A Level Media Studies: How stereotypical are the representations in your 3 main advertising texts? Essay Question

How stereotypical are the representations in your 3 main advertising texts?

Each of the texts use stereotypical representations to offer a sense of familiarity to the audience and help sell the product and ideology associated with it.

The Lynx advert represents men in a non-typical way. He is not overly masculine as expected from an advert of this type and is average. When he uses the product, he becomes completely irresistible which links to the tagline of ‘even angels will fall’ as it places an emphasis on how desirable he has now become. His representation appeals to the target demographic of young males looking for a female partner. The representation links to the ideology as it makes them more attractive to the opposite sex. However, the representations of women in the advert as very stereotypical. The angels are shown in clothes that give a nude illusion which directly appeals to the male gaze. The women are all famous models which creates unrealistic beauty standards and this may skew the male audience’s perception of women. Furthermore, the representation of Kelly Brook in the accompanying game (where users compete for a day with her ‘the arch angel’) gives the audience a sexualised representation of women which is stereotypical. She wears lingerie which suggests she is sexually available to the audience. In the video clip for the game, Brook uses direct mode of address which makes her seem seductive and tempting for the male audience, which again conforms to the stereotypical representation of women. Although the representation of men in this text leans away from typical, the such heavy objectification of women and representation of the product itself makes the representations stereotypical.

In the Jaguar advert, the characters are villains and their representations are typical of this. In Rendezvous, they are each pictured in locations which suggests a luxury lifestyle, for example, Tom Hiddleston’s character in the helicopter and Ben Kingsley in a large mansion. They play with the idea of Hollywood casting British people as villains and they highlight their ‘Britishness’ to show this e.g. Tom Hiddleston uses a cup of tea. They are represented as intelligent and highbrow, not as having physical strength but rather being able to outplay and outwit like a villain from films. This representation is stereotypical because that is what they are going for – it is based on the idea of British villains. The product is represented stereotypically also; the car’s features are emphasised in close up camera shots and the speed is shown against the competition which places it on a pedestal. Making the car seem unbeatable in this way is typical of car adverts as they ultimately want to sell the product and this is an effective way of being informative and doing that.

The BT Infinity advert campaign features Simon, Joe and Anna. Simon is represented as a stereotypical ‘geek’ character who knows a lot about technology and enjoys playing videogames. Simon subverts the hegemonic idea of masculinity because he does not have the typically perfect body image expected from someone who embodies masculinity. Joe is a stereotypical middle-class character who enjoys music and values his independence. Anna is typically feminine in the sense that she seems to mother the other characters and this is reinforced when we learn she is doing a veterinary degree which shows her as caring. In the ‘Hola’ advert, the flatmates encounter young Hispanic women. They are represented as stereotypically Spanish in their dress codes and personalities. The advert uses Levi Strauss’ binary opposition when we see Simon admire the women and enforces his traditional British mannerisms by offering a custard cream. The representations in this advert are also stereotypical and this is likely because the adverts adopt a sitcom style and using stereotypes is an easy way to be comedic.

Overall, the representations in the texts are mostly stereotypical. Whilst there are some instances of certain characters moving away from what is expected, most of the adverts rely on stereotypes to sell the product and create an advert that fits the genre they are going for.