Essentials of
Stylistics
Stylistics
is defined as the study of style used in literary and verbal language and the
effect writer or speaker intends to convey to the reader or hearer. It aims at
establishing principles which can explain the particular choices made by
individual and social groups in their use of language, such as socialization,
the production or reception of meaning, literary criticism and critical
discourse analysis. Crystal and Davy rightly point out:
Stylistics is a
discipline which studies literary or non-literary texts in a new way. It plays
a significant role in the teaching of English literature in India. It has been
defined as a “Sub-discipline” of linguistics that is concerned with the
systematic analysis of style in language and how this can vary according to
such factors as, for example, genre, context, historical period and author.
(1969:9 and 2008: 54)
It
can also be defined as the study of language of literature which makes use of
various tools of linguistic analysis. Stylistics emerged as a discipline of
serious study in the twentieth century. Prior, literary critics focused on the gradations
of language use by writers rather than discussing literature from the point of
view of their own feelings, or the writer’s presumed intentions or mere moral
judgements. Thus, the study of language became part of literary education.
The
term “Stylistics” is derived from the word “style” which has several meanings.
Its pre-linguistic meaning is the manner of writing, speaking and doing. It is
the means through which human beings gain contact with others. However, style
in literature is called “literary stylistics”. According to Halliday, “Linguistic Stylistics is the description of
literary texts, by methods derived from general linguistic theory, using the
categories of the description of the language as a whole”. Thus, Stylistics
is mainly concerned with the idea of “style” and the analysis of literary
texts. The application of linguistics to the literary texts and the “style” is
usually understood within this area of study as the selection of certain
linguistic forms or features over other possible ones.
It
is the systematic scientific study of the language of literature. It is a
branch of applied linguistics. It is applied to the study of language in
literary and non-literary texts. The basic framework of stylistics is borrowed
from linguistics. As linguistics studies
the relationship between the sound and meaning, Stylistics deals with the
relationship between the language of literature and the meaning of literature.
Style and theme are connected in literature. Stylistic analysis focuses on the
thematic aspects of literature by analysing its language. Stylistics is
objective in the analysis of literature as it studies the literary text from
the linguistic point of view. It depends more on the linguistic evidence in the
text for its interpretations of literature.
Stylistics
enables understanding of literature comprehensively. Literature is basically a
special use of language. Stylistic analysis of literature should enhance our
appreciation and enjoyment of literature. Stylistics studies some special
features of literature and tries to show their poetic significance. Thus,
Stylistics depends on systematic observation, classification and description of
the language of literature. Such is the nature of Stylistics.
Stylistics
is the science which explores how readers interact with the language of (mainly
literary) texts in order to explain how we understand, and are affected by texts
when we read them. Stylistics is the scientific study of style, which can be
viewed in several ways. More technically, stylistics is the study of the linguistic
features of a literary text, phonological, lexical, syntactical which directly
affects the meaning of an utterance. The variety in stylistics is due to the
main influences of linguistics and literary therefore, stylistics is concerned
with the examination of grammar, lexis, semantics, as well as phonological
properties and discursive devices. It might seem that the same issues
are investigated by sociolinguistics, and indeed that is the case, however
sociolinguistics analyses the above mentioned issues seen as dependant on the
social class, gender, age etc, while stylistics is more interested in the
significance of function that the style fulfils.
Stylistics
examines oral and written texts in order to determine crucial characteristic linguistic
properties, structures and patterns influencing perception of the texts. Thus,
it can be said that this branch of linguistics is
related to discourse analysis, in particular critical discourse analysis, and pragmatics.
Owing to the fact that at the beginning of the development of this study the
major part of the stylistic investigation was concerned with the analysis of
literary texts it is sometimes called literary linguistics, or literary
stylistics.
Nowadays,
however, linguists study various kinds of texts, such as manuals, recipes, as
well as novels and advertisements. It is vital to add here that none of the
text types is discriminated and thought to be more important than others. In
addition to that, in the recent year so called 'media-discourses' such as
films, news reports, song lyrics and political speeches have all been within
the scope of interest of stylistics. The development
of stylistics, given that it combines the use of linguistic analysis with
the psychological processes involved in reading.
In
the twentieth century stylistics can be seen as a logical extension of moves
within literary criticism to concentrate on studying texts rather than authors.
