Expound deeper meanings of the movie The Strangers (2008) Essay

Expound deeper meanings of the movie The Strangers (2008) - Essay Example The review further finds that the film deviates from the usual blood and gore but focuses on being â€Å"suspenseful and brilliantly invested in silence† (par.2). Thus, obviously, the movie’s purpose is not to present the usual graphic flicks of violence and bloodshed in the name of horror but to illustrate the intricacies of human life, where the â€Å"seeming† differs from the â€Å"real.† Thus, the movie subtly portrays a hidden meaning that the house that appears to be safe hosts horrors lurking beneath the surface and the couple who seems to be so close are in fact distanced from each other. In the beginning of the movie, as the couple drives across the street, the audience views a serene, peaceful and calm neighborhood, with several houses that look quiet elegant and clean, with beautiful gardens. Thus, overall the impression one gathers is that of a safe and tranquil environment. Then the movie shows blood on the wall and a gun as the audiences list ens to a 911 report in progress. Thus, by contrasting a serene environment with the telltale signs of brutal violence, the movie reveals that there is a hidden meaning about the home and that all is not well as it seems. The movie then goes into the flashback mode, showing the events that resulted in the distress call. The couple has been to a marriage reception and they decide to take a retreat at the residence, which is the summer home of the boy’s family. Thus, for the couple there exists the presumption of safety attached to the villa. However, as the couple enters the home and takes a walk around the audience can feel a disconcerting aura around the home, which is one of the most significant elements for making it a subtle horror movie. The creepiness enhances as the film progresses, especially with the introduction of the girl, who knocks at the door, asking for Tamara. From then on, the concept of safety of the home dissipates and fear starts creeping in. Thus, the mov ie reveals that there is something hidden about the home, a lurking primeval fear below its calm and serene appearance. A while after they reach the home, James, the protagonist, proposes to Kristen, saying â€Å"I remember the first time I saw you,† which suggests that the couple have been seeing each other for a while (Bryan 2008). However, Kristen refuses. Thus, the audience receives the first hint that though they appear familiar with each other, there is something that separates them. As the movie progresses, the audience feels an undercurrent of tension that mounts between them. It becomes more pronounced when James begins to have the ice cream without waiting for his girlfriend, though he knows she will join him soon. The accompanying music in these scenes accentuates the tension between them. Subsequently, James offers the ring back to Kristen telling her, â€Å"Take it because I can’t take it back† (Bryan 2008). Kristen does not respond and keeps runnin g her fingers through her untied hair. However, when James offers her the wine bottle from which he has taken a swig, she accepts and takes herself a swig too. This gesture connotes to a personal bonding, which, in fact, does not exist between them. Thus, though both these characters act as if they are quite familiar with each other, their closeness is literally wearing off. Besides, though the couple shows certain intimacy between, their relationship does not seem mature enough to culminate into a

Registered Nurse Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Registered Nurse - Case Study Example protocols and therefore a bit uncertain and lacking in her communication with the patients, the doctors and Miss Cook. Cook has to help Miss Wolf to shed her complexes and make her an efficient member of the staff. Usually, there are two methods. One is the Chosen leadership style and the other is the Authoritative leadership style. In the former, the leader is a chosen one and therefore has to be pleasant mannered, ever ready to help, interested in staff welfare, and be able to win the goodwill of all concerned. She has to use persuasion than power, instill duty consciousness in the nurses and teach them to find happiness in doing their job well. The other method is the Authoritative leadership style. This is indicated when circumstances call for a new vision. Any unit requires a clear sense of direction in order to achieve progress. If this is the problem, the Authoritative style would be very usefull. Sometimes organizations drift without any sense of direction and on such occasions also the Authoritative style is more appropriate and relevant. This style has a special attitude. It seems to say, "Come on! Come with me! I am with you. We will shatter all problems and go ahead!" Though authoritative, the style allows the workers a lot of freedom to deploy their own methods, skills and diplomacy and even to take calculated risks up to a limit.

The Image Of Women In Tv Advertisements Media Essay

The Image Of Women In Tv Advertisements Media Essay The first television advertisement appeared on July, 1941 during a baseball game on a local New York channel. The 10-second commercial spot broadcasted by the company Bulova Watches has revolutionized the television (Business Wikipedia). It knew a large overwhelm that pushed many other companies to jump on board .By 1948; many additional companies adopted this new marketing technique, and little by little , the new tool has become familiar and very used and companies were obliged to compete against each other to attract the largest number of customers . For this reason they tend to employ the more attracting image to convince people to buy. One of these images is that of woman. Since the late 60s, there have been concerns about woman ¿Ã‚ ½s portrayal in the media. Western advertisers introduce her in different commercials since they had noticed that her appearance is very effective in term of attractiveness. But, it is so noticeable that in the majority of ads, women are stereotype d and abused. However many wrong ideas are promoted about them, since they are always viewed as objects used to attract people ¿Ã‚ ½s attention. Besides their devaluation, the content of advertisement contains a lot of violence against them. Their abuse and their image misuse should be considered a serious issue as it affects the audience and change their minds and gazes. In Fact, advertisers tend to play on people ¿Ã‚ ½s psychologies, so they can easily manipulate and convince them to buy unnecessary goods. The question here is how western TV advertisements stereotype women and how much this could harm the audience. Chapter 1: Literature review 1. The Image of Women in TV Advertisements: 1.1 Women in TV advertisement; from a subject to an object: a) Women as a Sex Object: Nowadays, advertisements are seen everywhere at any time. Most of advertisers seek to present a beautiful sexy woman in their commercials in order to market products and by doing so they consider her as just a sex object that can persuade the consumer by means of seduction to buy. Many companies have succeeded in increasing their revenues by using the sexual context which has enlarged their customer base and attracted a largest number of clients. Therefore, Berger considers these advertisement techniques as  ¿Ã‚ ½sexploitation of the female body as one of its communication tools ¿Ã‚ ½ ( Ilona P.Pawlowski,2007). Historically, the employment of women as a sexual object has evolved gradually;  ¿Ã‚ ½in 1983 only 28% of women shown in ads had some sexy clothes in their bodies but  ¿Ã‚ ½in 2007, 75% ¿Ã‚ ½ of them dressed in an attractive sensual way. Nowadays women appear partially nude in advertisement. In other words,  ¿Ã‚ ½women not only continued to be portrayed in a sexual manner, but also the degree of sexuality increased over time ¿Ã‚ ½ (Ilona P.Pawlowski,2007). In the article  ¿Ã‚ ½The Exploitation of Women in Ads ¿Ã‚ ½ written by Kanter on the web cite Study mode, the fact that many fashion photographers return pornographic publications to take sexual and attractive poses or only parts of women ¿Ã‚ ½s body is mentioned. The book stresses the image of women as a sexual object, a thing or a part of the merchandise to be dehumanized especially by showing just parts of her body. To conclude as Cortese notices in his book Provocateur: Images of Women and Minorities in Advertisement  ¿Ã‚ ½advertising sells much more than products, it sells values and cultural representations, such as success and sexuality. ¿Ã‚ ½ Moreover, women are more used than men in advertisements and according to this article  ¿Ã‚ ½How Advertising Women Models Can Reach Market? ¿Ã‚ ½ the writer confirms that  ¿Ã‚ ½even for products that the target consumers are males ¿Ã‚ ½ woman image is often employed. It creates on them an impression that women would like a man that uses that product. In other words,  ¿Ã‚ ½women want this. Get the product, get the woman ¿Ã‚ ½ (Cortese, 2008). This shows that nowadays, women are used as a sex object with all kind of products from electronics to make-up. An article titled  ¿Ã‚ ½Russia-Campaign against sexism in advertising ¿Ã‚ ½ insists on the same idea,  ¿Ã‚ ½the female body is portrayed as a propaganda for pornography, violence and prostitution ¿Ã‚ ½ in order to advertise products that men buy such as cars, beers, perfume ¿Ã‚ ½for example in cars advertisement, women ¿Ã‚ ½s hot body is most of the time present,  ¿Ã‚ ½they act as a supplement to the car, as one of the options available to be expensively purchased by a successful man ¿Ã‚ ½. Danesi, a moralist, advertising professional and student of contemporary marketing communication knowledge, writes in his book Sex in Advertising that if we read about psychological studies that examine how males think, we can notice that  ¿Ã‚ ½the reward centers in the brains of young heterosexual males were activated by female face ¿Ã‚ ½. This means that the reason of creating a suggestive advertisement is that by showing women ¿Ã‚ ½s body as a sex object we can activate and influence the reward centers of a man and push him to purchase a product, simply because there is the image of a female body on its cover. Also, by showing women ¿Ã‚ ½s body we can access to the subconscious of a man and make him implicitly remember the sexual thing (women). That ¿Ã‚ ½s why  ¿Ã‚ ½Advertisers believe that the more outlandish, the sexier, the more skin shown, the more the brand image will refuse to leave your memory ¿Ã‚ ½ (Dansei, 2011). Figure 1: A nude woman in DG ad. This psychological explanation is another definite proof that women ¿Ã‚ ½s body is abused for marketing benefits for which many famous companies tend to portray women in a sex context , such as Dolce ¿Ã‚ ½ Gabbana, Calvin Klein, Yves Saint Laurent and many other well-known brands. Besides, according to the article  ¿Ã‚ ½Sex in advertising  ¿Ã‚ ½by Dansei, there are  ¿Ã‚ ½5000 advertising messages a day ¿Ã‚ ½ that a person can receive and 20% of these ads contain sexual images. So, advertisers consider that women ¿Ã‚ ½s bodies are not only  ¿Ã‚ ½a beguiling approach ¿Ã‚ ½ to attract consumers ¿Ã‚ ½ attention, but also the best tool and can be  ¿Ã‚ ½ Commodified as products that have a use value. ¿Ã‚ ½(Dansei,2011) It ¿Ã‚ ½s so clear then that a sex object is something that has become essential in every advertisement in a way that objectified and dehumanized women. This can be explained by the fact that  ¿Ã‚ ½people believe that sex sells products ¿Ã‚ ½ (Province,Monique,2010). As a result  ¿Ã‚ ½sex in advertisement contributes to the building of strong, vibrant, and long-lasting brands ¿Ã‚ ½ (Ilona P.Pawlowski,2007). Verhoeven explains in her article  ¿Ã‚ ½Axe body spray ads and women as sex objects ¿Ã‚ ½ that  ¿Ã‚ ½advertisements do not just sell products, they also promote and establish our culture ¿Ã‚ ½s values and ideas ¿Ã‚ ½ so naturally  ¿Ã‚ ½stereotypes are reinforced by advertisement ¿Ã‚ ½ (Verhoeven, Hanna, 2011). Axe body spray is one of the many examples of ads that make stereotypes against women. Figure 2: pictures of Axe spray commercial: The fallen angel To set an example, these two images belong to the commercial spot of Axe body spray for men. It is titled  ¿Ã‚ ½Fallen angels ¿Ã‚ ½; this ad shows many beautiful women introduced as angels that came from sky, on earth, they go directly to the place from where comes the smell of Axe body spray. When they find the man who puts it, they take off their crowns, forget about their innocence and seduce him. The message this ad delivers to the male audience is that women can not control themselves when smelling such a perfume. It ¿Ã‚ ½s always a sex context. b) The image of the traditional housewife: Another inappropriate image the advertisement reflects is the perfect housewife whose tasks are raising children and taking care of her house and husband .An article titled  ¿Ã‚ ½Women ¿Ã‚ ½s Images in Magazine Advertisement: How Far Have They Come? ¿Ã‚ ½ discuss this topic. It emphasizes in fact that advertisers  ¿Ã‚ ½characterize them as possessing low intelligence, analytical ability, and