Peddling a semiotics of fear: a critical examination of scare tactics and commercial strategies in public health promotion

This study critically examines the ways in which the nationwide Diabetes UK/Tesco public health promotion campaign (2013-2014) sought to raise awareness of Type 2 diabetes. Conducting a multimodal critical discourse analysis of six campaign images, we identify the presence of fear-inducing, stigmatising and commercial strategies, through which the campaign emphasises the dangers of diabetes and advocates personal responsibility for assessing both individual and others’ risk of the disease. Specifically, three discursive techniques are deployed in this campaign to achieve these ends: (1) the depiction of grief and amplification of diabetes-related danger, (2) the promotion of diabetes risk and responsibilization of individuals for their health, and (3) the commercial branding and framing of the Diabetes UK/Tesco partnership as providing tools for diabetes prevention and management. Our findings raise concerns about the moral legitimacy of using fear-inducing and commercial strategies in public health campaigns, strategies which do little to address the environmental factors which are associated with increasing rates of the disease

Reading Meaning through the Visual Images: Social Semiotic Approach to TELL Magazine in Nigeria.

Several studies have been carried out on verbal communication but with the  recent  trends  and  development of communication in conveyance of meaning, the  importance  of  the  cover-pages  of  news  magazine  in the  print media deserves to be given attention. Hence, the employment of social semiotic approach of Kress and Van Leeuwen (2006)’s Multimodal Discourse Analysis to four selected editions of TELL magazine. The purpose is to present a shift from the usual study of visuals in line with the semantic indicators to an examination of visual images in isolation. The research brought to the conclusion that the visual images such as pictorials, colour, signs, posture, distance and symbols go a long way to convey meaning in print media especially, news magazines that need to attract the attention of the public. Keywords: Advertisement, media, multimodal, images and context. 

Politics, power and ideology in American comedy late night talk shows: A critical discourse analysis

There appears to be a new trend in transferring political issues through late night talk shows (LNTSs). The President of the United States, Barack Obama, displayed different types of power relations and political ideologies during the interviews despite the comedic nature of LNTSs. Although studies have been done on the relation between LNTSs and political discourse, only a limited number of studies have looked at theportrayal of power in LNTSs. The purpose of this study is to investigate Obama's bases of power, his power relations and his use of deixis to present his political ideologies in the two American LNTSs; The Late Show with David Letterman and The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. This study focuses on Obama's portrayal of power in his political discourse (PD) using critical discourse analyses (CDA) approachthat incorporates multimodal aspects. The study analyzes Obama's linguistic and gestural variables in the transcripts collected through interviews in the two shows. The analysis of the linguistic data applies the systemic functional linguistics approach (SFL) while the analysis of the gestural ones is done inassociation with eclectic models of non-verbal behaviors.This study has revealed the different bases of power which Obama used in his PD, the influence tactics and the types of power relations which he employed in relation to the shows’ hosts; David Letterman and Jay Leno. The study has also identified the personal, temporal and spatial deixis which Obama used to present his ideologies on domestic and international politics.The study conceptualizes frameworks in which power and ideology in PD can fit into a non-traditional context such as LNTSs in order to transfer political information to a much wider audience

Constructing ideal body appearance for women: a multimodal analysis of a TV advertisement

Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Comunicação e Expressão. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Letras/Inglês e Literatura CorrespondenteThe multi-semiotic representations enacted by advertising disclose the world views in and through which it is created and consumed. Messages of gender promoting female body insecurity are strategically explored in advertisements to support diverse branches of body alteration industry including pharmaceutics. Thus, a discursive-semiotic content analysis of the national version of a 30-second television advertisement for Xenical, a prescription weight-management drug, is developed with a focus on the multimodal aspects of the dynamic displays of meaning-making resources. The key objective of this study is to carry out a critical examination of discursive-semiotic construction of gender identities, social relations and representations on the basis of the contextual and textual features of the film text. The dynamic unfolding of the images constituting the TV advertisement is based on a model of multimodal transcription of film genre proposed by Baldry & Thibault (2006) in which the visual configuration is divided into phases and organized according to the chronological sequence of the film and then aligned with its verbal information. At the micro level of visual analysis, the representational, interactional and compositional meanings of each shot are taken into account in line with the multimodal semiotic approach proposed by Kress and van Leeuven (1996; 2006). Similarly, the lexicogrammatical analysis of the verbal information/ utterances in the film is carried out in line with the tri-functional conceptualization of meaning proposed by Halliday (1994) and Halliday & Mathiessen, (2004). At the macro level, the contextual features are analyzed drawing upon principles of critical discourse analysis (Fairclough, 2003). The complex metafunctional interpretation of the structures of meaning indicates how visual and verbal meaning-making resources are expertly combined in order to produce, maintain and sustain ideological gender messages reinforcing social inequalities. As representações multi-semióticas oriundas da propaganda revelam as visões do mundo nas quais e através das quais a mesma é criada e consumida. Menssagens relacionadas ao gênero social que produzem inseguranças no corpo feminino são estrategicamente exploradas por comerciais com o objetivo de sustentarem diversos ramos da indústria de modificação do corpo incluindo o setor farmacêutico. Assim sendo, nesta tese desenvolve-se uma análise semiótica-discursiva do conteúdo de uma versão nacional de 30 segundos de uma propaganda de TV promovendo o medicamento Xenical, utilizado para o controle de peso, tendo em vista os aspectos multimodais da representação dinâmica dos recursos que compõem o significado do texto como um todo. O objetivo deste estudo consiste em promover uma investigação crítica envolvendo a construção semiótica-discursiva das identidades de gênero, suas relações e representações baseada em fatores textuais e contextuais de um texto sob o formato de filme. A investigação da dinâmica por das imagens de tal propaganda foi baseada em um modelo multimodal de transcrição de filme proposto por Baldry & Thibault (2006) no qual a formatação textual foi dividida em fases organizadas de acordo com a seqüência cronológica para a seguir serem alinhadas com as respectivas informações verbais. No que concerne a análise visual das fases, foi considerado o método semiótico multimodal proposto por by Kress e van Leeuven (1996; 2006). A análise lexicogramatical das informações verbais e das falas contidas no filme foi igualmente desenvolvida de acordo com o conceito tri-funcional de significado proposto por Halliday (1994) e Halliday & Mathiessen, (2004). Por sua vez, os aspectos contextuais são também examinados conforme os princípios de análise crítica do discurso (Fairclough, 2003). A complexa interpretação metafuncional deste tipo de texto indica como os recursos visuais e verbais são astutamente combinados para continuarem produzindo, mantendo e sustentando mensagens ideológicas em relação a gênero social as quais reforçam as desigualdades sociais

