Exegesis on Decoding Advertisements “We can only understand what advertisements mean by finding out how they mean, and analysing the way in which they work. What an advertisement ‘says’ is merely what it claims to say; it is part of the deceptive mythology of advertising to believe that an advertisement is simply a transparent vehicle for a ‘message’ behind it” (Williamson 17). In the world today, advertisements can be seen nearly anywhere and everywhere. In fact, it has been estimated that the average person sees as many as 5000 advertisements per day (http://www.cbsnews.com/news/cutting-through-advertising-clutter/). As Williamson explains above, the most important question to ask when consuming advertisements is not “what” but rather “how”. …show more content…
This is the definition that is put forth by Roland Barthes in “Myth Today”. Because this ideology is so widely accepted, its mere concept is invisible to the vast majority of the population. It is understood that the way an advertisement is presented is only used to deliver the main message or meaning. This explains the “transparent vehicle” that Williamson speaks of. Even though this is an incorrect assumption, it is still the common belief among the general public. However, just because an audience is unaware of how advertisements are selling to them does not mean that these methods do not work. In fact, most of the true meaning from an advertisement comes from how it is displayed to an audience rather than what it actually outright says. For example, Williamson writes about an advertisement for tyres that stated that its purpose was to test the braking abilities of that specific brand of tyre (Williamson 18). That would be what is directly said in the advertisement. However, how it is said can be broken down into two different categories: the signifier and the signified. For this example, the signifier is the relationship between both the tyre and the jetty in which they are driving on. The …show more content…
She goes on to say that this sort of connection between different aspects of an advertisement become of sort of currency. Currency, in this case, is a metaphor to describe the transfer of meaning from one object to another. Williamson uses examples of this currency in many different areas including colour, differentiation, product as signified, product as generator and product as currency. All of these different areas have one very important element in common. They are representing a value within these elements that can be associated with other objects present in the advertisement. When these elements are present in an advertisement, they are used to transfer their meaning to the product that is being sold. For example, in the advertisement for Beautiful Blue cigarettes the most prominent colour used is blue. However, blue is not the most important colour that is present. Within the woman’s blue mesh shopping bag, there is a deep red-purple bottle that matches exactly the colour of the woman’s lips. This use of colour immediately associates the two different objects. Since nothing else of the woman’s face is in frame, the association becomes fixated on oral consumption. The connection that is made between the mouth and the bottle becomes a parallel between the mouth and the cigarettes that are being sold. The use of colour is much more important than what is