A Study On Multimodal Metaphor In Print Public Service Advertisements From The Perspective Of Relevance Theory

With the development of social economy, people are frequently exposed to moreand more problems. Due to this, public service advertisements (abbreviated as PSAs)with the aim of dealing with different social problems are playing important roles inhuman life. At the same time, the rapid development of technology makes theadvertising media more varied, for example, different modes such as voice, image,music, etc. are used in the public service advertisements, which makes multimodalmetaphor an effective and popular way to attract and induce the consumers. Thepresent thesis, under the framework of Relevance Theory proposed by Sperber andWilson in1986, conducts a research on multimodal metaphor in twenty one printpublic service advertisements, with the aim of exploring three questions: Whatmultimodal metaphor is; how the audience understands multimodal metaphor in printPSAs; and what kind of pragmatic functions multimodal metaphor has in print PSAs.In this thesis, some relevant concepts about Relevance Theory are introducedand analyzed on stage. Then four kinds of multimodal metaphors (contextualmetaphor, hybrid metaphor, integrated metaphor and complementary metaphor) inprint PSAs are classified based on the predecessors’ achievement. Adopting aqualitative study, this thesis takes a detailed analysis of multimodal metaphor intwenty one print PSAs, and finally finds the comprehension mechanism and thepragmatic functions of multimodal metaphor.Through a systematic study, three major findings are found. Firstly, multimodalmetaphor in print PSAs refers to the metaphor which is constructed by image, verballanguage or brand in cooperation with each other, each mode plays an important rolein its construction and comprehension. Secondly, the process of interpretingmultimodal metaphor in print PSAs is the process of finding the optimal relevance ofthe advertisement. That is, the audiences believe every element in the advertisementis relevant enough to worth their while to process. Then under the guidance ofrelevance, they recognize the multimodal metaphor in the advertisement, construct a range of assumptions in the cognitive context to explore the optimal relevance, andfinally get the implicature of the multimodal metaphor, and the informative intentionand the communicative intention of the advertiser. Lastly, multimodal metaphor hasfour prominent pragmatic functions in print PSAs. First, it makes the advertisingmore eye-catching; second, it makes the transmission of message more effective;third, it makes the advertiser more polite; last, it avoids the absolutization of theinformation. In sum, these pragmatic functions make multimodal metaphor aneffective ostensive stimulus to transfer the advertiser’s intention to the audience.