An Epistemological and Ethical Examination of a Multimodal Discourse Analysis of Selected Nonalcoholic Beverages TV Advertisements in Osun State, Nigeria

Advertisements have become areas of great inquiry that most advertisers and directors are now paying attention to. Consequently, this study examines the advertisements for nonalcoholic drinks on TV stations in Osun, Nigeria. The study investigates the textual and visual properties employed by the producers of the selected non-alcoholic drink advertisements to produce the ideological meanings and their implications on the viewers to naturalise commodity consumption. This is with the view to determining how these properties present their ideological meanings and how these properties influence viewers to make purchases. The study draws insight on the multimodal framework of Kress and Leeuwen (2006) to analyze the images and written texts in the selected data for this study. This study only analyses non-alcoholic drink advertisements collected from two television stations in Osun State, Nigeria. The findings reveal that the advertisers employed different persuasive strategies, such as linguistic devices and visual mechanisms, to attempt to influence their viewers. The study also reveals that Maltina by Nigerian Breweries, Coke by Coca-Cola Company, Fanta by Coca-Cola, and 5-Alive orange drink promote the ideology of “Better life, greatness, and taste” with the aim to influence the viewers to commodity consumption. The study emphasizses that images were used to establish rapport, diversity, inclusiveness, state of mind and so on. Different colours project different moods like energy, sociability, joy and others. Apparently, many of these images serve as emotional connectors that transcend age, background and class. The study concludes that complex human emotions like desires, interests, and sense of taste can be reduced to marketable experiences.