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Bastian Ludwig
Wissenschaftliches Arbeiten und Präsentieren |
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Fachsprache in Automobilprospekten am Beispiel des Prospektes zum Hummer H2
1. Introduction
The language of automobile brochures cannot be described generally. The language used has changed a lot during the last few years. Furthermore, it is important to ask about the attracted audience. This audience has a lot in common with the car you are talking about, because each car attracts the attention of a specific group of buyers and therefore each automobile brochure has its own specific language.
The example I chose is the 2006 H2 by HUMMER. This car is a gigantic sport-utility vehicle (abbr. SUV), which is about 80 inches high, 80 inches wide and 200 inches long. Therefore this car is not interesting for everyone but only for a very small group of customers. For sure this group of potential buyers consists almost solely of men, who are middle-aged and earn a lot of money. This fact is important because the language used is somehow specific to the potential group of buyers.
2. Structure of the brochure
The front page shows a picture with an H2 in action and the name of the car in combination with the model year. The brochure contains no table of contents so the pages cannot be summarized to chapters. Most pages contain a whole chapter. The pages two and three again show a great picture of the H2 and a statement which says: “Like Nothing Else”.
On page five there is a text which describes and explains the status and reputation of the H2 and wants to communicate to the reader what the H2 stands for. No real information is given on this page. The paragraph on page six describes a special model of the H2. This model is called the H2 Sport-Utility Truck (abbr. SUT). On page eleven the relation between “Function and Form” is defined. In the next paragraph the frame of the H2 is described.
The next chapter on page 14 is one of the central chapters. Its topic is the engine and the power of the H2. Furthermore, the transmission and the four wheel drive are also presented in this chapter. On page 18 the suspension system is in focus followed by
the brakes on the next page. Moreover, the exterior of the H2 is presented on pages 28 to 31. Consequently, the following chapter focuses on the interior followed by a description of the OnStar satellite system. The topics of the next two chapters are the warranty and some clubs which have formed just because of this car.
The “Verdict” is finally presented on page 41 and works as a kind of conclusion.
The ending of this brochure is formed by some lists of extra accessory and some data sheets about the H2, which contain the dimensions and the performance data.
3. Syntax
Many experts of LSPs have developed different theories about syntax in LSP texts. Most experts like Beier or Fluck say that it is very hard to define a special syntax for LSPs. There are even completely different opinions about this topic. On the one hand theories describe the syntax as complex and technical, but on the other hand it is also described as simple and straightforward.
Anyway, the syntax of the automobile brochure of the H2 shows some special features. The main headlines are often formed by short phrases or ellipses like “Stay Connected” or only single words like “Inside”. The sub-headlines often feature whole sentences or phrases. This style is meant to convey seriousness. In combination with the layout of these pages the publishers try to copy the look and style of newspaper articles.. Furthermore, the presentation of the information strengthens this effect. The information seems to be presented objectively and seriously because a lot of facts are given. This phenomenom is called the reportage style. Therefore most sentences are not too complicated, because they aim at presenting facts.
Another typical feature of automobile advertisements is the hackstyle. This style can be found on page five. The sub-headline contains a lot of short phrases and sentences like “The Hummer H2 makes a Statement. And not just in Terms of “Stop and Stare” Aesthetics” or “To go just about anywhere. To do just about anything.” Obviously a lot of short statements follow each other sometimes even without the use of verbs. This phenomenom can be found in several other phrases in this brochure. When
using this writing style the punctuation is also a bit abnormal. The full stops are set behind short phrases and the next sentence may start with uncommon words like “and”, which are usually not used at the beginning of a sentence. The sense of this style is ambiguous. On the one hand this hackstyle creates a feeling of speed, which means that the speed of the car is somehow transferred to the customer when reading this text, but on the other hand this style slows the reading speed down.
Focusing on sentence structure one can observe paratactical as well as hypotactical sentence constructions; however, paratactical constructions can be found more frequently. We also find a lot of sentences which only consist of a single main clause, e.g. “See your GM dealer for terms and conditions of these limited warranties.” A nice example for such a paratactical construction is: ”The benefits of HUMMER Roadside Assistance include, but are not limited to,[…]”. In such a construction the subject applies to both verbs. These paratactical sentences are usually easier to follow than hypotactical sentences and are therefore used more fequently.
The direct address to the reader is frequently found in this brochure. “Once behind the wheel, you´ll quickly notice the large instrument panel” or “You´ll find that both trucks have a surprisingly “car-like” ride to them” are good examples for that. The reason for this direct address is that the publishers want to give the reader an impression of how it feels to own and drive a car like this. The authors even want to make the reader feel to be an owner of an H2. This is to strengthen the appeal to buy such a car.
The first person plural can also be found several times, for example on page five. By using this form the publishers try to let their company appear more familial and personalized. One might say the company is given a face somehow. The reader should not think that the car was built in any factory far away, but that the people who wrote the brochure did it.
4.Lexis
The lexis is always a remarkable sign of a language for special purposes. It is even more an important feature for these languages because they are often defined by their special words especially the technical terms and the use of them. For example Hans - R. Fluck says that these technical terms are of a great importance.
As one might expect, the number of technical terms is very high, sometimes even higher than the number of nouns of general language. Page 14 for example contains 28 nouns in total. 15 of them are special technical terms and only 13 are taken from daily life.
As usual for LSPs one can find a lot of borrowings from different foreign languages. These borrowings are often taken from ancient languages e.g. Latin or Greek, but can also be taken from other languages. A good example for this is the term “suspension” which forms the headline on page 18. This term is borrowed from Latin. The origin is “suspendere” which means “to hang up”.
