PhDr. Jitka Vlčková, Ph.D.
Katedra anglistiky a amerikanistiky
Personal advertisements in a tabloid and
a broadsheet
Seznamovací inzeráty v seriózním a
bulvárním tisku
Keywords: British Media,
newspapers, intertextuality.
Annotation: The advert-writers in both the tabloid and broadsheet follow the wording established in each newspaper. They recognize the formality of the situation by avoiding informal words, such as guy. The texts in the tabloid use abbreviated forms for some expressions that do not appear in the broadsheet (GSOH, LTR. GSOH-good sense of humour ranks among the ten most frequent words in the tabloid adverts). The tabloid more than the broadsheet uses expressions that are considered formal or even old-fashioned (lady, gentleman). The texts in The Style testify to more sophisticated readership by using a greater number of unique words, many of them of Roman and Latin origin. The Style, much more than The A List, supports the traditional values of lasting relationships – no ‘viewed relationship’ in The Style is ‘for fun’. There are expressions that appear in personal advertisements more than anywhere else (e.g. seek) and that can be found in both kinds of newspaper. There are also expressions that are unique to each kind of newspaper and the advert writers quite strictly observe their usage.
Anotace: Přemětem této studie bylo
srovnání seznamovacích inzerátů v serióznim britském tisku a bulvárních
novinách. Inzerenti se volbou výrazů přizpůsobili úzu praktikovanému v
příslušném typu tisku. Vážnost situace
se odráží ve vyhýbání se hovorovým výrazům, jako např. guy. Pro bulvární
tisk je typické používání zkratek
a výrazů, z nichž některé jsou již málo používané (lady, gentleman).
Seriózní tisk, jehož čtenáři jsou vzdělanější,
vykazuje bohatší výběr slov románského původu. Seriózní tisk se kloní se
k tradičním hodnotám –žádný partner není hledán jen “for fun”.
Personal advertisements in a
tabloid and a broadsheet
Advertising in
general, personal advertising included, has become part of our everyday
experience. Advertisements have their own
coding which invites creative and subtle reading to make the meaning.
The meanings, however, are not fixed for
all readers: the understanding and interpretation of suggested ideas depends on
the reader‘s cultural background. The advertisements carry traces of and
messages about the culture that produced them.
The messages both reflect and construct
cultural values: ”…kann man sagen, dass die Kultur die Gesamtheit der
jeweiligen Texte darstellt oder auch, dass die Kultur ein Text mit komplexem
Aufbau ist…” (Lotman 1981.19)
Though the
newspapers under consideration come from
one national culture, they
address readers of different social strata.
One may say that the readers of the two different kinds of newpaper
constitute distinctive cultural sub-groups (i.e. sub-cultures), each of them
maintaining their own atitudes and beliefs. These are continuously strengthened
in the interaction with texts of their choice, as texts are ”social spaces in which
two fundamental social processes simultaneously occur: cognition and
representation of the world ” Fairclough (1995). As Sapir (in: Palmer 1981.44)
suggested, the world in which we live ”is to a large extent unconsciously built
up on the language habits of the group.” The papers essentially operate on the
assumption that their readers are a homogenous group and, in response, the
readers when writing to their newspaper conform to the invisible ‘standards’ of
their paper.
Intertextuality is basically defined as texts in relation to other texts. There is a continual ‘dialogue’ between the text given and other texts that exist outside it (Wales 259). In our study, it is the relation to other texts within the immediate context, i.e. the type of newspaper. Our aim is to verify the hypotheses of uneven lexical variety in different types of newspapers
Personal advertisements appear with other advertisements of similar kind in a regular column in the newspaper and form the so-called ‘text colony’. They are self-sustained units ordered with a certain degree of arbitrariness (cf. Černá et al. 31). Their meanings do not derive from the way they are ordered. Both the writer creating the text (the advertisement) and the reader interpreting it are aware of this kind of text organisation. The language is compressed, which means that the advert is less explicit in its structure than a fully articulated text. This is manifested, among other things, by a frequent use of abbreviated forms, such as TLC (tender loving care) , WLTM (would like to meet), GSOH (good sense of humour).
