PART A: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale of the study
The Vietnamese government and people have a more and more positive point of view
the role of trading activities in which the value of corporate advertisement has been
highly appreciated after Vietnam operated the open-door policy as well as officially
joined the biggest trade organization “WTO”. In order to create good images of a
company or an organization, it is essential to build an informative and eligible
advertising. The purveyors might market their branches of business, operational
policies, and organization and so on through their skills of textual and lexical
manipulation.
The corporate introduction is normally written by the owner of the company in
his/her mother-tongue language and has it translated into target language or by the
copywriter. Thus, sometimes the terminology and terms used to render the text might
be different from the original meanings. Besides the sentences and grammatical
cohesive devices, the lexical cohesive devices are also essential to make a text to be a
coherent message.
To a writer of corporate advertisings, knowledge of linguistics, culture in general and
discourse analysis is really important for a coherent text. Corporate advertising is a
means of introducing company or organization name, operation methods, potentials,
services, production, staff and so on. I recognize some challenges in dealing with an
interesting but demanding text of corporate advertising. These might be solved by
writers if they have a thorough comprehension of and ability to use coherence and
cohesive devices in the discourse. In discourse, cohesion has an interrelation with
coherence; the former is a guide to and part of the latter in reading, writing. They are
features related to elements that produce cohesive and coherent texts. Thus, I make
decision to study the use of lexical cohesion in the English and Vietnamese corporate
advertisings as well as the frequency of occurrence.
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2. Aims of the study
This thesis aims to:

Part C: Conclusion
In this part, the author summarizes the findings and giving suggestions for further
development in writing corporate advertisements.
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PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
This chapter aims at dealing with theoretical framework of investigation such as
concepts of discourse, cohesion and coherence, cohesive devices, register and genre in
discourse analysis which are relevant to the purpose of this study, as well as the
definition and properties of advertisement in general and corporate advertisement in
particular.
1. Discourse and discourse analysis
1.1. The concepts of discourse
There are different ways of understanding and defining discourse. Halliday (1985)
defines “Discourse is a multidimensional process”. According to Crystal (1992)
discourse is seen as “a continuous stretch of language larger than a sentence, often
constituting a coherent unit such as a sermon, argument, joke, or narrative”. Cook
(1989) has a similar perspective of discourse; he considers discourse as “stretches of
language perceived to be meaningful, unified, and purposive”. In other words, as
Brown and Yule state, discourse is language material, either spoken or written, in
actual uses by speakers (and writters) of the language.
1.2. Text and Discourse
It is still in vagueness to define whether or not discourse and text are of two separate
entities and some linguists are trying to set them apart. According to Widdowson
(1979) text is sentences in combination whereas discourse is the use of sentence for
communication.
For some linguists, discourse is different from text. According to Cook (1989:158) text
is “ a stretch of language interpreted formally, without context”. However, Brown and
Yule (1983:6) argue that text is the representation of discourse and the verbal record