While in Nineteenth century literary criticism concentrated on the author, and
the text-based criticism of the two British critics Richards and William Empson
who rejected that approach and replaced it with the other approach called Practical
criticism. In many respects, however, stylistics is close to literary criticism
and practical criticism and by far the most common
kind of material studied is literary, and attention is largely text-centered.
In
short, Stylistics enables one to interact meaningfully well with a text. It opens one’s mind to the various dimensions
of a particular literary or non-literary text/work. It is a discipline which is relevant to all
activities which rely on the use of language.
Through the knowledge of stylistics, the knowledge of textual
appreciation increases. Thus, stylistics makes one an informed observer and
analyst of language use in the process of negotiating meaning.
Style as Deviation
When
an idea is presented in an unexpected way, then it is said such a manner of
carrying it out has deviated from the norm. The concept of style as deviation
is based on the notion that there are rules, conventions and regulations that
inform the different activities to be executed. But when these conventions are
not complied with, there is deviation. Deviation in stylistics is concerned
with the use of different styles from the expected norm of language use in a
given genre of writing. It is a departure from the norm and common practice.
Language
deviation refers to an intentional selection or choice of language use outside
the range of normal language. Language is a system organized in an organic
structure by rules providing phonetic, grammatical, lexical rules for its use.
Thus, any piece of writing that throws to the wind the rules of language is
said to have deviated. Traugott and Pratt suggest that the idea of style as
deviance is favoured by the “generative frame of reference.” It is an old
concept which stems from the work of such scholars as Jan Mukarovsky.
Mukarovsky relates style to foregrounding and points out that “the violation of
the norm of the standard, is what makes possible the poetic utilization of language”(Traugott and Pratt 1980:31)
Deviation
may occur at phonological, graphological, syntactic, lexico-semantic level. At
the graphological level, for example, one may see capital letters where they
are not supposed to be. At the lexico-grammatical level, subject and verb may
not be in agreement. The normal order of the clause elements may not be
observed. For example, Adjunct may come before the subject. At the
lexico-semantic level, words that should not go together may be deliberately
brought together, e.g. “dangerous safety”, “open secret”.
Foregrounding
A purely grammatical analysis falls
short of ‘literary’ understanding for what it can give us is the pattern of
grammatical structures but not the artistic/aesthetic communicational intent of
the discourse. While a grammatical analysis has a prerequisite of ‘linguistic
competence’, a proper understanding of a literary text has a prerequisite of
both ‘literary competence’ and ‘linguistic competence’.
A
proper analysis of a text involves a recognition of significant linguistic
features and patterns. Foregrounding,
as proposed by Prague scholars, is a way of identifying significant
linguistic/stylistic features that function as bearers of artistic meaning. The
present Module will highlight the concept of foregrounding as well as that of
the poetic function of language.
The Concept of Foregrounding
There
is a direct link between the concept of 'defamiliarization' of the Russian
formalists and that of 'foregrounding' of the Prague scholars. While the former
term was used by the formalists in relation to the effect of a device resulting
from its function in a text, the latter term was developed by the Prague
scholars to distinguish between 'dominant' and ‘automatized’ factors, for they
viewed a literary text in terms of a system composed of interrelated and
interacting elements.
The
Prague scholars were the first to talk about the ‘poetic’ or literary function
of language, and in the process made a distinction between cognitive and
expressive or poetic functions of language. The 'poetic' function is manifested
when its expressive aspect is dominant, i.e., when language deviates from the
'normal' forms by means of devices which thrust the act of expression itself
into the foreground. Mukarovsky states the significance of aktualisace or ‘foregrounding’ in the following way:
The function of
poetic language consists in the maximum of foregrounding of an utterance ... it
is not used in the services of communication, but in order to place in the
foreground the act of expression, the act of speech itself. (Mukarovsky 1964:
19)
Foregrounding
in language occurs when an unexpected usage suddenly forces the listener or
reader to take note of the utterance itself. Foregrounding occurs when elements
are raised from their functional roles to a position of unexpected prominence.
