THE DRAPERS: MAD MEN AND THE PURSUIT OF THE WHITE AMERICAN DREAM ǀ Armando García
According to Larry Grossberg
(2005), “The media have become an inseparable part of people’s lives, of their
sense of who they are, and of their sense of history”. We use the media as a
sort of looking glass through which our real life is filtered and served to us
in easy to digest pieces. It turns the greyish tones of reality into blacks and
whites. Media is a cultural creation and therefore reflects the social context
of the times its content was produced. It is through a process called
cultivation by which audiences are conditioned to view the world the way it is
represented in the media.
Mad Men premiered on July 19th
2007 and is currently on its sixth season. The show is broadcasted on AMC home
of another other critically well received show, Breaking Bad. Created by Matthew Weiner, the show explores the
lives of a successful New York advertising agency Sterling Cooper and its
creative director Donald Draper, played by John Hamm during the 1960s. The show
displays Mr. Draper’s personal and professional life during the ever changing
times America faced in the 60s. Mad Men can be enjoyed through several
different media platforms besides the regular cable network, for it is readily
available on iTunes and other media outlets.
The show has received a total of fifteen Emmys and four Golden Globes as
well as ranking 6th on TV
Guides, The 60 Greatest Dramas of All Time. It is through this text that we
will implement deconstructive critical theory in order to understand Mad Men’s view on The American Dream and
the way it represents it as an exclusively white ideology and an ideal
representation of U.S Culture.
One doesn’t have to look further
than the opening credits of the show to understand the main ideology that goes
on throughout the series. The title sequence portrays the silhouette of a man
(possibly Don Draper) falling amidst a sea of 60s advertisements and posters.
The show, much like the main characters, indulges itself on American
consumerism. According to Saussure these images that are shown to us during the
opening credits symbolize American culture’s obsession for consumer products.
In fact, during the pilot episode of the show titled "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes", Don meets up with Sally Menken, the owner of a department store. The sole purpose of this meeting is to help her boost her sales and improve her image to equal that of Chanel. Like a church serves as a symbol for religious beliefs (be it Christian, catholic, etc.), the department store can be seen as the modern church of consumerism. A large building that holds that beliefs of American societies within its walls. Accompanied by the echoes of cash registers one can almost hear the choir sing “Spend more, be more. Buying is what defines you”.
It is through the constant
client meetings that are shown throughout the series that we begin to
understand the importance that American Consumerism has not only on the
American industry, but on the lives of the men working for Sterling Cooper. Don
Draper and his colleagues would not be able to enjoy their fine suits and their
well-aged whisky without them. The different companies that walk into the
Sterling Cooper meeting room to hear Don Draper’s sales pitches serve as signifiers for American consumerism (the
signified). However, consumerism has
its roots firmly planted on a much larger ideological system that permeates
American culture: The American Dream.
Donald Draper is the main
character of our show; he is a successful white male in his 40s however, he was
not born into a world of privilege. Draper represents the American Dream, a western ideology that states that “if you work
hard enough, you will succeed”. Mad Men
uses the character of Don Draper to promote and cultivate the previous ideology
into the audience. Gerbner calls this process Mainstreaming by which “heavy viewing may absorb or override
differences in perspectives and behavior” (Bryant, 2012, Pg.112). One way it
presents this is by contrasting Draper with another character from the show,
Pete Campbell. Campbell is an account executive for Sterling Cooper who comes
from a privileged background. In contrast, Draper is simply an assumed
identity; his real name is Richard Whitman. His mother a 22 year old prostitute
died while giving birth to him. He later on lived in a farm with his father
(whom he hated) and fought during the Korean War. Donald Draper as a symbol
serves to represent the ideal American, grown from humble roots and a patriot.
The executive Superman (who was also a farm boy that later moved to the city).
We can use Levi-Strauss’ Mythemes in order to classify Drapers
life story as the following, “boy goes
from rags to riches”. Campbell was born into his position and role in
society, Draper had to earn it. In the viewer’s mind Campbell is less deserving
of being a part of Sterling Cooper (and in the process our sympathy) because he
did not have to work to attain his current social status. However, through
cultivation and mainstreaming audiences begin to sympathize with Donald Draper,
as a man who has “suffered” enough and has therefore been labeled worthy of his
current social status by that very audience.
