The Features of English Advertisement Language

1、the features of english advertisement language摘 要随着我国进入wto，对外经济交往迅速加深与扩大，英语广告已逐渐发展成为企业促进出口销售，开拓海外市场的一个主要手段。如何恰如其分地运用和理解英语广告语言以实现广告的目的，已是摆在进出口商广告人员及广大消费者面前的一个现实问题。如果广告的写作者只是简单的把国内成功的广告翻译成英文，往往不会成功。广告英语作为一种应用语言，因其所具有的特殊效用，已逐渐从普通英语中独立出来而发展成非规范化的专用语言，用词造句与普通英语也有着许多差异，并随着广告的发展，科技的进步及社会的变更而变化。本文旨在通过对英语广告的

2、语言分析总结出广告英语在词汇句法修辞上的语言特点。本文的结论均来自于对大量广告实例的分析。本文着重从广告英语的词法（选择常用词、模拟生造词、运用动感词和复合词）、修辞（比喻、拟人、对偶、排比、押韵）等方面来探讨广告英语的语言特点。关键词：英语广告；广告；词法；修辞 abstractwith the rapid development of world economy, advertising, as a primary component of a marketing mix and the free enterprise system, is showing its enthusiastic

3、 energy and its persuading power. every producer and entrepreneur wants to fully take advantage of this powerful means to publicize and eventually sell his or her products. as a result, it has penetrated into many aspects of our lives and influenced the speed of economic development and everyone liv

4、ing and working in this society. along with chinas entry into the wto and more businesses going international, english advertisement has gradually become a major tool for enterprises to promote exportations and to develop foreign markets. how to properly understand and utilize english advertising la

5、nguage in order to realize the goal of advertising has become a practical challenge for importing and exporting merchants, advertising personnel and all the consumers. this dissertation mainly focuses on the features of english advertising language. with the analysis, the author hopes that readers c

6、an have a general understanding of the significance of the words used in english advertisement, sentence structure and rhetoric characteristics of it.keywords：english advertisement；advertisement；syntactic； rhetoriccontents中文摘要abstract1 introduction.1 1.1 definitionof advertisement.1 1.2 advertising

7、elements.1 1.2.1 headline.2 1.2.2 body copy.3 1.2.3 slogan.3 1.3 functions of an advertisements.4 1.4 classification of advertisements.4 1.4.1 consumer advertisements.5 1.4.2 business advertisements.6 1.4.3 service advertisements.8 1.4.4 public interest advertisements.82 features of advertisements.

8、.9 2.1 english morphology in advertisement.9 2.1.1 simplicity and informal form.9 2.1.2 variation and creationary.10 2.1.3 foreign words.11 2.1.4 abbreviation.11 2.1.5 use of words.11 2.2 syntactical features.13 2.2.1 more simple sentences and less complex sentences.14 2.2.2 more interrogative sente

9、nces and imperative sentences.14 2.2.3 disjunctive clause.14 2.2.4 rhetorical devices in english advertising.143 conclusion.16bibliography.17acknowledgements.181 an introduction to advertisement 1.1 definition of advertisement american marketing association (ama) defines advertisement as “the non-pe

10、rsonal communication of information usually paid for and usually persuasive in nature about products, services or ideas by identified sponsors through the various media.” at the present time, with the rapid development of the technology and the diversity of the mass media, advertisement has influenc

11、ed us pervasively in our routine. however, whatever the promotive strategies advertisement takes, language is always the main carrier of message, as the language of advertising （ vestergaard & schroder，1999：1） says, “advertising takes many forms, but in most of them language is of crucial importance

12、.” the purpose of advertisement is to make people aware of products, service and ideas, and to promote sales and profits. what is more, advertisement is one of the major forces that are helping improve the standard of living around the world. combined with all these communicational, marketing and so

13、cial functions, advertisement becomes indispensable in the modern world.1.2advertising elements a complete written advertisement (newspaper, magazine) is usually composed of headline, body copy, slogan, illustrations and colors, trademark, and brand name. these elements are named as visual elements.

