Connotative Meaning Of Verbal And Visual Signs In Printed Perfume Advertisements
on
ISSN: 2302-920X
Jurnal Humanis, Fakultas Ilmu Budaya Unud
Vol 17.3 Desember 2016: 73 - 80
Connotative Meaning Of Verbal And Visual Signs In Printed Perfume Advertisements
I Wayan Eka Suarmita1*, Ni Wayan Sukarini2, Putu Weddha Savitri3 123English Department Faculty Of Arts Udayana University 1[eka.suarmita@gmail.com] 2[wayansukarini@yahoo.co.id] 3[weddha_savitri@unud.ac.id]
*
Corresponding Author
Abstrak
Makalah ini berjudul ‘Connotative Meaning of Verbal and Visual Signs in Printed Perfume Advertisements’. Tujuan dari penelitian ini adalah untuk mencari makna konotatif dari tanda verbal dan tanda visual di iklan cetak parfum dan menganalisa hubungan antara tanda verbal dan tanda visual dalam menciptakan makna konotatif.
Metode kualitatif digunakan sebagai metode penelitian dalam penelitian ini. Data yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini diperoleh dari iklan parfum yang di cetak di majalah. Ada dua teori utama yang digunakan untuk menganalisis data. Yang pertama adalah ‘dyadic theory’ dari Saussure (1983) untuk menganalisis makna konotatif. Yang kedua adalah teori dari Berger (1984) untuk menganalisis tanda visual. Sementara itu, teori yang diusulkan oleh Leech (1972) adalah untuk menganalisis tanda verbal terhadap struktur iklan. Dan teori yang diusulkan oleh Dyer (1982) digunakan untuk menganalisis makna konotatif dalam iklan. Data yang terkumpul dianalisis berdasarkan teori yang digunakan disebutkan di atas dan disajikan secara deskriptif dengan menggunakan klausa dan kalimat.
Berdasarkan hasil analisis, makna konotatif tanda verbal dalam iklan biasanya terjadi dalam kalimat sederhana dan singkat untuk menarik perhatian penonton dan pengiklan juga memilih kalimat sederhana yang mudah diingat. Makna konotatif mungkin sulit untuk dipahami, tetapi bisa membuat iklan lebih menarik. Tanda visual yang mengandung makna konotatif dapat ditemukan dalam hal ukuran, spasialitas, kontras, bentuk, dan warna. Hubungan antara tanda verbal dan tanda visual dalam menciptakan makna konotatif mendukung satu sama lain untuk menarik perhatian pembaca. Sebenarnya keduanya mengirim pesan yang sama ke pembaca tetapi melalui bentuk yang berbeda.
Kata kunci: iklan, makna konotatif, tanda verbal dan tanda visual.
Nowadays, advertisements become one of our daily needs. We can find everything in advertisements such as product, jobs, services, etc. “Advertising means drawing attention to something or notifying or informing somebody of something”
(Dyer, 1982:2). It exists in many forms of communication media such as television, newspaper, website, radio and magazine. The advertisements should be memorable, and prompt appropriate action in order to get the attention of their targets or costumers, therefore, the advertisers have to create or make a good advertising to reach their purpose.
The fact that advertisement is so pervasive suggests that it has a significant impact on society. Advertising companies are always in search of new and creative means to promote name and sell a product. To be interested, an advertisement always uses verbal and visual sign. Verbal sign is a sign which is concerned with sentences. Meanwhile visual sign is a sign which deals with pictures.
The language in advertisement is generally informal and colloquial, the sentences are usually simply constructed and short and it is different form of language used in everyday life. It is because of the commercial function of advertisement is to send a message from the advertiser to the consumers to do something. In this case, the advertiser uses verbal and visual signs that mostly have connotative meaning. Connotative meaning is the communicative value an expression has by virtue of what it refers to, over and above its purely conceptual content (Leech, 1972:12). Because they relate to each other, the connotative meaning of verbal and visual signs can be understood to the publics.
