The Linguistic Characteristics and Translation of Advertising English 语言学特征及广告英语翻译.doc

the linguistic characteristics and translation of advertising english一、 课题(论文)提纲1引言1.1广告的历史1.2 广告的分类1.3 广告的作用1.4 广告的定义2 广告英语的语言特点 2.1词汇特点 2.1.1 广告英语的词汇特点 2.2.2使用大量的动词2.3.3使用大量的形容词以及其比较级和最高级3广告英语的修辞特点3.1 明喻 3.2 暗喻3.3 拟人3.4双关4 广告英语的翻译4.1 直译4.2意译5 结论the linguistic characteristics and translation ofadvertising englishabstract: as a way of propagating and transmitting information, advertising plays a vital role in the development of society and economy. its function can not be underestimated. advertising english is a special applying language when it compares with others such literary and technological languages. it has become indispensable of daily life because of its particular characteristics and charm. along with chinas entry into the wto and more business going international, english advertisement has gradually become a major tool for enterprises to promote exportations and to develop foreign markets. the paper starts with briefly introducing the history, definition, classification and functions of advertising. then it mainly summarizes and analyzes major linguistic characteristics of the advertising english from lexical approach and rhetorical features. in the chapter four i briefly the translation approach. finally, it shows the conclusion that people can understand well if they try to learn and master the features of advertising english. the paper aims to bring some enlightenment to the understanding of advertising language and get a better demand of english.key words: advertising; advertising english; linguistic characteristics; translation内容摘要：作为一种宣传和传播信息模式，广告在社会和经济发展中扮演着重要角色。广告的作用不容忽视。广告英语是一中独具特色的应用性语言。它同文学语言、科技语言等相比有许多不同之处。它独具的特点和魅力已成为人们日常生活中一个不可或缺的组成部分。特别是随着中国加入世贸组织及经济的全球化,广告英语更加重要，成为企业销售和发展外贸的重要工具。本文首先简单的介绍广告的历史、定义、分类和作用。然后归纳和分析广告英语在词汇方面的主要语言特点。然后介绍广告英语的修辞特点，另外简单的叙述了广告英语的翻译方法。最后得出结论：如果我们学习并掌握广告英语的语言特点，就能更好理解和欣赏广告英语。本文旨在为更好理解广告英语，提高英语水平带来一些启迪。1.introductionadvertising, just like its name implies, means publicize and transmit information in order to make everyone know. nowadays advertising has penetrated into every corner of our life as its transmitting media exist in many forms: newspaper, magazine, tv, radio as well as network. in our country the advertising business is now in the ascendant, playing an immeasurable role in promoting sales of commodities and prospering our economy. no other statement could have summed up the charm of advertisement than what aldous huxley has commented. as he has said advertisement as a literary form is the most exciting, the most arduous literary form of all, and the most pregnant in curious possibilities. in his comment he asserted advertisement is a literary form and the copy- writing process is the delightful and salubrious exercise for the mind. but all in all, hat is advertising. and what makes it unique?1.1 history of advertisementadvertisement emerged from the appearance of commodity production and exchange. the condition for the existence of advertising is at least a segment of the population must live above the subsistence level. when this situation occurs, it also becomes necessary for the producers of materially unnecessary goods to do something to make people want to acquire their commodities.advertising was not unknown in ancient greece and rome, but advertising as we recognize it did not start until the seventeenth century in the west. it was at about this time that newspaper began to circulate. before that, it is printing which was first invented in china and then introduced to the west that played a、ital role in the production of print advertising. classified (small ads) types of advertising were dominant before the nineteenth century and the style and language used in ads at that time tended to be direct and informative. the industrial revolution, which began in england in the middle seventeenth century and reached the united states by the early eighteenth century, facilitated mass-production of goods. meanwhile advertising became more and more important in the industrial market. the great breakthrough for advertising came only in the late nineteenth century. technology and mass-production techniques were then sufficiently developed for more firms to be able to turn out products of roughly the same quality and at roughly the same price. this brought on a crisis of over-production and under- consumption which meant that the market needed to be stimulated by advertising. at this time advertising changed its function from proclamation to persuasion. in the twentieth century, advertising developed rapidly alongside the advent of new media-radio and television in succession. today， in china， while our economic structure is shifting from the entirely planned economy to the socialist market economy system, advertising is becoming more and more active and sophisticated. in 1992, chinas advertising expenditure reached$862 million, among the fastest growing countries in asia. with the entry of china into wto，this expenditure figure will undoubtedly rise up， which will support the view that advertising is an indispensable means for providing the information that all market- oriented industrialized societies need for their economies to function efficiently.1.2 classifications of advertising advertising may be classified by medium (newspaper, magazine, radio, television)，by target audience (consumer, industrial, business)，by geography (international, national, regional, local)，or by its function or purpose (product or non-product, commercial or noncommercial, primary demand or selective demand, direct action or indirect action). because it is difficult to gain access to enough data for english commercials and ads on radio or tv thus, the subject of this research paper will mainly concentrate on the print advertising.1.3 roles of advertising an advertisers main