Your Call Is Very Important to Us

Richard Hardack

doi:10.5771/9781538177747

Your Call Is Very Important to Us

Advertising and the Corporate Theft of Personhood

Published 2023

No access

doi.org/10.5771/9781538177747
ISBN print: 978-1-5381-7773-0
ISBN online: 978-1-5381-7774-7
Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham

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Zusammenfassung

In a unique exploration of how corporations appropriate the rights and identities of people, Richard Hardack unearths the unexpected consequences of corporate America’s quest to dominate every aspect of our culture.

Not only do corporations govern our economy, but corporate personas define our identities and shape our relationships with people and the world around us. In a timely and wide-ranging study, Hardack recontextualizes the inordinate influence of corporations and corporate advertising as a legal, political, psychological, and sociological phenomenon. He connects a surprising array of topics, including advertising, pop culture, representations of nature, science fiction, legal history, the history of colonization and slavery, and the longing to transcend individuality, to show how the principles of corporate personhood—the idea that corporation are people—allow corporations to impersonate and displace actual people. Throughout, Hardack also provides a novel reassessment of the pernicious role and effect of advertising in our daily lives.

The book makes accessible a complex topic and integrates many pressing issues in the U.S., including the privatization of the public sphere; the escalating polarization of wealth and rights; unchecked corporate power, influence and monopoly; and the descent of political debate and policy into the language of advertising, branding, and entertainment. Hardack treats the assumptions that foster corporate personhood as both cause and effect, driver and symptom, of a series of transformations in U.S. society. Awakened to this foundational way corporations infiltrate most human activities and interactions, readers can better understand and safeguard themselves against systemic changes to the American economy, culture, and politics.

Schlagworte

Marketing Branding Legal History Community Advertising popular culture personhood individualism corporate personhood depersonalization

Keywords

human rights Artificial Intelligence corporations capitalism

Chapter Expand | CollapsePage
Preface
- Contents
1–8 Chapter One. A Conceptual Overview 1–8
9–24 Chapter Two. The Zero-Sum Game of Corporate Personhood 9–24
25–28 Chapter Three. You’re Soaking in It 25–28
29–32 Chapter Four. He Can’t Be a Man ’CauseHe Doesn’t Smokethe Same Detergent Pack as Me 29–32
33–52 Chapter Five. The Nature of Corporations 33–52
53–58 Chapter Six. Pumpkins and Sugarplums 53–58
59–62 Chapter Seven. The Animated Corporation 59–62
63–70 Chapter Eight. Truth and Soul 63–70
71–74 Chapter Nine. Your Call Is Very Important to Us 71–74
75–78 Chapter Ten. There’s No Their There 75–78
79–82 Chapter Eleven.You Can’t See the Corporation for the CEOs 79–82
83–94 Chapter Twelve. Unpersoned 83–94
95–98 Chapter Thirteen. Buy with Confidence 95–98
99–100 Chapter Fourteen. Habeas Corporation 99–100
101–110 Chapter Fifteen. Paranoid Desires 101–110
111–120 Chapter Sixteen. The Gap between Signifier and Signified 111–120
121–124 Chapter Seventeen. It’s All Theater 121–124
125–130 Chapter Eighteen. Corpography 125–130
131–136 Chapter Nineteen. Corporate Exceptionalism 131–136
137–148 Chapter Twenty. Anonymous Autonomy 137–148
149–154 Chapter Twenty-One. When Texas Executes One 149–154
155–160 Chapter Twenty-Two. Immortality and Impersonation 155–160
161–172 Chapter Twenty-Three. Corporations Have No Souls 161–172
173–174 Chapter Twenty-Four. Extremely Hostile Takeovers 173–174
175–184 Chapter Twenty-Five. A Little Less than Kin 175–184
185–186 Chapter Twenty-Six. And Now the Wordsfrom Our Sponsor 185–186
187–190 Chapter Twenty-Seven. New and Improved: The Zero-Sum Game of Corporate Personhood 187–190
191–194 Chapter Twenty-Eight. The Whole World Is an America, a New World 191–194
195–198 Chapter Twenty-Nine. The Transcendental Franchise 195–198
199–202 Chapter Thirty. Advertising Makes the World Uniform: The New World as the Whole World 199–202
203–206 Chapter Thirty-One. Warning Signs 203–206
207–210 Chapter Thirty-Two. Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam,Trust, and Spam 207–210
211–214 Chapter Thirty-Three. Advertising Creep: The End of Public Space 211–214
215–216 Chapter Thirty-Four. The Age of Advertisements: What’s Your Sign? 215–216
217–224 Chapter Thirty-Five. Sponsored Language 217–224
225–228 Chapter Thirty-Six. I’m Not an Actor, but I Play One on TV 225–228
229–232 Chapter Thirty-Seven. Pretty Lies, Unclean Hands 229–232
233–246 Chapter Thirty-Eight. The Rise of the Impersonation State 233–246
247–254 Chapter Thirty-Nine. I Have Met the Alien 247–254
255–262 Chapter Forty. Corporations Cannot Speak 255–262
263–266 Chapter Forty-One. A Marketplace of Rights 263–266
267–274 Chapter Forty-Two. Commercial Personhood 267–274
275–278 Chapter Forty-Three. Advertisements against Myself 275–278
279–284 Chapter Forty-Four. The Self as Ad 279–284
285–288 Chapter Forty-Five. Schadenfreudian Slips: Ad Copy and the Culture of Envy 285–288
289–292 Chapter Forty-Six. Pop-Ups and Pinups Advertising Sex and Violence 289–292
293–294 Chapter Forty-Seven. The Art of Lying 293–294
295–296 Chapter Forty-Eight. Needs and Wants 295–296
297–300 Chapter Forty-Nine. Farewell Welfare 297–300
301–306 Chapter Fifty. Ask Your Advertiser If Advertising Is Right for You 301–306
307–310 Chapter Fifty-One. Living Outside the Market? 307–310
311–318 Chapter Fifty-Two. How Soon Is Nowhere? Advertising Academia 311–318
319–320 Chapter Fifty-Three. Gravekeepers 319–320
321–324 Chapter Fifty-Four. Imagine a World without Advertising 321–324
325–342 Notes 325–342
343–344 Acknowledgments 343–344
345–358 Bibliography 345–358
359–366 Index 359–366
367–368 About the Author 367–368

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