Adcult USA: The Triumph of Advertising in American Culture

by James B. Twitchell

Book Overview

We see them in flashing kaleidoscopes of colour and sound on television, splashes of neon on billboards, on glossy spreads in newspapers and magazines. We hear the peppy jingles on the radio. We even find them being sneaked past us as underwriting on public television and radio. Advertising is like a song Americans can't get out of their heads.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0231103255
• ISBN13: 9780231103251
• Release Date: April 1997
• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Length: 296 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 7.0" x 9.5"
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Insightful, Witty and Educational

To discover why Americans are sold on advertising, read this book. Twitchell examines the dpeths to which advertisers will go to win the affection of the American people. The book is funny, educational and actually fun to read.

Catchy and entertaining as the commercials...and scarier

Rick Dagwan's teaching opened my eyes and made me realize how a mass medium such as movies or television can be used to manipulate the beliefs, desires, and feelings of a great many people -- often to the point where an expert at media manipulation can become rich, or powerful, or both. (Is it just a coincidence that we end up electing the politicians who run the best TV commercials?) Advertising is one of the most insidious tools of the Conspiracy, in that it is so omnipresent ithat many of us don't even realize just how much of an effect it has on us. This is where books like Adcult USA come in. This book is a searing jolt of truth that wakes ups up and shows us just how much of our culture is shaped through advertising (the entire Christmas holiday season, for starters), while at the same time reminding us that we like to be advertised to. Because we've been bombarded with advertising for our entire lives, we've become used to it and this makes us receptive to short messages that insinute themselves into our culture. Adcult USA can be seen as a wake-up call or just a hell of an entertaining read, but it's likely to make you think twice when you watch TV or read.

Adcult USA: Just do it!

It may seem like an exageration to say that a book about advertising fundamentally changed the way I view the world... but it did (and 9 out of ten dental hygenists agree). Anyways, this book is sensational. It give an interesting historical overview, and then goes on to analyze the way advertising has shaped modern society. I'm going to read all of Mr. Twitchell's books. He is a really clever and witty writer, and obviously has some great insights on modern culture. Plus, this book has lots of pictures of the ads/trends he discusses-- this is a real asset to the text.

Leads you to better know what is going on in our minds!

In the time of fragmentation and frantic search for answers and patterns of what is going on in contemporary society, Twichell's book is a must read for every thinking person. Not just for advertising people (although it's of crucial value for getting the philosophy of modern advertising) but for educated person in general. For, it's not possible to understand why modern people behave the way they do if you don't know what is the role of modern advertising in their lives. Twichell's book is sharp-minded dissection of the strongest cult known today: advertising.

Compelling, Outstanding?and Downright Disconcerting

The premise of AdcultUSA-that advertising is the "dominant meaning-making system of modern life" [p. 253]-is argued compellingly and authenticated meticulously with numerous examples, photos, and anecdotes. Yet the messages about the transformative impact of advertising on contemporary American culture are downright disconcerting. On many levels, advertising has shaped our shared myths, our self concepts, and our marking of calendric time. [p. 124] People relate to each other by the commercials they have experienced and consumed rather than by the books they have read or the human interactions they have shared.We embrace advertising; we also blame it and give it vastly accentuated power. However, demonizing advertising says alot about human passivity in the face of complexity [p. 111]. Whereas it can be argued that advertisers are the primary censors of media content in the U.S. today [p. 119], and engage in intermingling fact and fiction [p. 134], the culture of advertising-adcult-arose and gained prominence by us as customers and consumers participating actively and passively in its meteoric rise. In many ways, we have consented to allowing our minds to be treated as a rental space for brand-name products ranging from jeans and perfume to cars and snack foods.Author James Twitchell, a professor of English at the University of Florida, asserts that "advertising is the culture developed to expedite the central problem of capitalism: the distribution of surplus goods." [p. 41] The two principal advertisers in America today are corporations which manufacture and distribute alcohol and tobacco products. According to his research, these industries collectively control 65% of newspaper space and 22% of television time. And repeated and defensible parallels between advertising culture and Christianity are drawn. Twitchell argues that both are systems for organizing value in society and in individual human lives.This book should be read and re-read by adults throughout America. And it should be among the required reading in all college and university undergraduate sociology, psychology, and communications courses. Robert S. Frey, Editor/Publisher, BRIDGES: An Interdisciplinary Journal