Mary Jackson Pitts, Ph.D.

mpitts@astate.edu

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Literacy Project Number 1

This project is due  February 6th no later than 8 am.   Email the project to me at mpitts@astate.edu

 Television, Advertising, and the Super Bowl

 Television has a profound impact on the lives of many people.  One of the biggest television events is the coverage given to the Super Bowl.   The Super Bowl attracts millions of people.   The Super Bowl audience is reportedly split almost evenly between male and female viewers.    Some discussion suggests that the males watch for the game and the females for the advertisements.   Please make sure all questions are answers with complete sentences.

 Your first project is designed to provide you with a greater awareness of the impact of the Super Bowl.

 Your job is to watch one hour of Super Bowl programming.  While you watch I would like for you to take note of several elements of the coverage.   Answer the following questions below for the one-hour that you watch.   This project is due  February 6th no later than 8 am.   Email the project to me at mpitts@astate.edu  

Watch the television network(Fox) that is airing the game.  You may watch pre-game coverage, game coverage or half time coverage to complete the assignment.  You may choose to address sports coverage or advertising, but not both.  See to areas below.

 Sports coverage:

How did the network bring diversity to its coverage?    Ie.  Who were the commentators and play-by-play people?  Did they provide a picture of the racial, ethnic, and gender mix of society?   Describe the super bowl coverage mix.    Of the people that were interviewed was there diversity?

What topics did that touch on besides the actually play by play coverage. 

What issues were discussed during the coverage?  Ie all game coverage, discussion of issues related to NFL rules and policies, etc

Advertising:

What products were advertised during the super bowl?

What kind of advertising was aired during the one hour that you watched? 

Who did the advertisers seem to be targeting with their product?   Were they going after the women in the audience, the men or both?  Why do you say they were going after one group as opposed to another?   

Was there diversity in the advertisements?  Did you see equal representation of men and women in the ads?  Did women play primary roles or secondary roles?   Was one racial group seen more in the advertising over another?  Which group was shown more often?  Why do you think this is the case?

 This project is due  February 6th no later than 8 am.   Email the project to me at mpitts@astate.edu  

I am looking for about two well thought out paragraphs.  So we are talking about a page of written material.