2025/06/09 by Singh, Neetu, Chakraborty, Niketa
#Aestheticization marketing #Beauty culture #Body image #Cosmetic advertising #Cosmetics #Cultural appropriation #Embodiment #Glamour #Hollywood #Women’s Liberation
paper · doi:10.34630/e-rei.vi13.6307
The concept of idealized beauty standards has fascinated women for centuries, making them pursue unrealistic standards of beauty augured by cultural messages and images promoted by a variety of sources. This research studies the anthropological perspectives of manufactured beauty standards since the late 19th and early 20th century, which have received scant attention in marketing research. Guided by the perspective of gendered subjectivity of manufactured beauty standards, this research shifts the narrative from beauty as a mere consumption practise towards attributing women's perspective of beauty to patriarchal regimes of body and the degree of agency determining personal choice. The research focusses on the study, practice, and actual meaning of beauty in day-to-day life through historical perspectives since the late 19th century, leading toward the formulation of the ideal body image, introduction of cosmetics, and the changing faces of cosmetic marking amidst a backdrop of cultural, economic and political changes by the early 20th century. Data for this research has been collected and analysed from various literary sources, like books, publications, journals, and Internet archives to understand the role of print magazines, advertisements, and Hollywood culture influencing 2 the advent and spread of cosmetics through marketing during this era. The findings indicate that the middle-class rise in consumer culture created opportunities for beauty and fashion industries, which created a commercial mass media perpetuated "beauty culture," projecting beauty and fashion as representations and sold to women consumers as tangible goods and services.