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2. Complexity of grammar: in spoken language grammar is not so important, but
information. For written language, it is important to maintain enough
information, appropriate grammatical structures as well as rational organization
of sentences.
3. Grammatical metaphor: Written language presents rather few different verbs,
whereas spoken language uses more verbs.
These above characteristics are inherent in spoken and written language in whatever
types of discourse. Written texts can be read out and heard such as letters, stories,
novels, contracts, reports, speeches. Moreover, spoken discourse such as lectures,
lessons, interviews, conversations and so on can also be reserved in the form of writing.
2. Context in discourse analysis
2.1. The notion of context
As premise, we should take a short excursion into the history of the notion of context.
Halliday and Hasan draw their concept of context from Bronislaw Malinowski's
principle of describing the environment and culture along with the text to analyze.
Malinowski, himself being an anthropologist in the 1920s, added various information
to his reports on the language of the Trobriand islanders, which included as much
cultural background as possible (context of culture), and the immediate environment in
which the text was produced (context of situation). He encountered basic difficulties
when translating pragmatic conversations of the Trobrianders into English, but later on
realized that even so called "civilized" language, mostly used for abstraction, could not
be separated from its cultural and immediate surroundings if it had to be understood
and rendered intelligibly. Based on this early framework of context, more and more
features determining the production and reception of texts were defined and added,
from Firth's 'nonverbal actions', 'effects', and 'objects and events' surrounding the text,
to Hymes' 'intent', 'key', 'medium' and 'genre', and normative principles of the text.
According to Halliday then, all these features are indebted to the complexity of modern
society and communication itself, but they enable us to predict what is going to happen
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a surface relation and it connects together the actual words and expressions that we can
see or hear.
Halliday and Hasan (1986) identify five main cohesive devices in English: reference,
substitution, ellipsis, conjunction, and lexical cohesion.
E.g. American Life Inc. pays the mortgage on each property from its own funds
until the mortgage is paid in full. The Company’s principals have made personal
guarantees covering all debt and no debt is cross-collateralized among the
properties and partnerships.
Reading this example, we can understand that there is a link between ‘American Life
Inc.’ and ‘the Company’’.
Coherence, on the other hand, is defined as the relationships of various ideas in a text
that are linked together to create a meaningful discourse. According to Nunan (1993)
coherence is “the feeling that sequences of sentences or utterances seems to hang
together and make sense. In short, coherence means the relationships that link the
meanings of utterances in a discourse or of the sentences in a text. These links may be
based on the speakers’ shared knowledge.
E.g. The aviation business includes handling aircrafts and passengers, offering
security check, services of security guard, fire fighting and other ground
services.
In the above example, there is a conceptual relationship among the aviation business
and other terms in the text.
Though cohesion and coherence, in essence, is different from each other, they are
closely linked together. They represent the very essential elements that make a text or
discourse coherent and that make coherent text or discourse different from random
sentences or utterances. Cohesion is mainly used to embody coherence by a system of
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cohesive devices. Accordingly, cohesion and coherence help consolidate the text as a
complete and unified linguistics unit beyond the largest syntactic unit of sentence.
3.2. Main principles of cohesion

They are considered as cohesive devices.
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Structure in text is provided by grammar therefore cohesion is considered to be outside
of the structure. Cohesion refers to the “non-structural text-forming relations” (Halliday
and Hasan 1976: 7). The concept of cohesion in text is related to semantic ties or
“relations of meanings that exist within the text, and that define it as a text” (ibid: 4).
within text, if a previously mentioned item is referred to again and is dependent upon
another element, it is considered a tie. Without semantic ties, sentences or utterances
would seem to lack any type of relationship to each other and might not be considered
text. Halliday and Hasan (ibid: 4) refer to this interstitial link as “the presupposing”
and “the presupposed”. Using the authors’ example, “Wash and core six cooking
apples. Put them into a reproof dish.” The word “them” presupposes “apples” and
provides a semantic tie between the two sentences, thus creating cohesion. Cohesion
creates interdependency in text.
a. Referencing
Referencing functions to retrieve presupposed information in text and must be
identifiable for it to be considered as cohesive. In written text, referencing indicates
how the writer introduces participants and keeps track of them throughout the text.
(Eggins 1994: 95) There are three general types of referencing: homophonic
referencing, which refers to shared information through the context of culture,
exophoric referencing, which refers to information from the immediate context of
situation, and endophoric referencing, which refers to information that can be
“retrieved” from within the text. It is this endophoric referencing which is the focus of
cohesion theory. Endophoric referencing can be divided into three areas: anaphoric,
cataphoric, and esphoric. Anaphoric refers to any reference that “points backwards”
to previously mentioned information in text. Cataphoric refers to any reference that
“points forward” to information that will be presented later in the text. Esphoric refers
to any reference within the same nominal group or phrase which follows the
presupposed item. For cohesion purposes, anaphoric referencing is the most relevant

