The Language Features of Advertisements
Chapter I Introduction
1.1Significance of Research
Advertising is something that we are exposed to. It is also something that is likely to affect most of us in a number of different spheres of our lives. Advertising takes many forms, but in most of them language is of crucial importance. The wording of advertisements is, in most cases, carefully crafted to meet particular ends. Sometimes it is intended to inform, but more often, and more importantly, to persuade and influence. Advertising, moreover, not only influences any human society in which it is widespread but also reflects certain aspects of that society?s values and that society?s structure.
1.2 Organization of the Paper
This thesis consists of 5 chapters. Chapter 1 is the introduction of the thesis. Chapter 2 sets out to explain what advertisement is. In Chapter 3, the author explains Necessity of advertisements In Chapter 4, the author does an analysis in Culture differences in advertisements. Chapter 5 the author makes a survey about Analyses of advertisements
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Chapter 2 What is advertisement
At first sight, this question might seem a bit superfluous. After all, advertisements are with us all the time: whenever we open a newspaper or a magazine, turn on the TV, or look at the hoardings in
tube stations or on buildings, we are confronted with advertisements. Most of these will be of the type which Leech describes as …commercial consumer advertising?. This is indeed the most frequent type, the type on which most money and skill is spent, and the type which affects us most deeply.
In the first place it is possible to distinguish between non-commercial and commercial advertisements. As examples of non-commercial advertising, one may mention communication from government agencies to citizens like the British metrication campaign, or appeals from various associations and societies, whether their purposes are charity or political propaganda.
Commercial advertising covers first the so-called prestige or good-will advertising, where firms advertise not a commodity or a service, but rather a name or an image. This type of advertising aims at creating long-term goodwill with the public rather than at an immediate increase in sales. Examples are particularly frequent in the business pages of the Sunday papers where large firms often publish extracts of their reports and accounts. Since shareholders will receive this information by post anyway, the only purpose of these advertisements must be to remind people of the existence of the firm and to leave a generally favourable impression. In some cases prestige advertising contains a more or less explicit element of political propaganda. Consider the following extract from a two-page advertisement for Exxon(in Europe: Esso) which appeared in the American Ms Magazine in September 1976:
Who?s really qualified to tackle America?s energy needs?
Experienced companies who can take the technology they?ve
developed in one area and make it work in another.
Exxon has been doing it – for years.
In addition to boosting the prestige of the particular firm behind the advert, this advert is intended to make the public adopt the same attitude as the industry towards what is regarded as undue government interference.
The second type of commercial advertising is known as Industrial or trade advertising. Here a firm advertises its products or services to other firms. Industrial advertising is most likely to be found in specialized trade journals or, again, in the business pages of newspapers. This type of advertising differs from both prestige advertising and consumer advertising in that it can be regarded as communication between equals, that is, both the advertiser and the prospective reader have a special interest in and a particular knowledge about the product or service advertised. For this reason Industrial advertising typically lays greater emphasis on factual information than prestige and consumer advertising, and inversely, less emphasis on the persuasive elements.
Harris and Seldon define advertising as a public notice …designed to spread information with a view to promoting the sales of marketable goods and services?. This definition will be seen to cover both Industrial advertising and commercial consumer advertising, where the advertiser is a firm appealing to individual private consumers rather than to other firms. The two participants in the communication situation
英语本科生学士学位毕业论文：(广告英语的特征)(中英)
