Representation of Historical Memory in Russian Media Advertising Discourse

Abstract

In the context of the panmediatization and digitalization of society, in the communicative environment there is a transformation of the ways in which historical memory is represented in media advertising discourse. Digital technologies create new opportunities for constructing a discursive space where the line between the past and the present, the real and the virtual, is blurred. History in the media advertising picture of the world appears as the past actualized in the present and seen from the axiological viewpoint of the future. Contemporary media advertising discourse, representing a certain perspective model of social reality in which different layers of time coexist, becomes a powerful resource for preserving historical memory and generational continuity, codes of national mentality and identity. The functioning of historical artifacts, which represent historical memory, within the structure of media advertising discourse is considered in the study as extra-artistic quotability of precedential “texts from life.” In the context of this study, an artifact of history is understood as a cognitive model linked to historical reality through images of personalities, events, and entire epochs, represented in the structure of a creolized media text through the interaction of verbal, visual, and acoustic components of a polymodal structure. The systematization of empirical materials has made it possible to identify key methods of representing historical memory in the structure of contemporary media advertising discourse: the incorporation of images of historical figures; the presentation of facts and events; and the representation of the functional and stylistic code of a particular historical era and the mindset actualized by this code. The comprehensive methodology was based on structural-semiotic analysis, a functional approach, and sociolinguistic research methods, which made it possible to analyze the types and functions of functional-stylistic codes of the past integrated into media texts and to identify the potential impact of creolized media advertising texts containing historical artifacts on the audience. The study showed that, given the dynamic transformations in our society, media advertising discourse is actualizing its sociocultural functions and can become a powerful tool for preserving historical memory and replenishing the largely lost spiritual and moral norms and traditional values.