A Comparison of the Language Used in Advertisements to Describe Male and Female Products - Coursework Example

Language Investigation: A Comparison of the Language used in Advertisements to Describe Male and Female Products Introduction Language is expressed in different forms and the case of the differences in gender, location, peer groups and other factors determine differences in the languages spoken1. Considering the case of English as a language, it is worth noting that the American spoken and written language differs from that in the UK. The youth do not speak the same language as the adults as they would like to add some localised value to their expressions to identify with their peers. Boys and girls would also express the same issue differently when composing written expressions in magazines, newspapers and other periodicals. Consideration of the written print in the newspapers about the language used by men and women is substantially credible to be accredited with the status of being spoken aloud. It is spoken aloud because it appeals to as many people that access it as possible. Repetto (2014) noted that it is a psychological issue determined at birth and that would explain the differences in communication styles between boys and girls. This language analysis will therefore focus on analyzing a collection of data between communication in males and female youth. Given that the males and females tend to behave differently, there is need to focus on the cause of the differences that are established. Aims Communication is quite diverse. People communicate for various reasons and the same communication is expressed differently depending on the situations as stated in the introduction2. This research is therefore based on the hypothesis “the language used to advertise male and female products in magazines is different”. The main aim is to investigate the use of nouns as well as adjectives in advertisements expressed in English. This will be geared towards finding the gender differences in communication in these advertisement media. The main focus is to establish whether the gender differences likely to occur are in conformation with the expectations in behaviour in males and females. Methodology a. Materials: The materials for the methodology in this topic consist of magazines for males and others for females. In total, there are twelve adverts that are taken from the male and female magazines. For the magazines meant for the males, there is a collection of six adverts, two from cars and aeroplanes, two from international football and two from music electronics. The female magazines had six magazines too. Two were from ‘Lasting Romance’, two from ‘Breath That Love’ and the last two from ‘Te Amo’ Australian edition. All these are world-wide magazines. The female magazines clearly base their themes on love, passion and romance while the male base their passion on machines. This is because cars, machines and football are a love for men while women concentrate on beauty and fashion. Procedure The total advertisements (12 in number) are divided based on gender of the readership and the contents. All these are based on stereotypical women and their celebrity counterparts in men. The first thing was to collect all the adjectives and nouns from the 12 adverts collected. Word class depended on the context. The second step is to note that the nouns and the adjectives were discussed in a separate manner. This was to determine whether there was any gender difference between the males and the females in terms of how the two language aspects are applied. There was also need to determine the proportion of the neutral aspects and those that were not neutral. It should be noted that non-neutral words have no sexist characteristic in themselves. This is because sexist language is hardly used in the magazines under review. The non-neutral words were used by the advertisers to describe things that were considered to be appealing to the users (readers) of any of the gender selected. Neutral words therefore do not have either gender connotation of reference. There are also sample words that are categorised depending on their levels of commonness and what their reference is. Some of the nouns and adjectives also refer to modified things that belong to the same category. For instance, taking the noun happiness, as well as the adjective exciting are categorised under emotions. Another example is that of punch indicating strength in the physical domain while un-compromise makes a reference to strength in the mental domain. With reference to the determined characteristics, it is then questioned as to whether the domains of the words belong to the male or female characteristic3. The focus on the identification of adjectives and nouns is therefore the greatest focus in this categorical study. Analysis An analytical view of the results of this study is a division into four parts. In the first two parts, there is analysis of the nouns and adjectives as they were used in the twelve adverts. The second section determines the nous that makes a reference to gender stereotypes. Reasons for this phenomenon will be determined in the evaluation section. i. Nouns In this case, there are neutral nouns, the nouns and the non-neutral nouns as presented in the table below: Neutral Non-neutral Noun number Neutral noun percentage% Non neutral noun percentage% Magazines for males 67 13 80 83 17 Magazines for females 58 24 82 70.7 29.3 Total count 125 37 162 77.16 22.8 Neutral nouns have the characteristic of being general in their meanings. The non-neutral nouns have the function of attracting interests characterised by certain types of gender. The number of nouns used in the female adverts is more than that used in the male. From a proportional perspective, the non-neutral nouns have a higher number in males than in the female gender. Generally speaking, it is noted that the neutral nouns are more than the non-neutral nouns. According to Sagisaka, & Nakamura (2010), women are naturally verbose and this would explain as to why there are more nouns compared to men. This is explained in their adverts tending to have greater lengths than those by males. It is openly factual that advertisers have the tendency to provide