Semiology is a useful tool in the analysis of media texts and allows the deeper layers of meaning to be revealed. According to Rayner, Wall and Kruger “semiology is an attempt to create a science of the study of sign systems and their role in the construction and reconstruction of meaning in media texts” (Image Analysis, 2004). The text that will be analysed is advertisement for PETA featuring Pamela Anderson, which aims to sell an ideology of beauty and femininity, as well as sexual empowerment through self-objectification (see appendix for image). This essay will analyse the chosen text through the use of semiology. The essay will analyse the connotations, denotations and myth of the text among other elements. The text is part of a campaign promoting vegetarianism, created by the animal rights advocacy group PETA, featuring actress and model Pamela Anderson in a two-piece swimsuit. Anderson is posing is seated on a flat surface with her legs bent at the knee, leaning back slightly on her hands and pushing her chest out. Her facial expression is sultry and seductive. Dotted lines have been painted on her body, dividing it into sections which are labelled with what the corresponding cut of meat would be called. The anchorage of the text reads: “All animals have the same parts. Have a heart, go vegetarian”. An anchorage is the caption on a text that “anchors” the preferred meaning of an image (Chandler, 2013). This text similar to other campaigns that PETA have created, nearly all of which feature nude or scantily-clad female celebrities who are sometimes posed with baby animals. In contrast, the male celebrities that feature in their campaigns are seldom nude. If they are, it is almost always from the waist up. This is common i... ... middle of paper ... ...con.com/seo/I/ideology.html# Lazar, M. M. (2013). The Right to Be Beautiful: Postfeminist Identity and Consumer Beauty Advertising. In R. Gill, & C. Scharff, New Femininities: Postfeminism, Neoliberalism and Subjectivity (pp. 37-51). Basingstroke: Palgrave Macmillan. New Zealand Ministry of Education . (2013). Codes and Conventions . Retrieved from Teaching Media Studies : http://media-studies.tki.org.nz/Teaching-media-studies/Media-concepts/Codes-and-conventions Rayner, P., Wall, P., & Kruger, S. (2004). Image Analysis. In P. Rayner, P. Wall, & S. Kruger, AS Media Studies: The Essential Introduction (2nd ed., p. 4). London: Routledge. Sommers, C. H. (1994). Who Stole Feminism? How Women Betrayed Women. New York: Simon and Schuster. Sturken, M., & Cartwright , L. (2004). Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture. London: Oxford University Press.
Almost everything about the ASPCA’s commercial is specifically made to make us feel and act a certain way. Everything from the time the show is aired, what channel it is aired on, and even the kind of music playing in the background is all targeted to a specific audience. In the case of the ASPCA commercial the audience that is being targeted is fairly wide, anyone who has a soft spot for animals or seems to be sensitive in general would definitely stop and think about donating money to the cause. This commercial also had a version that aired during the holiday sea...
First, Kilbourne’s research should be praised tremendously for bringing to light the unhealthy impression of true beauty in today’s culture. Kilbourne challenges the audience to reconsider their viewpoints on advertising that is sublime with sexual language. The evolution of advertising and product placement has drastically changed the real meaning of being a woman. According to the movie, every American is exposed to hundreds and thousands of advertisements each day. Furthermore, the picture of an “ideal women” in magazines, commercials, and billboards are a product of numerous computer retouching and cosmetics. Media creates a false and unrealistic sense of how women should be viewing themselves. Instead of being praised for their femininity and prowess, women are turned into objects. This can be detrimental to a society filled with girls that are brainwashed to strive to achieve this unrealistic look of beauty.
Advertisements across the globe are becoming more and more violent. In a recent PETA ad, it depicts a naked woman with a meat diagram on her, as seen on pigs and cows. In this ad it reads “ALL ANIMALS have the same parts. Have a heart. Go vegetarian.” This ad is degrading towards a woman because the advertisement is directly comparing her to an animal. PETA is taking their advertisements to a whole new level in the wrong direction. In society people do not consider themselves animals. In fact, being called an animal is an insult to many people. For PETA to comment that this woman is an ...
