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The preferred reading of this advertisement for Artline permanent markers, placed in The Australian Womens Weekly, is that teenage children are disinterested, disobedient and slothful. This reading relies heavily on the dominant interpretation of teenage children and their relationship with their parents. This dominant discourse is encouraged despite studies by scholars such as Peter Scales and Susannah Stern which argue that it is not indicative at all of the actual attitudes, behaviours or values of adolescents in society. This discourse is perpetuated through creation of, and emphasis on, the binary opposition between parent and child, which is hyperbolised within the context of the magazine. The magazine is strongly focussed on serving the values and ideas of the domestic, maternal woman and seeks to resonate with the assumed views of this demographic. Consequently, the advertisement is framed in such a way that silences the youth and allows the dominant discourse of the adolescent to be reinforced.
Whether or not it is justifiable, the discourse of the disinterested, disobedient adolescent is a prominent mode of conceptualisation in western societies. In his discussion of the medias portrayal of adolescents, Peter Scales describes an advertisement that was published across the United States of America in 2000. The ad
declared "Smelly. Lethargic. Incoherent. It's hard to tell inhalant abuse in the average teenager.", 1 and while the statement about the detection of inhalant abuse may be true the essential meaning of the ad was that teenagers on average are smelly, lethargic and incoherent. Similarly, in a study conducted by Susannah Stern, the discourse of teenagers that is presented and reinforced in teen genre films have a significant bearing on the way society views the values, behaviours and attitudes of adolescents regardless of their own experiences. 2 In her study, Stern found that two-thirds of the American public believed that the percentage of teens who committed violent crimes had increased in the past years, when it had actually decreased3. The dominant discourse when it comes to interpreting adolescent behaviour encourages notions of disinterest, self-service and disobedience. This Artline advertisement relies on this discourse to perpetuate the preferred reading.
The meaning of teenagers room emerges through a binary opposition the parent/child relationship and an us/them opposition. The phrase, make your bed. is written in the imperative mood, and signifies that whoever wrote it has a hierarchical power over whoever is meant to read it. Make your bed is an oft-repeated and therefore well-recognised parental phrase indicating that this power is a parental figure. The tagline stop repeating yourself identifies the reader of the ad as the force in power. Given the demographic that would be reading The Australian Womens Weekly would most likely be women and mothers, quite possibly, with teenage children. The viewer is positioned to be on one side of the opposition as us and the occupant of the room is them. This framing also favours a particular viewpoint
1
Peter C Scales, The public image of adolescents." Society 38, no. 4 (May 1, 2001), http://www.proquest.com/ 2 Susannah R Stern, Self-Absorbed, Dangerous and Disengaged: What Popular Films Tell Us About Teenagers. Mass Communication & Society 8, no. 1 (2005): 24. 3 Stern, 33.
one that is decidedly outside of the teenagers bedroom. This signifies to the viewer that whatever is inside the room is a sort of enemy territory. Indeed, the framing signifies a sense of voyeurism and spying thus positioning the viewer to interpret the owner of the room as the other.
This binary opposition is further emphasised when the advertisement is considered within the context of the magazine. The magazine is strongly oriented to peak the interest of domestic, maternal women. The cover advertises stories about Jessica Rowe and Peter Overtons Miracle Baby, MasterChef Julie Joins the Weekly, Meet Kylie Gillies Family and Bryan Brown and Rachel Ward Inside Our Country Home. The Australian Womens Weekly encourages the viewer to position themselves in this idyllic domestic setting on every page: places where rooms are always perfect and photogenic, meals are abundant, appetising and bursting with home-made perfection. The viewer turns the page to reveal a doorway set into this domestic bliss which reveals a crumpled, unmade bed, plain walls donned with posters and an absent youth. Consequently, the binary opposition is made starker than it actually may be.
With this dominant discourse and binary opposition in mind, there are several signs which reinforce that this is in fact a teenage childs room, and not any other room. The adhering of posters directly onto the wall is a practice indicative of youth. Indeed, if the posters had been framed and hung, they would mean something else. The surfing images on the posters are also significant of youth. Surfing has been associated with youth culture for much of the late 20th century thanks to books and
films like Puberty Blues4 which overtly link surfing with the development of teenage confidence and identity. The unmade, crinkled bed suggests a disinterest in the values of the magazine, and therefore the values of the parental figure reading.
When this ad is interpreted without looking through this dominant adolescent discourse, however, the meaning of this image shifts dramatically. The sign of writing on the pillow cases signifies that the writer reached a point of exasperation evidently from repeating themselves. Once one starts to look fully at the ad, the irony dawns that whoever wrote make your bed has asked for a bed to be made tidy, but then written on said bed with a permanent marker basically ruining the pillowcases. If one ignored the lethargic teen discourse prevalent in this ad, this ad could be interpreted as presenting an example of a mentally unstable parent and a hostile home life.
Moreover, the readers view is highly restricted by the framing of the image, which does not allow for the teenagers perspective of the rest of the house. Perhaps the teenager never makes their bed because they live in an untidy house and do not feel an impulse to do so. There is natural light in the room which signifies that it is during the day, but it may perhaps be early morning and the adolescent is having breakfast and the mother is in fact being highly unreasonable. Through removing the adolescent and effectively silencing them, this advertisement perpetuates the discourse of the disengaged, disinterested youth. The image is framed to resonate with the mothers who are viewing the advertisement and encourages a humorous criticism of the
Puberty Blues by Margaret Kelly, Gabrielle Carey and Kathy Lette, dir. Bruce Beresford (1981; Cronulla, N.S.W: Limelight Productions), DVD.
behaviours of adolescent children. In other words, this image is an in-joke with mothers who read The Australian Womens Weekly.
The preferred reading of this advertisement for Artline permanent markers, placed in The Australian Womens Weekly, is that teenage children are disinterested, disobedient and slothful. The successful communication of this meaning relies on the discourse of conceptualising adolescent behaviour as outside of normal society. This outside is created through emphasising a binary opposition between parent and child and, ultimately, between us and them. While considering this discourse and binary opposition, an application of semiotic analysis reveals a system of signs which reinforce this dominant conceptualisation of adolescent behaviour regardless of its accuracy. Word Count: 1, 144
Bibliography
Peter C Scales. "The public image of adolescents." Society 38, no. 4 (May 1, 2001): 64-70. http://www.proquest.com/ (accessed August 24, 2009).
Susannah R Stern, Self-Absorbed, Dangerous and Disengaged: What Popular Films Tell Us About Teenagers. Mass Communication & Society 8, no. 1 (2005): 23-38.
Puberty Blues. By Gabrielle Carey, Margaret Kelly, and Kathy Lette, dir. Bruce Beresford. Cronulla, N.S.W: Limelight Productions, 1981. DVD.