Haroldo Capote Filho new PhD in Communication Sciences

The doctoral exams in Communication Sciences by Haroldo Silva Capote Filho were held on December 5 (10:00 a.m.), in the ICS (Social Sciences Institute) Sala de Atos of the University of Minho, in Braga. The thesis is supervised by Moisés de Lemos Martins and Ana Melo (both from University of Minho), and is entitled  “Argumentation, symbolic violence and meaning: the emerging Brazilian audience and the advertising discourse between the leap and the ritualized act”.

According to the new PhD, this study investigates the Brazilian advertisement speech from 2004 to 2014, questioning the attempts to reach the emerging middle class: “A social group anxious to buy new products, but with strong primary social values, which makes their behavior unpredictable before the extreme happiness offered by the traditional adds”.

For Haroldo Capote Filho, this problematic establishes three main hypotheses to achieve a dialogue and definition of a communication agreement: the act that tends to mimic efficient speeches to the traditional components of the Brazilian middle class; a redirection that aims for an innovation, without losing the main speech, breaking stereotypes or yet, causing a rupture, characterized by a leap that builds a new reference, based in a new sociocultural spectrum and in line with the new audience”. The advertising speech registers “an intention that seeks to reduce boundaries, and yet fixates distances in the same social environment”.

The panel of examiners was chaired by the ICS president, Helena Sousa, representing UMinho’s dean, and will be composed of the following members:

– Paulo Serra, Full Professor at Beira Interior University (Faculty of Arts and Letters)

– Moisés de Lemos Martins, Full Professor at UMinho’s Communication Sciences Department (Institute of Social Sciences) and CECS Director

– Helena Pires, Lecturer at UMinho’s Communication Sciences Department (Institute of Social Sciences) and investigator at CECS;

– Sara Balonas, Lecturer at UMinho’s Communication Sciences Department (Institute of Social Sciences) and investigator at CECS;

– Rui Alexandre Grácio, specialist in the PhD Thesis theme, PHD in Communication Sciences at UMinho

–  Rcardo Ferreira de Freitas, Senior Lecturer at UNiversity of Rio de Janeiro State-Brasil (Faculty of Communication)

Texto: Vítor de Sousa

Fotos: Marta Barbosa