scholarly journals China’s ‘CivilOlympic’ Performances and (Re)gained Global Visibility Fantasising about a New Brand China through Olympic Public Service Announcements

Author(s):  
Giovanna Puppin

This article investigates how China fantasised about itself and the Beijing 2008 Olympics through the award-winning TV public service announcements (PSAs) of the Beijing Opera Series, with a focus on visibility. By drawing on theories of the spectacle, I perform a semiotic analysis of the most recurrent signs, organising them according to the main themes that emerge. The theatre stage – which represents the Olympic stage – is closely linked to China’s dream of owning the Games and its desire for global visibility. The performance includes the theatrical performance of the Beijing Opera and the performance of civilisation, which semiotically over-determines the Games. The protagonists include famous actors and roles of Beijing Opera (i.e. Dan, who is an anthropomorphic metaphor for China), as well as ordinary people, who are extraordinary for their high degree of civilisation. The spectators, especially through the intradiegetic presence of a Western male Other, validate the country’s performative success and confirm its achieved global visibility.

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (87) ◽  

Cigarette, which has 1.1 billion users globally, constitutes an important social health problem in Turkey and in the world and continues to find new addicts day by day. Worldwide, one person dies from smoking-related diseases every 4.5 seconds. In addition, more than 600,000 non-smokers die each year due to passive smoking. Many levels of government and non-governmental organizations carry out various studies and seek new methods to find a solution to this global problem. One of these methods is public service announcements and posters with social content, which are an important mass media tool. Social posters, which transform various persuasion methods into visual codes, are effective in raising awareness in societies with their striking and informative features in the context of health communication. Since posters with social content convey many implicit meanings with the literary and visual indicators they contain, the semiotic method is of great importance in the analysis of these meanings. In this research, samples of anti-smoking posters with social content, in which visual codes are intense, were examined and the connotations of the indicators in these posters were revealed. As a result of the examinations, it has been observed that fear-based persuasion methods are generally used in preventing smoking addiction and creating behavior change. As a result, it has been seen that the examined posters have many deep meanings that are overlooked at first glance. Keywords: Smoking addiction, social posters, social responsibility, semiotic analysis


Author(s):  
Valentina Nicolini ◽  
Fabio Cassia

AbstractThis paper suggests a model that considers the effects of the children’s attitude toward Public Service Announcements—PSAs (measured through the likeability of PSAs) on their behavioural intention to eat fruits and vegetables. The suggested model was tested through an empirical analysis conducted with children aged 8 to 11 and the data were analysed through partial least squares – structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) multigroup analysis. The findings indicate that the positive emotions PSAs generate and PSA credibility mediate the effects of the children’s perceived likeability of PSAs on their behavioural intention to eat fruits and vegetables. Overall, understanding the connections between PSA likeability, positive emotions, PSA credibility and behavioural intentions can facilitate the development of further social advertisements aimed at children covering healthy eating. Therefore, the findings of this study are relevant for non-profit organizations, government institutions and advertisers interested in creating effective social messages aimed at children.


2015 ◽  
Vol 37 (8) ◽  
pp. 1158-1175 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicole Danielle Schott ◽  
Debra Langan

2014 ◽  
Vol 42 (5) ◽  
pp. 799-809 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jueman (Mandy) Zhang ◽  
Di Zhang ◽  
T. Makana Chock

We examined how perceived threat affected attitude and behavior toward condom use with main and nonmain partners, among at-risk young adults with varying levels of self-efficacy. Participants were 170 heterosexually active, single students at a northeastern university in the United States. Exposure to HIV/AIDS public service announcements was found to increase perceived susceptibility, which facilitated a positive attitude toward condom use with main partners but not with nonmain partners. High self-efficacy promoted a positive attitude toward condom use with main partners, and condom use with main and nonmain partners. The interaction effects revealed that high, compared to low, self-efficacy motivated more condom use with main and nonmain partners when perceived susceptibility was lower.


2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Peggy Albers

AbstractAlthough a great deal of work has been done on the significance of new literacies in ELA teaching and learning, much less has been done on the area of analyzing critically the media that comprise digital projects created by textmakers. Composing with new literacies in mind requires that textmakers locate relevant information, design with particular media in mind that will convey their message, as well as anticipate what the viewer may want to see. However, with nearly unlimited access to images through various search engines, textmakers may be choosing images of convenience rather than content. In her work with preservice teachers, Albers invited them to create Public Service Announcements (PSAs) in response to social issues they saw at play in contemporary and classic literature. Framed in critical multimodal theory, Albers draws upon visual grammar and visual discourse analysis to analyze PSAs to understand how modal choices make visible stable and commonplace assumptions about adolescents, the intended audience for these PSAs.


2010 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 469-492 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph B. Walther ◽  
David DeAndrea ◽  
Jinsuk Kim ◽  
James C. Anthony

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