Advertising Six Feet Under

Datos Bibliográficos

ID15082038
AutoresSheila Harper (0009-0004-8776-5133, University of Bath, autor de correspondencia)
Año2009
Volumen14
Número3
Páginas203-225
Fecha de publicación2009-08-01
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaMortality (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1357-6275 • E-ISSN: 1469-9885
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/13576270903016679
OpenAlexW2071655097
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas3
Referencias citadas13

In May 2003, the UK terrestrial television station Channel 4 launched an advertising campaign to promote the second series of the American television programme Six Feet Under. The images used, depicting live models stylised to resemble corpses, appeared to advertise a (fictional) brand of ‘afterlife beauty accessories’ including ‘wound filler’, ‘lip lock’, and ‘embalming fluid’. The campaign came under the scrutiny of the UK's Advertising Standards Authority when it received complaints from the public. In order to examine the controversy created by the campaign, a small, exploratory study was conducted. The aim of the study was to identify the discourses employed by complainants when articulating their negative reaction to the campaign. First, a thematic content analysis of the complaint documents was undertaken. Then, semi-structured interviews were conducted in order to unpack the discourses identified in the complaint documents. Four of these discourses will be discusses herein; namely, the discourses of advertising, of media altruism, of death as ‘taboo’, and of context, were all employed by the complainants and interviewees to rationalise their reactions to the adverts. Finally, these four discourses are considered within the broader field of the sociology of morals

Advertising · Beauty · Complaint · Content analysis · Context (archaeology · Media studies · Order (exchange · Political science · Qualitative research · Scrutiny · Social science · Sociology · Taboo · Thematic analysis · Crime, Deviance, and Social Control · Emotions and Moral Behavior · History · Law · Law in Society and Culture