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Stylistics and Translational Stylistics

Stylistics was founded with the publication of Leech & Short (1981) Style in Fiction, a linguistic study of literary texts, and Short (1996) Exploring language of poems, a linguistic study of plays and prose. Generalisation must be handled with care. Stylistics deploys the frame of many disciplines. Definitions are not to be neglected. Translational stylistics was founded with this special issue: Simpson P. (2004) Language and Literature, SAGE. Translational stylistics means having the target audience in mind. It has two souls: translation and stylistics. English is a determined language: words on the left determine words on the right. Stylistics is a discipline characterised by linguistic focus. It is very useful when translating. It is focused on studying narrative and linguistic mechanisms that make the text operational. Reactions are guided, never unexpected or spontaneous. The semiologist Lotman is the first one who studied verbal sound as signs that make a culture. Only in human cultures texts embody a culture as a cultural social procedure. The Typology of Culture: language is our most powerful means of expression. The power of texts must never be taken for granted. E.g. A long way down by Nick Hornby has both metaphorical and literal meaning (going deep into something: reasons, the building). The Italian translation is Non buttiamoci gi. Translators must know layers of meaning because of the restricted span of time (very little time). Because of time constraints translators have to be quick. This is a developable skill.

Characteristics and Dimensions of Language


Language is ambiguous, conventional, and economic. The five dimensions of language are of paramount importance: phonology and graphology (Lotman) morphology (morphemes are basic units which have some kind of meaning in a language) bound morphemes e.g. anti-, -ism (they cannot stay alone) prefixes e.g. antisuffixes e.g. -ism (typical of nouns), -al, -ish (adjectives), -ise, -ize (verbs) free morphemes e.g. cat (not a word, but a free morpheme) e.g. nationalism (word): nation- (free morpheme) -al- (bound morpheme) ism (bound morpheme) syntax (structure of sentences) o o o phrases (group of words which go together for form and function) clauses (at least subject and verb, not necessarily grammatically complete) sentence (capital letter and full stop, both grammatically and lexically complete)

main clause v. subordinate clause

e.g. The young girl [noun phrase] with the red hat [post modifier: prepositional phrase] was writing [verb phrase] an email [structural grammar: noun phrase, functional grammar: realisation of the verb] slowly [adverb phrase]. The word girl is the head of the phrase and gives its name to the phase category. semantics (words and lexis) denotative meaning (the bare meaning of a word e.g. black, a colour) connotation (all those metaphorical meanings e.g. black, darkness, evil, racism, death) collocation (e.g. gentle breeze, golden fish, dependent on, independent of) idiomatic expression (proverbs and sayings e.g. to thank somebody from the bottom of ones heart, for no reason whatsoever, this is not necessarily the case) semantic field (according to Prototype theory words can be classified into groups, they can be grouped together according to their meaning or partial meaning; visual sketch: the position is related to the closeness to the prototype = the focus e.g. an eagle would be at the centre; moreover, the same word can be inserted in many semantic fields)

pragmatics (language in use: stylistics)

e.g. Stop. is a morpheme, a word, a phrase, a clause, a sentence. e.g. You must know the truth. Obviously. The first sentence is a prototypical one, while the latter is a free morpheme rank-shifted up to the level of clause.

Cohesion and Coherence


Cohesion and coherence are not mutually related. Cohesion is the way meaning is distributed within the text. Cohesive devices are text-oriented, that means they depend from text to text: lexical cohesion

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repetitions (heavy, probably the most difficult device to translate as it deals with semantic fields, that is how prototypical these words are) lexical reiterations (super ordinates/hyponyms, general words, synonyms/antonyms) complete antonyms (e.g. dead/alive) partial antonyms (depending on the perspective e.g. big/small)

grammatical cohesion (avoids unnecessary redundant repetition) conjunctions (hierarchy of information) coordinate conjunctions (two pieces of information of equal importance) subordinated conjunctions (dependence of information)

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substitutions (an expression which stands for a longer string, e.g. proper noun substituted by a pronoun, a synonym, an antonym, a similar expression) reference (everything that stands for something else is a referent) exophoric reference (refers to something outside the text or in the context) deixis (deictic elements refer to the outside world, e.g. people, time, place)

endophoric reference (refers to something within the text) anaphora (refers backwards) cataphora (refers forwards)

e.g. Claudia [mentioned for the first time: exophoric reference] was looking out of the window [exophoric reference]. She [endophoric reference] didnt know what to do. He [exophoric reference] was somewhere, out there [endophoric reference]. o ellipsis (avoids repetitions, e.g. in thrillers) Coherence is the logical and thematic progression (meaning) showed by the text.