purpose is to present and exhibit product or service, and to spread the influence and coverage of which to the extent that the potential purchasing population becomes real and actual. simply put, advertisers try by the various means try their best to get people to buy the product or service advertised. moreover, advertisers want potential purchasers to consider what is advertised to the exclusion of all other similar products or services. they therefore attempt to construct an advertisement that will fully involve the attention of the potential purchaser and which will have a persuasive effect. advertisers thus create a semiotic world in order to persuade their audience to purchase the goods.1.4 definitions of advertisingafter a brief introduction of the classifications and roles of advertising, we now come to the definitions of advertising. from different perspectives or purposes, the definitions might also vary. in english, the word advertise has its origin in advertere in latin, meaning to inform somebody of something, to bring into notice or to catch attention , etc. in chinese, the equivalent term guang-gao(广告) means widely announce. the father of modern advertising, albert lasker said that advertising was salesmanship in prints. although the definition was given long before the advent of radio and television and the nature and scope of advertising at that time were considerably different than they are today. this often-repeated savings indicates that the ultimate objective of advertising is to sell. obviously it is not a working definition. because can not use it to cover all advertisements. today, a widely quoted workings definition of advertising was put forward by courtland l.bovee and vfilliam f. areas: advertising is the non-personal communication of information. usually paid for and usually persuasive in nature, about products (goods or services) or ideas by identified sponsors through various media. another linguist bolen defines advertising as a paid， non-personal communication through various mass media by business firms, nonprofit organizations, and individuals who are in some way identified in the message and who hope to inform or persuade members of a particular audience. if the definitions of advertising were too vague and abstract to comprehend, a few words of its function would help to clarify this crucial term. broadly speaking, advertisements have at least one of two functions: informing or persuading, although overlap may often take place in one single piece. the trick here is that an informative advertisement informs the customer about goods, services, or ideas and then tells how to get them by means of an identified sponsor (bolen 6). examples of informative advertisements are not a few, ranging from flyers to insertions in magazine and newspapers. all of that aim to advertise new products / services or special prices on certain products/services. this type of advertisement gives basic. factual information and sometimes shows a photo or an illustration of the product /service to give the target audience a better view about the advertised product. persuasive advertisements are thus the instruments used by advertisers who have defined their target audiences and determined the effect they hope to achieve through persuasive advertisements in the media (bolen 9). and a persuasive advertisement should persuade the potential customers to buy the new product. the persuasive function is not only limited to attracting the potential customer into buying a certain object, but also including the selling of services, ideas, norms and values. to summarize, we would get the idea that firstly advertising is a communication process. secondly, at least a medium is used. thirdly, this communication process has a definite purpose to convince the target audience. the above three characteristics suggest advertising is closely connected with the society, employing its media. interconnecting with its people and guiding their buying habits, also in achieving the advertising effect. the advertising language should be vivid and attractive, whose linguistic characteristics would be covered in next chapter.2. linguistic features of advertising english a venture at analyzing advertising in the linguistic view is worthwhile, since advertising can be regarded as the construction of semiotic worlds for the rhetorical purpose of persuading the reader to purchase the advertised products or services. its unique features, simple language and immense attraction separate from it other kind of language. in this paper, two main aspects will be illustrated, namely, lexical features and syntactic features. 2.1 lexical approach2.1.1 lexical features as a means to convey the information and make people see and remember it easily, advertising english must be compact, vivid, visual, emotional and attractive. to realize this aim, the choice of words is playing a vital role.the lexical features of language of advertising vary a great deal, sometimes serious but typically all of them aim to help the brand stand out, disarm or distract the consumer and memory. therefore, in terms of lexical features, words or phrases of positive meaning are widely employed to stress the best sides of the product, among which the most noticeable are superlatives, comparatives, coinages, compounds, suffixes personal nouns, etc. the first distinctive features of the advertising english is the use of adjectives, especially those evaluative adjectives with strong positive meanings. according to linguist g.h.leech the most frequently used adjectives are to following :new, crisp, good /better/best, fine, free, fresh, great, delicious, special, rich, easy. in the advertisement for schweppes toilet water, every word appeared is an adjective which makes the advertisement quite noticeable :good，excellent，superior, nice, fine, rare.2.1.2 more verbs