This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Rothschild Ewald, H. Articles by Vann, R. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Deception by Design

Figure Ground and Verbal Illusion in Direct Mail

Iowa State University, hewald{at}iastate.edu

Roberta Vann

Iowa State University

Analyzing illustrative set of direct mail messages, this article explores textual strategies that invite readers to participate in their own deception. These strategies, which include personalization, imbalance, and competing frameworks, create a type of verbal illusion that emphasizes certain potentialities and eliminates others present within the text itself. Such verbal illusion can be understood in terms of the concept of figure ground, which embodies the idea of visual appearance and disappearance in optical illusions. The success of these verbal illusions suggests that texts have the power to transform perception, sometimes resulting in deception as the reader interacts with the text.

Key Words: direct mail • deception • figure ground • illusion • language

Journal of Business Communication, Vol. 45, No. 4, 430-450 (2008)
DOI: 10.1177/0021943608324120


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?