Advertising has long attempted to persuade us to turn to industrially produced answers to problems produced by industrial society
Can the real
dissatisfactions felt by people in our society be fixed by more mass production
and mass consumption?
This basic
contradiction Ðthe patently false promises we are repeatly subjected to--opens
ads up to criticism and mockery
-how long can we be fed the same fantasies and experience the same
disappointments?
To combat this
advertising fatigue, advertisers have increasingly tried to beat consumers to
the punch by making their ads ironic and self-critical
Today weÕll be
looking at what it means for advertisements to criticize themselves and
consumer society; and what the implications are for other forms of critique
As weÕll see,
irony can be used for a variety of purposes: although it is critical and even
judgmental, it isnÕt inherently radical
In the case of
advertisements, irony may be used to reaffirm our sense of rebelliousness and
individualism , while channeling our critical attitudes back into consumption
What is irony?
Irony is a form of
signification characterized by the fact that not everything is made explicit
-focus
on the implied meaning
-saying
one thing and meaning another
-potential
reversibility of meaning
-an evaluation is made, judgement is implied through ridicule and
mockery
Irony is a reading
position:
-I can make any image an ironic parody of itself; irony can also be
built into texts, implicitly including the reader in ridiculing a third party
Ads often promise
that with consumption will come love; this has long been an approach to selling
products
We can read such images ironically: how could a sweater or a dab of perfume or a car or a cigarette make anyone more lovable?
50s as a site of
happy consumerism is easy to mock
Ads are obviously
susceptible to ironic criticism because of their unrealistic, utopian promises
What is a marketer
to do?
Become
pre-emptively ironic
This pre-emptive
irony is a way of controlling the possibly critical response of members of the
audience
An ironic text
pre-empts this danger of criticism by using irony first; it attacks rather than
waiting to be victimized
Ads routinely draw
attention to their difference from other, more laughable ads
Quotation marks,
or a wink, are often enough to signal irony
Using a
recognizable style or form can be used as an ironic wink
All-Star Kola
(1940), Lucky Strike, Kamel pin-up (1998)
What is the
difference between these 40s pin-ups? The intervening 50 years; the feminist
movement that has made us question the use of womenÕs bodies as sites of
consumption
-the
Kamel ad resorts ironically to an outmoded style of sexism to use a womanÕs
body to sell a product
This knowing wink
interpellates or hails the reader as Òone of usÓ
Irony can thus
impart a sense of belonging, usually at someone elseÕs expense
The sense of
belonging is what ads have always tried to impart; only now it is done through
the wink of inclusion into a critical discursive community
This sense of
inclusion flatters us as individuals even though it is a form of mass
communication
Hierarchy is set
up between those who get it and those who donÕt
Ironic
objectification of women, through use of out-of-date style of representation
A similarly ironic
operation is underway where ads seem to criticize the promises of ads, without
criticizing the basic function of the consumer model
KelloggÕs Special
K ads attempt to harness to themselves womenÕs disgust with unrealistic images
of women promoted by advertisers
Where do these
standards come from? Special K was long marketed to women as a low-fat
breakfast; its trademark was supposed to represent a curvaceous woman with a
thin waist
Here we can see
that there are different ways of using irony to different ends
It all depends on
who is using it at whose expense
Bill Bernbach of Doyle Dane Bernback (DDB) invented honest, anti-advertising with his ground-breaking VW campaign of 1959, Òas style which,Ó as Tom Frank notes, Òharnessed public mistrust of consumerismÑperhaps the most powerful cultural tendency of the ageÑto consumerism itselfÓ (Frank 1997, 55)
VW ads used
peopleÕs skepticism about car advertisements and make it part of their selling
strategy
Graphically plain;
jokey tone; honest; respectful of readerÕs intelligence; trumpet their
anachronism; anti-obsolescence (suspicion of fashion); preconsumerist thrift;
self-reflexive (attentive to apparatus of advertising); anti-conformity
From Nazi
ÒpeopleÕs carÓ to Love bug (hip anti-consumerism) in a few short years
Articulate
signifier of car onto a whole new referent system
VWÕs
anti-advertising strategy was soon followed by others
Frank argues that
the youth counterculture of the 60s was fertile ground for the promises of
rebellious consumption
In a word,
marketers attempted to aquire the ineffable something that made objects in
youth culture cool
This was done by appropriating imagery associated with drug culture and youth culture and through the ironic criticism of advertising itself
Far from being the
antithesis of youth culture, consumerism made the shift from conformity to
individualism without much problem
ÒThe 1960s
counterculture seemed to have it all: the unconnectedness which would allow
consumers to indulge transitory whims; the irreverence that would allow them to
defy moral puritanism; and the contempt for established social rules that would
free them from the slow-moving, buttoned-down conformity of their abstemious
ancestors. In the counterculture, admen believed they had found both a perfect
model for consumer subjectivity, intelligent and at war with the conformist
past, and a cultural machine for turning disgust with consumerism into the very
fuel by which consumerism might be acceleratedÓ (Frank 1997, 119)
Today, such cool
ad strategies are very common; youth culture continues to be the leader in
fashion trends and the fate of brands often depends on how cool they are: which
means who is consuming them
In the lucrative
youth market, being cutting edge and making lots of money are in a conflictual
relationship: in order for something to be profitable, it must be sold in huge
numbers, but how can something be both mainstream and cutting edge?
We musnÕt confuse
an advertisers quest for cool or use of ironic criticism as anything radical:
theyÕre job is still to move product and if adopting the appearance of criticality
will attract more people to their brand, then more fools them
So why does this
hip, ironic consumerism work?
It taps into the
dissatisfaction with industrial society and consumer culture discussed by
Stewart Ewen: ÒNot only does hip consumerism recognize the alienation, boredom,
and disgust engendered by the demands of modern consumer society, but it makes
of those sentiments powerful imperatives of brand loyalty and accelerated
consumptionÓ (Frank 1997, 231)
These ads
ironically present consumption as the escape from the meaningless pursuit of
the image
-Sprite:
Image is nothing. Obey your taste.
Ultimate move in
hegemony: appropriate the cynicism and irony of the disaffected and bored
consumer
Adbusters produces
TV anti-ads that canÕt get played on TV
While critical
voices arenÕt allowed to buy time on TV, ads themselves become the only outlet
for the criticism of advertising messages
They thus
appropriate our own negative feelings about consumerism, mass standardization
and advertising and recuperate them for an advertising message
The truth is that
consumption canÕt make us rebels, even if we are appealed to as part of a cool
group or if a rhetorical style treats us like insiders by winking at us
Only not
consuming, or consuming thoughtfully, is a real threat to consumerism; short of
that marketers will find many ways to make us feel like we are sticking it to
the man by buying all his stuff