The Corporation as Person and Psychopath: Multimodal Metaphor, Rhetoric and Resistance

This article conducts a detailed analysis of multimodal metaphor in the documentary film The Corporation, with particular focus on the metaphor the corporation is a person. The metaphors that make up the film are analysed within the immediate context of the rhetorical structure of the film, the discursive context of the use of the corporation is a person metaphor by corporations to gain power, and the background context of the corporation is a person as a ubiquitous conceptual metaphor in everyday cognition. The metaphors in the film are then compared with other multimodal metaphors from two protest videos. The article can be thought of as Positive Discourse Analysis, in that the use of metaphors in the film and videos is held up as an example of how multimodal media can be used to resist hegemonic discourses that harm people and the environment. A practical aim of the analysis is to reveal the detailed workings of the metaphors in order to provide resources that can be drawn on in the construction of effective materials for challenging hegemonic constructions of the corporation in the future

Promoting Vices : An introduction to research on the advertising of coercive products

This book provides an introduction to the study of advertising products that jurisdictions typically regulate due to their potential harmfulness to health and well-being. Examples come from studies on the advertising of alcohol, tobacco, sugary foods, and gambling. It maps the most usual dilemma formulations and approaches employed by researchers. It addresses the subject also from the perspectives of new mediatized life, merged genres, synchronized communication technologies, and fuzzy borders between producers and consumers of commercial messages. The book suggests four problematization foci that the research has typically concerned: content, effect, vulnerable groups, and, policy. It portrays a research field that is underpinned by notions of the harmful effects caused by marketing and of the relevance of pointing out this circumstance in order to achieve a political change. After each chapter the book summarizes some take-home messages. It concludes by providing recommendations to researchers who want to take on tasks in this area of research.Peer reviewe

Coca-Cola vs. Obesity. Visual communication in CSR advertising and legitimacy management

Objective of the study: This study aimed to analyze how the Coca-Cola Company, the leading beverage brand in the United States, used multimodality to legitimize its position in an anti-obesity advertisement named Coming Together, and how Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), a public health advocate group, used a parody version of the same advertisement to illegitimate the company. The more specific focus was given on how the advertisement and the parody perceive legitimacy and in which ways they are building or questioning it. Methodology and the Analytical Framework: The study utilized a theoretical framework combining legitimacy and CSR advertising theories. The framework considers legitimacy to be the ultimate goal of CSR, and indicates how legitimacy has an influence on what kind of responsibilities the companies should address. In addition, it focuses on advertising of corporate social initiatives, such as the Coming Together campaign, and discusses the different factors influencing on consumer scepticism. The data of the study, two videos, was analysed with the qualitative methods of systemic functional multimodal discourse analysis, since it enabled to reveal the socio-political connections of the videos instead of focusing only on their content. Findings and Conclusions: The main findings of the study revealed that the Coca-Cola Company aimed to build procedural legitimacy in its Coming Together advertisement by embracing concrete actions, which they believed to be in line with the general perception of accurate methods to support healthy habits. By focusing on these actions, it shifted the attention from the obesity issue as such, and aimed to diminish the linkage between obesity and its beverages altogether by framing the beverages to be part of a healthy and active everyday life. The parody version's perspective on legitimacy was fundamentally different in comparison to the original version. Instead of criticising the represented actions as such, CSPI focused on questioning the structural legitimacy of the company by pointing out issues that can decrease the moral support of the public. With this perspective, it framed the Coca-Cola Company to be a hypocritical organization that only aims to increase its own sales with the advertisement

Discourse and Digital Practices

Discourse and Digital Practices shows how tools from discourse analysis can be used to help us understand new communication practices associated with digital media, from video gaming and social networking to apps and photo sharing. This cutting-edge book: draws together fourteen eminent scholars in the field including James Paul Gee, David Barton, Ilana Snyder, Phil Benson, Victoria Carrington, Guy Merchant, Camilla Vasquez, Neil Selwyn and Rodney Jones answers the central question: "How does discourse analysis enable us to understand digital practices?" addresses a different type of digital media in each chapter demonstrates how digital practices and the associated new technologies challenge discourse analysts to adapt traditional analytic tools and formulate new theories and methodologies examines digital practices from a wide variety of approaches including textual analysis, conversation analysis, interactional sociolinguistics, multimodal discourse analysis, object ethnography, geosemiotics, and critical discourse analysis. Discourse and Digital Practices will be of interest to advanced students studying courses on digital literacies or language and digital practices