The most used technical terms, especially nouns belong to the field of car industry. Examples for this are, “Automatic Transmission”, “Vortec 6000 V8 Engine” or “variable throttle control”. Such terms are familiar to members of the car industry and to people who are specially interested in cars. For a layman the used technical terms are hard to understand. By using many technical terms the publishers try to impress the reader and somehow try to manipulate him. When unfamiliar terms are chosen there is always a danger of manipulation.
Furthermore, the technical terms have some characteristics of LSPs. They are precise, clear and sytematic in a high degree. These are characteristics of special technical terms which were defined for example by Beier.
In contrast to typical LSPs we also find a lot of adjectives in this brochure. It is obvious that a brochure which is to describe a product has to contain a lot of adjectives in order to make the product more conceivable and a bit more touchable. Most of the adjectives are descriptive and are to strengthen the nouns and to make the text more interesting and fluent to read. Therefore, most adjectives are positive like “strong”, “good”, “amazing” or “versatile”.
The verbs one can find in the brochure say very little, mostly they are just to construct whole sentences but they do not carry any information. On page 28 for example we can find a total number of 15 verbs, which are mostly auxilliaries as “are” or “were”, in contrast to a much higher number of nouns and terms. All in all 40 nouns and compounds can be found on this single page. Page eleven contains 14 verbs in total but the number of nouns and compounds is 21. Such observations are equal to the observations Beier and Fluck made.
A very popular and effective advertising ploy besides the hyperbolic praising of the good is the unique selling point. This feature means that the brochure says that the car is the best and fastest or simply better than the competitors. The authors use different methods to make this clear. The most common solution is for sure the use of the grammatical superlative form. Another possibility is to use the grammatical comparative as an implied superlative. When you say that there is no better car, you say indirectly that this is the best car. So in this possibility the superlative is used without directly implying it. The easiest possibility to make clear the unique selling points of a car is simply to compare it with other cars.
In the brochure we can recognise a frequent use of abbreviations. Even the model name itself, which says “H2” is an abbreviation. Also the model category the H2 belongs to is called SUV/SUT. The term SUT is explained on page six but SUV remains unexplained. This term indeed is even an acronym, which means that this abbreviation can be referred to as a real noun. This means that it can be the subject or object of a sentence. Moreover, it can even be modified by adjectives. Furthermore, the name of the company General Motors also appears mostly in the abbreviated form GM.
By using abbreviations which are unfamiliar to average customers the publishers try to manipulate the reader by disguising information and facts. The reader’s vision is obscured. A nice example for this is the term “V8”. Not all potential buyers know that “V8” stands for a special type of engine where the eight cylinders are arranged like a V. However what is more interesting is that V8 engines have a high petrol consumption, which depends on the style of construction.
The psychological reaction of the reader to indentify himself with the offered car is a reaction the advertiser knows how to use for his purposes. He surrounds the car with a human ability field. When a publisher uses this technique of advertising he describes the car as if it were human. There are several ways to achieve this goal.
A possibility to make a car appear human is to compare car body parts with human body parts. A good example for this are the headlights of a car which are often described as eyes. These “eyes” make a car smile or be angry. So the car has a face, which can show different affections. Because of this some cars are referred to as sweet or aggressive, which are human abilities.
Another possibilty can frequently be found in our brochure. The car is given attributes of humans.
5. Is the Used Language a Language For Special Purposes?
As already mentioned, the lexical items are the most important features of languages for special purposes. Especially the nouns play an important role. As we have seen in the lexis chapter, the brochure of the H2 contains a lot of very specific technical terms, which are very precise, clear and systematic. Therefore, one can say that this is a feature which relates the language used here to the languages for special purposes.
Also the adjectives which have a differentiative function have to be mentioned. They are very important as well. The adjectives we find in the brochure are mostly descriptive and help to differentiate, which is absolutely not common for LSPs. One might think that adjectives are nearly not existing in LSPs.
The verbs and adverbs do not play an important role for languages for special purposes. As already shown in the lexis chapter the total number of verbs is much lower than the number of nouns. Thus, it is obvious that the verbs just carry very little information and are not important in this brochure, which again is usual in LSPs.
The used syntax is not common for languages for special purposes. Usually sentences have to be constructed in a way to give as much information as possible by using as little space as possible. This phenomenom cannot be found in our brochure. The advertisers do not only try to give facts, they also want to awake emotions in the customer. This cannot be achieved by short sentences which only contain information.
For example page five does not contain any piece of information because the text just wants to awaken emotions and to create special moods.
All in all one might say that it is hard to decide whether the used language belongs to LSPs or not. So we have to think about the intention of this brochure and what it was made for. This brochure was created to make a reader want to buy a product. The reader, in this case mostly laymen and not members of the automobile branch, is to be impressed and somehow manipulated by the technical terms used. Therefore, we have a dialogue between experts and laymen, whereas the experts are not necessarily experts of car technology but marketing strategists. Marketing strategists surely know how to influence the customer. Because of this fact we can say that the used languages contains some features of a LSP but it is no.
Bibliography
- General Motors Corporation. 06H2. 2005
- Gerhard J. Schmidt. Automobilwerbung in Wort und Bild. Stuttgart:Akademischer
Verlag, 1989
- Fluck, Hans-Rüdiger. Fachsprachen: Einführung und Bibliographie. Tübingen: Francke, 1996.
- Beier, Rudolf. Englische Fachsprache. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1980
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