DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF PETRLOEUM COMPANIES’ ADVERTISEMENTS

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DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF PETRLOEUM COMPANIES’

THESIS

By:

HANIF FALAH

(08360277)

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION

UNIVERSITY OF MUHAMMADIYAH MALANG

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Alhamdulillah. That is the first word thought by the writer when he had accomplished this thesis. The writer felt blissful because of the blessing and mercy from Allah, he could finish it very well.

The greatest gratitude would be delivered to Dr. Sri Hartiningsih, M.M and Bayu H. Wicaksono, M.Ed, Ph.D. This thesis will not be accomplished without their

help, patience and guidance. The second gratitude would be delivered to family, all friends and people around the writer who had given infinite support and motivation.

This thesis titled “Discourse Analysis of Petroleum Companies’

Advertisements” is submitted to fulfill the requirement to achieve Bachelor Degree of English Department. The writer hopes this thesis could be beneficial for readers.

Malang, October 2013

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REFERENCES

Ary D, Jacobs L.C, Sorensen C. 2010. Introduction to Research in Education (8th Edition). United State: Wadsworth

Baker Paul, Ellece Sibonile. 2011. Key Terms In Discourse Analysis. London: Continuum

Brown Gillian, Yule George. 1988. Discourse Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Brown, H. Douglas. 2000. Principles Of Language Learning And Teaching 4th Edition. New York: Longman, Inc

Cook, Guy. 1992. The Discourse Of Advertising. London: Routledge

Coulmas, Florian. 1998. The Handbook Of Sociolinguistic. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing

Creswell, John W. 2012. Educational Research: Planning, Conducting and evaluating Quantatibve and Qualitative research. Boston: Pearson

Fairclough, Norman. 2001. Language and power. United Kingdom: Longman

Foucault, Michel. 1972. The archaeology of knowledge and the discourse on language. New York: Pantheon

Gee, J. Paul. 2011. An Introduction To Discourse Analysis: Theory And Method Third Edition. New York: Routledge

Goddard, Angela. 1998. The Language Of Advertising. London: Routledge

Hawkins, Del I., Mothersbaugh, David L. 2008. Consumer Behaviour: Bulilding Marketing Strategy 11th Edition. New York: Irwin

Kurniati, Diah. 2009. Konstruksi Berita Peringatan Keagamaan Pada Televisi Swasta Lokal: Analisis Wacana Program Berita ‘Habar Si Utuh lawan Si Duyung’ Banjar Tv, Kalimantan Selatan. UMM: Unpublished Thesis

Lailia, Zuhrisa Noor. 2009. Konstruksi Pers Tentang Kampanye Pilkada Jombang 2008: Analisis Wacana Berita Kampanye Calon Bupati dan Wakil Bupati Jombang di Harian Radar Mojokerto Periode 6-18 Juli 2008. UMM: Unpublished Thesis

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Leech, G. 1966. English in Advertising. London: Longman

Moriarty Sandra, Nancy Mitchell, William Well. 2011. Advertising & IMC: Principle And Practice. New Jersey: Prentice Hall

Rodgers Shelly, Thorson Esther. 2012. Advertising Theory. London: Routledge Verdonk, Peter. 2002. Stylistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Wardhaugh, Ronald. 2006. An Introduction To Linguistic Fifth Edition. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing

Widdowson, H.G. 2004. Text, Context, And Pretext: Critical Issue In Discourse Analysis. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Ltd

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CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of Study

Language is an inseparable element of society’s life. It helps human to communicate their thought and ideas. It affects the society boundlessly.

Sociolinguistic is the scientific area of study on relationship between language and society (Wardhaugh, 2006). Focus of sociolinguistic is the effect of society on language. It explains how language develops beyond the level of communication but

as well as extending to societal aspects such as gender, ethnicity, religion, education, economic status and etc. Sociolinguistic has some branches area of study to explain

the phenomenon between the language and society, one of branches called as discourse analysis.

Discourse analysis is language beyond the level of the sentence. ‘A discourse

analysis is based on the details of speech (and gaze and gesture and action) or writing that are arguably deemed relevant in the context and that are relevant to the

arguments the analysis is attempting to make’ (Gee, 2011: 117). It is tightly related with content analysis and context analysis. Content or text analysis is viewed as a level of discourse analysis in initial stage, including characterizing and determining

the structure of discourse (Fairclough: 2003). Meanwhile, Context analysis is properties of the immediate interactional situation in which a communicative event

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on interpreting the text because it connects the text with context of situation.

