Culture Jamming: There is Always Two-Sides to a Coin

What is Culture Jamming?

“Culture jamming is an intriguing form of political communication that has emerged in response to the commercial isolation of public life. Practitioners of culture jamming argue that culture, politics, and social values have been bent by saturated commercial environments, from corporate logos on sports facilities, to television content designed solely to deliver targeted audiences to producers and sponsors. Many culture Jams are simply aimed at exposing questionable political assumptions behind commercial culture so that people can momentarily consider the branded environment in which they live. Culture jams refigure logos, fashion statements, and product images to challenge the idea of "what's cool," along with assumptions about the personal freedoms of consumption”.

This photo is a perfect example of culture jamming as described by the definition above. This image before it was culture jammed was a simple photo of a car advertisement. Now being a culture jammed photo, it depicts a different angle on this simple advertisement. The photo now shows how this SUV is in reality, “Poison for the Road” and that it is causing our world more harm than good. By implying these terms to the photo, it makes us think twice before seeing an advertisement, as the marketers would want us to see them. Such a simple image of a car in a commercial means nothing to the immense population of our planet because these depictions are of the norm for us.

For example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81K5zUWRkEk

This Suzuki commercial shows the similar depictions as the photo above but when looking at them without cultural jams, it seems like a good meaningful advertisement. It seems to us that it is something normal and acceptable. If this advertisement were to be culture jammed it would depict the same terms or remarks as the photo above because both advertisements share the same meaning. The world around us is full of symbols and meanings but there are several different ways of interpreting them. I believe that we should not look at things so simply and that we should decode certain advertisements and symbols to find different meanings behind them. A symbol that I decided to “culture jam” is known as Apple.

We all know this symbol as Apple, which is a giant technological company that produces the famous IPod and Mac computers. I have culture jammed this as a symbol of temptation. In the Bible, Adam and Eve are tempted by the Devil to take a bite of an apple from a tree that God stated specifically not to eat from. Adam and Eve then disobeyed Gods commands and took a bite from this forbidden apple causing both Adam and Eve to parish. This harmless symbol of an apple with a bite in it could mean both temptation and evil by simply trying to interpret certain signs and symbols in different ways. This is the way of Culture Jamming.

Works Cited

"2009 Suzuki Grand Vitara SUV Offroad Commercial." YouTube. Web. 21 Nov 2009. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81K5zUWRkEk.

"Culture Jamming." Center for Communication and Civic Engagement. Web. 21 Nov 2009. http://depts.washington.edu/ccce/polcommcampaigns/CultureJamming.htm.