LANGUAGE MEANS REALISING PRAGMATIC FUNCTION OF ADVERTISING TEXTS
Anna Kubrak
NTUU “KPI”
Contemporary mass communication, high technological advances as well as
widening of international contacts
prompt the necessity to perform the research in the field of advertising at the
interdisciplinary level and expand the frame of the advertising texts analysis
with the purpose of better
and deeper interpretation of their pragmatic potential.
From the point of
view of pragmatics, advertising is considered as the market instrument used to
influence the behavior of consumers at the point of purchase. Besides, being an
indispensable present-day communicating element, the advertising functions as a
powerful subliminal message through which consumers’ opinions are manipulated
in favor of particular products. In order to realize the mentioned pragmatic
function, an advertisement should immediately attract the buyers’ attention,
keep their interest and arise desire as well as stimulate their confidence and
demand towards a purchasing action [1, p. 236]. Therefore, the advertising text
incorporates the features of different styles and is characterized by a
specific interrelation between various language means of all levels: phonetic,
morphological, lexical, syntactical as well as the use of stylistics figures.
As a result of the undertaken analysis of the specific features of advertising
texts, we can systematize the language means realizing their pragmatic
potential as follows.
In terms of
lexical units advertising texts tend to use qualitative and quantitative
adjectives with positive connotations, which make the advertised idea sound
vivid (e.g.: bright, large, light,
sensitive), concrete (e.g.: juice,
spicy, glossy, delicious), (e.g.: safe,
good, extra, hi-tech), unreserved (best,
perfect, glamorous, splendid, unforgettable, luxurious, fantastic, magnum)
and the like. These adjectives are aimed at helping the addressee visualize the
advertised images and assess their qualities. Another lexical feature of
advertising texts is use of the so-called words-stereotypes [2, p. 143], i.e.
regularly repeated lexical units with a high informative degree, representing a
certain concept. Among such frequently used words-stereotypes there are verbs
(e.g.: buy, try, ask, get, see, call,
feel, taste, watch, smell, find, listen, drive, let, look, drink, do, discover,
start, enjoy) and nouns (e.g.: world,
freedom, safety, life, magic, style). The choice of words-stereotypes
depends on qualities of the advertised goods which are to be noted.
On the
morphological level the advertising texts are distinguished by word-building
means that make them sound expressive. Such a power is typical of an
adjective-building suffix –y that
adds specific coloring to the words, e.g.: juicy,
spicy, crispy, chunky, etc. It should also be noted that positive qualities
of the advertised products are emphasized with the help of prefixes, like extra-, super-, ultra-, micro-, hypo-,
etc., which denote extremely high or low degree of quality, denoted by
adjective or noun stem.
Grammatical means
realizing the advertising texts are characterized, in the first place, by their
elliptical structures that make the text sound rather enigmatic, e.g.: Our best just got better; A better deal: And it’s more than skin-deep,
etc. Besides, the majority of advertisements are composed of imperative
sentences like buy this, discover that,
try some today, don‘t forget, treat yourself are rather extended. For
example: Share the excitement (Nissan
Motor Company Ltd). Manage your risk (Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company). Another feature is that such texts lack long and
complex sentences and are rich in comparisons, aphorisms and proverbs, e.g.: The Nova from Vauxhall. Once driven, forever
smitten. We have also found out that very often nominative sentences
consisting of a noun, a prepositional noun-phrase, or an adverb are employed in
advertising texts, e.g.: “Bounty” – the
taste of paradise. Such sentences due to their grammatical independence
create a special pragmatic effect of picturing the situation I which the
positive qualities of a product are described to the advantage. Sometimes they
are used to increase the dynamism of narration and to acquaint the listener
with the place or origin of a certain commodity. Through the analysis of
advertising texts we can also observe that a pragmatic effect is achieved when
these texts are realized in the form of direct speech or dialogue, imitating
natural conversations.
The most typical
feature of advertising texts is the extensive usage of figurative expressions,
e.g. Taste the sunshine in K-Y peaches;
Oven Crunchies from Ross – the name that
stands out in a freezer; But Carvers have a Power-Pack. And it’s power that
packs a punch, etc. It should be mentioned that advertising texts are
abundant in image-bearing metaphors which appeal to the addressees’ imagination
and give them the possibility to interpret the text creatively. The pragmatic
function of the advertising text is also realized by a number of other
stylistic means, ranging from simile, pun and synonymy to rhetorical questions.
A remarkable
feature about advertising texts is that they are permeated with strong sound
effects, such as rhythm, alliteration, assonance and rhyme, especially in
slogans. Euphony, for instance, is one of the most frequently used phonetic
stylistic devices that makes the utterance sound harmonious, providing
concordance of sound ad meaning in the advertising text. The analysis of texts
also shows that a vivid effect is achieved with the help of alliteration, i.e.
a deliberate reiteration of the same or acoustically similar sounds and sound
combinations, e.g.: Sea, sun, sand,
seclusion – and Spain!
The undertaken
analysis proves that the pragmatic function of advertising texts is realized
through a specific combination of a variety of language means of different
levels, the most typical of which are lexical (qualitative and quantitative
adjectives, adverbs of degree, abbreviations, borrowed words, colloquialisms,
etc.), morphological (special word-building means and the stylistic usage of
notional words), syntactical (ellipsis, parenthesis, imperative and
interrogative sentences), stylistic (metaphors, similes, epithets, pun,
personification, etc.) and phonetic (onomatopoeia, assonance, alliteration,
sound symbolism, euphony).
References
1. Kotler Ph. The basics of marketing. -
Ì.: Wiley, 2003. – 224 p.
2.
Nazajkin A. The practice
of advertisement text. - Ì.: Berator-Press, 2003. - 310 p.