We must also understand that the
men working as ad men at Sterling Cooper are all white (or have some sort of
European descent), there are no African American characters (Unless one counts
the sandwich guy) on the show. Trying to make the show as historically accurate
while being set in the 60s is one thing, but the lack of an African American character in the shows main cast can be seen as
stereotyping, which helps to support “the audience’s collective consciousness a
character’s preconceived value systems and behavioral expectations” (Wilson,
2003 pg.) Therefore Mad Men
reinforces the idea that The American
Dream is an exclusive to hard working white men. Does the same apply to
women?
Let us deconstruct Don Draper’s
wife, Betty. She is a typical 1960’s housewife. She stays at home and takes
care of her kids; all while smoking and gossiping with the other housewives
that live around the neighborhood. She lacks ambition (aside from hosting house
parties) and is clueless of her husband’s affairs with other women (Women that
are smarter and more independent than her). Just like we previously talked
about the stereotypical portrayal of black characters on the show, we can tell
that Betty is also a stereotype. She is there to act as a symbol for the ideal woman. Betty Draper represents the
collection of desired characteristics that the patriarchal U.S Culture seeks to
promote amongst its women.
Stephanie Coontz (2010) states
that “She is a woman who thinks a redecorated living room, a brief affair or a
new husband might fill the emptiness inside her, and her attempts to appear the
perfect wife render her incapable of fully knowing her children or even her
successive husbands”. The writers even go as far as to introduce us to a single
mother, Helen Bishop as a symbol for the “modern woman”. Betty and the other
women critique her as if she were some kind of freak. There is no sense of
independence on Betty behalf, her happiness fully dependent on her marriage and
her husband’s professional life. We therefore can understand the shows
portrayal of women in the U.S as being favorable towards married women. “Women are nothing without their man” is
what the show is trying to teach us. Betty even suffers from psychosomatic
numbness in her hands when thinking of her husband’s affairs with other women.
Now, is this is a reaction to her crumbling marriage? Or are these constant
periods of numbness a reaction towards the fear of losing social and economic
security by losing Don?
Using Marxist Critical Theory
one can define the role of women in U.S Culture as being valuable for their Sign-Exchange Value, which means “the
social status it confers on its owner” (Tyson, 2006, Pg. 62). To put it simply,
Betty is Don’s arm candy. There is nothing she can offer him intellectually,
but because of her youthful looks (even after giving birth to two children) she
has become some sort of medal to wear on his chest for the world to see. She is
his trophy wife. Just like his job Don has earned her. However, Donald Draper
is also being used by Betty. He is her passage to a better life, a respectable
life as a mother and wife. Don and Betty are in a process that Marxist theory
calls commodification which is when “the
act of relating to objects or persons in terms of their exchange value or
sign-exchange value” (Tyson, 2006, Pg.62). Marriage is no longer seen as
institution (as some churches would say), in the world of Mad Men marriage is seen as an investment.
Mad Men not only showcase
the exploits and pitfalls of 1960s advertising, but at its very core help to
exemplify and promote the ideal American life. A world in which through hard
work a man can achieve anything, the only requirements needed are to be white,
have a beautiful wife and are willing to showcase their wealth. The Drapers
might be a typical American family, but they are a symbol of times past, and a
constant remainder of Americas desire to return to the good old days. Where white men and women could thrive economically
without being threatened by alternative styles of life in their office and
their homes, a place where all that was needed to be happy was spend some
money. For Don Draper it’s all about selling the dream, the dream of a better
rest, a better shave, a better traveling experience. For the show it’s all
about the American Dream.
ARMANDO GARCÍA. Adicto anónimo a la televisión, cual James Woods en Videodrome. Siempre buscando aquella nueva serie que llene el vacío existencial que le dejo la despedida de Buffy de la pantalla chica.
BIBLIOGRAFÍA
Bryant, Jennings (2012). Fundamentals of Media Effects. Waveland.
USA
Coontz, Stephanie (2010). Why
Mad Men is TV’s most feminist show. The Washington Post. Published October
10th 2010. Taken on June 6th 2013 from
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/08/AR2010100802662.html>
Grossberg, Larry (2005) MediaMaking: Mass Media in a Popular Culture.
SAGE Publications. USA
Tyson, Lois (2006) Critical Theory Today. Routledge. USA.
Weiner, Matthew (Creator) (2007)
Mad Men. United States: Lionsgate
Television.
Wilson II, Clint C. (2003) Racism, Sexism, and the Media. SAGE
Publications. USA