rationality ¿Ã‚ ½ and when the audience especially men get this message, they will generalize these characteristics to all women and of course this result in a devaluation of the woman and its important role in society. Standing for the same idea, Naughton Michael states in his book  ¿Ã‚ ½The Popularized Housewife in Advertisements ¿Ã‚ ½, that  ¿Ã‚ ½The creators of ads made it appear that the full time job of a woman should be a housewife ¿Ã‚ ½. Women are considered as mades or servants who are responsible just for the rest of the family. Figure 3: The traditional image of a hou sewife Therefore, many advertisements present the image of the housewives wearing the magic uniform of work. Usually ,they wear  ¿Ã‚ ½aprons, skirts, high heels, and pearls ¿Ã‚ ½ (Naughton,Michael,2006). He adds that  ¿Ã‚ ½The ad showed that women are expected to be in this professional uniform all the time ¿Ã‚ ½. they are always placed in the kitchen or the bathroom (described by Naughton as their  ¿Ã‚ ½office ¿Ã‚ ½). These two elements of job (uniform and office)  ¿Ã‚ ½strengthens that the housewife is, indeed, an important job as any other is ¿Ã‚ ½. This message delivered by advertisement reinforces the idea of the dependency of women on men. Figure 4:The commercial of Schlitz beer  ¿Ã‚ ½Negative characterizations made by advertisers such as women ¿Ã‚ ½s place is her house or women are weak and need men protection, push men to think that these ideas are true and women are really weak fragile and unable to go out for working. Moreover, advertisements show that women as housewives can not make expensive purchases. They are not intelligent enough to make such decisions. Differently, men in advertisements are introduced as businessmen who are usually busy outside the house .They also make big decisions and  ¿Ã‚ ½look after women who are not capable of looking after themselves ¿Ã‚ ½ (Shrikhande,Vaisahli 2003). It is so obvious here that advertisement stands for gender inequity. In fact it tends to present women in inferior positions comparing to males. Moreover they are very devaluated when their activities are limited to house shores. As an example, an ad for Schiltz beer shows a woman that burned the dinner that she prepared for her husband. She cries for this, then her husband says  ¿Ã‚ ½do not worry darling, you didn ¿Ã‚ ½t burn the beer ¿Ã‚ ½. The idea of the woman who serves the  ¿Ã‚ ½man of the house ¿Ã‚ ½ (Naughton, 2003) in order to make him happy is so clear. c) The Image of the Dumb Blonde: The article  ¿Ã‚ ½The Dumb Blonde Women Stereotype ¿Ã‚ ½ demonstrates that blond women are considered as beautiful, thin, sexy and attractive but not intelligent not serious and not responsible. Again she is seen as an empty minded who has no opinion or personality. Blonde women are always shown busy taking care of themselves in order to look beautiful; their main interest is to wear provocative clothes, put sexy perfumes and make-up .They are portrayed as stupid and superficial.  ¿Ã‚ ½This stereotype is often expressed excessively in blonde jokes ¿Ã‚ ½ (The dumb blonde women stereotype). In addition, advertisers treat blond women as a  ¿Ã‚ ½piece of meat ¿Ã‚ ½ (Kazay,Ginger 2007). The question here is why this image of the dumb blonde is employed in ads? Advertisers portray a blonde as a stupid women to attract the consumer attention and to keep the ad in his mind. They want to create original, funny ideas. When the consumer watches such funny images, he will laugh and t ell others about it. The ad is registered in his mind and transmitted to others. This is the result that advertisers aim to achieve. 1.2 Violence against Women in Advertisement: a ) Physical Violence:The first aspect of violence against woman that advertisement shows, is the sex context excessively used when introducing women in ads. Women are objectified and seen in a weak position, helpless and  ¿Ã‚ ½bound ¿Ã‚ ½ (Evans,Rachel), however men are seen strong and  ¿Ã‚ ½with power over women ¿Ã‚ ½ (Evans,Rachel). Advertisers send, through this image, the subliminal message that women like and want violent men. Evans explains this idea in her article  ¿Ã‚ ½American Experience: Does Selling Sex in Modern Ads Advocate Violence against Women? ¿Ã‚ ½ she writes about modern advertisement  ¿Ã‚ ½They are desirable to women, that desirable women are submissive, and that a woman doesn ¿Ã‚ ½t really mean no when she says it ¿Ã‚ ½ she adds that  ¿Ã‚ ½this image of violence towards women results in  ¿Ã‚ ½desensitizing consumers into thinking that violence against women is not only acceptable, but encouraged ¿Ã‚ ½ (Evans,Rachel). Such message is reall y a very dangerous way to portrait women .It is so unhealthy to make people believe that women like violence. Dealing with the same issue, Mc Cormack an assistant sociology professor collected many ads from the most famous magazines in America like Business Week and Cosmopolitan that show  ¿Ã‚ ½women smiling as they are being hit ¿Ã‚ ½ ( Rob,Roberts1991). He deduces that advertisement make the audience believes that women like to be hit and this is of course so wrong. Unfortunately, this kind of message that people get from advertisement encourage men to be violent with women. Mc Cormick ensures that  ¿Ã‚ ½We never see men in these positions, we never see men upside down, we never see men tied up, we never see men being assaulted by women, we never see men being hit by women, being hit by things in the head. We certainly would not see men enjoying it ¿Ã‚ ½ (Rob,Roberts1991). This picture is a concrete example of the conception of violence that advertisement emphasizes. It is an ad made by the famous company Calvin Klein,  ¿Ã‚ ½the image was demeaning to women by suggesting that she is a plaything of these men. It also demeans men by implying sexualized violence against women. ¿Ã‚ ½ (Doherty,Elissa 2010) Figure 5: a woman as sex object in Kelvin Klein ad Another company that its ads are plenty of violence against women is DolceGabbana. For this reason Dina Price made an interview with the Italian designer of this brand. He stated that  ¿Ã‚ ½these ads do not represent rape or violence, but if one had to give an interpretation of the picture, it could recall an erotic dream, a sexual game ¿Ã‚ ½. The idea of this  ¿Ã‚ ½sexual game ¿Ã‚ ½ is adopted by the majority of famous brands.  ¿Ã‚ ½All these companies consider violence and humiliation sexy. They transform these into that art that shocks the public opinion ¿Ã‚ ½ (Sex and Violence in Advertising, A Mainstream Phenomena). In fashion world, we notice that  ¿Ã‚ ½fashion photographers have an ongoing obsession with images of women looking dead ¿Ã‚ ½ (Katelate Stephanie,2011). These dead-like women are shown in a sexy and attractive poses. We can deduce here that advertisers and designers use violence to present something sexy (Katelate stephanie 2011).So women are shown again portrayed in shocking images. They are usually seen in  ¿Ã‚ ½an unhealthy way ¿Ã‚ ½ and suffering from the physical violence such as  ¿Ã‚ ½torture and killing ¿Ã‚ ½ (Rob,Roberts1991) caused by men. b) Psychological Violence: Sexual exploitation of women has increased over the last decades as a new marketing strategy. They are seen as attractive bodies and nothing else. This emotional violence can also be proved by discrimination, based on skin color, made by advertisers. White women are always preferable when choosing a model for a commercial spot. It ¿Ã‚ ½s so rare to see an advertisement with a black model, and even if it happened, she would be introduced as a vulgar and unsophisticated one. More moral violence against women is seen in advertisement when just few parts of women ¿Ã‚ ½s body are shown like legs or a mouth. This is a clear dehumanization of women.  ¿Ã‚ ½The reduction of women to body parts for men ¿Ã‚ ½s consumption can significantly damage a woman ¿Ã‚ ½s self-respect ¿Ã‚ ½ (Katele, 2011). Moreover, woman is treated as a prostitute in the majority of advertisements. She is not serious or respectful but happy with a smiley face. Considering this picture; they are not only intro duced as prostitutes but also proud of it! 1.3 Advertisers ¿Ã‚ ½ Definition of Beauty: a) The White Skin: To be beautiful as a first condition is to be a white-skinned person! This what advertisers promote as ¿Ã‚ ½White beauty is viewed as superior ¿Ã‚ ½ as Banks Michaela Choo confirms, because white women are seen more innocent, shiny, with straight hair and  ¿Ã‚ ½light skin ¿Ã‚ ½. In contrast, black women are viewed  ¿Ã‚ ½as animals more than as humans ¿Ã‚ ½ she adds. We can deduce then that racism is another negative value advertisement spreads. Furthermore, advertisers  ¿Ã‚ ½define the white standard of beauty in terms of the skin tone, hair type and body shape ¿Ã‚ ½, Bank says. One understands from this definition that not all white women are considered beautiful. Advertisers have many criteria to be followed. According to them the perfect white women must be thin, with straight hair, nice smile and preferably blond. A concrete example is when an African-American model was refused by the company of Ciroc Vodka (Bitchie,Nicole 2009), simply because she was a black wom an and the company admitted it. She wondered  ¿Ã‚ ½What message does this send? If you are not light you are not right? If you are black get back? What does this do for the self-esteem of young  ¿Ã‚ ½dark-skinned ¿Ã‚ ½ African-American girls every where? Tell them that they are ugly because their skin is too dark? Is this a type of mentality that you like to promote in your marketing campaigns? ¿Ã‚ ½ (Bitchie,Nicole 2009) For more credibility, researchers made statistics to figure out the percentage that white women take in commercials. As shown in the table below, white women are used in most ads of product categories. Models with light skin accounted by 64.8% in the clothes products ads compared to medium and black-skinned models by only 35.2%. This shows that advertisement designers prefer white women and consider them the more beautiful. For perfumes products black models are present in just 20% of ads when the rest (80%) is for white ones. For make-up products 65.5% of ads for white models and 34.5% for dark models. Through this obvious discrimination, advertisers tend to manipulate the unconsciousness of the consumer and oblige him to adopt the idea that the white skin is the first condition of beauty. Product category Light skin models Medium and dark skin models Hair product Shoes Perfumes Public service Ad Electronics Skin care Makeup Other 50.0% 66.7% 80.0% 58.8% 54.5% 57.1% 65.5% 61.5% 11 10 12 10 6 16 19 40 50.0% 33.3% 20.0% 41.2% 45.5% 42.9% 34.5% 38.5% 11 5 3 7 5 12 10 25 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% Table (*): Product for light skin models b) Super Skinny Models: Nowadays, skinny models are seen in all types of advertisement. They are preferred by many fashion designers who find them very attractive, beautiful and  ¿Ã‚ ½as the way their skin tightens up over the bone in most places in their bodies is what makes them look sexy and attractive ¿Ã‚ ½ (Barrett,Patrick,2004).  ¿Ã‚ ½Not only their bodies are easier to dress with but also the clothes hang better on them, says Joanna Hill, an advertisement designer in New York.  ¿Ã‚ ½Skinny models just look better ¿Ã‚ ½ says Karl Lagerfeld, a fashion designer from Germany. For that reason, most models shown in commercials of famous and well known brands are always super skinny ones. This excessive exposition to this image will lead people to think that to be elegant, beautiful and sexy, you should be too thin that your bone could be seen easily! This is of course a wrong idea, women are of different weights and being too thin is not a beauty indicator. However many women today seek to loose weight just to imitate what they see in T.V. As a model of perfume ,clothes or makup commercials, they think if such a famous brand employed this model to advertise its product , they should be necessarily so perfect. And to be beautiful, they should just look like her. c) Beautiful is to be Young: Sexy women are frequently seen in all types of advertisements. As sex sells every thing, advertisers employ attractive women posed in provocative way to buy products. But before beauty, models should be of course young women, the age is so important to advertise especially for feminine products .Beauty is so related to youth, this what advertisers promote. This idea can deeply harm the female audience. Every woman that gets over 30 or 35 will consider herself as an ugly woman that can not be seen as beautiful in a way or another. A woman may think that way due to the fact that the message excessively sent to the audience generalizes the idea even if is totally wrong, it makes everybody believe it even though it is illogical. It is so clear then that advertisers promote their own opinions and ideas and seek to standardize people ¿Ã‚ ½s mind in a way that serves them and convinces consumers to purchase what is advertised. 