The document provides background information on charity advertising and discusses conventions and challenges in this field. It then analyzes the 2016 WaterAid advert "Claudia Sings" which aims to showcase how communities benefit from clean water. The advert deliberately breaks from traditional charity formulas by not using excessive shock tactics or negative stereotypes, instead portraying an everyday story in a hopeful manner. It analyzes how the advert uses visual and audio codes as well as representation to convey its message to audiences.

1. MEDIA LANGUAGE AND
REPRESENTATION
COMPONENT 1 SECTION A:
ADVERTISING AND MARKETING
#2 – WaterAid Audiovisual Advert
Claudia Sings (2016)

2. CHARITY ADVERTISING
Promoting a charity is a much more complex process than
promoting a product, service or brand. More so than a
commercial business, a charity has to be seen to be getting
value for money for its advertising campaign, otherwise it will
be accused of wasting resources. However, like any other
organisation, charities have to promote awareness, of both
themselves and the causes they fight. They are often dealing
with taboo areas of society, circumstances that audiences
don't really want to read about, and the charities cannot be
accused of glamorising their subjects.

3. CHARITY ADVERTISING
They must not veer too far towards deglamourisation either -
charities have come under fire for using excessive and negative
stereotyping in their advertising (especially in the representation
of disabled people, or disaster victims). Complaints flood in to
the Advertising Standards Authority if it is felt that an ad is too
shocking, too controversial or too frightening. Charities are also
reliant on finding unique selling points that are bad, and that are
happening to other people - a long way from the aspirational
hopes keyed into by other advertising.

4. CHARITY ADVERTISING
Nonetheless, charity advertising is an innovative
and creative field. Charities and ad agencies work
hard within the restrictions imposed upon them
to create ads that will provoke discussion as well
as donation. Provocative advertising is one way of
getting a charity into the news - where column
inches are free.

5. WHAT DO THESE IMAGES PROVOKE?
WHY?

6. CODES AND CONVENTIONS OF AUDIO-VISUAL
ADVERTISING
Let’s start with the basics – Mise en
Scene/editing/sound/cinematography/colour/lighting.
Watch these 3 adverts ANALYSING as you go… what do you notice?
Silver Line
Barnardo’s
British Heart Foundation
Do they share the same
values and ideologies?
If so how do you know?

7. WHAT ABOUT THIS?
Just Giving
How does this change the way we think as an audience?
Is this effective? How and why?
Does it use the usual codes and conventions?

8. WATER AID 2016
CONTEXT:
The charity WATER AID was established in 1981 as a response to a
United Nations campaign for clean water, sanitisation and water
hygiene education. It now works with organisations in 37 African, Asian
and Central American countries plus the Pacific region. Since 1991 its
patron has been Prince Charles.
Created by ATOMIC LONDON in October 2016, this advert (titled Rain
for Good) stars 16 year old Zambian student Claudia and aims to show
how communities benefit from clean water by depicting everyday
chores such as farming and laundry.

9. MEDIA LANGUAGE
CULTURAL CONTEXT:
Following 1984’s Do They Know it’s Christmas? Single for BAND AID,
1985’s LIVE AID was the first global charity event aiming to raise funds
for relief of the ongoing famine in Ethiopia.
The COMIC RELIEF telethon was launched by Richard Curtis and Lenny
Henry in 1985 with the same initial famine relief aim, and went on to
raise over £1bn for charitable causes across Africa and in the UK.
The contemporary audience for this advert could be assumed to be
familiar with the codes and conventions of both audio-visual adverts
and those for charitable organisations in particular.

12. 1.Create a mind map of all the elements you have
seen in the advert
2. Create a table with the headings
CONVENTIONAL and UNCONVENTIONAL
Place your findings under the two headings
3. What overall impact do you think this advert
has? How did the producers convey meaning?

