OUGD601 | Packaging Research - 'Rhetorical Theory: An Introduction.' by Timothy Borchers

Borchers, Timothy. 'Rhetorical Theory: An Introduction.'  Sage Publications Ltd; 1 edition. 10th June 2005.

Chapter 15 - 'A Rhetorical Theory of the Advertisement' by Edward F. McQuarrie & Barbara J. Phillips

• 'Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any situation the available means of persuasion' - Aristotle
• Examine the advertising message, and argue that a rhetorical approach is needed to truly understand advertising messages. 
• Many theories explore advertising messages are communication theories, where the focus is on the fundamental properties of all messages, of which ads are but a single example. 
• Most of the remaining theoretical accounts of ad messages can be termed consumer response theories, defined as psychological accounts of how consumers process information. 
• Both communication and consumer response theories typically give a remarkably impoverished account of the advertisement. 
• We will attempt something different by offering a rhetorical theory of the advertisement, conceived asa distinct kind of message. 
• We then provide specific theoretical propositions about print advertisements fro future and testing. 

What Is an Advertisement? 

• We limit ourselves to theorising about commercial advertising - paid media with a profit motive. 
• The question: What defines a given communication attempt as an advertisement? 
• Answer: the conjunction of 1) Purpose 2) Form 3) reception environment constitute an advertisement. 
• A message must have a particular purpose, form, and reception to be considered an advertisement. 
• If the message examination has some other purpose, form, or reception, it is probably some other phenomenon that requires some other theory.