Being Female: From

Photo-edited to
Natural Beauty
Bethany Ross
A feminist perspective on Aerie Real, a new campaign by American Eagles sister
company that has girls re-thinking the old media approach of photo editing and air
brushing to make models look flawless. Young girls are joining with Aerie to fight
for natural beauty in the media.

Professor Hains
Com 206-01
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Introduction

Growing up as a female in a predominantly man-made world is a difficult situation because of

the social implications that accompany being a female. Young girls have to go through their fair share of

problems growing up. From eating disorders to learning how to stand up, the life of a young girl is that

of a struggle to find a voice to speak up in this male world. During adolescence one of the most

important things for young women to do is to become comfortable in their own bodies. The age

between 15 and 21 is when young girls are starting to fill out their bodies, and grow from girls into

young women. This change can be scary, as well as confusing and the normal lingerie ads are less than

helpful in promoting confidence during this change.

One of the things that changes as we grow from girls to young women is not only what we wear,

but also whats under what we wear. One of the things that give us confidence is how we look, and even

though people would argue that no one else sees whats under what we wear, the point is that we see

it, and if we feel good in it, it shows in our self-confidence. Self-confidence is one of the most important

things in growing up. Girls need to be aware of how they feel about themselves because confidence

allows you to feel better about yourself and be able to approach situations in a better way. Aerie, the

sister lingerie store of American Eagle Outfitters, is trying to prove that if you feel beautiful naturally,

you will boost your self-confidence, helping young girls grow up with confidence that shines naturally.

I will be looking at my paper from a feminist perspective because I feel that it is important to put

my own opinions about young girls and their ideas of the media within the paper to strengthen the

argument of media changing young girls perspectives of themselves. I feel that personal ideas will

influence my paper in a direction that will help people better understand the struggles of what its like

to find yourself and your voice as a young girl who is influenced by todays media. I also believe that it is

important to note the oppression of young girls while they are trying to find themselves at a young age.

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The oppression begins with young girls being shown how they should look instead of being able to gain

self-confidence on their own as they grow. The Aerie advertisement campaign is showing young girls

that it is okay to be yourself, as well as showing real beauty without the help of photo correction

software. This is the beginning of the end of oppressing young girls negative thoughts of themselves

due to photo corrected softwares expectation of beauty.

In my analysis of the American Eagle Aerie Advertisement I found the SEARCH acronym designed

by Media and Society textbook by OShaughnessy and Stadler which is used to explain the social roles of

the media and what media texts are seen as social issues and social differences or ways of categorizing

people into social groups (OShaughnessy 38-39). The SEARCH Acronym is important because it better

explains the way society is structured into social classes and social differences. This is helpful when

analyzing social issues that fit within the confines of the acronym. I will be looking at the S in SEARCH

which stands for sex, as well as the A which stands for age.

Description of Media Text

A. Commercial History

Aerie, the sister company of American Eagle Outfitters, launched a new advertising campaign late

January of this year called the REAL beauty campaign. The purpose of the campaign is to reach out to

the companys demographic, 15-21 year old girls, in the hopes of changing the idea of beauty being

photo edited supermodels to the natural beauty of everyday girls. The campaign was launched on

January 17, 2014 on Good Morning America, a popular news morning program based out of New York

City, New York. The advertisement campaign is aiming at slightly changing the media perspective on

retouching models. One of the new Aerie Real models even spoke out the E! News about how she felt

being a part of the campaign, claiming that the campaign forced her to come face-to-face with any little

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body insecurities she might have, and seeing the unretouched photos she realized, Oh. That's not as big

of a deal as I thought it was (Popp).

Although this advertising campaign has made a lot of progress in the past few months after being

launched, it is important to remember that there is still a long way for the advertising media world to

come before the idea of photo edited beauty is removed from the minds of young girls. The advertising

world has a long way before all of the other companies stop promoting photo edited advertisements,

but Aerie has aided the path for other companies to join them. It will be interesting to see what

companies follow in Aeries footsteps.

B. Description of Text

In the spring of 2014, Aerie, the American Eagle Outfitters sister lingerie store launched an

advertisement campaign called the REAL which portrays models untouched and naturally beautiful. The

company claims they are challenging supermodel standards by featuring unretouched models in their

latest collection of bras, undies and apparel (Krupnick)." This advertisement campaign is important to

show girls that they are naturally beautiful without any retouches or photo editing. One of the most

important things to note about this campaign is who the demographic is for the target audience. Aeries

market is primarily the 15-21 year old girls who are struggling to find themselves, as well as find their

self-confidence as they grow from girls, into young women.

