Inhabitants of the third and fourth worlds -- those places on the planet that have been systematically underdeveloped, thanks to the legacy of colonialism, capitalist imperialism, and now globalization -- do occasionally make an appearance in corporate ads.

Their images rarely appear as the pivot of attention, as the subject of the advertising narrative. When they do occupy the center of attention, it is not only surprising, but perhaps instructive. We have already analyzed one commercial that focuses attention on rural poverty in the Peruvian Andes by shooting the ad in the codes of video realism. More fleeting images of third world youth are actually not that uncommon -- e.g., Cisco, SAP, GE, IBM. Most of these images suggest a hopefulness for their future. Though the poverty of these children may be suggested in muted form in some of the signifiers, these are signifiers that are included to portend future remedies of education, training and western medicines.

The majority of images of third world people in ads are children. This fits nicely with the allusions to future transcendence. But the imagery differs from the gaunt representations that one sees in ads for charities to stave off death and malnutrition among starving children. Whereas portraits of new global elites include children as subjects who motivate the new elite, portraits of the poor actually focus on the children and visually (as well as narratively) marginalize adults to support functions as teachers or nurses.

It is surprising how many realist portraits of children's faces are included in montage ads -- though they are of fleeting duration, more often than not, less than one second on screen, they are there. Children's faces - or rather, pictures of children's faces - command a special place in advertising's hierarchies of significance. Especially in that category of ads we have dubbed legitimation advertising, children's portraiture taps into the value systems of 'family.' Children here represent a nostalgia for a future that will be like an imagined past.

Biotechnology ad (Spring 2001). The ad is sponsored by the Council for Biotechnology Information. Like most other ads of this genre, this piece sutures together a smooth montage of images of people around the world set against a soundtrack of light, airy, optimistic music. Some peoples are more privileged than others in these scenes, even though a strong nod has been given to the importance of representing diversity. For the moment, we want to focus on the concluding image of the montage - a Vietnamese woman holding her child. She stands posed for the camera in a field - behind her are other peasants/field workers. She steps forward, while behind her we can see none of the other faces hidden under the broad-brimmed hats they wear. And they are all gently stooped over at their labor.

But this remains abstract labor - it is the pose of labor rather than the labor itself. This depiction plays on our longstanding stereotypes of Asian peasants bent over in rice fields. Stoop labor meets glamour photography. Indeed, the photographic codes seem to cancel out connotations of either coerced labor or the grinding poverty associated with this kind of labor.

This must be the ideal-typical representation of third world peasantry since precisely the same imagery appears in a scene from Boeing's current ad campaign. Is this the poster-girl of the world poor and their future transcendence within a world of capitalist technologies? (Why the nearly identical pictures - same advertising agency? Image Bank?)

As pictured, the woman appears to possess a quiet dignity, and a confidence that the future is hers. Her position in the montage follows immediately scenes of a young woman (middle class white american) excelling at softball In fact there is no more poverty visible in the Asian agricultural fields than there is in the middle class subur. And neither seems unhealthy. The female voiceover frames the meaning of the suburban scene as an illustration of how biotechnology research has produced discoveries "that are improving lives today, and could improve our world, tomorrow." The latter phrase frames the Asian mother and daughter portrait.