Fowers Say What? – Ancients and YouTube Revision with Strunk & White and Williams
The Super Bowl is known for many things: great team match-ups, great food, great rivalries, and great commercials. Commercials that are sure to burn up the conversation around the water cooler (or coffee pot) on the Monday morning following. Commercials that are told, re-told, and viewed for endless minutes on YouTube or other websites. Commercials that, according to MSNBC.com’s Bill Ward, cost $3 million for a 30-second spot. However, there is one thing that makes these Super Commercials the same as all the other ones: the use of rhetoric and ancient styles to persuade the general, commercial-watching public into buying their product, item, service, or value statement.
During the 2008 Super Bowl Teleflora showed a commercial that starts out with a woman, Diane, getting a delivery. She is told that they are flowers and her co-workers “ooh” and “aww”. When she opens the box of flowers, we see that they are not bright in color, are somewhat wilted, and appear to be sparse in number. The flowers begin to talk and proceed to say, “Oh no! Look at the mug on you! Diane! You’re a train wreck! That’s why he only sent a box of flowers!” (Teleflora’s Talking Flowers, 2009). The commercial voice-over then says that by ordering flowers in a box, you are taking a chance because “you never know what they’ll say” and the flowers then deliver their final insult, “No one wants to see you naked!” The voiceover tells the audience that, in contrast to boxed flowers, Teleflora’s flowers are designed and delivered by local florists and shows a delivery man delivering a beautiful bouquet of flowers to someone’s home. The voiceover concludes by saying “That’s the Teleflora difference.” (Teleflora’s Talking Flowers, 2009) The commercial cuts back to Diane holding her box of flowers when her co-worker, Gary, starts to say, “I’d like to see you…” Diane cuts him off.
On the surface, and probably to the eyes of the ancients, this commercial violated the basic idea of kairos. In Crowley and Hawhee, Cicero is credited with defining kairos as “what is fitting and agreeable to an occasion or person” (233). One way to look at this meaning is to say that if society at large finds something appropriate, then it is, in fact, appropriate. Like Crowley and Hawhee say, “community standards” (233). Commercials that are generally shown during the Super Bowl usually feature scantily-clad, young, beautiful women shilling beer and a lifestyle. They feature men pummeling each other over candy bars or Doritos. Once upon a time, these images would have offended the viewers just by showing more leg than was deemed appropriate. However, as views on the clothed (and unclothed) human (specifically female) have become more liberal over the decades, our society has become more inured to sex. Sex sells things, and for the general American audience, most commercials probably do not ping many people’s sense of propriety.
However, this commercial violates kairos on a different level. It purports to equate love and affection with a material object: flowers. The insults from the wilted and rude flowers, the image of beautiful, fresh bouquets and the subsequent voiceover lauding the merits of ordering from Teleflora all want to lead the viewer to think that a person sending something from anyone but Teleflora is trying to send a message other than “I wanted to do something nice for you”. Our society, for all of its being open minded about the sexual nature of commercials is still holding on to the idea that equating love with material items is bad.
But even though a sense of kairos is not really being violated in this commercial, it is the use of hyperbole – at best described by Quintillian in Crowley and Hawhee as “an elegant straining of the truth” (258) – that makes it feel as though it should be. It plays upon the worst fears of most people – that the person that they are with finds them ugly, unattractive, and unworthy of receiving “nicer” flowers, bouquets if you will. And not only does this one person think you are hideous, but that person took a poll and discovered that no one on the planet wants to see you in the buff. Typically, flowers (or bouquets) are sent sight unseen. So this exaggerated statement is used to drive home the point that boxed flowers are a bad product and that boxed flowers also make a statement about a person’s physical attractiveness.