One of the advertisements gaining the most attention is one that has a note that says Dear

Aerie Girls, We think its time for a change. We think its time to GET REAL and THINK REAL. We want

every girl to feel good about who they are and what they look like inside and out. This means NO MORE

RETOUCHING OUR GIRLS AND NO MORE SUPERMODELS. Why? Because there is no reason to retouch

beauty. We think THE REAL YOU IS SEXY. Xoxo, Aerie. Other ads include messages such as the girl in

this photo has not been retouched. The real you is sexy and Time to get real, time to think real. It is

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important to note that there are many advertisements in this campaign that all have the same message:

the real you is sexy, beautiful, and YOU. This is an important point to make because of how young the

demographic of the company is, in order to show the real beauty, the company has removed retouching

from their advertisements. The importance of this advertising campaign is not lost, but does need to be

followed by other companies willing to make a sacrifice for real beauty.

Another important fact about the Aerie Real campaign is that Aerie has completely reinvented

their website in order to follow suit with the campaign. When shopping for a bra on the website, girls

are shown actual models wearing the size bra they are shopping for; this mean actually seeing what the

bra looks like on someone who has that size breasts! This is something new that doesnt seem like a big

deal, but to young girls who are used to seeing their bra size displayed on a model much larger than

them; it is revolutionary to think about just how far the company went to prove theyre following their

advertising campaign in everything they do. The amount of time and money that was put into the new

website and the new models goes to show just how far the company is willing to go to reinvent societys

idea of beauty from photo edited to natural beauty.

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C. Figure: Image(s) Representing Text

Aerie Real Campaign http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/17/aerie-unretouched-ads-photos_n_4618139.html

The company Aerie has created a new advertising campaign that was launched late January this year

called the Real Campaign. The purpose of the campaign is to slightly alter the image of what beauty

should be. The campaign promotes real beauty instead of using photo editing software and air brushing

techniques. The ad shown above is one of the advertisements from the campaign showing what Aerie

wishes girls to see- that the real you is sexy.

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D. Rationale: Why This Text?

I believe that we are living in a world where we are looking up to the wrong people, and if we

were able to see more examples of people standing up to societys idea of beauty, that we would live in

a world where we would be happier as being imperfect. Aerie has created a scenario where young girls

are able to see media instances where the models are not air brushed or retouched, but still look

beautiful. The point of the advertisements in this campaign are to make young girls have a higher level

of self-confidence, and be able to love themselves as they are; without any retouching or photo editing

software. I chose this advertisement because it was not only a great way for young girls to boost their

confidence levels, but also because it was part of not only a larger advertising campaign, but also a

larger movement that young girls can follow as they grow. This movement is one that will help them

gain self-confidence and the motivation to change the way the media portrays beauty into a more

realistic expectation of young girls.

I feel that in analyzing this advertisement and campaign, I was able to get a glimpse of what the

future could hold for media and advertising. If young girls can change the way the media portrays

beauty, future generations of girls will be able to modify the confidence levels of young girls and help

make the world of advertising and media into a place of self-confidence. Many young girls have been

influenced by this campaign, and I felt it was important to help spread the word about a company that is

striving for a better future for the young girls growing up in the world today while also giving them the

self-confidence they need to grow from girls into young women.

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Analysis of Media Text

The Aerie Real campaign is proving to young girls that they dont have to be edited or air

brushed in order to be beautiful in the eyes of society. The media portrays girls as flawless and beautiful

because they dont have any marks or blemishes due to editing software. From a feminist perspective, it

is important for girls to gain self-confidence in order to end female oppression in the media and in

society. If more companies follow suit with Aerie in campaigning for natural beauty, over time the

medias idea of beauty could be slightly changed to fit a new model of natural beauty.

The American Eagle sister company, Aerie, has proven to be one of the companies campaigning

for young womens self-confidence. The new campaign, Aerie Real has allowed young girls to see

through the medias interpretation of beauty in todays society. The demographic of the company is

young girls between the ages of 15 and 21 which is the most impressionable age where young girls are

being influenced heavily by women in the media. One of the most important things about this age

demographic is how easily they are influenced in the media. The media is todays society heavily relies

on photo editing software and air brushing. By using tools such as these to alter the images of models,

the media is essentially teaching girls that they have to be perfect in every way in order to be considered

beautiful in the eyes of society and the media.

Aerie has begun to make young girls question the advertisements of other campaigns that are

using models that are heavily air brushed and altered using photo editing software. It is an amazing idea

that Aerie has to make young girls more self-confident growing up in a world that tells them each day

that they have to be perfect by the standards of the media. The media in todays society portrays the

perception of beauty as super thin, perfect body, hair, teeth, and make-up, and while the Aerie models

still wear make-up, it is unrealistic to think that young girls arent going to wear make-up in the world

we live in today. It is important to remember that while Aerie has begun this path to acceptance of

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natural beauty, there is still a long way to go in order to boost the self-confidence of the young girls in

the 15-21 demographic of Aeries target audience.

