Bubble-pricking prankery.
September 2006's Issue
In your face and up your nose, mass advertising pushes more than just a product, it pushes an entire consumerist, globalized worldview – and makes it ‘fun’. This is different from the small-scale, non-glam stuff the NI itself accepts and indulges in. Backed by the financial muscle of the world’s corporate giants, advertising is about creating hungers in cultures of cool which big business can feed. With most of the media dependent on it and the finest creative brains working for it, the ad biz is hammering out that expressway to your skull. We peer into its bag of tricks.
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Featured in issue 393
Brand-hopping beauties
An alien consumer culture is blitzing Indian women. Mari Marcel Thekaekara takes its measure.
- Mari Marcel Thekaekara
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Beneath the gloss...
Sarah Irving opens the casebook on ad promise and corporate reality.
- Sarah Irving
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
A War Too Far
A War Too Far: Iran, Iraq and the New American Century by Paul Rogers
- Peter Whittaker
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Benin
If people in the rich world associate Benin with anything at all, it is likely to be child trafficking, slavery or voodoo – not exactly the ideal calling cards for a nation. Latterly, however, Benin is developing an entirely new reputation.
- Michée Boko
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Art for life - and death
Lindsey Collen on the fight for freedom of artistic expression.
- Lindsey Collen
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
How to read an ad
We asked the CEO of a major London ad agency to give us pointers on how to decode adverts.
- New Internationalist Editorial
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Interview with Semantics King Jr
Semantics King Jr – keeping the flame of independent media alive in a camp for Liberian refugees.
- Rosamund de Sybel
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Sultans of spin
Making an unpopular candidate win an election – in Bolivia or anywhere else – is an art, as Bob Burton discovers.
- Bob Burton
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo
The end hoves into sight for Equatorial Guinea’s blood-soaked dictator Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo – despite having an uncle who is a god.
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Public service
Chinese perceptions of the hard sell take Jacob Lotinga by surprise.
- Jacob Lotinga
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Seen, killed and unheard
Lebanese teens in the line of fire bear witness to their ripped lives and speak out about what needs to change. Testimony compiled by Rebecca Bridges and Fayyaz Muneer.
- Rebecca Bridges and Fayyaz Muneer
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
The Real Aim
The real aim of the bombs falling on Lebanon is regime change, argues Uri Avnery, a former member of Israel’s parliament.
- Uri Avnery
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Jesus is a brand of jeans
What is advertising? Jean Kilbourne on the gigantic propaganda effort and how it affects the way we think and feel.
- Jean Kilbourne
- 1 Sep 2006
- 10
Captive: how the ad industry pins us down
Dinyar Godrej sniffs at the bait being dangled by the ad biz.
- Dinyar Godrej
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
Shehab Uddin
The dignity of a poet resident at a senior citizen shelter in Kathmandu, Nepal, captured by Shehab Uddin.
- Shehab Uddin
- 1 Sep 2006
- 0
On Newsstands
The Feral Rich
The Feral Rich
The feral rich… are always with us, but ever richer and more savage. What can we do to stop the feckless rich, as they ravage economies to feather their nests? Jan/Feb 2013's New Internationalist magazine.
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If you would like to know something about what's actually going on, rather than what people would like you to think was going on, then read the New Internationalist.
– Emma Thompson –
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