Even the use of color and change of tone of the voiceover helps to increase the hyperbole. They took an actress and turned her in to a sad, single woman in her grayish and boring cubicle with her boring and boorish co-workers receiving dying and foul-mouthed flowers. But have no fear! Your life will not be boring, boorish, and gray! Like Dorothy opening the door after the twister, opening your door to a Teleflora man will bring you happiness and color and light! Boxed flowers are sent by men who don’t want to remove your clothes. In fact, that man believes that no one – in the whole of the universe – wants to see you naked.
However, they never introduced the person sending these flowers to Diane. And so, in the absence of a person (252), the flowers became the proxy voice of the person that sent the flowers to Diane and by extension, the company those flowers came from. The flowers, usually inanimate objects, were made to move, talk, and gesture. The flowers were given gruff and almost menacing voices. Their heads and leaves were animated to show strong, negative feelings relating to this person’s feelings about Diane. And they told her directly that because he sent flowers that were packaged in a box, he does not like her at all.
By trying to get the viewers to believe that these other flowers will send the wrong message to their intended recipient, the writers of this commercial also uses metonymy. Crowley and Hawhee define metonymy directly as naming something with a word or phrase that is closely related to it (257). A direct example for this ancient trope is a “man of the cloth” to mean a religious leader. However, this trope can also be used in a metaphorical sense. To say “the pen is mightier than the sword” we say that the written word, meaning communication, is stronger than war or violence. Teleflora uses this metonymy and even metaphor in this commercial. They use the word “flowers” to mean an inadequate gift and, by extension, an inadequate statement of intent or affection. They use the word “bouquet” to mean a superlative gift that perfectly conveys a depth of desire and emotion. By implying that there is a difference between what flowers mean and what bouquet means, they are trying to create a definition in the person’s head by using one as a negative and one as a positive.
Furthermore, the emphasis on the words “boxed” and “flowers” and the tone of voice that the narrator uses shows derision and negativity and is a direct effort to equate boxed with dislike or disgust, or rather to create new epithets. Boxed really has no connotations – positive or negative – but this commercial has not only made it a new four-letter word, but made flowers a dirty word as well.
This is a 30-second spot and the word “flowers” is used five times in the first twenty seconds of the commercial. Repeating the word over and over, and showing various people in the commercial saying “flowers” is very bluntly and adeptly drawing our attention to the fact that this is about flowers. What makes this choice of repetition interesting is that it is used in conjunction with the previously mentioned metonymy. The commercial stops using the word “flowers” once Teleflora has been introduced as the better choice – Teleflora has bouquets that are “hand arranged and hand delivered” (Teleflora’s Talking Flowers, 2009), thereby implying that bouquets done by hand equal not only higher quality, but that bouquets also represent better feelings. Crowley and Hawhee say that repetition is sometimes used when there is a lack of vocabulary (243), but in this instance, that is not the case. Here, “flowers” is used scornfully to really make the point that mere flowers are bad, but bouquets are awesome. Why send horrible flowers when bouquets better show your feelings?
The style of this commercial is exceptionally plain. It has a very bald statement of its purpose which is to convince the viewers that boxed flowers do not send the happy, warm message that flowers typically convey. The commercial places the characters in an office cubical, something that millions of Americans can relate to. The characters themselves do not look like the glamorous Hollywood types so frequently used in Super Bowl commercials. The words that were chosen were plain. No specifically flowery language, if you will excuse the pun. This is simple language, simple people, and simple associations.
There was judicious use of different ancient writing styles in this particular commercial. That alone does not make this commercial special. If the ancient styles and tropes were no longer used then there would not be any more commercials. Or any television. Or any written or spoken words. These tropes and styles have been used by writers and storytellers for so long because they hold up. They help to get the reader or viewer engaged and keep them that way. In the case of this commercial, it worked. Even though it was tasteless and stupid, I kept watching because I simply could not believe that a badly animated flower just said, “No one wants to see you naked.” Sadly, it was no trip to Oz and the flowers really did say that and it is just as idiotic two years later as it was the night I saw it for the first time.
