Lecture # 32

LECTURE # 32

Review of lecture 22 – 28

ROLE OF LINGUISTICS IN LITERARY INTERPRETATION

Some major premises of linguistics which play their roles in the study of style are the nature and importance of the addresser-addressee relationship, the interrelationships between linguistic and non-linguistic contexts, the uniqueness of the phenomenon language etc.

Literary language is not a yardstick to measure all other functions of language.


Phono-stylistics will deal with more or less regular recurrences of specific phonological characteristics and such features as verse, length (measured syllabic length), rhyme (the use of same sequence of phonemes in a given distribution normally at the end of each verse in a sequence of verses; or assonance (each verse ending in the same consonant or vowel phoneme; though not same consonants)


Writing has its own means of indicating some of the patterned contrasts perceived clearly in spoken language e.g. written language’s use of the alphabet, and of combinations of some of its letters to represent some of the sounds of language use; its use of punctuation italicization, capitalization, and so on.

Moreover, to deal with features such as stress and intonation


In other words, phonology and graphology not only connect substance to form, they are themselves aspects of form, patterns which on occasions directly make substance meaningful in a situation.

Grammar has dominated the description of form


‘Stylistics of word’ or lexical stylistics will explore the expressive resources available in the vocabulary of a language.

It will explore the stylistic implications of such phenomenon as word formation, synonymy, ambiguity, or the contrast between vague and precise, abstract and concrete, rare and common terms, foreign words, etc.


‘Stylistics of sentences’ or ‘syntactic stylistics’ will express the expressive values of syntax at three superimposed planes: components of the sentence (individual grammatical forms, passages from one word-class to another), sentence- structure (word order, negation etc.), and the higher units into which single sentences combine (direct, indirect and free indirect speech, etc.)


Eight kinds of temperaments: weak, delicate, balanced, positive, strong, hybrid, subtle, and defective.

We can study an author’s mind or inner ideas with the help of psycho-stylistics.

Socio-stylistics too has a role to play. It studies a literary text from the point of view of the varieties of language.

The student of style is to see language in literature in relation to other functions of language and has to keep the contextual meaning in mind as well.

By code- switching and dialect switching as well writers create literary effects – T.S. Eliot’s use of Sanskrit in ‘The Waste land’

So stylistics studies the psychic, social, linguistic, literary, ideological circumstances of a literary text.

SUMMARY Linguistics leads to the development

and critical maintenance of a sensitive attitude to language

The problems of stylistic reconstruction involves all aspects of language: sounds, vocabulary, morphology, syntax and semantics.

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS

‘Discourse’ refers to any utterance which is

meaningful. These texts can be: - written texts - oral texts (‘speech’/’talk’) - mixed written/oral texts (e.g. Internet

chat) Discourse does not depend on the size of

a text (“P” and “Ladies” can both be analysed

as discourse)

Definitions of ‘discourse’

(a) A set of terms, metaphors, allusions, ways of talking, references and so on, which constitute an object

(b) A to-and-fro of exchanges in talk (or text) that performs social actions

APPROACHES TO DISCOURSE

Deborah Schiffrin “Approaches to Discourse”

(1994) singles out 6 major approaches to

discourse: the speech act approach; interactional sociolinguistics; the ethnography of communication; pragmatic approach; conversation analysis; variationist approach.

THE SCOPE OF DISCOURSE ANALYSIS Discourse analysis is not a discipline which exists

on its own. It is influenced by other disciplines and influences them as well. It is a two-way process …

For this reason discourse analysis examines spoken and written texts from all sorts of different areas (medical, legal, advertising) and from all sorts of perspectives (race, gender, power)

Discourse analysis has a number of practical applications - for example in analysing communication problems in medicine, psychotherapy, education, in analysing written style etc.

SUMMARY OF APPROACHES TO DISCOURSE

Approaches to Studying Discourse Focus of Research Research Question

Structural CA Sequences of talk Why say what at what moment?

Variationist Structural categories within texts

Why that form?

Functional Speech Acts Communicative acts How to do things with words?

Ethnography of Communication

Communication as cultural behaviour

How does discourse reflect culture?

Interactional Sociolinguistics

Social and linguistic meanings created during communication

What are they doing?

Pragmatics Meaning in interaction What does the speaker mean?

How do you analyse discourse?

Various ways. Depends on what sort of discourse you’re interested in.

