University of Louisville ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository Electronic Theses and Dissertations 12-2010 The content and critical metaphor analysis of illustrated print advertisements in China. Chun Jiang University of Louisville Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.library.louisville.edu/etd Recommended Citation Jiang, Chun, "The content and critical metaphor analysis of illustrated print advertisements in China." (2010). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. Paper 688. https://doi.org/10.18297/etd/688 This Doctoral Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. This title appears here courtesy of the author, who has retained all other copyrights. 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THE CONTENT AND CRITICAL METAPHOR ANALYSIS OF ILLUSTRATED PRINT ADVERTISEMENTS IN CHINA By Jiang, Chun B.A., University ofInternational Business and Economics, 1985 M.A., Korea Development Institute, 2001 A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Louisville in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Humanities University of Louisville Louisville, Kentucky December 2010 Copyright 2010 by Jiang, Chun All rights reserved THE CONTENT AND CRITICAL METAPHOR ANALYSIS OF ILLUSTRATED PRINT ADVERTISEMENTS IN CHINA By Jiang, Chun B.A., University ofInternational Business and Economics, 1985 M.A., Korea Development Institute, 2001 A Dissertation Approved on Oct 15,2010 By the following Dissertation Committee: Dissertation Director ii DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated to my parents Jiang Fan and Zhang Minhua, and my husband and daughter Wang Jianwei and Wang Ye, who have given me invaluable and selfless support. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First of all I would like to express my sincere and heart-felt thanks to my adviser professor Robert N. St. Clair for his guidance, help and patience throughout the whole writing process. Next I would also like to express my gratitude to all the teachers in this humanities program who have given us the most enlightening instruction and systematic knowledge. The teachers who have accompanied me in the past four years are: Annette Allen, Osbourne P. Wiggins, Elaine o. Wise, Robert N. st. Clair, Pamela Beattie, Mark E. Blum, Li Jin, Youzhong Sun, Yian Wu, Zaixin Zhang, Guohua Chen, and Jian Zhang. In addition to that I am indebted to my family members without whose support this dissertation can never be accomplished. My parents, my brothers, my husband and my daughter have shown their full understanding and support during the last four years so that I can continue to pursue this degree to the very end with courage and confidence. Finally I would like to show my gratitude to my university colleagues and School of English with whom I have been working in the last twenty five years. They allow me time and resources for academic research. Some of their names are: Lifei Wang, Cuiping Zhang, Xiaoshu Zhu, Weilin Dou, Jieyun Feng. iv ABSTRACT THE CONTENT AND CRITICAL METAPHOR ANALYSIS OF ILLUSTRATED PRINT ADVERTISEMENTS IN CHINA Jiang, Chun Sept 18,2010 This dissertation takes Chinese advertisements as the research subjects to see in what way a quantifiable large number of advertisements with its metaphorical nature and instrumental mission can reflect social cultural change, in specifics, ideology and identity change of China in the last thirty years by combining four methods of research: content analysis, Critical Discourse Analysis, Conceptual Metaphor Analysis and Pictorial Metaphor Analysis. The dissertation goes through the sign or ad interpretation process of linguistic, semiotic and critical analysis of 300 sample illustrated print advertisements collected from popular and award-winning illustrated print advertisements in Chinese media in the three periods of 1980s, 1990s and 2000s respectively. After comparing and contrasting the high frequency key words, advertising appeals and metaphorical expressions and images (categories and groups) appeared in the advertisements of the three periods the following conclusions are made: First, although advertisements in all the three periods belonged to the commercial public discourse, those in 1980s were inclined towards public discourse without much consideration for specific target groups while those in 1990s and 2000s v ----------------------------- tended to denote private and personal discourse with clear target groups in mind. While the advertisements in 1980s were characterized largely by the direct informative style, the majority of the advertisements in 1990s manifested a hybridization of both informative and involving styles. The advertisements in 2000s demonstrated strong involving and interacting style. Second, it can be seen from the shift of advertising appeals from the use of rational appeal to personal appeal that the overall society is moving up the ladder of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Analysis from the basic need satisfaction to more social need and personal need satisfaction. Third, with regard to semiotic image categories used, the result shows the tendency that China is increasingly becoming a male-dominated society with a big increase in using male images from 1980s to 2000s and in particular adult male images. The representational images in the ads show a decline in intimacy but an increase in positional communication. The social setting is the dominant advertising background for all the three periods. Meanwhile with regard to the typical types of metaphorical images that are used as signifieds or secondary subjects to be projected onto the signifiers or primary subjects, there is a decline in using human images as opposed to non-human images. The dominant metaphorical image types used in three periods are in concomitant with the ideology and identity needs of each specific period of time. Fourth, on the whole the critical metaphor analysis of 300 sample illustrated print advertisements in mainland China from 1979 to 2008 has revealed vi advertisements during this period, implicitly or explicitly, have served the evolving ruling and dominant ideology very well. The dominant ideologies have changed from political ideology to economic ideology in 1980s, from economic ideology to national ideology in 1990s, and from national ideology to balanced harmonious ideologies in 2000s. The individual consumers have transformed their identities from political self to material social self in 1980s, from material social self to national cultural self in 1990s, and from national cultural self to a individualized my self in 2000s. The dissertation contributes both theoretically and practically to the advertising research as well as visual culture research. On the one hand it confirms the critical discourse theory that discourse change can reflect socially-constructed reality. On the other hand, it contributes to pictorial metaphor theory by that visual metaphors are deep-rooted in human conceptualization and are cultural-specific. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ..................................................................... .iv ABSTRACT ....................................................................................... v LIST OF TABLES ................................................................................ x LIST OF FIGURES ............................................................................. xii CHAPTERS I. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................. 1 Research Background ....................................................................... 1 Purpose and Significance ................................................................. 12 Research Assumptions and Questions ................................................... 16 The Organization of the Dissertation ................................................... 19 II. LITERATURE REVIEW .................................................................. 23 Literature Review on Advertising ...................................................... 24 Literature Review on Advertising Research ........................................... 31 The Interdisciplinary Nature of Advertising ........................................... 34 Literature Review on Critical Metaphor Analysis ................................... .48 Literature Review on Ideology and Identity ........................................... 56 III. LINGUISTIC AND SEMIOTIC ANALySIS .......................................... 71 Theoretical Framework and Methodology ............................................. 72 viii Sample Data Collection: Source and Criteria .......................................... 75 Sample Data Treatment: Linguistic and Semiotic Analysis .......................... 78 IV. CRITICAL METAPHOR ANALySIS ................................................. 112 Critical Metaphor Analysis of Advertisements ....................................... 112 The Contextual (Sign) Situation of Advertisements ................................. 117 The Ideology Changes Reflected by Advertisements ................................ 123 The Identity Changes Reflected by Advertisements ................................. 143 V. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS .............................................