Writer’s strategy
Writing is a form of image-making
(Goddard 13) which depends ”on the supression of undesirable associations and the promotion of desirable
ones.” (Wales
235)
This is even more true of advertising, the main goal of which is to attract the reader and elicit his/her response. On the one hand, the writer of a personal advertisement attempts to stand out from the others, on the other hand, s/he conforms to the expected standards, both linguistic and extra-linguistic ones.
It can be presumed that these standards, though to a great extent set by the type of newspaper, are partly affected by the advertisers themselves. Not only their social backgrounds but also age and sex idiolects may be an important factor. As Wierzbicka (1991) observes, there are not only considerable differences between different languages but cross cultural norms also vary from one regional and social variety to another: there are considerable differences between Australian English and American English, between middle-class English and working-class English, and so on. If the reader is not familiar with these and some other cultural aspects he might misinterpret the text completely. Different social and historical conditions can produce vastly different readings of the same text. Fig.1 illustrates the distribution of unique ads across the newspaper supplements.
Fig.1 Number of
advertisements in The A List and
The Style
LIST
|
STYLE
|
||
|
M |
F |
M |
F |
|
125 |
144 |
262 |
207 |
Converted into percentages, the male advertisements represent 47per cent in the tabloid and 56per cent in the broadsheet.
The percentile
representation according to the age groups in our study suggests that the
advertisers in the tabloid are mostly below the age of fifty while in the
broadsheet the majority come from the age groups between thirty and fifty nine
years of age. A considerable number of advertisers in the tabloid do not
mention their age (Fig.2).
Judging from the age required in the prospective partner (usually between 30
and 45) one may presume that the advertisers are below the age of fifty.
Fig. 2.
Advertisements according to age groups in per cent
|
|
LIST
|
STYLE
|
||
|
age |
M |
F |
M |
F |
|
20-29 |
11 |
10 |
4 |
3 |
|
30-39 |
14 |
18 |
26 |
24 |
|
40-49 |
39 |
26 |
38 |
45 |
|
50-59 |
6 |
15 |
20 |
19 |
|
60+ |
2 |
10 |
7 |
5 |
|
No age given |
28 |
21 |
5 |
4 |
|
Total |
100 |
100 |
100 |
100 |
The ‘expected’ personal advertisement will be stereotypical, written in the traditional way, i.e. the third person singular to create the feeling of objectivity. Its structure may be almost invariably expressed as: SD–Ac–PD–IR–L–C
SD: self-description and
self-identification- very good-looking tall, white male,…sometimes in reversed
order-Male, good-looking…
Ac: ”action” - seeks
PD: partner’s description - a sincere slim lady
IR: intended relationship - for LTR/marriage
L: location – London, Middlesex (in The A List)
C: advert code or phone number
The advertisement may also be conceived as a sort of
bartering: ”I offer something in exchange for something else”. In The A List,
‘what I offer’ is frequently longer than ‘what I expect’. Černá et al.(2002) call this strategy ‘self
oriented’.(SINGLE mum, cuddly size 16,happy-go-lucky likes pubs, the theatre,
clubs, restaurants and nights in, seeks male for LTR. Middlesex.337834)
In The Style, the ‘offer’
and ‘requirement’ are usually better proportioned but still more self-oriented.
‘Location’ is often part of SD: SLIM Merseyside male, 50s, semi-retired, fit
and active, seeks outgoing ,bright, professional female, for friendship and
sunshine. Voice No327392
Variations in the scheme,
such as passive constructions, are rare in either newspaper.
Advertisements in some other newspapers such as The
Guardian and The Observer Preview, and
advertisements in other anglophone countries exhibit more variety in their
structure and borrowings from other text types, such as
poems, telephone conversations a.o., are more visible. (cf.Vlčková 1996; 2001)
It is generally recognised that tabloids require a lower level of literacy than broadsheet papers because they use simpler language, i.e. common lexis, shorter sentences and not many complex constructions. One might thus expect that the advertisements in the tabloid would be shorter. On average, however, they do not exhibit significant differences in length. The male and female advertisements in both the newspapers have between 18.3 and 20.6 words. What is different, however, is the number of unique words. The most original are the females in The Style – with every 2.5th word being unique, compared with 6th (!) in The A List; the data in males are 3rd and 3.5th respectively. These findings support the general recognition of different stylistic standards in the newspapers.
