Stereotypes in Advertising: Breaking Down Domtar’s Ad – ES

Eugene Song

Prof. Mary Beth Kilkelly

COMD 3504, Summer 2025

June 16, 2025

Stereotypes in Advertising: Breaking Down Domtar’s Ad

I came across this old Domtar ad the other day. At first, it just looks simple and positive, an Asian kid smiling and holding up a test paper with an A+ on it. The background is a classroom chalkboard, and everything feels pretty clean and straightforward. It seems like the ad is just about school success and maybe promoting the idea that paper helps with learning.

But the more I looked at it, the more I started to question what’s really being shown. Why this specific image? Why this kid? The combination of the A+, the kid’s confident expression, and the fact that he’s Asian gives off a subtle message. It starts to feel like the ad is reinforcing a stereotype: that Asian kids are naturally good at school, especially in subjects like math or science.

According to Roland Barthes’ semiotic theory, images send messages in layers. There’s the literal meaning (denotation), and then the deeper, cultural meaning (connotation).

Non-coded iconic message: A student with a great grade, looking proud. No special knowledge is needed to interpret this.

Coded iconic message: The child is Asian. That’s not just a coincidence—it reinforces the “model minority” stereotype that Asian students are always successful, disciplined, and high-achieving.

This isn’t just about one ad. Dana Berry (2021) points out that Asian Americans are often shown in advertisements as academic overachievers. This isn’t a neutral pattern; it can create pressure and unrealistic expectations.

Some people might say, “But it’s a positive stereotype.” Still, it’s a stereotype. Sociologists Espenshade and Radford (2009) found that Asian students often need significantly higher SAT scores than their peers to get into elite colleges.

In 2025, a student named Stanley Zhong had a 4.42 GPA, a 1590 SAT score, and even a job offer from Google, yet he was rejected by 16 top colleges. His family believes racial bias played a role (New York Post, 2025). Many Asian families value education and set high expectations, but when that hard work is reduced to a racial trait, it creates a harmful narrative. It makes individuals feel like they are only being seen through a stereotype.

Following theories from Barthes, Saussure, and Peirce:

• The signifier is the image (the child, the A+ paper).
• The signified is the cultural idea that Asian students are naturally high achievers.
• It functions as an icon (realistic photo), an index (the A+ indicates success), and a symbol (connecting school success to the product).

This ad example contributes to the idea that these stereotypes are normal or even expected. According to Stuart Hall’s theory of encoding/decoding, people might interpret this ad in different ways—some might see it as a positive message about education, others might feel uncomfortable with how it flattens a diverse group into one narrow role.

At the end of the day, it’s not just about selling paper. It’s about the kind of story the ad tells: that Asian students are always smart, always achieving, always fitting one mold. That’s not only untrue—it can also be damaging. Real people are more than a stereotype, and advertisements need to reflect that.

Works Cited
Barthes, Roland. Image, Music, Text. Hill and Wang, 1977.
Bouissac, Paul. Saussure: A Guide for the Perplexed. Bloomsbury, 2010.
Hall, Sean. This Means This, This Means That. Laurence King, 2012.
Hall, Stuart. “Encoding/Decoding.” In Culture, Media, Language. Routledge, 1980.
Norman, Don. Emotional Design. Basic Books, 2007.
Berry, Dana. The Portrayal of Asian Americans in Advertisements from 2011 to 2020. University of Alabama, 2021. https://ir-api.ua.edu/api/core/bitstreams/f602d725-b4ef-4dfa-a744-369e28b3ad17/content

Espenshade, Thomas J., and Alexandria Walton Radford. No Longer Separate, Not Yet Equal. Princeton University Press, 2009. https://www.nacua.org/docs/default-source/jcul-articles/jcul-articles/volume37/37_jcul_425.pdf

New York Post. “Whiz kid offered Google job out of high school but got rejected by 16 colleges — now he’s suing for discrimination.” 2025. https://nypost.com/2025/03/03/us-news/stanley-zhong-had-a-4-4-gpa-but-got-rejected-by-16-colleges-now-hes-suing
Pinterest. “This Picture Shows an Example of Asian Stereotype in Media.” https://www.pinterest.com/pin/491525746803001602

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