wateraid

Question 1

product context

Answer 1

• Creates by atomic London in 2016, to show how communities benefit from clean water by depicting everyday chores such as farming and laundry

Question 2

genre

Answer 2

• Reinforces charity advertisement conventions by including key information about the concern, a personalised narrative to which this information is relevant, and a direct appeal to the audience for money
• However, lacks a non-diegetic voiceover, melancholic audio codes and black and white visual codes could all be seen as unconventional of this advertising sub-genre.

Question 3

Codes and conventions, how media lang influences meaning:

Answer 3

• Opening medium shot with a pull focus between the digital radio and the rain against the window establishes the advert in a modern, British setting (the audio codes are of an announcer with an English accent)
• The visual and audio codes work together to construct the narrative of “sunshine” (in Africa) “on a rainy day” (in Britain) with the associated problems of drought and “lack of access to clean drinking water” that the charity is aiming to relieve.
• Medium shot of a group of women carrying water buckets on their heads: “make me feel, make me feel like I belong… don’t leave me, won’t leave me here”. The connotation here being that the text’s audience can help Claudia “feel like she belongs” and “won’t leave” her there / in that situation if they donate to Water Aid.

Question 4

theory
barthes

Answer 4

• Suspense is created through the enigmatic use of the slow-motion, medium close-up, low angle tracking shot of Claudia’s feet and the swinging bucket (barthes)
• The Symbolic Codes (Barthes) of drought ridden African countries are reinforced both visually and through the advert’s audio codes up until about 00.47.

Question 5

theory
structuralism, strauss

Answer 5

• visual binary opposition is created between the arid, washed-out, primarily beige, and brown colour palette of the advert’s first third and the more vibrant colours used at 01.02.
• on-screen graphic (“650 million people still don’t have access to clean drinking water”) creates a conceptual binary opposition between Claudia’s positive story and that of other, less fortunate people.

Question 6

social context

Answer 6

• Water Aid said that it had “deliberately broken away from the traditional charity ad formula” in response to the public’s desensitisation to traditional fundraising tactics.
• This would perhaps make the more positive representation of Claudia as a healthy, independent and musically talented woman to stand out

Question 7

How reps are constructed through selection and combination:

Answer 7

• dress codes of the advert’s main female character include a stereotypical knee-length skirt and pink colour palette in both her top and shoes
• her smiling gesture code (01.09) represent her as the advert’s protagonist and a ‘character’ with whom the audience can positively associate.

Question 8

theory
hall, gauntlett, zoonen, gilroy

Answer 8

• the images of a dry, dusty African environment in which people may be struggling to survive form part of the “shared conceptual road map” that give meaning to the “world” of the advert. (hall)
• The more positive audio codes then work to challenge these stereotypical representations, creating enigmas around why Claudia appears to be so positive. The solution to these enigmas is given to the audience at 01.00 when we first see the water pump
• Claudia acts as a role model for the type of lifestyle changes that the audience could be responsible for creating if they donate to Water Aid. (gauntlet)
• by assuming the stereotypically male roles of ‘protagonist’ and ‘provider’, Claudia is perhaps contributing to social change by representing women in non-traditional roles. (zoonen)
• media texts reinforce colonial power could be applied, as Water Aid is encouraging its British audience to ‘help’ those like Claudia who live in ‘less developed’ countries. (Gilroy)

Question 9

social and cultural context:

Answer 9

• the advert has been viewed at least 47000 times on the WaterAid YouTube channel
• the likely target audience are literate with technology as donations are encouraged through the imperative “Text SUNNY to 70555” and the use on the YouTube page of a twitter hashtag (#ShareSunshine).
• The advert’s cover of Zoe’s 1990 song Sunshine On A Rainy Day could indicate that the target audience are in their 30s–40s as they’re likely to remember the original and receive nostalgia from hearing the song

Question 10

How industries target audiences:

Answer 10

• The likely audience demographic is constructed through the advert’s use of a young woman with whom they might personally identify (uses & grat)
• Parents may identify empathetically with the ‘better life’ that Water Aid’s clean water provides for the children represented in the advert.
• Water Aid acts as an Opinion Leader for the target audience who would assume the “650 million people…” statistic (01.14) is true and reliable.
• The positive visual codes, audio codes and representations would, give the advert unique selling points compared to other charity appeals and therefore make the audience more likely to donate.

Question 11

theory
reception, hall

Answer 11

• The fact that she’s named tells the preferred reading that she is a real person and that the audience should invest in her narrative, sharing Water Aid’s ideologies.
• The use of handheld camera shots and indirect mode of address made by Claudia connote that the audience is following her story, but Water Aid rather than she herself have constructed this narrative for us. (Dominant encoding created by WaterAid)

Question 12

theory
cultivation, gerbner

Answer 12

• This theory suggests that audiences have become used to the conventions of this sub-genre of advertising and are perhaps ‘immune’ to pleading, earnest non diegetic voiceovers by well-known voices and black and white, slow-motion, emotive representations of people suffering.