An Implication of Body Shaming Message in PETA’s Save the Whales Billboard

Advertisement: A Multimodal Discourse Analysis

By:
Annisa Safitri P. L. // 121811233072
Email: annisa.safitri.puspita-2018@fib.unair.ac.id

ABSTRACT
This study aims to identify and analyze the visual and linguistic elements in PETA’s ‘Save the
Whale’ billboard advertisement. This study is conducted because the advertisement seems to
have a body shaming act towards plus-sized women. Body shaming has become an ongoing
problem which has been proven to generate fatal outcomes. Kress and Van Leeuwen’s
Multimodal Discourse Analysis approach is used as the theoretical framework in this study.
Data for this study is drawn and discussed qualitatively and the findings are descriptively
reported. The results of the analysis show that visual and elements in the advertisement
generate the semantic quality of the advertisement. It exposes how a multimodal phenomenon
can communicate to viewers by emphasizing certain visual and verbal elements in a discourse.
Keywords: advertisement, body shaming, multimodal discourse analysis

INTRODUCTION
1. Background of the Study
Body shaming has become a serious, and unfortunately, common issue in the society
nowadays. Quoted from bodyshaming.org, body shaming is defined as “inappropriate, negative
statements and attitudes toward another person’s weight or size.” Additionally, body shaming
or any other appearance-based harassment can be defined as an act of ridiculing or shaming
someone based on their physical traits and/or appearance (Duncan, Zimmer-Gembeck and
Furman 2019). Body shaming has become one of the most harmful forms of bullying because
it affects one’s feelings mentally and emotionally. Body shaming often occurs when a certain
party comments negatively towards another’s body size. The words ‘too fat’ or ‘too thin’ about
someone’s body are some of the simplest forms of body shaming speech that are often heard
in society. While it is common knowledge that bullying usually involves at least two parties,
self-body shaming is also a phenomenon. Self-body shaming usually happens when an
individual is not happy with the size or/and look of oneself. The horrendous act of body
shaming came from the social stigma of how a person should look like. Models who walk the
runway and pose for editorial pictures are perceived as the ‘ideal’ beauty of sizes. When one’s
size or body does not meet the criteria of what is perceived ‘ideal’ by the society, one’s self-
esteem will be highly affected (Canadian Mental Health Association, BC Division 2015).
This issue is important to be brought up because low self-esteem which is caused by
body shaming and self-body shaming can result in self-harm and eating disorders. Body
shaming victims have been proven to have gone to a great extent in coping to the bullies. Self-
harm, for example, is the act of harming oneself in attempt to possibly end one’s life or in other
word, suicide. Self-harm that leads to suicide has become one of the most common unfortunate
result of bullying. Whereas with body shaming specifically, eating disorder has become one of
the most common distressing results of the act. Some of the most frequently heard diseases of
eating disorders are anorexia and bulimia nervosa. Both diseases affect health in an extremely
dangerous way. Anorexia nervosa is when an individual cannot maintain a healthy body weight
and is usually caused by skipping through meals yet exercising heavily. Bulimia nervosa on
the other hand, is the habit of binge eating concurrently with an unsettling behavior such as
regurgitating all the foods out again purposely (Chakraborty and Basu 2010).
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or commonly known as ‘PETA’ is an
organization that supports animal rights to an extremely great extent. In PETA’s official
website www.peta.org, a banner on the top of the site screams a slogan that says “Animals are
not ours to experiment on, eat, wear, use for entertainment, or abuse in any other way.” The
slogan directly exposes the primary goal of the organization. PETA is infamously known for
its strategies that are often considered to be over the top and overdramatized in promoting its
causes and ideas. Additionally, PETA is often criticized for its social media content that
regularly publishes explicit pictures and videos of animals being slaughtered.
The type of advertisements PETA delivers can take a number of forms such as protests,
advocacy, campaigns, TV commercials, billboard posters, and many more. In 2009, PETA
published an advertisement in the form of a billboard with the goal to encourage people to go
vegetarian. A billboard (a billing board), usually found in an outdoor public space with a high
number of passerby and/or traffic, is a large structure of advertising. Some of the advantages
of a billboard comparing to other types of advertisements are: (1) billboards convey their
agenda or idea to viewers affordably, (2) billboards have the ability to attract the eyes of
potential customers, and (3) billboards have been proven to increase sales (Taylor and Franke
2003).
The PETA billboard that will be analyzed in this study featured the back of a woman
wearing a two-piece swimwear with a text that read “SAVE THE WHALES. LOSE THE
BLUBBER: GO VEGETARIAN.” This advertisement received quite some backlash because
it was considered to be delivering a message of body shaming towards plus-sized women. This
study is conducted because as it was previously stated, body shaming is highly relevant in
today’s society. Second, even until now many people are still talking about how controversial
PETA advertisements can be.