13. MEDIA LANGUAGE TO CREATE MEANING
TASK:
ANALYSE THE VISUAL AND AUDIO CODES USED IN THE
WATER AID ADVERT – WHAT MEANING DO THEY
CREATE FOR THE AUDIENCE?
DOES IT CREATE A PREFERRED READING OR
OPPOSITIONAL? WHY?

14. THEORY - BARTHES
Consider how suspense is created?
(hermeneutic code)
Why are symbols important in this advert?
What do they suggest and reinforce to the
audience?

15. THEORY – LEVI STRAUSS
STRUCTURALISM – BINARY OPPOSITIONS
TASK: CREATE A LIST OF BINARY OPPOSITES
FOUND WITHIN THE ADVERT.
FURTHER THINKING: WHAT COULD BE A
CONCEPTUAL BINARY OPPOSTION?

16. TASK
Write no more than 500 words to
summarise how Media Language
has been used in the Claudia
Sings advert for Water Aid 2016.

17. REPRESENTATION
•In your opinion how are Charity Adverts represented?
•How do they make you feel?
•Are there adverts that provoke more feeling than
others? Why?
•What would you expect from a Charity advert?
•How are people usually presented in these adverts?

18. WATER AID ADVERT 2013 – NO CHOICE
NO CHOICE
How does this advert follow conventions aspects of Charity Advert?
How is it different/similar to the 2016 advert?
How is the main character represented to us?

19. REPRESENTATION
Launching the Rain for Good campaign, Water Aid said that it
‘deliberately broke away from the traditional charity ad formula’ in
response to the public’s desensitisation to traditional fundraising
tactics.
What does this mean?

20. DESENSITISATION
• Virginia Tech Massacre 2007: The Press blamed film Oldboy for influencing Cho Seung-Hui’s killings.
• Columbine High School Massccre 1999: The press blamed the music of Marilyn Manson for influencing Eric
Harris and Dylan Klebold.
• Jamie Bulger Case 1993: Jon Venables and Robert Thompson (both young children themselves) killed
toddler Jamie. The Press blamed the film Child’s Play 3 for their crime due to it being present in Venables’
father’s rental history.
• Article on Grand Theft Auto and desensitization - http://www.medicaldaily.com/gta-5-does-spectacle-
video-games-destroy-sensitivity-violence-257352
Becoming accustomed to something
so that it no longer provokes a
reaction. (i.e. video violence).

21. Huesmann and Eron (1986)- studied the effect of violent TV over a period of 22 years and
found that the more violent TV someone watched the more they likely to be convicted
of a criminal offence by the age of 50.
Guy Cumberbatch- believes there is no scientific evidence that relate media to violence
and that some people are just naturally aggressive.
Feshbach and Singer (1971)- found that children shown aggressive TV over 6 weeks are
LESS aggressive afterwards.
Sparkfin et al. (1975) and Baron et al. (1978)- found that TV did also have a pro-social
effect, which had twice the effect of aggressive TV.
Park et al. (1977)- found that juvenile delinquents in US/ Belgium watching violent TV
were more aggressive that those who weren’t.
DESENSITISATION

22. PROBLEMS:
- Argument that aggressive people will seek out aggressive films not
the other way round.
- There is so much conflicting data from different experiments and
studies that do not correlate.
- None of the studies can be seen to be accurate or to 100% prove their
theory.
- Measuring aggression is almost impossible.
DESENSITISATION

23. REPRESENTATION
The stereotypical ‘victim’ needing our help is
an archetype with which the audience would
be familiar from many other charity adverts.
With this in mind how is Claudia represented
in the advert?

24. REPRESENTATION
Comment on:
GENDER
ETHNICITY
AGE
How does Claudia appear to the audience?

25. THEORY
STUART HALL – challenging stereotypical representations – creating
enigmas – positive aspects despite situation.
DAVID GAUNTLETT – creating Claudia’s identity. Acting as a role model
for the type of lifestyle the audience could be responsible for changing.
LIESBET VAN ZOONEN – Claudia acts as the protagonist therefore
assuming a male role as the provider. Claudia is perhaps contributing to
social change. Work is physically challenging - male role.

