SIG Journal 47_Final

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Journal of the English for Specific Purposes Special Interest Group
Professional
and Academic English
Spring – Summer 2016 Issue 47
02 Editorial – Andy Gillett; Message from the ESP SIG Joint Coordinators – Aysen Guven & Prithvi Shrestha; Message from
the ESP SIG Journal Editor-in-Chief – Mark Krzanowski
03 ESP SIG Committee
04 Teaching discussion skills in an EGAP curriculum: The case of Japanese science and technology undergraduates –
Daniel Parsons
08 Why do student presentations and discussion boards work so well? – Marianna Goral
11 Corporate portrait in press releases: The case of banking institutions – Mayyer Ling
18 Advertising language: An effective marketing tool – Vaishali J. Shinde
22 Turning classroom assignments into published journal articles: What have we learned from these practices? –
Ribut Wahyudi
27 Chinese cultural values: In what ways they affect Chinese academic writing for publication – Ping Huang
34 Reports – Romania; Scotland
38 Book reviews – Balbina Moncada Comas; Alexander Cornford; Andy Gillett; Dr Gift Mheta; Desmond Carolan
SIG Journal 47_Final.indd 1 25/07/2016 11:47

2
Journal of the IATEFL ESP SIG
EDITORIAL
Welcome to Issue 47 of Professional and Academic English.
It is my pleasure to introduce you to the Spring–Summer issue of the journal. This issue, as usual,
demonstrates the wide range of contexts in which ESP is taught. In this case, we have articles relating
to students and oral EAP: discussion skills for science and engineering students from Daniel Parsons
in Japan and presentations and discussion boards from international business students in the UK from
Marianna Goral.
We have two articles dealing with professional writing: Mayyer Ling from Brunei Darussalam writes
about corporate press releases in banking institutions and marketing and advertising language is
discussed by Vaishali J. Shinde in India. Lastly, there are two articles discussing writing for publication:
Ribut Wahyudi on turning classroom assignments into published journal articles in Indonesia and the
influence of Chinese cultural values on writing for publication in China by Ping Huang.
We hope you find these articles interesting and useful and we hope that reading them will encourage all
our readers to submit articles to the journal. Please visit http://espsig.iatefl.org/ for further information.
Andy Gillett, UK
Dear Colleagues,
Every year, we aim to organize more events, either jointly with other SIGs or professional organizations,
or on our own. We hope to see you at these additional events. This year, we are holding a two-day
conference in Athens, Greece 1–2 October, 2016. Please submit your paper. For more information,
please visit our website and the ESP SIG Facebook page. If you wish to organize a local event, please
contact us for any support we can offer. We are grateful to our valued members for their constant
support. We look forward to seeing many of you at different ESP SIG events.
Aysen Guven and Prithvi Shrestha
Joint Coordinators, IATEFL ESP SIG
Message from the Joint Coordinators
02 Editorial – Andy Gillett;
Message from the ESP
SIG Joint Coordinators
– Aysen Guven & Prithvi
Shrestha; Message from
the ESP SIG Journal
Editor-in-Chief – Mark
Krzanowski
03 ESP SIG Committee
04 Teaching discussion
skills in an EGAP
curriculum: The case
of Japanese science
and technology
undergraduates – Daniel
Parsons
08 Why do student
presentations and
discussion boards work
so well? – Marianna Goral
11 Corporate portrait in
press releases: The case
of banking institutions –
Mayyer Ling
18 Advertising language:
An effective marketing
tool – Vaishali J. Shinde
22 Turning classroom
assignments into
published journal
articles: What have
we learned from these
practices? – Ribut
Wahyudi
27 Chinese cultural values:
In what ways they affect
Chinese academic
writing for publication –
Ping Huang
34 Reports – Romania;
Scotland
38 Book reviews – Balbina
Moncada Comas;
Alexander Cornford; Andy
Gillett; Dr Gift Mheta;
Desmond Carolan
Message from ESP SIG Journal Editor-in-Chief
It is with enormous regret that we inform you that Garnet Education will no longer be in a
position to sponsor our Journal after Issue 47. I would like to convey words of gratitude to
the Executive Director and the whole Garnet team for providing unmatched professional
support of the highest quality which stretches from Issue 30 (Summer–Autumn 2007)
until now (Issue 47). They have also sponsored the publication of four ESP SIG books, and for this we
are indebted, too. With Garnet’s sponsorship, we have been able to develop a solid set of EAP and ESP
publications which we will now have to maintain in our own right. It is likely (to be confirmed) that we may
switch to an electronic version of the journal in the immediate future in order to keep up with the times.
Mark Krzanowski
Disclaimer The ESP SIG Journal is a peer-reviewed publication. Articles submitted by prospective authors are carefully considered
by our editorial team, and where appropriate, feedback and advice is provided. The Journal is not blind refereed.
Copyright Notice Copyright for whole issue IATEFL 2016. Copyright for individual contributions remains vested in the authors,
to whom applications for rights to reproduce should be made. Copyright for individual reports and papers for use outside IATEFL
remains vested in the contributors, to whom applications for rights to reproduce should be made. Professional and Academic
English should always be acknowledged as the original source of publication. IATEFL retains the right to republish any of the
contributions in this issue in future IATEFL publications or to make them available in electronic form for the benefit of its members.
Welcome Index
Welcome

July 2016, Issue 47 3
Prithvi Shrestha
The Open University, UK
Email: prithvi.shrestha@open.ac.uk or
pnshrestha@gmail.com
Aysen Guven
Head of English, British Council, Ankara, Turkey
Email: aysen.guven@britishcouncil.org.tr
ESP SIG Committee
ESP SIG Coordinators:
Journal Editor-in-Chief (Professional and Academic English):
Mark Krzanowski
University of Westminster, London, UK
Email: markkski2@gmail.com
Assistant Editors:
Angola:
Leonardo Makiesse Ntemo Mack
Brazil:
Rosinda Guerra Ramos
Cameroon:
Martina Mbayu Nana
DRC (Democratic Republic of
Congo):
Raymond Sangabau Madiambwele
Ethiopia:
Abayneh Haile
Ghana:
Isaiah Adzigodie
India:
Albert P’Rayan
Japan:
John Adamson
Mozambique:
Tawanda Nhire Nelson Antonio
Nigeria:
Nkem Okoh
Pakistan:
Mohammed Zafar & Saba Bahareen Mansur
Russia:
Tatiana Szelinger
South Africa:
Junia Ngoepe & Gift Mheta
Yemen:
Abdulhameed Ashuja’a
Regional Representatives:
Event Coordinator:
Paschalis Chliaras
Email: paschalisc@yahoo.com
ESP Reporter:
Marcos Kofﬁ Ngoran
Ministry of Employment, Social Affairs
and Vocational Training, Ivory Coast
Email: souraley@hotmail.fr
ESP SIG Webmaster:
Semih Irfaner
Senior Educational Consultant, Macmillan
Education, Ankara, Turkey
Semih.Irfaner@macmillan.com
Andy Gillett
Email: andy@andygillett.com
Bernard Nchindila
Email: nchinbm@unisa.ac.za
Nadezhda Yakovchuk
Email: n.yakovchuk@hotmail.co.uk

Journal of the IATEFL ESP SIGJournal of the IATEFL ESP SIG
4
Teaching discussion skills in an EGAP
curriculum: The case of Japanese science and
technology undergraduates
Abstract
This paper describes the design, implementation and evaluation
of a discussion skills course for general academic purposes
for first-year undergraduates at a Japanese private university.
The paper outlines the use of the BALEAP Can Do Framework
for ESP syllabus design and assessment (BALEAP, 2013) in
designing the academic discourse skills needed for discussions.
The paper also outlines the use of task-based learning for the
implementation of the curriculum. Finally, an evaluation of the
course through a self-efficacy survey is described, and the
implications for future revisions to the course and to pedagogy
are discussed.
Keywords: syllabus development, discussion skills, tasks,
EGAP
1 Introduction
It is widely acknowledged in Japan that many students are
able to pass gruelling grammar and reading tests, but lack the
language skills to sustain even the most basic conversations in
English. Science and engineering undergraduates in Japan are
known, in particular, to have low motivation towards language
learning (Kaneko, 2012), report poor classroom experiences (Hill,
Falout & Apple, 2012) and show little improvement in their TOEIC
scores when compared with students majoring in other subjects
(Educational Testing Service, 2014). Given that English is the de
facto language of science, there is a pressing need to tackle
this issue if Japan is to remain competitive in scientific research.
This article describes a course in discussion skills for first-year
science and engineering majors at a university in Japan which
aims to tackle these issues. The design and implementation
of the course is reported through task-based learning and
the BALEAP Can Do Framework for EAP syllabus design and
assessment (BALEAP, 2013).
2 English program in the Faculty of
Science and Technology
Hyland (2006, p. 1) explains that EAP covers a wide range
of practices in academic institutions, including writing and
classroom interaction. English for General Academic Purposes
(EGAP) can be distinguished from a specific approach (ESAP)
in that practices which students must get used to, such as note
taking and giving presentations, are common to all disciplines in
EGAP. This resonates with the idea that there is also a common
core of language (Basturkmen, 2009, pp. 15–17) between the
disciplines, which also needs to be mastered by the students.
The course in the Department of Science and Technology
at Kwansei Gakuin University is designed to cover the basic
academic study skills and language knowledge. Students take
courses each week in Communication, Writing and Reading.
Each course covers a specific set of skills, such as intensive
reading, paragraph and essay writing, listening and note
taking, giving presentations and holding short discussions.
The program is designed to improve students’ study skills with
a goal to ‘help students to acquire the ability to accurately
understand someone else’s thinking’, and the communication
course in particular includes the objective ‘to provide students
with guidance and practice in basic conversation and discussion
skills’ (sci-tech.ksc.kwansei.ac.jp/LLL/service1.html).
Table 1: Curriculum Overview
Communication Writing Writing
Year 1 Group Discussion
Skills I
Presentation
Skills I
TOEIC Listening
Skills I
Paragraph
Writing Skills I
Email Writing
Skills I
Intensive and
Extensive
Reading I
Academic
Reading
Skills I
TOEIC
Vocabulary I
Year 2 Group Discussion
Skills II
Presentation
Skills II
TOEIC Listening
Skills II
Paragraph
Writing Skills II
Email Writing
Skills II
Intensive and
Extensive
Reading II
Academic
Reading Skills
II
TOEIC
Vocabulary II
The Communication Curriculum provides students with the
opportunity to practise a wide range of speaking and listening
skills, including listening to and giving presentations, asking
questions to presenters, taking notes while listening, carrying
out research in preparation for discussions and taking part
in discussions. Furthermore, these align with a number of
the competencies associated with the academic context as
identified by the BALEAP Can Do Framework for EAP syllabus
design and assessment (BALEAP, 2013). Each teacher who
implements the course has the freedom to organize the course
to achieve the objectives outlined in Table 2.
Daniel Parsons, Kwansei Gakuin University, Japan
Email: daniel1124@kwansei.ac.jp

