Sociolectal Variation in the Length of Color Terms Used in Advertising

Authors

  • Alena Anishchanka
  • Dirk Speelman
  • Dirk Geeraerts

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18485/bells.2010.2.2

Keywords:

color term length, sociolectal variation, color categorization, advertising, multivariate linear regression method

Abstract

In the article we explore the length of color terms used in advertising as one of the formal parameters of their lexical complexity. We report two case studies applying multiple linear regression to test the variation in the color term length relative to two sets of sociolinguistic parameters relevant for online marketing and purchase. The first case study reveals the most general variation patterns in four product categories (cars, clothing, women’s makeup, house paints) involving the effects of such sociolinguistic factors as product category and the status of the brand. In the second case study, we propose a more fine-grained analysis of the product category of cars focusing on the product-specific sociolinguistic parameters (type of car, year of production, country of the parent company) and their interactions with the more general variables revealed by the first analysis.

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Published

2010-11-22

How to Cite

Anishchanka, A. ., Speelman, D., & Geeraerts, D. (2010). Sociolectal Variation in the Length of Color Terms Used in Advertising. Belgrade English Language and Literature Studies, 2(1), 47–79. https://doi.org/10.18485/bells.2010.2.2

Issue

Vol. 2 No. 1 (2010): BELLS - volume 2

Section

THEORETICAL AND APPLIED LINGUISTICS

License

Copyright (c) 2021 Alena Anishchanka, Dirk Speelman, Dirk Geeraerts

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