The unusual prominence not only foregrounds the linguistic elements but at the
same time helps the readers to break out of their conventional signs, what
Jameson (1972) calls the 'prison-house of language', by subverting the
conventional sign systems and focusing attention on the signs themselves rather
than taking them for granted. The foregrounded sign, for the Prague scholars,
serves an identificatory purpose for the recognition of the 'aesthetic
function'.
The
Prague scholars introduced formalism into a much larger field of signification.
For Mukarovsky, "Everything in the work of art, and in its relation to the
outside world ... can be discussed in terms of sign and meaning ... aesthetics
can be regarded as a part of the modem science of signs" (cited in Erlich
1965: 159). This means that the aesthetic aspect of language operates as a
valid function within a total system of communication. Through this the Prague
scholars were not only able to insist on the specific properties of the 'poetic
text' but at the same time were also able to recognize its links with the
author and the social context. For them the poetic function is not exclusively
in the form of poetry or literature but can be present to varying degrees in
any form of verbal communication.
The
Prague school theory, though quite comprehensive, does not impose any limits on
the description of a text's structure. Though the 'dominant' provides the
element of focus, a description of the relationships of all the components of a
text is potentially endless. A criteria of delimitation is required. Further,
the emphasis on innovation would lead to the conclusion that the poetry in the
classical tradition or of other periods is less poetic than modem poetry, for
in the latter one finds more innovations than in the others.
Figurative Language
Figurative
language is broadly defined as language that uses words or expressions
deviating from their original, basic meaning. In contrast to literal language
which maintains a consistent meaning regardless of the context, figurative
language (or non-literal language) uses words and expressions in their
non-literal meaning which depends on the context in which they are used. This
section introduces to the concept of figurative language. We take a brief look
at some of the important figures of speech at the different levels of
linguistic structure in both literary and non-literary discourses.
To understand
what figurative language means, consider the following sentences:
1. The rat was caught in a trap.
2. The highway man was caught in his own trap.
An average
speaker of English will have no difficulty in understanding the difference
between the two ‘traps’. In (1), ‘trap’ refers to a contrivance for ensnaring
an animal; in (2), it refers to a robbery plan. ‘Trap’ in the first case, uses
the literal meaning of the word; in the second case, it is a non-literal use
(or, figurative use) of the word.
But the
similarity between the two ‘traps’ is apparent. Trap in (1) is a concrete
object, in (2) it is an abstract idea. Both share the common aim of creating a
situation from which the victim cannot escape.
But how is
this semantic change from a concrete
object to an abstract idea perceived at the cognitive level? Since ‘trap’ acquired an added meaning a long
time back, it has become formalized as literal meaning of ‘trap’.
Let’s,
therefore, consider relatively less exploited figurative usages:
3. The
country is groaning under the weight of a huge population.
4. O my Love’s like a red, red rose.
In sentence
(3), the literal meaning does not make sense as ‘groaning’, which means ‘making
a deep inarticulate sound as with pain’, is a peculiarly human attribute. It
can only have a human Subject. Therefore, to make sense of this sentence, we
modify the meaning of ‘country’ to include the feature [+human] so that this ‘country’ can feel pain and groan
as it is pressed by a massive population which it cannot sustain. When we assign a meaning other than its
literal meaning to an expression in a given context, we are giving it a figurative
meaning. An expression is said to be used
figuratively when its literal meaning contradicts our knowledge of the world.
In sentence (4), the preposition ‘like’ invites us to transfer some of the
properties of ‘rose’ to ‘love’ and give it a new meaning. Love, an abstract
idea becomes, like rose, an object of freshness and beauty. Deviation, that is
semantic change, takes a different form in different figures. In metaphor (sentence (3) above) and simile (sentence (4) above), for
example, there is feature addition which allows us to see one thing as another,
or to see the similarity between two things. In both the examples above,
figurative meaning is achieved by deviation from literal meaning.
We could now
define figurative language (or figure of speech) comprehensively as intentional
deviation from literal statement, or normal arrangement of words in language.
It has, however, to be noted that in a figurative sign, there is never complete
substitution of one sign by another. Therefore, recent research seems to suggest that figurative language is comprehended
at the same speed as literal language; and so the premise that the recipient
was first attempting to process a literal meaning and discarding it before
attempting to process a figurative meaning appears to be false.
Ambiguity
It refers to
the state of having multiple analyses (options) at a particular level of
abstraction (lexical, syntactic/structural, semantic, pragmatics/discourse or
higher abstraction of analysis).