Table 2: Curriculum Overview
Academic Context To work independently and
collaboratively.
To understand the connection
between pre-task, discussion task
and post-task.
To be fully engaged with the
discussions.
Academic Discourse To share opinions, provide
arguments and counterarguments.
To take turns talking appropriately
and buy time when necessary.
To ask for clarification.
To ask and respond to questions.
To summarise discussions.
To steer the discussion towards
decisions.
To try to persuade.
To improve accuracy and fluency.
3 Design of the Discussion Skills
Course
The BALEAP Can Do Framework was used as a reference
for the design of activities to foster the academic discourse
required to meet the linguistic demands of discussions. When
designing the course and the activities, the context of Japanese
students was first taken into account and a number of goals
were set. The first goal was to motivate students to speak to
each other in English, understanding that most students would
not have experienced this. The second goal was to ensure that
students understood the connections between the range of
tasks involved. A task-based approach to discussion activities
was chosen (Willis & Willis, 2007), with discussion tasks forming
the central unit of the curriculum, and pre-tasks and post-tasks
supporting both the contextual and linguistic development
within the discussion tasks. Tasks were sequenced in terms of
their complexity. Complexity is described by Duran and Ramaut
(2006, pp. 51–57) in terms of the task’s communicative and
cognitive processing demands, the text involved and the world
represented within the task.
3.1 Syllabus, tasks and sequencing
Tasks were sequenced with increasing demand on cognitive
processing during the discussion. An overview is shown in
Table 3. Show and tell activities in Lessons 2 and 3 allowed the
students to prepare simple language in advance and required
minimal response from group members. These activities
also allowed students to get to know each other. Spot the
difference activities were next deployed to introduce the turn
taking element of discussion tasks. The visual aspect of these
tasks allowed for low complexity tasks. These were followed
by discussion tasks which started with a simple text, such as
‘all students should not work part-time jobs – do you agree or
disagree with this?’ While the visual scaffold was no longer
available, the content remained grounded in the students’ real
world. Finally, listing tasks required students to agree on a
final list based on some given criteria. For example, students
had to rank the best places to visit in Japan or prepare a list of
reprimands for anti-social behaviour in order of severity. The
extended discussion involved students in considering wider
issues such as global warming and Japan’s ageing population,
and ranking the priority given to the development of particular
technologies. This final task was designed to connect with the
content of both their reading course and the general knowledge
they were developing in their science courses.
Table 3: Task sequence
Lesson Number Discussion Task Type
1 Course introduction and self-
introduction tasks
2–3 Show and tell tasks
4–5 Spot the difference tasks
6–9 Agree or Disagree tasks
10–12 Listing tasks
13–14 Extended discussion and post-
course discussion
3.2 Academic discourse focus
Academic discourse was introduced to students through focus
on form during pre-tasks and post-tasks. Students were given
sample dialogues such as the one shown in Figure 1. During
the pre-task, students identified some of the functions of each
member’s turn and chose a number of functions which they
would try to perform during the discussion task. These functions
were all recycled as the tasks became more complex, allowing
students to have regular practice. The post-tasks involved
students reflecting on their use of particular functions in order to
improve their accuracy in a later performance.
A: I think one of the places to visit
should be Kyoto.
Suggest an idea
What do you think?
Allocate a turn
B: It's a good idea, but she has
already visited Kyoto.
Reject an idea with a
reason
C: How about Himeji? She can eat
good noodles in Himej, and
Support an idea
Ethan will enjoy the big castle.
Give a reason
B: Yeah, it's a great idea! So, the
best place is Himeji. The thing
Support an idea
to do is see the castle, and they
should eat the noodles.
Summarize
Shall we write it?
Get consensus
Figure 1: Examples of the discourse functions from a student
worksheet

6
3.3 Materials
During discussions, students had the option to take time out
of a discussion and speak Japanese. Real-time conversation
can be fraught with turn-taking time pressures, which for
second language speakers can become overt and distracting.
Therefore, if students had trouble finding a word or phrase, they
could take time out to discuss a possible solution in Japanese
before returning back to English. In addition to this option,
students used the language laboratory headsets to record their
group discussions. In this way, students could listen to their
discussions and identify accuracy problems with particular
aspects of the academic discourse. The students rewrote any
problematic phrases in a language journal which was set up
on their learning management system (LMS). Homework tasks
also involved writing about any other difficulties they had with
their discussion tasks and getting advice from the teacher. The
rationale for this was to allow students a private forum where
they could get advice that might help them to reduce any anxiety
with speaking English.
4 Course evaluation
The course objectives, being based on academic discourse
and academic context, were evaluated through a self-efficacy
survey. Bandura (1989) explains that ‘Self-efficacy beliefs
function as an important set of proximal determinants of human
motivation, affect and action’ (p. 1175). Furthermore, it is
‘concerned with … beliefs in [the] capabilities to produce given
attainments’ (Bandura, 2006, p. 307). Since self-efficacy goes
to the heart of motivation and achievement, it was decided
that a self-efficacy survey would be an appropriate method
to gain insight into the perceptions of students’ own learning
through this course. The self-efficacy survey asked students to
reflect and rate their ability to perform the academic discourse
functions of the course. Questions were designed based on
advice by Bandura (2006) that they should be future oriented
and specific to the context of learning. The following question
was asked to students: ‘Please rate to what extent you feel you
can or cannot perform the following tasks’. They were given
a rating from 0 to 100, with 0 meaning ‘absolutely cannot do’
and 100 meaning ‘can definitely do’. A list of all the academic
discourse functions were given and students were asked to
write their rating.
Sixty students took part in the evaluation. A principal
components analysis was performed on the results to find
latent variables in the self-efficacy towards academic discourse
functions. The results are shown in Table 4 and Figure 2. Table 4
shows the factor loadings. The test of the hypothesis that
three factors are sufficient reveals that p = 0.141, which is not
significant. This means that the three factors are sufficient. The
scree plot in Figure 2 adds further visual support that three
factors are sufficient.
Table 4: Self-efficacy latent factor loadings analysed from a principal components analysis
Academic Discourse Functions in
Discussions
Factor 1: Advanced
Discourse Features
Factor 2: Linguistic Control Factor 3: Basic Discourse
Features
Suggest an idea 0.360 0.789
Make an argument 0.444 0.124 0.711
Show you are listening 0.258 0.605
Give a reason 0.518 0.391 0.555
Try to persuade 0.765 0.202 0.362
Make someone accept your decision 0.763 0.228 0.193
Strengthen your opinion 0.529 0.279 0.446
Make a counterargument 0.678 0.197 0.410
Make someone listen to you when
you can’t be heard
0.664 0.250 0.262
Speak fluently 0.596 0.641
Speak grammatically accurately 0.461 0.764 0.162
Speak with good pronunciation 0.101 0.891 0.206
Speak with correct word order 0.232 0.840 0.201
Figure 2: Scree plot showing the cut-off point at three factors
Examining the three factors that emerged, it can be seen that
they are fundamentally different and that these differences point
to aspects of the course that were difficult and can be improved.
The second factor seems to be about efficacy towards linguistic
performance. Certainly, fluency, accuracy, pronunciation
and word order are all features of language that appear in
performance and demonstrates students’ perceptions of their
control over these features.
The third factor could be labelled ‘basic discourse functions’ in
that they do not require a large amount of cognitive processing.

