Perform a researched, semiotic analysis of a TV program or movie

Instructions:

Perform a researched, semiotic analysis of a TV program or movie of your choosing (Do the paper on -> The Deer Hunter <-  @ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077416/). Try to conceptualize not just your favorite program or film, but rather something you are familiar with with has larger thematic concerns, and has gravitas to analyze. You should view your choice several times and takes notes so you can be as specific as possible in your essay. This is a 4 page analysis with a minimum of 3 outside sources. Note: the subject of your analysis, TV or film, is your primary source. If you wind up comparing two programs or films, then you have multiple primary sources. The research requirement is for secondary sources, scholarship you incorporate and discuss in the body of your essay.

 

Consider the following approaches to this essay:

Outside In: With this approach you are analyzing the primary source through the lens of its placement in time, structure, and theme as it relates to its genre. Consider its associations and differences. In chapter 3, the authors discussed OITNB as it relates to a multitude of other shows. Analyze your primary source from this perspective.

Inside Out: With this approach you are explicating the primary source in depth for all its signs and their meanings to get to its larger thematic concern, or argue the filmmaker's objective. Again referring to chapter 3, also with Orange Is The New Black, the authors looked inward at a specific episode called "The Chickening" where they unpacked the symbolism of that episode in depth.

 

paper

Module One: Advertising:

For this essay you are going to choose a specific advertisement, a company’s advertising campaign over time, or a company’s layout of their brick and mortar or digital store for semiotic analysis. This is a 4 page analysis with a minimum of 3 outside sources. 

Small: Look at a specific ad: print, radio, digital, TV, etc., or single campaign which incorporates multiple modalities and consider what their target audience/customer is and analyze their method of attracting that audience and its effectiveness.

Large: Look at a company (or specific product’s) ad campaign over the course of a period of time, over decades in some cases, and analyze how they have adapted their campaigns to be more reflective of the current time, how they speak to cultural moments at the time, how they work to maintain market share, and generate new customers.

Supersize Me: Analyze a company’s physical layout of either a brick or mortar location, it’s digital space, or both, and how it develops that layout to generate consumer traffic and increased sales, and conceptualize their effectiveness or shortcomings.