It is important that there are more campaigns that follow the idea of the Aerie Real in order to

end the oppression of young girls in the media. As long as there are more campaigns following this idea,

there is a chance that the media can be changed to better suit the growth of young women. I believe

that from a feminist perspective, this is important because there are many young girls who do not grow

up with the level of self-confidence they should have because natural beauty is being oppressed by the

confines of the media in todays society. There are many young girls who would be better off in life if

they were given the self-confidence they deserved from the media. The perception of beauty that the

media is portraying is a negative part of society in which young girls confidence is being oppressed by

the way the media is portraying beauty.

As I stated earlier, the SEARCH acronym is an important part of analyzing this campaign because

it helps explain the social circumstances that make these campaigns successful. Many young girls

struggle growing up because of how society in todays world has oppressed the voice of women growing

up. The SEARCH acronym that has been created will aid the argument for how hard it is growing up as a

young girl in todays society, and how the oppression of the female voice has a negative impact on

society. The S in SEARCH stands for sex or gender, which is important because boys grow up with

many different lessons, ideas and structures than girls do. When comparing young girls growing up

against young boys, this portion of the SEARCH acronym is the most important to look at in terms of the

way society is structured. Young girls are often seen as having low self-confidence due to the oppression

of real beauty in advertising. It is important to show that many young girls are introduced to the world

of beauty as being a place where no matter how beautiful you seem; you are photo edited until you look

flawless like every other advertisement in the media.

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Another important thing to look at is the A in SEARCH which stand for age. This is also

important because girls at different ages are portrayed in different ways. Younger girls are more likely

influenced by the media, and more likely to have problems finding themselves. Age is also important to

consider when looking at how girls think about themselves; generally at a younger age girls will have less

self-confidence. As girls get older, they are often seen as having more self-confidence because they are

growing up seeing how importance confidence is once they enter the real world. Young girls are often

less confident because many advertisements are photoshopped and show what a women should look

like in the eyes of the media. The women in advertisements are often flawless due to excessive photo

corrections. Girls grow up seeing these perfect images, and think that because they dont look like that,

they arent pretty in the eyes of others.

The media should be focusing on promoting self-confidence in young girls, but from a feminist

perspective young girls are being oppressed by the media because the media is afraid of the power of

young individuals with self-confidence to change the media, and the way society is run. The media is

scared that if young girls are able to speak up for themselves, there will be less advertising that uses girls

in super model thin bodies, with photo editing software in order to portray a sense of beauty.

The age demographic in which Aerie is targeting are the young women at the age where they

are most influenced by women they see in the media and advertisements. Although this advertisement

campaign will not change how young girls view themselves, this is certainly a step in the right direction.

If more companies jump on the idea of changing young girls perceptions of natural beauty, society may

be able to eventually change the negative shadow the media has placed over being you.

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Conclusion

From a feminist perspective, many young girls who would be better off in life if they were given

the self-confidence they deserved from the media. Young girls should be given the opportunity to grow

into young women with the confidence given to them by outside resources, one of the resources being

the media. In todays society, the media are portraying models as flawless and air brushed through

photo editing. As beautiful as these models are, it is unrealistic to believe that all girls look like that. It

seems as though the problem in self-confidence comes from knowing young girls are not as flawless as

those models. If more companies such as Aerie worked on campaigns like Aerie Real, making the models

real and showing off natural beauty, young girls would feel more confident with themselves.

Young girls between the ages of 15 and 21, which is the demographic of Aerie, are the most

impressionable ages where girls are growing into young women, and looking to raise their self-

confidence level. Its important for young girls to be able to see models in the media that portray natural

beauty that is achievable for them as well because it gives them a sense on self-confidence that helps

young women grow. Aerie is one of the companies that is traveling leaps and bounds trying to help girls

grow into young women, allowing them to feel confident in their own bodies.

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Resources

Aerie (2014). Our Most Amazing Bra Ever. Retrieved from

http://www.ae.com/aerie/guides/aeriereal.jsp?catId=cat6890055

Krupnick, Ellie (2014). Aeries Untouched Ads Challenge Supermodel Standards For Young Women.
Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/17/aerie-unretouched-ads-
photos_n_4618139.html

OShaughnessy and Jane Stadler (2012). Media and Society: An Introduction. South Melbourne.

Popp, Emily (2014). Aerie Model Speaks Out About Airbrushing. Retrieved from
http://www.eonline.com/news/502281/aerie-model-speaks-out-about-airbrushng-everything-that-is-
on-our-bodies-is-unretouched-

PRNewswire (2014). Aerie Press Release. Retrieved from http://www.prnewswire.com/news-

releases/intimates-line-aerie-gets-real-unveils-aerie-real-spring-2014-campaign-featuring-unretouched-
models-challenging-supermodel-standards-240777281.html

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