These are certainly the functions which would have been
recycled many more times throughout the course and which
would have been easiest for students to access.
The first factor could be labelled ‘advanced discourse functions’
in that they tend to occur at the most complex stages of a
discussion and require not only an understanding of how the
context of the discussion has developed, but also control over
enough linguistic resources to be able to perform this level of
academic discourse.
Table 5: Average self-efficacy score for each latent factor
Factor 1 Factor 2 Factor 3
Mean 70.8 45.1 80.6
Standard Deviation 18.8 21.6 15.0
Table 5 shows the mean and standard deviation scores for
each of the latent factors of the academic discourse functions.
Student self-efficacy towards control over linguistic features
(Factor 2) was the lowest of the three factors, which was an
unexpected outcome of the evaluation. Certainly, the course
did not provide much practice in pronunciation, due to time
constraints. However, a focus on accuracy in the language
journal did not seem to have the effect of raising students’
efficacy towards this aspect of language. This could be due
to the fact that this was mostly carried out for homework and
any follow up to teacher feedback was left to the discretion
of individual students. Furthermore, Hattie (2012) provides
evidence that homework tasks are among the least effective
methods for improving learning. This altogether suggests that
reflective tasks focusing on accuracy are probably best done
during the lesson with some degree of accountability. Improving
students’ efficacy towards linguistic control could encourage
them to feel more a part of an emerging academic community in
the classroom as they start to inhabit a new identity.
Student self-efficacy towards basic discourse functions
(Factor 3) was the highest among all the students. However,
self-efficacy towards complex discourse (Factor 1) functions
may have been lower, but it was still much higher than self-
efficacy towards linguistic control. This implies that this course
effectively provided students with the opportunity to experience
the academic discourse of persuasive argumentation through
discussion. Nonetheless, the question remains to what extent
improving the focus on fluency and accuracy could impact on
the other two factors.
Finally, students were asked to write open feedback on the
survey. Most of the comments were positive and included
statements such as ‘I was able to say my counterargument
with confidence’, ‘I could really concentrate in this class; it was
different from high school in that conversation was central, and I
absorbed quite a lot’, ‘I gave reasons for my opinions’, and ‘Each
class assessing our discussion and thinking about discussion
topics helped me improve my skills’.
5 Conclusion
This article described the design, implementation and evaluation
of a first-year discussion course for general academic purposes.
Tasks were sequenced in terms of complexity, and while they
were suitable in helping the students understand the academic
context and the academic discourse functions within that
context, they did not effectively help students to focus on
features of language such as pronunciation and grammatical
accuracy. Courses at university tend to be quite short, and the
opportunity to practise group discussions outside of class time
certainly restricts the teacher’s available options for focusing on
the features of language.
References
BALEAP (2013). Can Do Framework for EAP syllabus design and
assessment. Retrieved October 18, 2015 from https://www.
baleap.org/projects/can-do
Bandura, A. (1989). Human agency in social cognitive theory.
American Psychologist, 44(9), 1175–1184.
Bandura, A. (2006). Guide for constructing self-efficacy
scales. In F. Pajares, & T. Urdan (Eds.), Self-efficacy beliefs
of adolescents (pp. 307–337). Greenwich, Connecticut:
Information Age Publishing.
Basturkmen, H. (2009). Ideas and options in English for specific
purposes. New York & London: Routledge.
Duran, G., & Ramaut, G. (2006). Tasks for absolute beginners
and beyond: Developing and sequencing tasks at basic
proficiency levels. In K. Van den Branden (Ed.), Task based
language education: From theory to practice, (pp. 47–75).
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Educational Testing Service. (2014). TOEIC program: Data &
analysis 2014. Retrieved October 18, 2015 from http://www.
toeic.or.jp/library/toeic_data/toeic_en/pdf/data/TOEIC_
Program_DAA.pdf
Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers: Maximising impact
on learning. London & New York: Routledge.
Hill, G., Falout, J., & Apple, M. (2012). Possible L2 selves for
students of science and engineering. In N. Sonda, & A. Krause
(Eds.), JALT2012 Conference Proceedings. Tokyo: JALT.
Hyland, K. (2006). English for academic purposes: An advanced
resource book. Oxford: Routledge.
Kaneko, E. (2012). On the motivation of science majors learning
English as a foreign language: A case study from Japan.
OnCUE Journal, 6(2), 3–26.
Kwansei Gakuin Daigaku Riko Gakubu Eigo Kyoshitsu. (n.d.).
Retrieved May 30, 2016, from http://sci-tech.ksc.kwansei.
ac.jp/LLL/service1.html
Willis, D., & Willis, J. (2007). Doing task-based teaching. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Daniel Parsons is an Instructor of English as a Foreign
Language at Kwansei Gakuin University’s School of Science
and Technology, Japan. He teaches communication and writing
classes to undergraduate students and he is interested in how
formative assessment can be used in discussion classes.

8
Why do student presentations and discussion
boards work so well?
Marianna Goral, Regent’s University London, UK
Email: goralm@regents.ac.uk
Abstract
This paper reports on an ongoing study, which was set up to
initiate a group of language teachers to research their classroom
environment following the principled theoretical framework of
Exploratory Practice (EP).
I shall report on my own journey of teacher as a neophyte
researcher focusing on understanding ‘Why do some teaching
materials develop better language learning opportunities than
others in my language classes?’ The paper outlines the research
process that I followed, which has led my students and I to
better understand my teaching puzzle and improve our ‘quality
of life’ in the classroom (Allwright, 2003, p. 128).
Keywords: blackboard, Exploratory Practice (EP), Virtual
Learning Environment (VLE)
1 Introduction
Exploratory Practice is a form of practitioner research developed
in second language teacher education and professional
development to empower teachers (and learners) to investigate
their own teaching puzzles in order to develop a better
understanding of their professional context (Allwright, 2003;
Allwright & Hanks, 2009; Gieve & Miller, 2006).
Since it was originated in 1991 by Dick Allwright and Kathi
Bailey, it has been developed both as a coherent set of ideas
and practices for language teaching (and learning) research,
and more importantly, as a set of principles for any sort of
practitioner researcher as outlined below:
Principle 1: put ‘quality of life’ first
Principle 2: work primarily to understand classroom life
prior to bringing any change
Principle 3: involve everybody
Principle 4: work to bring teachers and learners together
(collegiality)
Principle 5: work for mutual development (inclusivity)
Principle 6: integrate the work for understanding into
classroom practice (use of normal pedagogic
activities as investigative approaches)
Principle 7: make the work a continuous enterprise
(sustainability)
(Allwright, 2003, p. 128).
Upon discovering and later following the EP principles, I was
able to start questioning my own tacit knowledge by researching
my immediate teaching and learning environment. The
methodology used for study has been outlined below.
1.1 The study
The study encompasses my preliminary observations of how
the quality of life of students and teacher can be enhanced in a
university Business English seminar, which tries to successfully
cover and merge Business English and business-related
topics, language and academic skills. A critical view of student-
generated materials, in the form of student presentations
and VLE discussion boards, will be given with regards to the
challenges faced and strategies used by both teacher and
student. These will be explored through the EP framework. The
purpose of this study will be to better understand classroom
life by bringing together people and encouraging mutual
development and collegiality for both the teacher and students.
As Principle 5 tells us, collegiality will perhaps be best served if
all involved are manifestly working for each other’s development
as well as their own (Allwright, 2003, p. 129). By bringing
learners together and shifting the dynamics of the teacher role,
learners can make valuable contributions during a class. This, in
turn, will benefit their development by building their confidence
as foreign speakers of the language.
1.2 The participants
The teacher has observed three groups of students over a
period of two semesters. The number of students per class
has ranged from 8–16. All the groups consist of undergraduate
exchange students between the ages of 19 and 22 from various
Asian, African and European linguistic backgrounds. They are
all non-native speakers of English, two of the three groups
observed were an upper-intermediate level class, and the
other was an advanced level class. English is the medium of
instruction and the seminar hours are as follows: 2 x 50-minute
slots and a 1 x 50-minute slot twice a week for a duration of
12 weeks.
1.3 The student presentations, post-
presentation student-led discussions and
discussion board set-up
The research for this study will specifically focus on the
50-minute slots that take place once a week for the first 7
weeks of the 12-week semester. In these seminars, students
are expected to give a group presentation (two to three people
to a group) about a current business topic and provide clear
definitions of ‘topic-related vocabulary’. At the end of the
presentation, the students must provide a set of questions for
the rest of the class and try to generate an in-class discussion.
Next, the group is subdivided and each ‘topic expert’ leads
the discussion in their respective groups. Their role is also to
clarify any information that the other students may not have
understood about the topic. After the debate takes place, the
‘topic experts’ are expected to report back to the entire class
about the key points that were discussed or any conclusions
that may have been drawn.

