Secondly, due to the development of the Internet and the globalization, the markets all around the world has a trend to merge to one, as a consequence those overseas business groups are now having more influence on our people in which advertising, especially television commercials and Internet commercials, has played an essential role. An appropriate application and translation of puns in an advertisement is more persuasive and can brings more positive effects than expected therefore, in this case the study of translation of puns is of much practical significance. It will allow the foreign advertisers to promote their product successfully without filming another commercial to be tailored for the local audience.

Finally, my personal interest plays a great part in choosing this subject, since the Internet now gives us easier access to foreign websites, I do find a great amount of creative commercials and I realize that these commercials could have become more effective as long as they had been translated to different languages not just English. Therefore, I decide to collect some commercials with puns as to study on and see if they can be translated into Chinese.

2 Features of Commercial Language 

A commercial advertisement on television is a span of television programming produced and paid for by an organization, which conveys a message, typically to market a product or service. Advertising revenue provides a significant portion of the funding for most privately owned television networks. The vast majority of television advertisements today consist of brief advertising spots, ranging in length from a few seconds to several minutes (as well as program-length infomercials). Advertisements of this sort have been used to promote a wide variety of goods, services and ideas since the dawn of television and TV commercial now takes the largest share in the advertising market. From the perspective of linguistics, the language of television advertising is different from those of other forms of advertising. In the following, two features of commercial language will be discussed.

2.1 Complementariness 

A TV commercial is a combination of image and sound. Since it is broadcasted through visual media, television commercial image is the most important factor in television advertising. The model expression and visual impact are the most powerful means for the commercial to effect. Therefore, in commercials, language is used to complement the image. Its main function is to strengthen the creative theme, to emphasize the goods brand and to participate in picture composition. For instance, in Nike's commercial, its slogan "just do it" as well as its logo only exist at the corner or simply flash at the end of the commercial. Even though image has done most of the job, in commercial, language is still of great significance. A good slogan can always effectively attract and impress the audience of the commercial.来~自^优尔论+文.网www.youerw.com/

2.2 Colloquial Sentences 

Another feature of commercial language is that commercials often use colloquial sentences because of the following reasons. Firstly, the audiences are of varied ages with different education background therefore, the language should be easy to understand. Secondly, in TV commercial the image is the leading role and if the commercial uses documented and formal sentences, the audiences' attention may be distracted from the image. Thirdly, TV commercials are unable to pause and repeat therefore, using difficult sentences in commercial means that if the audiences are not clear about the language, they cannot listen to it again, which will affect the audiences' understanding of advertising content, thereby will affect advertising effectiveness.

3 Puns in English Commercials

A pun (also known as paronomasia) is a considered confusion of words which have similar sounds for rhetorical purpose. Punning is also regarded as the humorous use of a word on their dual or multiple meanings. As a game of words, pun creates humor and wit effect to draw the audiences’ attention and inspire their association. Besides the vividness of pun can pleasure the audiences’ spirit and satisfy their requirement of beauty. In addition, with dual meanings, pun has the characteristic of small carrier but varied connotations, which is of economic advantage especially when the cost of commercial is so expensive. Therefore, punning is widely used in commercial and it becomes a key to impress the audiences and persuade the potential consumers to buy the products.