Abstract

     Advertising affects people’s life in various ways to a great extent in modern society. As an important way of promotion, it has unique linguistic features. This paper begins with a brief introduction to Grice’s Cooperative Principle, and then makes an attempt to explore the violation of this theory in Advertising English by many advertisements in English magazines and to analyze the advertisers’ purposes. By the combined study of advertising English and the Cooperative Principle, this paper attempts to give some hints on understanding the Cooperative Principle in a broader way and to provide implications for achieving a better comprehension of the special language features of English advertisements.

Key words:  advertising English, the Cooperative Principle, violation

摘 要

在现代社会，广告广泛深入地影响着人们的生活。作为一种特殊的宣传方式，广告有其独特的特点。本文从简要介绍格莱斯的合作原则入手，试图通过英文杂志中的广告实例，研究广告英语中违背合作原则的现象，并分析广告商的目的。通过广告英语与合作原则的结合研究，本文能对更全面地理解合作原则有所启示，为更好地理解广告英语的特殊语言特点提供一定的提示。

关键词：广告英语；合作原则；违反

1.    Introduction
With the rapid development of economy, advertising plays an increasingly significant role in modern society. It has been exerting great influence on people’s life in various aspects as they can almost be seen or heard anywhere. “Advertising is a basic business tool that is essential to retaining current customers and attracting new customers” (Thomas et al. 2009: 22). It’s a bridge between sellers and customers. However, advertising is not only a business process but also a communication process. As a special way of communication, the most fundamental feature of advertising is persuasiveness which means to persuade the consumers that the products in advertising are good and it’s worth purchasing them.
All this has aroused the interest of experts at home and abroad who have been studying advertising from various aspects, such as cross-culture, psychology, aesthetics and sociology. What’s more, linguists have been analyzing the language of adverting from the linguistic features and mechanisms with so many achievements.
This thesis makes an attempt to combine the study of advertising language with Grice’s Cooperative Principle by analyzing advertising in English magazines. It first gives a brief introduction of the CP, then studies the violation of the CP in advertising English, and lastly examines the purpose of the advertisers.