Abstract

Food advertisement language not only requires to be terse and forceful, but also to be novel and have the character of originality and attraction.Pun is intended to make a sentence have two meaning in the interior and exterior in a specific language environment using the phonetics and semantics of language. Also it make multi-angle advertisement for products and services with associative meaning caused by pun. Therefore, pun in food advertisement can produce the following significant economic effects: propaganda brand, resonate emotion, avoid tabu. The emotional resonance is mainly through humor effect, sensational effect and the resonance effect of value to achieve significant economic effects. Hence pun is widely used in food advertisement. The author uses lots of representative food quirkish advertisements firm and takes as examples to deeply analyse the process of understanding the puns applied in food advertisements. All the theoretical basis come from Sperber and wilson’s ostensive-inferential. The Relevance Theory offers convincing explanation about puns in food advertisements. The author attempt to utilize the theory to analyse that how the customers gain optimal relevance from the ostensive stimulus of advertiser.

Key words: relevance theory; food advertisement; pun

Contents

Abstract

摘要

1 Introduction-1

2 Literature Review-2

2.1 Relevance Theory-2

2.2 Advertisement-3

3 Puns in advertising-5

3.1 Definition of Pun-5

3.2 Classification of Pun-6

3.2.1 Classification of Pun in General-6

3.2.2 Classification of Pun in This Thesis-7

3.3 Basic Elements of Pun-8

3.3.1 Double Context-9

3.3.2 Hinge-9

3.3.3 Trigger-10

4 Findings and Discussions-10

4.1 Enhance the Humorous Effects-12

4.2 Enhance the Attention-gabbing Effects-12

4.3 Enhance Memory-retaining Effects-13

5 Conclusion.14

References-15