Week Four - Breaking Down KFC

‘Kentucky Fried Chicken’ or for short, KFC – almost everyone who has access to technology would know what this is all about. It is hard to ignore it, much less forget it. Why is this so? With these three alien terms ‘Syntax’, ‘Semantics’ and ‘Pragmatics’, I would analyze of the reasons for KFC to be such a popular brand.

First of all, a VERY brief explanation would be appropriate for the three alien terms: ‘Syntax’, ‘Semantics’ and ‘Pragmatics’. Syntax is a structure that makes a sign, semantics are what the sign connotes for and the result of both syntax and semantics are then ruled by pragmatics such as codes, modality, sender, receiver and context. In semiotics’ terms, it can be said that syntax is ‘signifier’, semantics are ‘signified’ and pragmatics are ‘signs’.

And now, back to KFC:

Syntax and semantics:

§  The colour red – warmth in terms of service and environment; warm foods; stands out from other

§  The white-suit middle-aged smiling man – the one who came up with the famous recipe for KFC’s famous fried chicken, the Colonel; smiling indicates friendliness

§  Apron – indicating that the food, even after all these years since its first appearance, KFC still produces its famous products in the kitchen and this again give the feeling of warmth, perhaps reminding one of one self’s home

§  The catchphrase ‘It’s finger lickin’ good!’ – people do not usually lick their fingers after eating something with their hands out of politeness and being ‘civilised’; however, KFC’s food has the ‘ability’ to make people forget their ‘formality’ as most would lick their finger after eating KFC’s fried chickens especially as if not having enough

Pragmatics of the logo:

§  Most would agree that apron reminds of people of kitchen, especially of their own home and this would give the ‘feel good’ sense.

§  A smiling face has always been considered a gesture of friendliness in any society.

§  The products KFC has produced fit the logo:

§  The advertising used by KFC also fit what KFC is trying to portray with its logo:

With everything about KFC fits with each other, no wonder people could easily remember KFC, making it one of those enduring fast-food brands in the century.

Reference:

§  Chandler, D. (2005). Introduction. Semiotics For Beginners. Retrieved June 19, 2010 from Prifysgol Aberystwyth University Media Website: http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/sem01.html

§  As retrieved from KFC Official Website at August 29, 2010: http://www.kcf.com

Week Three - More Than Just A Picture

Semiotics means literally ‘the study of signs’, and ‘signs’ here could include traffic signs, symbols, letters, languages, music, clothes and almost everything that we could sense with our five given senses – and if you want to include your sixth sense too, it is up to you. And ‘sign’, according to Roland Barthes, is the sum of two different parts – ‘signifier’ and ‘signified’.

‘Signifier’ is the object being examined and ‘signified’ is what the object concerned means.

Semiotics helps communication analysts to figure out how people interpret signs and in my case, to predict what genre a movie would be just from its promotion poster. For this very purpose, I would randomly choose movie posters that I have yet to watch in the cinema.

First movie poster is ‘Going The Distance’, directed by Nanette Burstein:

The sentence below the title of the movie is a give-away – “A Comedy of Meeting Each Other Halfway”. What else could have the movie be but a romantic comedy? Supposedly, there are no words provided on the poster but the title. So, in terms of semiotics:

Signifier: A man and a woman standing in close proximity, holding/touching each other and looking at each other, smiling

Signified: A close relationship – a couple?

Signifier: Sky-blue and yellow background

Signified: ‘Warm’, ‘happy’ colours – perhaps something that can make the audience happy...a comedy?

Sign: A romantic-comedy movie, most likely

Second movie poster is ‘Senario: Asam Garam’:

And this is even easier than the first one, especially for those living in Malaysia, Singapura, Brunei and Indonesia. Most people in these countries would be familiar with ‘Senario’, a comedy group and most certainly, people would instantly know that this is going to be a comedy:

Signifier: Senario

Signified: Comedy

Sign: A comedy

How the characters are positioned within the poster also contributes to this movie mostly being depicted as comedy. Each character is shown with a different expression, and most are comedic expressions. And somewhere behind them is a burning house right next to a non-burning one. Usually, a burning house is considered a dire situation but combined with the comically-reacting characters in front, one could predict it might turn out to be a humorous situation.

Below is another Malaysian-release movie, ‘Magika’:

The genre of this movie does not come as easy as before…until the dragon comes into view, and dragons are usually perceived as mythical creatures and only appear in fantasy settings. Immediately, one could say this is most likely going to be a fantasy movie with an adventure crossing time and space. Why do I suggest this? The clothes, simply from the clothes worn by the characters.

The two characters in the middle – a boy and a young woman possibly – are wearing 21^st century casual clothes. And this is the tricky part; for those who are unfamiliar with Malay history might not noticed this but most people living in Malay-speaking country would realize that the rest of characters are wearing those-centuries-old-clothes. Some of these traditionally-clothed characters then are lined up in a gesture of ‘welcoming’ the two ‘modern’ characters. It is like the two ‘modern’ characters are going from their 21^st century home to somewhere-way-back-in-time wilderness.

