Women have figured prominently in televised campaign ads since presidential political spots debuted in 1952. In "Sixteen Million Cracks: Women in TV Campaign Ads, from 1952 to Hillary," historian and Eisenberg Institute visiting scholar Liette Gidlow explores the discursive gender politics of campaign advertising for the American presidency from the early Cold War, through the feminist second wave, to the conservative ascendancy. How did campaign ads represent women over time, and what legacy did they leave for candidate Clinton? The talk will include a screening of select ads, some of which survive only in archives.

Liette Gidlow (PhD, Cornell University) is an associate professor of history at Wayne State University in Detroit. A specialist in twentieth-century US politics, women's history, and consumer culture, she has published two books: The Big Vote, which analyzes how massive, non-partisan voter turnout campaigns in the 1920s helped establish new norms of "expert citizenship" and "consumer citizenship"; and Obama, Clinton, Palin, a collection of essays by top-ranking historians that takes the long view on the historic 2008 presidential election.