Nativization of English Usage in Advertising in Taiwan: A Study of Readers’ Attitudes

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Nativization of English Usage in Advertising in Taiwan:

A Study of Readers’ Attitudes

*

Jia-ling Hsu

National Taiwan University

English mixing has become a very popular advertising strategy in Taiwan. However, perhaps due to either copywriters’ originality or their lack of good English proficiency, some nativized English devices have come into being such as e-Europe (derived from e-commerce), easy play (meaning ‘a DVD player can be played easily’), and green your heart.

This study intends to investigate readers’ attitudes toward these advertising devices occurring in newspapers and magazines in Taiwan. The data of this study were drawn from a questionnaire survey conducted to a quota sample of 425 subjects of various age, levels of education and occupations.

The results indicate that among the patterns surveyed, phrases such as easy play are most acceptable while long strings of English sentences derived from the verbatim translation from Chinese structures are least acceptable. Major factors determining the degree of readers’ acceptability of these devices include the semantic interpretability of these patterns, the appropriateness and compatibility of the language usage, and the stylistic and advertising effects induced by the usage.

In terms of what sociolinguistic factors correlate with subjects’ degree of acceptability of the nativized patterns, it is shown that subjects’ English proficiency and their degree of preference for using English in advertising in general are at work. Those subjects whose English proficiency is either very advanced or very low are most judgmental about the nativized patterns whereas those who prefer using English in various product domains and in advertising in general have a higher degree of acceptability of these nativized patterns.

On the whole, the survey subjects hold a positive attitude toward the development of nativization of English usage in advertising. The overwhelming favorable attitudes towards almost all the surveyed patterns suggest that the development of nativization of English in advertising in Taiwan will continue as a trend.

Key words: English mixing in advertising in Taiwan, nativization of English usage, nativized English devices, readers’ attitudes, sociolinguistic factors

*_{This paper as part of a research project was funded by National Science Council (NSC}

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1. Introduction

English mixing has become a worldwide trend in the global advertising and has been studied by Masavisut et al. (1986), Bhatia (1987, 1992, 2000, 2001), Takashi (1990), Pavlou (2002), Hashim (2005), and Martin (1998, 2002a, 2002b, 2005, 2006), to name just a few. While the advertising discourse in Taiwan is undergoing its process of Englishization, nativization of English usage is concurrently taking its course (Hsu 2000). Linguistic devices such as e-go (derived from e-commerce), easy select (select something without any difficulty), and give me high are some of the examples, which I will elaborate on in the following sections.

So far, the majority of works studying English mixing in global advertising focus on textual analyses. For example, Bhatia (2001) studies magazine advertisements from nine languages to explore the formal features, structural domain allocation, and the socio-psychological features of English mixing in these advertisements.

Martin (1998, 2002a, 2002b, 2006), examines the product categories and positioning of English mixing as well as cultural images of English in French advertisements, mainly using the corpus of magazine advertisements and TV commercials. By analyzing TV commercials and print advertisements, Takashi (1990) investigates the relationship between the functions of English loanwords and the features of targeted audience in Japanese advertising. Hashim (2005) surveys the visual and verbal interactions within an advertisement and their association to the construction of cultural identities, employing a genre-based approach.

Quite different from the focus of the previous works, the present study attempts to examine the general public’s attitudes toward the nativized devices of English usage newly developed in the advertisements in magazines and newspapers in Taiwan. The following issues will be explored: (1) the general public’s attitudes toward the nativized devices; (2) the underlying reasons that account for the public’s attitudes in the acceptability or lack of acceptability of these devices; (3) the sociolinguistic factors that correlate with the public’s attitudes; (4) the general public’s attitudes toward the development of nativization of English as a trend.

2. Methodology

2.1 Data collection

The data of this study were drawn from a survey questionnaire conducted to a quota sample of 425 subjects consisting of 189 males and 236 females aged from 14 to 87, with their level of education ranging from junior middle school to doctoral degree,

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and from more than forty-nine professions.1 For the detailed demographic information of subjects, please see Appendix 1.

In the questionnaire, three major parts of questions were posed. The first part elicited the demographic information of the subjects regarding their gender, age, level of education, occupation, and the dialects spoken at home.

In the second part, seven patterns of nativized English usage were presented, copied directly from the corpus of 1263 newspaper and magazine advertisements collected from October to December in 1999. Here, by “nativized” is meant that the linguistic patterns provided in the survey deviate systematically from the standard English grammar. “Systematically” further means that the patterns of deviation are consistent in various advertisements created by different copywriters. According to Kachru (1986), nativization is the ‘result of those productive linguistic innovations which are determined by the localized functions of a second language variety, the “culture of conversation” and communicative strategies in a new situations, and the transfer from local languages.’ As shall be demonstrated in the following discussions, the nativized patterns provided in the survey result from the direct transfer from the Chinese language (Hsu 2000). A brief listing of these patterns is provided below.

The first pattern of devices includes e-color, e-go, e-people, and e-match. The emergence of these compound words derive from the current usage of English compound words such as e-commerce.

The second category of devices consists of phrases conjoining an English adjective easy with either an English verb or a Chinese verb. The former type of instances includes easy select, easy go, easy talk, easy touch, easy show, and easy play. The latter subtype is exemplified by cases such as easy 敷 (fu) (cosmetics which can be put on the face easily) and easy 抽 (chou) (a piece of tissue paper which can be easily drawn from the box). In such device, easy is used for the sake of its translated meaning in Chinese, 容易 (rongyi) “effortless and easily.” Hence, the phrase of easy select means “select something easily.” Such native innovations of coining new verb phrases totally disregard the grammatical constraints from English.

In the third type of patterns, English words are freely mixed in an English sentence or with Chinese text, without observing parts of speech of these words. Take Give me high for example. High serves originally as an adjective and is now used as a noun. In the instance of Green Your Heart, the adjective green has become a verb.

As regards mixing English words with Chinese text, these English words are

1_{Due to the restriction that for subjects to be able to read the English mixing devices presented}

in the questionnaires and respond accordingly, it is required that subjects need to receive at least two years of English education. Therefore, subjects’ minimum level of education was confined to the third year of junior middle school.

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borrowed based on their translated meaning in Chinese, regardless of their original parts of speech. In the advertisement of 幫助您的愛心快速 ONLINE (bangzhu ninde aixin kuaisu online) meaning “to help you to quickly contribute your charity online,” online, originally an adjective or an adverb in English, is borrowed due to its Chinese translated meaning 上網 (shangwang), a verb in Chinese, and thus functions as a verb. Another instance is 給您最 fly 的音樂 (geinin zuiflyde yinyue) meaning “I’ll show you the most enjoyable music that will make you feel like flying.” In this example, the English verb fly is borrowed owing to its corresponding meaning in Chinese, 飛躍 (feiyao), together with the use of the adjectival suffix 的 (de), it is transformed into an adjective. The next type of patterns consists of text totally written in English; however, the underlying structure is entirely Chinese. That is, it is only the English lexicon and not the English structure that is borrowed into the wording. Thus, the composition of such text is a verbatim translation of Chinese structure into English. In some extreme cases, unintelligibility of the text arises. Take the following texts for example, where the first two cases are drawn from advertisements promoting sales of residential real estate properties and the third one is from travel agency advertisement.

