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Unicamp Newspaper - May 2000

page 12

MEDIA
Discrimination in the World Cup

Robert Costa

ABetween the lines of the advertisements broadcast during the World Cup brought prejudice, superficiality and alienation to the crowd. Check out a work that analyzed many of them and found that, for companies and advertising agencies, stereotypes and money come before the love of sport

AAt the same time that the eyes of Brazilian fans were fixed on the television screen, two years ago, to watch the Brazilian team's games in the French Cup, anthropologist �dison L. Gastaldo had a different reading of the event that became national unanimity. Remote control in his hands, three videos turned on, stacks and stacks of newspapers and magazines, Gastaldo wanted to experience the World Cup through the apex of advertisements. "I read the World Cup advertising with an anthropological eye", he states, noting that in this process he was able to perceive the discrimination against black people and women, magic as an instrument of conquest and the constant demotion of opponents from Brazil. His work, "The nation and the ad — the representation of the 'Brazilian' in World Cup advertising", presented in February, was the first doctoral thesis in Multimedia at the Institute of Arts (IA) of Unicamp.

For four months, March 14th to July 20th, 98, before and after the World Cup won by France — which took place from June 10th to July 12th —, Edison Gastaldo cataloged 415 advertisements. For each piece, he organized a file with a description and keywords, and then crossed over common themes. With this he was able to build boards with similar themes. Parallel to this, he also noticed the predominance of the World Cup theme in newspaper reports in relation to advertisements. Edison thought before his survey that the saturation of media outlets with the World Cup would be due to advertising. But he found that "in the main news programs the percentage of time dedicated to the World Cup is incomparably greater than the similar time in advertisements". Just see that, on the day of Brazil's game against the Netherlands, of the 41 minutes on Jornal Nacional, on TV Globo, 39 talked about Brazil's victory and the rest reported the weather forecast. Of the 9 advertising minutes, three were related to the World Cup. "Nothing else happened in Brazil on that day, at least according to Jornal Nacional", says Gastaldo.

Professor at the University of Vale do Rio dos Sinos (Unisinos), with a degree in advertising and a master's degree in anthropology, both at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Dison highlights the role of advertising as a builder and conveyor of social representations. The figure of the poor, black, good-playing boy is classic and a constant in advertisements from that period. In contrast to this, the fans, seen in advertising, were mostly white. When shown, the black man was in the background, out of focus, similar to what was seen in the woman's figure, also degraded by advertising. "It's lucky that in Brazil there is no birth control for football stars", said a newspaper footer, published by Unimed.

When advertising showed the family as the focus of an advertisement, black people were also excluded. The predominance was white. In the same way, the woman remained in the background or composing the scene with some service action. "I just hope Mommy brings dinner now", showed a Nintendo ad in which a father and son appeared in front of the television. Still on this issue of gender, women were almost out of the picture in an advertisement that highlighted the fact that "Brazil is supporting Philips". In the center were four men with their arms raised and the woman as an extra beside them.

"Religion, magic and orishas were at the service of winning the World Cup", says the Gacho anthropologist, who was supervised in his doctorate by professor Etienne Samain, from IA. The representation of this was clear: "It's good luck for your team. Rubber insulates", said the Hawaiian sandals, among other indications such as wearing rue on the ear or knocking on wood.

Degrading the opponent, in a pejorative way, was another resource frequently used in French commercials. "For the first time, the Vikings are going to popcorn", joked Yoki the popcorn. "Come and see the orange being squeezed" was a provocation to the Dutch, just as they enjoyed Chilean empanadas, Norwegian cod or other products. "A lot of orange was consumed before the Netherlands game", recalls Gastaldo. In the spirit of publicity for the World Cup, Edison Gastaldo traveled to England in March, where he is doing his post-doctorate at the University of Manchester. His background continues to be advertising, but now he will exchange football for the Australian Olympics.