Essay on Communication Evolved: Exploring the Impact of Technology on Advertisements

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The world has evolved over the past few years, especially due to the rise of technology. Technology has come up with various impacts in the sense that it has helped how various activities can be done. One of the impacts of technology is that it has helped in communication. Currently, there are various forms of communication that can be used to reach the public. Advertisements is one of the ways that can be used to communicate a particular message to the public. Various forms of advertisement can be used to pass different information. An example of an advertisement that can be used to pass information is political Ads. Political Ads are advertisements that are mainly used to invoke a political debate. Due to the presence of these advertisements, it is important to analyze to understand them properly. One of the ways to understand these political Ads is by conducting a rhetorical analysis that involves breaking down work into various parts for proper understanding. An example of an advertisement is the Democratic Presidential Campaign Ad, which was trying to persuade the American citizens to vote for Hillary Clinton in the upcoming elections. The Ad is made up of various parts that can be analyzed to understand it. Therefore, this paper will conduct a rhetorical analysis of the Democratic Presidential Campaign Ad.

Rhetorical Analysis

Aristotelian Analysis

One of the methods that can be used to conduct the rhetorical analysis of the Ad is Aristotelian Analysis. The Aristotelian analysis focuses on three main components, which include pathos, ethos, and logos. It is clear that the political ad presented appeals to pathos. The advertisement depicts Donald Trump, a candidate who will not have the American interest at heart since he is mostly focused on personal activities.

The ad goes on and claims that Hillary Clinton has a desire that will make America great such as improving health care and fight for the rights of the American People (Vafeiadis, Li and Shen, 98). This concept of the ad appeals to the pathos in the sense that it evokes the emotions of people as they will be excited; therefore, vote for Hillary Clinton (Labrador, Ramon, and Alaiz-Moreton 45).

Secondly, the ad appeals to ethos, which shows the credibility of a character. The ad portrays Hillary Clinton as a credible leader because she is more concerning the welfare of the American people. For example, when Hillary Clinton was the first lady, she helped to ensure that children who had various medical conditions go covered (Labrador, Ramon, and Alaiz-Moreton 45). This strategy helped these children to get affordable health care that helped improve their conditions. This gesture is one of the many reasons why Hillary Clinton is considered a credible leader that Donald Trump, who is volatile.

Thirdly, the Democratic Presidential Campaign Ad appeals to logos since it has logic, or it uses logic to improve the audience's understanding. In the political ad, Donald Trump has been quoted talking about his sprinkler tanks, something that will not benefit the Americans in any way (Vafeiadis, Li and Shen, 98). In the case of Hillary Clinton, it is evident that she is more connected to the people, and this means that she understands their needs much better. This aspect of analysis invokes logical reasoning in the sense that Americans will be able to think by themselves that Hillary Clinton would make a better leader than Donald Trump (Vafeiadis, Li and Shen, 98).

Metaphor Analysis

Apart from the Aristotelian Approach used to analyze a political ad, metaphor analysis can also be used. In this Ad, the use of metaphor is evident, whereby Hillary Clinton is portrayed as the leader who will bring change to the people of American. It is likely that when Hillary Clinton gets to the president, she will be the same politician as others have always been and will not fulfill all her promises.

Elements used to synthesize the Advertisement

Other elements can be used to synthesize the advertisement effectively, such as the 15 basic appeals of an advertisement. According to Lakoff and Johnson (78), "one of the basic appeals of an advertisement that is evident in this ad is the need to dominate." The need to dominate is evident, whereby Hillary Clinton is portrayed as a better leader than Donald Trump (Brown 33).

Another basic appeal of this advertisement is that it appeals to the need to achieve. In this case, the advertisements show that American needs a leader such as Hillary Clinton to achieve its vision. Also, the advertisement has a basic appeal for guidance, whereby it shows the Americans in the right direction that they should follow when voting to ensure that they have a good leader (Brown 33).

Also, there are various metaphors that we live daily. One such metaphor that will live by presented in the advertisement is the need to improve health care services. There is a need to improve health care services so that people who are suffering from various medical conditions can be treated.

Moreover, the political ad that has been presented can be synthesized using, "Don't think of an Elephant." According to Lakoff (98), "Don't think like an elephant implies that we view the world through frames". Therefore, in this case, the ad frames Hillary Clinton as a suitable leader for America than Donald Trump so that she could be voted for the presidency.

Conclusion

Concluding, it is evident that advertising has risen over the past few years to become one of the most common uses that is used to communicate different types of information to the members of the public. In most cases, advertisements are used to create awareness of various entities. Moreover, the rise in the use of advertisements has mainly been boosted by the recent development of technology. Various types of advertisements are presented, and one of them is the political advertisements that are aimed at creating certain political ideologies. However, at times it is not easy to understand the meaning of these advertisements, thus calling for the need to analyze them critically. Rhetorical analysis is one of the ways which can help to analyze these ads effectively. In the Democratic Presidential Primary Ads that was used for this paper, the rhetorical analysis was effectively used as it helped to understand it. For instance, the rhetorical analysis helped to understand who is a better leader between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. It was evident that the ad presented Clinton as a better leader when compared to Donald Trump because she had the needs of the American people at her heart while Trump was more focused on expanding his empire. The ad was calling for the Americans to vote for Hillary Clinton. Moreover, the ad was appealing to the audience through various elements such as guidance, dominance, as well as the need to achieve.

Works Cited

Labrador, B., Ramon, N., Alaiz-Moreton, H., & Sanjurjo-Gonzalez, H. (2014). Rhetoricalstructure and persuasive language in the subgenre of online advertisements. English forSpecific Purposes, 34, 38-47.

Lakoff, George, and Mark Johnson. Metaphors we live by-University of Chicago Press, 2008.Brown, J. "ENG 1001G-040." (2012).

Lakoff, George. The all-new don't think of an elephant! Know your values and frame the debate.Chelsea Green Publishing, 2014.

Vafeiadis, Michail, Ruobing Li, and Fuyuan Shen. "Narratives in political advertising: Ananalysis of the political advertisements in the 2014 midterm elections." Journal ofBroadcasting & Electronic Media 62.2 (2018): 354-370.