Controversies in Contemporary Advertising

By Kim Sheehan
2004: Sage Publications
ISBN: 1572309261

Assistant Professor Kim Sheehan is a prolific
researcher who has recently published on topics such as direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical advertising and e-marketing. In Controversies in Contemporary Advertising, her research converges with her years of experience at major advertising agencies in Boston, Chicago, and St. Louis to explore the role of advertising in society. As her students already know, Sheehan is adept at making sense of a number of complex issues. In writing the book, she says she learned “[t]hat advertising is a business of choices—part of my job as an educator is to help students learn how to make good choices for themselves, their clients, their agencies, and for society.”

Is this your first book?

First single-authored. I was one of four co-authors on Using Qualitative Research in Advertising.

Why did you write it?

There is a lot written about the negative effects of advertising and little providing any sort of balanced discussion on why advertisers do what they do. The book provides a broader context for advertising criticism than is currently provided in much of the literature. It looks at issues such as stereotyping, advertising of controversial products and advertising-media outlet interactions using a range of perspectives to help students learn how to effectively analyze and consider current debates regarding advertising.

What did you learn while writing it?

That advertising is a business of choices, and part of my job as an educator is to help students learn how to make good choices for themselves, their clients, their agencies and society.

Are you using it as a textbook?

Yes. Other schools that have adopted it are Southern Illinois University and Murray State University, and sections are used at Michigan State and UConn. It just came out in October, so I anticipate—hope, pray—that more schools will adopt it in fall term.

What are you working on now?

One of the chapters in the book deals with Direct to consumer prescription drug advertising. I've just finished a study examining this type of advertising in the US and New Zealand, and will be looking at how DTC advertisers use the web to provide information to and collect information from consumers.