(1) 鳳凰城 (fenghuangcheng) (WONDERFUL VILLA) Along the road, You will find the woods around us. Season over the leaves that love us. Where can give us so fresh so much as here?

(2) Experience The Art Of Living Between The Building And The Garden, You Will Know What Is You Always Waiting For.

(3) 太陽假期無限驚奇 Sun Vacation Very Surprise taiyangjiaqi wuxianjingqi sun vacation very surprise

You’ll be so much surprised by our sun vacation tour packages.

In the above instance of (2), the English sentence You will know what is you always waiting for is a direct verbatim translation into English of the Chinese structure 你將會知道什麼是你一直在等待的 (nijianghuizhidao shemoshi niyizhizaidengdaide). Likewise, the underlined wording in the instances of (1) and (3) is also a word-for-word translation from the meaning of their Chinese structural counterparts.

The last type of device is made up of sentences mixed with English and two dialects of Chinese, Mandarin and Southern Min. One instance follows.

希望房價低的人買到保證 You happy, he happy, everybody 攏 happy

xiwang fangjiadideren maidao baozheng you happy, he happy, everybody long happy For those who want to buy residential real estate properties at the lowest cost, we guarantee that your purchase with us will make everyone happy.

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In this example, other than mixing English and Mandarin Chinese, 攏, meaning “all,” is borrowed from the Southern Min dialect.

Concerning the arising of the above types of deviation of English usage, according to interviews conducted with a total of 13 copywriters from a variety of prestigious local and internationally-based advertising agencies in Taiwan, some local copywriters’ originality on the one hand and some other copywriters’ lack of good English proficiency on the other hand are held responsible (Hsu 2004).2 However, syntactic mistakes arising from the verbatim translation from Chinese structure are mainly attributable to some copywriters’ lack of good English command, especially those in the field of real estate property advertising.3

After the presentation of the seven nativized English patterns, the subjects’ general attitudes toward these patterns were surveyed. A scale of five grades of attitudinal choices was provided, ranging from ‘completely acceptable,’ ‘acceptable,’ ‘neutral,’ ‘unacceptable,’ to ‘completely unacceptable.’

Other than the multiple-choice format of questions, open-ended questions concerning why subjects made their certain attitudinal choices were also posed so that underlying reasons accounting for their multiple-choice answers could be obtained.

The last part of questionnaire investigated subjects’ attitudes toward the general trend of development of nativization of English usage. In addition, subjects’ level of competence in English, degree of preference for using English mixing in advertising in general and in specific domains as well as their preferred advertising language for various types of products were also examined. The specific items of investigation are provided in the discussion of the result of correlation analysis.

2_{When inquired whether the deviations from Standard English evident in advertising in Taiwan}

are defined as innovations or mistakes, most of the copywriters reach the consensus that syntactic deviations based on word-for-word translation from Chinese are intolerable errors while other devices may be termed innovations.

3_{Based on the interviews conducted with five real estate copywriters (Hsu 2004), due to the}

time and budget limit, many copywriters in the lower-scale real estate property advertising companies have to both write the English mixing in the body copy and use English mixing as the graphic design, without being able to recruit any professional help to proofread their English wording. For these copywriters, the purpose of attention-getting suffices as long as the English wording is easy to read and write. Consequently, mistakes such as verbatim translations from Chinese structure prevail in the real estate property advertisements.

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2.2 Statistical analysis

2.2.1 Frequency count

Frequency counts were performed for the analysis of the multiple-choice format of questions based on the five grades.

Regarding the analysis of the underlying reasons that account for subjects’ attitudinal choices made in the section of the multiple-choice format of questions, i.e., their degree of acceptability of a certain nativized pattern, a total of 2657 responses were elicited. Since some subjects provided more than one reasons in their responses, 3190 reasons were gathered. However, for the purpose of this study, only responses pertaining to positive and negative attitudes were recorded. All the responses pertaining to neutral attitudes and those involving contradictory or inconsistent reasons were excluded. Therefore, only 1823 responses with 2207 reasons were gathered as the corpus of data for analysis. Then all the reasons were classified into 20 categories. Each reason based on the categorization was coded into the computer, and a frequency count of these categories was carried out.

These categories are listed as follows.

1) Whether the meaning of the pattern is interpretable. 2) Whether the usage is attention-getting.

3) Whether the usage is familiar and common (or overused or never heard of). 4) Whether the linguistic device is innovating or creative.

5) What are the effects, purposes or functions of the advertised products that the advertisers intend to impress on the consumers?

6) Whether the usage is trendy.

7) Whether the code-mixing devices are considered essential and appropriate to advertise the intended products. Alternatively, can Chinese-only devices also serve the same purposes? Additionally, are the Chinese and English structures compatible to each other in the code-mixing devices? (不中不西, 不相容, 不搭調)

8) Whether the language usage yields a sense of modernization. 9) Whether the language usage yields a sense of internationalism. 10) Whether the usage copes with the standard English grammar.

11) Whether the devices sound smooth in reading and oral utterances (通順, 順口, 順眼, 順耳) (口語化).

12) Who are the major target audience of the advertisements? 13) What are the types of the advertised products?

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15) What influences may the linguistic devices have on the English learners? 16) Whether the language usage is pure advertising gimmicks.

17) Whether the linguistic pattern is a nativized device.

18) Whether the usage copes with the Chinese literary convention.

19) Whether the device copes with the essence and characteristics of language development such as language change and creativity.

20) Personal emotional responses without providing any explicit account that can fall into any of the previous categories.

For a brief illustration of a few examples from each category of reasons, please see Appendix 2.

2.2.2 Correlation analysis

For the correlation study between the sociolinguistic variables and the degree of acceptability of the seven nativized devices, a five-point scale from one to five was set up. Point one was assigned to choices made for ‘completely unacceptable,’ three to ‘neutral,’ and five to ‘completely acceptable.’ Therefore, a scale from 5 to 35 was set up: the higher the score, the higher degree of acceptability of these nativized devices by subjects.

Variables chosen for the correlation study consist of several sets of data. These included personal demographic information such as gender, age, level of education, occupation, the school one attended, and one’s major field of study; dialects spoken at home, such as Mandarin, Southern Min, Hakka, and other minor dialects. Other sets of variables included these subjects’ attitudes toward Englishization of advertising text and nativization of English in advertising as a trend, their self-rated command of English, and their preference for using English in different product domains. Analysis of variance was used to analyze the data.

