Nghiên cứu về việc sử dụng phép lặp trong quảng cáo tiếng anh trên báo và tạp chí

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY,HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION *************** GRADUATION THESIS A STUDY ON THE USE OF REPETITION IN ENGLISH PRINT ADVERTISEMENTS IN NEWSPAPERS AND MAGAZINES Supervisor: NGUYEN THI MAI HUU (M.A) Student’s name: BUI HANH MAI Class: QH 2009 Hanoi, May 2013 ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH *************** KHÓA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ VIỆC SỬ DỤNG PHÉP LẶP TRONG QUẢNG CÁO TIẾNG ANH TRÊN BÁO VÀ TẠP CHÍ Giáo viên hướng dẫn: Sinh viên: HẠ H H A HỮ A Khóa: QH 2009 HÀ NỘI – HÁ Ă 2013 (M.A) ACCEPTANCE PAGE I hereby state that I: Bui Hanh Mai – QH2009.F.1.E1, being a candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts (TEFL) accept the requirements of the College relating to the retention and use of Bachelor’s Graduation Paper deposited in the library In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan or reproduction of the paper Signature Hanoi, April 25 th 2013 i ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The researcher wish to show the gratefulness to all people who encouraged and gave me one hand during the time this research was conducted First and foremost, I am thankful to Ms Nguyen Mai Huu, my supervisor, for her great support Her useful instruction was a great guideline; her valuable advice helped me to overcome the difficulties and confusion when carrying out this study and I attributed my significant improvement in our research to her contributive comments Secondly, I would like to express my deep gratitude to my beloved family for their encouragement and sympathy when I was frustrated or when the research took too much time for our family from me Owing to their support, I became more confident of myself to work harder and finish the research successfully Last but not least, I would like to thank my friends who helped me to collect data from foreign sources Without their cooperation, this research can never be completed Besides, I also would like to thank two dear friends of mine, Hong Anh and Kim Anh for their priceless support and sympathy throughout the time of doing the thesis ii ABSTRACT The principal objective of this research is to figure out the typical types of repetition and their frequency in English print advertisements in newspapers and magazines The research method involved observation of document Thirty-five English print advertisements were collected based on a set of four criteria The data analysis procedure led the researcher to three main kinds of repetition which were repetition of sounds, words and structures; and eight subtypes including rhyme, chime, assonance and alliteration, anaphora, epistrophe, epanalepsis, anadiplosis and parison Among these types, word repetition was reported to be applied the most in the sampled ads, however, when coming to a more detailed classification, anaphora became the most popular repetition pattern Although the research was conducted seriously and carefully, limitations were inevitable Because of the limitation in data sources, the researcher could not carry out the study in a larger scale Due to the small number of samples, generalization was far from being achieved Besides, the study only focused on the English print advertisements in newspapers and magazines, therefore, the researcher would like to call for further research in this issue with more types of advertising being investigated iii TABLE OF CONTENT ACCEPTANCE PAGE i ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ii ABSTRACT iii LIST OF TABLE, FIGURES AND ABBREVIATIONS vi PART A: INTRODUCTION .1 Title of the paper .1 Statement of the problem and rationale for the study Aims and objectives of the study Significance of the study Scope of the study .4 Methods of the study .4 6.1 Data collection instrument .4 6.2 Data collection procedure .4 6.3 Data analysis method Organization of the study PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: REVIEW OF LITERATURE .6 1.1 Overview of advertising and newspaper advertisement .6 1.2 Overview of Repetition (Rhetorical device) 13 CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 18 2.1 Research design 18 2.2 Setting of the study 18 2.3 Participants 19 2.4 Data collecting instruments 20 2.5 Data analysis procedure 22 CHAPTER 3: FINDING AND DISCUSSION 23 3.1 An overview of the study 23 iv 3.2 The use of repetition in English print ads in newspapers and magazines 24 3.3 The effectiveness of the studied English print advertisements in newspapers and magazines reflected through the application of repetition (rhetorical device) 28 PART C: CONCLUSION 33 Summary of the study 33 Limitations of the study 34 Suggestions for further studies 35 REFERENCE 36 APPENDIX 39 v LIST OF TABLE, FIGURES AND ABBREVIATIONS No Tables / Figures Page Table 1: Advertising Classification – Arens et.al (1994) 14 Table 2: Advertising Classification – Le (2012) 15 Table 3: The classification of repetition patterns by McQuarrie and Mick (1996) 21 Table 4: List of newspapers and magazines 27 Table 5: The code of repetition patterns 28 Table 6: Number of ads containing repetition 29 Table 7: The examples of each repetition pattern 31 Table 8: The frequency of use of each type of repetition in English print ads in newspapers and magazines 33 Figure 1: The percentage of ads containing repetition (rhetorical device) 30 10 Figure 2: The frequency of each repetition's occurrence in English print ads in newspapers and magazines 32 11 Figure 3: The frequency of use of each type of repetition in English print ads in newspapers and magazines 233 