After the seminar, the students become ‘discussion board
administrators’ for a week and continue the in-class discussion
on the Regent’s University London, Virtual Learning Environment
(RUL VLE). They are encouraged to provide further links, videos
and updates related to the topic, they should also try to continue
generating topic interest and keep the discussion about the
presented topic ‘alive’. The discussion board closes after seven
days and all the students are expected to contribute to the
discussion board at least once. The teacher then goes through
the discussion board and identifies student language issues.
This is then collated and the language issues are underlined
and copied into a Word document so that student names are
not visible. Further to this, the teacher identifies in brackets a
description of the type of problem that has been highlighted,
i.e., punctuation, missing article, collocation issue, etc. Later,
the students are given back this document in order to reflect on
these mistakes and try to identify them and make corrections
where necessary. Later, the teacher asks the group to give their
suggested corrections and also shows them a model answer.
Finally, towards the end of the semester, the teacher chooses
one of the seven topics as the question for the final in-class
timed written report-style assessment that is worth 60% of the
overall mark for this module.
2 Methodology
Given the nature of the study, an inductive approach is used as
‘a strategy of linking data and theory typically associated with a
qualitative research approach’ (Bryman, 2012, p. 13). The literature
is therefore presented at the end of the study and used for
comparing and contrasting findings of the study (Creswell, 2003,
p. 14). Additionally, given the longitudinal nature of the study (a
two-year period), it seems to align with ethnographic strategies
of enquiry whereby ‘the researcher studies a group (three sets of
students) in a given setting (classroom) over a prolonged period
of time, collecting primarily observational data’ (Creswell, 2003,
p. 14). The process involves group work and presentations, and
student-led discussions using the University’s VLE.
Exploratory practice involves thought and reflection on a
teacher’s own practice stimulated through collaboration as
suggested by Principle 5. Therefore, structured questionnaires,
video-recorded observations and recorded student interviews
have been used to provide additional evidence of student
engagement, confidence, feelings, participation and learning.
3 Preliminary findings
3.1 Student presentations and post-
presentation student-led discussions
As outlined above, the presentations my students have to deliver
involve a certain amount of group work when researching the
topic and putting together a presentation. Moreover, further
group work takes place when the students deal with the post-
presentation student-led discussion. Exploratory practice
Principle 1 (Allwright, 2003, p. 128) emphasizes the ‘quality of
life’ in the language classroom. Since life is necessarily social,
group work may be a good way to improve life in the classroom.
Students have the opportunity to clarify points, practise the
new vocabulary, receive a variety of different points of view and
clarify what is puzzling them about the chosen topic or language
point. This also gives the teacher an opportunity to find out what
is going on in the class by examining the students’ contributions.
An investigation was carried out by giving students a
questionnaire. Since learning about EP as a framework, I wanted
to fully embrace it, especially concerning student feedback as
Principle 6 recommends ‘integrate the work for understanding
into classroom practice’ (Allwright, 2003, p. 128). Additionally, I
wanted to learn more about the students, rather than just focusing
on my own teaching. The main questions I asked were as follows:
• Do you feel you are teaching your classmates something
when you give your presentation?
• Do you feel you are learning from your classmates when you
participate in the class discussion?
Each group of students prepared and found much more material
than I expected and gave a very high standard of content, delivery
and analysis. Some information they brought to class was
completely new to me and I learnt a lot from them. The students
agreed that they learnt a lot from both the student presentations
and the student-led in-class discussion, not only about language
and content knowledge, but also something about co-operation
and teamwork. Further breaking the group down into smaller
subgroups post-presentation took the pressure off the students
and allowed them to express themselves more frequently.
3.2 Work for mutual development
Students have different levels of understanding, as well as
different angles of understanding. Group work allows students
to familiarize themselves with a different point of view on the
topics discussed other than their own, which helps them when
trying to effectively analyze a topic, particularly for their written
report assessment. They definitely saw the benefits of learning
other points of view on the topic from each other. As one student
put it: ‘I can see the problem from different angles after the other
students share their ideas. From their opinions I can learn more.’
3.3 Discussion board work on VLE – blackboard
Some students do not always have the opportunity to voice
their opinions in class during the presentation seminars due
to time constraints, lack of confidence or they simply may feel
they do not know enough about the topic to give an informed
opinion. Group work as guided by EP Principle 3 highlights
the importance of ‘involving everybody’ in the class, each
participant being given the opportunity to practise the target
language (Allwright, 2003, p. 129). However, thanks to the
discussion board, students have the opportunity to continue
giving their opinions and continue the discussion at least
‘virtually’. Although the students are not physically together, they
can still contribute to a collaborative practice.
3.4 Initial findings of VLE use
The main question I asked in the questionnaire about the
discussion board work was:
Do you find the discussion board useful? Why? Why not?
Most students found the discussion board a very useful activity,
particularly the post-discussion board language correction task
feedback. This activity makes it easier for the students to review
and prepare for their written assessment. Students are aware of
the benefits of working collaboratively. One student wrote:

10
‘I love to share and discuss with my peers. Certainly I’ve grown
my knowledge thanks to them’. Another student expressed her
thoughts on this point by saying: ‘I like it because we all learn
together and we all teach at each other’.
Some discussions boards were more successful than others
based on the number of posts made, which suggests student
engagement. When students were asked in a follow-up
questionnaire recorded in class about this they gave a few
reasons why this happened. Most students said that the choice
of presentation topic made a big difference to their level of
contribution, both in the in-class discussion and on the discussion
board thread. They said that if they did not feel they could ‘relate’
to the topic then they did find it more difficult to engage in the
discussion. Another reason for poor student contribution, was
put down to lack of time because of other commitments. Some
learners admitted that they would simply forget to contribute. They
did, however, get motivated if the teacher sent an email reminder
to all the students to contribute to the discussion board. Some
students felt that they would have found it useful if the teacher had
contributed some content to the discussion board or at least ‘kick-
started’ the discussion when the discussion was ‘drying up’. It was
revealed that not all students were aware of the discussion board
email alert system. Some students were unaware of this function
and would have found it a useful tool.
4 Conclusion
The research so far has helped me reinforce my initial ‘feelings’
that the seminar set up is a success for various reasons, despite
the limitations and constraints that I have now been made
more aware of as a result of my EP framework investigations,
observations and student feedback. By following the EP
theoretical framework, I have been able to further clarify what
contributes to the success of my Business English seminars. The
process of my initial research has not only helped the learners to
understand one another, but also helped teachers and learners
develop a mutual understanding of the classroom practice. As this
research is a work in progress, I look forward in anticipation to
see where my journey as an EP research practitioner will take me
next. However, I can say with a strong level of conviction that only
by continuous exploration, and only by successful co-operation
between teachers and students, can the challenges of language
classrooms be resolved.
References
Allwright, D. (2003). A brief guide to Exploratory Practice:
Rethinking practitioner research in language teaching. Language
Teaching Research, 7(2), 113–141.
Allwright, D., & Bailey, K. M. (1991). Focus on the language
classroom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Allwright, D., & Hanks, J. (2009). The developing language learner:
An introduction to exploratory practice. Basingstoke: Palgrave
Macmillan.
Bryman, A. (2012). Social research methods. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Creswell, J. W. (2003). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative,
and mixed methods approaches. London: Sage Publications.
Gieve, S., & Miller, I. K. (2006). Understanding the language
classroom. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Marianna Goral joined Regent’s University in 2008 and is an
EAP Senior Lecturer and Module Leader at Regent’s Institute of
Languages and Culture. She has been teaching EFL and EAP for
over 15 years.
She first started teaching for Berlitz, Poland, training Line
Managers at companies such as Cussons, Bosch and
Volkswagen. Marianna has also worked for various British Council
Accredited Schools in London and as a lecturer at University of
the Arts London.
Since joining Regent’s, Marianna has been lecturing, designing
and delivering Business English Modules, English Skills Modules,
and Business English Modules for the Business and Management
faculty and RILC. She has also designed and delivered various
workshops for staff across the university and RUL international
partnering universities.
One of Marianna’s current focuses and commitments includes
working on a two-year research project called ‘Developing
Language Teacher Research’. In 2015, she presented her initial
findings at conferences at MGIMO University, Moscow and
Regent’s University, London and gave a poster presentation at
IATEFL in Birmingham in April 2016.

Corporate portrait in press releases:
The case of banking institutions
Abstract
Press releases are powerful, yet subtle, bodies of texts that can
be used to paint a corporate portrait of an institution. However,
with the gap in research in the investigation of external corporate
communication (Jacobs, 1999), little is known of the manner
in which these press releases can be effectively used to an
institution’s corporate advantage. Thus, the current study aims
to outline the various forms of self-descriptions in press releases
implemented by ten of the top financial institutions in the world,
and highlight how these respectable institutions promote their
function in society and validate their continual dominance and
existence in the national and global economic community.
Keywords: English for Specific Purposes (ESP), corporate
communication, corporate identity, needs analysis, discourse,
press release, linguistics, journalism, business marketing
1 Introduction
The importance of what an institution sees as relevant to be
projected at a particular time (Weizman, 2006) results in the
richness of press releases (Alcoceba-Hernando, 2010). Despite
this richness, until recently, communications that take place
between an organisation and its external stakeholders were
largely ignored (Jacobs, 1999) and focus was given only to the
institution-internal communications such as communication
between and within departments. This has a significant impact
on English for Specific Purposes (ESP) pedagogy as it widens
the uncertainty space in the conduction of needs analysis (Long,
2005). In turn, lesson preparation and materials development
continue to suffer from an ensemble of educators’ beliefs
instead of circumstantial evidence from the actual discourse of
professional institutions. Therefore, this article attempts to fill
the gap in research for institutional external communication, and
simultaneously, address the prospect of a more informed needs
analysis resource for ESP pedagogy. Specifically, the current
study will focus on the implementation of self-description as
the linguistic unit used in painting corporate portraits in press
releases.
The mass media is a ‘powerful force in our society’ (Thomas,
Wareing, Singh, Peccei, Thornborrow, & Jones, 1999, p. 57)
because of the nature in which it operates. The form and
content of the media are highly strategic and very selective as
it is reflective of the image that an institution wants to convey.
However, Jacobs and Sluers (2005) noted that the general
public has the ultimate power of either accepting the content
of the media or rejecting it altogether. So, much thought and
justification are needed to produce the most efficient and
publicly-acceptable ‘external communication [that can] transmit
the image, the principles and functions of [an] organisation’
(Garcia-Rivas, 2003, p. 35).
There are several factors that need to be present in press
releases, and one of them is being newsworthy. Bell (1991)
outlined four qualities that make a press release newsworthy.
These include 1) ‘relevance’, referring to how familiar the
reported issue in the press release is, 2) ‘personalisation’,
questioning whether a reported issue is relatable to the
individual reader, 3) ‘eliteness’, referring to the presence of
famous individuals that may be a much more interesting read
when compared to the story of ordinary people, and also 4)
‘facticity’, referring to the inclusion of facts in the press release.
The need to satisfy the function of projecting a good image
of the company, and satisfying the public’s expectations
(hence, being newsworthy) are essential elements to balance in
taking advantage of the potential power that the media stores
(Alcoceba-Hernando, 2010; Wei, 2002).
2 Corporate portrait in press releases
Press releases are predominantly a textual corporate portrait of
a given institution, which includes the institution’s definition of
who they are, what they do and what they are concerned about
(Canel, 2007). Identity projection, or corporate portrait painting,
is the part where the institution ‘creates and maintains a positive
corporate image and good investor relations’ (McLaren & Gurau˘
2005, p. 11), and ‘shape reader’s opinion about the institution’
(Gilpin, 2010, p. 282). Hence, organisations can use press
releases to present themselves in a positive light to the public
that simultaneously justify their presence in the economic
environment. These factors necessarily translate to the fact
that press releases serve to strategically inform and promote a
company (Maleková, 2013) because of the elements that need to
be included in a limited space for a productive outcome.
In Gilpin’s (2010) study, ‘core’ and ‘narrative’ identities were
coined, which referred to techniques in painting a self-portrait
of an institution. The former refers to what the institution is
constantly identifying itself with. In the current study, it is
expected that the institutions under study will constantly portray
the image of being a financial institution. Meanwhile, the latter
is more fluid and ad hoc in nature. ‘Narrative’ identity depends
on the changes in the environment of the stakeholders. This
dependence means that issues of ‘managing finances’ may
be seen to be relevant during the Christmas period, but less
so when disaster happens. ‘Charity’ issues may be more
relevant then. Thus, Cotter’s (2011, p. 1898) observation was
accurate when he suggested that ‘both community-internal
and community-external values operate in news production
processes.’ Both forms of identities are equally important
inputs to be considered in painting corporate portraits of
the institutions.
Mayyer Ling, Universiti Brunei Darussalam
Email: mayyer.ling@ubd.edu.bn

