ASY1 Media Studies C1SA Tide Language and Representation

1. A Level Media
Studies
Component 1
Section A
Advertising & Marketing
Media Language & Representation
Introduction to Advertising
Case Study: Tide

2. Genre conventions of
advertising?
 Write down 3 genre conventions of advertising on a
post it note and stick it to the board.

3. Comparison of adverts
 You have been given a collection of adverts.
 Can you tell when each one was made?
 Can you put them into a chronological order?

11. Comparison of adverts
How could you tell how old they were?
 Different technical qualities (B&W, colour,
cartoon, photo, photoshopped images
 Different appearances (fashion, make up)
 Different values or “ideologies” (e.g. attitudes
to gender)

12. What do women want?
 Write down 2 suggestions on a post it note and
stick it to the board.
This
?

13. A Level Media
Studies
Component 1
Section A
Advertising & Marketing
Media Language & Representation
Introduction to Advertising
Case Study: Tide
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUPx
DOG-YGRD17PjKAqpDUjfLxEtbBm7u

14. A Level Media
Studies
When do you think that this
advert was produced?
Why?

15. Tide:
Product Context
Designed specifically for heavy-duty, machine
cleaning, Procter & Gamble launched Tide in
1946 and it quickly became the brand leader in
America, a position it maintains today.
The D’Arcy Masius Benton & Bowles (DMB&B)
advertising agency handled P&G’s accounts
throughout the 1950s. Its campaigns for Tide
referred explicitly to P&G because their market
research showed that consumers had high
levels of confidence in the company.
Uniquely, DMB&B used print and radio
advertising campaigns concurrently in order to
quickly build audience familiarity with the brand.
Both media forms used the “housewife”
character and the ideology that its customers
“loved” and “adored” Tide.

16. Tide:
Historical Context
 The post-WWII consumer
boom of the 1950s included the
rapid development of new
technologies for the home,
designed to make domestic
chores easier.
 Vacuum cleaners, fridge-
freezers, microwave ovens and
washing machines all become
desirable products for the
1950s consumer.
 Products linked to these new
technologies also developed
during this time, for example,
washing powder.

17. Tide:
Cultural Context
 Print adverts from the 1950s
conventionally used more copy
(written text) than we’re used to
seeing today.
 Consumer culture was in its early
stages of development and, with
so many ‘new’ brands and
products entering markets,
potential customers typically
needed more information about
them than a modern audience,
more used to advertising,
marketing and branding, might
need.

18. Tide
 Conduct a semiotic analysis of
Tide print advert – how does it
use media language; including
genre codes and conventions to
persuade/sell the product?
 Remember:
denotation/connotation
 Consider visual codes: colour,
costume, expression, gesture,
language, typography (font, etc),
layout

19. Tide
How does the text's use
of media language reflect
is production context?
Consider the following:
 1950s post war Consumer
boom – products such as washing
machines and powder are new to
the market
 New product launched
by established household
name Proctor and Gamble.

20. Tide
Z-line and a rough rule of thirds can
be applied to its composition.
Bright, primary colours connote the
positive associations the producers want
the audience to make with the product.
Headings, subheadings and slogans
are written in sans-serif font, connoting
an informal mode of address.
This is reinforced with the comic strip style
image in the bottom right-hand corner with
two women ‘talking’ about the product
using informal lexis (“sudsing whizz”).
The more ‘technical’ details of the product
are written in a serif font, connoting the
more ‘serious’ or ‘factual’ information that
the ‘1, 2, 3’ bullet point list includes.

21. Tide
 Conduct a semiotic analysis of
Tide print advert – how does it
use media language; including
genre codes and conventions to
persuade/sell the product?
 Remember:
denotation/connotation
 Consider visual codes: colour,
costume, expression, gesture,
language, typography (font, etc),
layout

22. Barthes’ Codes
 The Hermeneutic code?
 The Proairetic Code?
 The Semantic Code?
 The Symbolic Code?
 The Cultural Code?

23. Barthes’ Codes
 The Hermeneutic code (aka enigma code )- refers to any part of a
story that is not explained fully.
 The Proairetic Code (AKA action code) - refers to an action that
indicates something is going to happen.
 The Semantic Code - this is the connotation within the story that gives it
deeper meaning.
 The Symbolic Code – similar to semantic but acts at a wider level,
offering broader and deeper meanings.
 The Cultural Code (aka referential code)– something that can not be
challenged and is assumed by truth.
Which of these can you identify in the Tide advert?

24. Barthes’ Codes
 The Hermeneutic code?
 The Proairetic Code?
 The Semantic Code?
 The Symbolic Code?
 The Cultural Code?

25. Barthes’ Codes
 The Hermeneutic code?
 The Proairetic Code?
 The Semantic Code?
 The Symbolic Code?
 The Cultural Code?

26. Barthes’ Codes
Suspense is created through
the enigma of “what women
want” (Barthes’ Hermeneutic
Code) and emphasised by the
tension- building use of multiple
exclamation marks (Barthes’
Proairetic Code).

27. Barthes’ Codes
Barthes’ Semantic Code could
be applied to the use of hearts
above the main image. The
hearts and the woman’s
gesture codes have
connotations of love and
relationships. It’s connoted that
this is “what women want” (in
addition to clean laundry!).