26. THEORY
GILROY’S – (ETHNICITY AND POST COLONIAL)
Media texts reinforce colonial power
- Water Aid is encouraging Britain to help
those who live is less developed countries.
What is POST COLONIAL THEORY?

27. Post-colonialism
• Most European countries, including the UK have a history of military
imperialism.
• They would conquer less developed countries and impose their rule
on them.
• This was usually to ensure a supply of cheap materials from that
country to help support the economy.
• Former British colonies include India, South Africa, Australia, Jamaica
and the USA – at one point, GB ruled half the world.

28. Post-colonialism
These colonies eventually became independent and set up their
own governments.
However, it can be argued that much of the culture of the imperial
countries (eg. Their language) still lingers on in the former colonies
as a reminder of colonial rule.
Also, the process of decolonisation has not prevented the
Western powers from tightening their economic grip on the rest
of the world.
The wealth of economically developed countries increasingly
depends on the cheap labour and raw materials supplied by the
Third World.

29. Post-colonialism: Examples in media
‘Saunders of the River’
(1935) portrayed ideologies
naturalising colonisation
The Four Feathers (1939)
suggested the key role of the
British army was to bring a
civilising influence to India
and Egypt.
Zulu (1964) represented the
Zulu tribe in Africa as
violent savages.

30. Ideology
suggests that
black skin is
undesirable and
white skin is
desirable
Images like this
helped reinforce a
sense of superiority
of colonising
populations and the
way the colonised
African countries are
sidelined

31. Post-Colonialism
 Post-colonialism does not emphasise a new,
technologically advanced media world…
 It emphasises the importance of the cultural,
economic, political and military dominance of the
past.
 The absence of non-white images in the media
visually suggests a dominance of white culture.

32. TASK
Write no more than 500 words to
summarise how Representation
has been used in the Claudia Sings
advert for Water Aid 2016.

33. AUDIENCE
SOCIAL/CULTURAL CONTEXT:
In December 2016, this advert had been viewed about 47000
times on Water Aid’s YouTube channel and this page also
actively encourages the sharing of its adverts through social
networks. Further evidence that the likely target audience are
literate with technology is that donations are encouraged
through the imperative ‘TEXT SUNNY to 7055’ and the use of
YouTube page and Twitter hashtag #ShareSunshine.

34. AUDIENCE
The advert’s cover song of Zoe’s Sunshine on
a Rainy Day could indicate that the target
audience are in their 30s -40s as they are
likely to remember the original and get
pleasure from the nostalgic value of hearing
a song they are familiar with.

35. Who might be the audience demographic for
the this advert? How do you know? What has
the institution done to establish a link?
How have Uses and
Gratifications been
used to embed
meaning?

36. LET’S THINK BACK TO THIS

37. EFFECTS…
2-STEP FLOW MODEL:
The 2-step flow model details that
there are opinion leaders in society.
Opinion leaders are people who have
seen the media text and have been
able to make up their own mind
about it’s qualities and messages.
These opinion leaders are ACTIVE
however except for deciding which
opinion leaders to believe the rest
of the audience are PASSIVE.
This theory fits the concept of film reviews
and film magazines, people who write for
magazines such as Sight & Sound or
Empire or presenters like Jonathon Ross
are highly respected for their opinions. They
will decide whether a film is worth seeing
and “simplify” the content and qualities of
the film, helping PASSIVE people make a
decision about whether or not to see it.

38. HOW CAN WATER AID
BEEN SEEN AS AN
OPINION LEADER?
WRITE A SUMMARY OF
NO MORE THAN 10 LINES

39. TASK
FIND 1 CHARITY
ADVERT THAT WE
HAVEN’T LOOKED
AT OR THAT YOU
HAVEN’T USED.
WRITE A REPORT
ABOUT IT HAS USED:
MEDIA LANGUAGE
REPRESENTATION
AUDIENCE
WITH THEORY TO HELP SUPPORT
YOUR STATEMENTS.