دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی شکل ظاهری صحبت کردن: استعاره، شبیه سازی و متونمی در تفکر بازاریابی - امرالد 2018

Abstract

Purpose – Much has been written about metaphor in marketing. Much less has been written about simile and metonymy. It is widely assumed that they are types of metaphor. Some literary theorists see them as significantly different things. If this is the case, then there are implications for marketing theory and thought. Design/methodology/approach – In keeping with literary tradition, this paper comprises a wideranging reflective essay, not a tightly focussed empirical investigation. A combination of literature review and conceptual contemplation, it challenges convention by “reading against the grain”. Findings – The essay reveals that, far from being part of metaphor’s supporting cast, simile and metonymy are stars in themselves. With the aid of three concise cases-in-point – relationship marketing (RM), the consumer odyssey (CO) and Kotler’s generic concept (GC) – the authors present an alternative interpretation of their conceptual contribution and continuing importance. Practical implications – Marketing management is replete with metaphorical speculation (positioning, warfare, myopia and more). The shortcomings of such figures of speech are rarely spelled out, much less foregrounded. By raising figurative consciousness, marketing practice is furthered. Originality/value – As similes and metonymies are rarely spoken about in marketing scholarship, the study starts a much-needed conversation. It raises the issue of marketing’s figurative foundations and, in so doing, offers further scope for future debate.

Mini-me metonymy

The Odyssey, indeed, is more than an illustration of simile-shaped scholarship. It is arguably the academic equivalent of an epic simile, a virtuoso demonstration of qualitative research, the entire interpretive paradigm in miniature (Bradshaw and Brown, 2008). As such, the Odyssey operates in a metonymical manner. Succinctly defined as “the use of an aspect or attribute for the thing itself” (Arvatu and Aberdein, 2016, p. 254), metonyms substitute the part for the whole. When car-owners refer to their “wheels”, or dandies boast about their “threads”, or retail managers ruminate on “bricks, clicks and flips”, they are making use of metonymy. Much-cited instances include crown for the monarchy, jocks for sportspersons, Wall Street for financial services and Madison Avenue for the advertising industry as a whole (Abrams, 1993). If simile is a skeleton in the cupboard of marketing thought, a hidden figure that some seem hesitant to mention, metonymy is a ghost in the machine, quietly plying its trade and pulling the levers of power. It is not so much a beat cop or plainclothes detective (Leith, 2011) as marketing’s secret policeman. And, although more than a few marketing articles refer to and make use of metonymy (Brownlie, 1997; Borgerson et al., 2006; Cochoy, 2015; Hershey and Branch, 2011; Kates, 2002), the trope’s pervasiveness is not fully appreciated. It rarely features in EJM (6 papers out of 2,750) and, even then, it’s usually alluded to in passing, as one among many rhetorical devices. Yet marketing is heavily reliant on metonymical postulates. Namely, the notion of the universal-in-the-particular, of the all-in-each, of the world, as romantic poet William Blake puts it, “in a grain of sand” (Holbrook, 1995; Twitchell, 2004).