2. Stereotypes Against Women in TV Advertisements and its Impact on Society: 2.1 Women ¿Ã‚ ½s Body Dissatisfaction: Today, TV advertisement is a common way by which a company promotes its products. Thin and beautiful models or celebrities are the main image that companies relies on to attract the audience. In fact, this repeated image of the same physical characteristics of models create on women a feeling of dissatisfaction .They automatically tend to overestimate their bodies sizes in order to look like what they always see in ads. This causes them many serious problems. a) Eating Disorders: Eating disorders is eating more or less than the body needs. It is caused usually by psychological problems like anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa which are characterized by a disturbance of eating behavior. The first involves  ¿Ã‚ ½rejection of food ¿Ã‚ ½ while the second involves  ¿Ã‚ ½pursing ¿Ã‚ ½ after eating. Women mostly influenced by these disorders. In fact advertisement has a noticeable role in causing these troubles. After watching TV commercials that standardizes the conception of beauty, women would feel dissatisfied with their bodies shape. According to the researchers Harrison and Canter  ¿Ã‚ ½disordered eating symptomlogy and encompass related variables such as body dissatisfaction, drive for thinness, perfection, and ineffectiveness ¿Ã‚ ½ (Cohen, Sara2006). In advertisements, the portrayal of  ¿Ã‚ ½super-slim ¿Ã‚ ½ females is considered as more fashionable, desirable and attractive. Many researchers confirm that exposure to ideal-body images could increase eating disorders in two ways. First  ¿Ã‚ ½exposure could lead to internalizing the ideal-body stereotype ¿Ã‚ ½ (Harbin Channel,2011), which causes an excessive dieting in order to attain the internalized ideal. Second, exposure to thin-ideal could promote  ¿Ã‚ ½social comparison ¿Ã‚ ½, which engenders intense dieting as a means of seeking to meet  ¿Ã‚ ½external standards. ¿Ã‚ ½ b) Low Self-esteem: After watching super models in advertisements, women tend to compare themselves with models shown in commercials. This comparison makes them dissatisfied with the way they look especially those who already have negative impression about their bodies.  ¿Ã‚ ½Women who already have low opinions of their physical appearance are at an even greater risk for negative effects from media images ¿Ã‚ ½, says Bessonoff a professor in the Psychological Department in the University of Connecticut who has more than 7 years in the fields of social comparison, body image, and women in the media. Moreover, TV commercials show also unrealistic images with many modifications.  ¿Ã‚ ½Viewing television commercials containing images of the unrealistic thin-ideal for women caused adolescent girls to feel less confident, and more dissatisfied with their weight and appearances ¿Ã‚ ½(Dittmar Helega,2011). Women evaluate their own attitudes, abilities, and beliefs among others and they are not satisfied with their appearance which is more judged by themselves than by others.  ¿Ã‚ ½Comparisons interested on appearance commonly are upward, which means that a woman compares herself to others who are more attractive and better in order to find out the standard of excellence. This upward comparison is related to  ¿Ã‚ ½body dissatisfaction disordered eating, decreased self-confidence, depression, and anxiety ¿Ã‚ ½ (Cohen, Sara ,2006). c) The Need to be Perfect: The pressure of exposure in today ¿Ã‚ ½s life leads to dangerous effects on women ¿Ã‚ ½s body. Exposure, in which the ideal body image is portrayed, will make women unhappy and dissatisfied with their body shape, especially when they watch thin models, who advertise new fashion designs, so they feel the need to be perfect like them. Thin body images of such models and actress have been getting thinner and thinner over the past 40 years. They are wearing very small sizes 1and 0 which make women attempt impossible standards in order to be beautiful and perfect. As a result, cosmetic surgeries are very popular today. Many medical professionals confirm that the rising of cosmetic surgery is due to the rising accessibility to television programs. Thus, women become dissatisfied, worried, and obsessed with their appearance, and they turned to be only concerned about looking for cosmetics and advertised products that promised to offer them solutions. It is clear then why advertisers see k to make women feel unsatisfied and unhappy with their looks. 2.2 Stereotypes Against Women in Tv Advertisement and its Effects on Men: Nowadays, we are excessively exposed to advertisements in every single moment because of the well developed techniques used. Woman ¿Ã‚ ½s image is always the essential part in TV ads. This has a big influence on the audience. a) The Influence of Sexy Images on Men: Advertisements that contain plenty of sexy bodies may affect the audience and shape their ideas about women. A sexy ad in which a woman wears a bikini gets the attention of men. A research done by Susan Fiske, a professor of psychology at Princeton University, shows that  ¿Ã‚ ½in men ,the brain areas are associated with handling tools and the intention to perform actions light up when viewing images of women in bikinis ¿Ã‚ ½(Landau,Elizabeth,2010). Another research uses  ¿Ã‚ ½brain scans ¿Ã‚ ½ to show that when we see images of sexy bodies  ¿Ã‚ ½an activity increased in a part of the brain called the premotor cortex, which is involved in taking actions ¿Ã‚ ½ (Lan, 2011). Moreover, these sexy images portrayed in TV ads tend to increase the sexual appetite of men. According to the authors Bram Van den Bergh, Siegfried Dewitt, and Luk Warlop,  ¿Ã‚ ½the desire for immediate rewards increased in men who touched bras, looked at pictures of beautiful women, or watched video cl ips of young women in bikinis running through a park ¿Ã‚ ½ ( Science Daily,2008). b) The Influence of Models on Men ¿Ã‚ ½s Desire and Want towards Their Wives: As models are portrayed in different and frequent ads in their stereotyped manner, men are influenced by their bodies ¿Ã‚ ½ attractiveness and they want their wives to become like these models. Men are attracted by young women with  ¿Ã‚ ½small lower part of face with full lips, high cheek bones and long neck, large eyes and small nose ¿Ã‚ ½ (Men know what they want, 2011). c) Male ¿Ã‚ ½s gaze: According to Jonathan Schroeder,  ¿Ã‚ ½to gaze implies more than to look at-it signifies a psychological relationship of power, in which the gazer is superior to the object of the gaze ¿Ã‚ ½ (Chandler, Daniel,2011). The male ¿Ã‚ ½s gaze is the way how a man considers a woman. As TV ads are plenty of sexy women employed by advertisers to sell products  ¿Ã‚ ½the idea being that if you buy what they are selling you will get the girl ¿Ã‚ ½ (Abgond, 2011). In this picture of Channel advertisement, Nicole Kidman appears in such a way  ¿Ã‚ ½looking straightly into the eyes of the viewer ¿Ã‚ ½ (Lowen Linda, 2010). This advertisement is directed to men, Mulvey explains  ¿Ã‚ ½males may believe that buying this product as a gift for a woman might make her look like the model in the advertisement  ¿Ã‚ ½, also using this perfume could change the way people look at you ¿Ã‚ ½Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½ (Lowen Linda, 2010). Figure 6: An American actress in Channel ad 2.3 Stereotypes against Women in TV Advertisement and its Effects on Children: Television continues to represent women in highly stereotyped manner in order to influence viewers and specifically children who are easily affected. a) Stereotyping: In TV ads, women are portrayed in different ways. These images have an influence on children ¿Ã‚ ½s attitudes and beliefs. Children who watch female characters as  ¿Ã‚ ½passive, indecisive, and subordinate to men, and who see this reinforced by their environment, will likely believe that this is the appropriate way for females to behave ¿Ã‚ ½ (Witt, 2011). Furthermore, children after viewing female characters in advertisements, have difficulties to distinguish fantasy from reality  ¿Ã‚ ½Television characters are often exaggerated stereotypes that can distort children ¿Ã‚ ½s expectations of people in day-to-day life ¿Ã‚ ½ (Raizada,Parul, 2009). Moreover, women have a sex-role in TV ads and it leads to a harmful effect on children ¿Ã‚ ½s minds as they keep thinking about these sexual ads, young girls may feel inferior compared to this artificial beauty which may result in depression and underestimation of themselves. b) Violence against Women in Ads Influences Children Behavior: After watching TV ads involving violence against women, children may have aggressive thoughts which leads them to use violence against their sisters and even against their mothers. According to the psychologists Craig Anderson and Brad Bushman  ¿Ã‚ ½violent cognition may start a process that reinforces kid ¿Ã‚ ½s aggressive knowledge and makes them more likely to engage in aggressive acts ¿Ã‚ ½ (Science Daily, 2008). Moreover, when kids watch aggressive actions in TV ads, this may raise the risk and the aggressive tendencies children have ¿Ã‚ ½. The two psychologists confirm that when you let your children watch violent ads  ¿Ã‚ ½you are allowing your kids to have higher potential to engage in this activity and it puts them at a higher risk because they become desensitized to violence ¿Ã‚ ½. Due to the presence of violence used by males against women in TV advertisements, children are primarily influenced by these sights and that males are always superior to females. Cons equently, very terrible images are built in children ¿Ã‚ ½s memories which are based on gender inequity and violence. c) Women ¿Ã‚ ½s Tobacco Ads and its Impact on Children Behavior: Women are present in many tobacco advertisement which has a psychological effects on children. Tobacco advertisers use different techniques when advertising cigarettes. Their convincing tools influence many children and push them to consume tobacco products. In fact, celebrities shown in tobacco ads are a very important mean to convince children that tobacco is a sign of luxury and sophistication. Many famous tobacco companies tend to use this technique such as Winston, Virginia Slims, Salem and Marlboro. This picture shows a well known American singer with a tall cigarettes. Figure 7: An American singer in tobacco ad We all know that young people are more influenced by stars behavior .This is a deliberate message for children and adolescent to buy cigarette. Indeed, advertisers do not care about how harmful their product is, they only tend to enlarge their consumer base. * Questionnaire A: * Question 1: -How old are you? The sample analyzed

Stories of Success in Salome Thomas-ELs Book, I Choose to Stay Essay

The book I Choose to Stay was written by Mr. Salome Thomas-EL. In it were short stories of success, which were his success stories, and the stories of the children, that he have touched and inspired. Mr. EL is an educator; therefore, he wrote this book for its readers to know and eventually learn from his experiences as a student, a teacher, and a human being. Every human being has his own unique genetic talents and abilities. One of these abilities is intelligence. Intelligence is the ability of a person to learn and understand. In the beginning of life, every human being was born with different levels of intelligence, but the level of intelligence that we acquire from birth doesn’t entirely affect what we become or if we succeed or fail in life. This has been what Mr. EL instilled in his book. However, one student who have read the book thought, that the message of the book was that smart people succeed, while not-so-smart people fail. In my opinion, the students’ att itude about the book is wrong, because our genetics doesn’t determine our level of success. We succeed by being hard working and determined, by having sufficient time, and by having a set of people that would guide and support us as we grow. Skills and abilities are nothing compared to hard work and determination, and a positive attitude. It has been said that if you want to achieve something; you have to do your best to get it. You can’t just sit around and wait for it to come. You have to work and live your life, for you to achieve it. Salome once told his students, â€Å"If your mind can conceive and your heart can believe, you can achieve.† In addition to these words, he said â€Å"There is only one person capable of preventing you from reaching your goals, that person... ... if not because of the guidance and support of his teachers and especially his mother.† The same thing applies to his students. His students became successful, because Mr. Salome Thomas-EL was a great teacher; he cared, enlightened and guided his students to the right path. All of us have God-given abilities. And this â€Å"gift† needs to be opened, cherished and nurtured for it to be of great help in our journey of life. To succeed in life, the first thing we need to have is determination. Once we have the determination, what we need to do next is to manage and treasure the time that has been given to us. And after we have achieved those, the third thing that we need to have is a firm and strong support system. When we have all these three things with us, it would be much easier for us to succeed. What we need to succeed are merely sugar, spice and everything nice.

