AN ANALYSIS OF RHETORICAL FIGURES USED IN PRINTED BROCHURE ADVERTISEMENTS OF BEAUTY CLINICS

Abstract

Rhetorical figures are a powerful communication tool that has been widely used in advertisements to persuade potential customers to buy or use the products or services. The researcher has noticed that type of business highly competitive is the beauty clinics industry which is now booming in Thailand. It has been ranked first in the top 10 businesses in Thailand from 2017 to 2021 consecutively. The aim of this study is to explore the extent to which rhetorical figures are used as a persuasive device in the brochures of the selected beauty clinics and to identify the types of rhetorical figures presented in the brochures based on the rhetorical figure theory of Leigh (1994). The data analyzed by an intersection of qualitative and quantitative methods showed that 56 % of the brochures contain rhetorical figures. There were 12 types of tropes and schemes with the most frequently used tropes being imagery at 26 %, hyperbole at 16%, and pun at 10 %. The most frequently used scheme is alliteration at 20 %. The results of this study can be used in advertising as well as in raising consumer awareness regarding the persuasive devices used in advertisements.

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