Connotation in Stylistics

Emotive charge emotiveness reveals the emotional layer of cognition and perception. Expressiveness is aimed at intensification of the meaning. Evaluation states the value of the indicated notion. Stylistic charge indicates the situation of communication. Evaluative charge can be individual or common. (where if refers to all speakers.) Emotive connotation means some signals of the emotional attitude to the object. Girl –girly. There are syntacital means of emotivness : integections. Emotiveness should not be mixed up with logical meaning of words denoting feelings and emotions. Joy, sorrow, happiness. Systematic [henomenon that is repeatedly reproduced. Signals of the emotional state of the speaker of ther emothional attitude to the object. Types of addres – direct expressions of emotions – darling, dear, bastard, son of a bitch. They can be positive or negative. They can be dolly – dove, lamb, chick. – positive. Negative ones – dog, swine, pig, cow. There are two types of lexico- syntactical patterns - My poor little dove, you old dirty pig, positive. Get the hell out of her, you

Morphological means of creating emotiveness : suffixes – o ro so – bovo, palo, fatso, negatively charged suffixes – sleazoid, schizoid. Lexical emotiveness – filthy person, hat, weather, lousy coffee, money. Bunny, kitten, dish ( of a young and attractive girl), ex.

The evaluative component. The value of the indicated object of notion for the speaker. A dwelling or a dwelling place is a place where someone lives (formal). Slum, hovel, house building, but, mansion, palace etc. There are emotive adj expressing positive or negative emotions. Adj which have meanings in themselves. Awesome, fantastic, marvelous, extremely, enormous.

Expressiveness. It is a broader notion than emotiveness. It aims at intensification of the meaning. It is the technique of making the utterance more vivid and brighter with some special choice of vocabulary, imagery, phonetic means, syntactical patterns.

The concept of beauty. She is lovely, absolutely lovely. She is gorgeous. She is a feast for sore eyes.(imaginary). She is a drop-dead beauty .

Imagery. Double actualization or simultaneous realization of the two meanings.

The context makes all the difference, and the maning is often not computable from the lexical info alone. Any word even the most ordinary may be surrounded by an emotive aura wall a symbol of imprisonment, obstacles.

Expressiveness comprises evaluation, expressivity.

Д. з –семинар 2 стр 67 по 71.какие отношения между ними, почему говорят так. 2 – какая эмоцион. Присутствует, как определяем. 3- найти русский вар, попробовать перевести, какая лексика в переводе.

Stylistic classification of the English vocabulary

Systematic approach. Three main layers – neutral, literary, colloquial. Theory of opposition (neutral – unmarked member of the opposition, others – with positive stylistic determination marked ones). Specific, stylistically charged units (bookish, official, dialectal, etc) have a label. When used in different speech situations neutral words are capable of acquiring a great range of different stylistic information.

Sylistic characteristics of a separate linguistic unit. A literary word 1) is confined to bookish contexts. 2) Possesses elevated (ameliorative) expressiveness and emotiveness. 3) it must be placed above the zero level of the norm.

A colloquial word 1) is limited to informal speech situations or dialects. 2) possesses low (pejorative) emotiveness and expressiveness. 3) is placed below the neutral norm.

A neutral word 1) is unlimited in its use (universal). 2) possesses zero expressiveness and zero emotiveness. 3) is placed at the zero level of the neutral norm (the scheme).( По Гальперину схема) Scheme of Sylistic Layers of the Vocabulary appendix 3.

Standard English vocabulary has neutral plus common literary and plus common colloquial word. SEV is the core of the vocabulary is made up of three groups – common literary, neutral and common colloquial vocabulary. It is used from formal speeches to everyday communication.

Socio-linguistic factors determining the use of SEV. 1) Zone of control (public disapproval of linguistic laxity, grammar negligence, the use of taboo improper words, etc.) 2) Economy of linguistic means 3) Redundancy.

Economy of linguistic means.

ü Increasing pace of life

ü It manifests itself in all the language`s level

ü The prevalence of phrasal verbs: (Carry on, give up, rule out, take on..) – the principle of conceptual economy

ü Abundance of shortened words

ü A) curtailing of the initial letters – rents, cycle. B) curtailing of the final letters – fab, congrats, celeb, biz, ab fab.. C) the use of acronyms : VIP, PR, AWOL, ASAAP, AAMOF (as a matter of fact, R.S.V.P.DIY, B.Y.O.B. ETA (not E.T.A) stands for estimated time of arrival. A/S/L (Age/Sex/Location), AYK.

