OUGD401 | Study Task 5 - part 2

PROPOSAL

My research question is "To what extent does advertising construct our ideas of gender?". My current hypothesis is that the way gender is represented in advertising is false, misleading and ridiculous. Advertising is a process of power, and manipulating the spectator-buyer into envying their future self. Both genders in adverts pose powerfully but the overall position of power lies with the man, whilst women appear as objects, ready to be observed. The contexts of my research lie in advertising itself, and sourcing examples of gender representation and analysing the tools used within the adverts, I will particularly focus on the representation of man and women within these and the positioning of them and what actions are communicated by each. I plan to find these adverts in magazines, newspapers and billboards. We are bombarded by so much advertising that this should not be difficult to source. I plan to analyse how certain products are advertised and identity if their is a common theme when advertising a certain product. I also plan to analyse the techniques used by Adbusters to understand the opposite situation and how I can use this successfully to communicate a message.  I further plan to analyse the photography within advertising, and how the composition of these effects the men, women and the product itself. I will also research products which are similar to the product that I decide to create to fulfil my answer. In order to connect this to my written work, I plan to find advertisements that satisfy various quotes from my sources such as Berger and Coward - through this I will prove the connection and therefore answer the question. In order to test my work I plan to produce questionnaires for the public as well as those in the creative industry. They will answer these questions after seeing my work and hopefully my practical work will be successful in communicating the message of my written work.

TIME PLAN

Week beginning 23rd Feb RESEARCH
Week beginning 2rd March RESEARCH
Week beginning 9rd March IDEA GENERATION AND PLANNING
Week beginning 16rd March IDEA GENERATION AND PLANNING
Week beginning 23rd March EXPERIMENTATION
Week beginning 30rd March EXPERIMENTATION /DEVELOPMENT
Week beginning 6th April DEVELOPMENT
Week beginning 13th April PRODUCTION
Week beginning 20th April PRODUCTION
Week beginning 27th April TESTING
HAND IN 5TH MAY