Advertising and cultural representation in Zimbabwe : a study of advertisements in a monthly magazine, 1980-1997

Abstract

1980 is argued to have initiated Zimbabwe into full - scale global participation. Over a decade and half later claims are being made that open borders are letting in negative influences from outside the immediate borders of the country. Claims and counter - claims have been raised around this cultural focal point. In terms of the media proponent views, at the one, allege the images availed to the public are little by little departing from the local to mirror, more, the foreign. Contesting arguments stress the positiveness, rather than source, of change to consist the proper site of discussion. Typically, both arguments are seeking a better understanding of the character of change both as it has arrived and as it continues to filter in. This study analyses the messages in advertisements in a monthly publication, Parade. It is a surface investigation into the changes that have taken place in the representative image between 1980 and 1997. It looks at the place, image - wise, of women in relation to men and the rural in relation to the urban. It also enquires into the representation of the three major languages in Zimbabwe. An attempt is made to discover the extent to which at the very surface level larger normative arguments mirrored above are sustained, by way of factual support. The study´s prime argument is that it is only a first level factual grasp of the existing map of change mutations that will effect sharpened engagements in the grander normative treatises as abstracted above. This understanding is crucial and absolute.