Semiotic Analysis of an advertisement campaign consisting of a series of adverts, or your selection of adverts on a theme or across a comparative period In this

essay I will be evaluating my findings for a semiotic analysis carried out on a series of adverts released in the 20th century, I will be discussing my findings in correlation to the methodology used while carrying out my assignment, concentrating on the gender politics expressed with in the adverts. A semiotic analysis was carried out for three Hoover adverts; I have chosen three printed ads that where published in the UK and US over 3 decades (40s, 50s, 60s). These ads have very iconic meanings as it shows the development of women in society with those four years, contrast of how women are portrayed post WW2 and in the age of the feminist movement around the western world are evident in the production of these ads. I wanted to explore the role of women in society and have they have changed and been challenged, how the media has used the development of social views of women and their part in society to there advantage and to what extend the medias portrayal of women has changed. The first advert is a printed advertisement for the brand Hoover that was published in the 1940s, it show a mother and daughter dressed the same with indicates that all daughters espier to there mother, they are both dressed in suitable cleaning wear which reflect housewives The mother observes as her daughter operates the Hoover, title reads Your New Hoover while the subtitle reads, Easy Cleaning is its middle name another image is shown of the daughter helping the mother convert the hoover to be used freely. At the top right hand corner it has a little text box titled Wartime Lesson the box contains a message to the reader. Its title indicates a post war century giving insight to the time and period of the advert. The second advert was printed in the 1950s for the same brand Hoover, this advert was published around the Christmas period, which is evident from the title; Christmas morning shell be happier with a hoover and symbols of Christmas are expressed through out the advertisement with a bows on the logo and the hoover, a good use of Christmas colours green and red. In the advert theres a female lying on the floor reading a Christmas gift note on a brand new red hoover (with the brand logo on it) this implies her powerlessness. She is wearing an elegant green and white dress, her hair is neatly tied with a green bow, and her nails are well manicured with soft pink polish and make up well applied. This reveals a soft elegance to the image. There are also small present visible in this image to reinforce the Christmas element to it. The last advert was printed in the 1960s; the title reads Hoovers incredible flying machine. The woman is wearing a pilots outfit, the style of the uniform indicates the time and period of the advert, and it also expresses the change in female roles in society, as a pilot was a male dominated job. The hoover logo is small but we are still aware of the advertiser. Unfortunately the text alongside the title is too small to see, the woman holds the hoover upright in a position, looking down at the camera again expressing a dominant nature.

All three images have the same characteristics and elements echoing through them, and its more than evident who their target market audience is; women there partners who will purchase the product for them. Its clear that these adverts arent just selling a product but they are selling an idea of happiness and perfect living along with feminine beauty (less household stress, leaves you more time to be beautiful). Each female who is presented in these images are effortlessly beautiful, simple make- up and hair, manicured nail and simple basic clothing, holding or touching the Hoover which highlighting the idea the product advertised is the reason these women look the way they do. By having each advert express how Easy the product is to use and how Happy one could by owing the Hoover the adverts gives an illusion of perfect life for the perfect house wife implying that a womens sole feelings of completion and happiness come from a happy with which can be achieved with a Hoover. One of the adverts even directs its attention the husbands advising if they want to keep their wife happy they should by her a Hoover. However even though happiness maybe the common selling point in all adverts this is not as clear in the third advert, the female pictured is not smiling, in fact she is looking down at the camera with a straight face, from her positioning and her stance I can see dominant element to this advertisement. At the time of the release of this advert the second wave of the feminist movement had started so instead of directing the advert at a typical housewife we can see the direct of this advert was aiming at the modern day independent female who can be career driving and busy outside the home, and through this new found independence happiness can still be found with a Hoover. Over the 30 years these ads where release we can see that main element encrypted with in the images havent changed, as it target audience hasnt, their main goal is to sell a product and the perfect lifestyle that comes along with it, aiming at the one thing every human wants happiness. Myth is a type if speech defined by its intention much more than by its literal senseand in spite of this, its intention is somehow frozen, purified, eternalized, made absent by this literal sense. This constituent ambiguity of mythical speech has two consequences for the signification, which henceforth appears both like a notification and like a statement of fact (bathes, 2000:124) Theorist Ronald Barthes author of the very influential academic book Mythologies believes that mythologies are used everyday in media to transform a preferred meaning/ reality into actually reality, turn ideas into facts. This is then consumed innocently, and incorporated into everyday life associations It is well-known that foam signifies luxury. Barthes, Mythologies. Semiotics is the study of signs and with in this study semiotics has been divided into stages of reading; denotation and connotation these terminologies describe the relationship between the signifier and its signified, the purpose of which is to read beyond the obvious image portrayed to audience and to decode a deeper encrypted meaning.

