The Use Of Metaphors In Advertising

Abstract

The study investigated the use of metaphors in food and drinks advertising slogans. These metaphors were analyzed using the conceptual metaphor theory which was developed by researchers in the field of cognitive linguistics. The advertising slogans of food and drinks were sampled from a total of fifty slogans collected from watching mainstream television channels namely Citizen, KTN and NTV; billboards within Nairobi county, online adverts and products in Naivas shelves. Of the fifty slogans sampled, twenty-three were selected and conceptual metaphors in them analyzed. Advertisers use manipulative language and this contributed largely to the choice of this study. The aim of the study was to find out which linguistic properties are found in the advertising slogans of food and drinks. These features were analyzed at the graphological, phonological, lexical, morphological, syntactic and semantic levels. The study also aimed to identify the types of metaphors found in the slogans. The structural, ontological and creative metaphors realized through a case of metonymy were identified and analyzed. The choice of a particular source domain for a particular target domain was also established. The study found out that either the food or drink was the source domain since these were the focus of the study. However, the different target domains were established. FEELING and LIFE were the most exploited target domains since the advertiser wants to make the consumers believe that their products will make them feel better and that their lives will change for the better. Personification also made an important part of the metaphors. The study established that the products were personified so that the consumer could feel that intimate relationship with the product. This analysis was guided by the main tenet of the conceptual metaphor theory which is the mapping from source domain onto the target domain. The analogies from the source domain aids in the understanding of the target domain. Finally, the four chapters gave detailed accounts into solving the statement of the problem by analyzing the metaphorical slogans using the conceptual metaphor theory and most importantly, the effect such usage has on cognition. It was established that consumers perceive certain things about advertised products from their claim despite the fact that these things are often not true of the product themselves. As a result, they ignorantly purchase the products expecting the perceived outcome.