Le plurilinguisme dans la publicité (English shop)

Stefanie Lemaire’s dissertation “Le plurilinguisme dans la publicité” examines the use, communicative functions, and cultural significance of multilingualism in European advertising. The research focuses on a comparative analysis of advertisements from France, Germany, and Spain, particularly during the 1990s. It investigates how foreign languages are strategically employed to communicate cultural identity, internationalism, social prestige, and specific brand images. Particular attention is given to language policies, regional multilingualism, and the influence of Anglicisms and mixed linguistic forms such as Franglais and Denglisch. Through statistical analysis and numerous advertising examples, the study explores the distribution of foreign-language advertising and the factors encouraging or restricting its use. Central themes include audience-oriented language selection, the symbolic representation of product origin, and the tension between international advertising standardization and cultural adaptation. The dissertation further examines linguistic creativity through wordplay, rhetorical figures, phonetic devices, and semantic techniques in multilingual advertising slogans. Another important dimension addresses the relationship between advertising, visual arts, and literature, including influences from Modernism, Futurism, Dadaism, Bauhaus, and Pop Art. The findings illustrate how multilingual advertising operates beyond information transmission as a cultural, aesthetic, and strategic instrument of commercial communication.