Stylistics.

Seminar 13
1. The notion of expressive means and figures of speech on the
syntactical level.

The main unit of syntactical level is a model of a sentence – a

predicative chain of wordforms which is made up of a noun, verbal
members which are in a particular lineal meaningful and formal
relations. These models of sentences can contain denotative and
connotative information, make synonymic relations and build syntactic-
stylistic paradigms.

Expressive means on a syntactical level are syntactical models of

sentences which have additional logical and expressive information
which influences the increasing of pragmatic effectiveness of an
expression and speech in general.

Figures of speech on the syntactical level involve the use of language

structures, such as sentences, phrases, and clauses, to create rhetorical
effects and convey meaning beyond the literal interpretation of the
words.

2. Syntactical repetitions:
Repetition is a figure of speech that shows the logical emphasis that is
necessary to attract a reader’s attention on the key-word or a key-phrase
of the text. It implies repeating sounds, words, expressions and clauses
in a certain succession or even with no particular placement of the
words, in order to provide emphasis
Parallelism: the repetition of words or phrases that have similar
grammatical structures.
 one for the money, two for the show.
Anaphora: Anaphora or anaphoric repetition is called the repetition of a
word or a phrase at the beginning of two or more consecutive sentences.
 "We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing
grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall
fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." – (Winston Churchill)
Anaphoric repetition is met not only in emotive prose but it is rather
often used in poetry. Anaphora gives a literary text peculiar rhythm
what, together with repetition of an anaphoric element, somehow brings
that particular extract of prose and sound of poetic speech close together.
But being used in poetry, anaphora increases sound harmony of speech.
Epiphora: Epiphora or epiphoric repetition is a type of repetition when
one and the same word or phrase is placed at the end of consecutive
sentences.
 “Now this gentleman had a younger brother of still better
appearance that himself, who had tried life as a cornet of dragoons,
and found it a bore; and ad afterwards tried it in the train of an
English minister abroad, and found it a bore; and had then strolled
to Jerusalem, and got bored there; and then gone yachting about
the world, and got bored everywhere. “ - (Chesterton)
Epiphora even more than anaphora contribute to rhythmic organization
of speech due to increase of intonation and sound identity at final
position of sentences.
Framing: Framing is a type of repetition when it is arranged in the form
of a frame, namely, the initial parts of a syntactical unit, in most cases of
a paragraph, are repeated at the end of it.
 "No wonder his father wanted to know what Bosinney meant, no
wonder." - (G. Galsworthy)
Framing makes the whole utterance more compact and more complete.
Framing is most effective in singling out paragraphs. It is more often
met in poetry though we can find a great deal of it in emotive prose as
well. This type of repetition can comprise any part of text - a sentence a
paragraph, a page.
Anadiplosis: Anadiplosis is a figure of speech which consists in the
repetition of the same word at the end of one and at the beginning of the
following clauses, sentences.
 “All service ranks the same with God, With God, whose puppets,
best and worst, Are we." - (Robert Browning)
Chiasmus: a figure of speech by which the order of the terms in the first
of two parallel clauses is reversed in the second.
 poetry is the record of the best and happiest moments of the
happiest and best minds.
Enumeration: Enumeration is the process of listing details, words or
phrases step by step. It clarifies an idea for the reader/listener and helps
to avoid ambiguity. Enumeration is used by writers to eloborate on an
idea and convey a strong clear message.
 "He was known for his honesty, integrity, and humility."
 Polysyndeton: using several conjunctions in close succession,
especially where some might be omitted (as in “he ran and jumped and
laughed for joy”).
 “I went to the store, and park, and library, and scholl, and
church”.

Tautology: Tautology is a figure of speech where the same idea is

expressed twice in different words, often with the intention of emphasis
or reinforcement.
 "He's the most unique person I've ever met."