as much detail as possible while dealing with female products than in the male4. There is also a form of imbalance between male and female magazines in the market. Advertisers understand that advertising influences the lives of people and that is why they have to use different language to capture the attention of thee target groups. The languages must be preferred for more interest to be attracted. ii. Adjectives The statistical view of the adjectives in the two groups of advertisements is indicated in the table below: Neutral objectives Non-neutral Total adjectives Percentage of the neutral adjectives % of the non-neutral adjectives Magazines for females 78 21 99 78.79 21.21 Magazines for males 34 33 67 50.7 49.3 Total 112 54 166 67.46 32.53 Just like in the nouns, it is observed that females tend to use more adjectives than their male counterparts. The ideas expressed in this case are in line with the observations of Repetto (2014) where there was noted to be more correspondence to the female language having more adjectives than the male. There are also longer sentences in this case of female counterparts in the magazines. The explanation for this is that shorter sentences are used in male magazines hence the use of the fewer nouns. The second issue is that the adjectives are used in noun modification and also reveals the qualities of the people. The male language is however tougher and in rather more straightforward manner5. Summarily, it can be noted that male adverts have less focus on gender issues and are therefore likely to use masculine words such as unparalleled, peerless and uncompromising. On the other hand, females tend to use more adjectives than men in their speeches and that is why there are more of the same words in the advertisements. Evaluation The evaluation of the gender differences that occur in the use of the nouns and adjectives is dependent on the findings illustrated in the analysis section. This is a situation in which the aspect of feminism occurs as a result of there being differences in the perpetuation of their languages. When one has to get hold of the words that have a reflection of gender connotation, aspects of morphology and etymology come out. For instance, words like actor and actress indicate differences in the inferiority or superiority of the woman. In this case, the woman is inferior. In the male magazines, it is normal to find words like legendary and classic to depict superiority. Such words are hardly found in magazines meant for women. Moreover, words like adventurous and daring describe brevity and the ability to have willingness to tackle any challenge that face them. Women magazines do not use the same language though there is a similarity in the meanings. Words such as sensitive, tender as well as warm and affectionate are used to determine the value of a woman. They are words that are associated with feelings, emotions and love. This case therefore determines that there are words in a language that are stereotypic to either gender and therefore not directly desirable by the whole society. Different social expectations are always part of the life of human beings. Human beings are social by nature. A reference to ants indicates that they are also social. In the ant territory, there are those that are born to fight while others are born to work. Still others are born to give birth to the next generation of ants. In all situations, the aspect of interaction has to manifest itself. With the dynamic societies in human beings, there is no discrete definition and determination that a given gender is born to carry out specified tasks. However, the law of social nature determines that a woman will do some roles and a man will still take a different perspective6. Social scientists have also approved of the fact that in a transgender situation, men tend to domineer. This aspect has brought up the issue of women being considered less feminine if they assume a certain character. In a meeting, if a woman contributes more, she will be considered by her male counterparts to be too wordy and less feminine. Advertisers therefore adapt the same language and character when determining the words to use in an advertisement. These are used to express things that are within the interests of males and females respectively. These results have therefore determined that the differences are created by relationships, colours and senses among other aspects. These define the female likes and social definitions. In the male ads, there is adventure; the strengths and much achievement are achieved. In the long run, there are advertisements that are clearly defined for male products such as the electronics and cars and different from those of feminine products such as jewels. Successful athletes are depicted as models; jewel adverts describe great appearances and watch ads lay emphasis on function. Although all these may be balanced words to describe ability, it is important to note that the language used cannot be the same when referring to males and females. Conclusion The conclusive remarks in this study have determined that magazine advertisements clearly depict flow of information based on the gender differences. The language used differs because it has to cater for the interests of males’ and females’ interests which are also expressed in a different manner. Sometimes the language place the different people in their different classes based on male and female division and roles in the society. Language is therefore strongly advertised to serve a specified function such as manipulation of the thoughts of the people. This clearly determined that the males and female language differs by higher margins. The study has therefore justified the hypothesis statement in which there was a need to justify the fact that “the language used to advertise males and female products in magazines is different”. References I·, Dawa, Yoshinori Sagisaka, and Satoshi Nakamura. "Investigation of ASR Systems for Resource-deficient Languages: Investigation of ASR Systems for Resource-deficient Languages." Acta Automatica Sinica 36, no. 4 (2010): 119. Repetto, Claudia. "The use of virtual reality for language investigation and learning." Frontiers in psychology 5 (2014): 115. Read More