Conveying The Sensation Of’Whiteness’in Modern Advertisements

The preference for fair or’white’skin has long historical roots in China, and continues to prevail in Chinese society today. Modern Chinese women yearn for a fair complexion, as it possesses a form of symbolic capital that implies attractiveness, youth, desirability, and status. Mass media further plays an important role in fueling such pursuit of’whiteness’by utilizing advanced media technology in its execution. Equipped with sophisticated media solutions, modern advertisements are able to employ both verbal and non-verbal components of an advert to convey passions and emotions among consumers. Women magazines exemplify one of the most effective vehicles in resonating with female consumers, as their aesthetically designed advertisements embrace vivid imagery, evocative language, and personal appeals. This dissertation offers semiotic analyses of the advertising communication of leading cosmetics corporations, namely L’Oreal, Shiseido, and Herborist, in order to explore how such selected cosmetics brands employ the interplay of linguistics and visual resources to stimulate and enhance the embedded meanings of’whiteness’as the ideal feminine beauty in China.