Teaching ex tempore, incorporating current events, finding stories of local interest, and attempting to follow student trends in order to make them part of the course enhance my teaching style but I feel that I can do better. I really want to create lessons that are significant for the class and meet their needs, hopefully engendering the same enthusiasm for marketing and finance that I have. I want to discuss major issues and make students stop to think.
During the spring, I read No Logo by Naomi Klein. I think that it can be a good resource for both high school and post-secondary marketing instructors. To me, the book is meaningful because it advances issues initially raised by legends of the field like Theodore Levitt but illustrates the argument with examples that students can relate to. The publication date on some articles sometimes causes students to tune out so for that reason alone, excerpts from Klein’s exposé are more accessible.
(Obviously, globalization is one of a litany of pertinent issues in the field of marketing.)
In 1972, Al Ries and Jack Trout authored a paper entitled “The Positioning Era Cometh”; in 2000 Klein published her book. Both works – and countless others – describe brand dominance, beginning with the advent of the television age and continuing until today’s age of increased communication and information, and its effects on consumers. Ries and Trout look forward several decades whereas Klein recounts recent marketing history and analyzes what consumers should do next. Levitt’s prescient article about Globalization discusses how global companies will overtake the neighbourhood store and what will happen to local economy, although he is not as austere as Klein.
Once brands overtake products – from shoes and clothes to phones and communication to schools and politicians – and image supersedes quality, modern life bursts at the seams with noise. The public space is imbued with logos, conversation littered with slogans. Sometimes I feel that we don
I don’t think that we ask enough questions. What is the point of education aside from providing a critical framework to analyze the reasoning behind actions? The actual fundamentals of globalization – importing, manufacturing, transporting, storing products – are soon forgotten but the trend affects the lives of students on a daily basis. I want to imbue the marketing course with significance, inspiring inquisitiveness.
It’s like asking a student why they bought a gold-coloured Cavaliers baseball hat: did they buy it because New Era makes the most durable and comfortable hats on the market or because they think LeBron James is cool? Or it may be merely because Chris Brown wore it in a photo posted on TMZ. I don’t care either way but I hope they understand why they made the decision.
If it’s possible to delve that deeply into an subject these days…
I have far fewer answers to my problem than I would like and I hope to gain some insight by reading, studying, and learning from others at an OISE/UT Additional Qualifications course during the month of July.