General Notes on Styles and Stylistics Lecture 1

Questions to discuss: Problems of stylistic research. Stylistics of language and speech. Types of stylistic research and branches of stylistics. Stylistics and other linguistic disciplines. Stylistic neutrality and stylistic coloring. Stylistic function notion.

What is “style”? Term not much loved by linguists Too vague Has connotations in neighbouring fields (“style” = good style, ie a value judgment) Many books/articles make reference to etymology of the word (Lat. stilus = ‘pen’), so it follows that style is mainly about written language Various definitions, some very close to things already seen (especially “register”) Two main aspects widely supposed: style is choice style is described by reference to something else

Style (Lat. 'stylus‘) = a short stick sharp at one end and flat at the other used by the Romans for writing on wax tablets. Stylistics ( Fr. “Stylistique”) =instrument for writing.

fields of investigation the aesthetic function of language; 2) expressive means in language; 3) synonymous ways of rendering one and the same idea;

4) emotional colouring of language; 5) a system of special devices called stylistic devices; 6) the interrelation between language and thought; 7) the individual manner of an author in making use of language.

Style: correspondence between thought and expression embellishment of language technique of expression a literary genre different styles of language (functional styles)

functional styles the belles- lettres style; 2) the publicist style; 3) the newspaper style; 4) the scientific prose style; 5) the style of official documents

Stylistics and its Subdivisions

SDs and Ems desirable effect; Stylistics SDs and Ems desirable effect; b) types of text “discourse” -functional styles

2) Literary stylistics (encoding stylistics); Depending on the school of thought there are: 1) Linguo-stylistics; 2) Literary stylistics (encoding stylistics); 3) Decoding stylistics (of the reader);

Linguo-stylistics studies of literary discourse from a linguistic point of view; studies the linguistic nature of the expressive means of the language, their character and functions.

Literary stylistics (encoding st.) the composition of a work of art various literary genres the writer's outlook

Decoding stylistics (of the reader) Sender - message - receiver Speaker - book - reader

Expressive Means (EM) and Stylistic Devices (SD)

Expressive Means fixed in grammars and dictionaries; normalized, and are labeled as intensifiers in some dictionaries; in most cases they have corresponding neutral synonymous forms.

Phonetical Means Pitch Melody Stress Drawling out certain syllables Whispering A sing-song manner of speech and other ways of using the voice

Morphological Means Historical Present “shall” (2nd and 3rd ) Cf. He shall do it (I shall make him do it) He has to do it (It is necessary for him to do it)

Word Building Means diminutive suf. as - у (- ie), - let e.g. dearie, streamlet an unexpected use of the author's nonce words e.g. He glasnosted his love affair with this movie star.

Lexical expressive means group of intensifiers - awfully, terribly, absolutely, etc. words that retain their logical meaning while being used emphatically: It was a very special evening/event/gift.

Lexical expressive means interjections set expressions proverbs and sayings

Stylistic Device the ability of a verbal element to obtain extra significance, to say more in a definite context. Most stylistic devices may be regarded as aiming at the further intensification in the corresponding EM.

Stylistic Device unlike EM, SD are patterns of the language the interplay/interaction of the dictionary and contextual meanings of words will lead to such stylistic devices as metaphor, metonymy or irony.