Call for papers - Critical perspectives on Advertising - "A embalagem do sistema" 40 years on

Published forty years ago, Maria Arminda do Nascimento Arruda's book A embalagem do Sistema (1985) was a forerunner in offering a critical analytical key to reflect on advertising in the Brazilian social context, from a sociological perspective. During this same period, Brazilian advertising consolidated itself as a relatively autonomous field of activity, while scientific knowledge about it gained in scope, space for discussion and epistemological legitimacy, configuring its own place for problematising the processes of production, circulation, reception and consumption, in macro and micro-structural terms. By recognising advertising as a link between monopoly capitalism and the Cultural Industry, Maria Arminda opened the door to a broader study of this phenomenon in Brazil.

Her analysis was continued in the book Mercado Brasileiro de Televisão, by César Bolaño (1988), which, in turn, starts with the Cultural Industry in general, from which the functions it fulfils in capitalism are particularised, including advertising. Based on this work, the Political Economy of Communication is presented as the subfield in which advertising is analysed in a more comprehensive sense. The origins of these two fields of study also have in common the influence of the work of the so-called Unicamp School, especially the work of João Manuel Cardoso de Mello on late capitalism. It is important to emphasise that Arminda's work, like Bolaño's, does not derive its dialectical approach from a mere application of the models proposed by Marx or the classics of the Frankfurt School. The critical perspective adopted stems above all from a detailed observation of the object itself in its national configuration, in direct dialogue with authors who have previously produced arguments on the issue. Looking, for example, at the work of Maria da Conceição Tavares, both highlight the wage conditions of the Brazilian working class in order to analyse the particularities of advertising and the Cultural Industry in the national context. In this way, it is possible to identify that dialectics as a method of analysis and exposition arises not from an external application, but from an evaluation of the national configuration of its object, which continues to be valid as an approach premise.
In the last two decades, various theoretical contributions, originating in the scientific field of advertising itself and beyond, have contributed to the critical approach to the specificities and transformations of the advertising phenomenon. For example, the work by Maria Eduarda da Mota Rocha (2010) dedicated to studying the new rhetoric of capital advances Maria Arminda's original propositions for the historical period in which neoliberalism is presented as the dominant model of regulation. On the other hand, the EPC has continued to expand on the more general aspects, for example by pointing to advertising as the fundamental organising dynamic of digital platforms, although there are few works that look specifically at advertising from this perspective.
What can be drawn from the above is that there are various connections between the strands that derive from Maria Arminda's work, which this dossier aims to put into dialogue. Beyond these perspectives, the Dossier proposes a space for reflection on critical studies of advertising today. Taking the publication of A embalagem do Sistema as a milestone, it encourages researchers to present theoretical approaches, empirical observations and epistemological discussions that thematise critical strands of studies on Advertising in Brazil.
With the publication of the dossier, we intend to contribute to deepening the debate on the intricate links between the advertising system and burning issues in society, such as productive restructuring, platformisation, data protection, the rise of the far right, combating (or endorsing) discrimination based on gender, race, class, generation and other social markers; exploring the theme of diversity, among other topics that highlight the relationship between advertising and contemporary social formations. We also welcome reflections on the work of Arruda (1985) and other classics whose recovery can support the understanding of Advertising in the current context. The dossier will be coordinated by professors Glícia Maria Pontes Bezerra (UFC) and Laura Wottrich (UFSM/UFRGS). Texts must be submitted by 31 July 2025.

The thematic axes indicated for publication in the dossier are:
Historical perspectives on a critical approach to advertising;
Latin American theoretical perspectives critical of advertising;
Brazilian theoretical perspectives critical of advertising;
Economic transformations in the advertising sector;
Transformations in capitalism and advertising;
Advertising and its relationship with platformisation and artificial intelligence;
Advertising and its relationship with democratic regimes;
Advertising and its relationship with the social dimensions of experience (gender, race, class, generation, geolocation, etc.)
Critical empirical perspectives on the practices of production, circulation, consumption, use and reception of advertising.