BILL HICKS AND JOHN BERGER: VIEWS RELATING TO THE WORLD OF ADVERTISING.

Bill Hicks was an american comedian who has been an inspiration to a vast number of my generation. I am an unashamed fan of his glorious perception. If you click on the link below you will access Bill's views relating to the world of advertising and marketing. This performance in London was one of Bill's final shows before his death in 1994 at the age of 32. Hicks performed this show armed with the knowledge that he was dying of pancreatic cancer. I encourage any individual with a beating heart to digest the rest of Bill's comedy. The CD and video format were able to capture his work when he was still alive and the DVD format and sites such as You Tube will ensure that Bill's archive remains available and accessible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVZo1Jjfshw&feature=related

Obviously this is not an academic resource that can be referred to in an essay but it does provide material for class discussion and a consideration of media issues relating to the role and purpose of advertising. Why is Bill so anti-advertising? What is the aim of his satirical attack? Why are the audience cheering? What kind of value system is being attacked here? This can be linked to media theories such as Marxism and Pluralism. A more credible media theorist, who shares a similar view to Hicks, is JOHN BERGER. In his essential book 'WAYS OF SEEING' [published in 1972] Berger states : " The purpose of publicity is to make the spectator marginally dissatisfied with his present way of life. Not with the way of life of society, but with his own life within it. It suggests that if he buys what it is offering, his life will become better. It offers him an alternative to what he is....All publicity works upon anxiety. The sum of everything is money, to get money is to overcome anxiety...the anxiety on which publicity plays is the fear that having nothing you will be nothing.Money is not life...According to the legends of publicity, those who lack the power to spend money become literally faceless. Those who have the power become lovable....If you cannot buy it, you will be less lovable."

Berger's book was also made into a BBC documentary. It's probably too dry for students but I would advise all teachers to watch this episode. Click on link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmgGT3th_oI

Berger's book is still available and the chapter that deals with the role and purpose of advertising is essay number 7. My A2 students found Berger's views relevant when considering the purpose of marketing within their MEST 4 Critical investigations. Students exploring the objectification of the female found Berger's views particularly useful when exploring the media issues and debates surrounding the role of women within the advertising industry and placed Berger's views alongside Mulvey's theory of the male gaze. Berger's book was published 38 years ago but the ideas being expressed within its pages are still worthy of consideration.

AN ESSENTIAL MEDIA TEXT.