American Television Advertising

The development of modern advertisements as we know them is an important topic, considering the fact that they are present (for the most of us) in our everyday lives. Basing myself upon the methodology developed by Machin (2007), that is a semiotical approach that focuses on particular representations of social actors. I shall apply this…

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Persuasion and Rhetoric in Advertising

Persuasion and rhetoric are fundamental aspects of advertising, and are notably exercised in many situations of everyday life. According to Simons (2001), persuasion is “human communication designed to influence the autonomous judgments and actions of others” (Simons, 2001, p. 7).  One key feature of persuasion as noted by Simons (2001) is that it always predisposes…

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Discourse Analysis I

Michel Foucault (1926-1984) is considered to be one of the founders of modern studies on discourse. The study of discourse in the Foucauldian sense aims at uncovering the organization of knowledge within institutions, and the powers that are exerted via this knowledge. As Foucault observed in his research, elements such as language, the layouts of…

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