Rhetorical Analysis of an Advertisement Advertisements are all over the place. Whether they are on TV, radio, or in a magazine, there is no way that you can escape them.
They all have their target audience who they have specifically designed the ad for. And of course they are selling their product. This is a multi billion dollar industry and the advertiser’s study all the ways that they can attract the person’s attention. One way that is used the most and is in some ways very controversial is use of sex to sell products. For me to analyze this advertisement I used the rhetorical triangle, as well as ethos, pathos, and logos. The target audience is both males and females in their late teens to mid twenties.
This company gets the male side of the equation by getting their attention and interest drawn to the attractive woman on the right with bright colors drawing your attention there as well as the bottle of whiskey which is right in the middle of the page. Then what gets these peoples attention to stay there is the fact they have an incredibly good looking female who is posing in next to nothing. Then a way that they try and get the females to look at the advertisement and read it is by showing a very plain girl who seems to be very typical of girls during their younger years. Then beside they show the same girl who now has become a women who is very attractive and just seems so much more powerful and sure of herself. One way that you can achieve that is if you drink Evan Williams Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey. The purpose is to get young adults even ones that are under age to drink their whiskey.
One piece of specific information that is sent across to you is that the whiskey is aged for seven years before it is sold. The writer’s whole purpose of this advertisement is to try and sell Evan Williams Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. The reason that I think that it advertises to people that are under age because the girl that is on the left in my opinion seems to be under age. Then they got that bottle of whisky which is in between each of the pictures. The author of this advertisement is all about sexual stereotypes such as blonde hair blue eyes and a very large breast size.
All this leads to the notion that sex sells. I do not see this author as trustworthy it seems as if they have a snobby attitude. Like the only way that people will care about you is if you are good looking, while less attractive people aren’t equals. You won’t be able to get the same kind of opportunities as the one on the right who is so much more sexually enticing to her audience. I feel that this advertisement is not very ethical at all. They send the message that if you do not wear sexy clothes and try and act sexy then you are no good.
Plus they are advertising a alcohol that just doesn’t seem right because that girl who is all dressed up is looking as if she is not any much older than 22. Which I guess is nothing wrong with that except on the left in the picture where it says March 22nd 98 that would make her only 15 years of age. This is not right because she is six years under the legal drinking limit. The logic behind the advertisement is almost in all essence sexual. They are using a scantly clad woman who is very attractive with bright colors standing next to a bottle of whiskey.
As well they try and use their slogan that goes with their product and apply it to a completely different situation with a woman. They show how much “ better it gets” when it is aged seven years. This is very degrading to the woman who is in it because they say that she was ugly in the first photo but after seven years less clothing and all the make up is so much better. But the problem that I see with this is that there are just so few women who actually look like that it sets a bar that is just too high for people to reach. Not to mention there is nothing wrong with the girl on the left who is just plain and simple.
When you have to wear next to nothing to get noticed it just continues to drain away from the collective respectability of our society. Another way that they make the photo on the left look worse is they don’t do the hair all up she is wearing a wrinkled shirt plus simple ear rings and a simplistic vest. They try to play sexual emotions in this advertisement. They show an attractive woman and a bottle of whiskey. They try and make it seem that if you drink their product that you can get this woman.
Also they try and use the emotions of the females talking about how a decent looking woman can ecome very attractive. As well the advertiser shows the younger girl who is supposed to be less attractive makes her seem less confident about her self. While the older picture she is much more attractive. The newer picture also is more vibrant plus she is wearing a lot more sexually provocative clothing than her old self, who is all covered up and not showing any skin.
It also seems to draw onto girls that have a lower self esteem. Showing that you will become a much happier person if you are good looking and dressed very sexually, than if you are not the best of looking person. Personally I think that this is a terrible way to advertise something. The only problem is that all companies advertise the same way.
What I realized when looking at this advertisement I noticed that all of the different angles this advertisement uses they are all very similar. That way is to use sex to sell anything and everything. I don’t see any changes to our society occurring any time soon so we probably will continue to see sexually racy ads. Hopefully we will some day be able to get away from these types of ads and make more suitable ads for our culture.