Carl Jones discusses Myth creation in Hong Kong, and racism in advertising in Mexico

On January 30^th Carl jones spoke to an international group of researchers at CityU,Hong Kong about his investigation into myth creation and racial hierarchies within a former colonized nation state. His research examines the tools and techniques used to create the cultural codes within multimodal 2D advertising messages in Mexico.  Jones told the Hong Kong audience that according to semioticians Kress & Van Leeuwen, Multimodality refers to the interplay between different representational modes, for instance, between images and written/spoken word. Advertising is a perfect example of MULTIMODAL as much advertising appropriates different ‘representational modes’ such as in outdoor or print advertising using images  and written words.

As part of  his research process Carl explored the differences in 2D message creation between the lower; middle, and high socio-economic classes, and concluded that Mexican advertising is a racist spectacle, that needs to be decolonized.

The following week Jones led a panel for the largest organization devoted to creativity in Mexico called Circulo Creativo de Mexico (Mexican Creative Club) where he discussed his research applying Mignolo’s theory of ‘de-linking’ to advertising to remove racist thinking from the advertising creation process.  In the question period that followed he stated that his goal is to bring together academic research and the creative industries so they can learn from each other just like the industries of Law, Architecture and Medicine do, by sharing information, and supporting academic research and education.

Circulo creative talk

Photo by Iván Díaz on Unsplash