Semiotic Analysis of a Website
The Dumbest Generation

The Dumbest Generation: How The Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans And Jeopardizes Our Future * (*Or, Don’t Trust Anyone Under 30) is a book written by Emory University professor, Mark Bauerlein (Bauerlein, M, 2007). The youth of today mainly reads on the Internet, and are used to skimming through the pages. They only focus on key words and bullet points and easily get distracted by links popping up on the site. Bauerlein argues that kids also transfer that way of reading (or skimming) to books. In his opinion kids only use the Internet for pop-culture and for gossiping with friends. (Drutman, L., 2008) They suffer from a loss of knowledge and do not know the history and politics they are supposed to know. In a nutshell Bauerlein claims that the digital age has made kids stupid.

The Web site supporting the book is www.thegreatesgeneration.com. It is designed to make a broader audience aware of it. Like all other commercials (if you want to call it that) it is built up of various signs and codes so that it can reach out to its potential customer – or consumers. To understand the Site – and how it works – better, it can be wise to take use of semiotic analysis.

To analyze the site, it is easiest dividing it into three parts, or divisions. The header – at the top left, the menu- below the header, and then the main division, on the right side of the menu, carrying the main content. If we start by looking at the Welcome page- in the main division, we can separate it into three parts. At the bottom you will find the Web page’s main picture – the cover of the book. The background is colored white, and the main-title The dumbest Generation is written in big upper-case letters. The words The and Generation is colored black, while the word Dumbest has slightly bigger letters and is colored red. Placed between Generation and Dumbest there are three robots raising the American flag towards the left. Under the Generation more typing appears in lower-case lettering: How The Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future*. This writing is colored red. Below this, at the bottom of the cover, a label which represents the alternative title appears. When it comes to the design – the entire site bases itself on the cover of the book, especially when it comes to the colors. The text is mainly red and black, and just as the cover it has a clear white background.

If we move onto the connotation-side of the site, we can start with the title of the book. The title of the book is, as previously mentioned, The Dumbest Generation. This title is probably a play on the well know term, invented by the journalist Tom Brokaw (CNN, 1999), The Greatest Generation – referring to the generation growing up during the great depression, later fighting in the Second World War. The reference to war goes even deeper with the image of the robots raising the American Flag. Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima is a famous historic photograph taken by Joe Rosenthal and shows four American Soldiers – the greatest generation – raising the American flag (Bradley, J.H., 2009). At Iwo Jima the soldiers also raised the flag towards the right, while on the book cover the robots raise it towards the left. This may of course be of strictly design purposes, but maybe it is an image of the youth generation heading in the wrong direction. The previous signs of hope is now replaced and shown in a negative light. The robots, a metonymy for the generation of today, also holds a resemblance to the action figures, Transformers – alien robots. And if you look even deeper into pop-culture references, you will find that one of the tag lines for these toys is robots in disguise (Articlesbase, 2007). Is that what the youth of today are?

Below the main title you can find the alternative title Or Don’t Trust Anyone Under 30. Again we can find references to historic events. Don’t trust anyone over 30 was a well know slogan during the 60’s amongst the so called hippies (Stone, S.). The text is written on a label, an alternate version of the Parental advisory warning labels which you can find on audio and video recordings in the U.S. It is supposed to warn parents that the content may not be suitable for children. This is in the same way a warning angled towards the parents: don’t trust anyone under 30.

The text is mainly black apart from the word Dumbest which is colored red to draw attention to itself. The color red bears a number of different meanings, but in this case it is fair to assume that it first and foremost is used a signifier to a warning, but also aggression and perhaps energy.

If we move up to the animated text – part two of the main content. The text sort of drops in from nowhere and it contains a description of what the book is about. It switches between four different paragraphs and changes quickly. You really have to skim through it to understand what it is saying. Whether this is intentional or not, is hard to say. It could be in connection with one of the themes from the book that the youth generation of today cannot concentrate or read properly. Placed over this you will see yet another heading, a sub-heading, written in a grey bluish color 50 Million Minds Diverted, Distracted, Devoured. It is a simple sentence describing the book. The sentence is written in alliteration Million Minds and Diverted, Distracted and Devoured starts with the same letters. Again it emphasizes the message of the book, youths of today equals no good.

The menu placed at the left margin, contains eight links written in a light grey color – similar to the sub-heading. It is very subtle and does not steal much attention from the other elements. The links show the ways to various information about the book; reviews, articles, etc. They show that the book has been talked about and this may pique the interest of the visitor. In the menu you can also click on the home page, this is a page similar to the Welcome page, only this contains a bit more text and smaller pictures. This is probably again – to repeat what the book is about.

The target audience of the site is probably the same as the ones for the book. The simple design and use of pop-culture (the label and the transformers) and strong colors is exactly what Bauerline argued that the kids only paid attention to. The pop-culture references reaches out to the kids, while the historic references, reaches out to those over 30 – you can assume that that is the intention considering what Bauerlein states in the book.

To sum things up, the site is designed in the same simple style as the cover of the book. It is created to work as an advertisement on its behalf, and to emphasize the message of the book: Don’t Trust Anyone Under 30.

(Words: 1201)

Articlesbase, 2007, More Than Meets The Eye: The Future of Transformers. http://www.articlesbase.com/art-and-entertainment-articles/more-than-meets-the-eye-the-future-of-transformers-201297.html

Bauerlein, M, 2007. http://www.dumbestgeneration.com/welcome.html

Bauerlein, M, 2007. http://www.dumbestgeneration.com/home.html

Bauerlein, M, 2007. http://www.dumbestgeneration.com/about.html

Bauerlein, M, 2008. http://chronicle.com/free/v55/i04/04b01001.htm

Bauerlein, M, 2007. http://www.dumbestgeneration.com/media.html

Bradley, J.H., 2009. http://www.iwojima.com/raising/raisingb.htm

Chandler, D., 2007. Semiotics: The Basics.

Chandler, D., 2009. http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/sem02.html

Chandler, D., 2009. http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/sem06.html

CNN, 1999. http://edition.cnn.com/books/news/9901/20/tom.brokaw/

Drutman, L., 2008. http://www.latimes.com/features/books/la-et-book5-2008jul05,0,3980465.story

Stone. S, Hippy Glossary. http://www.hipplanet.com/books/atoz/glossary.htm