Linguistic Imperialism and Pop Culture

Linguistic imperialism is the idea that a certain dominant language is being transferred onto other people due to current world demands that center around that language. From education to business to pop culture, the English language is rising to be the most dominant language on the world. Pop culture is currently known today to be in “English”. When someone is named an “international celebrity”, it is generally known that they are either from and English speaking country or they have been able to make international relations because they are proficient in the English language. For example, Lady Gaga is very well known in both English and non-English speaking countries. Ailee is an international Korean star but was actually born in Colorado and studied in the states her whole life. In that sense, the face of pop culture are English speaking stars, English songs, and English television. These are the celebrities and shows that children will grow up watching and admiring. In today’s society, the spread of pop culture is extremely quick and accessible. Children in India can watch an American movie online easily. The movie industry is generally known to be American and most movie theaters in the world carry English movies. For many foreign singers, incorporating English words and sentences into their songs is a very good way to appeal to a larger and more international audience. For a star to be able to be international and successful, they must have connections from other countries. The only way they can get these connections is by being able to speak English because they will not learn every single language in the world in order to have to reach out to a wider audience. Shakira, for example, began singing only Spanish songs in the beginning of her career. As she broadened her horizons, she found that in order to make it into the business, her songs must be in English. She is the international sensation that she is today because she was able to learn and communicate in English. By making pop culture dominated by English, it excludes many potential singers, movie stars, and directors. There could be a little boy who lives in Malaysia that has the potential to be the most influential and brilliant director, but without the English language, he could never put himself on an international scale.  With that being said, there are always rare occasions of barriers being broken. The most watched video on YouTube and the only video to ever be viewed 2 billion times is Gangam Style, a Korean song that only has 2 English words. The appeal of this song comes from the rather unique singer, catchy tune, and the exotic music video. But as I said before, that is a rare occasion. Pop culture is continually being dominated by the English language and as for now, it does not seem like that could change. While there are consequences, pop culture is meant to be taken lightly and so the fact that there is linguistic imperialism in pop culture does not pose any real threat on the world today. 

Paper 1 Text 2 Analysis

           This paper one text can be interpreted to be a lot of things but I believe that it is an advertisement disguised as an informative article. The text starts off with an introductory paragraph that explains what the article will be about – something that many articles have. It starts off with facts and numbers and so the reader automatically knows that it is meant to be informative and factual. The article is split into three different parts and each part has its own subtitle, also another quality for an article. The last part explains the entire organization and everything they do and convey it in a positive light – something that might lead people to believe that it is an advertisement. The company helps areas with deep poverty and the article continues to explain how the company achieves this and is also very interactive with the audience and that is a good quality of an advertisement. The purpose of the article is to persuade and encourage the audience to donate and help the organization. The target audience seems to be people that are looking for ways to help and are considering organizations to donate to because this article recalls every possible way to shed a good and positive light on the organization. 

            The article is written from the point of view of a worker in an organization called “Oxfam”, an organization dedicated to address issues of poverty in extremely poor countries. The article is taken directly off of the Oxfam website. The target audience seems to be people who are interested and worried about growing epidemics and are looking for ways to help. In general, the text is meant to do two things: to inform and to persuade. Firstly, many facts and numbers are brought up. People tend to believe a number and tend to be more affected by such things. The article explains the problem very effectively. Secondly, as stated before, there is a hidden advertisement in this article. Firstly, the article is placed on the website and so it must aim for something specific. The organization is portrayed in a very positive light. Often, things like “we can help” are often said. By using pronouns like “we”, the article becomes very interactive and personal with the audience. The audience therefore is more encouraged to donate because it becomes more of a personal task. It very subtly persuades people to donate to the cause and do something about the problem. It offers a problem - solution scenario because it states all of the growing issues and then goes on to explain how Oxfam is the solution. 

            The article goes on to explain about the hunger epidemic that is present in West and Central Africa. The problem seems to be a result of poor food harvests and water shortages. A study shows that around 12 million people are facing the possibility of a serious food crisis like the one that occurred in 2005 and 2008. Oxfam is sending humanitarian aid to millions of people in this area and working closely with families to help set up a foundation in order to prevent further such epidemics. 

          The tone and mood of the article are sad yet hopeful. The article is structured in a way that it begins very sadly and explains this crisis and how many people are involved in this epidemic but then continues on to explain that there is hope and that many communities are hard at work to fix these problems. The reader would begin reading the article and would feel very affected and upset but by the end of the article, they would feel as if they can help and as if there is hope. It has a certain sad mood because it gives us facts about poverty and hunger and when people have numbers in front of them, it is difficult to not be effected by it. By setting a depressing atmosphere, the audience is immediately snapped into reality and it encourages them to want to help and do something about the problem. This article very efficiently informs and persuades the target audience in a way that this problem can be solved but the company can also benefit from it. 

          By disguising the advertisement as an informative article, it uses ethos because the audience would not look at it as something that is trying to get money out of them but rather something that wants to inform them. Oxfam places themselves on a high pedestal and very effectively persuades the audience. 

