A pragmatics theory on television advertising

This paper aims to articulate a pragmatics theory of TV advertising. It elaborates the distinction established by the advertiser Bernstein (1974) and the linguist Simpson (2001) between reason and tickle advertising. In order to accomplish this endeavor, we distinguish what type of information is used and how it is handled through the discourse of the advertisement. Therefore, the basic constituents of two types of commercial message will be described. This will allow us to predict their disposition taking into account the rhetorical strategy chosen by the advertiser. Once we have defined both prototypes and the peripheries between them, using the empirical data from our corpus, we will be able to make a calculation of which of these categories were predominant at peak viewing time on the television channels that broadcast openly in Mexico in April 2007.

► This paper articulates a pragmatics theory of TV advertising following a functional criterion: how the advertiser manages the uncertainties of the viewer–consumer. ► The basic constituents of any TV advertisement are defined. ► This will allow us to predict the rhetorical disposition of prototypical reason and tickle ads and the peripheries between them. ► Once these classes are defined, we classify 200 Mexican ads.