I brain ODTÜ ( + other slogan)

When I came to ODTÜ I felt like in an American Film about students and their life. I met a lot of people who are in a sport team here at ODTÜ and they are very proud of their “Team-Shirts”. I have to admit that I was jealous about these cool ODTÜ shirts. Of course I fall in love with this mainstream “I  _(fill in with, brain, love, smile…)  _(fill in with ODTÜ, Hamburg, NY, London…) ” – slogan.  Even after some discussions with natives about that slogan I still wanted this shirt.  By the way, my Turkish friends told me that they really don’t like this campaign; it doesn’t express the spirit of ODTÜ…

Well, after reading this text I am so peeved at this people who made this spot! They named all the good habits of ODTÜ students  but then they transmit, to my mind (!), that ODTÜ students are better humans and that people who are not graduated (at ODTÜ) are not that successful in their life’s.

“What makes him/her a METU person is the culture of success and "making a difference" that is special to METU.”

“His/Her sphere of responsibility is not limited to his/her immediate environment”

These are just two quotations, which I picked out to show how they discriminate people who chose (or simply had no other chance because of different factors) another way of live/education and are mechanics, nurse, caretaker or whatever!

I’m not angry about the slogan itself but about this spot. The slogan is mainstream, hip and young.

My idea for an ODTÜ shirt/ slogan would be:

Open-mindedness

Devrim

Tolerance

Üniversite

I’m not sure if it is creative enough but the important thing for me is NOT to have a spot like they did. I don’t like the idea of making everybody notice that “ODTÜs are something better”. Actually I don’t think that the first ODTÜ alumni generation wouldn’t be happy when today’s students would think like that.

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Another slogan who is worth to be discussed is:

Mc Donalds -  I'm lovin' it

Mc Donald’s published this slogan in 17 languages and in more than 40 countries. The slogans literal meaning is sometimes a little bit different “I am loving it; I just like (China, Malaysia, Singapore,…); of course I love it (Egypt, Kuwait); It is everything that I love ( France); I love this ( Philippines ); I love all of that (Chile); I love all this a lot (Brazil); This is what I love (Turkey); I like it (Latvia); …” but on the whole it always describes a positive and emotional connection to this fast food restaurant.

We know that language is always changing, even from generation to generation, and that’s why I am scared of this slogan; it uses a word with a strong meaning. What is love? I have a lot of associations when I hear this word but actually no one of them has something to do with food! Is it possible to have such strong feelings for a franchise restaurant? I don’t think so; or at least I don’t hope so. Because of this campaign we can see how the account of the word LOVE has changed. Or did it changed because of the campaign? That is something that we can think about; do slogans modify our understanding of words? If it would work like that, than Mc Donald’s  relativises the meaning of the word LOVE. How does slogans influence on us? Why does everybody enjoy a slogan from a fast food restaurant with this pregnant word?

Finally I still think about if the meaning of the word, love, has changed before the slogan or after? I think especially our generation should think about how to use such pregnant words and if we are ok with it that suddenly people love cheeseburger, fries and milkshakes instead of their grandparents, sisters, brothers, parents and environment.

Well, maybe I am too radical and there is no influence on the meaning of the word but I guess it has changed and I think it is worth to talk about it.