Multimodal Discourse Analsis Of TV PSAs

In recent years, with the rapid development of multimedia technology, the advertising inChina has obtained flourishing development, especially the public service advertisement—aiming at advocating truth, kindness and beauty. Reviewing of the advertising discourseanalysis so far, most of researches are only based on the text. Many scholars analyze from theperspective view of journalism and advertisement science. There are some textual analysesfrom the perspective view of linguistics, but ignoring the function of the television pictures, asalient aspect of the TV public service advertisement. Based on the limitations of the previousresearches, the present research will integrately analyze both the verbiage and image of theTV public service advertising discourse “Welcoming the Olympic Games, StressingCivilization, Fostering a New Trend” in CCTV.As for the discourse analysis, the most applicable theory is Halliday’s SystemicFunctional Linguistics. In order to analyze the visual images, based on Halliday’s theory ofSystemic Functional Linguistics, considering image also as social semiotic, Kress and vanLeeuwen extend Halliday’s three metafunctions to visual mode, and propose Visual Grammarto analyze the discourse including pictures. Visual Grammar consists of three systems:representational meaning, interactive meaning, and compositional meaning, respectivelycorresponding with Halliday’s three metafunctions—ideational function, interpersonalfunction, and textual function.The present research adopts qualitative research method, takes Halliday’s FunctionalGrammar as theoretical foundation, uses the multimodal discourse analysis methodconstructed by Kress and van Leeuwen, from the perspective view of the three metafunctionsto interpret the TV public service advertising discourse, and concentrates on the research questions to analyze the case “Welcoming the Olympic Games, Stressing Civilization,Fostering a New Trend”, aiming at discussing the social function and meaning of the verbiageand image alike semiotic modes of the TV public service advertisement, illustrating how theverbiage and image produce join forces and complement and expand to constructcommunication meaning. To begin with, we briefly analyze how the verbal mode realizes thethree metafunctions—experiential function, interpersonal function and textural function toachieve the communication meaning. Secondly, we emphatically analyze how the visual modeachieves the three meanings—representational meaning, interactive meaning andcompositional meaning. After the previous analysis, we can solve the first research questionof the present research, namely, how the different modes realize the communication meaningin the multimodal discourse—TV public service advertisement. Thirdly, we analyze theintegration of the verbiage and image, thereby solving the second research question, namely,the relationship of the verbiage and image in the TV public service advertisement. And finally,we can make the conclusion. On the one hand, the verbal mode is intimately associated withthe visual mode. The verbiage is not the repetitive explanation to the images, but concise andcomprehensive explanation of the images, making the meaning clearer and moreunderstandable. On the other hand, the visual images enrich the communication meaning, addthe meanings that the verbal part does not express, and are explicit and sublimed by the meansof verbiage. In a word, the two modes complement and expand each other to construct thewhole meaning.To some extent, the present research has its significance and value. On the one hand, onthe aspect of theory, not only does the present research broaden the research field of themultimodality, enrich the result of the research view, but also verifies the explanation of themultimodal discourse theory constructed by Kress and van Leeuwen on TV public serviceadvertising discourse, proves the feasibility and applicability of the multimodal discourse analysis framework on advertising analysis, and enriches the research dimension ofadvertising discourse. On the other hand, at the aspect of practice, the present research notonly improves audiences’ multiliteracy ability, but also provides a new angle for audiences tounderstand TV public service advertisement.This thesis is comprised of five chapters.Chapter One is an overall introduction. First, it introduces the rationale and researchquestions of this paper on the basis of the research background, and then methodology anddata collection are illustrated. Lastly, the research significance is exposed.Chapter Two is literature review. Firstly, we discuss the previous researches onadvertising analysis. Secondly, we review the origins of the public service advertisement.Thirdly, we review the previous studies of public service advertising discourse and summarizethe limitations of the previous studies.Chapter Three is theoretical foundation. First, we give an elaborate introduction ofmultimodality and review the previous studies on multimodal discourse. Then, we brieflyintroduce Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar and the three metafunctions—ideationalfunction, interpersonal function, and textual function. Thirdly, we interpret the VisualGrammar, which develops from the Systemic Functional Grammar, purposely to study thevisual part of the multimodality. And at last, we posit the theoretical framework of this paper,aiming at comprehensively studying the multimodal discourse.Chapter Four is the case study. Firstly, we give a qualitative analysis of the verbaldiscourse from the perspective view of three metafunctions. Secondly, we give a qualitativeanalysis of the visual discourse from the perspective view of Visual Grammar. Finally, it canbe found that the verbal and visual modes are evolved to function integrately to construct theinteraction of the TV public service advertisement. In Chapter Five, the conclusion points out the major findings, the limitations and thesuggestions of the research.