How does the writer create suspense in the Tell Tale Heart? Essay

The Tell Tale Heart is an extraordinary horror story. It was written by Edgar Allan Poe. His horror story keeps you interested, builds a lot of tension and creates suspense. I am going to write an essay on how Edgar Allan Poe creates suspense by explaining thoroughly all the techniques he uses. These techniques are, use of repetition, punctuation, how he uses first person, sound, imagery, tension, his use of time and finally in addition, how Poe uses italics and similes. I will also use quotes from the Tell Tale Heart to explain my points fully. Firstly, Poe uses lots of repetition or repeated words. For example, â€Å"I moved it slowly- very, very slowly.† Poe does this because he wants you to imagine how slowly and carefully he thrust his head in, so the man would not wake up. Also, he keeps repeating this because he is saying that it wasn’t just slowly. It was much slower than that. This quote was shown on the third paragraph, already this soon he has used a repetition. My next example is he uses or repeats the words â€Å"madness and mad† a lot. This has the effect of you believing that the main character is actually quite mad, even though he is repeating he isn’t. This is said throughout the story, starting from the first paragraph and the reader starts to understand what the murderer is really like. My final example is â€Å"it grew louder- louder- louder!† This adds to the point of how loud it really was and by repeating it exaggerates how it was. It also gives you a clear image of this, as it is repeated throughout the paragraphs. As a last point, I would like to explain the effect of using repetition. Repetition exaggerates the point and gives you a clear image of how it was. It adds to the suspense, for example â€Å"carefully, very, very carefully.† This shows he took it over the top because he had to be very quiet. Secondly, I will explain how Poe uses a variety of punctuation, for a greater effect. He uses punctuation to speed up and slow down the pace, which is much better than reading normally. My first example is â€Å"they heard! – They suspected! – They knew!† In this quotation, Poe has gripped the audience using dashes and exclamation marks. As this speeds up the pace, so therefore you can feel the murderer is frightened, worried and terrified. Poe speeds up the pace here because there is a lot of tension at this point. If he never used this you would read it normally and wouldn’t feel the suspense in this piece of text. My next example is â€Å"I foamed- I raved- I swore!† Here dashes and exclamation marks are used again. The punctuation shows he was angry and shouting. This is especially shown by the exclamation marks. To finish with punctuation have a good effect on the reader. It speeds up and slows down the pace and is more interesting than reading normal. This is also a very good hooking technique and adds to the suspense quite well. Finally, he uses a lot of punctuation throughout the whole story giving a good result. Next, Poe uses first person because it lets the reader see the story from the murderer’s point of view. This makes the story more interesting, as you can find out all the feelings and emotions of the murderer along the way. Where as, in 3rd person you wouldn’t get to know as much. My first example is â€Å"I have told you that I am nervous: so I am.† This quotation shows how the murderer feels when he is going through killing the man. My next example is â€Å"I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of mortal terror.† This quotation gives a very good effect, as it shows what he heard and saw right up to slaughtering the man. Also, from first person narrative you can share what is happening in some ways. Poe makes out the murderer as to be the following things, very secretive as you don’t know the sex, name, appearance and very little of his background. Next, he is incredibly mad, as he killed a man and cut his arms and legs up. The quotation to show he is mad is â€Å"I heard many things in hell.† This example shows he isn’t exactly normal. The murderer is also very obsessive as he can’t stop talking about they evil eye. He is crazy and gets very nervous around people, especially when the officers of the police come in near the end. You can also see he is disturbed and very unusual. Furthermore, the murderer has a routine and is in some ways organised because he plans out everything on what he is going to do step by step. Poe makes the murderer different and crazy in his own way. This is because it adds to the horror and suspense of the story. In addition, the murderer being first person uses a hooking technique which is to directly address the reader. This keeps the reader involved and keeps them paying attention to what’s happening. My first example is â€Å"how then, am I mad?† In this quotation, when he talks to the reader he uses rhetorical questions (questions that shouldn’t be answered). This includes the reader in the story, as they are being talked to. My next example is â€Å"I smiled – for what had I to fear?† This does the same again using rhetorical questions to the reader. This is almost like the murderer is sharing his worries with you, which has a good effect overall. To conclude this section, using direct address and talking to the reader, gets them involved on what is happening and is a great result, as sometimes you can relate to the story. Poe does this by using the word â€Å"you† and question marks from rhetorical questions. Another unique way Poe creates suspense is describing a lot of sound in the Tell Tale Heart; this has an exceptional effect on the reader. My first example is â€Å"for the hinges creaked.† This phrase reminds you of old scary horror films and makes you wonder, who is behind the door? It is also a creepy noise that relates to old abandoned houses. My second example is â€Å"It was the low stifled sound.† This quotation shows that in some ways he is paranoid as he is hearing things. It gets the reader more into suspense, as he believes the murderer is not alone and something is going to happen within this. Also, the sound gives you an idea of how it sounded. An additional example is â€Å"the old man sprang up in the bed, crying out- whose there?† In this example there is a lot of tension, you can almost hear the old voice of the man. A last quotation is â€Å"I fairly chuckled at the idea.† This shows that you can imagine the murderer laughing in an evil way; also he is amused that the man has no idea about what is going to happen. As a final point, sound gives the idea of how something sounded – so maybe quietly. It gives an idea of the surroundings and creates atmosphere. Poe has used this at the right moments in the story when he is describing something. A further reason Poe creates suspense is the use of descriptive words (imagery). These describe a lot of things throughout the story, these things are – evil words, the description of the eye and murdering the elderly man. A lot is used at certain points to emphasise his ideas. Also, it keeps you imagining and gets you hooked. Some examples of evil words he uses are â€Å"corpse†. This gives the reader the idea of a murdered body; it gives a scarier effect as it is more horrifying than just saying a dead body. My next example is â€Å"the evil eye†. This shows the eye was not exactly normal and it wasn’t nice looking. It was something that made his blood run cold and make him shake with fear. So you can imagine what it was like, also it suggests the centre of the story. My final example for this point is â€Å"the mortal terror.† It shows the feelings of the man and he wasn’t just frightened he was absolutely terrified. Additionally, he makes the ‘eye’ sound disgusting, here are some examples â€Å"his eye resembled that of a vulture.† This shows his eye was repulsive as it looks like a vulture (not a very nice creature). It also lets you imagine what the eye looks like. Another example is â€Å"a pale blue eye†. This describes how the eye looked and that it was unusually pale, which makes the reader feel the same way, as the murderer. Poe also makes ‘death’ sound disgusting, as all the tension builds up in a horrible way. The man gets killed astonishingly, which is quite scary. He gets suffocated by the bed covers and the way it is revolting is that, it says â€Å"the heart beat on with a muffled sound.† So he suffocated and his heart carried on beating a few minutes after. He also â€Å"shrieked† just before he was murdered. Finally, a last point that was terrifying is that when he pulled back the covers â€Å"he was stone dead.† So you can imagine how horrible he looked while dead. To conclude this, Poe uses descriptive words all throughout the story. This is to emphasise how horrifying something looked and it shows that the murderer looks at everything from the dark side. Next, Poe’s use of tension right through the story increases and decreases. This is done to not get the reader bored, whilst reading. It usually starts low, and then builds up more and more until it is really high. The parts where the tension is high is when: he is about to murder the man, when he is trying to hide the body under the floorboards and when the police has come round and he is about to confess. The parts when there is a low amount of tension is when: they are at the start and the murderer is explaining why he wants to kill the man and when he is waiting long time for when it is the right time to kill. Poe has made the tension go up and down because it is more exciting and keeps you in suspense. If I was to draw a graph for this it would go up and then down all the way through, so in other words it would go zigzag. A next point is how Poe uses time in the Tale Tell Heart, in some sections time goes slowly and some times it goes fast. When Poe makes time go slowly the character is doing something important or the murderer is describing something in detail. The evidence for this is â€Å"slowly so not to wake the man up†. Here this is a part where time goes slowly as it is telling the audience he has to be very quiet – to not cause any suspicion. Another example for time going slowly is when he is killing the man. The example for this is â€Å"yet for some minutes longer I stood still.† Here everything is going slow because he is about to murder the man. Poe makes time go fast when he is describing his actions over a period of time. My example for this is â€Å"every morning when the day broke.† Here he is describing time fast and over a period of time. Poe has made time go fast and slowly, so there is more tension and pace. A final point, to how Poe creates suspense in the Tell Tale Heart, is using italics and similes. To start with italics emphasize what is said, or something repeated. So it could emphasize something horrible that has happened, for a scarier effect. My example for this is â€Å"I now grew very pale.† This is said when the police officers have come in, to show he is nervous. The italics give emphasis to how pale he looked, so the murderer was looking really colourless. Italics are used a lot in The Tale Heart for many different reasons. Next, similes are used to describe something towards something else. My first example for this is â€Å"his room was as black as pitch.† This quotation gives you a clear image of how dark it was, as it is being referred to a pitch. Another example is â€Å"a low dull quick sound, such as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton.† This gives you another image of what the sound was like being referred to something else. As a final point, Poe uses italics and similes because they stress the point clearly. In conclusion, Poe uses a variety of techniques to create suspense in the Tale Tell Heart. These are – use of repetition, punctuation, how he uses first person, sound, imagery, tension, his use of time and italics and similes. These techniques create a good effect on the reader and are mostly successful hooking techniques. Poe keeps you reading the story by making you want to know what happens next using these skilful ways, without those ways The Tell Tale heart wouldn’t be as good. I think that the use of tension is most effective because it covers just about all the areas and it makes the story more exciting and interesting to read. The part of story I think is the best, is where all the tension increases when he is going to murder the man. This is because at that point you don’t want to put it down, as there is a lot of suspense. Overall, I would rate The Tale Tell Heart a very good horror story, with impressive techniques used throughout.