2. Research Questions
This research analyzes an advertisement by PETA that encourages viewers to go
vegetarian and how it subtly conveys a body shaming message to viewers. Based on these
circumstances and to achieve the goal of the study, this research aims to answer these following
questions:
General question:
How are the multimodal elements that are present in the PETA advertisement represent a
body shaming act?
Specific questions:
1. How is the ideational meaning represented in the PETA advertisement?
2. How is the interpersonal meaning represented in the PETA advertisement?
3. How is the textual meaning represented in the PETA advertisement?

3. Theory
In this research, the theoretical approach proposed by Kress and Van Leeuwen is applied
to analyze a certain visual advertisement. Visuals in any form have always been intended for
people’s consumption. The use of visual elements in every advertisement is vital in attracting
people’s attention. Advertising is one form of communication that aims to market, promote, or
sell certain products, services, and ideas without using a personal message (Stanton 1984).
According to Cook (2001), advertisements are out there to inform, persuade, influence, remind,
and even change people’s opinions, emotions, and attitudes. Various forms of advertisements
are communicated via various media such as newspapers, television, magazines, outdoor
advertising, direct mail, blogs, websites, social media, and even text messages (Arens 2002).
According to Kress and Van Leeuwen (1996), discourse can be considered as
multimodal if its meaning can be interpreted in more than one semiotic code. Multimodal
discourse analysis primarily focuses on the theory and analysis of the semiotic aspects and
semantic expansion that occur as a combined semiotic choice in a multi modal phenomena
(O'Halloran 2011). Author seeks to identify the meaning of a semiotic code within a given
context, focusing on the interaction between multiple semiotic systems in a discourse (Baldry
and Thibault 2006). This research adopts the theoretical approach of Grammar Visual Design
by Kress and Van Leeuwen (1996). Kress and Van Leeuwen (1996) proposed this approach
based on Michael Halliday’s theory of Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) consisting of
three metafunctions, which are ideational, interpersonal, and textual.
Kress and Van Leeuwen stated that ideational metafunction focuses on the current state of
things and how it relates to the circumstances surrounding it. Interpreting a language’s
ideational metafunction will allow researchers to find out its actions and relationships, the
setting of time and place, and the circumstances in which the scene took place. They suggested
that visual elements can be analyzed as either narrative or conceptual. Narrative visuals are
images that exhibit actions and events, with participants being usually involved in that set of
circumstances. Meanwhile, conceptual visuals are images that represent certain social
circumstances which are being analyzed, symbolized, and classified visually.
Interpersonal metafunction focuses on the relationship and message that the addresser tries
to convey to the audience and/or viewers. Kress and Van Leeuwen coined the term ‘demand’
when an image captures viewers’ gaze and when a message uses a personal pronoun ‘you’
because their curiosity is demanded. On the contrary, where an image doesn’t meet viewers’
gaze, Kress and Van Leeuwen defined it as an ‘offer’. Furthermore, in the case where an image
is considered an ‘offer’, it means that the relationship the addresser intends to create between
the viewers and the message is impersonal. Impersonality can also be interpreted by analyzing
the shot distance of an image. For instance, a close-up shot suggests intimacy whereas a long
shot suggests social alienation. Moreover, the angle or perspective of an image also counts as
the elements in determining impersonality based on its vertical and horizontal dimension.
Finally, Kress and Van Leeuwen coined the term ‘modality’ to represent the reality of a
message. Modality judges the level of commitment that a message delivers to the addressee.
Word expressions such as ‘sure’ and ‘certain’ show a higher level of commitment than ‘think’
or ‘guess’. In an image, the elements of colors and resolution are used to judge the modality
based on how they naturally represent the said image.
Lastly, textual metafunction focuses on how an arrangement of messages relates to one
another as a coherent whole. Kress and Van Leeuwen suggested that the placement of where a
certain element in an image is presented is crucial in the value of the information. For instance,
they proposed that elements in the left side usually present information that is assumed to be a
common or general knowledge. Meanwhile, elements on the right side usually present new
information. This assumption also applies to top and bottom placements. They suggested that
the upper part of an image usually presents the abstract of an information while the lower part
presents typically the main or real message of an image itself. Kress and Van Leeuwen coined
the term salience and framing as another two elements in this metafunction. Salience is about
how strong an element in an image influences the message. It analyzes the size, sharpness, and
placement as well. Meanwhile, framing is about the dividing lines or parts of each element to
suggest whether or not an element is an independent unit or linked with other elements.

