INDS-7012-01: Theory of Beauty: Winter 2016 research paper Advertising: for beauty or to sell? Ji Hae Kim 4/15/2016 Let’s look around the room that you are in right now. I am sure you see all kinds of products that lay around beside you. Can you try to pick anything that you haven’t seen or heard from media? It would be pretty difficult to pick one since we are surrounded by advertisements and every decision that we make on purchases are based on those advertisements. So, it’s safe to assume that we are hugely affected by media advertisements. Is it aesthetic perspective that move us to purchase a product or commercial perspective that encourages us to buy? In this essay, it will discuss history of advertising, how advertising is constructed and how it affects people on individual level and as a society. In order to analyze the purpose of advertising, we need to look at where advertising originated from. In the history of United States, it’s hard to remember days when advertisements were not around. However, it all started when Americans were worried about their dependency on imported products such as porcelain, furniture and musical instruments from Britain in 18th century(History matters, 1988). Buyers still needed descriptions of products before they decided to purchase products, so they verbally explained goods with persuasive tones Goods were not the only thing that were sold which included slaves(History matters, 1988). Even with the increase
In the essay Advertisements R Us, Melissa Rubin does a satisfactory job persuading readers who may not share the same view or analysis of the advertisement as her. Rubin does this by including plenty of historical context into her writing. This works by providing sound reasons and evidence to back up her analysis about what the ad was trying to do, which was to sell its product to the most profitable group of people
For the longest time now, advertising has played a huge role in how we identify ourselves in the United States with the American culture, and how others identify themselves with all the cultures of the rest of the world as well. It guides us in making everyday decisions, such as what items we definitely need to invest our money on, how to dress in-vogue, and what mindset we should have to prosper the most. Although advertising does help make life easier for most, at the same time it has negative affects on the people of society as well. Advertisement discreetly manipulates the beliefs, morals, and values of our culture, and it does so in a way that most of the time we don’t even realize it’s happened. In order to reach our main goal of
Throughout history, advertising has played a significant role in consumerism, politics, and much more. By the 1920’s it had developed into a major aspect of daily life for Americans, determining everything from their hygiene habits to their meals. Despite this having been almost one-hundred years ago, there are many similarities, but also many differences in the advertising industry today.
Kilbourne demonstrates three major main criticisms of advertising. First, advertising objectifies people and objects for the purpose of sales. This critique promotes products as more important than people and exploits human deeds and desires. Kilbourne offers ample evidence to support her first criticism of advertising. For example, Kilbourne examines advertisement such as the Thule car-rack - which humorously places more value on sports equipment been a child's life - is evidence of the trend that advertising is “objectif[ing] people…trivializ[ing and exploiting] our most heartfelt moments and relationships. Every emotion [,person, animal, and natural phenomenon] is used to sell us something” (Kilbourne, 2006, 369). Second - according to Kilbourne - advertising promotes and perpetuates the unnatural passion for products rather than personal relationship. “Advertising corrupts relationships and then offers us products, both as solace and as substitutes for the intimate human connection we all long for and need” (Kilbourne, 2006, 370). Within this concept, advertising also commits ‘cultural rape’ by manipulating sacred symbols for their utilization as emotional leverage in advertising. Third, advertisements damage the personality and structure of culture. For example the Giwch’in tribe’s traditional culture was almost erased by the introduction of advertising through television. “As multinational chains replace local character, we end up in a world in which everyone is Gapped and Starbucked…[Thus] rampant commercialism undermines our physical and psychological health, our environments and our civic life, and creates a toxic society” (Kilbourne, 2006, 371), which robs individuals of cultural and personal diversity. Based on the evidence presented by Kilbourne, I strongly agree with all three of these
In Chapter Seven of Practices of Looking, we start to explore in the ideas of advertising, consumer cultures and desire. Everyday, we are faced with advertisements through newspapers, magazines, TV, movies, billboards, public transportation such as buses and taxis, clothing, the internet, etc. Logos, such as signs, or anything that resemble a brand, are everywhere, they are on clothing, household items, electronics, cars, etc. Consumers are always showing off their brands and advertisements and we are used to seeing those brands and advertisements in an everyday setting. In modern media, advertisers are pressured to always change the ways they show off and get the attention to consumers, old and new. Advertisers also used present figures who were glamorous. Advertisements set up a certain relationship between the product and its meaning to sell the products and the hidden meaning we link to each of the products. Advertisements use the language of conversion. Advertisers try to create a customer relationship to the brand to try to form them as familiar, necessary, and also likeable.