12
3 Methodology
This section will be divided into two subsections: data collection,
which focuses on the corpus under study, and data analysis,
which discusses the analysis done on descriptions of self by
the chosen banking institution in press releases in order to paint
their respective corporate portraits.
3.1 Data collection
The corpus used in this study consist of 100 press releases from
ten banks that occupy the top 20 spots in The Banker’s list of
top 1,000 banks 2014. The corpus will henceforth be referred
to as the WB Corpus in the rest of this article. Some banks in
the top ten spots did not have enough press release samples
that met the criteria for the data selection and, hence, the
collection of texts was extended to banks that occupy the top
20 spots. The financial institutions included in the WB Corpus
are Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of America, Bank of China
(Hong Kong), Banque Nationale de Paris and Banque de Paris et
des Pays-Bas, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Industrial and
Commercial Bank of China, JPMorgan Chase, Lloyds Banking
Group and Société Générale, in alphabetical order. A total of
100 press releases from the respective media sections of these
institutions’ websites was gathered, ten from each institution.
The total number of words in the WB Corpus was 42,392, with
each text sample having between 114 and 1,285 words.
There were two criteria to pass the data selection process. The
first criterion was that each of these press releases had to be
obtained from the issuing institution’s website, specifically their
respective media section. The criterion allowed raw data to be
collected for analysis, with the authentic lexis and style from the
institutions themselves to reflect their use of this communication
channel. The second criterion was that the selected texts must
be non-financial-heavy press releases. This meant that the
selected press releases have to deal with topics such as the
announcement of workshops, charities, or sponsorships, and
not quarterly financial reports or annual profit reports. This
criterion was set because preliminary observations indicated
that financial-heavy press releases have very minimal size lexis
(aside from jargon particular to the industry) and heavy numeric
content that is seen as irrelevant for the purpose of the study.
With this criteria in place, the ten latest non-financial-heavy
press releases published were selected from each of the ten
selected banks’ websites.
3.2 Data analysis
Each of the press releases in the corpora were analysed
manually, and any description of the issuing institution was
highlighted. These descriptions were then given a summative
title. Similar-natured summative titles were compiled, and types
were assigned to them. These types were further compiled
into categories of description. The visual representation of the
outcome of this procedure can be found in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Visual summary of self-descriptions category and
type in WB Corpus
All the categories and types were inductively assigned to the
descriptions after looking at the emerging patterns in the text.
The details of description labels and examples from WB Corpus
are in Table 1.
Table 1: Details of description category and types from the WB
Corpus
Description category Description type
Nature of institution:
Description that
revolves around the
direct function of the
institution, i.e., banking/
finance related
Institution-function specific:
Readers of the press release
can tell the nature and function
of the institution, i.e., a banking
institution.
Non-institution-function
specific: Readers of the press
release cannot tell the nature and
function of the institution, i.e., may
be seen as a generic institution.
Projected priorities:
Descriptions that target
a particular population,
or addresses a particular
issue
Stakeholders: Any human entity
or a group of individuals who were
addressed in the description of
the institution.
Others: Descriptions where the
highlighted element was not the
primary nature of the institution,
nor does it fit the stakeholders
category.
There are overlaps in all the description types in most of the
press releases analysed. This means that, in some press
releases, all four types of descriptions were implemented to
paint the corporate portrait of the institution. A sample of the
process of data analysis is provided in Table 2.

Table 2: Sample of data analysis from the WB Corpus
Press release Description analysis Description category (type)
Deutsche Bank wins Best Administrator – Over $30bn Single
Manager
HFM Week has recognised Deutsche Bank’s leadership in fund
services at its annual European Services Awards. Deutsche Bank’s
leadership in fund services has been recognised by HFM Week in
its annual European Services Awards for 2014.
Deutsche Bank was named Best Administrator – Over $30bn
Single Manager, the first time that such an accolade has been
awarded to the Bank in this space.
HFM Week’s editorial team decides upon the winners of its
awards, which were announced at a lunch in London on 27 March
2014. Deutsche Bank Fund Services was also shortlisted as most
innovative fund administrator (USD 30bn-plus).
Mike Hughes, Global Head of Fund Services, commented: ‘This is
a milestone in the evolution of our alternatives business.
Winning this award is a reflection of significant growth – in terms
of assets under administration, our global footprint and our
reputation in the marketplace.
Over the last few years, we have invested around the world in our
people, technology and products to cater for new, dynamic asset
classes.
As a result, we now have award-winning products in each of
the core segments in which we compete: private equity, fund of
hedge fund, managed accounts and single manager products and
services.’
Deutsche Bank Fund Services is a leading provider of fund
administration services to the alternative investments segments.
It is part of the Bank’s Trust & Securities Services business within
the Global Transaction Banking division.
Bank’s commitment to
leadership
Described as ‘the Bank’
Described as a ‘fund
administrator’
Described as having
alternative business
Described as undergoing
corporate growth
Committed to being an
investing corporation
Described as a provider
of multiple finance-related
services
Described as a fund provider
Described as part of a larger
financial body
Projected priorities (Others:
Products)
Nature of institution
(institution-function specific)
Nature of institution (non-
institution-function specific)
Nature of institution (non-
institution-function specific)
Projected priorities
(stakeholders: people, others:
technology, products)
All press releases went through the same process of manual
identification of self-description and individual assignment of
description category and types. This process was repeated
multiple times until an 80% intra-rater reliability rate was
achieved.
To provide a more diverse picture of the descriptions
implemented in press releases released by the corporate
communications division of the institutions in the Corpus, Table
3 is included in this section.

14
Table 3: Category and type examples from WB Corpus
Category Type Examples
Nature of
institution
Institution-
function specific
• This makes Société Générale the first bank to set up this sort of system ...
• As a responsible large commercial bank, Agricultural Bank of China (ABC) has been
taking cultural industry as one of its strategic focuses for ...
Non-institution-
function specific
• ... The BNP Paribas Group has received recognition as one of Europe’s most
attractive employers ...
• Adhering to the ‘customer-centred’ business philosophy, ABC adopts ...
Projected Priority Stakeholders • ... Signifying the firm’s deepened commitment to military families.
• Their initiatives ensure that social capital is built in all regions in which the bank
operates.
Others • Bank of America has been named as a leader in climate change performance ...
• ... Reflects both organizations’ focus on thinking for tomorrow by acting today, using
arts as a powerful facilitator ...
In Table 3, the samples of description of the nature of institution
category are predictable in that it highlighted the nature of
the organisation as being either a finance-based institution or
simply as an organisation, but added details that promote the
institution according to the overall theme of the press release.
Stakeholders specifically contained elements related to global
concerns and also the national population. These descriptions
can be as specific as military families or as broad as customers
and social capital. As for the description type others, the picture
is more diverse. As can be imagined, an organisation, especially
the ones that are as established as those included in the
Corpus would have multiple priorities in their portfolios, which
depend on the needs of the global and national community in
which they serve. For instance, in Table 3, it was demonstrated
that the institution was described as one that is monitoring its
climate change performance, and another one that promotes art
in its programmes. Therefore, the corporate social responsibility
activities are always accompanied by the institutions’, and
sometimes the public’s, priorities in the descriptions.
Table 4: Numeric summary of self-description found in WB Corpus*
Self-descriptions Count
Detailed breakdown for projected priorities
Stakeholders Count Others Count
Nature of institution Customers 26 Green/sustainability 13
Institution-function specific 36 Nation 16 Education 4
Non-institution-function specific 18 Staff 8 Culture 2
Projected priorities Clients 8 Economy 2
Stakeholders 90 Bank itself 8 Charity 1
Others 28 Military 7 Product 1
*Data from 74 press releases
Finance industry 5 Arts 1
Employers 3 Ethic 1
Women 3 Social 1
Investors 1 Leadership 1
Issuers 1 Volunteering 1
Retailers 1
Young adults 1
Children 1
Disabled 1
4 Results
There were a total of 74 press releases out of 100 in the corpus
containing self-descriptions of the issuing instructions. The rest
of the textual press releases not included in the analysis were
primarily issued to make an announcement to the public. Table
4 provides a numeric summary of the results from the press
release analysis.