in advertising verb is widely used in advertising english, especially monosyllable ones. words such as get, make, give, bring , like ,love, need, use are frequently used, advertising english language needs to be simple ,easy to understand, easy to remember and easy to read. monosyllable verb boasts all these features. in daily life, monosyllable verb is the one that people most often used and also the one usually has most definite meaning. however, advertisers should pay attention to the grammatical changes of these basic verbs and know the differences between them. most of the words can show the relation between the consumers and the product. following i will show some examples for a better understanding.moisture wear make-up . it gives life to the look of your skin. this sentence comes from cover girl, an american cosmetic brand. it is the leading color make-ups in america, which was created by dr.george and a.bunting, a creative enterprise, in 1961. it is now very popular all cover the world. here the verb “give” is used.give life to the look and feel of your skinis pretty attractive to females. good-looking and young skin is always the things that female pursue,givethem that sure will make the product end up with big sale.we bring high technology home. -necsimilarly, from this sentence, we learn that it is simple and easy to understand. the semantic is right and flexible. there is a great deal of other instances that wonderfully used verbs in advertising english, it is a functional way to use more proper verbs.2.1.3 more adjectives and its comparative and superlative in advertising the purpose of advertising is to publicize products. so it is indispensable to describe many aspects of the product such as size, color, nature, and quality. during this process, adjective plays a vital role. advertisers want to attract the consumers; they must make the advertisement imaginable, vivid and hold special appeals. in this case, many modifiers must be put in. in advertising, some adjectives are frequently chosen like good, young, special, fresh, great and so on. besides, the comparative and superlative degrees of adjective are often used as well. it always brings amazing result. now let us see an instance as following:famous world-wide gourmet cuisine. excellent daily specials and mouthwatering desserts.this is an advertisement in restaurant. in the ad, the advertiser uses several adjectives, which make the food more attractive. and you will enjoy the delicious gourmet.along the way, you will enjoy the warmest, most personal service.from this sentence, we can understand the speaker is very considerate and enthusiastic. so, naturally, the relation between the speaker and the people are closing. 3. the rhetorical characteristics as we all known, rhetoric was used usually. the main rhetoric is simile, metaphor, repetition, personification, hyperbole, pun, contrast and so on. in this paper, i will give a brief introduction for simile, metaphor, personification and pun.3.1 simile in advertising in order to describe the products vividly and attractively, people always make a contrast between the two things that have the same characteristics. this trope called simile. in the simile, the ontology and the metaphor used to connect with as, like and other preposition. english advertising writer just takes advantage of this rhetoric meaning to facilitate the consumer to have a clear and specific understanding of the products, familiar with the brand and win consumers acceptance, trust and favor. for example:cool as a mountain stream cool as fresh consulate.两凉如高山溪水，爽如consulate香烟。consulate is a name brand cigarette made in america. one of its characteristics is menthol added to cigarette. you are given a cool and refreshing feeling when you are smoking. this company uses two similes in the sales advertising. therefore, the smokers, especially those chain-smokers, smoking cigarettes just like the heat of summer in the mountain forests of exposure to, the valley beside the stream, feeling cool, relaxed and happy, parched feeling disappeared. faced with such “an irrepressible temptation”, can the smokers refrain from it? another example:light as the breeze, soft as the clouds.轻如拂面之微风，软如天上之浮云。this is a clothing advertising title to describe a garment material, light as a breeze, soft as a cloud, consumers could naturally think of the easy and comfortable feeling for the clothing made with this fabric when they read the title , then imagine the elegant visualize when they wearing the clothes. as a consumer, they will have consumer psychology for an eager to try the clothes.3.2 metaphor in advertisingaccording to the features between the two things, or an inherent connection to the name of a thing used in the name of the other things, the speaker do not have to direct the indication but the reader to understand its meaning by himself, called metaphor. generally, metaphor is implicit but very easy to understand. similar with simile, it also can make people have a wonderful imagine. such as:you are better off under the umbrella. 有伞的保护，你就不怕风雨this is an advertising used by travel insurance company. as we all known, safety is the most important thing in travel. this company makes use of the tourists general mind. using the metaphor, umbrella, vividly make the visitors feel: to buy insurance, go to a long journey, like exposure to an umbrella. you can be freely to enjoy the fun of trip. moreover, better off have a meaning of more relaxed, much happier. that is to say, buying this insurance can make your travel more comfortable, more enjoyable. the ad title was very short, but the proper selection of the metaphor makes the visitors feel more friendly and faithfully to the companys insurance.3.3 personification in advertising personification is another rhetorical approach, which makes lifeless things to be living things and gives