Abbreviations ads: advertisements vi PART A: INTRODUCTION The first part – Introduction- states the problem and the rationale of the study, together with the aims, significance, methods, scope and organization of the whole paper More importantly, in this chapter, the research questions which serve as the guidelines of the whole study are also identified Title of the paper A study on the use of repetition in English print advertisements in newspapers and magazines Statement of the problem and rationale for the study In a successful business, advertising always plays an essential and important role Every year, billions of dollars are spent on advertising campaigns in order to promote products and services and the budget for this field of business is more and more increasing Along with the development of technology, a lot of media are employed in advertising industry; some typical ones are TV, radio, the Internet, newspaper and magazine Of all these media, newspaper and magazine still remain as the vital media although they are usually considered as traditional ways of advertising The role of newspaper and magazine is even more clearly recognized in Vietnam where high technology devices such as TV or the Internet not present in some rural areas of the country; and newspaper seems to be the most popular source of information Even in the urban sites where people have more chances to access the information, newspaper and especially magazine still remain their attraction Moreover, as English is becoming an international language, English ads are preferable even in Vietnam The reason is that since 2007 when Vietnam joined WTO, a lot of Vietnamese companies have desired to join the worldwide trading market, so that English should be considered as an effective tool Although the global financial crisis happened years ago, in 2007, it has had big influences on economy in not only the world but also Vietnam As a result, every company’s expenditure should be carefully controlled, including advertising budget In other words, the effectiveness of advertisements is drawing more and more attention from both advertisement producers and company managers In fact, a lot of researches have been conducted to figure out the best way to enhance the effectiveness of ads in which many factors have been mentioned such as visual aids, media, strategy, etc However, not many studies have been conducted about linguistic features, or more specifically repetition as a rhetorical device that can have huge influence on the success of an advertisement Considering all of the aforementioned reasons, the researcher has made a decision on conducting the study of the use of repetition in English print advertisements in newspapers and magazines with the hope of gaining knowledge of repetition, its classification a well as its effects on the success of English print ads in newspapers and magazines Aims and objectives of the study This study aims at figuring out the types of repetition that are used in English newspaper advertisements as well as their effects on those studied advertisements in terms of linguistic features To be more specific, it particularly answers the three questions below: 3.1 What are the typical types of repetition used in the studied English print advertisements in newspaper and magazine? 3.2 What are the frequency of repetition types in the studied English print advertisements in newspaper and magazine? 3.3 How is the effectiveness of the studied English print advertisements in newspaper and magazine reflected through the application of repetition (rhetorical device)? Figure 2: The frequency of each repetition's occurrence in English print ads in newspapers and magazines The overview of the repetition in the 35 sampled ads reveals that: there is a preference in using word repetition and a lower frequency of the other two types which are sound and structure repetition There are totally 38 repetition items identified in the sampled ads of which 21 are word repetition, accounting for the largest proportion of approximately 48% It is followed by repetition of structures with the occurrence of 13 times, covering 29.55% In the final position is repetition of sounds which has a count of 10, equivalent to 22.73% In order to provide more detailed view into the frequency distribution of eight subtypes of repetition which are rhyme, chime, assonance & alliteration, anaphora, epistrophe, epanalepsis, anadiplosis and parison, the research result is demonstrated by the following table and chart Levels Sound Types of Repetition Code % Rhyme R1 11.36 % Chime R2 6.82 % Assonance & Alliteration R3 4.55 % Anaphora R4 20.45 % Epistrophe R5 13.64 % Epanalepsis R6 4.55 % Anadiplosis R7 9.09% Parison R8 13 29.55 % 44 100% Word Structure No Total 26 Table 8: The frequency of use of each type of repetition in English print ads in newspapers and magazines The frequency of use of each type of repetition in English print ads in newspapers and magazines 11.36% 6.82% 29.55% 4.55% R1 R2 R3 20.45% 9.09% R4 R5 R6 13.64% R7 R8 4.55% Figure 3: The frequency of use of each type of repetition in English print ads in newspapers and magazines According to the pie chart, the largest proportion or frequency belongs to parison (R8) which is nearly 30% of the total; meanwhile the repetition types occurring the least among 31 ads are assonance & alliteration (R3) and epanalepsis (R6), making up the same rate at 4.55% In the second position is anaphora (R4) which is employed by out of 31 ads, accounting for 20.45% Having applied in ads, epistrophe’s frequency (R5), which is 13.64%, is far smaller compared to R4 Being a bit slower are rhyme (R1) and anadiplosis (R7), taking