ü The use of nouns with broad meaning: stuff, thing, job, challenge, etc

ü Redundancy of linguistic means (time-fillers such as so, eh, ah, so to speak)

ü Pepetitions in the belles letters genre

ü Pleonasm and tautology. Lovely evening, I said. Yes. Lovely, istn`t? Lovely. Reminds me of Cannes. PhU (phrasal units) with zoonisms – hen party, stag party, to buy a pig in a poke.

Occasionalisms (coinages)

ü Belong to language in action

ü Reveal unrealized language potential

ü Tied up to an occasion

ü They are unpredictable, expressive and emotive, positive stylistic determination

ü Neologisms are new names for new concepts (clone, cloning, nonotechnology, blog sphere)

ü Occasionalisms are words for already existing objects

Word-building means of occasionalisms

1) Suffixes – dom, hood, ee, holic (sisterhood, queenhood, absentee, invitee, chocoholic)

2) Prefixes (upgrade, uptight, upfront)

3) Extended stems with suffixed –ness (nothingness, togetherness, oneness), able (givupable, go-to-hellable)

4) Conversion, compounding or nominalization of phrases (bearhug, spoonfeed)

5) Formal words become nominal. She is It. She is the Itiest girl in the town. Она еще та штучка

Brodeo – bro plus rodeo – a bar or a pary with more men than women

Mocktail – a non alcoholic cocktail

Globoboss – business executive that has the ability to perform well in any country. Global boss

Plank – a stupid person (old phrase as thick as two short planks).

Prolly – likely to happen (probably)

Sarcastrophe – when you try to use some more humorous sarcasm, but it goes catastrophically wrong and you feel embarrassed.

Bacheloric – having the characteristics of a bachelor. Type of word formation – affxation.

Домашнее задание – семинар 3 from the book, plus non-verbal test.

Special literary vocabulary

General points

· Terms, archaisms, poetic words, Biblicism, foreign words, barbarisms, euphemisms, politically correct vocabulary, etc.

· Literary words serve to satisfy communicative demands of official, scientific, poetic messages. SLV belong to special communicative spheres. They are used in official papers and documents, in scientific communication, in high poetry, in authorial speech of creative prose (historical novels, novels concerned with professions, discoveries, science fiction, fantasy).

· Inherent stylistic function of amelioration. Stylistic effect of elevation. Literary words, both general (also called learned, bookish, high-flown) and special, contribute to the message the tone of solemnity, sophistication, seriousness, gravity.

· Terms are words denoting objects, processes, phenomena of science, humanities, technique, special words associated with a definite branch of human activity which refer to a concept directly.

· They are monosemantic in character, aim at accuracy

· It is usually an item in the nomenclature, a member of the set. Clusters of terms. When a term is used our mind immediately associates it with a certain nomenclature.

· Terms are highly conventional, often prescriptive. A term is directly connected with the concept it denotes. A term, unlike other words, directs the mind to the essential quality of the thing, phenomenon or action

· When used in the prescriptive spheres, they convey logic (referential information), terminological function

· In the unusual context a term may acquire stylistic properties (Belles-lettres) authenticity of the artistic environment, local color.

· Terms may take on the status of stylistic device when they are used terminologically and stylistically

· Cyberculture, cybercafé, cyberfraud

· Nanobridge, nanodiamond

· Website, blog, e-mail, log in, etc

· Social development, word-building potentials.

Archaisms

· Belong to the upper stratum of the voc – bear the label of the previous historic development.

· Obsolescent, obsolete and archaic proper (Galperin)

· The beginning of the aging process when the word becomes rarely used. Such words are called obsolescent, i.e. they are in the stage of gradually passing out of general use (e.g. thou, thee, thy, and thine, the corresponding verbal ending –est and the verb forms art, wilt (thou makest, thou wilt) the ending (e) instead of (e)s ( he maketh) and the pronoun ye French borrowings as a means of preserving the spirit of earlier periods – pallet (a straw mattress), a palfrey (a small horse), garniture (furniture)

· Obsolete words – archaic words are those that have already gone completely out of use but are still recognized by the English-speaking community – methinks (it seems to me), nay (no)

· Archaic proper, are words which are no longer recognizable in modern English, words that were in use in Old English and which have either dropped out of the language entirely or have changed in their appearance so much that they have become unrecognizable – troth (faith) – a losel (a worthless, lazy fellow)

Obsolescent words

· Pronouns – you – thou, thee, ye, your – thy, thine

· Prepositions – thereof, therein, thereafter, ere, ere long

· Conjunctions – hence, henceforth, albeit, whilst

· Adverbs – bewhiles, anon

· Verbal forms – thinkest, maketh, dost, shalt.

