Applied Research Project

Volkswagen Super Bowl Commercial 2011

Introduction

The pop culture artifact that I have decided to choose is the Super Bowl commercial of 2014 for Coca Cola. To simply summarize the commercial, it has multiple voices singing the patriotic song, “America the Beautiful”, firstly in English, and then into multiples of other languages to symbolize the diverse culture and the many people of America. While the singing goes, it shows many faces of all races and age, all enjoying what USA has to offer. Anyhow, why would this commercial be considered as a pop culture? Firstly, this is a commercial for the Super Bowl, which companies would pay millions to get a few seconds of screen time. The Super Bowl is an US nationwide famous annual pastime which has millions of people tuning in, and its commercials are one of its well known aspects. Hence these commercials have the potential (and has) raised company values by multitudes. This particular commercial is also famous due to its controversy as there were cry outs that the song was sang in different languages when it should only be sang in English, etc…Throughout this project, I will be analyzing 6 principles of communication and rhetoric, which are kinesics, migrant-host relations, code switching, rhetoric appeals, elements of style, and ideographs and how these relate to my pop culture.

Word Count: 216

Kinesic — Kinesics is, according to Whitney(2017), “the study of Body and face movements that communicate messages to others”(p.3). This can involve voluntary movements such as eye rolling, which indicates annoyance, or involuntary action such as smiling when experiencing happiness.Throughout this commercial, these actors produce certain body movements to exude the feelings of togetherness. After all, this commercial is about celebrating the many kinds of Americans being together, unified under things such as eating, playing, and coke. To elaborate, the hand movements on 0:41 indicates family and being together. At 0:23, the hand movements as well as facial expressions indicates curiosity of exploring the views of America and the smiling indicates of being happy together throughout their “exploration”. These are only some of the example of the many people in the video, eating together on the same table, children exploring with curious faces, etc… Many themes of contentment and intimacy is shown through their movements. These movements can be considered to be involuntary, which it could be if done in real life, but as its filmed and purposely meant to evoke a certain emotion from the watchers, they are voluntary movements. Looking into the overarching theme of non-verbal communication, one of the functions can be to help supplement verbal communication. Taking in consideration of how throughout the video, many voices sings the song “America the Beautiful”, these motions help enrich the idea of the plenitude of culture and history of people of America.

Word Count: 247

Migrant Host Relationships — This particular principle involves 4 different aspects, which are assimilation, separation, integration, and marginalization. Assimilation is when a individual gives up their own culture and replaces it with the mainstream culture. Separation is when the individual has their own culture and interacts minimally with other cultures. Integration is when the individual maintains their own culture and also interacts with other cultures. Marginalization is when the individual has little care for both theirs and other cultures. Of course, while this may bring problems such as communication, as mentioned by Triscott, Szafran, Waugh, Torti, Barton (2016), “ experience challenges in the areas of: (1) communication skills ”(p.1). Due to the nature of this commercial, one can see that the migrant host relationship it is focusing on is integration. Multiple of people of different races are together, all enjoying the American culture. Integration can be especially seen through the singing of the song. The song is sang through multitudes of languages, which symbolizes how all these differing cultures interacts with the American culture. Because it is sang by different races in their own language, it is not assimilation as the individuals all retains their own culture. This hits the overarching theme of the video that America is a home of many cultures, all unified. This hits the idea of identity, which is a persons conception of oneself, influenced by culture, history, etc… Identity can be multiple, and this video hits the idea that America has many differing identities of people and that they are all accepted, whether its about race, sexual preferences, etc…

Word Count: 260

Code Switching —Code Switching is, according to Whitney(2017), “ The ability to move back and forth between different languages, different ways of speaking. Simply speaking, for example, it is the ability to switch from Spanish to English, how changing the way one speaks to others. Code switching is an important theme in the commercial as it has the song sang in multiple of languages. The switching of languages, as mentioned before, is a way of representing the different identities and cultures all shared. The switching of languages is powerful because it is saying how the people share and are proud of the differing languages and cultures through the ease and confidence of use of code switching. It shows that everyone has different ways of communicating but they are all under the same flag. Of course, this can also show problems which is that the multiples of languages and cultures may cause confusion, as even in the video, one probably do not understand most of the lyrics as it is sang in other languages. And code switching does bring problems such as misunderstandings, and brings out the negative emotions of others, which has to do with the controversy behind the song, of many others not liking how the song was not sang in English.