Bag of Bones CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

I was walking north along The Street. Japanese lanterns lined it, but they were all dark because it was daylight bright daylight. The muggy, smutchy look of mid-July was gone; the sky was that deep sapphire shade which is the sole property of October. The lake was deepest indigo beneath it, sparkling with sunpoints. The trees were just past the peak of their autumn colors, burning like torches. A wind out of the south blew the fallen leaves past me and between my legs in rattly, fragrant gusts. The Japanese lanterns nodded as if in approval of the season. Up ahead, faintly, I could hear music. Sara and the Red-Tops. Sara was belting it out, laughing her way through the lyric as she always had . . . only, how could laughter sound so much like a snarl? ‘White boy, I'd never kill a child of mine. That you'd even think it!' I whirled, expecting to see her right behind me, but there was no one there. Well . . . The Green Lady was there, only she had changed her dress of leaves for autumn and become the Yellow Lady. The bare pine-branch behind her still pointed the way: go north, young man, go north. Not much farther down the path was another birch, the one I'd held onto when that terrible drowning sensation had come over me again. I waited for it to come again now for my mouth and throat to fill up with the iron taste of the lake but it didn't happen. I looked back at the Yellow Lady, then beyond her to Sara Laughs. The house was there, but much reduced: no north wing, no south wing, no second story. No sign of Jo's studio off to the side, either. None of those things had been built yet. The ladybirch had travelled back with me from 1998; so had the one hanging over the lake. Otherwise ‘Where am I?' I asked the Yellow Lady and the nodding Japanese lanterns. Then a better question occurred to me. ‘When am I?' No answer. ‘It's a dream, isn't it? I'm in bed and dreaming.' Somewhere out in the brilliant, gold-sparkling net of the lake, a loon called. Twice. Hoot once for yes, twice for no, I thought. Not a dream, Michael. I don't know exactly what it is spiritual time-travel, maybe but it's not a dream. ‘Is this really happening?' I asked the day, and from somewhere back in the trees, where a track which would eventually come to be known as Lane Forty-two ran toward a dirt road which would eventually come to be known as Route 68, a crow cawed. Just once. I went to the birch hanging over the lake, slipped an arm around it (doing it lit a trace memory of slipping my hands around Mattie's waist, feeling her dress slide over her skin), and peered into the water, half-wanting to see the drowned boy, half-fearing to see him. There was no boy there, but something lay on the bottom where he had been, among the rocks and roots and waterweed. I squinted and just then the wind died a little, stilling the glints on the water. It was a cane, one with a gold head. A Boston Post cane. Wrapped around it in a rising spiral, their ends waving lazily, were what appeared to be a pair of ribbons white ones with bright red edges. Seeing Royce's cane wrapped that way made me think of high-school graduations, and the baton the class marshal waves as he or she leads the gowned seniors to their seats. Now I understood why the old crock hadn't answered the phone. Royce Merrill's phone-answering days were all done. I knew that; I also knew I had come to a time before Royce had even been born. Sara Tidwell was here, I could hear her singing, and when Royce had been born in 1903, Sara had already been gone for two years, she and her whole Red-Top family. ‘Go down, Moses,' I told the ribbon-wrapped cane in the water. ‘You bound for the Promised Land.' I walked on toward the sound of the music, invigorated by the cool air and rushing wind. Now I could hear voices as well, lots of them, talking and shouting and laughing. Rising above them and pumping like a piston was the hoarse cry of a sideshow barker: ‘Come on in, folks, hurr-ay, hurr-ay, hurr-ay! It's all on the inside but you've got to hurr-ay, next show starts in ten minutes! See Angelina the Snake-Woman, she shimmies, she shakes, she'll bewitch your eye and steal your heart, but don't get too close for her bite is poy-son! See Hando the Dog-Faced Boy, terror of the South Seas! See the Human Skeleton! See the Human Gila Monster, relic of a time God forgot! See the Bearded Lady and all the Killer Martians! It's on the inside, yessirree, so hurr-ay, hurr-ay, hurr-ay!' I could hear the steam-driven calliope of a merry-go-round and the bang of the bell at the top of the post as some lumberjack won a stuffed toy for his sweetie. You could tell from the delighted feminine screams that he'd hit it almost hard enough to pop it off the post. There was the snap of. 22s from the shooting gallery, the snoring moo of someone's prize cow . . . and now I began to smell the aromas I have associated with county fairs since I was a boy: sweet fried dough, grilled onions and peppers, cotton candy, manure, hay. I began to walk faster as the strum of guitars and thud of double basses grew louder. My heart kicked into a higher gear. I was going to see them perform, actually see Sara Laughs and the Red-Tops live and on stage. This was no crazy three-part fever-dream, either. This was happening right now, so hurr-ay, hurr-ay, hurr-ay. The Washburn place (the one that would always be the Bricker place to Mrs. M.) was gone. Beyond where it would eventually be, rising up the steep slope on the eastern side of The Street, was a flight of broad wooden stairs. They reminded me of the ones which lead down from the amusement park to the beach at Old Orchard. Here the Japanese lanterns were lit in spite of the brightness of the day, and the music was louder than ever. Sara was singing ‘Jimmy Crack Corn.' I climbed the stairs toward the laughter and shouts, the sounds of the Red-Tops and the calliope, the smells of fried food and farm animals. Above the stairhead was a wooden arch with WELCOME TO FRYEBURG FAIR WELCOME TO THE 20TH CENTURY printed on it. As I watched, a little boy in short pants and a woman wearing a shirtwaist and an ankle-length linen skirt walked under the arch and toward me. They shimmered, grew gauzy. For a moment I could see their skeletons and the bone grins which lurked beneath their laughing faces. A moment later and they were gone. Two farmers one wearing a straw hat, the other gesturing expansively with a corncob pipe appeared on the Fair side of the arch in exactly the same fashion. In this way I understood that there was a barrier between The Street and the Fair. Yet I did not think it was a barrier which would affect me. I was an exception. ‘Is that right?' I asked. ‘Can I go in?' The bell at the top of the Test Your Strength pole banged loud and clear. Bong once for yes, twice for no. I continued on up the stairs. Now I could see the Ferris wheel turning against the brilliant sky, the wheel that had been in the background of the band photo in Osteen's Dark Score Days. The framework was metal, but the brightly painted gondolas were made of wood. Leading up to it like an aisle leading up to an altar was a broad, sawdust-strewn midway. The sawdust was there for a purpose; almost every man I saw was chewing tobacco. I paused for a few seconds at the top of the stairs, still on the lake side of the arch. I was afraid of what might happen to me if I passed under. Afraid of dying or disappearing, yes, but mostly of never being able to return the way I had come, of being condemned to spend eternity as a visitor to the turn-of-the-century Fryeburg Fair. That was also like a Ray Bradbury story, now that I thought of it. In the end what drew me into that other world was Sara Tidwell. I had to see her with my own eyes. I had to watch her sing. Had to. I felt a tingling as I stepped beneath the arch, and there was a sighing in my ears, as of a million voices, very far away. Sighing in relief? Dismay? I couldn't tell. All I knew for sure was that being on the other side was different the difference between looking at a thing through a window and actually being there; the difference between observing and participating. Colors jumped out like ambushers at the moment of attack. The smells which had been sweet and evocative and nostalgic on the lake side of the arch were now rough and sexy, prose instead of poetry. I could smell dense sausages and frying beef and the vast shadowy aroma of boiling chocolate. Two kids walked past me sharing a paper cone of cotton candy. Both of them were clutching knotted hankies with their little bits of change in them. ‘Hey kids!' a barker in a dark blue shirt called to them. He was wearing sleeve-garters and his smile revealed one splendid gold tooth. ‘Knock over the milk-bottles and win a prize! I en't had a loser all day!' Up ahead, the Red-Tops swung into ‘Fishin Blues.' I'd thought the kid on the common in Castle Rock was pretty good, but this version made the kid's sound old and slow and clueless. It wasn't cute, like an antique picture of ladies with their skirts held up to their knees, dancing a decorous version of the black bottom with the edges of their bloomers showing. It wasn't something Alan Lomax had collected with his other folk songs, just one more dusty American butterfly in a glass case full of them; this was smut with just enough shine on it to keep the whole struttin bunch of them out of jail. Sara Tidwell was singing about the dirty boogie, and I guessed that every overalled, straw-hatted, plug-chewing, callus-handed, clod-hopper-wearing farmer standing in front of the stage was dreaming about doing it with her, getting right down to where the sweat forms in the crease and the heat gets hot and the pink comes glimmering through. I started walking in that direction, aware of cows mooing and sheep blatting from the exhibition barns the Fair's version of my childhood Hi-Ho Dairy-O. I walked past the shooting gallery and the ringtoss and the penny-pitch; I walked past a stage where The Handmaidens of Angelina were weaving in a slow, snakelike dance with their hands pressed together as a guy with a turban on his head and shoepolish on his face tooted a flute. The picture painted on stretched canvas suggested that Angelina on view inside for just one tenth of a dollar, neighbor would make these two look like old boots. I walked past the entrance to Freak Alley, the corn-roasting pit, the Ghost House, where more stretched canvas depicted spooks coming out of broken windows and crumbling chimneys. Everything in there is death, I thought . . . but from inside I could hear children who were very much alive laughing and squealing as they bumped into things in the dark. The older among them were likely stealing kisse s. I passed the Test Your Strength pole, where the gradations leading to the brass bell at the top were marked BABY NEEDS HIS BOTTLE, SISSY, TRY AGAIN, BIG BOY, HE-MAN, and, just below the bell itself, in red: HERCULES! Standing at the center of a little crowd a young man with red hair was removing his shirt, revealing a heavily muscled upper torso. A cigar-smoking carny held a hammer out to him. I passed the quilting booth, a tent where people were sitting on benches and playing Bingo, the baseball pitch. I passed them all and hardly noticed. I was in the zone, tranced out. ‘You'll have to call him back,' Jo had sometimes told Harold when he phoned, ‘Michael is currently in the Land of Big Make-Believe.' Only now nothing felt like pretend and the only thing that interested me was the stage at the base of the Ferris wheel. There were eight black folks up there on it, maybe ten. Standing at the front, wearing a guitar and whaling on it as she sang, was Sara Tidwell. She w as alive. She was in her prime. She threw back her head and laughed at the October sky. What brought me out of this daze was a cry from behind me: ‘Wait up, Mike! Wait up!' I turned and saw Kyra running toward me, dodging around the strollers and gamesters and midway gawkers with her pudgy knees pumping. She was wearing a little white sailor dress with red piping and a straw hat with a navy-blue ribbon on it. In one hand she clutched Strickland, and when she got to me she threw herself confidently forward, knowing I would catch her and swing her up. I did, and when her hat started to fall offi caught it and jammed it back on her head. ‘I taggled my own quartermack,' she said, and laughed. ‘Again.' ‘That's right,' I said. ‘You're a regular Mean Joe Green.' I was wearing overalls (the tail of a wash-faded blue bandanna stuck out of the bib pocket) and manure-stained workboots. I looked at Kyra's white socks and saw they were homemade. I would find no discreet little label reading Made in Mexico or Made in China if I took off her straw hat and looked inside, either. This hat had been most likely Made in Motton, by some farmer's wife with red hands and achy joints. ‘Ki, where's Mattie?' ‘Home, I guess. She couldn't come.' ‘How did you get here?' ‘Up