· Lexical obscolescent units belong to nominal categories – nouns, verbs – main (ocean, dale (valley), welkin (sky), steed (horse), palfrey (a horse)

· Prefix “fore” in the words – forethought, forbearance, forewarned. The prefix “pre” – premonition, preoccupation. The suffix “some” in winsome, wholesome ect.

· They are used to produce an elevated, lofty stylistic effect

· A humourous effect if they are used in down-to-earth prosaic situations or unnatural context

· Historical terms – the names for the objects belonging to the previous epochs. By-gone periods in the life of any society are marked by historical events, and by institutions, customs, material objects which are no longer in use – Thane, yeoman, goblet, baldric, mace, the main function of archaisms, finds different interpretation in – different novels by different writers to create a local coloring – mace (кольчуга )б a kirtle (юбка)

Poetic and Highly Literary Words

· These words are used to sustain the special elevated and romantic atmosphere of poetry (archaic or obsolete words) woe (sorrow), foe (enemy), realm (kingdom), haply (may be), oft (often), morn (morning)

· Foreign words are words loaned from other languages, do not belong to the English vocabulary. They are italicized to indicate their alien nature or their stylistic value. They may fulfill a terminological function

· Dolce vita, waltz, croissants, bonjour, tout le monde, persona grata.

Foreign words and Barbarisms

· Barbarisms have gradually lost their foreign peculiarities become more or less naturalized and have merged with the native English stock of words

· Most of them have corresponding English synonyms

· They bear the appearance of a borrowing and are felt as smth alien to the native language. There are some words which retain their foreign appearance to greater or lesser degree. These words, which are called barbarisms, are also considered to be on the outskirst of the literary language.

· Bon mot (a clever, witty saying, vis-à-vis, apropos.

Biblicisms

· Are words closely associated with their source

· To produce ameliorative effect

· They can be hardly set apart from other phraseological units – tit for tat, scapegoat, the corner stone, as you sow you will mow, there is nothing new under the sun, a living dog is better than a dead lion.

· Biblicisms contain proper names which give away their origin because they bring about associations with concrete biblical personage or episodes described in the Bible – Noah`s Ark, Lot`s wife, the kiss of Judas

· Bublicisms contain religious terms (festival events, symbols, rituals, laws) Ten Commandments, Immaculate conception, Passover, Creation, their name is a legion

· Biblicisms are characterized by an inherent stylistic property of elevation. They fulfill ameliorative function if used in their natural setting. This function is assured by obsolescent words (lexical or morphological) in their component structure

· The compositional structure of biblical nominal units – 1) Proper names. The name of Adam has acquired the meaning of a male. Judas of a traitor, Solomon of a wise man. Biblical names may acquire the status of a common name, Judas – замочная скважина в тюрьме, ирод. 2) The doublets (Samson and Delilah, David and Goliath)

· Topographic names ( Sodom and Gomorrah – general chaos and corruption or a single name Jericho)

· Mixed (proper and common nouns) Noah`s ark, Cain`s Mark, Lot`s wife, The garden of Eden

· Elevated, emeliorative function or occasional stylistic function of producing a humorous or ironic effect.

· Д.з – семинар и 2 теста, seminar 4 and seminar 5, test on terms and biblisms.

Traditional and political correct euphemesems

Traditional (classical euphemisms)

· Euphemism is a word or a phrase aimed at substituting a rude or improper expression for the socially more acceptable one.

· 1) a euphemism is a substitution of one word for another on the basis of synonymous relations between them

· 2) a euphemism refers to an object indirectly

· 3) the declared function of a eu. is ameliorative that is presenting a referent in a more favourable light

· 4) eu. are caused by social changes.

Historic and social causes of eu

· Religious taboo

· Linguistic response to some bans or restrictions

· The puritan revolution in GB in the 17^th century and its echo in the US brought forth the greatest influx of up (leg-limb, shirt).