Stylistics. Seminar 14
1. SDs based on the reduction of the sentence model:
Ellipsis: is mainly used in dialogs where it is consciously employed by
the author to reflect the natural omnitions characterised by oral
colloquial speech. Often used in authors' remarks commenting the
speech of a character. Elliptical sentences acquire expressiveness when
they are used in emotive prose (or sometimes in poetry) as a means of
imitating real colloquial speech, live talk or as a means of exposing a
character's emotions.
Aposiopesis (break-in-the narrative): is a common feature of
colloquial speech. In literary discourse aposiopesis, like ellipsis and one-
member sentences, is mostly to be found in dialogues, direct, indirect or
represented speech. This stylistic device is used in emotive prose with
the purpose of conveying speaker’s emotions without naming them
directly or expressing such modal meanings as threat, warning, doubt,
excitement, promise Aposiopesis, in a broad sense, is not confined only
to the function of speech characterization. A writer may deliberately
leave his whole work (a story, a novel, a play) incomplete (unfinished)
thus making the readers to arrive at the conclusion predetermined by the
whole semantic structure of the text on their own.
Suppression: involves the deliberate omission of certain elements from
a sentence or phrase without losing its comprehensibility or impact. It's
based on the reduction of the sentence model by eliminating words or
 phrases that are deemed unnecessary or redundant. This technique is
often used to create a more concise, direct, or impactful expression.
 "He ate the sandwich, drank the soda." ("He ate the sandwich and
drank the soda.")
Asyndeton: is deliberate omission of structurally significant
conjunctions and connectives.
 We had heard planes coming, seen them pass overhead, watched
them go far to the left, heard them bombing…
Parcelling: is intentional splitting of sentences into smaller parts
separated by full stops.
 Oswald bates Rolf. Very much. Then the pain began. Slow.
Methodical. And professional.

2.Inversion: is a syntactic phenomenon of the deliberate changing of word

order in the initial sentence model. Word order is a crucial syntactical
problem in many languages. In English it has peculiarities which have
been caused by the concrete and specific way the language has developed.
There are two types of inversion: grammatical and
stylistic. Grammatical inversion is aimed at the change of the
communicative type of sentence and has no stylistic value.
Stylistic inversion is aimed at logical or emotional intensification of a
certain sentence element. It attaches the additional emotional colouring
to the surface meaning of the utterance. It is always semantically and
stylistically motivated:
 Rude am I in my speech... ( W.Shakespeare).
 Of his own class he saw nothing (J. London).

Detachment: is a stylistic device based on singling out structurally and

semantically a secondary member of the sentence with the help of
punctuation: dashes, commas or even a full stop. When placed in a
certain syntactic position, a detached sentence component may seem
formally independent of the words it refers to, though the word order
may not be violated and semantic connections between the elements
remain strong:
 He had been nearly killed, ingloriously, in a jeep accident (I.
Show).
 Rhetoric questions: is an emotional statement or negation expressed in
the form of a question. Rhetoric question does not require any answer or
demand any information but is used to emphasize the idea, to render
speaker’s emotions or to call the attention of the listener (reader) to the
focus of the utterance. Rhetoric questions make an indispensable part of
emotive prose, poetry and oratorical and publicistic style. They elevate
the style of the utterance, serve as powerful means of emotional
inducement, or on the contrary are effective tools of irony, sarcasm and
derision.
 What on earth are you doing?

Stylistics. Seminar 15
1. The stylistic features of scientific style.
1) the style of humanitarian sciences;
2) the style of "exact" sciences;
3) the style of popular scientific prose.

Its function is to work out and prove theoretically objective knowledge

about reality, to create new concepts, to disclose the internal laws of
existence, development, etc.
The peculiarities are: objectiveness; logical coherence, impersonality,
unemotional character, exactness.
The scientific prose style consists mostly of ordinary words which tend
to be used in their primary logical meaning. Emotiveness depends on the
subject of investigation but mostly scientific prose style is unemotional.
The logical presentation and cohesion of thought manifests itself in a
developed feature of scientific syntax that is the use of established
sentence patterns: postulator, formulate, argumentative.
Some features of the style in the text are: use of quotations and
references, se of foot-notes helps to preserve the logical coherence of
ideas.

2. The stylistic features of official style

1) language of business letters;
2) language of legal documents;
3) language of diplomacy;
4) language of military documents.
 The official style aims are to reach agreement between two contracting
parties and to state the conditions binding two parties in an
understanding. Each of the substyles of official documents makes use of
special terms. Legal documents: military documents, diplomatic
documents. The documents use set expressions inherited from early
Victorian period. This vocabulary is conservative. Legal documents
contain a large proportion of formal and archaic words used in their
dictionary meaning. In diplomatic and legal documents many words
have Latin and French origin. There are a lot of abbreviations and
conventional symbols.
Every functional style of language is marked by a specific use of
language means, thus establishing its own norms which, however, are
subordinated to the norm-invariant and which do not violate the general
notion of the literary norm.

