Imaging in Advertising: Verbal and Visual Codes of Commerce

While scholarship on the visual elements of advertising has advanced our understanding of communication and media, the language elements - or 'verbal images' of the advertisement tend to be downplayed, providing a truncated analysis. Imaging in Advertising explores how the verbal and visual work together to create a language of advertising that speaks to audiences and moves them to particular thoughts and actions. Through a series of case studies, Fern L. Johnson examines how the verbal and visual produce meaning - exploring advertisements for cigarettes, alcohol, and cosmetics - and argues that the verbal images in advertising are as important as the visual images, treating advertisements as a structured whole, rather than a series of fragments.

Fern L. Johnson is Professor of English and faculty member in the Communication and Culture Program at Clark University.