3. Results

3.1 Percentage of the surveyed patterns

As Table 1 indicates, in terms of the degree of acceptability of the seven surveyed patterns, three are rated with a percentage over 50%. These patterns include phrases such as easy go, English sentences which change the parts of speech such as give me high, and the Chinese-English mixing pattern of 幫助您的愛心快速 ONLINE (bangzhu ninde aixin kuaisu online). In particular, expressions such as easy go receive the highest rating, almost doubling the frequency of the Chinese style of long English sentences,

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which receives the lowest frequency.

3.2 Underlying reasons accounting for the acceptability and

unaccept-ability of the nativized patterns

An analysis of the underlying reasons accounting for the acceptability and un-acceptability of these nativized patterns indicates that factors as follows play significant roles in determining subjects’ attitudes toward these devices─semantic interpretability of the patterns, stylistic effects and advertising effects induced by the language usage, and the appropriateness of the language use as advertising devices, including the com-patibility of these devices with Chinese grammar. A detailed discussion on the top three factors determining why a certain pattern is acceptable or unacceptable is provided in the following sections, based on the descending order of the acceptability of these patterns.

To begin with, as regards the most acceptable pattern such as easy play and easy select, as shown by Table 2, the major type of responses favoring such usage is concerned with its semantic interpretability. According to the feedback elicited, since a great number of people know the word easy, the message conveyed by the advertisements is easy to understand. In addition, for some other subjects, compared with the standard English usage, such a nativized device based on the translated meaning of its Chinese counterpart makes the meaning even more transparent. However, one subject notes that such usage is easy to be understood by young people only while it does not work with the older generation, suggesting that age may play a role in influencing subjects’ attitudes in accepting this pattern.

As for the other two less dominant factors contributing to subjects’ favorable attitudes, one is the positive stylistic effects induced by the language usage. Subjects hold that such device consisting of easy English vocabulary makes the whole expression sound straightforward, dynamic and full of fun. Another factor is related to the positive advertising effects yielded by the language use. Based on the observation of some subjects, the simple English word easy fully features the characteristics of the advertised products and yields in the readers a feeling of user-friendliness concerning the products. For these readers, via the use of the expression such as easy play, they are lured to believe that they can operate the advertised products such as a DVD player successfully and effortlessly.

By contrast, among the negative responses, although very few, the violation of Standard English grammar by this device mainly accounts for the unacceptability of this pattern. Comments such as “It’s Chinese English” and “a word-for-word translation from Chinese structure” are elicited. In spite of such objection to the nonstandard

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English usage involved in this pattern, due to its easy-to-understand meaning brought about by the verbatim translation from Chinese grammar, such pattern is rated with the highest degree of acceptability.

With regard to the second most acceptable devices such as give me high and green your heart, where the parts of speech have been changed, whether the patterns are semantically interpretable largely determines subjects’ acceptability of this usage. See Table 3 for the percentage. For those subjects who can understand these patterns, the message conveyed by the advertisements is easy to read. However, for those having difficulties understanding the patterns, they complain that the meanings are unintelligible to those readers whose proficiency of English is low. Some of them affirm that if the advertising text is mixed with both Chinese and English, the meaning will become more clear.

The next factor determining whether the pattern is acceptable is the stylistic effects induced by the language usage. Subjects who accept this pattern find its rhetorical style simple, lively, dynamic and full of fun whereas those who are against such usage find it ludicrous. Still some other opponents who are concerned with the appropriateness or linguistic accuracy of such usage argue that for Chinese audience, Chinese should be the only language used in advertisements and such usage messes with Standard English grammar. In this part of analysis, the same leading two factors, viz., the semantic interpretability of the patterns and the stylistic effects of the usage determine both the acceptability as well as the unacceptability of these English-only patterns. Although the language barrier of English may lead to the lack of semantic interpretability of these patterns, favorable responses still surpass unfavorable ones to a large extent.

The following devices analyzed are composed by the Chinese text mixed with single English words such as 幫助您的愛心快速 ONLINE (bangzhu ninde aixin kuaisu online) and 給您最 fly 的音樂 (geinin zuiflyde yinyue). Table 4 shows that semantic interpretability once again constitutes the primary factor in accounting for the acceptability and unacceptability of this pattern. For subjects who can comprehend this pattern, the meaning of the English words can be easily derived. By contrast, subjects not being able to understand the meaning claim that it takes an above-average level of English proficiency to understand the expression. Thus, for those who do not possess such level of English proficiency, they fail in the task of comprehending the meaning.

Other than semantic interpretability of the patterns, stylistic effects induced by the language usage also come into play in influencing subjects’ attitudes in either accepting or not accepting the patterns. Subjects who like the style maintain that when using equivalent Chinese words entails wordiness, the code-mixing of English helps to convey the message more clearly and creates a simple, forceful, and lively style. For example, in the instance of 給您最 fly 的音樂 (geinin zuiflyde yinyue), one subject asserts that

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the English word fly is used so lively that he/she can feel the bouncing of the musical notes. On the other hand, for those who do not appreciate the code-mixing style or find the English expressions an inappropriate way to advertise the products, they think that it is unnecessary to code-mix English at all and the code-mixing style looks unnatural and ludicrous.

Again in this part of analysis, the same factors, namely, semantic interpretability of the devices, stylistic effects induced by the language usage, and the inappropriateness of the linguistic expressions as advertising devices, determine subjects’ attitudes towards the patterns.

When it comes to the e-derived words such as e-color, e-go, e-color and e-match, as indicated by Table 5, the most distinguishing positive feature of such language usage is the trendiness involved in the terms. Based on some subjects’ comments, these e-words represent the trendy development of the 21st_{century since this is an e-era (electronic}

era). To a much lesser extent, the semantic transparency of these newly coined terms wins the heart of some other subjects. For them, by looking at these English terms, the meanings can be automatically entailed. Still another 12 percent of favorable views regard such devices as innovating and seminal.

Among the unfavorable feedback, lack of semantic interpretability mainly accounts for the unacceptability of these expressions. One subject points out that semantic obscurity is often involved in all the e-words in that they look like professional jargon which is foreign to readers not in the related fields.

In sum, as far as such e-words are concerned, though whether their meanings can be interpretable constitutes one major reason to account for their degree of acceptability and unacceptability, representing the trendy development has become the most distinct merit of such devices.