The title ‘Magika’ also plays a part; just tweak the word a bit and it would sound like the word ‘magical’ – hence, fantasy.

The movie poster of ‘The Hole’ also does not give a straight answer of what genre it belongs:

Signifier: Dark surroundings, especially the hole on the ground, even after being shone by light

Signified: Mystery, the unknown, death, danger – creates anxiety and fear

                 

Signifier: The hole on the ground – a pit?

Signified: Trap, reference to ‘Dante’s Inferno’ and its ‘Nine Circles of Hell’, giving the impression of being unable to escape

Signifier: “What Are You So Afraid Of?”

Signified: Sounds ironic, considering the surroundings in the poster; as if challenging the viewer or whoever the question is directed at to uncover the mystery, bringing even more anxiety at the prospect of expecting the unexpected

Sign: A possible thriller/horror movie

Now, the last movie poster, ‘Vampires Suck’:

At one glance, it looks like romance with the three main characters standing in close proximity, like those in ‘Going The Distance’. It might also be comedy, with the characters positioned like the ones in ‘Senario: Asam Garam’. Reading the title, it can be fantasy as vampires are as mythical as that of dragon in ‘Magika’. The background is dark and hazy and there is fog depicted lightly at the bottom of the poster – is it a thriller/horror like ‘The Hole’?

However, if one is up-to-date with recent movies, the poster may seem familiar, even the way the characters are presented… Remember the movie poster ‘The Twilight Saga: New Moon’?

By now, most people would realize that ‘Vampires Suck’ may be a parody based on ‘The Twilight Saga’. And as a parody, it might be ranging from romance to comedy to thriller and everything else. And if one squints hard enough of the movie poster of ‘Vampires Suck’, there is Lady Gaga on the farthest left, followed by Alice of Wonderland – judging by the white rabbit in her hands and her golden curls – and a young woman holding a stake and wearing a sleeveless top with the word ‘Buffy’ on it – certainly, a reference to the famous Buffy the vampire slayer. This is the trademark of a parody – always bringing in characters from other stories or famous people to join the chaos of the way-altered movie.

This is just one way of using semiotics, and there are hundreds and thousands of ‘signs’ that can be analyzed using semiotics as for communication students and professionals, there are no such thing as ‘just a picture’.

Reference:

§  Stokes, J. (2003) Semiotics. How To Do Media And Cultural Studies (page 70-75). London: Sage Publications.

Week Two - The Ghost's Eyes

When I was still a primary school student, I once encountered a pair of red blinking and moving spots on the night sky and wondered of them. Having experienced a night flight before, I knew instinctively that the red-spots were the red lights of an aeroplane – what else the red spots could have been? Perhaps noticing me musing over the red-spots, my father said that the red spots could have been ghost’s eyes, according to the elderly. Curious, I asked of the reason and he simply replied, “None of them had ever seen an aeroplane before.”

And this brings us to PERCEPTIONS.

Perception is unlike physical seeing; while seeing is basically seeing, perception is HOW we see things. Why some people are fascinated by lightning and the others see it as an ominous sign or even a bad memory? Why is seeing babies’ gummy smiles always bring adorations while a smug smile from someone we loathe makes us want to beat the daylights out of the said person? Why is the smile seen as smug by the way? Why is a white room look bigger than a black room? These are all because of perceptions.

Perceptions are based on first-hand knowledge and experience and could be affected by culture and social environment, as well as space and time context.

For my case as stated before, I had been onto an aeroplane on a night flight and happened to see the red lights on the aeroplane’s wings from my window-seat; hence, with this knowledge, I ‘instinctively’ perceived the red-spots as aeroplane’s lights. The elders who lived years ahead of me most likely had never seen an aeroplane before, let alone to know what kind of equipments an aeroplane might have or even to know of aeroplanes having night flights. Living in a more-superstitious society than today, it would not be such a farfetched idea if the people back then settled for supernatural explanations to explain the identity of red-spots – BLINKING and MOVING red-spots – on random nights on the sky.

This is how perception can be affected by social, cultural, space and time context. And there is a lot more examples out there that could illustrate this, even on the global scale. Let’s take dragons as the example.

Dragons are always been perceived by the Western culture as flying fire-breathing lizard-like creatures that ‘enjoy’ wrecking havoc across the land. This could easily be seen in Western written literatures and arts; heroes – and occasionally heroines – usually have to slay a dragon to restore peace for their society.

These depictions may arise from the fact that the dragons resemble serpents in a way or another, the very animal that has caused both Adam and Eve to be thrown out of Eden.

Hence, according to Western context, dragons are the embodiment of evil that cause sufferings among the mortals and leaving ruins in their paths. However, things are different in the Eastern culture.

