In this PSA Alicia Keys is the spokes person for one.org, an organization that’s aim is to not have any babies born with HIV by 2015. I find this commercial interesting from a communication perspective because the public awareness for the HIV and AIDS has now shifted from how one contracts it to avoiding the spread to a child. The way they use the image of a pregnant woman, and question how the baby will “look”. This imagery drives home the idea that another life is in the picture. And then when Ms. Keys begins to speak on who it is unnecessary for any child to be born with the disease due to modern medical advancement it brings a whole new perspective to the babies “look”. YouTube video
Alright my first attempt at this was lacking to say the least so I am trying to now redeem myself.
As I already stated this is a PSA (public service announcmnet) by singer/song writer Alicia Keys for the grass roots organization One.org. “ONE is a grassroots advocacy and campaigning organization that fights extreme poverty and preventable disease, particularly in Africa, by raising public awareness and pressuring political leaders to support smart and effective policies and programs that are saving lives, helping to put kids in school and improving futures. Co-founded by Bono and other campaigners, ONE is nonpartisan and works closely with African activists and policy makers,” (http://one.org/us/about/). This particular PSA is regarding no child being born with HIV by 2015. Wiki.answers.com says there are 490,000 babies born every day and in this PSA 1,000 of them are born with HIV that is statistically that is over 0.49%, that is a lot of babies! Aside from the social perspective of a sheer number of children born with a death sentence there is an interesting message in this commercial. First they only show pregnant women, not at all the fathers (the means by which these women became pregnant), but at about the 30 second mark Ms. Keys says “this can all be prevented…” and the images go from women whom are obviously with child to women who obviously are not. So that raised the question, what can be prevented? Let’s look at the issue from a literal standpoint; obviously no baby would be born with HIV if a woman was not pregnant in the first place. Ms. Keys goes on to talk about the availibity of drugs to prevent the spread from mother to child and then the images go back to various pregnant women.
My analysis is that there are two ways to address this greater issue. The first way would be to educate people in the areas where this is more of a prevailing problem and second to address the problem once a baby is in the picture. ONE.org has taken the later approach and the way of conveying the message is first by shock (using the numbers) and then second by using emotions to provoke response.
In this PSA Alicia Keys is the spokes person for one.org, an organization that’s aim is to not have any babies born with HIV by 2015. I find this commercial interesting from a communication perspective because the public awareness for the HIV and AIDS has now shifted from how one contracts it to avoiding the spread to a child. The way they use the image of a pregnant woman, and question how the baby will “look”. This imagery drives home the idea that another life is in the picture. And then when Ms. Keys begins to speak on who it is unnecessary for any child to be born with the disease due to modern medical advancement it brings a whole new perspective to the babies “look”.
ReplyDeleteYouTube video
Interesting spot. It's not clear to me yet how your commentary investigates language...
ReplyDeleteAlright my first attempt at this was lacking to say the least so I am trying to now redeem myself.
ReplyDeleteAs I already stated this is a PSA (public service announcmnet) by singer/song writer Alicia Keys for the grass roots organization One.org. “ONE is a grassroots advocacy and campaigning organization that fights extreme poverty and preventable disease, particularly in Africa, by raising public awareness and pressuring political leaders to support smart and effective policies and programs that are saving lives, helping to put kids in school and improving futures. Co-founded by Bono and other campaigners, ONE is nonpartisan and works closely with African activists and policy makers,” (http://one.org/us/about/). This particular PSA is regarding no child being born with HIV by 2015.
Wiki.answers.com says there are 490,000 babies born every day and in this PSA 1,000 of them are born with HIV that is statistically that is over 0.49%, that is a lot of babies! Aside from the social perspective of a sheer number of children born with a death sentence there is an interesting message in this commercial. First they only show pregnant women, not at all the fathers (the means by which these women became pregnant), but at about the 30 second mark Ms. Keys says “this can all be prevented…” and the images go from women whom are obviously with child to women who obviously are not. So that raised the question, what can be prevented? Let’s look at the issue from a literal standpoint; obviously no baby would be born with HIV if a woman was not pregnant in the first place. Ms. Keys goes on to talk about the availibity of drugs to prevent the spread from mother to child and then the images go back to various pregnant women.
My analysis is that there are two ways to address this greater issue. The first way would be to educate people in the areas where this is more of a prevailing problem and second to address the problem once a baby is in the picture. ONE.org has taken the later approach and the way of conveying the message is first by shock (using the numbers) and then second by using emotions to provoke response.