Works Cited
Crowley, Shannon, and Debra Hawhee. Ancient Rhetorics for Contemporary Students. 3rd ed. N.p.: Longman, 2003. 228-63. Web. 3
Oct. 2010.
“Teleflora’s Talking Flowers”. www.teleflora.com. 1 February 2009.
< http://www.teleflora.com/teleflora-super-bowl-flower-commercial.asp
Ward, Bill. “Commercials: From Foul to Fabulous” 2 February 2009. 3 October 2010.
< http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28963887/>.
Shrt Essay Portion:
This paper was a hard one to write, but it was a lot easier to revise. First, I went through and revised it to have it make more sense according to the parameters of the original paper. After that, I went through with Williams and Strunk and White to see what needed to be changed stylistically.
I started broad (the whole paper) and then went into more specifics within paragraphs. The first glaring issue I found was that I was having a hard time following my own points because my paper was not arranged in a way that had my individual points together in the same general area. There was no flow. Chapter three of Williams talks about flow in regards to having a good cohesion in your writing, but it does not really address – at that point anyway – about having good flow between paragraphs. After my introductory paragraph, I talked about kairos and how that related to Super Bowl commercials in general. It was a nice way to set up speaking about kairos and my commercial specifically, but instead I jumped into a description of my commercial. I did not bring kairos back up until five paragraphs later. After revising, I pulled the kairos paragraph from the spot as number two, reinserted it after the description of the commercial. I then moved the paragraph toward the end of the paper to the beginning. I did this to accomplish two things: one, to get all of my points regarding kairos into the same area so the paper wasn’t bouncing all over the place and two, to improve the flow by talking about a larger idea first and then introducing more specific ideas as the paper moved on.
Now that I had my ideas and paragraphs in a sequence that I felt read better, I needed to work on the specific paragraphs. Was I following the issue + discussion = paragraph rule that Williams talked about in chapter five? Sometimes I was, but a lot of the times I was not. Like my paragraphs, I was not “beginning well” (chapter three) and stating my point /issue at the beginning of the sentence and then following it up with supporting detail and discussion. I think the best example of this is where the original fourth paragraph starts with “The insults from the flowers…” I was trying to tie the commercial back to the idea of kairos I started the paper with. However, I failed to get that point across and then I went right into talking about another ancient rhetoric style. To fix that, I changed the opening sentence to “However, this commercial violates kairos on a different level. It purports to equate love and affection with a material object: flowers.” I then shortened the paragraph so that metonymy could stand on its own and not be lumped in with kairos.
This example also shows how I changed the transitions. In the first two drafts, they were non-existent and paragraphs were just ramming into each other without making sense. I took the advice on sequencers from chapter seven of Williams and used it in conjunction with the advice about beginning sentences well.
I also went through and omitted the needless words. I’m a wordy person. I use lots and lots of words when one or two could suffice. Both Strunk and White and Williams talk about concision to both be clear and to not be wordy. As was discussed in the class blog, a lot of my wordiness on an academic level comes from trying to make the word count, plain and simple. The instructor wants to make sure I have enough space so that they can make sure that I comprehend the information, and so, I pad. However, I was fine on the word count so I could really go through and omit things like the word “only” in the sentence “This is only a 30 second commercial.” I was trying to emphasize that the commercial was short, but that can be understood from “30 second”. Later in the same paragraph, I say “Flowers is the word used”. In the new draft, I got rid of “the word”. Anyone reading this is probably able to identify flowers as a word, so I do not need to state the obvious.
Using Strunk and White and Williams to revise this paper was kind of a challenge. I knew why things needed to be changed, but even though I read both books, it was sometimes hard to link my changes back to the suggestions the books give. That may have been the backwards way to do it, but maybe I set myself up for that when I chose the paper that needed the most work to revise. On the other hand, both books also talk about revising and drafting and the importance of doing both numerous times before good clarity and well done style are achieved. So I succeeded on that point, anyway.
