Stylistics

• Stylistics

  the study of style, which can be defined as the analysis of distinctive expressions in language and the description of its purpose and effect
• Style


  A distinctive way of using language for some purpose and to some effect; individual manner of expression
• Norm

  A set of language rules which are considered to be the most standard and correct in a certain epoch and in a certain society
• Individual style

  A unique combination of language units, expressive means and stylistic devices peculiar to a given writer which makes his works easily recognizable
• Context


  A linguistic encirclement of a language unit; conditions and peculiarities of functioning of a language unit in speech
• Stylistic context


  A stretch of a text interrupted by an unexpected element that results in a stylistic device; can be microcontext (within one sentence), macrocontext (within a super phrasal unit or paragraph), or megacontext (comprising the whole literary work)
• Foregrounding


  A stylistic device that includes the principles of formal textual organization that focuses the reader's attention on some certain fragments of the message
• Ways of producing foregrounding


  • Parallelism (unexpected regularity, "more of the same")
  • Deviation (unexpected irregularity)
• Types of foregrounding


  • Convergence (combination of stylistic devices promoting the same idea)
  • Coupling (semantically relevant appearance of equivalent elements in equivalent position)
  • Defeated expectancy (some element of the text receives prominence due to an interruption in the pattern of predictability)
• Image


  A speech fragment that contains image-bearing information; any word expression that imparts picturesqueness and vividness
• Trope


  A sort of transfer based on the interplay of lexical meanings of a word that results in establishing connections between different or even opposite notions or things, which are understood to have some similarity in the given context
• Components of image structure

  • The direct thought (the tenor)
  • The figurative thought (the vehicle)
  • The ground of comparison (the similar feature of the tenor and vehicle)
  • The relation between the tenor and vehicle
  • The type of identification/comparison or the type of a trope
• Types of images


  • General (macroimages)
  • Individual (microimages)
• Categories of images


  • Visual
  • Aural (acoustic)
  • Relational
• Meaning


  A certain reflection in our mind of objects, phenomena or relations that makes part of the linguistic sign
• Types of meaning


  • Grammatical (refers to relations between words or to some forms of words or constructions bearing upon their structural functions in the language-as-a-system)
  • Lexical (refers to some concrete concept, phenomenon, or thing of objective reality, whether real or imaginary; can be denotative and connotative)
• Denotative meaning

  Refers to the notional basis of information conveyed by the speaker to the listener; establishes correlation between the name (word) and the object, phenomenon, process or qualification of concrete reality or thought as such, which is detonated by the word
• Connotative meaning

  Refers to socio-cultural and personal associations; conveys information about the situation and the participants of communication; does not exist independently of denotation but simultaneously with it
• Types of connotative meaning

  • Functional stylistic (result of the constant usage of the word in definite speech spheres)
  • Evaluative (bears reference to things, phenomena or ideas through the evaluation of the denotate)
  • Emotive (expresses the speaker's emotional attitude to the denotate)
  • Expressive (does not refer directly to things or phenomena of the objective reality, but to the feelings and emotions of the speaker; aims at intensification of the meaning)
• Phonetic stylistic means in English include phonemes, which are the main unit of the phonological level and whose chief function is to distinguish words and their forms
• Phonemes have the expression side only, i.e. they are not two-fold signs, so there are no EM on the phonological level
• Patterns of sound arrangement

  • Versification (art of writing poetry)
  • Instrumentation (sound selection and combination modes)
• Modes of sound arrangement in instrumentation

  • Alliteration
  • Assonance
  • Onomatopoeia
• Euphony

  Harmonious sounding of the utterance, optimum concordance of sound and meaning
• Cacophony


  Grouping of harsh, discordant sounds, sense of strain and discomfort in pronouncing and hearing
• Alliteration


  Deliberate reiterated repetition of the same (or acoustically similar) sounds and sound combinations
• Alliteration is most frequent in modern poetry where it creates a certain melodic and emotional effect while enhancing the expressiveness of the utterance
• Assonance


  Deliberate reiterated repetition of the same (or acoustically similar) vowels in close succession aimed at creating a specific sound and contential effect
• Assonance


  • Twinkle, twinkle, little star
  • How I wonder what you are
  • Up above the world so high
  • Like a diamond in the sky
• Semasiology is a branch of linguistics which studies semantics or meaning of linguistic units belonging to different language levels.
• Lexical semasiology analyses the meaning of words and word combinations, relations between these meanings and the changes these meanings undergo.
• Stylistic semasiology is concerned only with those semantic relations and changes which form the basis of EM and SD.
• Hyperbole - is a deliberate exaggeration which is aimed at intensification one of the features of an object to such extent that will show its absurdity.
• Meiosis (майоусіс) -is the figure of speech, contrary to hyperbole, consists in lessening, reducing the real quantity of the object of speech
• litotes-is a rhetorical diminishing which includes the negative particles “no, not” before a word with a negative meaning (such a word may possess a negative prefix).
• metaphor – a secondary nomination unit based on likeness; similarity
• antonomasia - the use of the name of a historical, mythological, or biblical personage applied to a person whose characteristic features resemble those
• personification -is attributing human properties to lifeless objects
• allegory - means expressing abstract ideas through concrete pictures, naming smth. Meaning smth else
• epithet - is based on the interplay of emotive and logical meaning in an attributive word, phrase, sentence, used to characterize an object.