Women as a target public of publicity campaigns: a social semiotic analysis of Nestlé's Nesfit campaign

Abstract

By using the female vocatives in the publicity Nestlé Nesfit campaign situates their main public: women. This article presents some definitions of gender and the interface between feminism studies and Critical Discourse Analysis, the turning point of the methodological contributions of queer studies and a theoretical summary of Functional Grammar and Social Semiotics Theory. We analyze a discursive repositioning process of Nestlé brand by contrasting images and verbal texts. The initial study shows that the brand does not replace the identification of women through a more emancipatory discourse, but their discursive practice maintains a stereotyped identity, which does not subdues the woman to man but to their own bodies.

Keywords:
Feminism; Critical discourse studies; Social Semiotic Theory; Publicity.