Denotation tends to describe the obvious or literal meaning presented Denotation of a representational visual image is what all viewers from any culture and at any time would recognize the image as depicting (Panofsky 1970a, 51-3) Connotation is then used to describe the sub-text within the images portrayed connotation, refers to the wider social and cultural meanings (Myths) attached to a sign. (Laughey, 2007, p.58) By using these two methodologies we are able to deconstruct the text and evaluate the cultural meanings and signs presented by discovering the relationship between the signs. Using this method to draw out meaning from the adverts I researched was very insightful. I used the semiotic method to analyse each advert carefully, I then took my findings for each element and elevated them in correlation with each other for each advert. After carefully analysing each of the three Hoover adverts chosen I took my findings for each of them and discuss the key signs echoing through all of them together, linking the join meanings and hidden sub-text through 3 decades of Hoover advertisement. meaning structures 1 refers to the encoder who attempts to insert his/her own intended meaning, which Hall describes Production, here, constructs the message (Hall, 1980: 129). Once the intended meaning is produced, it is then followed by the medium of discourse, but at a certain point, however, the broadcasting structures must yield encoded messages in the form of a meaningful discourse (Hall, 1980: 130). Analysing these adverts I can see that Hoover directs their adverts towards women, as they are their intended target market. They used mythologies of happiness and easy living to sell they products to female as they stereotype women and their desires. This is not simply to say that media products are just directed at women as a particular audience but that content and form, as well as aspects of delivery and distribution, accord with the nature of womens lives, social roles and wider cultural expectations or conventions and connotations of femininity (Long and Wall) These images use the representation of women in society to sell their products. The first two adverts researched we see a perfect female doing what is expected of her; a perfect housewife cleaning, looking pretty being a nurturer. This is what was perceived in the 20th century as being a female, Although my last image does imply some sort of change in the female attitude as this was published around the onset of the second wave feminism we still see her holding a Hoover, which implies that her roles and her position in society has totally changed as she is still required to look after her domestic environment.

While negative images of women abound across all media forms media products aimed at, consumed and enjoyed by women are especially limited. Thus, such approaches to media meanings evidence a concern with media effect or influence, for the way in which women are located in culture saturated with images that present a rather limited set of roles for women and ideas about women women learn from these, are thus socialised, and grow into the circumscribed roles available to thempresents women as cultural dupes, complicit in their own oppression through their consumption. (Long and wall) These adverts and most other, if not all-utility ads restrict females to their domestic roles. Stripping away any personal identity and knowledge one may have by representing them in such a stereotypical way, only focusing on images of women in the home. Conveying them as weak fragile being whose duties dont surpass the walls of their household, driven by beauty and sexual pleasure of their partners. As advertiser target women, their representation of them will remain; even to this day women are given domestic roles in advertisements. Betty Friedan says the feminine Mystique buried millions of American women alive, driving them to self- destruction. The feminine mystique has succeeded in burying millions of American women alive. There is no way for these women to break out of their comfortable concentration camps except by finally putting forth an effort that human effort which reaches beyond biology, beyond the narrow walls of home, to help shape the future.

Bibliography Long and wall (2009), Media Studies, texts, production and context. London Friedan, B. (1963) The Feminine Mystique. London: Penguin Books. http://www.advertisingarchives.co.uk/en/asset/show_zoom_window_popup.ht ml?asset=26583&location=grid&asset_list=35852,35851,32060,27494,27491,26 584,26583,26582,26405,26404,25856,25308,25243,25225,25223,25122,25112, 25103,25102,25101,22861,20857,7714,3315,3314&basket_item_id=undefined