新編大學(xué)英語第一冊unit11 Text A: What Advertising Does to Us

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UNIT 11 IN-CLASS READING; New College English (I)

What Advertising Does to Us

1 Advertising images are surely the most common art we see today. We have to go out of our way to see a good movie or a good painting, but advertising images are everywhere. We see them whether we want to or not, on billboards as we drive to work, on the walls of stores where we shop, in magazines and newspapers, on television, and on the products we use. We even get them in the mail. Everything gets advertised. Advertising is an art form that is uniquely linked to our economic system.

2 Unlike fine art, which usually gives us the perspective of a single individual, advertisements give us the perspective of a whole community of institutions. If fashion advertisements show people wearing baggy clothes, then the characters in toothpaste ads also wear baggy clothes, and there are baggy clothes in the store for us to buy. Advertisements repeat and reinforce each other's social messages. One tells us to buy underarm deodorant to prevent body odor, another tells us to buy deodorant soap, and another asks us to buy feminine deodorant spray; all reinforce the message that we smell bad and need products to make us smell the way we should.

3 Because we are exposed to so much advertising, we absorb its messages and accept its values and attitudes in our approach to life. Throughout our day, we ask questions like: "What do I want to buy? What are they trying to sell me? What can I afford?" in response to advertising. This keeps us focused on money as the essence of daily life. It maintains in us an awareness of how we lack products that would make our lives more comfortable or enjoyable. In this way, exposure to advertising creates within us a self-interest and a restless striving to become more comfortable. It focuses our attention on our own interests at the expense of others or of the collective good.

4 There is also an atmosphere of dishonesty about advertising. We all know that the claims ads make for their products are often greatly exaggerated. We hear the advertisers claim that they want to improve our lives when we know they just want to improve their sales. Often companies put out image advertisements to counter bad impressions people might have of the company. Oil and paper companies show beautiful pictures of nature and say they are concerned with the environment, and cigarette companies put out advertisements saying they really don't want kids to smoke. Constant exposure to this sort of hypocrisy destroys our belief in human decency, and makes us suspicious of people's real motives. Because we live our lives surrounded by hypocritical, or even false advertising messages, advertising for good causes may also appear corrupt.

5 Advertisers generally serve two functions for their clients: They create ads for products or causes, and they give their clients advice on what will sell. The advertisers research the demographics (sex, age, marital status, race, religion, region, income, labor-force participation) of their target consumers, and then design ads that appeal to that group. Advertising acts as a social mirror. The advertisements we see are generally only weeks or months old, showing completely contemporary people doing completely contemporary things. This is part of the power of advertising. We see ourselves as we are now. However, advertising is a distorted mirror, reflecting back at us only those values and attitudes that the advertiser wants us to hold.

6 Most ads use pictures because mental images are the predominant mode of thinking in daydreams and fantasies. Text by itself gets people to think, but pictures easily bypass thinking and get people to feel and do, i.e., to imagine themselves as the central players walking through the scene.

7 Advertising constructs fantasies for us that play on our desires for such things as social acceptance or romance. If that magic kiss comes with breath mints, we can try using breath mints ourselves to get a magic kiss. This gives the daydream constructed by the ad that much more power as we replay it in our own lives.