The next pattern to be analyzed consists of mixing of English, Mandarin and Southern Min. For percentages of the top three factors, please see Table 6. Among the three languages mixed, Southern Min in particular has a special meaning: it represents binary values in the current phase of Taiwan. On the one hand, Southern Min stands for a symbol of solidarity, an ethnic and cultural identity of local Taiwanese people. On the other hand, since Southern Min used to be associated with the language used by the rural people and people of lower socio-economic status, it has been stigmatized as non-standard and uncultured. Therefore, such polarizing views are witnessed by subjects’ feedback. The same leading factor “the stylistic effects induced by the language usage” creates completely opposite impacts on subjects’ attitudes. Subjects who find the style positive argue that this pattern yields a sense of local flavor, familiarity, forcefulness, cuteness, and liveliness. As for those finding this pattern disagreeable, they regard it as vulgar, uncultured, like the expression used by a country bumpkin. However, the frequency of

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the positive feedback sill outnumbers that of the negative by almost doubling it.

Other than the positive stylistic usage of the pattern, semantic interpretability also accounts for some subjects’ favorable attitudes. According to some of the feedback elicited, subjects’ knowledge of at least a little bit of English and Southern Min contributes to their understanding of this pattern. Conversely, though small in number, subjects with negative attitudes complain that half of the Southern Min speakers in Taiwan do not understand any English and some speakers of other dialects do not understand any Southern Min. For these speakers, the communication breakdown occurs accordingly. Therefore, based on these comments, people’s language barrier of either English or Southern Min or both entails the incomprehensibility of this pattern.

Regarding what other major factors contribute to subjects’ negative attitudes, the unnecessary, inappropriate and incompatible language mixing of the pattern largely affects the subjects’ choices. Some subjects state that the mixing of the two entirely different languages, namely, English, symbolizing internationalism, and Southern Min, representing localism, produces incongruity and incompatibility in the style.

The third dominant negative factor pertains to the non-standard English usage involved in the pattern. Some subjects note that such usage is ungrammatical and informal. One subject, however, adds that the majority of people in Taiwan do not care about Standard English grammar anyway, implying that no matter how ungrammatical the advertising language may be, the general public’s positive views stay unaffected. This view is cross-referred by Hsu (2002).4

This part of analysis suggests that whether subjects have a basic knowledge of both English and Southern Min as well as their underlying attitudes toward the symbolic meaning of Southern Min mainly determine their attitudes toward the surveyed pattern.

The following patterns to be examined are easy 抽 (chou) and easy 敷 (fu). Once again the factor of semantic interpretability plays the most important role in accounting for subjects’ positive attitudes toward this device, as indicated by Table 7. Subjects state that the English word easy is easy to understand; due to the special combination of Chinese and English words, the meaning of these phrases is transparent.

On the other hand, subjects holding a negative attitude are mainly concerned about the lack of necessity and appropriateness in mixing English. According to these subjects, such device consists of unnecessary language combination, yielding a sense of incongruity

4_{In Hsu’s study (2002) and the present study, the same sampling population was surveyed.}

However, different research questions were posed in these two works. In Hsu (2002), subjects were investigated concerning their attitudes towards mistakes in English mixing in advertising in Taiwan. The result shows that 61 percent as opposed to 39 percent of subjects hold that the identification of English mistakes in advertisements would not affect their extent of acceptability of these advertisements.

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and incompatibility. They believe that without mixing English, the Chinese language will produce the same advertising effects.

The second important factor, stylistic effects of the usage, contributes to both favorable and unfavorable attitudes. Subjects with positive attitudes find such patterns cute, concise, and full of fun whereas subjects with negative attitudes consider them ludicrous, vulgar and uncultured.

The third main types of factors accounting for subjects’ attitudes, positively vs. negatively, are the positive advertising effects induced by the language usage as opposed to the lack of smoothness in its structure. Informants who favor the device consider that the word easy renders a feeling of user-friendliness, making readers feel that the operation of the advertised products is easy. By contrast, those with disapproving attitudes argue that the mixed pattern does not sound smooth in reading or in oral utterances.

To sum up, though the pattern of easy 抽 (chou) consists of both Chinese and simple English vocabulary, it receives a much lower degree of acceptability than the all-English phrases such as easy play. Its incompatibility with either Chinese or English and the lack of smoothness in its structure largely account for such outcome.

Concerning the last pattern rated with the lowest degree of acceptability, the English-only sentences based on the verbatim translation from Chinese structure, the responses elicited shed a great deal of light on the underlying mentality of the general public’s inferiority of their English proficiency. Table 8 indicates that once again semantic interpretability of these expressions determines the subjects’ attitudes, positively vs. negatively. However, this is the only device where the number of negative responses surpasses that of positive ones. For subjects who find such patterns interpretable, some remark that since these expressions are word-for-word translations from Chinese grammar, the meaning of English is easy to understand. Others claim that such usages are semantically transparent to foreigners (the literal meaning copied from the responses, implying “native speakers of English”) and Chinese speakers who frequently travel abroad and who have higher socio-economic status. What such statement implies is that since these English sentences are so difficult to understand, only native speakers of English and Chinese speakers in the middle-upper class with good command of English can deal with such texts easily.

By contrast, for subjects having difficulty understanding the meaning of the patterns, two types of feedback were elicited. The first group of subjects maintains that two reasons contribute to the incomprehensibility of these English sentences. On the one hand, most of the people in Taiwan lack an adequate command of English to understand the meaning of such English-only type of sentences. On the other hand, the great amount of English words used in the devices further contributes to the semantic incomprehensibility of such sentences. In contrast to the above view, the second group

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of informants, whose English is good enough to identify the ungrammatical English usages in the sentences, hold that the immense amount of English errors in the sentences actually render these patterns unintelligible.

Besides semantic comprehensibility, two other factors that equally account for the subjects’ favorable attitudes are the positive advertising effects and the positive stylistic effects induced by the language usage. As regards the advertising effects, in the case of the advertisement campaigning the sales of the residential real estate property which brand name is “Wonderful Villa” 鳳凰城 (feng-huang-cheng), some subjects affirm that the English-only wording seems to stimulate more of their imagination than does its Chinese equivalent, creating for the readers a sense of being abroad. Some others believe that the English-only usage helps to enhance the quality of the advertised products and satisfy the consumers’ mentality of idolatry for foreign affairs. In terms of the positive stylistic effects, the language usage is depicted as “lively, simple, easy to read and without any difficult words.”

As for the other two factors leading to subjects’ negative attitudes, these are the inappropriateness of the linguistic expressions as advertising devices and the non-standard English usage involved in the patterns. The former category of responses is rated with almost the same frequency as that of the semantic incomprehensibility. According to subjects’ feedback, since the target audience of the advertisements is Chinese speakers, using English-only type of devices is not appropriate. In addition, the sentences are too long, filled with so many English words; the general public may easily lose their incentive and patience to read the text, a finding cross-referred by Hsu (2002).5 This is particularly the case with those readers whose English proficiency is low and they tend to skip the whole text completely.

The latter type of negative comments is made by informants, though in a very small number, who are able to identify the English mistakes made in the advertising text. They observe that such English sentences are the outcome of the Chinese or Taiwanese style of English, deviating seriously from the norm of Standard English. Copywriters who create such advertising text possess an extremely bad command of English. Such English mistakes occurring in the advertising text arouse ridicules from the readers, leaving them highly doubtful about the quality of the advertised products.

