My chosen advertisement for the assignment is the Marine Corps' recruiting ad titled "The Climb". It is a very well-thought out advertisement playing on many different dynamics of potential recruits as well as their families. Another interesting facet of the commercial and its underlying meaning is the fact that the commercial is paid for with American tax dollars funneled into Defense spending; therefore, the makers of the commercial produced what they felt was the clearest, most poignant advertisement with as little risk as possible.
The whole advertisement is a long-running metaphor for the process to become a Marine. What's important to realize is that the intended group is Marine recruits: high school dropouts and graduates, blacks and whites, the weak and the strong. The only linking characteristic of the target audience is the fact that they can understand and want to be pushed by the challenge of joining the Marines. When the man starts out climbing (a very unrealistic climb, mind you, straight up a crumbling rock face with no safety mechanism at all) it shows the potential recruit the path will be a tough one. As the man reaches the top, it shows that he is tired and haggard from the climb, yet still able to move, making the process of becoming a Marine attainable. And when the man is saluted by the other dressed Marine, with the voice over saying that he will be joining the brotherhood of the few, it makes the trip seem worthwhile.
The entire advertisement is a very interesting use of personality profiles for potential recruits. In some ways, it is funny how the makers of the commercial chose their own path, playing off a man's masculinity and inherent macho-ism to get the to join the Marine Corps. I look forward to expounding upon some of the basic ideas I have laid out here in my project.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Monday, October 26, 2009
Spam 10.26.09
I have never eaten Spam. My decision to never eat Spam is roughly based on my seeing Spam at a young age and immediately vowing to never put that gelatinous meat goop into my body.
Reading Chu's "Spam: Meaning" showed me that some people eat Spam consistently, despite their own palates, out of necessity. She even goes so far to mention that there are people who eat Spam not out of necessity but out of desire. Spam has become the brunt of many lower-class jokes but is there such a lower-class monopolization of Spam to merit these jokes? Chu argues no, that Spam, although cheap and disgusting in all of its not-exactly-natural goodness, can be chosen, even craved.
And although some people love Spam and some people unequivocally hate Spam, there is not a single person in this world is uninterested in a can of Spam. The bold, deli-style colors of its can, strange consistency, and processed contents make it intriguing, while its class status make sit more or less fascinating.
Reading Chu's "Spam: Meaning" showed me that some people eat Spam consistently, despite their own palates, out of necessity. She even goes so far to mention that there are people who eat Spam not out of necessity but out of desire. Spam has become the brunt of many lower-class jokes but is there such a lower-class monopolization of Spam to merit these jokes? Chu argues no, that Spam, although cheap and disgusting in all of its not-exactly-natural goodness, can be chosen, even craved.
And although some people love Spam and some people unequivocally hate Spam, there is not a single person in this world is uninterested in a can of Spam. The bold, deli-style colors of its can, strange consistency, and processed contents make it intriguing, while its class status make sit more or less fascinating.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Post hoc ergo propter hoc
Having gone back and forth on the topic an infinite number of times, I feel almost like the ending steps of a Maclaurin series finally having reached a suitable topic.
My family is very sports-oriented. My younger brother is a wide receiver at the University of Richmond, the defending D-1AA national champions. My oldest cousin is a scholarship baseball player at Catawba College in North Carolina and is planning on being drafted into the Major Leagues either this draft or the next. My younger cousin was ranked as one of the top ten baseball players in North Carolina for his age when he was 11, 12, 13, and 14. He is now the quarterback of a championship high school in North Carolina. My mother and grandfather run marathons to this day.
I, however, am not so naturally blessed with athletic ability. Although I am not by any means unathletic, although most of my sporting ability comes from having, by threat of ridicule, to play competitively against my brother and cousins in every sport imaginable.
My efforts to be an athlete left me in an untenable position, resulting in a profligate use of time and energy. My area of ability has always been in the classroom through thought, speech, and language. I am admittedly a nerd deep down. I can hide it well sometimes, but it eventually comes out.
I will do my project on my struggle to identify myself, even sometimes to this day, with either the world of academia or athletics. These two are by no means by definition mutually exclusive, but it's funny how it often tends to be.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc:
Roughly translated: "after this, therefore, because of this"
Did I become a fan of the classroom simply by default? Was I pushed into something other than sports when I realized that I could no longer hang with my two-years-junior brother? Interesting to think about.
My family is very sports-oriented. My younger brother is a wide receiver at the University of Richmond, the defending D-1AA national champions. My oldest cousin is a scholarship baseball player at Catawba College in North Carolina and is planning on being drafted into the Major Leagues either this draft or the next. My younger cousin was ranked as one of the top ten baseball players in North Carolina for his age when he was 11, 12, 13, and 14. He is now the quarterback of a championship high school in North Carolina. My mother and grandfather run marathons to this day.
I, however, am not so naturally blessed with athletic ability. Although I am not by any means unathletic, although most of my sporting ability comes from having, by threat of ridicule, to play competitively against my brother and cousins in every sport imaginable.
My efforts to be an athlete left me in an untenable position, resulting in a profligate use of time and energy. My area of ability has always been in the classroom through thought, speech, and language. I am admittedly a nerd deep down. I can hide it well sometimes, but it eventually comes out.
I will do my project on my struggle to identify myself, even sometimes to this day, with either the world of academia or athletics. These two are by no means by definition mutually exclusive, but it's funny how it often tends to be.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc:
Roughly translated: "after this, therefore, because of this"
Did I become a fan of the classroom simply by default? Was I pushed into something other than sports when I realized that I could no longer hang with my two-years-junior brother? Interesting to think about.
Friday, October 2, 2009
"Introduction to Financial Crises" by George Cooper
The one reading I am drawn to enough to write about here is "The Introduction of Financial Crises" by George Cooper. An excellent read for any person who is interested in the, well, origins of the financial crisis, this book spends a predominant amount of its pages reuting the Random Walk Hypothesis. This hypothesis, a cornerstone of economic theory, states that the activity of a financial market today has no effect on the activity of the same financial market tomorrow, that market performance follows a 'random walk.' However, using empirical evidence and solid logic, George Cooper casts serious doubt on the foundation of the Random Walk Hypothesis and its applications.
And it all makes sense as well. The Random Walk Hypothesis states that because a market follows no set path and that, you can't predict it. Because a market can only go up or down, the application of the random walk hypothesis is like flipping a coin x number of times. The larger x becomes, the likelier the outcomes of the coin flip become perfectly split (100 flips- 50 heads 50 tails). A market's value according to the RWH should always remain halfway in between the two extremes, negative infinity and positive infinity, or exactly zero.
However, common knowledge states that once recessions occurr, they snowball, and become deeper, and not by chance alone. It is a clear shortfall of the RWH that once markets start to fail, people react, facilitating their failures and withdrawing all of their money.
This reading is a great read for anybody remotely interested in what is happening in today's economy.
And it all makes sense as well. The Random Walk Hypothesis states that because a market follows no set path and that, you can't predict it. Because a market can only go up or down, the application of the random walk hypothesis is like flipping a coin x number of times. The larger x becomes, the likelier the outcomes of the coin flip become perfectly split (100 flips- 50 heads 50 tails). A market's value according to the RWH should always remain halfway in between the two extremes, negative infinity and positive infinity, or exactly zero.
However, common knowledge states that once recessions occurr, they snowball, and become deeper, and not by chance alone. It is a clear shortfall of the RWH that once markets start to fail, people react, facilitating their failures and withdrawing all of their money.
This reading is a great read for anybody remotely interested in what is happening in today's economy.
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