English Adjectives in Indonesian Cosmetic Advertisement: A Study of Emphatic Personal Metadiscourse Marker

Authors: Nia Kurniasih (Institut Teknologi Bandung, Indonesia)
Iis Kurnia N (Telkom University, Indonesia)
Speakers: Nia Kurniasih, Iis Kurnia N
Topic: Language, Gender, Sexuality
The (SCOPUS / ISI) SOAS GLOCAL CALA 2020 General Session

Abstract

The growth of the globalization of brands in the international market place has led to the inevitable importance of advertisement and its studies, including methods metadiscourse. This descriptive qualitative study was aimed at finding out the interpersonal metadiscourse markers used in eight (8) advertisements of Indonesian cosmetic products using English in constructing the concept of beauty within contemporary Indonesian context. The result of study has shown an emerging new terminology in defining and classifying the types of beauty as a social construct presented in the product advertisements. Through a discourse analysis on the use of Hylans’s emphatic personal metadiscourse marker adjectives, it was found that the advertising makers have used adjectives to describe nouns in the advertising texts due to their persuasive meanings, namely those of aesthetic adjectives. The adjectives found in the data belong to several categories, i.e. evaluativity, dimensionality (unidimensional and multidimensional), and measurability. All these adjectives have constructed the concept of green beauty, healthy beauty, modern beauty, religious beauty, and aesthetic beauty. This study was expected to contribute to the development of language and media studies. In addition, this study is expected to enrich the theory in language and media studies, especially those that can enhance the strategy used by advertising agencies to choose the most effective kind of language in their advertisements.

Keywords: Advertising, adjectives, cosmetic, beauty, emphatic personal metadiscourse.