In the Eastern society, dragons are mythical creatures that possess magical powers in which some may rival god and in some cases, are gods and goddesses themselves. Some are said to have the power to control over weather; some are acting as guardians of sacred places; some are said to have the ability to grant impossible wishes and give unimaginable riches for the fortunates.

Dragons are important in some of the Eastern countries that they are part of the culture. The ancient Chinese for example, it is not rare to see dragon sculptures being place on rooftops and gates in the belief of bringing good luck and safety.

           

The Emperors themselves adorned their royal yellow robes with the design of five-clawed dragons to signify their status.

There are also dragon dances being held during festive to bring good luck.

All these are just the surface of what differentiate the perceptions of dragons between Western and Eastern context. Whilst the Western may be influence by Biblical teachings, Eastern culture however sees dragons as sacred beings and therefore have to be respected accordingly.

It is not uncommon that a lot of people perceive the same thing differently; it all depends on the environment they are living in and the ‘ingrained’ knowledge within them. That is how, anyway, perceptions work.

References:

§  Berger, J., Bloomberg, S., Fox, C., Dibb, M. & Hollis, R. (1972). Ways of Seeing (pp. 7–33). London and New York: Penguin Books.

§  Jamieson, H. (2007). Visual Communication: More Than Meets The Eye (pp. 13–27). Bristol: Intellect Books

Week One – “Are you the Alice?”

In one scene of ‘Alice in Wonderland’:

And several other scenes:

    

These scenes thus result in Alice saying:

    

And in one scene, Absolem says to Alice:

A question rises – what makes Alice the Alice? To search for the answer, I am then led to the terms coined by the communication specialists as ‘discourse’ and ‘ideology’.

Discourse, in short, is ‘a written or spoken communication of a certain topic’ and ideology is what could be found within a discourse. According to Branston and Stafford (2007), ideology is 'the way in which such values and meanings are usually posed as natural and obvious rather than socially aligned, in other words, working with or against particular sets of power’ (page 174). In short, ideology could be said as ‘commonsense’. Together, both discourse and ideology make up the so-called ‘unspoken truth’.

Let’s take…a classroom as an example. On the thought of classroom, most would think of desks, chairs, writing board, stationeries, books, students, a teacher and etcetera. The ‘classroom’ is a discourse, and what could be found within the classroom as listed before are ideologies.

In term of Alice being a discourse, the ideologies are that she is a curly-haired female Caucasian and that she is the prophesized saviour of the Wonderland. The ideology of being a female would be that Alice would never says that she is in fact a male and the ideology of being a Caucasian would mean that Alice is fair-skinned and lives at temperate-climate areas. The ideology of curly hair would mean that Alice does not have the straight hair that most shampoo and conditioner advertisers would love to have as their model; in fact, her curly hair is distinct enough to be separated from any other curly-haired people and probably, would have trouble of combing her hair. The ideology of being a heroine would mean that she is brave, determined, justice-driven and intelligent, just like any other typical heroes and heroines.

Most of the time, people – and even animals, plants and non-living things – follows the discourse that is set upon them, and this could be easily seen in Disney’s movies. For example, the heroes of Disney have always been a young man whose strength, bravery and intelligence would win him any evil anytime. They have always been depicted as a fair-looking man and usually of a high-ranked status and at the end of their story, they would usually manage to win the heart and hand of their desired fair maiden.

       

However, not all heroes follow the set discourse. Such as in the recent Disney’s movie ‘Up’, the hero is an old man who could even barely walk without the aid of his four-legged walking stick and his so-called sidekick(s)…  Let’s just say that they would not make a convincing rescue team AT ALL, let alone to assume that they would be the ones who would triumph over evil. Yet, the old unlikely hero manages to ‘save’ the day with the help of his so-called sidekick(s) and this event could be called as a counter-discourse or sets of counter-ideologies, the exact opposites of discourse and ideologies.

And the hero of ‘Up’ is not the only one who is not following his set discourse; in fact, recently, there are a lot of heroes out there who are just not the ‘ideal’ hero that the term ‘anti-hero’ is created to describe these kind of heroes.

All in all, life can be seen as following sets of discourses and ideologies. However, life is not exactly fixed; any of its components could change which then creates the counter-discourses and counter-ideologies. After all, life that is fixed could be proven very dull; a little bit of deviants here and there could spice up our life to the fullest.

Now, before I end this, a question enters my mind that I think ought to be shared; if discourses and ideologies are the assumed way of behaviour of things, is not it stereotyping? What are the differences between these terms?

Until then, I end my observation here.

References:

§  Richard D. Zanuck (producer), Tim Burton (director). (2010). Alice in Wonderland (motion picture). United States:

§  Jonas Rivera (producer), Pete Docter (director). (2010). Up (motion picture). United States: Disney.

§  Branston, G & Stafford, R. (2007). The Media Student’s Book. New York, United States of America: Routledge.