28. Barthes’ Codes
Hyperbole and superlatives
(“Miracle”, “World’s cleanest
wash!”, “World’s whitest wash!”)
as well as tripling (“No
other...”) are used to oppose
the connoted superior cleaning
power of Tide to its competitors.

29. Barthes’ Codes
This Symbolic Code (Barthes)
was clearly successful as
Procter and Gamble’s
competitor products were
rapidly overtaken, making
Tide the brand leader by the
mid-1950s.

30. Representation

31. Tide Representation:
Social and Political Context
Women in the War.
During World War 2, women were required to
take up roles in the workforce traditionally done
by men, since the men were away fighting.
This meant, for the first time, women were being
encouraged to do ‘manly’ jobs, in factories, on
farms and elsewhere.
There was a huge recruitment drive to get
women to join the Women’s Land Army.

32. Tide Representation:
Social and Political Context
Women in the War.
The representations in these
adverts challenge stereotypical
views of women being confined to
the domestic sphere, something
society needed at the time as
traditional ‘male roles’ were
vacated as men left to fight.

33. Tide Representation:
Social and Political Context
Women in the War.
Representations of women at this time were mixed.
They needed to show women being strong and capable, in masculine roles.
But this needed to be balanced with maintaining their ‘feminine’ side, to
remain attractive for male approval.
Also, advertisers believed once the men returned from war, the women
would go back to their domestic roles. Women entering the workforce was
only expected to be temporary so the social attitudes towards women’s roles
did not change.
Further reading: http://scalar.usc.edu/students/rosie-the-riveter-
archive/rosie-the-riveter-original-wwii-poster?path=clorox-rosie-the-riveter-
advertisement

34. Rosie The
Riveter
This poster is an iconic symbol of
women at this time. The character
shown is known as “Rose The
Riveter” (actually a drawing of
Geraldine Doyle).
She is flexing her arm while wearing a
blue work shirt. She wears her hair up
in a red bandana. The top of the
poster states: “We Can Do It!” and the
bottom right corner of the poster
states “War Production Co-ordinating
Committee”.

35. Rosie The
Riveter
The image is multi-faceted, as it has
been used to empower women, or
inspire social and political
movements, as well as to promote
women as homemakers and
alternative views on the women's
movement.

36. Inspired by Rosie The Riveter
http://scalar.usc.edu/students/rosie-the-riveter-archive/index

37. Inspired by Rosie The Riveter
P!nk in music
video for
Raise your
glass

39. Tide Representation:
Social and Political Context
Women in the War.
In the 1950s, while men were
being targeted for the post-war
boom in America’s car industry,
women were the primary market
for the technologies and products
being developed for the home.
In advertising for these types of
texts, stereotypical
representations of domestic
perfection, caring for the family and
servitude to the ‘man of the house’
became linked to a more modern
need for speed, convenience and a
better standard of living than the
women experienced in the pre-war
era.

40. Tide Representation:
Social and Political Context
Women in the War.
Due to the plethora of new products
available to use around the house by
the 1930’s it was seen that women
were in charge of the ‘domestic’ side of
the house and that the budgeting of the
house fell to them.
This was reflected in the media and
advertisers from companies such as
Tide as they targeted women in their
adverts.
Advertisers used flattery to ‘hail women
as experts’ and housework gained a
‘higher status’.
Don’t forget women had been out
working in the fields and factories
during the War and so, the needed to
be ‘enticed’ back into the house.

41. Tide Representation
What parts of the ‘world’ (i.e. groups of people, places,
ideas, etc) are portrayed?
Are any of the representations stereotypical? Do they
go against stereotype in any way?
How is media language used to construct these
representations?
What aspects of reality have been selected and
omitted?
What values and beliefs (ideologies) are present
within the representation?
What factors do you think have impacted upon this
representation?
How does the texts social and cultural context impact
upon its construction?
How might we apply Stuart Hall's theory on
representation here?

42. Tide Representation
How might we apply Stuart Hall's theory on
representation here?
 Representation is the production of meaning
through language, with language defined in its
broadest sense as a system of signs
 The relationship between concepts and signs is
governed by codes
 Stereotyping, as a form of representation,
reduces people to a few simple characteristics
or traits
 Stereotyping tends to occur where there are
inequalities of power, as subordinate or excluded
groups are constructed as different or ‘other’ (e.g.
through ethnocentrism).
SUMMARY: Media language is used to create
representations. Stereotyping is often used to
assert power.

43. Tide & Identity
 When discussing advertising techniques we
talked about how advertisers try to link their
products with certain lifestyles and
personalities.
 How ever, it is often argued that media
products don’t just reflect our identities, but
they also shape them.

44. David Gauntlett
David Gauntlett is a British sociologist
and media theorist.
His earlier work concerned contemporary
media audiences, and has moved
towards a focus on the everyday making
and sharing of digital media and social
media, as well as the power of making in
general, and the role of these activities in
self-identity and building creative
cultures.

45. David Gauntlett
Gauntlett is credited with the following ideas
 ›the media provide us with ‘tools’ or resources that we
use to construct our identities
 ›whilst in the past the media tended to convey
singular, straightforward messages about ideal
types of male and female identities, the media today
offer us a more diverse range of stars, icons and
characters from whom we may pick and mix different
ideas.

46. Tide, David Gauntlett & Identity
 How can we apply
Gauntlett’s ideas on
identity to the Tide
advert?

47. Tide, David Gauntlett & Identity
 “What women want”