Stylistics. Seminar 16

1. The stylistic features of newspaper style.

Not all the printed materials found in newspapers comes under
newspaper style. Only materials which perform the function of
informing the reader and providing him with an evaluation of
information published can be regarded as belonging to newspaper style.
English newspaper style can be defined as a system of interrelated
lexical, phraseological and grammatical means which is perceived by the
community as a separate linguistic unity that serves the purpose of
informing and instructing the reader.
Characteristic features:
1) Brief news items. Its function is to inform the reader. It states only
facts without giving comments. The vocabulary used is neutral and
common literary.
2) Headlines. The headline is a dependent form of newspaper writing.
The main function is to inform the reader briefly of what the text that
follows is about.
3) The editorial. The function of the editorial is to influence the reader
by giving an interpretation of certain facts. It comments on the political
and other events of the day. It appeals not only to the readers mind, but
to his feelings as well.
 4) Advertisements and announcements. The function of
advertisements and announcements is to inform the reader. There are
two types of them: classified and non-classified. In classified
advertisements and announcements information is arranged according to
the subject matter into sections: births, marriages, personal etc.
The newspaper also seeks to influence public opinion on political and
other matters. Elements of appraisal may be observed in the very
selection and way of presentation of news, in the use of specific
vocabulary, casting some doubt on the facts recorded, and syntactical
constructions indicating a lack of assurance of the reporter or his desire
to avoid responsibility.

2. The stylistic features of publicist style.

The pubicistic style treats certain political, social, economic,
cultural problems. The aim of this style is to form public opinion, to
convince the reader or the listener.

It has the following substyles:

1) Oratory. The oratorical style is the oral subdivision of the publicist
style. It makes use of a great number of expressive means to arouse and
keep the public's interest: repetition, gradation, antithesis, rhetorical
questions, emotive words, elements of colloquial speech. Similes and
metaphors are generally traditional. It is prepared beforehand and it is a
monologue. It has some special formulas of address and conclusion.
2) Essays. The essay is very subjective and the most colloquial of the all
substyles of the publicistic style. It is a literary composition of moderate
length on philosophical, social, aesthetic, etc. subjects. It makes use of
expressive means and tropes. It is characterized by brevity of
expressions, the use of the 1-st person singular (personal approach to the
problem), expanded use of connections, naturalness of expressions, the
abundant use of emotive words, use of similes and sustained metaphors.
3) Articles in newspapers and magazines. It is defined by the character
of newspaper, magazine, as well as subjects chosen. Literary reviews
stand closer to essays.

3. The stylistic features of belletristic style.

The belletristic style has the following substyles:

1) The language of poetry is characterized by its orderly form, which is
based mainly on the rhythmic and phonetic arrangement of the
 utterances. The rhythmic aspect calls forth syntactic and semantic
peculiarities. There are certain restrictions which result in brevity of
expression, epigram-like utterances and fresh, unexpected imagery.
Syntactically this brevity is shown in elliptical sentences, in detached
constructions, in inversion, etc.
2) Emotive prose shares the same common features, but these features
are correlated differently than in poetry. The imagery is not so rich as in
poetry; the percentage of words with contextual meaning is not so high.
Emotive prose features the combination of the literary variant of the
language, both in words and in syntax, with the colloquial variant. But
the colloquial language in the belletristic style is not a simple
reproduction of the natural speech, it has undergone changes introduced
by the writer and has been made "literature-like". In emotive prose there
are always two forms of communication present - monologue (the
writer's speech) and dialogue (the speech of the characters). Emotive
prose allows the use of elements from other styles as well. But all these
styles undergo a kind of transformation under the influence of emotive
prose. Passages written in other styles may be viewed only as
interpolations and not as constituents of the style.
3) Language of the drama is entirely dialogue. The author's speech is
almost entirely excluded except for the playwright's remarks and stage
directions. But the language of the characters is not the exact
reproduction of the norms of colloquial language. Any variety of the
belletristic style will use the norms of the literary language of the given
period. The language of plays is always stylized, it strives to retain the
modus of literary English.
The belletristic style is individual in essence. This is one of its most
distinctive properties.

Stylistics. Seminar 17
1. Text types.
Text types are classifications of texts that exhibit similar traits
concerning their intent, organization, and linguistic features.
Recognizing the text type is crucial in stylistic analysis, as it aids in
discerning the author's intended message and the stylistic tools they've
utilized.
 Informative Texts: These texts aim to provide factual information in a
straightforward and unbiased manner. They typically follow a logical
structure, presenting information in a clear and organized way.
Examples include news articles, textbooks, and academic papers.
Persuasive Texts: Persuasive texts seek to influence the reader's
opinions or behaviors by presenting arguments and supporting evidence.
They often use persuasive language, rhetorical devices, and appeals to
emotion or reason. Examples include advertisements, speeches, and
opinion columns.
Expressive Texts: Expressive texts are focused on conveying the
writer's emotions, thoughts, or experiences. They may employ vivid
imagery, descriptive language, and personal anecdotes to evoke a
particular mood or response in the reader. Examples include poetry,
personal essays, and diary entries.
Literary Texts: Literary texts are characterized by their artistic and
creative expression. They often explore complex themes, employ
figurative language, and experiment with narrative techniques. Examples
include novels, short stories, poems, and plays.