Resolving ambiguity involves technique to choose appropriate option from the
list of options. At times ambiguity may not be resolvable; in such case it is
called inherent ambiguity. Literature has described three types of ambiguities,
which includes lexical ambiguity,
syntactic ambiguity and semantic ambiguity. Each of these is explained
below:
Lexical
ambiguity
Homography: Refers to
same word having different meanings. E.g. English word ‘book’ has two meanings
viz. reading object or recording something officially in legal sense. Similarly,
Hindi word ‘आम’ (Aam) has
two meanings: ‘common’ and ‘mango’. Marathi word ‘वाट’ (vaat) means ‘waiting’ or ‘path’. Hindi word ‘सोना’(sona) means gold or to sleep, ‘उत्तर’(uttar) meaning answer or north direction, ‘हल’(hal) means solution of a problem or plough which is
farming equipment used for ploughing, ‘खाना’(khaana)
means to eat or slot/compartment in a shelf and ‘खाता’(khaataa)
means account or eating.
Polysemy: This refers to multiple equivalent
words having same gross meaning but having subtle differences in meaning
shades. E.g. English word ‘kill’ Marathi has different meaning like ‘ठार मारणे’ (murder sense), ‘वध करणे’ (killing of monsters in mythology
or negative character), ‘हत्या करणे’ (killing of VIPs, assassination
sense).
It is also
common to observe that not every lexical word can have an exactly accurate
equivalent in TL. Because some concepts are highly localized to particular
culture, these include local festivals, cuisines, and idioms. Indian festival ‘नवरात्रि’(Navraatri) which is celebrated for nine days does not have exact
English equivalent, similarly Indian fast food item ‘वडा पाव’(Vadaa Paav) is similar to burger
but is not an exact translation. This is also called as lexical gap. Lexical
ambiguity generally triggers semantic ambiguity. Lexical ambiguity is very
common to witness.
Syntactic/Structural ambiguity
Syntactic or
structural ambiguity refers to multiple syntactic structures of sentence
analyses, interpretations of which, may affect the meaning of sentence
(semantics). The syntactic analysis represents the construction of the sentence
in terms of composition of its constituents using tree like hierarchical data
structure.
This type of
ambiguity is commonly witnessed in English and its’ sister Languages with
Prepositional Phrases (PP), PP can modify a Verb Phrase (VP) or Noun Phrase
(NP), so in SVO type of sentence construction, if PP occurs after verb, then
most of the parsing algorithm would attach it either to NP or VP yielding two
analyses, which causes change in the meaning of TL sentence.
E.g. consider
the famous much discussed English illustration (Hausser, 1988) of the sentence:
I saw a man with telescope.
Due to the
way syntactic structure can evolve, question here is, whom did the phrase ‘with telescope’ modifying? Is it verb saw or object man? Accordingly, we get following two meanings i.e. Meaning-1 or
Meaning-2 respectively, these meaning interpretations are given below:
Meaning-1:
Act of ‘seeing’ a man having (carrying) a telescope with naked eyes.
Meaning-2:
Act of seeing the man with the help of telescope as instrument.
This type of
ambiguity may be resolved using pragmatics or in some cases using certain
features of constituents, e.g. if we consider the sentence, I saw a bird with telescope. Since, bird can’t carry the telescope, it can
be resolved that PP attachment (with
telescope) is modifying the VP (act of seeing) and not the NP (bird). The telescope has requirement that its carrier should have +human feature.
Semantic ambiguity
This
ambiguity reflects more than one meanings of the sentence and needs context
(pragmatics) to resolve it.
आपको मुझे सौ रूपए देने है ।(Aapko muze sau rupaaye dene hain) ……....(1)
मैने दौडते हुए शेर को देखा।(Maine daudate hue sher ko
dekha)…………….(2)
मुझे सोना चाहिए। (Muze sona Chahiye) ……………………….(3)
Both (1), (2)
and (3) have two meanings, which are radically different from each other.
Sentence (1) is about returning back the borrowed money (सौ रूपए Hundred rupees), but it is not clear as to who is borrower and who is
lender?
Meanings of
(1):
You (second
person -आप) are supposed to give (देने है)
hundred rupees (सौ रूपए) to me (मुझ-oblique form).