Native Advertisement

With such an expanding media and advertising empire, it's not surprising that companies have found new and improved ways to put advertisements into our everyday lives. Native advertisement is basically ads that have been strategically placed online and have been integrated into a normal online platform. For example, you could see "Sponsored by Forever 21" on a website that is designed for teens and people looking for clothes. These advertisements are placed in a website that targets their target audience. The above native advertisement is by Taco Bell and is placed in a BuzzFeed article. It is placed very naturally in an article that many people read for entertainment and looks like it's an unintentional part of the article. The audience that usually reads BuzzFeed is a young and new crowd that reads it for entertainment and has free time to sit in a computer. Taco Bell wants to target and new and fresh audience because most of their customers and young. The caption for the article reads, "Some things are meant to be kept for yourself, just like the new Taco Bell Loaded Grillers...". It seems so integrated in the article and like it's not even an advertisement. Because it's so naturally placed in the article, it becomes naturally placed in the readers mind and becomes a normal part of their life.The tone of it is very happy and friendly. It's almost as if the author is talking to the audience in a personal and friendly way, thus increasing the appeal of Taco Bell. The article is fun and entertaining, thus Taco Bell is fun and entertaining. Then it shows how the loaded grillers are 99 cents, also an appealing offer. It is all placed right above the article and so it is the first thing that people read and think about. This advertisement is clearly a native advertisement because not many people would consider it a "normal everyday advertisement" and would not ignore it like they would with any other advertisement. 

Generation Like

How powerful is the connection between the effect of social media and the structure of the Hunger Games?

The Hunger Games is a rising movie about a Utopian world that has annual games with children being placed in a giant stadium by adults and having to fight to death for entertainment. While it may be incredibly twisted, it is regarded as “normal” in their community. With such an extreme and violent ideology, it is surprising that many people have compared the Hunger Games with social media today. Firstly, just like the Hunger Games, social media is basically a big stadium with kids that is meant for entertainment. Each of these kids are competing for the most “fame” or the most “likes”. Each person in the Hunger and Games and in social media is looking for sponsors and looking for people to accept them. Most of these social media outlets are made by adults and always have a board of adults working the magic in the back, similar to the game makers in the Hunger Games. Similar to the Hunger Games, the point of social media is entertaining. But we as a society have invested so much time and energy in it that it has become a normal part of society. Because social media is integrated into our everyday lives, it is not often thought of as a competition till death. But when you sit back and examine each detail, it is shocking to see how much social media resembles a movie about competition and death. Every little aspect of the Hunger Games can be related to social media and that is eye opening. 

Iggy, Don't Forget Where you Came From

The new and upcoming star, Iggy Azalea, prides herself in the fact that she came from a rough life and has made it big. In her song, “Work”, she expresses the pride she has over her achievements in life. The song is filled with powerful line such as “how many floors I had to scrub just to make it past where I am from” or the reoccurring line of “no money, no family, 16 in the middle of Miami”. The song is meant to show her struggles and to empower people who are coming from several backgrounds to achieve their dreams. With such an empowering message, it would be thought that the music video would put a tear in your eye. The music video falls just shorts of that, seeing as Azalea herself is wearing $2000 shoes and barely any clothing.

The opening scene begins with Azalea walking in a desert with several objects on fire. The music video disappoints from the beginning considering the fact that Azalea is barely dressed and wearing clothing that costs more than most people’s homes, which is ironic considering the fact that she is singing about the fact that she had nothing while growing up. The music video continues to go downhill about 50 seconds in. Azalea is suddenly surrounded with backup dancers who are shaking their butts in front of the camera while Azalea is sexualizing herself because of the movements she is doing but also the clothing she’s wearing. This lessens the value of the song and takes away from the meaning. She is sexualizing and objectifying women, even though her song is meant to be inspiring.

The real problem with the music video comes up about two minutes in when Azalea begins dancing on a guy, steals his keys, and runs away. This is a problem for two reasons. Firstly, it is disregarding the real message of the song and making it seem like the only way she got to where she is is buy seducing men and doing illegal things. Although her song is filled with lyrics about her working hard, the music video makes it seem like the only way that she becae successful was because of men and breaking the law. This brings up the second problem: it marginalizes women everywhere because it shows that women cannot be successful on their own and rather they have to seduce or trick men in order to be up-and-coming.

Not only does this music video marginalizes women, it also goes on to offend the impoverished people and their society. Azalea is seen riding in her bike and walking around with clean clothing, full makeup, and nice hair in neighborhoods with people who are wearing ripped and dirty clothes. She is priding herself in coming from that background and yet in the music video, she is walking around like she is better and more powerful than all of them. It shows that she has clearly forgotten where she came from. It disrespects people that are still living in impoverished situations and makes them seem like they are worthless compared to people like her.

Although this song has a potential to be an empowering song, the music video brings it back down to the norms of the music industry. Although Azalea knows that she had a rough background, this music video proves that she has succumbed to the lifestyle and the attitudes of the music industry. 