4. Previous Studies
Multimodal discourse analysis has been done by many researchers and Theo Van
Leeuwen and Gunther Kress are technically the trailblazer in terms of analyzing visual
elements in discourse. Therefore, the approach coined by Kress and Van Leeuwen has been
widely used. To compare this study with other previous studies, two previous related studies
will be discussed.
The first one is about the analysis of malaria drugs advertisements conducted by Olowu
and Akinkurolere (2015). The study, which is titled A Multimodal Discourse Analysis of
Selected Advertisement of Malaria Drugs (2015), used Kress and Van Leeuwen (1996)’s
multimodality framework as its approach, the similar approach that is used in this research.
The study, which was conducted by Olowu and Akinkurolere (2015), explored 4 printed
advertisements about malaria drugs, each with very different elements. The distinction between
Olowu and Akinkurolere’s study and this study is that Olowu and Akinkurolere’s study
compared 4 different advertisements while this study will only discuss one particular
advertisement. The aim of Olowu and Akinkurolere’s study was to find out how the elements
of each advertisement communicate to viewers. The elements analyzed in this study include
visual resources such as pictures, colors, symbols, icons and gaze. The gap of this study is that
the analyzed data wasn’t specifically examined using the systems that Kress and Van Leeuwen
suggested. The researchers only presented the big picture rather than went into details. The
result of the study implied that the different elements being used in each advertisement set a
particular mood for each one of the advertisements (Olowu and Akinkurolere 2015).
Another previous related study has been conducted by Dongyan Li and it is titled
Multimodal Discourse Analysis of the Interpersonal Meaning of TV Advertisements (2016).
The difference between Li’s study and this study is that Li’s study focused solely on the
interpersonal meaning from Kress and Van Leeuwen’s approach. Li’s study analyzed a
particular coca cola TV advertisement. Li’s analysis focused on the hilltop of the coca cola
jingle and she used multimodal theory to analyze the speech, colors, image, movement, and
sound work as one to build and convey the interpersonal meaning. Li’s method in analyzing
the coca cola TV advertisement is unique. Firstly, Li analyzed the interpersonal meaning in the
image, in the action and movement, and in the speech, sound, and music separately. After that,
Li analyzed those three aspects as an integrated item. An integrated analysis between the three
aspects was needed because according to Li, those three aspects are supposed to be
simultaneously recognized as the advertisement unfolds in time. The gap of this study is that
Li only focused on one metafunction which is interpersonal. From Li’s analysis, it can be
concluded that to create an interpersonal meaning in the coca cola hilltop TV advertisement,
each semiotic code cannot stand without the other. The features of each aspects, such as the
color and perspective on the image, the gaze, gesture, and facial expression in the movement,
and the rhythm, syllables, and sonic interaction in the music and sound, are working
coordinately to what eventually enhances the interpersonal meaning of the coca cola TV
advertisement (Li 2016).

