From a Humanities Perspective, Advertising Means Consumers

Robert Pennington

《慈濟大學人文社會科學學刊》 9期 (2010/04) Pp. 107-140

https://doi.org/10.29650/TCUJHSS.201004.0004

並列摘要

This article discusses the study of advetising in academic programs from three approaches: humanities, social science and professional. The three approaches are not mutually exclusive. The perspective is that a compete study of advertising begins and ends with the humanities because advertsing begins and ends with consumers. Advertising is about consumers.
Humanities programs are not bound by the assumptions about advertising that constrain professional and social science programs. Professional programs assume a purpose and a measurable range of effects. Social science programs assume observable patterns, governed by probability, that are general and predictable. Professional programs utilize social scientific methods in attempting to find symbols that most effectively convey meaning, the most effective manner of transmitting the symbols, and the occurrence of the desired effect. Social science programs examine advertising as a social intervention with specific real-world effects. In both professional and social science programs, the attitude toward consumers is detached and disinterested. Because humanities programs do not assume a specific purpose or predictable, general pattern, they are best suited to examine advertising as meaningful cultural communication.
This article discusses consumption itself as cultural communication. Drawing on studies of language and meaning, this discussion outlines the circular process of meaning production, dissemination and use. Consumers give meaning to objects and symbols, which appear in advertisements that disseminate meaning, which consumers transfer back to themselves through consumption. The perspective available to humanities programs is that cultural meanings, rather than products, are what consumers buy. This is especially true of brands, which have no other function than to convey cultural meaning. Through the study of advertising, humanities programs can examine who consumers are.

並列關鍵字

advertising ； communication ； culture ； consumer ； humanities

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