A Cognitive Approach To The Construal Of Irony In Advertisements

The study aims at analyzing the construal of irony in advertisements by meansof integrating two important theories, namely, Conceptual Blending Theory (CBT)and Frame-Shifting Theory (FST).Irony, as a figure of speech, now has gained its popularity in advertisement,which plays a significant role in promoting sales. Previous studies on irony, however,mainly focus on its definitions, classifications, properties and functions, which leavemuch room for further studies from different perspectives. In addition, few scholarshave studied irony in advertisements, let alone from the cognitive perspective.Therefore, the thesis puts forward CBT~+to analyze irony in advertisements from theview of cognition, and discuss the construal mechanism underlying irony inadvertisements.The thesis analyses the strengths and weaknesses of CBT and FST respectively,and points out that CBT lacks the process of inference while FST lacks the process ofblending in interpreting irony in advertisements, due to which an integrated modelCBT~+is established, so that irony in advertisements can be best interpreted by thecombination of two prominent advantages of CBT and FST: blending and inference.In addition, the thesis classifies irony in advertisements into three types, namelyhomophony-based irony, context-based irony, as well as affection-based irony. Basedon the newly integrated CBT~+model and the classification of irony in advertisements,it is finally found that the interpretation of irony in advertisements is a dynamiccognitive process during which two input spaces are established by frame-shifting,and the intended meaning is realized by means of blending and inference.