The analysis of the elicited responses in this section points to two things worth noting. First, except for a small group of subjects, the general public’s English proficiency is so low that most of them cannot even identify the deviations from Standard English grammar involved in the sentence patterns. Second, being totally aware of and ashamed

5_{In Hsu (2002), when subjects are inquired whether a large number of English words employed}

in advertising text would affect their interest in reading the advertisements, 56 percent vs. 43 percent of them respond that their interest would be affected.

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of their low proficiency in English, many of the subjects presume that any long length of English text entails difficulty and incomprehensibility in reading due to their own language barrier.

As evidenced by the rates of acceptability of all the code-mixed patterns shown in Table 1, when the English mixing involves a single word or easy vocabulary, such usage is welcome. Overwhelmingly favorable attitudes are induced because these patterns are semantically transparent to them. However, when it comes to long strings of English words based on the word-for-word translation from Chinese structure, the rate of acceptability drops tremendously. Based on the their feedback, the majority of subjects blame themselves for not being able to understand the English sentences because a great amount of English words are involved and their command of English is very low. Some of them presume that as long as the advertising text consists of English-only type of long sentences, these patterns must be standard: only native speakers of English and Chinese audience with good English competence can deal with them. Some of the subjects even believe that these advertising texts are so standard that they can serve as a good model for English learning. Overall, except for a relatively small number of subjects, the general public do not have the knowledge that the semantic unintelligibility of the advertising text actually stems from the serious ungrammaticality involved in the English usages.

On the other hand, since most of these subjects tend to think that long strings of English words entail difficulty in reading, even before they actually process the long length of advertising texts, with their low command of English, they believe that they will fail in the interpretation of the text, thus feeling psychologically inhibited to read the text. In other words, the language barrier created by the long English sentences blocks these subjects’ interest to read the text and contributes to the semantic incomprehensibility of the text. For most of the subjects, the equation works in this way: long strings of English words are synonymous to the difficulty of the text and their inability to comprehend the text.

In short, the analysis indicates that subjects’ language barrier of English, the prescriptive attitudes towards the ungrammatical English usage and the inappropriateness in using such long strings of English to the Chinese target audience amount to the subjects’ overwhelmingly negative attitudes toward the English-only type of long sentences based on verbatim translation.

In summary, Table 9 indicates that in terms of the top three categories of reasons accounting for the acceptability of the nativized devices, semantic interpretability has cast its effect throughout all of the seven patterns. Positive advertising effects and stylistic effects of the language usage have come second in equally contributing to the favorable attitudes toward the following five patterns: easy select, easy 敷 (fu), 幫助

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您的愛心快速ONLINE (bangzhu ninde aixin kuaisu ONLINE), the mixing pattern of the three languages, i.e., everybody 攏 (long) happy and the Chinese style of long English sentences. The device of e-color is regarded as both trendy and innovating whereas the pattern Give me high is marked by its stylistic effects and innovating language usage.

On the other hand, among all the factors accounting for the negative attitudes toward the nativzed patterns, the inappropriateness or lack of necessity of the language usage, including the incompatibility of the usage with Chinese or English grammar, has repeatedly influenced subject’s attitudes toward all the seven patterns. The next dominant factor is the semantic interpretability of these devices. It contributes to the subjects’ judgmental attitudes toward all the patterns except for two of them─easy 敷(fu) and the mixing pattern of three languages, everybody 攏 (long) happy. The negative stylistic effects of the language usage also equally cast their influences on subjects’ disproving attitudes toward all the patterns other than easy play and the Chinese style of long English sentences.

With regard to the patterns of easy play, Chinese style of English sentences and the mixing of three languages, everybody 攏 (long) happy, they have been particularly identified as violating Standard English grammar. The device of easy 敷 (fu), on the other hand, is marked by its lack of smoothness in its structure. Intrinsically, the language barrier of English and Southern Min, the inappropriateness and incompatibility in using English in advertising texts to the Chinese target audience, and the prescriptive attitudes toward the non-standard English usage have contributed to subjects’ critical attitudes toward these nativized English patterns.

3.3 The public’s attitudes toward the trend of nativization of English in

advertising

in

Taiwan

Concerning the subjects’ general attitudes toward the trend of nativization of English usage in advertising in Taiwan, as Table 10 shows, out of the 502 responses gathered, almost two thirds of them hold that such nativized devices are just instances of copywriters’ creativity for the purpose of attention-getting and therefore, grammatical observance should not be strictly demanded. Along the same line, 14 percent of responses assert that such devices demonstrate the unique characteristics of creativity via the process of nativization of English usage in Taiwan. By contrast, only a total of 16 percent of feedback is prescriptive, concerned that these devices violate the standard English usage and the copywriters’ English proficiency should be enhanced. The statistics shows that the majority of responses, more than 75 percent of them, regard the nativized devices of English usage as linguistic creativity rather than deviations from standard English. In other words, the majority of the public take a descriptive attitude

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rather than a prescriptive one in dealing with the nativization of English in advertising in Taiwan.

3.4 The correlation between sociolinguistics factors and the subjects’

degree of acceptability of the nativized patterns

The results of the correlation analysis indicate that subjects’ level of competence of English and their degree of preference for using English in advertisements correlate with their extent of acceptability of the surveyed patterns. Following next are the attitudinal factors pertaining to subjects’ preference for using English in advertisements that are shown to have a correlation.

1. Whether using English to advertise products imported from abroad vs. those manufactured locally will enhance subjects’ level of confidence in the advertised products.

2. Whether using a great number of English words to advertise the above two types of products will help to enhance subjects’ level of confidence in the advertised products. 3. Subjects’ views and degree of acceptability of using English to advertise products that are culturally sensitive in nature such as the traditional clothing, food and medicine.

4. Subjects’ views concerning the trend of development of using English in general and nativized English in particular in advertising in Taiwan.

5. Whether using difficult English words in advertisements will inhibit or enhance subjects’ incentive or interest to read the advertisement.

6. Subjects’ preferred language for advertising products imported from abroad as opposed to those manufactured domestically.

Table 11 indicates that regarding subjects’ self-rated level of competence of English, subjects who rate their command of English at the two ends of the spectrum hold a more negative attitude toward all the nativized patterns than those who rate their English competence in the middle. In other words, informants whose self-rated proficiency is “alright” or “barely alright” have a higher degree of acceptability of the surveyed patterns than those who consider their English proficiency to be either very good or very bad. As evidenced by the analysis of the underlying factors accounting for subjects’ degree of unacceptability, subjects whose English is very good are able to identify the non-standard English usages in the advertising text and thus are very judgmental and critical about such Chinese style of English usage. By contrast, those whose English proficiency is very low either have difficulty in understanding the meaning of the nativized devices or

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find the code-mixed English usage unnecessary due to their language barrier of English. Consequently, these two types of subjects are more judgmental and have a lower degree of acceptability than those who rate their English proficiency in the middle of the spectrum.