METHODS
In obtaining the data, the author had some options on what advertisement the author
wanted to analyse. The Author looked up on some well-known official websites of certain
companies and organisations for some interesting visual advertisements that had the potential
to be analysed using the multimodal concept. Author found numerous visual advertisements,
however in the author’s opinion, the visual advertisements found were not as interesting as the
author initially hoped it would be. Author then visited the website of PETA (www.peta.org),
because the author has been a follower of PETA’s agenda since 2015. The author recalled that
although PETA has always aimed for a noble cause, PETA often took their advertising
strategies to another level that may not be well-received by the society. Therefore, the author
decided to specifically find one of PETA’s visual advertisements that had caused some
controversies in the past. The author decided that opting for a controversial visual
advertisement can furtherly develop the analysis. The author found a website listing 13 of
PETA’s visual advertisements that are perceived as offensive by the society (Bhasin 2011).
The author then chose the ‘Save the Whale’ advertisement because the advertisement brought
up an important issue that may be found in the society nowadays. which is body shaming. The
data would then be analyzed qualitatively using Kress and Van Leeuwen’s Grammar Visual
Design approach which will identify three metafunctions, which are ideational, interpersonal,
and textual. In the ideational metafunction. In the ideational metafunction, the image would be
analyzed conceptually. In discussing the interpersonal metafunction, the concept of modality
and how por what message the advertisement was trying to convey to viewers would be
examined. Lastly, in textual metafunction, verbal and visual elements presented in the data
would be analyzed according to their placements and sizes in order to identify the motives of
each visual element.

FINDING AND DISCUSSION

1. Ideational Metafunction
The text in the advertisement says “Save the Whales. LOSE THE BLUBBER: GO
VEGETARIAN”. The text “Save the Whales” written in the sky of the background, implies
that whales are out there in the ocean and human beings must not harm them. “LOSE THE
BLUBBER” refers to the body fat that the woman in the advertisement flaunts. Both the words
‘whales’ and ‘blubber’ act as nouns. This implies that the addresser was trying to equalize
whales and blubbers or fats on human bodies. Meanwhile, “GO VEGETARIAN” is the
ultimate message that PETA wanted to convey from this particular advertisement. According
to Kress and Van Leeuwen (1996), the ideational metafunction approach can be analyzed as
either a narrative or conceptual. This PETA advertisement is analyzed conceptually because
the image represents a symbol instead of an action. The advertisement shows the back profile
of a person’s body from shoulder to hip in a two-piece swimsuit, also known as a bikini,
seemingly looking out to the beach. Although the absolute evidence of the gender of the person
shown in the image is not present, a two-piece swimwear or a bikini is identical to women’s
wear. Therefore, it is assumed that the individual that acts as a symbol in this image is a woman.
A two-piece swimwear is the choice of outfit in this image, thus it can be assumed that the said
choice is deliberately done to draw more attention to only some certain body parts of the
woman. The use of a woman instead of a man in the advertisement implies that women are
more likely to care about their physical appearances than men. It also implies that women are
the gender that is more likely to change their lifestyle in order to achieve an ideal body.
Conventionally, body shaming mostly happens to women (Katrak 2006).

2. Interpersonal Metafunction
The absence of the woman’s face in the PETA advertisement proves that the
advertisement doesn’t want people to focus on the facial traits. According to Kress and Van
Leeuwen (1996), this is an ‘offer’ of representation to the viewers. The woman represents the
symbol or object of contemplation to what the advertisement suggested what a woman’s body
would be like if one does not apply a vegetarian diet. Viewers are expected to look at the
woman’s body and identify its flaws. The message in the advertisement counts as high
modality. It serves a high level of commitment judging from the directness of the message.
With the text saying “Save the Whales. LOSE THE BLUBBER: GO VEGETARIAN”, the
advertisement encourages people to switch their diets to vegetarianism in order to not look like
the woman pictured. From a linguistic aspect, “Save the Whales'' is an imperative utterance
with a directive function. It directs viewers to act something to save the whales. The message
“Save the Whales'' alone however, can be interpreted into two different meanings. First, the
message “Save the Whales'' conveniently matches PETA’s agenda in protecting animal rights.
Whale is chosen to be the animal that is mentioned because of its association with the beach as
the background. The second possible meaning is, the advertisement tries to associate whales
with the woman pictured. Whales are widely known as one of the biggest types of marine
mammals. The advertisement correlates this fact to the woman pictured. The advertisement
compares whales and a plus-sized woman. The message “Save the Whales'' would imply “Save
the Woman”. The advertisement indirectly calls on viewers to save the woman from her weight
or her size. The other text from the advertisement is “LOSE THE BLUBBER: GO
VEGETARIAN”. This utterance is also imperative and acts as a direction. The word choice of
‘blubber’ points to the extra fat and cellulitis of the woman’s body pictured. The message again,
implies that in order to lose that extra weight, one has to apply a vegetarian lifestyle.
Additionally, it implies that extra weights, fats, and cellulites are not ideal for women, and that
blubber on a woman’s body must not present.