Today, fragrances have been collected over the countries from the four corners of the world to inspire, delight, and seduce. Wearing perfume or fragrances gives pleasure, not only because it smells nice, but also because perfumes create an aura around the wearer that express something he/she wishes to convey about personality. However, most of the advertisements especially in perfume advertisement in magazine or brochures; it is usually full of pictures rather than texts (words or sentences). And this condition sometimes make readers confused and difficult to catch what the massages contains. The process of understanding about what is in the advertisements depends on the ability of the readers. This study focuses on connotative meaning of verbal and visual sign in printed perfume’s advertisement. It will be easier for the readers to understand what actually the advertisers want to convey through the advertisement by knowing the connotative meaning in the advertisement.
Regarding to the background above, there are two problems formulated in this study. They are mentioned as follows:
-
1. What are the connotative meanings of verbal and visual signs in printed perfume advertisements?
-
2. How do the verbal sign and visual signs in printed perfume advertisements are related to each other?
According to the problems, the aims of this study are:
-
1. To describe the connotative meaning of verbal and visual signs in printed perfume advertisement.
-
2. To analyze the relationship between verbal and visual signs in creating connotative meanings on printed perfume advertisements.
The data source was taken from printed advertisement on Men’s Health Indonesia Magazine (June 2015 edition). The advertisement is an advertisement of Carolina Herrera 212 VIP Men. It was introduced in 2011 and recommended for party lover and nightlife style which has characteristic dominated by vodka and gin scents. This fragrance for men contains a blend of Caviar lime, frozen mint, Black pepper, Chilled vodka, ginger, Slice of apple, King wood, Salty amber, and Tonka beans essence.
The data were collected based on documentation method. In collecting data, some steps were taken. First, the data were taken from some printed magazines. After that, the magazines were read carefully. The advertisements in the magazine which fulfill the requirement (containing verbal and visual sign) were chosen as the data and unnecessary data were eliminated. Next, the advertisement was observed intensively one by one in order to find out the verbal and visual elements of the advertisement.
Finally, the required data were classified based on the used words and pictures, and followed by some note-taking.
The collected data were analyzed using qualitative method based on the theories underlying the study; they are the theories of connotative meaning, verbal sign, visual sign and the theory of advertising.
Some steps were applied in order to analyze the data thoroughly: first, the signs in advertisement were identified based on the theory proposed by Saussure (1983) and visual signs based on the theory proposed by Berger (1984). Next, verbal sign was classified based on the structure of the advertisement based on the theory proposed by Leech (1972). Then, visual sign was analyzed based on the theory of connotative meaning of visual sign proposed by Berger (1984). After the meanings of verbal signs and visual signs were found and analyzed based on Dyadic theory proposed by Saussure (1983), the relationship between verbal sign and visual sign in creating connotative meaning was analyzed using the theory proposed by Dyer (1982).
There were four data (advertisements) being analyzed. The analysis of one data was described as follows.
The connotative meanings of verbal sign on Carolina Herrera 212 VIP Men advertisement are in the form of text written in English. The analysis of presentation of
verbal sign is based on the Dyadic theory proposed by de Saussure. For detail of the analysis can be seen through the table below:
|
Components |
Signs | |
|
Signifier |
Signified | |
|
Headline |
212 VIP MEN CAROLINA HERRERA NEW YORK |
The word is referring to the name of the company of the perfume maker and the new series of the perfume. |
|
Body Copy |
ARE YOU ON THE LIST? |
A statement to persuade audience to use the perfume to make the user feels special. |
|
Signature Line |
212 VIP MEN |
Representing the name of the product. |
|
Standing Details |
The information about website address. | |
-
1. The Headline of the advertisement 2 is the form of the product name “212 VIP MEN CAROLINA HERRERA NEW YORK”. It represents the new series of men’s perfume from Carolina Herrera Company located on New York.
-
2. The slogan on body copy “ARE YOU ON THE LIST?”, it explains the customer’s feeling when using the product, they feel like living in high class situation like on New York’s night lifestyle. This perfume is dedicated to the party lover and nightlife style which has characteristic dominated by vodka and gin scents. It also represents that the product can make the costumer feel like they live on VIP List of the party.
-
3. The signature line of this advertisement is in the form of brand name of the product “212 VIP MEN”. It represents the name series of the Carolina Herrera perfume for men.
-
4. The text “www.212areyouonthelist.com” in the standing detail signifies the website address when the consumer wants more details about the product.