possession of the proportion at 11.36% and 9.09%, respectively Standing in the 7th position is chime (R2) with the frequency of nearly 7% In conclusion, at the levels of sound, word and structure, the word repetition comprised the highest rate of repetition occurrence in all collected English print ads in newspapers and magazines However, having a deeper 27 insight into the classification of repetition, parison (R8) and anaphora (R4) appeared to be the most typical types that were employed in the studied ads 3.3 The effectiveness of the studied English print advertisements in newspapers and magazines reflected through the application of repetition (rhetorical device) According to Consterdine (n.d.), in order to access the effectiveness of an advertisement whether it is in newspapers, magazines or any other media, it is necessary to set objectives in advance against which achievements can be compared As mentioned in the literature review, a successful advertisement needs to be able to draw people’s attention, sustain their interest, stimulate their desires and evoke them to purchase the promoted products or services In other words, these criteria can be regarded as attention, readability, memorability and selling power In this study, it is possible to rely on these objectives as well as the findings of the study to evaluate the effectiveness of those English print ads in newspapers and magazines reflected through the application of each type of repetition (rhetorical device) 3.3.1 Repetition of sounds Regarding sound repetition, all three types including rhyme, chime and assonance and alliteration appeared in the sampled print ads Firstly, among three mentioned types, rhyme, which means repeating syllables at the end of the words, gained the highest frequency of occurrence (11.36%) Employing rhyme could make language so smooth that the ads might draw more attention of the readers towards the messages as well as increasing the readability The effect of rhyme could be obviously realized through the typical examples in A19 and A20 (A5) Yummy in your Tummy! In this example, the repetition of the sound /ʌmi/ [ummy] at the end of the word “yummy” and “tummy” often reminded readers about the deliciousness of the 28 teddy bear bread (the promoted product) So they were able to remember not only about the product but also its quality (A20) Your brain isn’t freezing, it’s rebooting In the advertisements of Mocha Frappé Coffee of McCafé, the sound /iƞ/ [ing] was repeated, so that the message could be remember more easily due to the smoothness of the language In terms of the other types of chime and assonance and alliteration, they either create similar effects on advertising language as rhyme The following examples can provide more detailed explanations (A30) Gucci Guilty pour Homme A30 used chime as a tool to gain the fluency of the sentence, making it much easier to retain not only the brand name but also the name of the targeted product (A2) Kids Grow With Cheerios (A31) Every bit, in our kit, is made to fit Both A2 and A31 employed the pattern of assonance and alliteration with repeated sounds such as /əʊ/ [o] in “grow” and “cheerios” or /it/ [it] in “bit”, “kit” and “fit” It could be seen that they were all the key words that contained the main message of the product In A2, Nestle would like to emphasize that the snack Cheerios containing a lot of nutrients was good for kid’s growth A31 was an advertisement of steam traction toys and it was advertised that every pieces in the toy collection had its own function in creating the whole collection of steam tractions It can be concluded that repetition of sounds was applied in these English print ads in newspapers and magazines with the major aims of improving readability and memorability Or in other words, according to AIDA the ory, its functions are to draw people’s attention and sustain their interests 29 3.3.2 Repetition of words According to McQuarrie and Mick (1996), the study examined four subtypes of word repetition including anaphora, epistrophe, epanalepsis and anadiplosis It was figured out that word repetition was the most common type of repetition appearing in the sampled ads Anaphora (repetition of words at the beginning of the phrase) ranked in the 1st position among four mentioned types in term of the frequency of occurrence Some noticeable examples of anaphora are presented below (A12) Good Food, Good Life Today, when people are caring more and more about the quality of food and drinks as well as their food choice to protect and improve their health, consumers’ attention could be easily caught by the repetition of the word “good” in A12 They might be impressed and the message retained in their minds was that Nestlé’s products often had good quality which was consequently good for their life Therefore, when facing a food choice, they might be more likely to choose a product from Nestlé The advertisement below A15 also employed the repetition of words “have” with the aim of reminding people to enjoy KitKat during their break, especially students or young people Whenever they heard “have a break”, they might immediately refer it to “have a KitKat” (A15) Have a break, have a KITKAT As a result, it is obvious that anaphora can help to draw people’s attention as well as increase the selling power The second type is epistrophe, which means repetition of words at the end of the phrase As analyzed in the study, this kind was used less than anaphora but more than the other types namely epanalepsis and anadiplosis (A1) Other bikes talk tough We guarantee tough In the example above, the advertiser repeated the word “tough” twice so as to indicate a feature of the