Tone of
voice
Authoritative but unbiased
5 key
points
- Power is
balanced between different social aspects, which all have their own automatous
values, yet the outcome varies depending on situation and specific situations
-
Ideologies impact on every aspect of peoples lives, the only way this isn’t the
case is if things are viewed through a scientific discourse
- Messages
are constructed by relying on peoples shared knowledge, meaning that value can
be found through the connotations of what is not in the text just as much as
what is in it
- Deliberate
spaces within advertising should not be criticised, as the choice to exclude
them is just as important as the choice to include them
-
Consumerism is a never ending circle of products creating an attraction, which
ensures consumers want to purchase them initially, trapping them into a cycle
of buying and consuming and buying and consuming
5 key
quotes
- Social
formation consists of three practices: the economic, the political and the
ideological
- The
relationship is both real and imaginary in the sense that ideology is the way
we live our relationship to the real conditions of existence at the level of
representations
- To read a
text symptomatically therefore, is to perform a double reading: reading first
the manifesto text, and then, through the lapses, distortions, silences and
absences.
- competent
critical practice is not to make a whisper audible, nor to complete what the
text leaves unsaid, but to… explain the ideological necessity of its...
structuring incompleteness
- Like all
ideology, advertising functions by interpellation
Evaluation
Throughout
the text, Storey talks broadly of Althusserianism and the impacts this has on
audiences, especially with regard to how consumers respond to advertising. When
considering historical views and traditions, as well as the politics of modern social
interaction, he explains that ‘Social formation consists of three practices:
the economic, the political and the ideological’. Storey expands on this to
show how power is balanced between different social aspects, which all have
their own automatous values, yet the outcome varies depending on situation and
specific situations. The cultural impacts of this are the way ideologies impact
on every aspect of peoples lives, with the only way of this not being the case
is if things are viewed through a scientific discourse. He explains this
through the theory that, within advertising, ‘the relationship is both real and
imaginary in the sense that ideology is the way we live our relationship to the
real conditions of existence at the level of representations’. Furthermore,
through considering the cultural considerations of a text, a double reading
must be performed ‘reading first the manifesto text, and then, through the
lapses, distortions, silences and absences’, as messages are constructed by
relying on peoples shared knowledge, meaning that value can be found through
the connotations of what is not in the text just as much as what is in it.
Because of this, deliberate spaces within advertising should not be criticised,
as the choice to exclude them is just as important as the choice to include
them, as ‘competent critical practice is not to make a whisper audible, nor to
complete what the text leaves unsaid, but to… explain the ideological necessity
of its... structuring incompleteness’. Due to this increase in knowledge of what
makes a good advertising text, consumerism is growing rapidly, as the
technology becomes available to make more and more, the functions of ‘interpellation’
ensure that consumerism is a never ending circle of products creating an
attraction, which ensures consumers want to purchase them, trapping them into a
cycle of buying and consuming and buying and consuming [Storey, 2008:70-79]
Storey, J. (2008) Cultural Theory and Popular Culture', 5th ed, London: Pearson. pp. 70-79.
