Women of Color Participating in Personal Advertising: Dating, Mating, and Relating in a “Post” Racial, Gendered, and Modern Society

Abstract

Purpose – Using a framework of intersectionality, this chapter makes visible the realities of women of color who try to form relationships through the use of personal advertising.Methodological/approach – A discursive analysis of race and social class in personal ads using Phrase Tokens, and in-depth interviews with 14 women of color who participated in various forms of personal advertising, present the synergism of race and racism, sex and sexism, and sexuality and heteronormativity, and how these systems continue to pervade interpersonal relations.Finding – Patterns found in both texts and narratives illustrate how establishing relationships among women who are members of heterogeneous collectivities continues to be located in systems of inequality. These data also illustrate how ad placers are unique individuals whose markers of race, class, gender, and sex identity, produce commonalities, yet how their narratives reflect diverse goals, experiences, and responses to those experiences. Women of color convey how personal advertising remains rooted in modern society where people choose their individual affiliations and continue to be defined by their group affiliations.Originality/value of chapter – Though the structural factors and social processes involved in personal advertising are relevant to the formation of interpersonal and social relationships, the phenomenon of personal advertising as a form of courtship has received relatively little attention by sociologists. In rethinking the intersections of race, gender, and social class in personal advertising this chapter includes participants’ voices to more fully understand the motivations for personal advertising, how women ‘do’ identity, and how they experience personal advertising.

Citation

Anne Quiroz, P. (2013), "Women of Color Participating in Personal Advertising: Dating, Mating, and Relating in a “Post” Racial, Gendered, and Modern Society", Kohlman, M.H., Krieg, D.B. and Dickerson, B.J. (Ed.) Notions of Family: Intersectional Perspectives (Advances in Gender Research, Vol. 17), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 49-66. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1529-2126(2013)0000017006