The language of advertising: A pedagogically related attempt to break the code

MARIA ALEJANDRA PORTELA

Mendoza

Conferencia; Primera Conferencia Regional Latinoamericana de Lingüistica Sistemático-Funcional: la lingüística sistémico-funcional, la lengua y la educación; 2005

Critical Discourse Analysis attempts to describe, interpret and explain discourse as a form of social, cultural and ideological practice (Fairclough 1989; 1992; 1995). CDA sets out to accomplish such purpose through the analysis of texts. Discourse is conceived as a three- dimensional construct "consisting of a (socio)linguistic dimension, a sociocultural dimension and a sociopolitical dimension" (Kumaravadivelu 1999, 469). On the other hand, text is seen as ?a theoretical abstract construct which underlies what is normally understood as discourse? (Van Dijk 1977, 32). In order to exemplify how patterns of discourse interact with socio-cultural structures and ideology and make a text mean what it does, this paper focuses on the discourse of advertisements. One aim is to analyse a print advertisement along the conceptual framework of CDA. Another aim is to link the theoretical discussion to pedagogical concerns or, more specifically, to draw out insights for classroom exploitation related particularly to CDA?s emphasis on ?critical awareness of language and discursive practices? (Fairclough 1995,140). The analysis follows a macro- micro perspective organisation. The first section of the paper contributes a brief contextualisation of CDA in terms of influencing theoretical sources. The second section includes a brief discussion of the three-stage procedure proposed by Fairclough (1995) to understand hidden power relations and ideological processes in discourse (p:109). This section contains a text-based examination of the ad in terms of the ways in which linguistic patterns realise contextual dimensions of culture and social situation (Eggins 1994). It also aims to show the ways in which ?language in discourse maintains and reproduces social relations of power? (Price 1999, 582). The paper concludes with an attempt to highlight the pedagogical relevance of the CDA model of textual dissection to a particular instructed setting namely the English teacher training programme offered at the School of Languages in Cordoba, Argentina.