Commercial Language

Lately, I've been doing a lot of analyzing and commenting on issues and whatnot. So, I've decided to bring it all back down to Earth and talk a little bit about me and what has been on my mind lately (with a language twist of course).


Being a sports fan, this weekend I watched the Green Bay Packers win Super Bowl XLV. Now, I won't say I was happy that the Packers won, but I was thrilled that the Steelers lost. Moving on, what really inspired me to write this blog was of course.......Super Bowl commercials. Gotta love 'em right? Anyways, as I was watching them, I realized how numb I have become to the actual words being uttered in each commercial. The sensory overload that happens as a result of constant advertisements, causes me to completely tune out any commercials unless they are 1) funny or 2) have high enough shock value. Nowadays, it seems as if many companies are dead set on creating a commercial that is as funny as possible, and then, they slap their name at the end of it.

When I thought about why that is, I came to a conclusion: obviously, the funny/shocking commercials are the ones I remember and even if I don't know what the advertisement is promoting, I remember the company's name. However, it doesn't stop there. Commercials that try simply using language to describe a product, without humor or shock value, are dull and obsolete. We have been overloaded by so many advertisements that the words in commercials are no longer important because everyone is saying the exact same thing: their product is the best. This can be seen almost everywhere, especially with car commercials. With out even listening to a commercial, I can already assume that a classic car advertisement is going to mention the car's awesome performance, excellent safety rating, great fuel efficiency and likely some sort of sale or promotion going on at the dealerships. What else is new? Subconsciously, I know what these car/beer/paper towel/fertilizer/etc. commercials are all going to say, so I tune out.

It seems companies have begun to realize this and thus, are focusing more and more on the funny/shock factor and less and less on the words. I will tell you this, I can only remember two car commercials the Super Bowl off the top of my head. Neither of them said one word about the actual car.

The first is the Volkswagen commercial with the kid dressed as Darth Vader.

The second was a Kia commercial where the car was "caught" by a helicopter but then Poseiden came out and grabbed it, sent it into a UFO where it drove into a black hole and emerged in a Mayan-like civilization. Yeah, quite strange, but I remembered it for some reason.

In a nutshell, thinking about this new breed of commercial made me recognize the limitations of language in our modern society due to information overload. However, understanding this concept made me further appreciate the power of language that comes in the form of a great book. It is unparalleled.