Though substitution and ellipsis are similar in their functions as the linguistic links for
cohesion, ellipsis differs in that it is “substitution by zero”. (ibid: 142). Ellipsis refers
to a presupposed anaphoric item although the reference is not through a “place-
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marker” like in substitution. The presupposed item is understood through its structural
link. As it is a structural link, ellipsis operates through nominal, verbal and clausal
levels. Halliday and Hasan further classify ellipsis in systemic linguistic terminology
as deictic, numerative, epithet, classifier, and qualifier.
c. Conjunction
Conjunction, as described by Bloor and Bloor (1995: 98) acts as a “cohesive tie
between clauses or sections of text in such a way as to demonstrate a meaningful
pattern between them”, though Halliday and Hasan (ibid: 227) indicate that
“conjunctive relations are not tied to any particular sequence in the expression”.
Therefore, amongst the cohesion-forming devices within text, conjunction is the least
directly identifiable relation. Conjunction acts as a semantic cohesive tie within text
in four categories: additive, adversative, causal and temporal. Additive conjunction
acts to structurally coordinate or link by adding to the presupposed item and are
signaled through “and, also, too, furthermore, additionally”, etc. Additive conjunction
may also act to negate the presupposed item and is signaled by “nor, and Not, either,
neither”, etc. Adversative conjunctions act to indicate “contrary to expectation” (ibid:
250) and are signaled by “yet, though, only, but, in fact, rather”, etc. Causal
conjunction expresses “result, reason and purpose” and is signaled by “so, then, for,
because, for this reason, as a result, in this respect, etc” and adverbs: consequently,
accordingly. The last conjunctive category is temporal and links by signaling sequence
or time. Some sample temporal conjunctive signals are “then, next, after that, next day,
until then, at the same time, at this point”, etc.
3.2.2. Lexical Cohesion
Halliday & Hasan (1976) classify reiteration into four types: the same word, a
synonym/near-synonym, a super-ordinate, and a general word. For example, ‘a boy’

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and much more carefully planned. In general, there are two factors contributing to the
coherence of discourse.
1.3.3.1 Topical coherence
Only discussing on a specific topic, can the writer or speaker create a coherent text.
E.g. The experience we have gained integrating our medicines management
solutions enables us to offer a range of quality healthcare solutions where
patient care is the driver. Our products and services have a proven track record
of successfully delivering improvements to the patient care process. We have
established a reputation amongst clinicians that is second to none.
It is clear that the central topic of the above sentences concerns with the patient care
solutions of a hospital. The words and phrases are closely related to each other. The
passage is coherent because we have a feeling that the text hangs together and makes
sense, and is not just a jumble of sentences. In general, the topical coherence is
considered as the first important aspect of coherence.
1.3.3.2 Logical coherence
Another important aspect of coherence is logical coherence because it helps the reader
have a thorough understanding of the text. Looking back at the example of the above
extract, it is apparent that all the sentences are logically connected. The first sentence
functions as a topic sentence introducing the competence and experience of a hospital
and followed with supportive sentences proving by the quality and success of the
operation as well as the staff.
It can be said that what makes the above extract different from random sentences is the
coherence achieved by means of logical coherence. Generally, in order to have clauses
and sentences of a text linked with each other, it is necessary to have cohesion and
coherence. What makes a text topically and logically coherent is achieved with the
usage of topical coherence and logical coherence.
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CHAPTER II: SOME GENERAL FEATURES OF ENGLISH AND

