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Dewar's Scotch Whisky

An early cinematic advert

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Description

A short cinematic advertisement for Dewar's Scotch Whisky from original material preserved in Museum of Modern Art, New York. The film shows kilted Scotsmen dancing in front of backdrop bearing wording 'Dewar's Scotch Whisky' beside a table with a bottle of whisky.

Questions & Activities

Questions

  • What is going on?
  • How are they trying to sell the product?
  • What does the clip say about the features and benefits of the product?
  • Does it make you want to buy some?
  • What does the clip say about Scottish national identity in the eyes of the Americans at that time?

Activities

Art and Design: Advertising has moved on since this advert from 1897 and it is easy to laugh at the amateurish nature of this film; however, are the messages really that different from recent Bacardi 'Latin Quarter' adverts. Collect printed adverts and analyse the different messages and contexts that they use to sell to different age groups. How do advertisers persuade their target audiences to consumer their products?

Maths / Health and Wellbeing: Keep a survey of how many alcohol adverts you see in a week, what times they are on and what channels they are on. Transpose these into a spreadsheet and produce a variety of graphs.

English / Citizenship / Heath and Wellbeing / PSE: Debate whether alcohol advertising should be allowed on TV and if in which contexts and at which types of events.

Clip Details

Record Id 007-000-000-359-C
Resource Rights Holder National Library of Scotland
Project Ref 4414
Date 1897
Genre Advert
School Subject Mathematics, Art and Design, Health and Wellbeing, Media Studies, English
Subject Matter Citizenship, Victorians
Who International Film Company (production company)
Where Scotland
Event Party
Attributes Black and White, Silent
Clip Length 0:37
Film Length 00:37