Table 4 paints a colourful corporate portrait as far as banking
institutions are concerned. On the note of caution that there
were only 74 press releases in the corpus included in the
analysis, the institution-function specific description type was
used more than the non-institution-function specific descriptions
to describe the nature of the institution. This is an expected
result as these descriptions serve as reminders of what role
the institution plays in the community. Projected priorities, on
the other hand, was used more than the nature of institution
for self-description, which taps further into the role that they
play in the community, and also who their target audience is
(stakeholders) and what else they prioritise (others). Table 4 also
shows that the institutions in the WB Corpus prefer to specify
their stakeholders as their priority, specifically their respective
customers and the population in which they are serving, the
nation. It is also worth noting that the priorities of the institution
have not always adhered to finance-related responsibilities
despite being a banking institution, with the inclusion of Green/
sustainability and education-related commitments in their
descriptions.
5 Discussion
There are two functions of press releases as highlighted by
Maleková (2013), which are to inform (journalistic end) and
promote (promotional end) the issuing institution. In the present
study, there was no clear indication that the corporate institution
favours one function over the other, except in raw number. The
implementation of projected priorities was numerically higher
than nature of institution, 118 and 54 occurrences respectively.
This is because the descriptions analysed were, more often
than not, occurring side by side with the noun that refers
to the organisation and descriptions of other social actors’
self-description was not analysed. However, based on the
self-description analysis carried out, these organisations tried
to balance between advertising their nature as an institution
that deserves to be acknowledged by the public (either as a
financial institution, or as an organisation with other desirable
qualities resulting in an informative function). At the same time,
the institutions also tried to adhere to the public’s expectations
(by projecting the idea that what is important for the public
is equally important for them as an organisation, resulting
in a promotional function). The informative nature of press
releases was demonstrated with the use of nature of institution
descriptions. The promotional nature was projected with the use
of projected priorities which may not even be finance-related.
This, however, suggests the flexible, relevant and accountable
nature of the institutions in the WB Corpus. These institutions
are flexible enough to incorporate many needs, wants and
concerns of the public into their corporate social responsibility
by identifying themselves with the issue in press releases with
the use of self-description. Further, the institutions in the WB
Corpus use their fluid narrative identity (Gilpin, 2010) to carry
out corporate social responsibility by addressing changes in
the community in which they are serving. This is an attempt to
continue to be relevant to the community. They are also seen
to be accountable due to the manner in which they correlate
themselves with the functions that they play in the society to
validate their existence in the economic community with the
direct announcement of their function and priorities.
These organisations choose to address their need for
recognition as an institution and simultaneously justify their
existence in the surrounding community by addressing
society’s multiple needs and fulfilling their expectations in
order to harness support from the public. By doing this, the
organisations are actually satisfying some of Bell’s (1991)
criteria of being newsworthy. One example is education, which
was seen to be one of the priorities that was projected in the
corpus. First, institutions are tackling issues that are familiar to
the community they are serving, such as prioritising education
(i.e., relevance). Then, since institutions are responding to the
demands of the public, they are simultaneously responding
to issues that are relatable to the public. For instance, in the
corpus, education was one of the prominent issues, despite the
institutions in the WB Corpus not being an education-institute.
This will be a priority among a community that is trying to find
an education scheme that fits the young generations, possibly
because parents among the community believe that it will help
their children do better in schools (i.e., relatability). Mentioning
prominent names in the education sector who are proponents
of education (i.e., eliteness) – such as the inclusion of quotes
from prominent figures who supports early childhood education
– will further improve the level of newsworthiness of the press
release. This prominent figure could even be the CEO of the
financial institution itself who willingly vows to provide financial
assistance for the perusal of education. Finally, the inclusion
of facts that reflect the beliefs of the public will further make
the press release newsworthy. This could include how children
can benefit from having exposure to education at a young age
(i.e., facticity). Unfortunately, facticity cannot be shown in the
analysis of self-description, but Bell’s (1991) three other factors
were seen to be present in the analyses. Nonetheless, the
corporate portrait of the institution is clearly painted in the
form of the function and priorities that the organisation carries
out in the society embedded in the description of self in their
press releases.
Further, both core and narrative identity (Gilpin, 2010) was
colourfully demonstrated in the press releases analysed. The
former was more static and is what keeps the core purpose of
an organisation intact (i.e., for financial institutions the ultimate
goal would be in line with financial stability). The latter depended
on what the public sees as newsworthy, in a particular social
condition or time. The Corpus contained organisations focused
on using various means to project a consistent and diverse
corporate portrait of the institution. They are consistent in the
sense that elements that were seen to be important such as
their function as an organisation are prominently reflected in
the nature of bank category descriptions, thus reflective of the
core identity. Meanwhile, their priorities as an organisation were
clearly reflected in projected priorities category descriptions,
which is in turn reflective of narrative identity. Since community
internal and organisation internal factors play a role in the
production of press releases (Cotter, 2011), the consistency
in identity projection is a plausible struggle for institutions
in the Corpus. This is because changes in the stakeholder’s
environment can be very fast-paced while changes internal to
the organisation may be relatively slow. The former is dependent
on trends, while the latter is in accordance with the mission
and vision of an organisation. So far, it can be suggested the
WB Corpus is a collection of global-reaching (i.e., humanistic)
institutions, institutions which are already established and
have a wider audience to address. This necessarily translates
to the use of overarching descriptions in their press releases
that can be used to simultaneously address ever-changing

16
national and global audience’s concerns (Weizman, 2006) and,
at the same time, stay true to their role as a financial institution.
This demonstrates the balancing act that institutions have to
carry out in addressing the need of their audiences apart from
their own (Alcoceba-Hernando, 2010; Wei, 2002) by constantly
switching roles (Thomas et al., 1999) in accordance to their
clients’ needs as well as their own.
The institutions in the corpus undoubtedly had a wide
range of roles to play. To demonstrate, institutions from the
corpus identified themselves as proponents of sustainability,
education, culture, economy, charity, product, arts, ethic, social
(development), leadership and volunteering. This is not to say
that the WB Corpus institutions do not care for other elements
important to the local community, such as housing, health,
security and service. However, when an institution is showing
what they are concerned about, especially formally, for instance,
with the use of self-descriptions in press releases, this is seen
as part of their identity projection (Canel, 2007), or corporate
portrait painting. So, the absence of certain priorities that are
present in the Corpus simply suggests that it is not used as a
description of the institution and thus is not what the institutions
choose to identify themselves with. The choices that institutions
make in terms of the self-descriptions to be used in their press
releases projects the effort in the upkeeping of the corporate
portrait (McLaren & Gurau˘, 2005) as there is an active selection
process happening internally, and the weighing of which change
in the stakeholders’ environment will bring the most benefit to
the institution, should they choose to identify themselves with
the change. The most beneficial identification will not only boost
the institution’s corporate image, but also increase its credibility
and thus, improve investor relations (McLaren & Gurau˘, 2005).
This is because the strategic selection process will allow the
institution to stay focused on their role as a financial body.
Consequently, neither will the institution be overwhelmed with
accommodating the needs, wants and concerns of the society in
which they serve, nor will they be blatantly ignoring the societal
needs, wants and concerns. In other words, they are still
carrying out corporate social responsibility, albeit selectively.
Indeed, the press release inherently functions as a mode of
external communication from the institution in the WB Corpus
with the public (Garcia-Rivas, 2003). Thus, despite the fact that
the power to accept or reject painted corporate portrait is in
the hands of the public (Jacobs & Sluers, 2005), an institution
will always have the upper hand in presenting the options for
which the public is to accept or reject. These options are the
result of strategic balancing of the core and narrative identity,
identification of functions and priorities, with the use of linguistic
resources in the form of self-description, which puts the issuing
institution in the most advantageous position in the context of
the population in which they serve.
6 Conclusion
Institutions in the WB Corpus, in accordance with the
analysis done on the self-description implemented by the
issuing institution, seemed to be global-reaching, humanistic
organisations with multi-faceted clienteles. The descriptions
chosen to paint the corporate portrait of the institution
seemed to be generic to the banking industry (i.e., that are not
determined by the size of the institution), with diverse
stakeholder terms (i.e., that are not confined to a social stratum
in a community) and global concerns (i.e., issues that are
generally faced by the global citizens, such as the issue of
sustainability). As a result, the institutions in the corpus were
seen to have a firm core identity in contrast with its fairly fluid
narrative identity. Since the press releases used in this study
were authentic and the institutions are top performers in the
financial playing field, the results of the study allow the corporate
portrait-painting techniques to be outlined to a certain extent.
First, self-descriptions are tools that are useful techniques
in producing a corporate portrait and as a form of direct
communication with the public. Second, institutions do have
the upper hand in deciding what to identify themselves with
and do not necessarily have to address needs, wants and
concerns of the public in its entirety. However, not addressing
the needs, wants and concerns at all will also possibly have
an adverse effect on the institution’s corporate portrait. And
third, the decision that is made in terms of the self-description
elements used has to adhere to the core identity and function of
the issuing institution, not overshadow it in the attempt to obtain
the public’s support. In sum, decision-making in the production
of press releases by the issuing institutions has a potentially
enduring influence on the outcome of the corporate portrait
presented to the public.
However, with a limited sample size and without proper
organisational insider’s knowledge about these institutions,
it can be difficult to fully justify these techniques that I have
suggested. Nonetheless, it does address the gap in literature
as far as external communication channels (Jacobs, 1999) is
concerned and it can thus be used as a baseline for further
external corporate communication investigations. In terms
of pedagogy, the current study is relevant to a wide range of
disciplines including Corporate Communication, Journalism
and Business Marketing. Thus, English for Specific Purposes
educators can utilise the current study as a point of reference
for needs analysis (Long, 2005), and the betterment of lesson
preparations and material development for their target
respective disciplines. In terms of further research, investigation
can be extended to genre analysis in identifying effective
corporate portrait painting techniques for the different purposes
and intentions of the institutions with the use of press releases.
A take-away from this study is that institutions can use linguistic
indicators in the form of self-descriptions to parallel their
intention and corporate portrait. In so doing, much thought
and justification is needed as input for the production of press
releases. The writers of the press releases are to ensure that
the self-description are in line with the institution’s goals, and
are, simultaneously, addressing the most advantageous need,
want and concern in the stakeholder’s environment. This allows
the importance of both parties to be reflected, despite the fact
that the institution is the ultimate choice-giver and thus, have
the upper hand in this communication channel, and the press
releases issued can carry both the informative and promotional
functions that they are supposed to carry.
References
Alcoceba-Hernando, J. A. (2010). Analysis of institutional press
releases and its visibility in the press. Revista Latina de
Communicacion Social, 65, 354–367.
˘
˘

