Sinekdochos teoriniai niuansai ir praktiniai jos aspektai reklamoje
Synecdoche: Theoretical Subtleties and Some Aspects of its Application in Advertisements

Summary/Abstract: This article deals with the concept of synecdoche which has changed significantly since the way it was treated by ancient authors and it tackles the issues of distinguishing its types. In classical rhetoric there was no proper definition of a metonymy and in the majority of treatises its description was limited to only listing its types. The definitions provided in the theoretical works of the Belgian school in the 9th decade of the 20th century state that metaphor is a juxtaposition of two synecdoches, i.e., if we want to create a metaphor, we have to combine two synecdoches that complement each other. A metaphor may be clarified with the help of a synecdoche or a metonymy. In principle, there is no major difference between a metonymy and a synecdoche: in both cases an item acquires the name of another item that is related to the former. A solid theoretical foundation allows researchers to analyse synecdoches in advertisements more efficiently, to focus on their expression and their relationship with other tropes as well as their interplay. Synecdoche is a particularly capacious and expressive trope enabling a creator to highlight the most significant features of a promoted item, to appeal to and affect the addressee. A part-for-whole synecdoche highlights the most important feature of a promoted item; a wholefor-part synecdoche creates a more magnificent image of an item than it actually is; a number synecdoche produces stereotypes and symbols; a voice synecdoche turns an advertisement into a game of associations; a gender synecdoche allows encompassing more addressees, whereas a feature synecdoche encodes the actual meaning of an expression. Even though synecdoches are not that numerous in advertisements, it is possible to claim that part-for-whole and whole-for-part synecdoches are chosen most frequently to serve the purpose of promotional texts. Synecdoches of advertising are characteristic of exceptional capacious properties since a text creator has a possibility to “accommodate” an explanatory text consisting of a few sentences into one trope, to involve the addressee into the advertisement by means of encoded words and expressions. By using synecdoche, producers of advertisements achieve the main aim of promotion, i.e. to appeal to the potential consumers, to involve them into the act of advertising, and to make them voluntarily purchase the promoted item. In this case, the aims of both, synecdoche and promotion correspond.

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