Copywriting is the art of producing words that sell, not just themselves, but something else. How is it different from translating, editing, rewriting, journalism, or writing non-fiction or fiction? What are its varieties? Where do the ideas come from? And why are copywriters sometimes paid more for a few lines of copy than a translator or editor for a book-length manuscript?

SWET’s September speaker, John McCreery, doesn’t know all the answers. He has, however, spent thirteen years as a copywriter and creative director for Hakuhodo Incorporated, Japan’s second largest advertising agency. He has written print ads and TV commercials, flyers, brochures, and sales manuals. As a lecturer in the Graduate Program in Comparative Culture at Sophia University, he teaches seminars on “Marketing in Japan” and “The Making and Meaning of Advertising” that are informed by his being both an anthropologist and an ad man. This September 30, he will share with us the lessons he has learned from this experience. Definitely not all the answers. But a good many useful hints.