Stylistic devices as means of forming discursive features of advertising minitexts (exemplified by English economic and political media sources)

Abstract

The article is devoted to functional and stylistic features of advertising minitexts in English economic and political mass media and Internet sources. The scientific relevance of the topic is proved by the significant role of advertising in building up not only market relations but also cultural stereotypes and public opinion. Besides, the necessity arises to reveal the human linguistic consciousness potential of integrating different meanings and small forms of their verbalization, as the trend towards contracting speech acts is gaining momentum in both oral and written communication. Hence, advertising texts make a proper object of analysis since the need for quick catching of the customers attention and saving money on publication space determines advertisements small volume. The authors set the purpose of analysing the stylistic features of advertising minitexts in economic and political sources in terms of the formation of their discursive features. Methods of discourse functional analysis, descriptive and contextual analyses are implemented thereto. The article addresses the issue of correlation between text and discourse with regard to the advertising linguistic status, types of advertising texts, extralinguistic factors (including psychographic and demographic profiles of consumers) determining the choice of means that actualise advertising discourse functions. The analysis focuses on the expressive means forming peculiar advertising stylistics and special pragmatic increments aimed at making efficient impacts on the recipient. The findings of the empiric analysis are presented in reference to such expressive means as metaphors, allusions, wordplay, antithesis, etc. The prevalence of metaphors, epithets and hyperbole as the most frequent stylistic devices in advertising discourse has been revealed. The authors conclude that discursive features of the texts under analysis are actualized in pragmasemantic increments which are not inferred from speech elements direct meanings alone but are synergistically formed in advertising functional space in the course of text generation and perception based on the communicating parties living backgrounds.