Sociology 2172A/B Chapter Notes -Advertising Campaign, Sexual Attraction, Gender Identity

• School: Western University
• Department: Sociology
• Course: Sociology 2172A/B
• Professor: Gale Cassidy

Document Summary

Ayers changed public attitudes toward diamonds to transform them from a financial investment into a symbol of committed and ever lasting love: diamond is forever. Institutional structure of the consumer society orients the culture towards the world of commodities: market place is the major structuring institution of contemporary consumer society (advertising) Public discourse soon became dominated by the discourse through and about objects: transmitting information about products, using the available means of textual communication offered by newspapers, move from being purely text-based to image. Don"t see real people, but we see representation of people who stand for reigning social values such as family structure, status differentiation, and hierarchical authority: people do not properly decode the ever more complex messages. Advertising industry had to educate as well as sell. Written material explained the visual material: the consumer society was literally being taught how to read the commercial messages.