A multimodal analysis of humor in billboard advertising

master's thesis

• Title (croatian): Multimodalna analiza humorističnih reklamnih panoa
• Author: Nenad Padarić
• Mentor: Marina Grubišić (mentor)
• Committee member: Ivana Bašić (predsjednik povjerenstva)
• Committee member: Anđel Starčević (član povjerenstva)
• Granter: University of Zagreb; Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences; (Department of English language and literature); Zagreb
• Defense date and country: 2022-10-05, Croatia
• Scientific / art field, discipline and subdiscipline: HUMANISTIC SCIENCES; Philology; Anglistics

Abstract

Billboards have proven to be an effective medium for various types of advertisements due to their ability to attract attention, especially by making use of their surroundings. Many brands utilize humor in order to further increase the memorability and the appeal of their ads, as humor usually causes a positive cognitive effect which makes both the ad and the product that is being advertised more relevant. The primary goal of this paper is to examine the function of humor in billboard advertising and to analyze it from a multimodal perspective. The analysis consists of ten examples of humorous billboard ads categorized into two groups based on (the degree of) their dependance on either verbal or non-verbal features to achieve humor. To conclude, billboard ads are both a visual and a verbal medium and require both segments to interact with each other in order to achieve the desired (humorous) effect.

• Keywords: Advertising; Billboard; Humor; Multimodality; Relevance Theory
• Language: english
• URN:NBN: urn:nbn:hr:131:869737
• Study programme: Title: English Language and Literature (double major); specializations in: Linguistics, Literature and Culture, Translation, TEFL; Course: Linguistics; Study programme type: university; Study level: graduate; Academic / professional title: magistar/magistra engleskog jezika i književnosti (magistar/magistra engleskog jezika i književnosti)
• Type of resource: Text
• File origin: Born digital
• Access conditions: Access restricted to students and staff of home institution
• Created on: 2022-10-07 22:00:30