14、 another kind of elementsaudio elements are advertising commentary, advertising music and advertising sounds. in these elements, headline, body copy and slogan are the most important elements in an advertisement. 1.2.1 headline headline is the theme and center of an advertisement. its usually in the

15、 most conspicuous position of an advertisement and to attract the consumers attention. therefore, headline is crucial to a successful advertisement. but what kind of headline is a good headline? there are seven principles for headline writing:(1). know clearly the customers appetite, and make them f

16、eel it will be useful for them. when people are reading advertisement, they always wish to find something good to them. so to give the reader a feeling of getting benefits will have the best result in advertisement. example 1 every time we race, you win. this is an advertisement for yamaha electroni

17、c organ. it tells the consumer that every price war in the industry will benefit the consumers out of question. (2). try to introduce new ideas and things.(3). try to include the name of trademark in the headline precisely and clearly.(4). use words that could arouse customers interest.(5). keep mod

18、erate length. a research by institute of the retailer business researching of new york shows that headlines that have more than 10 words usually have better effect than short headlines. the most effective headlines have 6 to 12 words. (6). avoid the use of vague words.(7). avoid the use of privative

19、 words. there are many ways to write a headline, and 2 types often appear in written advertisement:(1) straight forward headlines this kind of headlines usually uses interrogative sentences and imperative sentences to arouse consumers interest.example 2 ever wander why most guys in pants ads are sta

20、nding up? example 3 discover the wonder of your first dash wash!(2). news headlinespursuing new things is the nature of human beings. people are always interested in finding some new products or improvement of old products. therefore, news headlines could attract consumers attention better. example

21、4 introducing renunt freshell, the new wave in air fresheners.1.2.2 body copy after attracted their attention to the advertisement by headline, the readers will go on the body copy, which is the main part of advertisement information, to find something useful. whether an advertisement has met the co

22、nsumers requirements, satisfied their desire, and stimulated them to take action are the factors to judge a good advertisement. there are 6 kinds of body copy writing: (1). straight-line copy this kind of body copy is to objectively state the features and advantages of the product.(2). question copy

23、 question copy is to use a serious of questions in the beginning of the advertisement, and then give positive answers to each question. moreover, all of these answers are just the advantages of the product.(3). narrative copy this body copy is to introduce a product by telling a story, which will ob

24、viously increase the interest and attraction of the advertisement.(4). extend knowledge copy this form of advertisement is to state the scientific knowledge that is correlative to the information of the product. the consumer will feel the product is creditable and advanced.(5). testimonial copy test

25、imonial copy is to make up a speaker, or take out a real witness to judge and praise the product.(6). similar copy similar copy is to compare the product with other brand of product, which will make the strength of the product more prominent.1.2.3. slogan slogan, which is also known as taglines, sha

26、res some similarities with headline, because some slogans come from successful headlines. the features of slogan is explicit, refined and inflammatory . the principles of slogan writing are:(1). to be briefthe slogan of an advertisement should brief normanlly no more than 10 words.(2). point out the

27、 advantages and arouse the customers interest.(3). to be inflammatory.the slogan should be inflammatory to make the customers take action. 1.3. functions of an advertisement what kind of advertisement is successful? and what features a successful advertisement should possess? american marketing mana

28、gers handbook points out that an advertisement should have four functions: aida, which represent four wordsattention, interest, desire, action. (1). attentiona good advertisement should attract the consumer to direct their attention to the product of it.(2). interestthe introduction and publicity of

29、 an advertisement should arouse consumers great interest.(3). desirethe publicity of advertising should stimulate consumers desire to buy the product, and make them realize that this product is just what they want.(4). actionthe advertising makes consumer to response to the advertising information a

30、nd evoke them to take the action of purchasing.1.4 classification of advertisements by using the above principles and forms of writing advertisement, we could easily find a way, which we believe is the best one, to write an advertisement. the headline may be attractive, the body copy may be persuasi

31、ve, and the slogan may be memorable. all the details are perfect in linguistic direction. however, the result may not be well pleasing. but why? one answer is that we may have forgotten which kind of target audience we are pleasing, or what kind of product we are selling. the process of finding a pr

32、oper position for advertisements is classification. we must analyze the features of different kinds of advertisements, in order to find a proper position for our own advertisement, and choose methods fit it best. the advertisements can be classified into four groups by factors as target audience, fu