Word Count: 211

Rhetoric Appeals —Rhetoric Appeals are categorized by 3 different aspects, which are logos, which builds credibility through reason and evidence, pathos, which uses emotions and experiences to persuade, and lastly ethos, which uses credibility through sources, people, etc… to gain trust. In this commercial, the rhetoric appeal to be focused on is pathos, as it tries to evoke certain emotions for the video to be memorable. After all, as said by Lopez and Thompson (2013), “creator wants the audience to think. There is very little print — either an implicit (implied) message or an explicit (clearly expressed) message”(p1). This can be done by for example, the voice actors for the singers. The people singing “America the Beautiful” are sometimes children, young girls, which can bring out emotions such as calmness, an adorable charm. It is also replaced by an obviously skilled singer, creating a dazzling atmosphere. This is further supported by the images and videos shown of children exploring or old people smiling widely, or friends and family excitedly getting together for simple things such as eating, playing, or just sight seeing. With the combination of the song in the background, it makes people on the verge of tears, or as others say “tearing up”. The emotional values caused by this video may make people remember and stick into memory longer as it caused a reaction of the body and memory is known to stick longer if it can be associated with a certain emotion.

Word Count: 242

Elements of Style — This particular principle has 3 different aspects which are tone, diction and texture. Tone is as Whitney (2017) says, “the general emotion or attitude behind a piece of work”, diction is the choice of certain words, and texture is portraying the subject realistically and meaningfully. This can be done with repetition of something. For tone, the general attitude behind the video is happiness and togetherness. This is portrayed through the video of peoples emotion, as well as the combination with the song, particularly chosen as “America the Beautiful”, which showcases nice harmonies. This can also be heard through the energy and pitch behind the voices of the singers, as it is calm, steady and clear. In terms of diction, the director purposely chose “America the Beautiful”, instead of any other patriotic song. The purpose may be because the word choices are very simple and easy to sing as well as the word “beautiful” is simple yet can mean many things up to perspective. It may mean beautiful in terms of how many cultures there are together, or maybe beautiful in terms of how close people are, etc… Texture for media is usually shown through repetitions of a certain shape or lines. In this video, a repetitions of coca cola bottles can be seen everywhere. What this allows it to do is that it associates the company to “America the Beautiful” and the idea of happiness. This is because of the underlying tone of the commercial.

Word Count: 245

Ideographs — These are, according to Whitney(2017), “ appear in visual form, a term that serves as, guides, warrants, or excuses actions that represent a particular way of thinking.” This can represent certain words such as “freedom” which represents a certain way of thinking. To go even further, visual ideographs are similar but appear in visual form such as the Statue of Liberty which represents liberty. Throughout this video, ideograph can be seen which is the word “beautiful”. This term does not have a clear concept or a clear definition, but represents a certain overall idea. As mentioned before, beautiful can be up for interpretation, as it can be referring to different things, but the overall message is that all cultures are welcomed and together. Furthermore, there is the visual ideographs which can be for example the coca cola bottle. This global symbol is used to represent the American culture and how these different cultures are enjoying and celebrating it with their loved ones. The coca cola bottle is not the only visual ideographs as for example the Grand Canyon is also shown as well as other famous US attractions to indicate the views of America and the culture one can enjoy with the multitudes of others.

Word Count: 205

Overall, the video makes use of these principles to show the overarching message: that America is the land of many origins and cultures and that all of them are celebrated and all of them are free to make use of America’s views. This is done by the principles, kinesics, migrant-host relations, code switching, rhetoric appeals, elements of style, and ideographs. At first glance, the commercial seemed to be just a beautiful array of voices singing a patriotic song together, but through analysis, it brings out another message of culture and acceptance, and what America really is. Many of these feelings are also not purposely analyzed normally but are just felt subconsciously (the message). However, it also shows that these companies such as Coca Cola are very adapt in evoking certain emotions to make sure their products stick into our memories, which in realization, probably influences our culture and society in certain aspects. Perhaps in the future, technological determination can be analyzed in future research or analysis and how much of an impact it has.

Word Count: 174

Works Cited:

Related posts:

Serendipity is regarded as one of the most beautiful words in the English dictionary. It finds meaning in words like fate, and chance with equally beautiful connotations. The Merriam-Webster…

Now that we are all finally getting over the Will Smith and Chris Rock debacle, there is a new celebrity duo that are butting heads, and this time it is Johnny Depp and Amber Heard. As you may or may…

Stop sabotaging relationships, get out of your own way, and create a healthy partnership to celebrate life's triumphs' with. Be the person you desire.