Pun in Advertising From the Perspective of Figure-Ground Theory

Li WANG

Abstract


As a flexible rhetorical device, pun is widely adopted by advertisers because of its brevity and novelty. For a long time, scholars have studied pun from different perspectives and focused on translation, pragmatics and aesthetics. This paper will study puns in advertising from the perspective of cognitive linguistics, and further analyze the cognitive mechanism of pun in advertising within the framework of Figure-Ground Theory. Based on the analysis of specific examples, we draw the conclusion that puns in advertisement not only has the features of ambiguity and double context, but conforms to the characteristics of figure and ground. 


Keywords


Pun; Figure-ground theory; Cognitive mechanism; Advertisement

Full Text:

PDF

References


Gan, R. H. (2011). A cognitive-pragmatic analysis of advertising puns. Journal of Language and Literature.

Kuang, F. T., & Wen, X. (2003). Realization of figure-ground. Journal of Foreign Languages.

Li, Z. X. (1992). English in advertising. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.

Lu, Y. (2008). On the cognitive interpretation of advertisement pun. Journal of Hefei University of Technology (Social Sciences).

Redfern, W. D. (1982). Guano of the mind: Puns in advertising. Language and Communication.

Tanaka Keiko. (1992). The pun in advertising: A pragmatic approach. Lingua.

Tian, L. J. (2010). A figure-ground approach to pun. Foreign Language Research.

Van Mulken, M., et al. (2005). Pun, relevance and appreciation in advertisements. Journal of pragmatics.

Yang, Z. L. (2011). A study of puns in english advertisement from the cognitive perspective. Overseas English.

Yao, J. (2004). A cognitive approach to the pun in advertising. Journal of Sichuan International Studies University.

Zhao, Y. (2013). Puns in advertising: A figure-ground perspective. Shenyang Normal University.




DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3968/7477

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Copyright (c) 2015



Reminder

  • How to do online submission to another Journal?
  • If you have already registered in Journal A, then how can you submit another article to Journal B? It takes two steps to make it happen:

Submission Guidelines for Canadian Social Science

We are currently accepting submissions via email only. The registration and online submission functions have been disabled.

Please send your manuscripts to css@cscanada.net,or css@cscanada.org for consideration. We look forward to receiving your work.

 Articles published in Canadian Social Science are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC-BY).

 

Canadian Social Science Editorial Office

Address: 1020 Bouvier Street, Suite 400, Quebec City, Quebec, G2K 0K9, Canada.
Telephone: 1-514-558 6138 
Website: Http://www.cscanada.net; Http://www.cscanada.org 
E-mail:caooc@hotmail.com; office@cscanada.net

Copyright © Canadian Academy of Oriental and Occidental Culture