Contents

Preface 7

Chapter 1. The Object of Stylistics 9

1. Problems of stylistic research 9

2. Stylistics of language and speech 14

3. Types of stylistic research and branches of stylistics 16

4. Stylistics and other linguistic disciplines 19

5. Stylistic neutrality and stylistic colouring 20

6. Stylistic function notion 24

Practice Section 28

Chapter 2. Expressive Resources of the Language 33

1. Expressive means and stylistic devices 34

2. Different classifications of expressive means .... 37

1. Hellenistic Roman rhetoric system 39

2. Stylistic theory and classification of expresssive means by G. Leech 45

Contents

3. I. R. Galperin's classification of expressive means and stylistic devices 50

4. Classification of expressive means and

stylistic devices by Y. M. Skrebnev 57

Practice Section 76

Chapter 3. Stylistic Grammar 87

1. The theory of grammatical gradation. Marked, semi-marked and unmarked structures 87

2. Grammatical metaphor and types of grammatical transposition 89

3. Morphological stylistics. Stylistic potential of the

parts of speech 92

1. The noun and its stylistic potential 92

2. The article and its stylistic potential 95

3. The stylistic power of the pronoun 97

4. The adjective and its stylistic functions ... 101

5. The verb and its stylistic properties 103

6. Affixation and its expressiveness 107

3.4. Stylistic syntax 110

Practice Section 116

Contents

Chapter 4. The Theory of Functional Styles 122

1. The notion of style in functional stylistics 122

2. Correlation of style, norm and function in the language 124

3. Language varieties: regional, social, occupational . 128

4. An overview of functional style systems 133

5. Distinctive linguistic features of the major functional styles of English 145

1. Literary colloquial style 145

2. Familiar colloquial style 148

3. Publicist (media) style 150

4. The style of official documents 153

5. Scientific/academic style 155

Practice Section 159

Chapter 5. Decoding Stylistics and Its Fundamental Notions . 162

1. Stylistics of the author and of the reader. The notions of encoding and decoding 163

2. Essential concepts of decoding stylistic analysis

and types of foregrounding 166

1. Convergence 169

2. Defeated expectancy 171

Contents

3. Coupling 173

4. Semantic field 176

5. Semi-marked structures 179

Practice Section 181

Glossary for the Course of Stylistics 190

Sources 202

Dictionaries 204

List of Authors and Publications Quoted 205

Preface

The book suggests the fundamentals of stylistic theory that outline such basic areas of research as expressive resources of the language, stylistic differentiation of vocabulary, varieties of the national language and sociolinguistic and pragmatic factors that determine functional styles.

The second chapter will take a student of English to the beginnings of stylistics in Greek and Roman schools of rhetoric and show how-much modern terminology and classifications of expressive means owe to rhetoric.

An important part of the book is devoted to the new tendencies and schools of stylistics that assimilated advancements in the linguistic science in such trends of the 20"¹ century as functional, decoding and grammatical stylistics.

The material on the wealth of expressive means of English will help a student of philology, a would-be teacher and a reader of literature not only to receive orientation in how to fully decode the message of the work of art and therefore enjoy it all the more but also to improve their own style of expression.

he chapter on functional styles highlights the importance of «time

^a" ^place» m language usage. It tells how the same language differs

^{len used} for different purposes on different occasions in communi-

ation with different people. It explains why we adopt different uses of

Preface

language as we go through our day. A selection of distinctive features of each functional style will help to identify and use it correctly whether you deal with producing or analysing a text of a certain functional type.

Chapters on grammar stylistics and decoding stylistics are intended to introduce the student to the secrets of how a stylistic device works. Modern linguistics may help to identify the nature and algorithm of stylistic effect by showing what kind of semantic change, grammatical transposition or lexical deviation results in various stylistic outcomes.

This book combines theoretical study and practice. Each chapter is supplied with a special section that enables the student and the teacher to revise and process the theoretical part by drawing conclusions and parallels, doing comparison and critical analysis. Another type of prac­tice involves creative tasks on stylistic analysis and interpretation, such as identifying devices in literary texts, explaining their function and the principle of performance, decoding the implications they create.

The knowledge of the theoretical background of stylistic research and the experience of integrating it into one's analytical reading skills will enhance the competence and proficiency of a future teacher of English. Working with literary texts on this level also helps to develop one's cultural scope and aesthetic taste. It will also enrich the student's linguistic and stylistic thesaurus.

The author owes acknowledgements for the kindly assistance in reading and stylistic editing of this work to a colleague from the Shimer College of Chicago, a lecturer in English and American literature S. Sklar.

Chapter 1 The Object of Stylistics

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.

1.1. Problems of stylistic research

Units of language on different levels are studied by traditional branches of linguistics such as phonetics that deals with speech sounds and intonation; lexicology that treats words, their mean­ing and vocabulary structure, grammar that analyses forms of words and their function in a sentence which is studied by syn­tax. These areas of linguistic study are rather clearly defined and ^ave a long-term tradition of regarding language phenomena from ^{a leve,}-oriented point of view. Thus the subject matter and the material under study of these linguistic disciplines are more or less clear-cut.

Chapter 1. The Object of Stylistics

It gets more complicated when we talk, about stylistics. Some scholars claim that this is a comparatively new branch of linguistics, which has only a few decades of intense linguistic interest behind it. The term stylistics really came into existence not too long ago. In point of fact the scope of problems and the object of stylistic study go as far back as ancient schools of rhetoric and poetics.

The problem that makes the definition of stylistics a curious one deals both with the object and the material of studies. When we speak of the stylistic value of a text we cannot proceed from the level-biased approach that is so logically described through the hierarchical system of sounds, words and clauses. Not only may each of these linguistic units be charged with a certain stylistic meaning but the interaction of these elements, as well as the structure and composition of the whole text are stylistically pertinent.

Another problem has to do with a whole set of special linguistic means that create what we call «style». Style may be belles-letters or scientific or neutral or low colloquial or archaic or pompous, or a combination of those. Style may also be typical of a certain writer-Shakespearean style, Dickensian style, etc. There is the style of the j press, the style of official documents, the style of social etiquette and even an individual style of a speaker or writer—his idiolect.

Stylistics deals with styles. Different scholars have defined style differently at different times. Out of this variety we shall quote the most representative ones that scan the period from the 50ies to the 90ies of the 20^<л century.

In 1955 the Academician V.V.Vinogradov defined style as «socially recognized and functionally conditioned internally united totality of the ways of using, selecting and combining the means of lingual