· Hugh Rawson`s two linguistic laws:

· 1) the law of Gresham: bad money drives out the good – coition, copulation and intercourse. It was a gay party

· 2) the law of succession a new set of coins was to be minted

· A eup. Follows a direct name like a shadow, always triggering if off in the minds. Such close association is bound to smear or compromise a euphemism providing ground for its replacement.

· The functions of a traditional eu

· Fulfill an elevated, ameliorative function

· Humorous, disrespectful aspects of an object

· Death: to give up one`s ghost (отдать богу душу), to join the world of the shadows, to be gathered by one`s forefathers (отойти к праотцам), (ameliorative)

· to kick the bucket, to hang off the hooks, to kiss the dust (pejorative)

· All the words or word-combinations presenting a concept indirectly (thus obscuring it) should be categorized into eu and disephemisms. The former fulfills an ameliorative function, the latter – pejorative one

· Social bands and restrictions are subject to change. To be in a delicate (interesting) state, to be in a family way, to have a water-melon in one`s stomach – pregnant.

· Socially topical classification of eu

· With each historical ephoch social and moral priorities underwent changes

· Religious or defensive euphemisms (God, Satan, death and birth), to go (умереть), to peg out, to croak, to drop, to pop off

· Each individual euphemism is short-lived but eup as a socio-linguistic phenomenon will be as long as there is a social establishment with its rules, bans and restrictions.

· Politically Correct (PC) Euphemisms

· Post modern philosophy at the beginning of the 20^th century:

· 1) Moral values of the previous centuries inherited from Christianity should be scrapped, their hierarchy practically reversed

· 2) Traditional morality should be replaced by ideology of self-identification and inclusion

· 3) This ideology involves upgrading the status of marginal social groups

· 4) The principle of “otherness” or difference should be prioritized, who are we to judge?

· 5) Society should be permissible for “everything goes”

· 6) In US the form of affirmative actions in the following social fields: class, gender, race, the other.

· The English language reforms

· The most militant feminist wing of the P.C. movement (feminists began it)

· Oppressed marginal group (Non-white people, disabled people, homosexuals)

· Some grammar rules, lexical units denoting professions, semantic structure of some key-words of the English language (“man”, “sex”), word-building

· He-he/she or he-or-she, hero-shero

· The feminine suffix – ess and the semi suffix man, waitress – dining-service attendant, stewardess – flying attendant, prostitute – sex worker, working woman, sex provider or strolling street hostess.

· Policeman – police officer, fire-man- fire-fighter, chairman – chairperson, spokesman-spokesperson.

· Feminist ideologists consider that in the lexical set of oppositions, the member of the opposition, denoting a female is a marked one. Miss – Mrs-Ms.

· Bachelor vs spinster: girl, honey, sweet, baby, little thing, zoonisms – chick, lamb

· Man-made, the fair-sex, a gay dog, a man in the street.

· Pets (oppressed group) – non-human companions

· “different” a personality who runs counter to the accepted norms (sexual behavior, physical appearance) should be treated with due respect.

· New morphemes: 1) Differently-abled (disabled), morally different (immoral) 2) impaired, challenged, disadvantaged, dispossessed.

· Knowledge-impaired (ignorant), mentally-challenged (retarded), vertically-challenged (short), financially-disadvantaged (poor), motivationally-dispossessed (lazy), physically-impaired (crippled), optically-challenged (blind, metaphysically perplexed (dead).

· Race (the concept of color blindness), race distinctive features (curly hair, slit (narrow eyes, etc)

· P.C. euphemisms are a response to a new social tendencies, bans and restrictions.

· To create socially friendly, tolerant atmosphere.

· The P.C. word-building norms are prescriptive. Alive –temporarily metabolically abled, drunk – chemically inconvenienced, dishonest – ethically disoriented, housewife – domestic engineer

·

Special colloquial voc (slang, jagonisms, professionalism, vulgarisms)

Slang

· Thieve (slang), beggar (slang) usage

· French word langue (язык)

· Slang is the substandard layer of the English voc used in uncontrolled speech situations requiring easy familiarity and utter spontaneity aimed at a shocking effect.

· The speech of the younger generation who want to cause a sensation. It must be constantly renewed

· Every generation is believed to have slang of its own

· Sky-scraper, rot, fun, date, kid, guy, cool

· Topics: money, alcohol, drugs, sex

· Money: dibs, rolls, greens, cabbage, readies (the ready), dough etc.

