The sliding of meanings: analyzing the interpretations produced by chinese readers on an advertisement published in latin american print media

This study investigates the meanings produced by Chinese participants based on their interpretation of an advertisement by Colgate company divulgated on South American print media and holder of the Silver Award at Cannes Lions 2011 Festival. According to the discursive perspective, we consider the text as a 'bolide of meanings', connected to its exteriority, namely the interdiscourse. For this reason, text is not a single closed unity, nor something with an evident or preconceived meaning to be captured by its reader. Based on this idea, different accounts from a same text are possible. In order to support this hypothesis, we carried out some interviews with semi-structured topics with four participants and analyzed their interpretations on the abovementioned advertisement, identifying the similarities and differences among them. The results show that participants produced different accounts, which identify them not only as subjects of a different culture from the one in which the advertisement was previously divulgated, but as different subjects among themselves, since interpretation is not a linear move. Rather, it is part of a complex interdiscursive game.

Reading; Advertisement; Chinese participants