In-class post 1--Peter

I thought that the one that stood out the most, perhaps because it was so close to the beginning and represented the very beginning of poster usage, was the broadside or the early one that functioned a lot as a bulletin board. You highlighted a lot of "public humiliation" and the "dark side" of society, but that really was just every day life for people, neither good nor bad. It was a completely different culture, and to judge it in terms of this one and our values isn't really fair.

In that sense, then, the broadside is very much a time-capsule that contains so much about the society of the time. It hadn't yet been so capitalized by the capitalist to draw public attention to a single object or product, but it was nevertheless advertising community functions. The attention was shared, and perhaps in working as a sort of newsletter, the broadside was, I think, advertising all of its components and events in a far more effective manner than just about any advertisement can today where important community information cannot be found among the serious advertisements. Moreover, the space is used far less aggressively, and it is much easier to synthesize the data contained within.

Comments

  1. Dolores WilberJanuary 26, 2020 at 6:01 AM

    Both your major points could be excellent investigations for the research paper topic — you raise the question as to whether we can fairly judge a different time in culture. The other point that advertising was more effective in the past and, if so, why, is another interesting research investigation.

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