All Over The Place Jean Kilbourne Analysis
Some people over look advertising; they consider ads the easiest way to draw in the attention of their audience. Advertising is so much more though. Ads contain controversial text, photos, and settings that are disregarded because of the culture we live in today. Advertising contains derogatory and controversial implications that are disregarded by the audience.
The ad I choose displays a muscular man, hoisting a beautiful woman over his shoulder. The setting takes place in what looks to be a house, with a modern style to it. The focus is aimed directly toward the connection the man and woman share. The man portrays a cheerful expression as he has a stunning young lady slung over his shoulder. He has his hands placed right below her butt in a usual …show more content…
way. The man is wearing some pale colored clothing along with a very classy watch. The woman he has slung over his back is dressed in an elegant silk blouse. Her expression looks as if she is laughing hysterically. Her arms are wrapped around his biceps in a sensual manner.
The essays you read in this unit will help you to analyze a variety of features common to many advertisements—erotic displays of the human figure, accounts that ascribe to mundane products the power to subvert the social order and transform lives, the ambiguous language that purposefully misleads (to name but a few).
And while the feature under scrutiny differs somewhat in each, all the essays note that advertisements do much more than merely sell merchandise. Indeed, in “In Your Face . . . All Over the Place,” Jean Kilbourne goes so far as to claim that “The unintended effects of advertising are far more important and far more difficult to measure than those effects that are intended. The important question is not ‘Does this ad sell the product?’ but rather ‘What else does this ad sell?’” (85). Just as this latter question informs the essays you will read, so should it help shape the one you write as you attempt to account fully for the rhetoric of the ad you examine. Please select one from a newspaper or magazine that contains graphics and a written text and analyze it according to the criteria that follow.
Graphics Describe features of the ad’s composition, layout, color, style, scale, and focus
that pertain to—that ultimately will help support—your thesis. What overall effect do these features convey? Language Offer observations about tone (does the ad use sentences or fragments? are they declarative, interrogative, or imperative? is the text humorous, somber, pretentious, hip, enigmatic?); about style (is the diction spare or ornate?); about length of text (this might offer insight into the ad’s intent: is its appeal primarily logical or emotional?); about use of figurative language, puns, double-entendre; and about use of “weasel words” (“help,” “new,” “like,” etc.).
(Again, select your observations carefully so that they clearly and effectively support your thesis.) What overall effect does this language convey?
Audience Specify in what publication the ad appeared, when, and in what context (does it appear amid other ads or amid copy that supports or contradicts it?—in the latter case, for instance, consider the tactic of a dessert ad that appears amid articles on dieting) and determine who you think is the target audience for this publication and ad. (Again, relate your observations to your thesis.) To what does the ad appeal: the audience’s financial status, social class, intellectual aspirations, sexual interests? Which of the audience’s values or vices does the ad seek to exploit in order to sell the product?
Argument Identify and evaluate the ad’s overall message/s by drawing upon your observations about the graphics, language, and audience. What explicit claims does the ad make about the product? Are these claims plausible and logical? What implicit assumptions does the ad make about the product, about the audience, and about the culture at large? Are these assumptions beneficial or harmful? What might the connections or discrepancies between these explicit claims and implicit assumptions tell us about the ad’s meaning overall? What events, trends, attitudes, beliefs, or stereotypes would help account for why this ad appeared when it did? And what insight into our culture might its appearance provide?
The above guideline seeks 1) to help you create an effective structure for your essay, and 2) to provide a set of questions to help you investigate the form, content, and cultural significance of your ad. By no means need you consider only this structure or these questions. If you discover a more suitable means of organizing your essay or can raise additional relevant questions to pursue, by all means do so. Still, you should not overlook these two requirements: 1) your essay must have a discernible structure (in general, this means that it must include an argument and effectively organize evidence that supports this argument), and 2) your essay must thoroughly explore your ad’s explicit and implicit messages and address its larger cultural significance (it must, in short, address the issues the underlined questions raise).
Remember that you are writing an essay and not simply responding to each section as you might on an exam. This means that you must consider the attitudes and beliefs of your audience
(members of this class and of the SDSU community at large), introduce your subject, analyze the form and content of the ad in the body paragraphs, and ultimately draw some conclusions about the cultural significance of the ad overall. Your essay should be 4-5 double-spaced, typed pages
(please use 12-point Times New Roman [or similar font]) and follow MLA style. It also must incorporate at least two quotes from the assigned readings—passages that help you to introduce or shape or support or extend your argument—and include a Works Cited (not included in the 5- page requirement). The first draft is due February 12; the revision, February 14; and the final,
February 26.
