We Are What We Sell: How Advertising Shapes American Life...And Always Has

Danielle Coombs and Bob Batchelor are currently soliciting brief proposals (title and synopsis) for essays to be included in an upcoming three-volume collection/anthology of essays (under contract to Praeger/ABC-CLIO). The essays will focus on American advertising, history, and popular culture. The chapters below provide direction on a given topic, but individual authors may adapt them to fit their research interests. Also, there may be room for related topics.

Final essays will be about 4,000- to 5,000-words (may be slightly longer, with editors approval) in length and will be due August 15, 2012.

A kind of Mad Men-inspired anthology, We Are What We Sell examines the development of advertising and its influence on popular culture, politics, and the economy in the twentieth century. Beginning in the early 1900s, the collection reveals how advertising played a critical role in establishing a consumer culture in the United States. Before long, advertising functioned not only as a means of selling goods to an eager public, but served as a way of embedding and fueling the notion of the American Dream. While some critics decried advertising’s ability to persuade consumers to buy products and services, others viewed the profession as a way to educate and expand the public’s knowledge of the items it consumed. The three volumes will be arranged chronologically, so each essay in a given volume should primarily focus on the era that the volume covers chronologically.

Please send a note to Danielle Coombs and Bob Batchelor that expresses your interest and includes the chapter title you are interested in, a brief synopsis of your approach, and a CV to Danielle (dcoombs@kent.edu). The editors will send a style guide and further information to authors after assignment.

Table of Contents:

Volume One
Creating Advertising Culture: Beginnings to the 1930s
7.
Make Me Beautiful: Cosmetics for America
10.
Keeping Consumers Clean: Ivory Soap
11.
Snapshots of Life: Selling Kodak
15.
Brand Characters: Quaker Oats
17.
Radio Ads in the 1930s
18.
Agricultural Advertising
22.
Advertising Underwear in the Early 20th Century
23.
Kellogg Advertising in the Great Depression

Volume Two
Advertising at the Center of Popular Culture: 1930-1975
1.
Building the Consumer Culture: Post World War II
2.
Early Television Advertising
4.
Magazine Advertising
5.
Billboards
7.
Reassessing the “Golden Age” of Advertising
11.
Clairol: New and Improved Attitudes
13.
Please Don’t Squeeze the Charmin
16.
Eisenhower and Political Advertising
18.
Dancing Hot Dogs and Popcorn: Movie Theater Ads in the 1950s
20.
McDonald’s in the 1940s and 1950s
23.
The Big Draw: Advertising in Promoting Concerts, Sporting Events, and Games

Volume Three
Advertising in the Contemporary Age
2.
Where’s the Beef: A Trip through 1980s Advertising Stars
6.
The Super Bowl and Advertising
15.
Coke’s Enduring Legacy
16.
Dot.coms and Dot.bombs: Selling the Web
19.
Joe Camel
21.
Celebrity Endorsements
23.
Bringing Vice Back to TV: Selling Alcohol
26.
Built Army Tough: The Evolution of Military Advertising