As our aim is not to analyse the relatively subtle differences in the advert structures between the two kinds of newspaper, let us look at some of the lexical choices. The restricted space of this paper forces us to make a very limited choice. Concentration will therefore be on the expressions that appear in all advertisements: the words by which the writers describe themselves and their prospective partners.
Male and Female, Lady and Gentleman
Wierzbicka (1988.471) describes the usual usage of male and female ”…female or male are of entirely different order from concept such as man, woman and child. In particular, male and female are pure ‘distinguishers’, which are used to distinguish members of two abstract sub-classes from one another rather than to identify certain positive kinds…” The idea of non-markedness is obviously in the subconsciousness of the writers as male and female are the most frequent references. As words that do not carry emotional connotations, they add to the ‘objectivity’ of the utterance. Their ‘neutrality’ is strongly felt by the advertisers in The Style, who markedly prefer female over any other reference. Unlike the male advertisers in The A List, who frequently leave the reference without any further attribute, the male advertisers in The Style add several attributes to it.
If the male writers in The A List add an attribute, they confine themselves to a limited number of descriptions of appearance while those in The Style use a wide range of attributes referring to both appearance and character. The semantics of the attributes correlate with the intended relationships. References to body appearance only are usually connected with temporal relationships (”…seeks attractive white female, N/S for fun times together”)
Female advertisers in both newspapers conform to the societal stereotypes and almost all of them refer to their appearance. There is a considerably greater variety in The Style (apart from attractive, slim which are also frequent in The A List, there are expressions such as beautiful, voluptuous, stylish, elegant).
Female is used by 36per cent and 80per cent of female advertisers and by 46per cent and 91per cent of male advertisers in The A List and The Style, respectively. Its usage is spread across all age groups. The corresponding data for male are 64per cent and 83per cent in female advertisements and 77per cent and 88per cent in male advertisements. There are seemingly different perceptions of these counterparts. Male is preferred in both newspapers while female is considerably lower in The A List (F36per cent and M 46per cent). The lower usage in female advertisers may be explained by the use of other references to self, such as mum (single mum-18per cent, lady 21per cent, blonde 11per cent). There is a question whether some of the male advertisers in The A List may be influenced by the rather negative collocations (and connotations) with female in their subconsciousness (cf. CID) and therefore prefer other expressions, such as lady (in 25per cent), which is considered polite. Writers of other races, such as Asian or black also prefer lady to female. In all age groups in the broadsheet (not in the tabloid) the viewed relationship with a lady is always lasting (lasting romance, long-term relationship, for a new beginning). As a reference to self, it is mostly used by women of the age groups 40+ and women from other ethnic backgrounds in both newspapers. Gentleman never appears in self-reference. In female advertisements gentleman is the counterpart of lady and is more frequently found in the tabloid (12per cent compared with 4per cent in the broadsheet).
Guy, which is popular in everyday speech, appears only among 5per cent male advertisers and 1per cent of female advertisers and only in the tabloid.
Conclusion
The advert-writers in both the tabloid and broadsheet follow the wording established in each newspaper. They recognize the formality of the situation by avoiding informal words, such as guy. The texts in the tabloid use abbreviated forms for some expressions that do not appear in the broadsheet (GSOH, LTR. GSOH-good sense of humour ranks among the ten most frequent words in the tabloid adverts). The tabloid more than the broadsheet uses expressions that are considered formal or even old-fashioned (lady, gentleman). The texts in The Style testify to more sophisticated readership by using a greater number of unique words, many of them of Roman and Latin origin. The Style, much more than The A List, supports the traditional values of lasting relationships – no ‘viewed relationship’ in The Style is ‘for fun’. There are expressions that appear in personal advertisements more than anywhere else (e.g. seek) and that can be found in both kinds of newspaper. There are also expressions that are unique to each kind of newspaper and the advert writers quite strictly observe their usage.
The study is part of the
research project GAČR 405/02/0349
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Bibliografický
údaj: VLČKOVÁ, J. Personal Advertisements in a Tabloid and a
Broadsheet. Brno Studies in English S 9, 2003, s. 37-43.