2. Types of stylistic analysis.

Computational Stylistics: Uses computational methods to analyze
stylistic elements in text, such as authorship attribution and genre
classification, often in digital humanities research.
Linguo-Stylistics: Analyzes stylistic features in language, like lexical
choices and rhetorical devices, to understand how they contribute to
meaning and impact in various forms of discourse.
Literary Stylistics: Studies the linguistic features and rhetorical devices
in literary texts to explore how they enhance themes, character
development, and emotional impact.
General Stylistics: Examines universal principles of style across
different types of texts, including diction, syntax, tone, and rhetorical
devices.
Textualist Stylistics: Focuses on close readings of specific textual
features within individual works to explore how linguistic and rhetorical
choices contribute to meaning and aesthetic effect.
Interpretative Stylistics: Examines how stylistic elements contribute to
the interpretation and meaning of a text, bridging the gap between
textual analysis and reader response.
 Cognitive Stylistics: Combines linguistic analysis with cognitive
psychology to study how readers perceive and interpret stylistic features
in texts.
Pragmatic Stylistics: Analyzes how stylistic choices are influenced by
social, cultural, and situational factors within communication contexts.
Forensic Stylistics: Applies stylistic analysis to legal and investigative
contexts, often to determine authorship or authenticate documents, using
linguistic markers for evidence.

3. Stylistics of encoding and decoding the author's message.

Decoding stylistics deals with regarding the esthetic value of a text
based on the interaction of specific textual elements, stylistic devices
and compositional structure in delivering the author's message. This
method considers the stylistic function of any stylistically important
feature as a part of the whole text. So expressive means and stylistic
devices are treated in their interaction and distribution within the text as
carriers of the author's purport.
Decoding stylistics helps the reader in his or her understanding of a
literary work by explaining or decoding the information that may be
hidden from immediate view in specific allusions, cultural or political
parallels, peculiar use of irony or euphemy, etc.
The process of internalizing of the outside information and
translating it into his imagery is called “encoding”. To encode
certain information an author turns to certain means— meaningful units
that are organized according to certain rules. This information encoded
by the author is called the message.
Decoding stylistics investigates the same levels as linguastylistics
— phonetic, graphical, lexical, and grammatical. The basic difference is
that it studies expressive means provided by each level not as isolated
devices but as a part of the general pattern. Ideas, events, characters,
emotions and an author's attitudes are all encoded in the text through
language. The reader is expected to perceive and decipher these things
by reading and interpreting the text. One of the fundamental concepts of
decoding stylistics is “foregrounding”.
Foregrounding means a specific role that some language items play
in a certain context when the reader's attention cannot but be drawn to
them. However decoding stylistics laid down a few principal methods
that ensure the effect of foregrounding in a literary text.
Convergence denotes a combination or accumulation of stylistic devices
promoting the same idea, emotion or motive. It ensures the delivery of
the message to the reader.
Defeated expectancy is connected with the process of decoding by the
reader of the literary text.The linear organization of the text mentally
prepares the reader for the logical development of ideas. Without
predictability there would be no coherence and no decoding.
At the same time stylistically distinctive features are often based on the
deviation from the norm and predictability. A stylistic device is a low
expectancy element and it is sure to catch the reader's eye. Paradox is a
fine example of defeated expectancy.
Coupling is another technique that helps in decoding the message
implied in a literary work. Coupling deals with the arrangement of
textual elements that provide the unity and cohesion of the whole
structure. Semantic coupling is demonstrated by the use of synonyms
and antonyms, both direct and contextual, root repetition, paraphrase,
sustained metaphor, semantic fields, recurrence of images, connotations
or symbols.
Semantic field is a method of decoding stylistics which identifies
lexical elements in text segments and the whole work that provide its
thematic and compositional cohesion. To reveal this sort of cohesion
decoding must carefully observe not only lexical and synonymous
repetition but semantic affinity which finds expression in cases of
lexico-semantic variants, connotations and associations aroused by a
specific use or distribution of lexical units.This type of analysis shows
how cohesion is achieved on a level called the vertical context.
Semi-marked structures are extreme cases of defeated expectancy in
which the unpredictable element is used contrary to the norm so it
produces a very strong emphatic impact.Lexical deviation from the norm
usually means breaking the laws of semantic compatibility and lexical
valency. Arnold considers semi-marked structures as a part of tropes
based on the unexpected or unpredictable relations established between
objects and phenomena by the author.