3. Textual Metafunction
The advertisement consists of a text and a visual image. The text is placed on the left
side of the advertisement which indicates that viewers are deliberately intended to read the text
first before catching the glimpse of the visual image. Analyzing the advertisement using one
of the textual metafunction elements that is coined by Kress and Van Leeuwen (1996), which
is salience, the text ‘Save the Whales’ is written in the upper part; therefore, it can be interpreted
that this text is the abstract of the whole message. It doesn’t serve as the main message of the
image. The size of the word ‘whales’ is the biggest element on the image. It represents the true
size of the animal whale and how it would correlate with the real message of the image. The
text “LOSE THE BLUBBER: GO VEGETARIAN” is written in a medium-sized red font
horizontally and is placed in the lower part of the image. According to Kress and Van Leeuwen,
this indicates that this is the real and specific message the advertiser was intending to convey
to viewers. The text is written in a red font because it matches the women’s bikini, implying
that the word ‘blubber’ conveniently matches the women pictured. The use of the color red
may also be intended to emphasize the main message because the color red is identical with
boldness. On the right side, the back of a woman’s body is pictured and by this point, arguably,
viewers would have understood the meaning of the text depicted in the advertisement. In the
right side of the advertisement, stamped in the woman’s back, PETA identifies as the
advertiser. Arguably, this is the last item in the advertisement that viewers will notice. This is
done deliberately so that viewers who are not in favor with PETA’s agendas would still take
their time to observe the advertisement because the placement of PETA’s identity is not the
first thing viewers would look at. Analyzing the image with the framing element that Kress and
Van Leeuwen also coined, the verbal message in the advertisement is separated from the visual
image indicating both messages are independent elements. However, the two elements are
interrelated as it has been proven with the analysis above.

CONCLUSION
Most advertisers make their advertisements ‘safe’ to be consumed or viewed by
everyone so their products or ideas can be accepted in the society. However, some advertisers
prefer to take risks and opt to make their advertisements controversial. Some controversial
advertisements may be done deliberately and may not. The ones that are made controversial
deliberately assume that the more controversial an advertisement gets, the more people talk
about their products or ideas, which will eventually lead to more people buying their products
or ideas.
While on paper PETA seems to have the most noble agenda which is to protect animals’
rights, this particular billboard advertisement does not even whisper noble at the slightest. From
the findings and discussions, it can be concluded that the advertisement targets plus-sized
women and implicitly body shames them. The advertisement glorifies vegetarianism as the
only way to lose fat. Advertisements’ purposes should be to invite or encourage viewers to buy
the advertisers’ products or ideas. However, in this particular billboard advertisement, targeted
viewers would instead be offended rather than to believe the advertisement.
This kind of advertisement, one which targets women’s insecurities, is what constructed
the idea of ‘ideal beauty’ in the first place. This ‘ideal beauty’ of a woman is symbolized by
various components in public advertisements telling the whole world on how a woman should
look like. The use of women bodies in advertisements has the consequences of shadowing
women’s intellectual abilities in relation with the demands from a society that is deemed
patriarchal (Gill 2007). These circumstances may be the initial reason why body shaming exists
in the first place. Multimodal discourse analysis has enabled the possibility to interpret the
multiple meanings conveyed from a visual image and text or linguistic components. While
there is a specific method and theoretical framework being used in this study, it is vital to keep
in mind that the interpretation of the advertisement in this study is based on the author’s best
comprehension.
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APPENDICES