33、nctions, and product types. the four groups are consumer advertising, business advertising, service advertising, and public interest advertising. there will be 20 advertisements chosen at random from newspapers, magazines, and other advertising books, for each group to help the analyses.1.4.1consume

34、r advertisements most television, radio, newspaper and magazine ads are consumer advertisements. they are sponsored by the manufacturer of the product or the dealer who sells the product. they are usually directed at the ultimate consumer of the product or at the person who will buy the product for

35、someone elses use. for example, a magazine advertisement for coca-cola may be aimed at both the purchaser and the consumer. a commercial for dog food on television, however, is aimed at the purchaser, not the consumer, of the product. the consumer advertisement includes alcoholic ads, cigarette ads,

36、 drink ads, food ads, wear ads, cosmetic ads, automobile ads, home electric appliance ads, and other products which are used and purchased by ordinary people. to this kind of advertisements, most people have developed a kind of ambivalent psychology. on one hand, they are bored with the endless adve

37、rtisements hiding in the newspapers and magazines, clamoring on the radio, or dazzling on the tv. on the other hand, they still need the information to guide their purchasing. therefore, to attract the consumers attention is the most important task for an advertising copywriter. headline is the firs

38、t, or maybe the only component to the reader, so whether the headline is attractive determine whether the reader will read further or skip to another page. the statistic shows that the average words of 20 consumers advertisement is 10.66, and the most frequently used headline writing ways are emotio

39、nal (30%) and curiosity (30%) headlines. it means that emotional and curiosity ways are more effective and usually used to arouse readers interest. they incline to use comparatively longer headline, whereas only 25% of them include the brand of the products. this point shows that the advertisers are

40、 not hurry to sell their product on appearance (although their purpose is so). they dont want to give the reader an impression that the advertiser attend to sell their product but a feeling that they want to give benefit to the consumer. after the readers have been attracted, how could the body copy

41、 persuade them? the statistic proves that all the writing methods could be the best for a consumer advertisements. the 20 advertisements have used almost all the writing methods, morphology, syntax and rhetorical devices as i have introduced above. the detailed data is that: 35% of those advertiseme

42、nts are straight-line copies, 30% are extend knowledge copies, 25% are testimonial copies, and 5% for both question copy and narrative copy. the most frequently used morphology is compound words, which account for 55% of the 20 ads. the most frequently used rhetorical devices are metaphor and person

43、ification (both are 40%). the statistic shows that copywriters have much more space to express their thoughts in consumer advertising, but their only purpose is to convince consumers to buy their productat any cost. when the consumers have the desire to buy the product, a good slogan to let them rem

44、ember its brand also plays an important role. the average slogan words of the 20 ads are 5.2, and 60% of them include their brand into the slogans. from this point we can understand that striking and deep impression neednt many words. however, many advertisement writers still try to find a room for

45、the brand name in the 5-word-long slogan lest the reader should only remember the slogan and forget the brand.1.4.2 business advertisements business advertisements is often said to be invisible, because unless you are actively involved in some business, you are unlikely to see it. the majority of ad

46、vertising you see as a consumer appears in mass consumer media. business advertising, on the other hand, tends to be concentrated in specialized business publications or a professional journal, in direct-mail pieces mailed to business establishments, or in trade shows held for specific areas of busi

47、ness. until recently, business advertising was rarely seen in the mass media. people in business comprise the target audience for business advertising. there are four distinct types of business advertising: industrial, trade, professional, and agricultural. industrial advertisements is aimed at indi

48、viduals in business who buy or influence that purchase of industrial goods. industrial goods include those products and service that are used in the manufacture of other goods (plants, machinery, equipment, etc.) or become a physical part of another product (raw materials, semi-manufactured goods, c

49、omponents, etc.). industrial goods also include those that are used to conduct business and do not become part of another product, like capital goods (office machines, desks, operating supplies) and business services for which the user contracts. manufacturers use trade advertisingthe advertising of

50、 goods and services to middlemento stimulate wholesalers and retailers to buy goods for resale to their customers. some items advertised to the trade, such as office equipment, store fixtures, or specialized business services, might be bought for use in the middlemans own business. individuals who are normally licensed and operate under a code of ethics or professional set of standardssuch as teachers, accountants, doctors, dentist