intended to persuade the public such as propaganda publicity and public relations.
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Advertising techniques range in complexity from the publishing of straightforward
notices in the classified-advertising columns of newspapers to the concerted use of
newspapers magazines television radio direct mail and other communications media in
the course of a single advertising campaign. From its unsophisticated beginnings in
ancient times advertising has burgeoned into a worldwide industry.
Advertising goal is a specific communicative task and achievement level to be
accomplished with a specific audience in a specific period of time (Colly: 1997)
From the linguistic points of view, advertising is an activity of verbal communication
not only to present information but also to win the mind and heart of advertisement
receivers, the potential customers. As a result, advertisers benefit from this act.
Advertising whose purpose is to promote the image of a corporation rather than the sale of
a product or service; also called institutional advertising. This advertising is also used to
create public awareness of a corporation or to improve its reputation in the marketplace.
2. Corporate advertisements
A relatively minor but important form of advertising is corporate advertisement which
is designed solely to build prestige and public respect for particular business. Corporate
advertisements are sometimes called as “institutional advertisements” that introduce
business, culture and identity of a company or an organization. Different from
advertisements of name brand, the sale of a product or service, business to business and
public service, corporate advertisement gives potential customers an overview of the
enterprises operation, orientation, potentials, staff… or improve its reputation in the
market. Corporate advertisement is a major contributor toward the first impression
buyers will have of a company or organization and is a great opportunity to gain their
trust.
When writing a corporate advertisement it is important to remember that its length
must be between 400 and 4,000 characters. With this in mind, it makes good sense to
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languages, make sure that it is clear as potential buyers will feel confident that they will
be understood when they contact the company.
Making buyers aware of significant achievements that the company has made is
another effective way to differentiate the company from other competitors.
Paragraph 3 – Quality certificate (QC)
Quality certifications (such as ISO) allow for an increased level of trust and mentioning
them in the company introduction can only benefit it. The company may also wish to
inform buyers of the quality control procedures that it has in place and whether the use
or welcome third parties approved by buyers to handle QC operations. Additionally,
adding the company monthly output volume, countries/regions serviced and any major
clients that the company have will also build credibility with buyers. It is important to
keep in mind that awards or certifications that are specific to the city or area only will
be meaningless to readers and omit such certificates to save the reader from confusion.
Paragraph 4 - The closing
Many companies use the final paragraph of their company introductions to state their
corporate values and invite buyers to contact them.
Let us look at the following specific example for the above sample
Innovation First Notice was founded in 1993 with the vision of improving the customer
service of insurance carriers, third-party administrators, and self-insureds—while
simultaneously cutting their costs.
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The initial focus was on First Notice of Loss (FNOL) reports. Insurance companies
then, like today, were not in the business of capturing information or running call
centers. Loss reports came in from everywhere: agencies; branches; regional call
centers; etc. Containing inconsistent and incomplete data, these handwritten forms,
faxes and electronic files took days moving between company offices/systems and often
had to be re-entered along the way.
The need was just as clear in the call centers. Policyholders calling in by phone
experienced long hold times and often couldn’t get through at all during peak times

qualities of the entities involved and to the circumstances of the activities.
The corporate advertisements in English and Vietnamese share the same purpose of
providing essential information about the operation and business of a company in detail
and easy to remember.
b. Mode
Mode presents the medium and channel of the text. The two basic modes are spoken
(monologue, conversation) and written (newspaper articles, reference book). In
addition, written mode and spoken mode can be interchangeable for example spoken
mode can be interpreted into written mode (e.g. a dialogue in an article of a
newspaper), a written mode can be presented in spoken mode (e.g. a novel or drama is
spoken as a play).
Language used in the corporate advertisements must be concrete and informative so
that the reader of different English levels can understand.
c. Tenor
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Tenor is divided into personal tenor and functional tenor. Personal tenor is concerned
with the social roles of participants together with their status relationship and
personalities; it thus handles the degree of formality, familiarity and technicality of
linguistic exchanges whereas functional tenor is concerned with determining the social
function or role of utterance, identifying the purpose of which the language is used.
Considering English and Vietnamese corporate advertisements, we can recognize that
the two discourses are written by company owners or copywriters who have a deep
comprehension of the company structure. However, the target readership can be those
who get information on purpose or by chance provided that they find it interesting and
eager to read more.
CHAPTER 3: A COMPARATIVE STUDY ON LEXICAL
COHESIVE DEVICES IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE
CORPORATE ADVERTISEMENTS
1. General picture of lexical cohesive devices in Corporate advertisements

3 Collocation 65 (33%) 47 (33%)
3 Total 195 (100%) 142 (100%)
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The percentages of lexical cohesive devices’ contribution to the cohesion of English
CAs are presented in the pie-chart as follows:

Figure 3.1 – Percentage of Lexical cohesive devices in English CAs
The percentages of each lexical cohesive device’ contribution to the overall cohesion of
English CAs are shown in the pie-chart below:
Figure 3.2 – Percentage of Lexical cohesive devices in Vietnamese CAs
It is clear that repetition accounts for large portion in comparison with other lexical
cohesive devices.
2. A detailed analysis of Lexical Cohesive Devices in English and Vietnamese
corporate advertisements
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47%
9%
5%
6%
33%
Repetition
Synonym
Antonym
Super- ordinate
Collocat io n
Basically there is no basic difference in terms of nature of lexical cohesive devices
used in any genres or registers. They are items whichcommonly appeared in any
documents to create clarity and coherence. It is impossible to state that repetition only