Discourse analysis sees writing and conversation beyond the structural meaning but also its contextual. The objects of discourse analysis are various from writing, conversation, politic, media, gender, and advertisement.

Advertisement has taken its place on society’s life. A lot of advertisements appear on newspaper, television, and internet on daily basis. There is, however,

interaction between advertisement and audience. The way of advertisement targets audience through the language or visual used on its content count as creating discourse. As Cook (1992: xiv) stated there is somehow the relationship between

participant and advertisement, it can be deemed as discourse and such discourse should make linguistic.

Subliminal message is one of advertisement elements. Subliminal message is a hidden message in advertisement used to represent particular idea indirectly, the messages presented fast, softly, or masked by other messages that one is not aware of

seeing or hearing them (Hawkins: 2008). It conveys the interest of advertising agent to engage the audience with certain issue in a subtle way.

One of interesting advertisements to discourse is petroleum advertisement. Petroleum advertisement has unique features on its content. It can be seen on petroleum companies’ advertisement in late of 2000’s. As the issue of global

warming has been becoming major lately, petroleum companies change their content of advertisement significantly compares to some decades ago. The ‘Supermajor’, the

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friendly companies. Those companies try to alter the mindset of society about

petroleum company through the advertisement massively and intensively. There are, indeed, the subliminal messages serve on those advertisement. It requires academic skills and specific knowledge to analyse the discourse on it. On this regard, the

researcher applies discourse analysis to analyse the message behind the petroleum companies’ advertisement.

There has not been much literature that can be found specifically on discourse of advertisement. However, there are two studies closely related to this paper. Those were written by Lailia (2009) and Kurniati (2009). Lailia (2009) concerned about

advertisement of representative member election. She analysed the advertisement during the campaign moment. She tried to see the local newspaper construction on

the political advertisement whereas Kurniati (2009) focused her discourse analysis on news content of religious days commemoration appearing on local television. She tried to analyse the reason why the local television broadcast the different religious

celebration in different amount of duration respectively.

On this research, the researcher applies discourse analysis not only based on

content analysis but as well as the contextual. The previous researchers have the local media as the actor to discourse only, but this research has the petroleum company as the actor who creates advertisement to counter attack the environmental issue on

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1.2 Statements of problem

Based on the background above, the problems are as follow:

1. What is the subliminal message conveyed by the content of petroleum

advertisements?

2. What is the subliminal message conveyed by the context of petroleum

advertisements?

1.3 Purposes of Study

The purposes of this study are:

1. To analyse the subliminal message conveyed by the content on petroleum

companies’ advertisement

2. To analyse the subliminal message conveyed by the context on petroleum

companies’ advertisement

1.4 Significance of Study

The researcher believes this research can be used to understand the discourse of petroleum advertisement through discourse analysis. It can increase the readers’

awareness regard to advertisement. It is not solely ordinary text and visual composition but there are particular messages conveyed to audience. Especially the advertisement relates to environment issues. It enriches the understanding of

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1.5 Scope and Limitation

The research concern is about the discourse analysis on petroleum companies’ advertisements. The scope of this research is petroleum companies’ advertisement.

The limitation is on the content and context analysis on the print advertisement.

1.6 Definition of Key Terms

These are the definition of key terms of this research:

Discourse analysis is the study of language patterns above the sentence

(Widdowson, 2004).

Advertising is the non-personal communication of information usually paid

for and usually persuasive in nature about products, services or ideas by identified sponsors through the various media (Rodgers, 2012).

Petroleum company is profit-oriented corporates, which operate to drill oil

as the major revenue.

Subliminal message is messages presented briefly or covered by other

messages that one is not aware of seeing or hearing them (Hawkins: 2008).

Content analysis is a method for studying the content of communication

through text (Baker & Ellece, 2011: 21).

Context analysis is a method of analysis that helps in the interpretative

process of linguistic phenomena as well as providing explanations (Baker & Ellece,

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF PETRLOEUM COMPANIES’ ADVERTISEMENTS