I (मुझे) am supposed to give you (आप) hundred rupees (सौ रूपए).
Sentence (2) is about watching lion,
the ambiguity is about participle दौडते हुए (running) i.e. who is running? Is it
the speaker or the lion?
Meanings of (2):
i)
I
(म) saw a lion (शेर), who was running (दौडते हुए)
ii)
I
(म) saw a lion (शेर) while I (म) was running (दौडते हुए).
Semantic ambiguity may be further classified as complex
semantic ambiguity (occurring due to lexical ambiguity) and contextual ambiguity
(occurring due to Anaphora/Cataphora and constructions like example (1) and PP
constructions). Ambiguity is unilateral matter pertaining to a particular
Natural Language. Sometimes ambiguity on the source side may be carried from SL
to TL sentence without affecting the translation (sentence meaning).
Patterns of Sound
Stylistics
with its orientation in linguistics examines and studies sound patterns as the
phonological features of poetry. Phonology is specifically concerned with the
study of the inventory of phonemes within a language, their patterns and
distribution. At its phonological level poetic language is often characterized
by a foregrounding of certain sounds through devices like repetition,
alliteration, assonance, rhyme and phonaesthesia. We also come across
phonological deviations in poetry through elision of sounds. Sound patterns in
poetry can be studied at two levels: segmental and supra-segmental. At the
segmental level stylistics describes and analyses the individual phonemes - the
consonants and the vowels - and their patterns foregrounded through repetition
and parallelism. The study of the supra-segmentals refers to the description
and analysis of what is popularly known as the prosodic features of poetic
language - features like stress, rhythm and intonation which spread over a
stretch of language.
The Irrational Element in Poetry
Wallace Stevens lecture talks about how poets choose
subjects, what drives them to create, and what an artist is seeking. He is
concerned with, “the transaction between reality and the sensibility of the
poet from which poetry springs.” He is interested in explaining how poems come
into being and how they flow through that particular poet. Stevens furthermore
wanted to apply his own personality to something matter of fact.
A poet is a poet because that is his means of self-expression.
The poet, “is able to give it the form of poetry because poetry is the medium
of his personal sensibility.” You are a poet because you are a poet and cannot
be explained because that is your personal sensibility. I can express myself in
many ways but the one way in which I feel the most comfortable is using
photography. For me its the most clear way for me to explain my reality. The
ways in which I engage with my reality are through seeing while photographing.
The irrational element in poetry for him is, “merely poetic
energy”. Stevens wants to, “apply my own sensibility to something perfectly
matter of fact”. He wants to deal with things that exist in the world. The
result of this is a, “disclosure of my own sensibility or individuality.” For
me this is something that I struggle with every time I think or go about making
work. Photography has become the form for which I explain my own sensibility.
For Stevens there exists a certain amount unexpectedness
when creating a poem. “While there is nothing automatic about the poem
nevertheless it has an automatic aspect in the sense that it is was I wanted it
to be without knowing before it was written what I wanted it to do.” He also
talks about the poet as a mechanism, “If each of us is a mechanism, each poet
is a poetic mechanism.” So when creating art there is a play between intention
and what happens. In my own work I find this a lot. There are times in which I
go out to explore taking pictures and find unexpected things happen.
Photographs that I wasn’t expecting to take appear before me. I also find that
I am a photographic mechanism that things need to flow through me in order for
them to come out photographically.
So why do people write poetry or make art? Stevens asserts
that at least for poetry, “One writes poetry, then to approach the good in what
is harmonious and orderly.” Furthermore when poetry is really good it can give
us a moment on an existential plane. Artists are seeking to find their own good
and in it they find God. An artist seeks freedom in the good that they are
trying to find, “A superior obsession of all such spirits is the obsession of
freedom.” Freedom is the ultimate obsession and in turn helps them to create
art.
“It is
necessary to be a seer, to make oneself a seer. The poet makes himself a seer
by a long, immense and reason unruliness of the senses…. he attains the
unknown.”
When
photographing for my own work I do feel that I am searching for a good. It may
not necessarily be a search for god. But there is an intangibility that I am
seeking as well as unintended consequences that happen. I would agree that I
become a seer and am searching to attain the unknown.