the stairs. It was a lot of stairs. You should have waited for me. You could have carrot me, like before. I want to hear the music.' ‘Me too. Do you know who that is, Kyra?' ‘Yes,' she said, ‘Kito's mom. Hurry up, slowpoke!' I walked toward the stage, thinking we'd have to stand at the back of the crowd, but they parted for us as we came forward, me carrying Kyra in my arms the lovely sweet weight of her, a little Gibson Girl in her sailor dress and ribbon-accented straw hat. Her arm was curled around my neck and they parted for us like the Red Sea had parted for Moses. They didn't turn to look at us, either. They were clapping and stomping and bellowing along with the music, totally involved. They stepped aside unconsciously, as if some kind of magnetism were at work here ours positive, theirs negative. The few women in the crowd were blushing but clearly enjoying themselves, one of them laughing so hard tears were streaming down her face. She looked no more than twenty-two or -three. Kyra pointed to her and said matter-of-factly: ‘You know Mattie's boss at the liberry? That's her nana.' Lindy Briggs's grandmother, and fresh as a daisy, I thought. Good Christ. The Red-Tops were spread across the stage and under swags of red, white, and blue bunting like some time-travelling rock band. I recognized all of them from the picture in Edward Osteen's book. The men wore white shirts, arm-garters, dark vests, dark pants. Son Tidwell, at the far end of the stage, was wearing the derby he'd had on in the photo. Sara, though . . . ‘Why is the lady wearing Mattie's dress?' Kyra asked me, and she began to tremble. ‘I don't know, honey. I can't say.' Nor could I argue it was the white sleeveless dress Mattie had been wearing on the common, all right. On stage, the band was smoking through an instrumental break. Reginald ‘Son' Tidwell strolled over to Sara, feet ambling, hands a brown blur on the strings and frets of his guitar, and she turned to face him. They put their foreheads together, she laughing and he solemn; they looked into each other's eyes and tried to play each other down, the crowd cheering and clapping, the rest of the Red-Tops laughing as they played. Seeing them together like that, I realized that I had been right: they were brother and sister. The resemblance was too strong to be missed or mistaken. But mostly what I looked at was the way her hips and butt switched in that white dress. Kyra and I might be dressed in turn-of-the-century country clothes, but Sara was thoroughly modern Millie. No bloomers for her, no petticoats, no cotton stockings. No one seemed to notice that she was wearing a dress that stopped above her knees that she was all but naked by the standards of this time. And under Mattie's dr ess she'd be wearing garments the like of which these people had never seen: a Lycra bra and hip-hugger nylon panties. If I put my hands on her waist, the dress would slip not against an unwet-coming corset but against soft bare skin. Brown skin, not white. What do you want, sugar? Sara backed away from Son, shaking her ungirdled, unbustled fanny and laughing. He strolled back to his spot and she turned to the crowd as the band played the turnaround. She sang the next verse looking directly at me. ‘Before you start in fishin you better check your line. Said before you start in fishin, honey, you better check on your line. I'll pull on yours, darling, and you best tug on mine.' The crowd roared happily. In my arms, Kyra was shaking harder than ever. ‘I'm scared, Mike,' she said. ‘I don't like that lady. She's a scary lady. She stole Mattie's dress. I want to go home.' It was as if Sara heard her, even over the rip and ram of the music. Her head cocked back on her neck, her lips peeled open, and she laughed at the sky. Her teeth were big and yellow. They looked like the teeth of a hungry animal, and I decided I agreed with Kyra: she was a scary lady. ‘Okay, hon,' I murmured in Ki's ear. ‘We're out of here.' But before I could move, the sense of the woman I don't know how else to say it fell upon me and held me. Now I understood what had shot past me in the kitchen to knock away the CARLADEAN letters; the chill was the same. It was almost like identifying a person by the sound of their walk. She led the band to the turnaround once more, then into another verse. Not one you'd find in any written version of the song, though: ‘I ain't gonna hurt her, honey, not for all the treasure in the world'. Said I wouldn't hurt your baby, not for diamonds or for pearls Only one black-hearted bastard dare to touch that little girl.' The crowd roared as if it were the funniest thing they'd ever heard, but Kyra began to cry. Sara saw this and stuck out her breasts much bigger breasts than Mattie's and shook them at her, laughing her trademark laugh as she did. There was a parodic coldness about this gesture . . . and an emptiness, too. A sadness. Yet I could feel no compassion for her. It was as if the heart had been burned out of her and the sadness which remained was just another ghost, the memory of love haunting the bones of hate. And how her laughing teeth leered. Sara raised her arms over her head and this time shook it all the way down, as if reading my thoughts and mocking them. Just like jelly on a plate, as some other old song of the time has it. Her shadow wavered on the canvas backdrop, which was a painting of Fryeburg, and as I looked at it I realized I had found the Shape from my Manderley dreams. It was Sara. Sara was the Shape and always had been. No, Mike. That's close, but it's not right. Right or wrong, I'd had enough. I turned, putting my hand on the back of Ki's head and urging her face down against my chest. Both her arms were around my neck now, clutching with panicky tightness. I thought I'd have to bull my way back through the crowd they had let me in easily enough, but they might be a lot less amenable to letting me back out. Don't fuck with me, boys, I thought. You don't want to do that. And they didn't. On stage Son Tidwell had taken the band from E to G, someone began to bang a tambourine, and Sara went from ‘Fishin Blues' to ‘Dog My Cats' without a single pause. Out here, in front of the stage and below it, the crowd once more drew back from me and my little girl without looking at us or missing a beat as they clapped their work-swollen hands together. One young man with a port-wine stain swimming across the side of his face opened his mouth at twenty he was already missing half his teeth and hollered ‘Yee-HAW!' around a melting glob of tobacco. It was Buddy Jellison from the Village Cafe, I realized . . . Buddy Jellison magically rolled back in age from sixty-eight to eighteen. Then I realized the hair was the wrong shade light brown instead of black (although he was pushing seventy and looking it in every other way, Bud hadn't a single white hair in his head). This was Buddy's grandfather, maybe even his great-grandfather. I didn't give a sh it either way. I only wanted to get out of here. ‘Excuse me,' I said, brushing by him. ‘There's no town drunk here, you meddling son of a bitch,' he said, never looking at me and never missing a beat as he clapped. ‘We all just take turns.' It's a dream after all, I thought. It's a dream and that proves it. But the smell of tobacco on his breath wasn't a dream, the smell of the crowd wasn't a dream, and the weight of the frightened child in my arms wasn't a dream, either. My shirt was hot and wet where her face was pressed. She was crying. ‘Hey, Irish!' Sara called from the stage, and her voice was so like Jo's that I could have screamed. She wanted me to turn back I could feel her will working on the sides of my face like fingers but I wouldn't do it. I dodged around three farmers who were passing a ceramic bottle from hand to hand and then I was free of the crowd. The midway lay ahead, wide as Fifth Avenue, and at the end of it was the arch, the steps, The Street, the lake. Home. If I could get to The Street we'd be safe. I was sure of it. ‘Almost done, Irish!' Sara shrieked after me. She sounded angry, but not too angry to laugh. ‘You gonna get what you want, sugar, all the comfort you need, but you want to let me finish my bi'ness. Do you hear me, boy? Just stand clear! Mind me, now!' I began to hurry back the way I had come, stroking Ki's head, still holding her face against my shirt. Her straw hat fell off and when I grabbed for it, I got nothing but the ribbon, which pulled free of the brim. No matter. We had to get out of here. On our left was the baseball pitch and some little boy shouting ‘Willy hit it over the fence, Ma! Willy hit it over the fence!' with monotonous, brain-croggling regularity. We passed the Bingo, where some woman howled that she had won the turkey, by glory, every number was covered with a button and she had won the turkey. Overhead, the sun dove behind a cloud and the day went dull. Our shadows disappeared. The arch at the end of the midway drew closer with maddening slowness. ‘Are we home yet?' Ki almost moaned. ‘I want to go home, Mike, please take me home to my mommy.' ‘I will,' I said. ‘Everything's going to be all right.' We were passing the Test Your Strength pole, where the young man with the red hair was putting his shirt back on. He looked at me with stolid dislike the instinctive mistrust of a native for an interloper, per-haps and I realized I knew him, too. He'd have a grandson named Dickie who would, toward the end of the century to which this fair had been dedicated, own the All-Purpose Garage on Route 68. A woman coming out of the quilting booth stopped and pointed at me. At the same moment her upper lip lifted in a dog's snarl. I knew that face, too. From where? Somewhere around town. It didn't matter, and I didn't want to know even if it did. ‘We never should have come here,' Ki moaned. ‘I know how you feel,' I said. ‘But I don't think we had any choice, hon. We ‘ They came out of Freak Alley, perhaps twenty yards ahead. I saw them and stopped. There were seven in all, long-striding men dressed in cutters' clothes, but four didn't matter those four looked faded and white and ghostly. They were sick fellows, maybe dead fellows, and no more dangerous than daguerreotypes. The other three, though, were real. As real as the rest of this place, anyway. The leader was an old man wearing a faded blue Union Army cap. He looked at me with eyes I knew. Eyes I had seen measuring me over the top of an oxygen mask. ‘Mike? Why we stoppin?' ‘It's all right, Ki. Just keep your head down. This is all a dream. You'll wake up tomorrow morning in your own bed.' †Kay.' The jacks spread across the midway hand to hand and boot to boot, blocking our way back to the arch and The Street. Old Blue-Cap was in the middle. The ones on either side of him were much younger, some by maybe as much as half a century. Two of the pale ones, the almost-not-there ones, were standing side-by-side to the old man's right, and I wondered if I could burst through that part of their line. I thought they were no more flesh than the thing which had thumped the insulation of the cellar wall . . . but what if I was wrong? ‘Give her over, son,' the old man said. His voice was reedy and implacable. He held out his hands. It was Max Devore, he had come back, even in death he was seeking custody. Yet it wasn't him. I knew it wasn't. The planes of this man's face were subtly different, the cheeks gaunter, the eyes a brighter blue. ‘Where am I?' I called to him, accenting the last word heavily, and in front of Angelina's booth, the man in the turban (a Hindu who perhaps hailed from Sandusky, Ohio) put down his flute and simply watched. The snake-girls stopped dancing and watched, too, slipping their arms around each other and drawing together for comfort. ‘Where am I, Devore? If our great-grandfathers shit in the same pit, then where am I?' ‘Ain't here to answer your questions. Give her over.' ‘I'll take her, Jared,' one of the younger men-one of those who were really there said. He looked at Devore with a kind of fawning eagerness that sickened me, mostly because I knew who he was: Bill Dean's father. A man who had grown up to be one of the most respected elders in Castle County was all but licking Devore's boots. Don't think too badly of him, Jo whispered. Don't think too badly of any of them. They were very young. ‘You don't need to do nothing,' Devore said. His reedy voice was irritated; Fred Dean looked abashed. ‘He's going to hand her over on his own. And if he don't, we'll take her together.' I looked at the man on the far left, the third of those that seemed totally real, totally there. Was this me? It didn't look like me. There was something in the face that seemed familiar but ‘Hand her over, Irish,' Devore said. ‘Last chance.' ‘No.' Devore nodded as if this was exactly what he had expected. ‘Then we'll take her. This has got to end. Come on, boys.' They started toward me and as they did I realized who the one on the end the one in the caulked treewalker boots and flannel