Written Task 2

Amirah Abualeez

Mr. Michael

Language and Literature HL

6 December 2014

How could the text be read and interpreted differently by two different readers?

            Every advertisement bases every single detail based on the target audience, yet some advertisements can be multivocal and can give a different message to each individual reader. American Apparel released an ad showing a pair of female legs being held carelessly by a man. The only words that were placed were the company’s logo in between the female’s legs. At first, because of the clear objectification of the woman, the target audience may be blatantly assumed to be men. In reality, though, this advert targets both men and women in very different ways because it gives the men a very dominant and many vibe but it also makes women feel as if their sole purpose is to please that man.

            The clear and unconcealed target audience of this ad are men. The advertisement shows a man holding a woman by her feet as if they were toys. By showing only one body part, it completely disregards the woman and focuses on the man in the ad. The man is the dominant figure while the woman is the submissive figure. The ad uses affect transfer because the men looking at this ad can get a very dominant and manly vibe from the models and can transfer that vibe onto the company and associate it with wearing their clothing. By having the woman being held as if she was a toy, it shows the men looking at this advert that the main purpose for women is to please men and that men can buy sex and women by buying clothing from American Apparel. It gives men three things they want: women, sex, and manliness. These are things that many men strive for and the company has successfully been able to associate those three things with their company in this one advertisement.

            While this advertisement seems to objectify, sexualize, and objectify women, women can interpret this ad in one of two ways: either it offends them, or it encourages them. Firstly, the logo of the company being placed in between the woman’s legs further makes the woman look like a sex object. Because no other part of her body is shown, the woman is objectified and made out to look worthless. Many women will look at this ad and be offended because all women are made out to be objectified as a result of this advert. On the other hand, this ad can directly target women because it plays on many of their insecurities to sell. Just as it shows the men that women are here to please them, it shows women the ways to please men. Women will relate wearing American Apparel clothing with getting men’s attention, something that many women strive for. They will relate beauty and happiness with getting a man, which they will ultimately relate with the company. This ad takes many women who feel negatively about themselves and tries to portray this idea of being held by a man in a positive light. While American Apparel is turning away many customers as a result of this advertisement, it is also attracting and entire new audience.
            This advertisement shows multivocality because it gives a dominant vibe to men but also plays on many women’s insecurities. Although completely unacceptable and appalling, this advert has a lot of potential for success. It captures attention and gets people to talk, and that is ultimately the purpose of this advert and many other American Apparel ads. American Apparel has not had a decline in their sales as a result of their overly risqué marketing techniques.  They have strategically designed this ad in a way that reaches a variety of audiences and can be interpreted by each reader in a different way.

Further Oral Presenttion Reflection

FOA Reflection

            For the first Further Oral Presentation, the possibilities were virtually endless. My FOA analyzed how American Apparel, a clothing company, continuously used the sexualization, objectification, and exploitation of women as an advertising technique. American Apparel has hundreds of ads that focus on specific body parts, shows girls in provocative positions, and does not bother censoring most of their advertisements. The message that I was trying to get across with all this was that these advertisements hold many unintended effects such as exposing women to more violence, showing that women are only here to please men, and holding up stereotypes about a women’s worth that have been prominent for centuries. I decided to take a different approach when answering the unit question of, “what does advertising reveal to us about society?” I decided to show many ads that would make it seem like society is going nowhere, but in fact I believe that these ads are the ones that show social progress because of all the controversy they constantly receive. The four criterion that this FOA was graded on was Knowledge and understanding of the text, organization, language, and understanding how language is used. The main thing that I struggled with was being able to find pictures that analyzed language well and being able to link the language with my main topic question. I believe that I was able to use the language well and understand that every sentence has a hidden meaning and I was able to communicate that well. I do think that I could have talked about the language in relation to the persuasive techniques we learned in class more (Ex: shock factor, pathos, logos, etc). The techniques that I did discuss were affect transfer, commodification of intimacy, ethos, logos, and I used trigger words several times. With that being said, there were many instances where I could have used them more effectively. Another weakness that I had was staying formal throughout the entire presentation. There were many instances where I did not use appropriate language or I could have been more formal with my wording. I picked a topic that was tricky because it was time consuming to find ads that incorporated enough language to analyze but was also school appropriate. I do believe that one of my strengths was taking a different approach when answering the unit question. Overall, I feel as if I had the potential to do a much better job on my presentation but I am happy with the overall result. I feel as if I did not say everything that I had intended to say but I also found myself saying more things than I had written down. The message that I was trying to convey was that American Apparel uses this exploitation of women to sell but it is not completely accepted in society. I think I communicated this message efficiently. Next time, I will make practicing my speech the main priority. I found myself nervously looking down at my paper several times even though I knew what I was supposed to say. I will also be aware of time constraints and have everything I need to say in the required time. Overall, although I will set the bar higher next time, I am proud of my work and how hard I worked on it.