A Metadiscourse study of Slogans of Mobile Phone products

ABSTRACT

Slogan is a short sentence containing catchy words or easily remember phrase used in advertisement. The main purpose of slogan is to attract people and to promote products. Slogan is one of the language phenomenons. However, through this short sentence an advertiser can transform a common sentence into a friendly prose or poem of much nicer reading. Besides, it is able to convey a persuasive message under the informative mask.The language used in advertisement moreover slogan is really important to be analyzed. In fact, it is more than just deal with the fighting words used to win the product from another product. It is also creating challenging expectations from the addressee.

It will be very hard or impossible to interpret and find the message from this short catchy sentence but then the Function of Metadiscourse help to answer the question. Metadiscourse plays an important aspect in persuasive writing. Assuming that” advertising English should be represented as a continuum of text functions fluctuating between „informing‟ and „manipulating‟ in accordance with the idea that advertising is an example of covert communication”1, the writer tries to find the messages in slogans of mobile phone products and seek the persuasive messages under the informative mask. Here, the writer uses descriptive qualitative approach to conduct the research. The theory that the writer used to support the analysis is the theory proposed by Pedro A. Fuertes Olivera, the Functions of Metadiscourse in advertisement through textual metadiscourse: endophoric markers and evidentials, and interpersonal metadiscourse: person markers, hedges, and emphatics.

The result of the analysis is there is a new way of promoting the product of mobile phone in which never been discussed before. The advertisers use a frankly speaking in showing the application of mobile phone by claiming as the product of the latest technology. That is the reason why mobile phone products become the measure of fashion who leads the ideas of the users.

This research is far from being perfect. That is why the writer suggests the next researcher to add the headline of the slogan to enrich the data. Besides, the headline will give more information about the slogan. Hence, the research is able to develop the theory of Metadiscourse and find a credible result.