{"id":28064,"date":"2026-01-06T16:51:55","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T16:51:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/?p=28064"},"modified":"2026-01-06T16:51:55","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T16:51:55","slug":"from-sun-safety-to-sex-appeal-what-sunscreen-ads-reveal-about-beauty-ideals-and-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/education-languages-health\/from-sun-safety-to-sex-appeal-what-sunscreen-ads-reveal-about-beauty-ideals-and-power\/","title":{"rendered":"From sun safety to sex appeal: what sunscreen ads reveal about beauty ideals and\u00a0power"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Lauren Alex O’Hagan<\/a>, The Open University<\/a><\/em> and Lame M. Kenalemang-Palm<\/a>, Shanghai University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

In the depths of winter, sunscreen might not be top of many people\u2019s shopping lists. Yet it remains a staple in most households, and many of us are encouraged to use it year-round. But sunscreen\u2019s history reveals more than just protection from the sun.<\/p>\n

For decades, sunscreen<\/a> advertising has shaped beauty ideals, dictated how women\u2019s bodies should look and reinforced social norms.<\/p>\n

Our recent study<\/a> analyses historical and contemporary advertising campaigns and shows how these messages have endured, continuing to influence ideas about gender, health and personal responsibility. These messages are not only about safety or wellbeing, but about staying youthful, attractive and socially acceptable.<\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Main image:<\/strong> Armin Rimondi, Pexels.com<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lauren Alex O’Hagan, The Open University and Lame M. Kenalemang-Palm, Shanghai University In the depths of winter, sunscreen might not be top of many people\u2019s shopping lists. Yet it remains a staple in most households, and many of us are encouraged to use it year-round. But sunscreen\u2019s history reveals more than just protection from the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":28065,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,10,15],"tags":[2677,2676,1640,1643,2155],"class_list":["post-28064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education-languages-health","category-languages","category-society-politics","tag-adverts","tag-holidays","tag-ou-home","tag-ou-news","tag-sun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28064"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28064\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28066,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28064\/revisions\/28066"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}