Tables 11 and 12 show that subjects holding a favorable attitude toward using English in advertising products, regardless of the product type, whether imported from abroad, manufactured locally or pertaining to traditional domains, have a higher degree of acceptability of the nativized patterns than those whose attitudes are negative.

The same result is obtained, as indicated by Tables 13 and 14, when it comes to the positive correlation between subjects’ degree of acceptability and their views regarding the trend of development of using English in general as well as using nativized English in particular in advertising in Taiwan. The more they favor the trend, the higher their degree of acceptability of the nativized patterns is.

In addition to the attitudinal factors mentioned above, Table 15 shows that other factors such as the number of English words used in advertisements, using difficult English words in advertisements, and the preferred language to be used in advertising products imported from abroad and manufactured domestically also come into play in correlating with subjects’ degree of acceptability of the nativized patterns. The result indicates that those who are negative about using difficult English words, using a large number of English words, and using any English at all in advertising any type of products come up with a lower extent of acceptability of the surveyed patterns than those who hold favorable attitudes.

The analysis so far suggests that one’s command of English and the preference for using English in advertising correlate with one’s degree of acceptability of the nativized devices. Subjects with the highest and lowest proficiency of English hold the most negative attitudes toward the nativized devices. Those who prefer using English in whichever product domains and are positive about the development of Englishization as well as nativization of English in advertising hold more favorable attitudes.

4. Conclusion

Among the seven patterns surveyed, devices such as easy go are most popular while the Chinese style of long English sentences, which derive from verbatim translations from the Chinese structure, are least acceptable.

In examining the top three factors that determine whether a nativized pattern is acceptable, the same major factors such as whether a pattern is semantically interpretable, whether a pattern is considered appropriate, essential and compatible with the Chinese grammar, whether the English usage copes with the standard English grammar, and

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what are the stylistic and advertising effects induced by the language usage repeatedly come into play in influencing subjects’ attitudes. Other minor factors include whether a device is linguistically seminal or trendy and whether a device sounds smooth in reading.

Although some subjects who take a prescriptive attitude toward the non-standard English usages keep on voicing their concerns that such nativized devices, based on the word-for-word translation from Chinese grammar, violate the norm of Standard English, such concerns are still outweighed to a huge extent by the public’s general preference for such linguistic ingenuity. As demonstrated by the statistics of subjects’ attitudinal choices toward the trend of nativization of English usage in advertising in Taiwan, more than three quarters of the feedback is positive.

However, since in this study, the semantic interpretability of a mixed pattern depends on the understanding of English, especially when it comes to devices consisting of only English, subjects’ proficiency of and preference for English influence their acceptability of the patterns as well. A consistent observation is obtained by the correlation analysis where subjects’ English proficiency and their degree of preference for using English in advertising in general correlate with their level of acceptability of the nativized patterns. Those whose English proficiency is either very good or very bad and those who oppose using English in advertising are most critical about the nativized patterns. On the contrary, those who posses a medium level of English competence and those who favor using English in various product domains have a higher degree of acceptability of these nativized patterns.

In general, according to the analysis of this survey, though the majority of the public have a very low level of competence in English, who cannot even identify the serious ungrammaticality involved in the Chinese style of long English sentences, which is the sole factor responsible for the semantic unintelligibility of those patterns, they have such an immense enthusiasm toward English mixing in advertising. However, such enthusiasm is only limited to the text where the English vocabulary mixed is simple and easy to read. When it comes to the reading of long length of English text, their interest in and comprehension of the text will be automatically inhibited due to their psychological and language barriers.

To conclude, in spite of subjects’ general language barrier of English and the prescriptive attitudes held by a small number of subjects, based on the public’s favorable reactions towards the nativized advertising devices newly developed, it is predicted that the future development of such process will continue as a trend and further into a major discourse development in advertising in Taiwan.

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Table 1: Percentage of acceptability of the nativized patterns

SURVEYED PATTERNS Entirely

Acceptable Acceptable Neutral Unacceptable

Entirely Unacceptable

11.5 57.9 4.7 1.2

All-English phrases:

easy play, easy go, easy select _69.4 24.5 _5.89

11 47 12.2 1.2

All-English sentences: Give me high

Green your heart 58.1

28 13.4 8.7 43.9 13 0.9 Chinese-English mixing: 幫助您的愛心快速ONLINE, 給您最 fly 的音樂 52.6 32.8 13.9 6.1 42.4 17 2.8 All-English compounds:

e-color, e-go, e-people _48.5 31.8 _19.8

8.5 37.2 22.4 1.9

English-Mandarin-Southern Min mixing:

希望房價低的人買到保證 You happy, he happy,

everybody 攏 happy 45.7 30.1 24.3 7.8 33.7 24.7 2.1 Chinese-English mixing phrases: easy 抽, easy 敷 41.5 31.8 26.8 4.2 32.5 29.2 5.4

Chinese style of long English sentences:

Along the road, You will find the woods around us. Season over the leaves that love us. Where can give us so fresh so much as here?

36.7

28.7

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Table 2: Percentage of the top three categories of reasons accounting for the acceptability and unacceptability of the patterns such as easy play and easy select Easy play, easy

select Acceptable Unacceptable

Top three categories

of reasons Frequency Percentage

Top three categories of

reasons Frequency Percentage

Such pattern is semantically interpretable.

110 33.5 Such English usage is _{non-standard.} 8 29.6

Such language usage induces positive stylistic effects such as “simple,

straightforward” and “lovely.”

59 17.8

The linguistic expression is not considered appropriate, essential or compatible as an advertising device.

5 18.5

Such pattern induces positive advertising effects.

52 15.7

Such pattern is not semantically interpretable.

4 14.8 Total number of

reasons elicited 331

Total number of reasons

elicited 27

Table 3: Percentage of the top three categories of reasons accounting for the acceptability and unacceptability of the pattern Green your heart

Green your heart Acceptable Unacceptable

Top three categories of reasons

Frequency Percentage Top three categories of reasons Frequency Percentage Such pattern is semantically interpretable. 55 22.4

19 29.2 Such language usage

induces positive stylistic effects such as “simple” and “lovely.”

38 15.5

Such language usage induces negative stylistic effects such as

“ludicrous.”

