Bio: Jillian Klean Zwilling is an assistant professor at Governors State University. Her work is primarily concerned with women’s health and advertising.
Abstract:
The Lehn and Fink Company advertised the Lysol douche as a multi-purpose product for the home and personal care in the U.S. starting in 1912. However, the “family limitation” Lysol advertised was not officially for sale in the U.S. during the Comstock Era. While the mention of birth control in the 1920s would have been considered immoral, many women were able to read through the euphemistic ads which promised a better life with “family limitation.” Aspirational images of youthful women, secure in their marriages, with adorable and well-cared for children, illuminate the changing cultural conventions that paved the way for women to attempt to take more control of their fertility, but also demonstrate how women were also harmed by and deceived by advertising that promised an aspirational life. This article will examine the interlocking facets related to the Lysol douche to explore how the confluence of time and social factors resulted in the advertising of a household chemical and dangerous carcinogen as a douche, and also explore the rhetorical strategies employed by the advertisers of these products as an especially important question to the study of advertising to women and mothers.
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