Bell, A. (1991). The language of news media. Oxford: Blackwell.
Canel, M. J. (2007). La comunicación de las instituciones
públicas. Madrid: Editorial Tecnos.
Cotter, C. (2011). Diversity awareness and the role of language in
cultural representation in news stories. Journal of Pragmatics,
43, 1890–1899.
Garcia-Rivas, M. I. (2003). Presente de la información
institucional de la Universidad española. El caso de la
Universidad de Murcia. Comunicación y Sociedad, 16(1),
29–56.
Gilpin, D. R. (2010). Organizational image construction in a
fragmented online media environment. Journal of Public
Relations Research, 22(3), 165–287.
Jacobs, G. (1999) Preformulating the news. Amsterdam: John
Benjamins.
Jacobs, G., & Sluers, K. (2005). Beyond preformulation: An
ethnographic perspective on press releases. Journal of
Pragmatics, 37, 1251–1273.
Long, M. H. (Ed.). (2005). Second language needs analysis.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Maleková, D. (2013). Self-reference in the leads of institutional
press releases. Brno Studies in English, 39, 41–58.
McLaren, Y., & Gurau˘, C. (2005). Characterising the genre of the
corporate press release. LSP and Professional Communication
(LSPPC), 5(1), 10–30.
Thomas, L., Wareing, S., Singh, I., Peccei, J. S., Thornborrow,
J., & Jones, J. (1999). Language, society and power: An
introduction. London: Routledge.
Wei, Y. K. (2002). Corporate image as collective ethos: A
poststructuralist approach. Corporate Communications: An
International Journal, 7(4), 269–276.
Weizman, E. (2006). Roles and identities in news interviews: The
Israeli context. Journal of Pragmatics, 38, 154–179.
Mayyer Ling is an aspiring academic who is currently working
as a research assistant at Universiti Brunei Darussalam.
Her research interests lie in the area of applied linguistics,
ranging from English for Speciﬁc Purposes, Professional
Communication, and Intercultural Communication.

18
Advertising language: An effective
marketing tool
Vaishali J. Shinde, NIIT University, Neemrana, Rajasthan-301705 (India)
Email: vaishali1902@gmail.com
Abstract
In today’s multi-tasking world, greater responsibility has been
laid on companies to utilise marketing strategies which satisfy
the urge for intellectual, rational and emotional presentations
and satisfy customers. When a company develops a product,
there is a need to establish contact with the target market so as
to sell the product. Moreover, this has to be a mass contact as
the company is interested in reaching out to a large number of
people and the most effective tool of mass communication is
advertising.
This paper reviews ‘Advertising as a promotional component of
marketing communication’ as the case study in linguistics and
pragmatics. Further, to elaborate this function of advertisement,
the researcher analyses the significant features of advertising
language in both print and audiovisual advertisements on
Indian television. Advertising language is a kind of register
which demonstrates the unique features that distinguish it from
normal language (Krishnaswamy, Verma, & Nagarajan, 1992,
pp. 28–29). These features are observed at all levels of analysis
– phonological, lexical, syntactic, semantic, pragmatic and
rhetorical/stylistic (Shinde, 2015).
Keywords: marketing, advertising, advertising language,
linguistics, pragmatics, phonology, semantics, syntax, rhetoric
1 Introduction
Marketing is the process by which companies determine what
products or services may be of interest to customers. It also
generates the strategies to develop sales techniques and
to build strong customer relationships. Marketing is used to
identify the customer, satisfy the customer and maintain the
customer for a longer time. Such customer-oriented marketing
management is one of the major components of business
management. The concept of marketing believes that achieving
organisational goals depends on knowing the needs and wants
of target markets, and delivering the desired satisfactions. It
proposes that, in order to satisfy its organisational objectives,
an organisation should anticipate the needs and wants of
consumers and satisfy these more effectively than competitors.
Marketing has been evolving over the last two to three
centuries to develop new markets and to satisfy the needs of
this new ever-expanding market. This development has led
to the enhancement of existing marketing strategies where
communication plays a vital role.
2 Marketing communication
Marketing depends largely on the effective communication
flow between the company and the consumer. It is essential to
propagate the distinctive features of the product. Traditionally,
the known ‘promotional mix’ (Ajagaonkar & Patkar, 2005)
included personal selling, advertising, sales promotion and
publicity. Today, besides the promotion mix, the company
attempts to communicate with the consumer through quality
products, attractive packages, written messages, pictures,
symbols, attractive showrooms and efficient salespeople. When
the various stimuli instigated from these sources are received
and interpreted by the consumer, marketing communication
takes place. Marketing communication is ‘the endeavour
of presenting a set of messages to a target market through
multiple cues and media, with the intention of creating a
favourable response from the market for the company’s total
product offering and, simultaneously, providing market feedback
for improving and modifying the offering’.
In today’s multi-tasking world, greater responsibility has been
laid on companies to utilise those strategies which would satisfy
the urge for intellectual, rational and emotional presentations
and to satisfy all urges, advertising is the most effective
marketing strategy.
3 Advertising as a promotional
component of marketing
communication
When a company develops a product, there is a need to
establish contact with the target market so as to sell the product.
Moreover, this has to be a mass contact as the company is
interested in reaching out to a large number of people and the
most effective tool of mass communication is advertising.
The term ‘advertising’ originated from the Latin word ‘adverto’
which means to turn round. Advertising, thus, denotes the means
employed to draw attention to any object or purpose. Advertising
has existed for almost 3,000 years. Earlier, it used to be in the
form of shouting and announcing the product. Thus, with gradual
development since the 15th century, advertising has turned into
a major industry in the 21st century. To meet the challenges
of rapidly advancing commercialism, the advertising of the
age is cleverly using all kinds of media, including newspapers,
television, direct mail, radio, magazines, outdoor signs and, of
course, the internet to generate interest and entertain in order to
survive.
Advertising uses different tools to make it more effective,
interesting and entertaining. However, language plays a
significant role among all the audio, visual and audiovisual
tools. This paper highlights the advertising language as an
effective marketing tool with reference to the advertisements in
print and television media. Moreover, this paper analyses the
features of the advertising language in terms of the marketing
functions it performs.

4 Significant features of advertising
language
Once the type of copy (e.g., testimonial, rationale, competitive,
teaser, institutional, announcement, dialogue, reminder, topical,
prestige, narrative, gimmick or illustrative copy) is decided and
the message to be conveyed is finalised, the copywriter has to
decide how the language of his copy will achieve the desired
impact on the target consumers. According to Leech (1966, p.
27), ‘to be a success, a typical advertisement must accomplish
four things in sequence: attention value – it must draw attention
to itself; readability (or listenability) – it must sustain the interest
it has attracted by using simple, personal and colloquial style
with a familiar vocabulary, and by finding out how easy it is to
predict individual words from their environment; memorability – it
must be remembered, or at any rate recognised as familiar; and
selling power – it must prompt the right kind of action’. Moreover,
Leech says that language plays different roles to accomplish
these four things; in fact, many characteristics of the advertising
language can be directly related to one of the four principles
listed and the advertising language can be studied under these
respective principles. The specific features of the language need
to be looked into as they are used to form the message to hold
the target consumers spellbound. These features are related
to lexical, syntactic, semantic or stylistic presentation of the
content.
4.1 Phonological features
A number of distinct features of the advertising language are
observed at this level. The use of pause-stress-intonation
variations is apparent in audiovisual advertisements. Many
audiovisual advertisements exhibit the marked features at
this level. For example, the use of single words or groups
as questions with intonation variation, as in the television
commercial of Garnier Men Deodorant – ‘Wet patches?’ and
‘Sweat?’. Moreover, the use of stress on the significant words
and the use of pauses convey specific meanings. The print
advertisements, however, observe the repetition of sounds,
words and the structural patterns to create rhythm in the copy.
4.2 Lexical features
The words selected for advertisements are eye-catching,
attractive and appealing. The vocabulary is used according
to the target audience or readers – simple and easy to
comprehend. Advertising language makes use of different kinds
of vocabulary – active vocabulary in the form of colloquial, slang
and simple words, and passive vocabulary in the form of formal,
learned and technical words.
Advertisements of electronic products like the Sony Car Music
System – 2DIN MP3 player with USB/iPod 1 wire control and
Samsung 3D LED TV – HyperReal 3d Engine, real D 3D and
video conversion, dynamic, incredible, immersive, complimentary,
ultra-slim use a number of technical words to elaborate
the technological features. Public service or institutional
advertisements like Save Our Tigers and Accenture – aligned,
maximise, margin of error, outthink, out-execute, drivers,
execution, competitive weapon, operational excellence and
the idiomatic usage – to be in shape, use a number of formal
and learned vocabulary. Advertisements of products like LG
Side-by-Side Refrigerator – high fashion, a diva, stunning, trim
kit art, marble exterior finish, a fashion statement, exquisite
art, a wonderful impression and trim kit art and Laopala – diva,
dazzle and fine art, which try to appeal to the aesthetic sense of
consumers, make creative use of the language. Thus, the type of
the product determines the use of words.
Advertisements are full of adjectives and adverbs to highlight
the relative merits and features of the products and services in
terms of price, quality, quantity, utility, durability, convenience,
welfare, etc. A limited range of evaluative adjectives like
new, clean, white, real, fresh, right, natural, big, great, slim,
soft, wholesome, improved, etc., is frequently used. In
advertisements, the use of second-person pronouns addresses
an audience effectively with a friendly attitude, for example, the
print advertisement of Amway – We care about your weight, your
heartbeat and the fact that you love playing with your kid even
after a tiring day. Experimentation with vocabulary is also done,
such as neologisms or coinages, which means the formation of
new words, for example, the print advertisement of Sugar Free
D’lite – lite and D’lite. Such words are appreciable, acceptable
and clear in meaning, and have the same supporting context;
they may be new, but not out of the context and at the same
time, with the novelty impact.
Advertising normally emphasises the positive side of a product;
the negative sides are overshadowed. In concealing the negative
side, sometimes misleading or ‘weasel’ words are used. These
are words that suggest a meaning without actually being
specific. For example, words like helps, enriched, fresh, tested,
guaranteed, scientific, homemade, etc., when used alone don’t
make clear sense. Certain words are frequently repeated to
reaffirm the impression that companies want the audience to
feel, to tie the pictures/images created in advertisements to the
product they are trying to sell. Thus, the words are used cleverly
and effectively to charm the consumers.
Due to the lack of retention value, audiovisual media is more
repetitive than print media. Such repetition is used to highlight
and reinforce the information to be remembered for a longer
time. For example, in the television commercial of Sunsilk
Blackshine, to highlight the co-creation by the experts, the
word expert is repeated thrice. Moreover, the quick and fluent
communication in the audiovisual media leads to the contraction
of the words to save time. For example, the advertisements of
Colgate 360o
ActiFlex – It’s and He’s, Save Our Tigers – won’t
and I’m, Garnier Men Deodorant – there’s, Sugar Free D’Lite –
’ve and it’s and LG Side-by-Side Refrigerator – won’t, what’s,
let’s, life’s and what’s.
4.3 Syntactic features
At this level, advertisers do many experiments to attract the
attention of the consumers. The advertisers make use of all the
modes of discourse – discursive, disjunctive and abbreviated
modes. The discursive mode is used where detailed explanation
and illustration are needed; the disjunctive mode – only single
words, phrases or clauses are used as sentences to achieve
instant impact as in the headlines, the signature lines and the
supers in the form of naming labels, noun groups and block
language; and the abbreviated mode is skilfully blended with
both the preceding modes. Moreover, the use of declarative,
imperative and interrogative sentences is evident with all kinds
of structures – simple, compound and complex. Sentences in
advertisements are simple, generally in present tense; most
often, complex sentences are avoided to avoid ambiguity in