The most dominant mass marketing technique known as advertising has become inevitable. Advertisements are everywhere in some form or fashion. Whether it is billboards, posters, fliers, or any other print media, advertisements are there fulfilling their purpose; in other words, they are breaking down the “tuning out” barrier. In the article, “Jesus is a Brand of Jeans” written by speaker, social theorist, and widely published writer, Jean Kilbourne, she expresses that we are all influenced by advertisements. She indicates that majority of the power of advertising originates from the mentality of believing advertisements have no effect on oneself. I agree with Kilbourne on the fact that advertising affects every individual.
While it is undeniable that advertising has invaded a number of segments in our lives, it is equally undeniable that the manner in which advertisers have tried to connect with viewers is highly variable and dependent on the presiding values of the culture in the specific time period, which the ad was released. Ads can either try to suggest that a specific product cultivates these desirable values or on the other hand they can attempt to suggest that people that already have these values will use these products. Throughout the course of this paper, three ads from three time periods; 1935-1940: Great Depression, 1941-1945: World War II, 1946-1960: Postwar, and their subsequent dominating historical events will be examined to determine how the
In this article, “Jesus is brand of Jeans,” by Jean Kilbourne, explores the world of advertisements and their effect on modern day consumers. She states that advertisements have a tendency to play on the emotions of people; attempting to convince the consumer to buy their products. As well as encouraging the thought of that objects will make us look better and make us whole. This is deceiving and a destructive way to look at life, as objects being just as important as people. Kilbourne explains this throughout her article with many examples and describes how ads affects us daily.
Advertisements can be defined as published papers or videos used to promote a product and to persuade customers to buy a certain product from a certain company. Whether people buy a product because of an advertisement or simply because of the brand, product sales have gone up ever since the firsts ads were seen around the 1920’s. While ads constantly use the same tactics to influence people, the tactics change based on the evolving society. For example, the 7 Up company have advertised their drinks since the 1930’s, but over time they have developed and adapted to the changing society.
Ads are inescapable, they are everywhere you look and have become even more readily available with new technology. How are these ads affecting us today? In the film Killing Us softly 4, Jean Kilbourne argues that advertisements sell not only products but also ideas and values to its onlookers. Let’s take a look at an ad that was created for the product Pepsi. In this ad a variety of ideas and values are being sold, not just the drink itself.
I believe that the role of advertising is to create desire in consumers, rather than needs. These desires need not reflect the needs of the consumers at all. While there are elements of advertising that do not explicitly create desire some advertising may create awareness, for example, the primary role that advertising plays in our society is to manufacture desire. This paper will make the case that the role of advertising is to create demand; it is not a reflection of demand.
Advertising has had a major impact on society. Some may be considered positive and some negative. Take a look around, advertisements are placed everywhere, television commercials, billboards, newspapers, and even on the sides of buses. Advertising is the basic form of marketing and trading throughout the world. Today’s society knows it as marketers trying to influence or persuade consumers into buying something. It also serves as a medium for services and businesses. There are many advertising strategies, but television commercials will always remain the number one strategy. Think about it, how much television is watched a day, probably a lot. What better way to advertise a product or service? Advertising has a positive effect on our economy. It does not only influence and persuade consumers, but it also benefits them in many ways. It also benefits manufacturers and their company, and the world as a whole.
Advertising has always been an important part of our society. The history of advertising can be traced to pre-modern history when it served an important purpose by allowing sellers to effectively compete with other merchants for the attention of clients in Ancient Egypt. From 1704 when the first newspaper advertisement was announced, it gradually grows into a major force in American society based primarily on newspapers and magazines (Ad Age Advertising Century, 1999). It not only helps to raise the target demographics’ awareness of issues, but also educate consumers with the benefits of the product. However, advertising cannot target a particular person before the emerging of World Wide Web.
Advertising is a persuasive communication attempt to change or reinforce one’s prior attitude that is predictable of future behavior. We are not born with the attitudes for which we hold toward various things in our environment. Instead, we learn our feelings of favorability or unfavorability through information about the object through advertising or direct experience with the object, or some combination of the two. Furthermore, the main aim of advertising is to ‘persuade’ to consumer in order to generate new markets for production.
Advertising is one of the channels of social communication. The system of social communication provides not only the preservation and rebroadcast achievements of culture and cultural norms and everyday practices, but it is also a crucial part of the process of inculturation personality which is essential to the processes of social development as a whole. An important event in the evolution of modern mass culture was the so-called “visual turn” resulting from the multimedia revolution of XX-XXI centuries.This revolution led to the dominance of visual cultural forms, including outdoor advertising as a mass phenomenon culture.