‘Reason’ and ‘tickle’ as pragmatic constructs in the discourse of advertising

This paper explores certain pragmatic features of advertising discourse. It focuses on and expands upon a binary distinction between types of advertising discourse which was proposed initially by Bernstein (1974) and which has been touched upon more recently by other commentators such as Cook (1992). This is the distinction between reason advertisements (those which suggest a motive or reason for purchase) and tickle advertisements (those which appeal to humour, emotion and mood). It will be argued that Bernstein's distinction can be accommodated relatively systematically within contemporary frameworks of language and discourse. Drawing on a range of work in pragmatics and in systemic-functional linguistics, this paper takes some tentative steps towards the development of a theoretical model with accounts for this particular communicative-cognitive dimension of advertising discourse.

The Design Process- Making It Relevant For Students

Within the ever-changing arenas of architectural design and education, the core element of architectural education remains: that of the design process. The consideration of how to design in addition to what to design presents architectural educators with that most constant and demanding challenge of how do we best teach the design process?

This challenge is arguably most acute at a student's early stages of their architectural education. In their first years in architecture, students will commonly concentrate on the end product rather than the process. This is, in many ways, understandable. A great deal of time, money and effort go into their final presentations. They believe that it is what is on the wall that is going to be assessed. Armed with new computer skills, they want to produce eye-catching graphics that are often no more than a celebration of a CAD package. In an era of increasing speed, immediacy of information and powerful advertising it is unsurprising that students want to race quickly to presenting an end-product.

Recognising that trend, new teaching methods and models were introduced into the second year undergraduate studio over the past two years at Queen's University Belfast, aimed at promoting student self-reflection and making the design process more relevant to the students. This paper will first generate a critical discussion on the difficulties associated with the design process before outlining some of the methods employed to help promote the following; an understanding of concept, personalisation of the design process for the individual student; adding realism and value to the design process and finally, getting he students to play to their strengths in illustrating their design process like an element of product. Frameworks, examples, outcomes and student feedback will all be presented to help illustrate the effectiveness of the new strategies employed in making the design process firstly, more relevant and therefore secondly, of greater value, to the architecture student.

An Analysis of Advertising Wars

Comparative advertising by one brand against another showcases its merits versus the demerits of the other. In a two-stage game with finitely many firms, firms decide first how much to advertise against whom. In the second stage, given the advertising configuration, firms compete as Cournot oligopolists. In the symmetric case, equilibrium advertising constitutes a clear welfare loss. In the asymmetric case, depending on parameter values, a variety of outcomes are possible in equilibrium. An a priori disadvantaged firm (in terms of advertising costs or advertising effectiveness) may advertise more. Advertising can affect firms that are not advertisers or targets themselves.