Advertising and consumption: ways and waywardness of youth as a value

• Grant number: 12/12659-4
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: September 01, 2012
• End date: August 31, 2013
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Communications - Public Relations and Propaganda
• Principal Investigator: Maria Ogécia Drigo
• Grantee: Maria Ogécia Drigo
• Host Institution: Escola de Comunicações e Artes (ECA). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• City of the host institution: São Paulo

Abstract

This research deals with the relationship between advertising and consumption. The hypothesis is that, in the contemporary context, the continuity of the connections between people and the objects is held through the values that the brands, by advertising, can set. In order to validate or not this hypothesis it is necessary to think about the possibility of building, through advertising, environments that provide the experience of values and to think about resulting implications for consumption. We choose youth as a value to support these thoughts. So, the specific objectives are: explain aspects of contemporary context; highlight the fragility of the boundaries of age's ranges: childhood, adolescence, adulthood and old age; describe and analyze the process of building the youth and their possible virtualization; assess the harvest of meanings constructed by visual representations of advertising, with regard to the ways in which youth is engendered as a value; as well as identify the specific relationship between advertising and consumption, through this mode of propagation (commercial advertising) of youth as a value. To achieve these goals, we make use of Bauman (1998, 2001, 2007, 2008), Hall (2006), Maffesoli (2005, 2006, 2010), Lipovetsky (2007, 2009), Canclini (2006) and McCraken's theory (2003), among others to address issues of contemporary and consumption; Savage (2009), Giddens (1993, 2001), Ariès (1991) and Borelli (2008, 2009) in what concerns the issue of youth. The semiotic analysis of visual representations, selected from advertising available in the media, throughout the second half of 2012, related to the fashion brands, technologies, and artistic products to the health and welfare will be done based on Peirce (Collected Papers); Santaella (2002); Santaella and Nöth (2010); Merrell (1997) and Dondis (2007). The relevance of this research is the study of the relationship between advertising and consumption to the explanation of the logic that underlies and strengthens communication processes in the contemporary context. (AU)