The ad I choose displays a muscular man, hoisting a beautiful woman over his shoulder. The setting takes place in what looks to be a house, with a modern style to it. The focus is aimed directly toward the connection the man and woman share. The man portrays a cheerful expression as he has a stunning young lady slung over his shoulder. He has his hands placed right below her butt in a usual …show more content…
way. The man is wearing some pale colored clothing along with a very classy watch. The woman he has slung over his back is dressed in an elegant silk blouse. Her expression looks as if she is laughing hysterically. Her arms are wrapped around his biceps in a sensual manner.
The essays you read in this unit will help you to analyze a variety of features common to many advertisements—erotic displays of the human figure, accounts that ascribe to mundane products the power to subvert the social order and transform lives, the ambiguous language that purposefully misleads (to name but a few).
And while the feature under scrutiny differs somewhat in each, all the essays note that advertisements do much more than merely sell merchandise. Indeed, in “In Your Face . . . All Over the Place,” Jean Kilbourne goes so far as to claim that “The unintended effects of advertising are far more important and far more difficult to measure than those effects that are intended. The important question is not ‘Does this ad sell the product?’ but rather ‘What else does this ad sell?’” (85). Just as this latter question informs the essays you will read, so should it help shape the one you write as you attempt to account fully for the rhetoric of the ad you examine. Please select one from a newspaper or magazine that contains graphics and a written text and analyze it according to the criteria that follow.
Graphics Describe features of the ad’s composition, layout, color, style, scale, and focus
that pertain to—that ultimately will help support—your thesis. What overall effect do these features convey? Language Offer observations about tone (does the ad use sentences or fragments? are they declarative, interrogative, or imperative? is the text humorous, somber, pretentious, hip, enigmatic?); about style (is the diction spare or ornate?); about length of text (this might offer insight into the ad’s intent: is its appeal primarily logical or emotional?); about use of figurative language, puns, double-entendre; and about use of “weasel words” (“help,” “new,” “like,” etc.).
(Again, select your observations carefully so that they clearly and effectively support your thesis.) What overall effect does this language convey?
Audience Specify in what publication the ad appeared, when, and in what context (does it appear amid other ads or amid copy that supports or contradicts it?—in the latter case, for instance, consider the tactic of a dessert ad that appears amid articles on dieting) and determine who you think is the target audience for this publication and ad. (Again, relate your observations to your thesis.) To what does the ad appeal: the audience’s financial status, social class, intellectual aspirations, sexual interests? Which of the audience’s values or vices does the ad seek to exploit in order to sell the product?
Argument Identify and evaluate the ad’s overall message/s by drawing upon your observations about the graphics, language, and audience. What explicit claims does the ad make about the product? Are these claims plausible and logical? What implicit assumptions does the ad make about the product, about the audience, and about the culture at large? Are these assumptions beneficial or harmful? What might the connections or discrepancies between these explicit claims and implicit assumptions tell us about the ad’s meaning overall? What events, trends, attitudes, beliefs, or stereotypes would help account for why this ad appeared when it did? And what insight into our culture might its appearance provide?
The above guideline seeks 1) to help you create an effective structure for your essay, and 2) to provide a set of questions to help you investigate the form, content, and cultural significance of your ad. By no means need you consider only this structure or these questions. If you discover a more suitable means of organizing your essay or can raise additional relevant questions to pursue, by all means do so. Still, you should not overlook these two requirements: 1) your essay must have a discernible structure (in general, this means that it must include an argument and effectively organize evidence that supports this argument), and 2) your essay must thoroughly explore your ad’s explicit and implicit messages and address its larger cultural significance (it must, in short, address the issues the underlined questions raise).
Remember that you are writing an essay and not simply responding to each section as you might on an exam. This means that you must consider the attitudes and beliefs of your audience
(members of this class and of the SDSU community at large), introduce your subject, analyze the form and content of the ad in the body paragraphs, and ultimately draw some conclusions about the cultural significance of the ad overall. Your essay should be 4-5 double-spaced, typed pages
(please use 12-point Times New Roman [or similar font]) and follow MLA style. It also must incorporate at least two quotes from the assigned readings—passages that help you to introduce or shape or support or extend your argument—and include a Works Cited (not included in the 5- page requirement). The first draft is due February 12; the revision, February 14; and the final,
February 26.