promoted bike which was so strong to help people deal with 30 difficult conditions The special feature might play important role in consumer’s decision of purchasing the bike The next pattern is epanalepsis, which was not popular in the chosen ads The key words are repeated at not only the beginning but also the end of the phrase to draw people’s attention, create stronger impression, thus may lead to the decision of purchasing the promoted product or service (A34) Smart phone smarts A34 employed the repetition of the term “smart” at both the beginning and the end of the phrase “Smart” contains several meanings such as intelligent, quick, fashionable, etc Therefore, the advertiser would like to emphasize that this kind of phone is really “smart” as its name, suitable with “smart” people, hence convincing people to choose it due to its up-to-date trend, convenience and multifunction Finally, in term of anadiplosis, A8 and A35 are significant (A8) Kids built Lego Lego built kids The word “Lego” occurred at the end of the first sentence and the beginning of the second sentence It was obvious that the repetition pattern help readers retain the name of the products in their mind for a longer time (A35) For a better start, start COLA earlier! A35 also repeated the word “start” in the same positions as A8 The repetition patterns could make the speech smoother and more fluent as well as increase the recall of the targeted message In short, the repetition of words brings a great number of benefits to the success of the promoted product or service Its effects include not only consumers’ attention attraction but also the readability enhancement and the increase in the selling power 31 3.3.3 Repetition of structures First of all, at the levels of sound, word and structure, repetition of structures occupied nearly 30%, the largest proportion of the frequency of occurrence In the ads containing structure repetition or more specifically, parison, similar structures of sentences or phrases are repeated many times to make the speech much smoother and fluent, catch readers’ attention and increase the recall ability as well as the selling power The following examples will provide more detailed evidences (A5) It’s not what people see, it’s what they don’t see (A11) The future’s bright, the future’s Orange It can be seen that in both A5 and A11, the two sentences followed the same structure, just some of the words changed and it was the different words which made the message of the ads For example, in A5, Tide, a famous brand of detergent, would like to indicate the effectiveness of its new detergent that it could bring the true cleanliness that normal people could not see A11 was an advertisement of Orange – a UK mobile network operator By employing parison, the message was that Orange was a modern and fashion mobile network and people should join the network as Orange seemed to be an unavoidable trend in the future 32 PART C: CONCLUSION In spite of the wide application of repetition (rhetorical device) in most of advertising languages, its patterns have hardly been defined thoroughly This research performs as a fairly comprehensive study of repetition patterns as well as their effects on those English print ads in newspapers and magazines to some extents In the previous chapters, the general introduction, theoretical background, research methods and results of the study were presented fully This final part, serving as the conclusion part of the whole research will firstly review some noticeable findings Then some limitations of the study will be pointed out, leading to the suggestions for further researches Summary of the study On the whole, the study has investigated the use of repetition in English print advertisements in newspapers and magazines as well as their possible effects on the success of those ads Firstly, the study has indicated that 31 out of 35 sampled ads which covered nearly 90%, made use of repetition – an effective tool in advertising language It can be concluded that repetition is one of the most popular rhetorical devices in English print advertisements in newspapers and magazines Secondly, in terms of the frequency of each repetition type at the levels of sound, word and structure, it was revealed that the repetition of words got 33 the highest rate of occurrence while the two remaining ones were at the similar rates In addition, when considering the eight subtypes of repetition, parison, which belongs to structure repetition, was reported to be applied the most, accounting for approximately 30% Meanwhile, anaphora – a subtype of word repetition – comprised a much lower rate at 20.45% As a result, based on the frequency of repetition types, it is possible to make conclusion that among 35 studied ads, word repetition is preferred, however, more specifically, the typical types of repetition that were employed in those ads are parison and anaphora Finally, regarding the effectiveness of those English print ads in newspapers and magazines reflected through each type of repetition, it was very hard for the researcher to evaluate thoroughly as it depended on not only a single rhetorical device employed in the advertising language but also a lot of other factors to measure the success of an advertisement Based on the theoretical background, some possible effects were pointed out such as enhancing attention, memorability and selling power Limitations of the study In spite of the researcher’ efforts as well as the great support from the supervisor, there still remained several shortcomings in the research due to the constraints of time and resources and the researcher’s limited experiences Firstly, due to the