Home and the family in Mulino Bianco advertising: Forty years of (gendered) Italian social history, translated for the consumer market

Ira Torresi, University of Bologna at Forlì

Abstract: It can be argued that advertising modifies certain cultural traits to its own purposes and then puts them in circulation again, 'selling' them along with the products it promotes. In this light, advertising can be seen as a form of intersemiotic translation in itself, even when it circulates within one single language and culture. After setting the theoretical background for these considerations, the paper applies such theory to the depiction of 'home' and 'the family' in Mulino Bianco’s advertising campaigns from the 1970s to 2011.