M&Ms-not your average chocolate

M&Ms-not your average chocolate

I chose the M&M commercial with William Levy and the female chocolate M&M character. Chocolate is special when one considers sweet treats; it is elevated to a special status, chocolate is an aphrodisiac. This commercial has Levy and the Chocolate M&M on a date in a restaurant. The dialogue is clever, it starts with Levy complimenting the M&M, telling her she looks delicious. This starts the discussion about why he likes her, is it for her body or for who she is. Levy tries to reassure her saying he likes her for what she is on the inside. She’s chocolate. The female M&M tells Levy she thought he loved her for her brain. Levy then leans forward smiling and asks the M&M if it is made of chocolate too? She pauses for a second, one thinks she will cut him down with a clever quip but her reply is “Gosh you’re handsome.”

The setting and the conversation feel like a real date with someone you are physically attracted to and the relationship is very new. The idea M&Ms is trying to portray is its chocolate candy is irresistible and delicious. The choosing of William Levy is deliberate, he is a Cuban actor that is considered a male sex symbol and he is lusting after a chocolate M&M. Levy is trying to sweet talk the M&M. Millions of women would want to be in the chocolate M&M’s place; that must be some terrific chocolate to have Levy gazing at the chocolate M&M that way.  

This commercial is trying to sell M&Ms to adults. M&Ms does not want children to be its primary market. The advertisement is persuasive because it manages to talk about the product, pure milk chocolate inside every M&Ms. I like how they developed the female M&Ms’ character, she fails to get mad because she is an M&M, she is sweet inside. But the female is also playing the role of desire, she is also very attracted to William Levy. A dream date with a sexy, desirable man who is lusting back at you makes the chocolate M&M “not your average chocolate”. It is not difficult to see M&Ms is using desire as a way to make viewers crave something sweet.

If there is a cultural narrative, it is romance, desire, a woman is supposed to want to be pursued by a man. It can reduce a woman to a sex object but in this commercial it is not offensive, the female is an object-she is an M&M. She does not have to defend feminism, she is not properly equipped, her substance is pure milk chocolate, she will melt.   (This commercial is also in Spanish, it is effective too because in Spanish, individual syllables in words can be emphasized, making William Levy’s pursuit of the female M&M a more sexual banter before he wins over the M&M).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jg-0Mq7I9b0

 

 

The Rise of Popular Culture

"The Rise of Popular Culture: A Historiographical Sketch" by LeRoy Ashby covered a lot of topics and movements in an interesting manner and he made the events inter-related. Ashby gave interesting examples of historians looking for historical facts that were overlooked. When Bill Malone was working on his PhD dissertation, he found there were no academic articles writen about country music. A stark contrast was another historian, Lawrence Levine. He examined the recorded folk history of African Americans and chose to discredit the perception that African Americans were inarticulate, impotent, formed by events they had no control over. This was a very perceptive understanding that this strongly biased historical view of African Americans was a formed by political power forcing a false, unflattering cultural view on an entire group of individuals. Levine had the opportunity to study events and individuals he thought were historically and culturally significant. Ashby writes, that when Levine had to depart from traditional histories, he "felt quite lonely and vulnerable". I understood from this comment that Levine faced many difficulties, he did not have cohorts ready to assist him and the political climate was violently opposed to civil rights. In addition, I can't help but think he felt rushed to uncover historical details in the form of artifacts, letters or documentation and witnesses before this information vanished or people died.

The Rise of Popular Culture

"The Rise of Popular Culture: A Historiographical Sketch" by LeRoy Ashby covered a lot of topics and movements in an interesting manner and he made the events inter-related. Ashby gave interesting examples of historians looking for historical facts that were overlooked. When Bill Malone was working on his PhD dissertation, he found there were no academic articles written about country music. A stark contrast was another historian, Lawrence Levine. He examined the recorded folk history of African Americans and chose to discredit the perception that African Americans were inarticulate, impotent, formed by events they had no control over. This was a very perceptive understanding that this strongly biased historical view of African Americans was a formed by political power forcing a false, unflattering cultural view on an entire group of individuals. Levine has the opportunity to study events and individuals he thought were historically and culturally significant. Ashby writes, that when Levine had to depart from traditional histories, he "felt quite lonely and vulnerable". I understood from this comment that Levine faced many difficulties, he did not have cohorts ready to assist him and the political climate was violently opposed to civil rights. In addition, I can't help but think he felt rushed to uncover historical details in the form of artifacts, letters or documentation and witnesses before this information vanished or people died.