Overig
WRT 101 Weasel Words Assignment
- Vak
- Instelling
This is a comprehensive and detailed assignment on weasel words for WRT 101.
[Meer zien]Voorbeeld 2 van de 8 pagina's
Voorbeeld 2 van de 8 pagina's
In winkelwagen
In winkelwagen
gesponsord bericht van onze partner
Verkoper
Volgen
anyiamgeorge19
Ontvangen beoordelingen
Voorbeeld van de inhoud
Weasel Wordsby William Lutz
William Lutz has spent much of his professional life examining the words used in
law, politics, and business to discover how words are used to mislead without
lying. He has also written extensively to try to educate people about this
misleading language, which has been called ‘double-speak.” Lutz defines
doublespeak as “language that pretends to communicate, but really doesn’t. It is
language that makes the bad seem good, the negative appear positive, the
unpleasant appear attractive or at least tolerable” (The New Doublespeak, 1997).
In this excerpt from his book Doublespeak (1990), Lutz describes one type of
doublespeak – “weasel words” – and shows how different types of weasel words
are used by advertisers to encourage people to buy products.
1 One problem advertisers have when they try to convince you that the product
they are pushing is really something different from other, similar products is that
their claims are subject to some laws. Not a lot of laws, but there are some to
prevent fraudulent or untruthful claims in advertising. Even during the happy
years of nonregulation under President Ronald Reagan, the Federal Trade
Commission did crack down on the more blatant 1 abuses in advertising claims.
Generally speaking, advertisers have to be careful in what they say in their ads, in
the claims they make for the products they advertise. Parity claims 2 are safe
because they are legal and supported by a number of court decisions. But
beyond parity claims there are weasel words.
2 Advertisers use weasel words to appear to be making a claim for a product when
in fact they are making no claim at all. Weasel words get their name from the
way weasels eat the eggs they find in nests of other animals. A weasel will make
a small hole in the egg, suck out the insides, then place the egg back in the nest.
Only when the egg is examined closely is it found to be hollow. That’s the way it
is with weasel words in advertising: Examine weasel words closely and you’ll find
that they are as hollow as any egg sucked by a weasel. Weasel words appear to
say one thing when in fact they say the opposite or nothing at all. “Help” – The
Number One Weasel Word
1 blatant: obvious
2 parity claims: claiming a product is equal to other similar products
1
, 3 The biggest weasel word used in advertising doublespeak is “help.” Now, “help”
only means to aid or assist, nothing more. It does not mean to conquer, stop,
eliminate, end, solve, heal, cure, or anything else. But once the ad says “help,” it
can say just about anything after that because “help” qualifies 3 everything
coming after it. The trick is that the claim that comes after the weasel words is
usually so strong and so dramatic that you forget the word “help” and
concentrate only on the dramatic claim. You need to read into the ad a message
that the ad does not contain. More importantly, the advertiser is not responsible
for the claim that you read into the ad, even though the advertiser wrote the ad
so you would read the claim into it.
4 The next time you see an ad for a cold medicine that promises that it “helps
relieve cold symptoms fast,” don’t rush out to buy it. Ask yourself what this claim
is really saying. Remember, “helps” means only that the medicine will aid or
assist. What will it aid or assist in doing? Why, “relieve” your cold “symptoms.”
Relieve only means to ease, alleviate, or mitigate 4, not to stop, end, or cure. Nor
does the claim say how much relieving this medicine will do. Nowhere does this
ad claim it will do anything at all. The ad only claims that it will aid in relieving
(not curing) your cold symptoms, which are probably a runny nose, watery eyes,
and a headache. In other words, this medicine probably contains a standard
decongestant and some aspirin. By the way, what does “fast” mean? Ten
minutes, one hour, one day? What is fast to one person can be very slow to
another. Fast is another weasel word.
5 Ad claims using “help” are among the most popular ads. One says, “Helps keep
you young looking,” but then a lot of things will help keep you young looking,
including exercise, rest, good nutrition, and a facelift. More importantly, this ad
doesn’t say the product will keep you young, only “ young looking .” Someone
may look young to one person and old to another.
6 A toothpaste ad says, “Helps prevent cavities,” but it doesn’t say it will actually
prevent cavities. A liquid cleaner ad says, “Helps keep your home germ free,” but
it doesn’t say it actually kills germs, nor does it even specify which germs it might
kill.
7 “Help” is such a useful weasel word that it is often combined with other action-
verb weasel words such as “fight” and “control.” Consider the claim, “Helps
control dandruff symptoms with regular use.” What does it really say? It will
assist in controlling (not eliminating, stopping, ending, or curing) the symptoms
of dandruff, not the cause of the dandruff or the dandruff itself. What are the
symptoms of dandruff? The ad deliberately leaves that undefined, but assume
3 qualifies: limits
4 mitigate: to make less severe
2
Voordelen van het kopen van samenvattingen bij Stuvia op een rij:
Verzekerd van kwaliteit door reviews
Stuvia-klanten hebben meer dan 700.000 samenvattingen beoordeeld. Zo weet je zeker dat je de beste documenten koopt!
Snel en makkelijk kopen
Je betaalt supersnel en eenmalig met iDeal, creditcard of Stuvia-tegoed voor de samenvatting. Zonder lidmaatschap.
Focus op de essentie
Samenvattingen worden geschreven voor en door anderen. Daarom zijn de samenvattingen altijd betrouwbaar en actueel. Zo kom je snel tot de kern!
Veelgestelde vragen
Wat krijg ik als ik dit document koop?
Je krijgt een PDF, die direct beschikbaar is na je aankoop. Het gekochte document is altijd, overal en oneindig toegankelijk via je profiel.
Tevredenheidsgarantie: hoe werkt dat?
Onze tevredenheidsgarantie zorgt ervoor dat je altijd een studiedocument vindt dat goed bij je past. Je vult een formulier in en onze klantenservice regelt de rest.
Van wie koop ik deze samenvatting?
Stuvia is een marktplaats, je koop dit document dus niet van ons, maar van verkoper anyiamgeorge19. Stuvia faciliteert de betaling aan de verkoper.
Zit ik meteen vast aan een abonnement?
Nee, je koopt alleen deze samenvatting voor €11,78. Je zit daarna nergens aan vast.
Is Stuvia te vertrouwen?
4,6 sterren op Google & Trustpilot (+1000 reviews)
Afgelopen 30 dagen zijn er 67096 samenvattingen verkocht
Opgericht in 2010, al 14 jaar dé plek om samenvattingen te kopen