Linguistic and Cultural Insights in Advertising

Abstract

12-Spanish class repeats as a knowing smile is exchanged with teacher during a substitution exercise. We-and books from which we teach-play games with beginning language students, and they know it. No native speaker would think of using such a nonsensical sentence, nor will student ever return to it again. Why are students subjected to such uninteresting and indeed absurd sentences? The answer is that rules of teaching game require a careful selection of foreign-language structures that meet student's linguistic needs at his particular stage of learning. But what kind of Spanish is the car is not in house now? Is it some kind of drill Spanish? Whatever it may be, student is fully aware that it is not real Spanish, and this is precisely why he is never convinced that he really knows Spanish-or any other foreign language-until he can read a newspaper or magazine without such customary props as footnotes, vocabulary and abridgments. Even though his teacher may speak language like a native, he judges his own proficiency by his spontaneous performance in language. And have you ever noticed excitement generated by visit of a native speaker to a language class? Perhaps these are only times when students feel freed from classroom games. The problem for teacher, then, is how to rely less on contrived material, yet stay within beginner's limited knowledge of vocabulary and structure. This challenge is not easily met; every time we play games with students we confess our failure to meet it. I should like to propose one source of authentic material that is usable at any stage of language learning: advertisements in foreign language publications. For several years I have used Spanish and French advertising as a source of linguistic and cultural material for high-school as well as college students. After an introductory lesson, in which I analyze some ads, students are anxious to buy periodicals and bring them to class for this purpose. It may sound curious to buy a magazine for its advertising, but my experience has convinced me that even if student reads