loggers' pants reminded me of: Kenny Auster, whose wolfhound would eat cake 'til it busted. Kenny Auster, whose baby brother had been drowned under the pump by Kenny's father. I looked behind me. The Red-Tops were still playing, Sara was still laughing, shaking her hips with her hands in the sky, and the crowd was still plugging the east end of the midway. That way was no good, anyway. if I went that way, I'd end up raising a little girl in the early years of the twentieth century, trying to make a living by writing penny dreadfuls and dime novels. That might not be so bad . . . but there was a lonely young woman miles and years from here who would miss her. Who might even miss us both. I turned back and saw the jackboys were almost on me. Some of them more here than others, more vital, but all of them dead. All of them damned. I looked at the towhead whose descendants would include Kenny Auster and asked him, ‘What did you do? What in Christ's name did you men do?' He held out his hands. ‘Give her over, Irish. That's all you have to do. You and the woman can have more. All the more you want. She's young, she'll pop em out like watermelon seeds.' I was hypnotized, and they would have taken us if not for Kyra. ‘What's happening?' she screamed against my shirt. ‘Something smells! Something smells so bad! Oh Mike, make it stop!' And I realized I could smell it, too. Spoiled meat and swampgas. Burst tissue and simmering guts. Devore was the most alive of all of them, generating the same crude but powerful magnetism I had felt around his great-grandson, but he was as dead as the rest of them, too: as he neared I could see the tiny bugs which were feeding in his nostrils and the pink corners of his eyes. Everything down here is death, I thought. Didn't my own wife tell me so? They reached out their tenebrous hands, first to touch Ki and then to take her. I backed up a step, looked to my right, and saw more ghosts some coming out of busted windows, some slipping from redbrick chimneys. Holding Kyra in my arms, I ran for the Ghost House. ‘Get him!' Jared Devore yelled, startled. ‘Get him, boys! Get that punk! Goddamnit!' I sprinted up the wooden steps, vaguely aware of something soft rubbing against my cheek Ki's little stuffed dog, still clutched in one of her hands. I wanted to look back and see how close they were getting, but I didn't dare. If I stumbled ‘Hey!' the woman in the ticket booth cawed. She had clouds of gingery hair, makeup that appeared to have been applied with a garden-trowel, and mercifully resembled no one I knew. She was just a carny, just passing through this benighted place. Lucky her. ‘Hey, mister, you gotta buy a ticket!' No time, lady, no time. ‘Stop him!' Devore shouted. ‘He's a goddam punk thief! That ain't his young ‘un he's got! Stop him!' But no one did and I rushed into the darkness of the Ghost House with Ki in my arms. Beyond the entry was a passage so narrow I had to turn sideways to get down it. Phosphorescent eyes glared at us in the gloom. Up ahead was a growing wooden rumble, a loose sound with a clacking chain beneath it. Behind us came the clumsy thunder of caulk-equipped loggers' boots rushing up the stairs outside. The ginger-haired carny was hollering at them now, she was telling them that if they broke anything inside they'd have to give up the goods. ‘You mind me, you damned rubes!' she shouted. ‘That place is for kids, not the likes of you!' The rumble was directly ahead of us. Something was turning. At first I couldn't make out what it was. ‘Put me down, Mike!' Kyra sounded excited. ‘I want to go through by myself!' I set her on her feet, then looked nervously back over my shoulder. The bright light at the entryway was blocked out as they tried to cram in. ‘You asses!' Devore yelled. ‘Not all at the same time! Sweet weeping Jesus!' There was a smack and someone cried out. I faced front just in time to see Kyra dart through the rolling barrel, holding her hands out for balance. Incredibly, she was laughing. I followed, got halfway across, then went down with a thump. ‘Ooops!' Kyra called from the far side, then giggled as I tried to get up, fell again, and was tumbled all the way over. The bandanna fell out of my bib pocket. A bag of horehound candy dropped from another pocket. I tried to look back, to see if they had got themselves sorted out and were coming. When I did, the barrel hurled me through another inadvertent somersault. Now I knew how clothes felt in a dryer. I crawled to the end of the barrel, got up, took Ki's hand, and let her lead us deeper into the Ghost House. We got perhaps ten paces before white bloomed around her like a lily and she screamed. Some animal something that sounded like a huge cat hissed heavily. Adrenaline dumped into my bloodstream and I was about to jerk her backward into my arms again when the hiss came once more. I felt hot air on my ankles, and Ki's dress made that bell-shape around her legs again. This time she laughed instead of screaming. ‘Go, Ki!' I whispered. ‘Fast.' We went on, leaving the steam-vent behind. There was a mirrored corridor where we were reflected first as squat dwarves and then as scrawny ectomorphs with long white vampire features. I had to urge Kyra on again; she wanted to make faces at herself. Behind us, I heard cursing lumberjacks trying to negotiate the barrel. I could hear Devore cursing, too, but he no longer seemed so . . . well, so eminent. There was a sliding-pole that landed us on a big canvas pillow. This made a loud farting noise when we hit it, and Ki laughed until fresh tears spilled down her cheeks, rolling around and kicking her feet in glee. I got my hands under her arms and yanked her up. ‘Don't taggle yer own quartermack,' she said, then laughed again. Her fear seemed to have entirely departed. We went down another narrow corridor. It smelled of the fragrant pine from which it had been constructed. Behind one of these walls, two ‘ghosts' were clanking chains as mechanically as men working on a shoe-factory assembly line, talking about where they were going to take their girls tonight and who was going to bring some ‘red-eye engine,' whatever that was. I could no longer hear anyone behind us. Kyra led the way confidently, one of her little hands holding one of my big ones, pulling me along. When we came to a door painted with glowing flames and marked THIS WAY TO HADES, she pushed through it with no hesitation at all. Here red isinglass topped the passage like a tinted skylight, imparting a rosy glow I thought far too pleasant for Hades. We went on for what felt like a very long time, and I realized I could no longer hear the calliope, the hearty bong! of the Test Your Strength bell, or Sara and the Red-Tops. Nor was that exactly surprising. We must have walked a quarter of a mile. How could any county fair Ghost House be so big? We came to three doors then, one on the left, one on the right, and one set into the end of the corridor. On one a little red tricycle was painted. On the door facing it was my green IBM typewriter. The picture on the door at the end looked older, somehow faded and dowdy. It showed a child's sled. That's Scooter Larribee's, I thought. That's the one Devore stole. A rash of gooseflesh broke out on my arms and back. ‘Well,' Kyra said brightly, ‘here are our toys.' She lifted Strickland, presumably so he could see the red trike. ‘Yeah,' I said. ‘I guess so.' ‘Thank you for taking me away,' she said. ‘Those were scary men but the spookyhouse was fun. Nighty-night. Stricken says nighty-night, too.' It still came out sounding exotic tiu like the Vietnamese word for sublime happiness. Before I could say another word, she had pushed open the door with the trike on it and stepped through. It snapped shut behind her, and as it did I saw the ribbon from her hat. It was hanging out of the bib pocket of the overalls I was wearing. I looked at it a moment, then tried the knob of the door she had just gone through. It wouldn't turn, and when I slapped my hand against the wood it was like slapping some hard and fabulously dense metal. I stepped back, then cocked my head in the direction from which we'd come. There was nothing. Total silence. This is the between-time, I thought. When people talk about ‘slipping through the cracks,' this is what they really mean. This is the place where they really go. You better get going yourself, Jo told me. If you don't want to find yourself trapped here, maybe forever, you better get going yourself. I tried the knob of the door with the typewriter painted on it. It turned easily. Behind it was another narrow corridor more wooden walls and the sweet smell of pine. I didn't want to go in there, something about it made me think of a long coffin, but there was nothing else to do, nowhere else to go. I went, and the door slammed shut behind me. Christ, I thought. I'm in the dark, in a closed-in place . . . it's time for one of Michael Noonan' s world-famous panic attacks. But no bands clamped themselves over my chest, and although my heart-rate was high and my muscles were still jacked on adrenaline, I was under control. Also, I realized, it wasn't entirely dark. I could only see a little, but enough to make out the walls and the plank floor. I wrapped the dark blue ribbon from Ki's hat around my wrist, tucking one end underneath so it wouldn't come loose. Then I began to move forward. I went on for a long time, the corridor turning this way and that, seemingly at random. I felt like a microbe slipping through an intestine. At last I came to a pair of wooden arched doorways. I stood before them, wondering which was the correct choice, and realized I could hear Bunter's bell faintly through the one to my left. I went that way and as I walked, the bell grew steadily louder. At some point the sound of the bell was joined by the mutter of thunder. The autumn cool had left the air and it was hot again stifling. I looked down and saw that the biballs and clodhopper shoes were gone. I was wearing thermal underwear and itchy socks. Twice more I came to choices, and each time I picked the opening through which I could hear Bunter's bell. As I stood before the second pair of doorways, I heard a voice somewhere in the dark say quite clearly: ‘No, the President's wife wasn't hit. That's his blood on her stockings.' I walked on, then stopped when I realized my feet and ankles no longer itched, that my thighs were no longer sweating into the longjohns. I was wearing the Jockey shorts I usually slept in. I looked up and saw I was in my own living room, threading my way carefully around the furniture as you do in the dark, trying like hell not to stub your stupid toe. I could see a little better; faint milky light was coming in through the windows. I reached the counter which separates the living room from the kitchen and looked over it at the waggy-cat clock. It was five past five. I went to the sink and turned on the water. When I reached for a glass I saw I was still wearing the ribbon from Ki's straw hat on my wrist. I unwound it and put it on the counter between the coffee-maker and the kitchen TV. Then I drew myself some cold water, drank it down, and made my way cautiously along the north-wing corridor by the pallid yellow glow of the bathroom nightlight. I peed (you-rinated, I could hear Ki saying), then went into the bedroom. The sheets were rumpled, but the bed didn't have the orgiastic look of the morning after my dream of Sara, Mattie, and Jo. Why would it? I'd gotten out of it and had myself a little sleepwalk. An extraordinarily vivid dream of the Fryeburg Fair. Except that was bullshit, and not just because I had the blue silk ribbon from Ki's hat. None of it had the quality of dreams on waking, where what seemed plausible becomes immediately ridiculous and all the colors both those bright and those ominous fade at once. I raised my hands to my face, cupped them over my nose, and breathed deeply. Pine. When I looked, I even saw a little smear of sap on one pinky finger. I sat on the bed, thought about dictating what I'd just experienced into the Memo-Scriber, then flopped back on the pillows instead. I was too tired. Thunder rumbled. I closed my eyes, began to drift away, and then a scream ripped through the house. It was as sharp as the neck of a broken bottle. I sat up with a yell, clutching at my chest. It was Jo. I had never heard her scream like that in our life together, but I knew who it was, just the same. ‘Stop hurting her!' I shouted into the darkness. ‘Whoever you are, stop hurting her!' She screamed again, as if something with a knife, clamp, or hot poker took a malicious delight in disobeying me. It seemed to come from a distance this time, and her third scream, while just as agonized as the first two, was farther away still. They were diminishing as the little boy's sobbing had diminished. A fourth scream floated out of the dark, then Sara was silent. Breathless, the house breathed around me. Alive in the heat, aware in the faint sound of dawn thunder.