In a society dominated by visual activity it is not uncommon to be faced with images
The documentary Killing Us Softly 4 discusses and examines the role of women in advertisements and the effects of the ads throughout history. The film begins by inspecting a variety of old ads. The speaker, Jean Kilbourne, then discusses and dissects each ad describing the messages of the advertisements and the subliminal meanings they evoke. The commercials from the past and now differ in some respects but they still suggest the same messages. These messages include but are not limited to the following: women are sexual objects, physical appearance is everything, and women are naturally inferior then men. Kilbourne discusses that because individuals are surrounded by media and advertisements everywhere they go, that these messages become real attitudes and mindsets in men and women. Women believe they must achieve a level of beauty similar to models they see in magazines and television commercials. On the other hand, men expect real women to have the same characteristics and look as beautiful as the women pictured in ads. However, even though women may diet and exercise, the reality...
People tend to views an image based on how society say it should be they tend to interpret the image on those assumption, but never their own assumptions. Susan Bordo and John Berger writes’ an argumentative essay in relation to how viewing images have an effect on the way we interpret images. Moreover, these arguments come into union to show what society plants into our minds acts itself out when viewing pictures. Both Susan Bordo and John Berger shows that based on assumptions this is what causes us to perceive an image in a certain way. Learning assumption plays into our everyday lives and both authors bring them into reality.
Yuval-Davis. Who's Afraid of Feminism? Ed. Ann Oakley and Juliet Mitchell. New York: The New Press, 1997.
Advertisements are all over the place. Whether they are on TV, radio, or in a magazine, there is no way that you can escape them. They all have their target audience who they have specifically designed the ad for. And of course they are selling their product. This is a multi billion dollar industry and the advertiser’s study all the ways that they can attract the person’s attention. One way that is used the most and is in some ways very controversial is use of sex to sell products. For me to analyze this advertisement I used the rhetorical triangle, as well as ethos, pathos, and logos.
PETA released a poster featuring actress, and former model, Pamela Anderson, wearing a skimpy bikini; with her body parts marked, as they would be were she an animal (Appendix 3). The advertisement is meant to promote vegetarianism by arguing that animals and women have the same parts, but it seems as though it is only aimed towards heterosexual men. This brings about the concept of metaphorical sexual butchering, which Adams proposes as something that “silently invokes the violent act of animal slaughter while reinforcing raped women’s senses of themselves as “pieces of meat”” (Adams, 69.2). Ironically, this is not dissimilar to the image of a woman used on Adams’ cover for The Sexual Politics of Meat (Appendix 1), which actually aims to criticize the issue of women being a metaphor for
Hartley, John (2002), Communication, Cultural and Media Studies: The Key Concepts, London, Routledge, pp. 19-21.
Advertisement has been around many years that it become part of our daily life, we see it everywhere from TVs, schools, even driving in the middle of the town with billboard every corner of the street. However, most of us are not aware of the negative impact it has on our lives. Documentary killing us Softly 4 from Jean Kilbourne reveals on how the multibillion advertisement industry uses women’s beauty to sell their product. Meanwhile, downgrading the women’s place in the society. The documentary shows how most of the images are computer generated and not real sometimes photos are from three different women, those images give false hope to women it promises them an image that doesn’t exit and most importantly, it tells women they are not beautiful.
Nussbaum, Felicity. “Risky Business: Feminism Now and Then.” Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature 26.1 (Spring 2007): 81-86. JSTOR. Web. 11 Mar. 2014.
‘Semiology provides the analyst with a conceptual toolkit for approaching sign systems systematically in order to discover how they produce meaning’ (Bawer et. all, 2000: 227). Advertising is one of the typically elements used for a convincing presentation product or service to the buyer or user. Advertising provides the link between products or service and people. To be efficient, it must correspond to products and to be relevant for people, expressing and sustaining competitive advantages. My image appears in Glamour, a specialized publication for women, which cultural context is gender, thus providing a greater degree of authority and the intention is to promote the reputation and sales of the perfume. The image is a collection of signs, these signs may include paradigmatic and systematic elements such as the name of the perfume, the fonts used, the colors or the women which appears with an green apple in her hand. ‘The goal of semiotics in the study of advertising is, ultimately, to unmask the arrays of hidden meanings in the underlying level, which form what can be called signification systems’ (Beasley et.all, 2002: 20). It is obvious that in the interpretation of an image controversies can arise and the meaning could be different from person to person due to the cultural level or ways of image analysis, because the reader approaches an image from a personal ideological perspective. Here we can say that the link between signified and signifier is essential. Signifier, is the particular te...
· James Curran & Michael Gurevitch: (2000): Arnold Publishers “Mass Media And Society: Third Edition”
Curran, James & Michael Gurevitch (eds.) (1991): Mass Media and Society. London: Edward Arnold Dyer, Richard (ed.) (1981): Coronation Street. London: British Film Institute