Jean Kilbourne is internationally recognized for her groundbreaking work on the image of women in advertising and for her critical studies of alcohol and tobacco advertising.
In the late 1960s, Jean began her exploration of the connection between advertising and several public health issues, including violence against women, eating disorders, and addiction, and launched a movement to promote media literacy as a way to prevent these problems. A radical and original idea at the time, this approach is now mainstream and an integral part of most prevention programs. According to Susan Faludi, “Jean Kilbourne’s work is pioneering and crucial to the dialogue of one of the most underexplored, yet most powerful, realms of American culture -advertising. We owe her a great debt.” Mary Pipher has called Kilbourne “our best, most compassionate teacher.”
“But many people do not fully realize that there are terrible consequences when people becoming things. …
“Our need for social and personal change and power is often co-opted and trivialized into an adolescent and self-centered kind of rebellion.”