limitation of data sources, the number of participants was relatively small in which only 35 English print ads were sampled from newspapers and magazines This rather small number could not best and exactly represent the whole English print ads in newspapers and magazines in not only Vietnam but also all over the world Therefore, the findings of the study may be affected Secondly, since there are a lot of products and services that are promoted every day while the sampled ads just focused on popular brands, consequently, it could be very difficult for the researcher to make 34 generalization about the effectiveness of the English print ads in newspapers and magazines as reflected through the use of repetition Finally, in order to have a clear and exact evaluation of the effectiveness of the application of repetition in English print ads in newspapers and magazines, the findings that were analyzed and discussed in the study may not be persuasive enough More opinions, knowledge as well as related figures from professional advertising experts should be involved to increase the reliability and creditability of the study In conclusion, it is obvious that shortcomings are unavoidable in every research However, it is expected that these limitations listed above will be worth considering by other researchers who share similar interest in studying about the employment of rhetorical devices in general and repetition in particular in advertising language Suggestions for further studies As mentioned in the review of literature, there have been so few studies on the application of repetition (rhetorical device) in advertising language so far, especially in Vietnam As a result, it offers other researchers large room to carry out further studies on similar topics Firstly, due to the restricted number of samples, it is recommended that further investigation into the issue could be conducted within larger population or different groups of samples For examples, it can be changed into Vietnamese print ads in Vietnamese, thus, there will be a good comparison of the use of repetition in print ads among different languages In other cases, it can be conducted on ads by other media such as the Internet, radio or television; therefore, there will be more references for advertising agencies to choose a suitable media of advertising basing on different objectives and features 35 Furthermore, with the aims of increasing the validity and reliability of the study, future researchers may need more evidence to confirm the effectiveness of repetition (rhetorical device) in English print ads in newspapers and magazines by carrying out more thorough experiments on the targeted subjects as well as refer to many more opinions and professional knowledge of advertising experts Finally, the review of literature in chapter has confirmed the importance of not only repetition but also rhetorical devices in creating successful ads, other researchers may shift the focus of the study to the application of other rhetorical devices in advertising, hence providing broader view of how to make best use of these effective advertising tools REFERENCE Arens, W F., &Bovee, C L (1994).Contemporary advertising (10th ed.) McGraw-Hill Education Ad age advertising century: Timeline (1999, March 29) Retrieved from http://adage.com/article/special-report-the-advertising-century/ad-ageadvertising-century-timeline/143661/ Barbara, J P., & Edward, F M (2002) The development, change, and transformation of rhetorical style in magazine advertisements 1954-1999 Journal of Advertising, 31(4), 1-13 Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/236500676?accountid=39811 Consterdine, G (n.d.) Magazine advertising effectiveness Manuscript submitted for publication, Consterdine, G (2005) How magazine advertising word (5th ed.) Lamb, C W., Hair, J F., & McDaniel, C (2009).Essentials of Marketing (6th ed.) South-Western Cengate Learning 36 Le, T A (2012) A study on the use of repetition (rhetorical device) in Vietnamese tv commercials Markey, A & Gass, S.M (2005) Second language research: Methodology and Design London: Laurence Erlbaum Associates McQuarrie, E F., & Mick, D G (1996) Figures of rhetoric in advertising language The Journal of Consumer Research, 22(4), 424-438 Mulken, M V (2003) Analyzing rhetorical devices in print advertisements In Document Design (4 ed., Vol 2, pp 114-128) John Benjamin Publishing Company Patton, M (2002) Qualitative research & evaluation methods The United States of America: Sage Publications Tom, G., & Eves, A (1999) The use of rhetorical devices in advertising Journal of Advertising Research, 39-43 Tran, T A (2012) A comparative study on Vietnamese and English advertisements Vu, T H (2008) Effectiveness of television commercials in Vietnam a glance at tv advertising on VTV3 Vasiloaia, M (2002) Linguistic features of the language of advertising George Bacovia University, Bacau, Romania Zikmund, W G., & D'Amico, M (1999) Marketing (6th ed.) Cincinati, Ohio: South-Western College Publisher 37 38 APPENDIX 39 40 ... NỘI ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH *************** KHÓA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ VIỆC SỬ DỤNG PHÉP LẶP TRONG QUẢNG CÁO TIẾNG ANH TRÊN BÁO VÀ TẠP CHÍ Giáo viên hướng dẫn: Sinh viên:... can never be completed Besides, I also would like to thank two dear friends of mine, Hong Anh and Kim Anh for their priceless support and sympathy throughout the time of doing the thesis ii ABSTRACT... HẠ H H A HỮ A Khóa: QH 2009 HÀ NỘI – HÁ Ă 2013 (M.A) ACCEPTANCE PAGE I hereby state that I: Bui Hanh Mai – QH2009.F.1.E1, being a candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts (TEFL) accept the