20
interpretation. Structures used in advertisements usually appeal
more. Short sentences are used frequently for the impact on the
reader in terms of clarity and retention. All types of sentences,
namely declarative sentences, interrogative sentences,
exclamatory sentences and also imperative sentences, are widely
used to achieve specific objectives. Most of the time, rhetorical
questions are used to evoke thinking. They impart the message
with persuasive effect without expectation of a reply, for example,
the question in the National Egg Co-ordination Committee
advertisement – ‘Did you know?’. Such questions raise curiosity
in the minds of the audience.
4.4 Semantic features
Different kinds of meanings (Leech, 1981) are used. The
comprehension level of meaning is kept simple and ambiguity
is avoided. However, sometimes, semantic ambiguity is created
with the use of a pun, i.e., using a word with two different
meanings. For example, in the print advertisement of Kohler – the
word ‘flip’ is used, firstly, to convey the ‘flipping’ nature of the
shower and, secondly, to mean ‘to change’. Due to complexity
at the lexical and the syntactic levels, understanding of meaning
is more difficult in print media compared with the audiovisual
media. For example, the advertisements of Colgate 360o
ActiFlex
(Flexible Action Bridge: Helps clean in-between & around teeth
more effectively. Pogo Ball: Improves torsion movement, to firm
up mouth-feel.) Samsung 3D LED TV, Accenture, D’Decor Home
Fabrics, Garnier Men Deodorant, Sugar Free D’Lite and LG Side-
by-Side Refrigerator.
4.5 Pragmatic features
Semantics deals with the direct exploration of the meaning of a
sentence at a surface level, whereas pragmatics deals with the
contextual, i.e., implied or suggested meanings in a particular
context/situation. According to Austin (1970), ‘some utterances
are not used just to say things, but rather actively to do things’.
Advertisements only offer us text; it is our own experiences and
knowledge that allow us to make meaning out of what we see
and also hear in the case of the audiovisual advertisements. In
advertising language, Dyer (1982, p. 187) says, ‘… it is important
to be aware not just of the content, but also of the structure of
signs in ads, the way meanings are exchanged, the way signifier
and signified work, the way ads incorporate other reference
systems and ideologies (even advertising itself), and the way they
structure us into the advertisement and call upon us to create
meaning.’ They appeal to the wider range of major aspects of life
like standard of living, social and economic status, employment
needs, social belief system, marriage, learning, etc., and also
the minute aspects of human life like motives, attitudes, habits,
likes, dislikes, beliefs, ideas and so on. Advertising language
can achieve different types of appeal, such as rational appeal,
where logical and rational explanations about the brand are
provided, moral appeal, where the ethical practices in the
company or ethical importance of the product is elaborated and
emotional appeal where various emotions of the consumers
are stirred. For example, emotional appeal in Johnson and
Johnson advertisements or rational appeal in the industrial,
institutional or public service advertisements like the Save Our
Tiger advertisement. Advertisements work by appealing to our
needs – social needs like friendship and love, and physical needs
like food, warmth, and shelter. Thus, the pragmatic features
(Leech, 1983; Levinson, 1983) of advertising language work
towards achieving psychological as well as sociological impact.
To achieve this impact, advertising language also makes use
of narrative skills by using a particular cultural or social context
(Cutting, 2008) as in the advertisements of Platinum Love Bands.
4.6 Rhetorical/Stylistic features
‘Advertising language’ is part and parcel of ‘normal language’.
It is, in fact, derived from ‘normal’ or ‘standard’ language, but
with certain unique features and devices. The commonly used
rhetorical devices of the figures of speech (Leech, 1969) are
personification, as in the advertisements of NutriChoice – Hello
Diabetes, Let’s Cut the Sweet Talk, hyperbole and metaphor
in Arrow – The Fabric of Power, the Style of Presidents, code
switching, i.e., blending two languages as in the television
commercial of Garnier Men Deodorant – Par condition jo bhi
ho ... mein rehta hoon fresh and Ab life, no sweat. In advertising
language, these features are used for more immediate and
persuasive effect.
The lexical and syntactic characteristics of print media result
in the more ceremonial, impersonal and complex style of
language. Further, the standing details – the term used by
Leech (1966, p. 59) to refer to cut-out coupons, additional
information in small font (that usually remains unchanged in a
series of different advertisements), the address of the firm, legal
footnotes or footnotes with terms and conditions, etc. – in the
advertisements of D’Decor Home Fabrics and Sugar Free D’Lite
– Contains no fruit. Contains added flavours. Contains Aspartame.
Contains artificial sweetener and for calorie conscious. No
sugar added in the product. Not recommended for children.
Not for Phenylketoneurics; and the footnotes of Platinum Love
Bands and LG Side-by-Side Refrigerator – 24×7 CALL CENTER
OPERATIONS 1800-180-99 Toll Free 575755 Send SMS www.
lgindia.com lgservice@lgindia.com To know more about LG, visit
www.lgindia.com For Corporate/Institutional enquiries, please write
to enquiries@lgindia.com become very official and legitimate.
Audiovisual media, on the other hand, exhibits the colloquial,
informal, personal and simple style of language. For example,
advertisements like Colgate 360o
ActiFlex with interactive and
monitoring features like ‘Dad, look’ and
‘Watch this’.
5 Conclusion
Thus, the advertisements demonstrate the creative and
metaphorical use of language to perform various marketing
functions like identification function, informative function,
precipitation function, persuasive function, reinforcement
function, reminder function and value-adding function. Advertisers
and agencies today see innovations like digital and interactive
advertising as challenges and opportunities, rather than obstacles.
It is difficult to foretell how future advertising will be; but it will
certainly be advantageous to business and to the consumer. To
elaborate the need of studying the language of advertisements,
Cook (1992, p. 3) adds, ‘Advertisements use fiction, word play,
compressed story-telling, stylised acting, photography, cartoons,
puns and rhythms in ways which are often memorable, enjoyable
and amusing. New ads evoke comment. The words and details of
advertisements often
come to people’s minds more readily than those of novels, poems
and plays, and they are often recalled with more laughter and
enthusiasm.’

References
Ajagaonkar, P., & Patkar, A. (2005). Advertising. Mumbai: Sheth
Publishers Pvt. Ltd.
Austin, J. L. (1970). Philosophical papers (2nd ed.). Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Cook, G. (1992). The discourse of advertising. New York:
Routledge.
Cutting, J. (2008). Pragmatics and discourse: A resource book for
students. Special Indian Edition. Oxon: Routledge.
Dyer, G. (1982). Advertising as communication. London:
Routledge.
Krishnaswamy, N., Verma, S. K., & Nagarajan, M. (1992). Modern
applied linguistics. Chennai: Macmillan.
Leech, G. N. (1966). English in advertising: A linguistic study of
advertising in Great Britain. London: Longman.
Leech, G. N. (1969). A linguistic guide to English poetry. London:
Longman.
Leech, G. N. (1981). Semantics. London: Penguin Books.
Leech, G. N. (1983). The principles of pragmatics. London:
Longman.
Levinson, S. C. (1983). Pragmatics. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Shinde, V. (2015). Advertisement communiqué: A language guide
for researchers and designers. Germany: Lambert Academic
Publishing.
Dr Vaishali Jayaprakash Shinde is working as an Assistant
Professor and an Academic Council Member at NIIT University,
Rajasthan. She has been awarded a Doctoral Degree for her
research entitled Linguistic Analysis of Advertisements in Print
and Audio-Visual Media: A Comparative Study. She has been
teaching since 1998. Her book Advertisement Communiqué: A
Language Guide for Researchers and Designers was published
by Lambert Academic Publishing in May 2015. She has also
published various research papers, including The Rhetoric
of Advertisement: The Print Media, Advertising Language in
Print and Television Media – A Comparative Study. As she
is fascinated with new ideas in Linguistics, Pragmatics and
Communication Skills, she endorses innovative ways of research
and teaching.

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