Identity In Anne Norton's The Signs Of Shopping

In Anne Norton’s “The Signs of Shopping” she starts off by dismissing shopping malls as venues for the public. They maintain the illusion as such but, malls consciously filter who walks through their entrances. The basic rights of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly are “not permitted” (87). The mall wants the people that flitter through its stores to only identify themselves by the possessions they have acquired. Possessions like clothing and jewelry or the latest technological devices represent a person’s position in the social hierarchy. Brands create the image of what someone can be with how they dress up their mannequins and hang posters of specific types of people wearing their merchandise which in turn plants the idea that if someone

I agree with her analysis of how shopping malls seek out the people they want to shop there and attempt to sell the idea of buying an identity. She goes into detail of how one group that are heavily marketed towards are teenage girls which are more susceptible to the “subversive” ways of stores and advertisements. For instance, stores like American Eagle illustrate the idea of being happy and having fun with one’s friends which is a pathos approach that sparks the thought that their clothing has a direct correlation with one’s happiness.

Some advertisements take on more an ethos approach as they rely on the currently held beliefs and customs of that time to sell their products. As time has progressed and traditions have changed though, advertisements have had to challenge old ethos strategies by appealing to the now reversed roles of men and women. Nowadays, there are more stay-at-home fathers who have taken on the role that was originally reserved for the female population and because of this role reversal companies have had to make their products appealing to both