Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture: Advertising's Impact on American Character and Culture

by Berger, Arthur Asa

• ISBN13: 9780742500310
• ISBN10: 0742500314
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-08-01
• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Pub Inc

Summary

Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture is an engaging cultural studies critique of advertising and its impacts on American society. Arthur Asa Berger looks at marketing strategies, sex and advertising, consumer culture, political advertising, and communication theory and process to give an accessible overview of advertising in America. He explores how advertising works and how society does or doesn't respond to it, and he gives two detailed interpretations of ads to offer readers step-by-step frameworks for decoding print ads and television commercials. Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture is an engaging cultural studies critique of advertising and its impacts on American society. Arthur Asa Berger looks at marketing strategies, sex and advertising, consumer culture, political advertising, and communication theory and process to give an accessible overview of advertising in America. He explores how advertising works and how society does or doesn't respond to it, and he gives two detailed interpretations of ads to offer readers step-by-step frameworks for decoding print ads

Author Biography

Arthur Asa Berger is professor of broadcast and electronic communication arts at San Francisco State University.

Table of Contents

Preface: I Stink, Therefore I Am	xi
Acknowledgments	xv
Advertising in American Society	1	(20)
Advertising as a Puzzlement	1	(3)
Defining Advertising	4	(6)
A Psycho-Cultural Perspective on Advertising	10	(1)
Running It Up a Flagpole to See If Anyone Salutes	11	(1)
Commercials as Mini-Dramas and Works of Art	12	(4)
Teleculture	16	(1)
Conclusion	17	(4)
Consumer Cultures	21	(12)
A Cultural Critique of Advertising	21	(2)
Consumer Cultures Defined	23	(2)
Consumer Culture and Privatism	25	(1)
Neiman Marcus and ``Couthification''	26	(2)
Needs Are Finite, Desires Are Infinite	28	(1)
Mimetic Desire	29	(4)
Advertising and the Communication Process	33	(12)
The Lasswell Formula	33	(1)
Focal Points and the Study of Media	34	(2)
The Lasswell Formula and Focal Points	36	(1)
A Problem with the Lasswell Formula	37	(3)
Johnny Q. Public's Daily Media Diet	40	(1)
Television Viewing and Exposure to Commercials	41	(1)
Our All-Consuming Passion for Consuming	42	(1)
The Price We Pay for ``Free'' Television	43	(2)
Running It Up a Flagpole to See If Anyone Salutes	45	(12)
Tiffany's Morning: A Fiction	45	(1)
The Illusion of Control	46	(3)
Being a ``Branded'' Individual	49	(1)
Selling Oneself	50	(1)
The Problem of Self-Alienation	51	(2)
We Can Choose as We Please, But Can We Please as We Please?	53	(4)
Sexuality and Advertising	57	(12)
Sex in Advertising	57	(2)
The Peach That Became a Prune: A Cautionary Fable	59	(2)
The Pseudo-Poetic Appeal to the Illiterati	61	(2)
Sex Sells Cigarettes	63	(1)
The Case of Joe Camel	63	(2)
Sex and the Problem of Clutter	65	(4)
Political Advertising	69	(12)
Kinds of Political Advertisements	71	(2)
The 1998 California Primary: A ``Virtual'' Campaign for Governor	73	(1)
``Experience Money Can't Buy.''	73	(1)
Questions Raised by the ``Virtual'' Campaign	74	(2)
The Code of the Commercial (and Other Political Advertising)	76	(2)
The Death of the Tobacco Bill	78	(3)
The Marketing Society	81	(22)
Statistics on Advertising	81	(1)
More Comments on the Illusion of Freedom	82	(1)
The Marketing View	83	(1)
The VALS 1 Typology	84	(3)
Using the VALS 1 Typology: A Case Study	87	(1)
VALS 2: A Revision of the VALS 1 Typology	88	(2)
Zip Codes and Kinds of Consumers	90	(2)
Magazine Choice as an Indicator of Consumer Taste	92	(2)
Types of Teenage Consumers	94	(2)
A Typology for Everyone in the World	96	(3)
A Comparison of the Different Typologies	99	(1)
A Conclusion in the Form of a Question	100	(3)
Analyzing Print Advertisements or: Six Ways of Looking at a Fidji Perfume Advertisement	103	(16)
Lotman's Contributions to Understanding Texts	103	(1)
What's There to Analyze in an Advertisement?	104	(2)
Analyzing the Fidji Ad	106	(1)
A Semiotic Interpretation of the Fidji Advertisement	107	(2)
A Psychoanalytic Interpretation of the Fidji Advertisement	109	(3)
A Sociological Interpretation of the Fidji Advertisement	112	(1)
A Marxist Interpretation of the Fidji Advertisement	113	(1)
The Myth Model and the Fidji Advertisement	114	(2)
A Feminist Interpretation of the Fidji Advertisement	116	(1)
Conclusion	117	(2)
Analyzing Television Commercials	119	(20)
The Macintosh ``1984'' Commercial
Analyzing Television Commercials	119	(2)
A Synopsis of the Text	121	(2)
The Background	123	(1)
George Orwell's 1984 and Ridley Scott's ``1984''	124	(1)
The Image of the Total Institution	125	(1)
The Prisoners' Boots	125	(1)
The Blond as Symbol	126	(1)
The Brainwashing Scenario	127	(1)
The Big Brother Figure	127	(1)
The Brainwasher's Message	128	(1)
The Big Explosion	129	(1)
The Inmates' Response	130	(1)
The Macintosh Announcement	130	(1)
The Heroine as Mythic Figure	130	(2)
Psychoanalytic Aspects of the Commercial	132	(1)
The Blond as Mediator	132	(1)
Alienated Proles	133	(1)
The Big Blue	134	(1)
A Clever Marketing Strategy	135	(1)
The ``1984'' Commercial and a Bit of Scholarly Research	136	(3)
Glossary	139	(18)
Bibliography	157	(4)
Index	161	(6)
About the Author	167