Constituting an object vs realising a social action

Why you might do Discourse Analysis

- you get close to the data the data (eg video recordings) are of life as it’s lived you uncover the subtle organisation of language, the

prime medium of our social lives (and selves) You plug in to social practices that - at the grandest -

constitute reality and our place in it

Other reasons why discourse analysis might interest you

it might be connected to your life (job, family, friends and so on)

it can go on your cv if you get interested in the subject you might want

to take it further (specialization)

GENERAL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SPOKEN & WRITTEN DISCOURSES

1. Grammatical intricacy 2. Lexical density 3. Nominalization 4. Explicitness 5. Contextualization 6. Spontaneity 7. Repetition, hesitations, and

redundancy

STRUCTURE OF CONVERSATION According to Brown and Yule (1983) there are two

main forms of conversation: transactional – spoken language used to obtain

goods or services – also referred to as service encounters;

interactional – spoken language used to allow

people to interact with each other – which features a phatic use of language whose purpose is to establish an atmosphere and allow people to socialise.

Turn taking, Turn ending, Adjacency pairs, Tag questions, preferred/dispreferred responses,

Face-saving, Face threatening acts,

THE COOPERATIVE- PRINCIPLE

The ‘rules ‘ of conversation were first formulated by the Paul Grice (1975) as the Co-operative Principle. This states that we interpret the language on the assumption that a speaker is obeying the four maxims (known as Grice’s Maxims) of:

1 QUALITY (BEING TRUE) 2 QUANTITY (BEING BRIEF) 3 RELATION (BEING RELEVANT) 4 MANNER (BEING CLEAR)

Conversation is a flexible text negotiated between the various participants in a conversation.

With the knowledge of Grice’s maxims, the speakers and listeners support and evaluate each other using known building blocks: adjacency pairs and turns,

Non-fluency features (voiced gap fillers), openers and closures

discourse markers to sign-post the structure.

This sign-posting causes the participants to be aware of the conversation’s structure , enabling the smooth progression from topic to topic and from speaker to speaker.At the same time, conversation also observes the politeness principle, which in turn involves issues of face.

CONVERSATIONAL ANALYSIS Basic notions -Turn- taking Conversation is analysed in turns. One

speaker and then the next A turn consists of one or more turn

constructional units The end of a turn constructional unit is a

point during a turn when another speaker can intervene

This point is called a turn transitional relevant point

BASIC TURN TYPES Adjacency pairs

One of the most noticeable things about conversation is that certain classes of utterances conventionally come in pairs.

Example: Question/answer Greeting/greeting Invitation/acceptance(declination) Offer/acceptance (refusal)

THE ORGANIZATION OF REPAIRS Repair types

The repair system embodies a distinction between 1) the initiation of repair (marking something as a source of trouble), and 2) the actual repair itself. There is also a distinction between 1) repair initiated by self (the speaker who produced the trouble source), and 2) repair initiated by other. Consequently, there are four varieties of repair:

INTERRUPTIONS & OVER-LAPPING Interruptions break the symmetry of

the conversational model: the interruption prevents the first speaker from finishing his/her turn, at the same time gaining a turn for oneself (second speaker).

Bennett (1981) : Overlap is when two voices are going on at the same time.

LANGUAGE VARIATION Changes occur because they are

natural – just as human behaviour changes

Language in the state of constant variation because it is transmitted from one generation to the next.

Change slow but sure, Sometimes it is unnoticed & becomes

prominent over long period of time

LANGUAGE VARIATION Change neither for good, nor for bad,

but just for the suitability – just for need.

Language change can be studied along two lines – Diachronic and Synchronic

Examples: Chaucer – Milton – T.S.Eliot Old English – Middle – Modern English Diachronic variations

LANGUAGE VARIATIONDiachronic variations Meaning changed sometimes due to its

continuous use in particular context, Extension, Euphemism, metathesis, spellings, syntax.

Synchronic VariationsLanguage contact, dialect, register

SYNCHRONIC VARIATIONSVarieties of dialect The variety of language according to

the user is called Dialect. It is determined by a speaker’s social

and geographical background.

SYNCHRONIC VARIATIONS General American English and RP are

two different dialects of English. They differ in many ways as shown below:

RP Gen. American Last /La:st/ /Læst/ Dance /da:ns/ /dæns/

SYNCHRONIC VARIATIONSRegister The same individual uses different

varieties of language depending upon the situation.

Language according to the situation is called ‘Register’.

Different registers – formal, informal, linguistics, law, literary, commerce, science, business etc.

SYNCHRONIC VARIATIONSClassification of Registers (i) Register according to field of discourse (ii)Register according to the mode of discourse

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Lecture # 32