9 13.8

The linguistic expression is not considered appropriate, essential or compatible as an advertising device. 8 12.3 Such device is innovating and creative. 32 13.1

Such English usage is

non-standard. 8 12.3

Total number of

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Table 4: Percentage of the top three categories of reasons accounting for the acceptability and unacceptability of the pattern 幫助您的愛心快速 ONLINE 幫助您的愛心快速

ONLINE

Acceptable Unacceptable

Top three categories Frequency Percentage Top three categories Frequency Percentage

Such pattern is

semantically interpretable. 42 18.8

18 29.5

Such language usage induces positive stylistic effects such as “simple” and “lovely.” 36 16.1 The linguistic expression is not considered appropriate, essential or compatible as an advertising device. 12 19.7

Such language usage induces positive advertising effects.

26 11.7

Such language usage induces negative stylistic effects such as “vulgar” and “ludicrous.”

11 18

elicited 223

Total number of

reasons elicited 61

Table 5: Percentage of the top three categories of reasons accounting for the acceptability and unacceptability of the pattern e-color

e-color Acceptable Unacceptable

Such language usage

represents being trendy. 52 23.3

35 38.5

Such pattern is

semantically interpretable. 33 14.8

Such language usage induces negative stylistic effects such as “vulgar” and “ludicrous.”

13 14.3

Such device is innovating

and creative. 26 11.7 The linguistic expression is not considered appropriate, essential or compatible as an advertising device. 9 9.9

elicited 223

Total number of

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Table 6: Percentage of the top three categories of reasons accounting for the acceptability and unacceptability of the pattern of You happy, he happy, everybody 攏 happy You happy, he happy,

everybody 攏 happy

Acceptable Unacceptable

Such language usage induces positive stylistic effects such as

‘localized’ and ‘cute.’

67 32.1

Such language usage induces negative stylistic effects such as “vulgar” and “ludicrous.” 36 31.9 Such pattern is semantically interpretable. 35 16.7 The linguistic expression is not considered appropriate, essential or compatible as an advertising device. 26 23

Such pattern induces positive advertising effects.

elicited 209

Total number of

Table 7: Percentage of the top three categories of reasons accounting for the acceptability and unacceptability of patterns such as easy 抽, easy 敷

Easy 抽, easy 敷 Acceptable Unacceptable

Such pattern is semantically interpretable. 66 34.6 The linguistic expression is not considered appropriate, essential or compatible as an advertising device. 34 28.1

Such language usage induces positive stylistic effects.

34 17.8

Such language usage induces negative stylistic effects.

32 26.4 Such language usage

induces positive advertising effects.

20 10.5

The structure does not sound smooth in reading.

19 15.7 Total number of reasons

elicited 191

Total number of

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Table 8: Percentage of the top three categories of reasons accounting for the acceptability and unacceptability of the Chinese style of long English sentences Long English

sentences

Acceptable Unacceptable

Top three categories of reasons

Frequency Percentage Top three categories of reasons Frequency Percentage Such pattern is semantically interpretable. 43 34.1

50 28.2

Such language usage induces positive advertising effects. 13 10.3 The linguistic expression is not considered appropriate, essential or compatible as an advertising device. 49 27.7

Such language usage induces positive stylistic effects.

Total number of

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Table 9: The top three categories of reasons for acceptability and unacceptability of the nativized devices

The top three categories of reasons for acceptability of the nativized devices

★ Semantic interpretability: All patterns

★ Positive advertising & stylistic effects induced by the language usage: easy play

easy 抽

everybody 攏 happy

幫助您的愛心快速ONLINE Chinese style of English sentences ★ Positive stylistic effects:

Give me high ★ Trendy: e-color ★ Innovating: e-color Give me high

The top three categories of reasons for unacceptability of the nativized devices

★ Not an appropriate, essential or compatible usage as advertising language: All patterns

★ Not semantically interpretable: easy play

e-color Give me high

幫助您的愛心快速ONLINE

Chinese style of English long sentences

★ Negative stylistic effects induced by the language usage: e-color easy 抽 Give me high everybody 攏 happy 幫助您的愛心快速ONLINE ★ Non-standard grammar: easy play everybody 攏 happy

Chinese style of English long sentences ★ Not smooth in structure:

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Table 10: Percentage of subjects’ attitudinal choices towards the trend of development of nativization of English usage in advertising in Taiwan

Attitudinal choices Percentage

Such devices are merely copywriters’ creativity for the purpose of attention-getting; readers don’t need to be too demanding on the grammatical observance.

62.5 Such devices demonstrate the unique characteristics of

creativity by the process of nativization of English usage. 14.1

76.6

Such devices violate the standard English usage and should

not be promoted. 8.6

These copywriters’ English proficiency needs to be enhanced. 7.7

16.3

Others 7

Table 11: Statistical results of the attitudinal test. P’s represent the probability of obtaining the observed difference by chance alone

Variables Number of

Subjects

Mean Rank Subjects’ self-rated proficiency of English.

Very low 87 22.40

Barely alright 158 23.95

Alright 98 24.16

Very good 17 22.53

P=0.0199

To use English in ads helps to enhance the degree of consumers’ confidence in the advertised products imported from abroad.

Yes 197 24.19

No 146 22.67

P=0.0071

To use more English words in ads helps to enhance the degree of consumers’ confidence in the advertised products.

Yes 28 25.96

No 318 23.15

P=0.007

To use English in ads helps to enhance the degree of consumers’ confidence in the advertised products manufactured locally.

Yes 24 25.75

No 321 23.19

P=0.0025

To use more English words in ads helps to enhance the degree of consumers’ confidence in the advertised products manufactured locally.

Yes 18 27.22

No 330 23.22

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Variables Number of Subjects Mean Rank

Subjects’ degree of acceptability of using English to advertise local and traditional products.

Very unacceptable 26 21.92 Unacceptable 142 22.39 Neutral 106 23.82 Acceptable 86 24.86 Very acceptable 9 30.11 P<0.0001

Using English to advertise the traditional and local products helps to market these products internationally.

Yes 130 24.25

No 240 23.15

P=0.0230

Using English to advertise the local and traditional products is highly expected.

Yes 82 24.77

No 288 23.18

P=0.0046

Using English in ads is incompatible with the nature of the traditional and local products.

Yes 136 22.90

No 234 23.91

P=0.0367

It’s difficult to accept using English to advertise the local and traditional products.

Yes 36 21.44

No 334 23.76

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The nativized English devices demonstrate the copywriters’ linguistic originality stemming from the nativization of English.

Yes 55 25.63

No 314 23.17

P=0.0007

Such nativized usages violate the standard English grammar. They are not worth promoting.

Yes 36 19.08

No 334 24.01

P<0.0001

Such nativized devices are merely copywriters’ linguistic originality for the purpose of attention-getting; observance for the grammatical rules should not be strictly required.

Yes 278 24.20

No 92 21.52

P<0.0001

The proficiency of English of these copywriters should be enhanced, who created such nativized English usage.

Yes 31 20.90

No 339 23.78

P=0.0006

Table 14: Statistical results of the attitudinal test. P’s represent the probability of obtaining the observed difference by chance alone.