How to Use Psychology in Advertising to Make People Buy

How to Use Psychology in Advertising to Make People Buy 5,000. That’s the number of advertisements that the average consumer is exposed to every day. You are probably thinking†¦ â€Å"How the heck can I make people notice my advertisements?† Advertisers have long discovered that they can leverage psychology to find what attracts attention, leaves an impression, persuades, and leads to the act of purchase. That being said, you can use psychology to make sure that your advertising is actually working. Ok, that’s awesome. But how? If you want to learn how to make your advertisements actually work, by work I mean make people buy your product, keep on scrolling’.👇 On average, people are exposed to nearly 5,000 ads per day. #advertising.The Psychology of Advertising Chances are you specialize in marketing, not psychology, so this area may be a little†¦ fuzzy. So what is the Psychology of Advertising? Psychology explores human nature, the psyche, and why people behave the way they do. Advertising explores the art of influencing human behavior to make certain purchase decisions. Its no surprise that these two areas converge. Psychology explores human nature, the psyche, and why people behave the way they do. Advertising explores the art of influencing human behavior to make certain purchase decisions. Basic Types of Advertisements Nowadays, there are so many different types of advertisements. Whether you’re using traditional tactics or digital tactics, understanding the psychology behind your advertisements is important. Here are a few of the basic forms of advertisements: Traditional Commercials Newspaper Magazine Radio Direct mail Billboard Digital Social Google Ads Search Display Inbox Sponsored listings Whether you’re running a Google ad, or just put up a billboard, you’ll want to choose either the thinking or feeling approach for your advertisement. CPM vs. HEM There are two basic models that explain how people process information, the Consumer Processing Model and the Hedonic, Experiential Model. In other words, thinking and feeling models. Chances are you’ll lean towards one model, depending on your product and audience. Ads don’t have to be one or the other, think of it more as a scale. Thinking Thinking approaches of advertisements allow consumers to use logic and reason to buy the product based on features or solving a problem. You can think of this advertisement as facts based if that helps. You should use a thinking approach if: You want to highlight direct information, features, benefits, or advantages. Your product is interpreted as a product used to solve a serious need, for example, migraine medication. It aligns with your brand voice  and target audience. Use the thinking approach if: You want to highlight features, benefits, or information Your product relates to a serious issue The approach aligns with your brand voice + target audience An example of an advertisement that uses a CPM approach, or a thinking approach, is Apple’s commercial that introduces their new feature launch of the iPhone XS and iPhone XR. It’s clear that they are highlighting the specific features and benefits of their products with no fluff. Feeling According to a 2016 Nielson Report, ads that generated emotional response got a 23% lift in sales volume. Feeling approaches use emotion to capture consumer behavior. Whether it’s fun, fantasy, or fear, the HEM approach persuades consumers using emotion. You should use a feeling approach if: You can leverage some type of emotion (humor, fear, love, etc.) that will lead a consumer to buy your product. You want to make light of a situation. It aligns with your brand voice and target audience. Use the feeling approach if: You want to leverage some type of emotion You want to make light of a situation The approach aligns with your brand voice + target audience In this commercial, Apple uses a feel-good approach, persuading people to share gifts. Although this ad doesn’t focus on a specific product or feature, they leverage their brand voice and give consumers a good feeling. With over 21 million views, it’s safe to say they got the message out there. Persuasion Techniques Using Emotion If you’ve decided to use the feeling approach for your advertisement, it’s important to choose the emotion that best appeals to your product, target audience, and brand. I’ve listed 4 of the basic emotions that people use in advertising. Humor Humor drives memorability.  If you’re looking to make people remember your product and your brand, this may be the best option for you. Making people laugh helps people remember your brand in a positive light. A company that slayed the humor game is Old Spice. Using humor in your advertisements makes people remember it more than any other emotion.Fear Using fear in an ad can be tricky, but if done right it can be very effective. This tactic uses fear as a persuasion technique by using your product to solve a problem or to change a behavior. Excitement Using excitement  in your advertising can be perfect if you have a feature launch or something exciting to share with your audience. Excitement causes your mind and body to react, which can make people more likely to act and make a purchasing decision. Sadness Making people sad is a great way to get their attention. I know how awful that sounds, but it’s true. Remember that sad puppy commercial  that Budweiser created back in 2014 with the puppies? It was sad in the beginning but made you feel good at the end, and was very memorable. 4 basic emotions to persuade Humor Fear Excitement Sadness Every emotion persuades consumers in a different way, so make sure that the emotion you choose is the best match for your product and brand, and ultimately helps you towards the goal of your advertisement (a.k.a. make people buy). Recommended Reading: https://.com/blog/marketing-objectives/ Consumer Information Process Now that we covered the basics, it’s important to know how your audience is going to process the information that you’re throwing in their face, literally. There are 7 important steps that happen before your customer purchases. Ultimately, you have control over almost all of these steps. Exposure to Information This is the very first thing that happens when a viewer sees your ad. This step stems from brand awareness. If it’s someone's very first time seeing the ad, let alone your brand, they may not even notice it. That’s why it’s important to factor in repetition to make your audience more exposed to your advertisement. Selective attention Now that your consumer has been exposed to the information, it’s time to grab their attention (and never let go). This step is tricky because you have no control over your consumer and there is no guarantee that they will see your ad. What I mean is that just because you run a commercial, it doesn’t mean people are watching the tv, or just because you run a display ad, it doesn’t mean the consumer even looks at it. You have to make your target audience notice you with all the distractions going on in their everyday life. Using the Color Psychology  principles to attract viewers is one of the smartest ways to achieve their undivided attention. Recommended Reading: https://.com/blog/color-psychology-marketing/ Comprehension This step is pretty important because if your consumer can’t comprehend what you’re selling, chances are they aren’t going to purchase. If you’re using the HEM approach, it’s important that you make sure that your underlying message is clear. Don’t let the message in your advertisement overshine your product. Agreement You’ve captured their attention, they understand what your selling, what’s next? Agreement. If you have a credible message that aligns with your target audience and their needs, this step should naturally happen. If you want more tips on creating effective articles, read this. Retention and Retrieval Think back to the last ad you saw that you actually stood out. Why did it stand out to you? This is your chance to make your ad stand out from the rest so when the consumer is ready to purchase, they think of you and not your competition. Check out what your competitors are doing and make sure that your advertisement is different than theirs (and better 😉). Decision Making At this step you’re so close, yet so far away. Your consumer realizes that your product may be right for them, but there are so many considerations in the decision making process. Adding a call to action could be the extra push that your consumer needs to buy your product. If the consumer decides to buy your product after seeing your advertisement, it doesn’t mean that they will follow through. Keep in mind that the product isn’t sold until that purchase is made. Action This final step was the goal all along, to make the consumer purchase your product. Give yourself a pat on the back because this means your advertisement worked. Through all the ads that consumers are exposed to and the different steps their brain takes before purchasing a product, they chose yours. How to Use Psychology in Advertising to Make People Buy 5,000. That’s the number of advertisements that the average consumer is exposed to every day. You are probably thinking†¦ â€Å"How the heck can I make people notice my advertisements?† Advertisers have long discovered that they can leverage psychology to find what attracts attention, leaves an impression, persuades, and leads to the act of purchase. That being said, you can use psychology to make sure that your advertising is actually working. Ok, that’s awesome. But how? If you want to learn how to make your advertisements actually work, by work I mean make people buy your product, keep on scrolling’.👇 On average, people are exposed to nearly 5,000 ads per day. #advertising.The Psychology of Advertising Chances are you specialize in marketing, not psychology, so this area may be a little†¦ fuzzy. So what is the Psychology of Advertising? Psychology explores human nature, the psyche, and why people behave the way they do. Advertising explores the art of influencing human behavior to make certain purchase decisions. Its no surprise that these two areas converge. Psychology explores human nature, the psyche, and why people behave the way they do. Advertising explores the art of influencing human behavior to make certain purchase decisions. Basic Types of Advertisements Nowadays, there are so many different types of advertisements. Whether you’re using traditional tactics or digital tactics, understanding the psychology behind your advertisements is important. Here are a few of the basic forms of advertisements: Traditional Commercials Newspaper Magazine Radio Direct mail Billboard Digital Social Google Ads Search Display Inbox Sponsored listings Whether you’re running a Google ad, or just put up a billboard, you’ll want to choose either the thinking or feeling approach for your advertisement. CPM vs. HEM There are two basic models that explain how people process information, the Consumer Processing Model and the Hedonic, Experiential Model. In other words, thinking and feeling models. Chances are you’ll lean towards one model, depending on your product and audience. Ads don’t have to be one or the other, think of it more as a scale. Thinking Thinking approaches of advertisements allow consumers to use logic and reason to buy the product based on features or solving a problem. You can think of this advertisement as facts based if that helps. You should use a thinking approach if: You want to highlight direct information, features, benefits, or advantages. Your product is interpreted as a product used to solve a serious need, for example, migraine medication. It aligns with your brand voice  and target audience. Use the thinking approach if: You want to highlight features, benefits, or information Your product relates to a serious issue The approach aligns with your brand voice + target audience Recommended Reading: https://.com/blog/brand-voice-guidelines/ An example of an advertisement that uses a CPM approach, or a thinking approach, is Apple’s commercial that introduces their new feature launch of the iPhone XS and iPhone XR. It’s clear that they are highlighting the specific features and benefits of their products with no fluff. Feeling According to a 2016 Nielson Report, ads that generated emotional response got a 23% lift in sales volume. Feeling approaches use emotion to capture consumer behavior. Whether it’s fun, fantasy, or fear, the HEM approach persuades consumers using emotion. You should use a feeling approach if: You can leverage some type of emotion (humor, fear, love, etc.) that will lead a consumer to buy your product. You want to make light of a situation. It aligns with your brand voice and target audience. Use the feeling approach if: You want to leverage some type of emotion You want to make light of a situation The approach aligns with your brand voice + target audience In this commercial, Apple uses a feel-good approach, persuading people to share gifts. Although this ad doesn’t focus on a specific product or feature, they leverage their brand voice and give consumers a good feeling. With over 21 million views, it’s safe to say they got the message out there. Persuasion Techniques Using Emotion If you’ve decided to use the feeling approach for your advertisement, it’s important to choose the emotion that best appeals to your product, target audience, and brand. I’ve listed 4 of the basic emotions that people use in advertising. Humor Humor drives memorability.  If you’re looking to make people remember your product and your brand, this may be the best option for you. Making people laugh helps people remember your brand in a positive light. A company that slayed the humor game is Old Spice. Using humor in your advertisements makes people remember it more than any other emotion.Fear Using fear in an ad can be tricky, but if done right it can be very effective. This tactic uses fear as a persuasion technique by using your product to solve a problem or to change a behavior. Excitement Using excitement  in your advertising can be perfect if you have a feature launch or something exciting to share with your audience. Excitement causes your mind and body to react, which can make people more likely to act and make a purchasing decision. Sadness Making people sad is a great way to get their attention. I know how awful that sounds, but it’s true. Remember that sad puppy commercial  that Budweiser created back in 2014 with the puppies? It was sad in the beginning but made you feel good at the end, and was very memorable. 4 basic emotions to persuade Humor Fear Excitement Sadness Every emotion persuades consumers in a different way, so make sure that the emotion you choose is the best match for your product and brand, and ultimately helps you towards the goal of your advertisement (a.k.a. make people buy). Recommended Reading: https://.com/blog/marketing-objectives/ Consumer Information Process Now that we covered the basics, it’s important to know how your audience is going to process the information that you’re throwing in their face, literally. There are 7 important steps that happen before your customer purchases. Ultimately, you have control over almost all of these steps. Exposure to Information This is the very first thing that happens when a viewer sees your ad. This step stems from brand awareness. If it’s someone's very first time seeing the ad, let alone your brand, they may not even notice it. That’s why it’s important to factor in repetition to make your audience more exposed to your advertisement. Selective attention Now that your consumer has been exposed to the information, it’s time to grab their attention (and never let go). This step is tricky because you have no control over your consumer and there is no guarantee that they will see your ad. What I mean is that just because you run a commercial, it doesn’t mean people are watching the tv, or just because you run a display ad, it doesn’t mean the consumer even looks at it. You have to make your target audience notice you with all the distractions going on in their everyday life. Using the Color Psychology  principles to attract viewers is one of the smartest ways to achieve their undivided attention. Recommended Reading: https://.com/blog/color-psychology-marketing/ Comprehension This step is pretty important because if your consumer can’t comprehend what you’re selling, chances are they aren’t going to purchase. If you’re using the HEM approach, it’s important that you make sure that your underlying message is clear. Don’t let the message in your advertisement overshine your product. Agreement You’ve captured their attention, they understand what your selling, what’s next? Agreement. If you have a credible message that aligns with your target audience and their needs, this step should naturally happen. If you want more tips on creating effective articles, read this. Retention and Retrieval Think back to the last ad you saw that you actually stood out. Why did it stand out to you? This is your chance to make your ad stand out from the rest so when the consumer is ready to purchase, they think of you and not your competition. Check out what your competitors are doing and make sure that your advertisement is different than theirs (and better 😉). Decision Making At this step you’re so close, yet so far away. Your consumer realizes that your product may be right for them, but there are so many considerations in the decision making process. Adding a call to action could be the extra push that your consumer needs to buy your product. If the consumer decides to buy your product after seeing your advertisement, it doesn’t mean that they will follow through. Keep in mind that the product isn’t sold until that purchase is made. Action This final step was the goal all along, to make the consumer purchase your product. Give yourself a pat on the back because this means your advertisement worked. Through all the ads that consumers are exposed to and the different steps their brain takes before purchasing a product, they chose yours.