· C (century) – 100 dollars

· Grand – a thousand dollar

· A quid – 1 pound

· A buck – 1 dollar

· An ace – 1 pound (an ace in the hole – заначка)

· To be drunk: hammered, pissed, smashed, wasted, sloshed, plastered, wrecked

· Bar slang: This place is a dive. A hole in the ground/wall. Can we start a tab? Don`t worry it`s on me. To speak to Al and Mary, to blow grass, to smoke pot, to sniff snow

· Wannable = want to be. Winnable is a noun which takes on the inflexion (s) (wannables)

· The most essential quality of slang is their substandard expressiveness. Slang almost always borders on the improper, the vulgar or the taboo.

· Flea-bag, stinks, pants-wetter (funny story), the throne, Active citizens, juice-happy, to kiss off (to die)

· 1) the use of highly literary words for a contemptible thing (see above), 2) the use of a zoonism for a person. Chicken – a coward, a dog, a fat cat – a rich man, snow-bird 3) the use of an inanimate object for a name of a person: a pillar-box (ненормальный)б a skirt, a crack-pot

· Slang words well understood by the majority of speaker

· A gold-digger, a sugar-daddyy

· Have synonyms but sometimes but sometimes fill in semantically void niches. E.g- sky-scraper, teenager, the campus.

· The linguists of the previous epochs used to look upon slang as a sign of language decay and degradation. Others think opposite, this is the way the language is developed.

· Over 70% of the present day native speakers recognize slang and up to 20% matter-of-factly use it

· 1. The old suffixes – hood, -dom, -ee: second-hand-hood, gansterdom, dogdom, invitee, askee, signee, swappee

· 2. The Relatively new suffix –o, -oo, -oro in the American variant is added to names of males (suggested by the Mexican borrowing – macho) boyo, palo

· 3. The Foreign semi-affixes ville (French), kopf (German) bring to mind the well-known cliché that America is the melting-pot of all nations.

· Wigsville –театр, clump kopf –дурак

· 3. The insertion of a vulgarizm between the initial and final syllables of a word turns it into a hilarious vulgarizm: in-bloody-credible, Dolce-bloody-Gabbana, ta-crappy-ta

· 4. A special treatment is given to phrasal verbs. The suffix er or double er is added to each part of the verb: give up – giverer-upperer, take over (наследник) takerer –overer. Doubling the suffix er imparts a certain humourous flavor to the whole. One of the typical word-building means in slang is acronyms: BO – bad Odour, S.O.B – son of a bitch, AWOL, B&B.

· Cockney. Rhyme involves, at least, two units. In rhyming slang only one unit is in evidence, the other is supposed to be in your mind and may be supplied in the conversation. It looks like a linguistic game: plates of meat – feet, cod`s roe – dough, pig`s ear – beer.

· Jargonism

· Jargon is a substandard layer of words characterized by belonging to some closely-knit social or professional group

· Isolated, as a code which is comprehensible only to the initiated, preserve secrecy

· To impose new meanings on well-known standard one. The function is to preserve secrecy.

· Tiger- неквалифицированный рабочий, penguin – служащий в авиационных войсках, scorpion – британский военнослужащий

· The voc of the thieves, gangsters, vagabonds and the like is known as the cant. Canary – свидетель обвинения, to sing – дать свидетельские показания, opera – система показаний

· Dejargonization

· Professionalisms

· Professsionalisms are sub-standard words belonging to professional or business sphere used to display a certain emotive closeness and common interest

· Professionals and terms

· Pen-pusher – a clerk, counter-jumper – продавецб chips – плотник, ink-slinger – писатель, bricky-каменщик

· The main function of a prof is to convey emotions, thus relieving the boredom of monotonous communication in the same office laboratory.

· Don`t worry, honey, I will get rid of that mall-rat look you`ve got soon enough

· Hols-каникулы, lit – literature

· The main means creating profess – are metaphor or metonymy.

· That`s deadly – классный, that`s wicked – very fantastic, sick – really awesome, that`s phat – cool. “killa” – it`s cool, bad-ass –very cool, da bomb means good, gnarley – cool. Dog`s bullocks - bladdered –drunk, cheeky - sexual, knuckle sandwich - , fanny - , Grab or Noch – nervous, chufted – ,