To attract more customers, the advertiser usually used visual sign that contain connotative meaning to support the verbal sign. According to Berger (1984), the form of visual signs has some connotative meanings, as follows: size, color, contrast, spatiality and shape. The illustration of the advertisement shows a couple of men and women who 77
are ready to go to party with two bottles of the perfume product. The men wore black suits and the women wore an elegant white dress. And it has white background. While the analysis of visual sign could be seen below:
-
1. Size
The advertisement contained connotative meaning in term of size. Size here referred to the font of letters used. Based on Berger (1984) size in the advertisement is focusing on the size of letters that is used in the advertisement, not the size of the advertisement itself. The headline and signature line are written in medium size only because the company just presents its product name to the audience. Meanwhile, the body copy has the biggest font size in order to attract the audience with connotative meaning in the advertisement. And the last one is the smallest standing details font size. The standing detail gave the costumer further information about the product with website address.
-
2. Spatiality
The picture of the advertisement contains ‘empty space’. In this case, the advertisement deals with perfect ‘empty space’ which connoted to high and elegance class. It means that the product was for high-class people. So, it indirectly described that the product has good and high quality. By using this product the ‘common’ people can change into ‘high-class’ people.
-
3. Contrast
The advertisement did not use contrast in the picture. It is because the advertiser did not use opposition to illustrate the product.
-
4. Shape
A shape of picture in advertisement was a couple of men and women who are ready to go to party with two bottles of the perfume product. It resembles how a man gets intense pleasure from party by using the perfume. The advertiser wants to attract the consumer that by using this product the ‘common’ people can change into a ‘high-class’ people.
-
5. Color
Color has important role in advertisement and it can produce connotative meaning. In the advertisement, the color was dominated by black and silver
white. According to Eiseman (2000) Black is often associated with negative qualities such as illegality, darkness, hardship, and sadness. Black denotes strength and authority; it is considered to be a very formal, elegant, and prestigious color. And White means light, goodness, innocence, and purity. And for the background color is silver, it means goodness, safety, power, and prestigious color as a result from white and black color. The advertiser wants to present the detail of perfume’s characters with that color.
The headline and signature line used black color that means powerful. It connoted that Carolina Herrera 212 VIP Men is a useful men’s perfume that can be used in any kind of condition such as daytime or nighttime.
The appearance of connotative meaning of verbal and visual sign in the advertisement 2 should support each other and showed great advertisement to the audience. The important thing is to make the message conveyed to the audience. The message of verbal sign in the picture is the name 212 VIP Men from Carolina Herrera Company that would satisfy the consumer with the strong and powerful scent of the perfume used in any condition even in daytime or nighttime. The visual sign supports it. The picture shows a couple of men and women who are ready to go to party. The men wore black suits and the women wore an elegant white dress. By using this product the ‘common’ people can change into ‘high-class’ people. In this case the relationship of both signs is logic and supports each other and can produce connotative meaning. The coherence or relation between verbal sign and visual sign on Advertisement is well organized.
The conclusions are the connotative meaning of verbal sign in printed perfume advertisements can be found through the structure of advertisement including headline, body copy, signature line, and standing detail. A simple and short sentence or slogan implied the connotative meaning. On the other hand, the use of the connotative meaning of visual sign in printed perfume advertisements can be found in term of size, spatiality, contrast, shape and colors.
The verbal sign and visual sign are always related to each other. Actually, both of them send the same message to the readers but through different forms. The coherence between verbal sign and visual sign makes the reader easier to understand what is exactly meant by both signs in creating the connotative meaning of the product being advertised.
Berger, Arthur Asa. 1984. Sign in Contemporary Culture. Ney York and London: Longman Inc.
Dyer, Gillian. 1982. Advertisement as Communication. London: Methuen & Co.Ltd. Eisman, Leatrice. 2000. Colors for Your Every Mood. Capital Book Inc.: Virginia. Leech, Geoffrey. 1972. English in Advertising: A linguistics study of Advertising.
London: Longman group Limited.
Saussure, Ferdinand De. 1983. Course in General Linguistics. London: McGraw-Hill
80
Discussion and feedback