Using English in advertising is a way to market Taiwan’s products internationally.

Yes 110 24.66

No 248 23.07

P=0.0018

It’s an international trend to use English in advertising. So let the nature take its course.

Yes 218 24.20

No 140 22.56

P=0.0006

Using English in advertising stands for an idolatry for foreign affairs. Such trend should be prohibited.

Yes 5 18.8

No 353 23.63

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Variables Number of Subjects Mean Rank

Using difficult English words in advertisement will inhibit my interest of reading the advertisement.

Yes 165 22.98

No 198 24.05

P=0.0228

Mixing English sentences in Chinese text is the most preferred way to advertise products imported from aboard.

Yes 58 24.93

No 300 23.3

P=0.0104

Using Chinese only is the most preferred way to advertise products imported from aboard.

Yes 23 21.35

No 335 23.71

P=0.0137

Using Chinese only is the most preferred way to advertise products manufactured domestically.

Yes 182 22.9

No 176 24.23

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Appendix 1: The demographic profile of the survey subjects

Frequency Percentage

TOTAL NUMBER OF SUBJECTS 425

VARIABLES GENDER Male 189 44.5 Female 236 55.5 AGE 14-20 70 16.5 21-30 129 30.4 31-40 93 21.9 41-50 103 24.2 51-60 20 4.7 61-70 5 1.9 71-80 4 0.9 80-90 1 0.2 LEVEL OF EDUCATION Junior high 14 3.3 Senior high 80 18.8 Junior college 35 8.2

Technical (Vocational) college 57 13.4

College and university 161 37.9

Master Degree 65 15.3 Doctoral Degree 13 3 OCCUPATION Students 98 23 Teachers 64 15 Businessmen 40 9.4 Government employees 32 7.5 Service 20 4.7 Homemakers 18 4.2

Insurance salesmen/real estate agents 18 4.2 Journalists/magazine editors/mass media workers 12 2.8

Electronics/information engineers 11 2.6

Policemen 4 0.09

Dentists/doctors/psychiatrist 4 0.09

DIALECTS SPOKEN AT HOME

Mandarin Chinese 398 55.7

Southern Min Dialect 265 37.1

Hakka 34 4.8

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Appendix 2

Examples of the 20 categories of underlying factors accounting for subjects’ acceptability and unacceptability of the nativized patterns

1) Whether the meaning of the pattern is interpretable.

a. Such usage yields more semantic interpretability than that of the standard English. 2) Whether the usage is attention-getting.

a. Such usage attracts the public’s attention.

b. It looks appealing to me, motivating me to find out what the content of the advertisement is (or what the English words are about).

3) Whether the usage is familiar and common (or overused or never heard of). a. I seem to often hear such type of Chinese style of English.

b. I have got used to it.

c. Such usage has become a convention. d. English is not so common yet.

4) Whether the linguistic device is innovating or creative.

By innovating or creative is meant that the advertising language is full of linguistic originality.

a. It’s a new invention from the copywriters. b. Such device reflects nativized creativity.

5) What are the effects, purposes or functions of the advertised product that the advertisement intends to impress on the readers?

a. Simple oral English strengthens the effect of the advertisement. b. As a reader, the word ‘easy’ gives me a feeling of being user-friendly.

c. Such language device (Chinese style of long English sentences) makes me feel that I am already abroad.

d. Such language usage upgrades the quality of the advertised product and satisfies the readers’ psychology of foreign idolatry.

e. How is it likely that such broken English can yield to the readers any sense of professionalism and any good impression on the quality of the advertised product?

6) Whether the usage copes with the trend of development. a. Such usage is a fashion of the time.

b. Time is changing.

c. Since this is an e-era, why cannot we use this device?

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advertise the intended products or convey the message delivered by the advertise-ments. Alternatively, can Chinese-only devices also serve the same purposes? In the code-mixing devices, are the Chinese and English structures compatible to each other?

a. Such English sentences are too long. It makes readers feel bored, impatient and unmotivated to read them.

b. (easy 敷 and easy 抽) Such Chinese-English combination seems to be odd and incongruent.

c. Using Chinese words can equally convey the same meaning as the English mixing. There is no need to use English at all.

d. Such mixing is incompatible with either language; it’s neither Chinese nor English. (不中不西, 不相容, 不搭調)

e. The meaning of the English mixing can hardly be conveyed by the equivalent Chinese words.

f. As long as the meaning is conveyed clearly, there is nothing wrong with using such expression.

g. Since this advertisement of real estate property aims at Chinese audience, the English-only device is not appropriate.

8) Whether the language usage yields a sense of modernization. a. Such device gives readers a feeling of modernized quality. 9) Whether the language usage yields a sense of internationalism.

a. Such device gives readers a feeling of internationalism.

b. (Code-mixing of English, Mandarin and Southern Min) Such usage can be termed “nativization of internationalism.”

10) Whether the usage copes with standard English grammar.

a. It is too exaggerating that such device follows no grammar at all.

b. Such usage is a word-for-word translation from Chinese structure. It has serious grammatical mistakes.

c. It is only proper for the copywriter to use standard English in creating such English sentences. If he/she fails to do so, he/she is only making himself/ herself a target of ridicule from others.

d. Since it is advertising language, grammatical rules should not be strictly demanded.

11) Whether the device sounds smooth in reading and oral utterances (通順, 順口, 順眼, 順耳) (口語化)

a. It sounds smooth orally. b. It sounds weird.

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c. It is easy to read.

12) Who are the major target audience of the advertisements?

a. Such advertisement aims at the e-generation or young people who appreciate novelty in life.

b. For the consumers whose English competence is not good, they can hardly accept such type of advertising language.

13) What are the types of advertised products?

a. The advertised product is manufactured locally; there is no need to use English in the advertisements.

14) What are the stylistic effects or impressions induced by the language usage? a. Such device is simple and easy.

b. Such style is too vulgar. c. Pretty good.

15) What influences may the linguistic devices have on the English learners? a. It helps readers to learn their English.

b. Such English usage is misleading the general public. 16) Whether the language usage is a pure advertising gimmick.

a. Such usage is only a pure advertising gimmick. There is nothing wrong with it. b. The copywriter is only showing off his/her English. Such advertising language

does not agree with the advertised product. 17) Whether the linguistic pattern is a device of nativiztion.

a. When English usage is nativized, it makes people feel more at ease to accept it. b. Such device integrates the local culture.

18) Whether the usage copes with the Chinese convention.

a. (Green your heart) The change of word class also occurred in ancient Chinese poetry.

b. To change the class of words is not such a big deal. In Chinese ancient text, such cases were quite common.

19) Whether the device copes with the essence and characteristics of language development such as language change.

a. Language is subject to human use. It has its flexibility and variation.

20) Personal emotional responses without providing any explicit account that can fall into any of the previous categories.

a. It’s not important. b. Very repulsive.