Meritocrats. Looking upwards

Abstract

This paper aims at addressing the manipulation of city images within mass communication scope from a critical view. Thus, it seeks to unveil the leading role that contemporary audiovisual discourse gives to urban space which is usually used for constructing relevant social imaginaries through nonverbal –thereby, globally comprehensible- communication. In order to attain this objective, the study focuses on a particular national case where the image of urban space is subordinated to a social and political discourse pursuing cultural hegemony: the advertising spot called Meritocrats for introducing a new Chevrolet's model in Argentina.
The advertising proposal which is structured upon a specific demand involves a current society construct that leads to the positioning of the brand product related to aspiration values that entail middle-class social mobility. These values are based on individualism and competition as means of success which, in turn, implies getting the top. Urban space is then used as a stage for displaying symbolic-consumption objects; the highest buildings express goal achievement and successful individuality detached from the anonymous mass represented by the lower city.
In this way, the new car’s model embodies not only a promise of justified social recognition but also an engrained city-approach underpinning the construction of a discourse that legitimizes social inequality relations and –just as meritocrats do– aims at becoming hegemonic.