Theories and Cultures of Advertising

The course aims to explore the many forms of advertising discourse with the help of multimedia materials, and in constant dialogue with other disciplines such as linguistics, semiotics, aesthetics, philosophy, sociology, history, marketing and economics.
The exploration focuses on the appearance, components and profound attributes of advertising and post-advertising discourse, analyzing the impact of technology on the notion of propaganda and strategies of the involvement of prospects.
The course also aims to address themes of communication design, business design and design management, such as brand identity, targeting, engagement, conversion, omni-channel, sustainability, distribution, ethics, gender neutrality and storytelling.
The ultimate educational objective is to provide students with the theoretical tools useful for a critical - and therefore profound and personal - reading of advertising discourse and their role in defining the experience of brand, product and reality.

The student will understand the underlying mechanics of promoting the activities of a company or organization, the best practices necessary to structure a positive image of a brand, and the procedures useful to activate effective campaigns. The student will then be able to critically analyze the stories, meanings and values associated with a brand and a product.
Finally, the student will become aware of the role, power and responsibility of communication-advertising discourses within society, as well as the mechanisms underlying the relationship of postponement between sensory elements - that which the public discourse demonstrates- and intellectual elements- that which the advertising discourse expresses.