Marked and Unmarked Structures


Unmarked structures are prototypical, the most spontaneous ones in a particular language. Marked structures are not prototypical, and therefore carry meaning: dislocation (the most marked structure, typically in spoken language) o o right dislocation (cataphora) e.g. It was unexpected, Janets success. left dislocation (anaphora) e.g. Janet, shes incredible.

fronting/preposing/topicalisation (a phrase is placed in a position which is usually occupied by the subject) e.g. Every day she looked out of the window. cleft (passive: negative value judgment suggested meaning) e.g. It was Mark who stole the money.

pseudo-cleft (negative value judgment suggested meaning) e.g. What Mark did was to steal the money. The unmarked structure just states the obvious: Mark stole the money. e.g. He slept in his bed. (unmarked structure) e.g. His bed was slept in. (marked structure: somebody slept in it, we are not sure whether he slept in his bed)

Sentences, Utterances, and Pragmatics


A sentence is composed by meaning and grammar, while from the graphological point of view it starts with a capital letter and ends with a full stop. An utterance (Italian: enunciato) is a unit in use before which and after which there is a pause. Language is a formal system and the capacity of constituting a means of communication. Language per se is useless. Pragmatics studies sentences in dynamic use (the so-called Saussures parole) and is the very last study of language after semantics and syntax. Pragmatics is not possible with dead languages. The birth of pragmatics dates back to the 1950s with the Speech acts theory. According to Austins Speech acts theory (1962), communication is a hypothesis-testing and decisionmaking process. Acts can be behavioural as well as linguistic. An utterance is a speech act and there are three acts performed at the same time: locutionary level (the very utterance) illocutionary force (the intention lying behind the words) perlocutionary effect (the effect I want to bring about in response of my utterance)

The groundbreaking book is Austins How to do things with words. If what I say is what I mean, my speech act is direct, that is the locutionary level (level 1) and the illocutionary force (level 2) overlap. No breakdown of communication is possible. When level 1 and level 2 do not overlap, my speech act is indirect and it does not abide by prescriptive grammar, e.g. Can we close the window? does not mean Are we able to stand up and close the window?; e.g. language as information processing process: A: Door! [Exclamation, but actually a request] B: Im in the bathroom! [Statement, but actually a refusal] A: Ok. [Acceptance of the reason] Each sentence means something more. The illocutionary uptake is proven by the negative response of the hearer, i.e. a refusal. As people tend to be indirect, there is the possibility of a communication breakdown, e.g. A: Can we open the window? B: Yes, we can. (but nobody stands up). In this case the response is only on locutionary level, not considering the illocutionary one. 95% of communication is indirect for politeness sake (in the Western world, it is a culture bound feature) and for reparations sake (if I state something unclearly, I can always take it back and do not lose my face). As defined during the 1970s in the message model of communication by Shannon & Weaver and Jakobson, communication is the product of a process in which the message originates from a source and reaches the receiver through a channel. The reason of a communication breakdown is e.g. noise. However,

nothing like misunderstanding, reformulation, lies, and change of subject are in this schema. As it is pure mathematics and son of the period of automatic translation, it was soon disregarded. (Human skills are too obscure. Language acquisition theories dont explain 100%.) Assumptions, ideas, and hypothesis are built on what is going on: situation, context, circumstances, and knowledge of the world. A presupposition in an entailment: context isnt needed. e.g. My sister Daniela is at University now. Entailments: 1. I have a sister. 2. Her name I Daniela. 3. She is a woman. 4. Someone is called Daniela. 5. She is at University. 6. Someone is at university. 7. We cannot be sure whether she a teacher or not. In order to understand the meaning we need the context. A: I cant find my wallet. B: Really? Oh dear Well, no, I havent seen it, but if it was in your bedroom, I saw Lisa was there this morning. At very least, we can assume A and B live together and B has access to As bedroom. A wallet is a sensitive issue, a personal matter. Expressions such as Oh dear, Well, no, and Really? are markers of informal content and form. The latter is remarkable, since you do not answer to a question with another question. Young people tend to be informal, but there is no further element concerning the age issue. Lisa is introduced with no further explanation, as it is shared knowledge. A is a man, since women use purses, not wallets. Gendered language is always a problematic issue. Gender Studies are led by Deborah Cameron and are usually synonym of feminism. However, this is a narrow definition. In a Western patriarchal world, males and females do not speak in different ways, unlike someone has suggested. In fact, male and female social roles are the result of gender prototypes. It is a shifting terrain, as males and females adopt in some cases different linguistic behaviours. Similarly, Queer Studies claim that the gay world exists and has the right to be studied. The indirect speech act is Bs suggestion that Lisa stole the wallet. As question Have you seen it? is potentially an accusation. However, we need more information, e.g. context, co-text. Money, sex, and religion are sensitive issues. If one is indirect, reparation is possible. Austin suggests there are constantive and performative acts. Constantive acts can be verified by their true or false value, whereas performative acts change the world by their very utterance and complete a social conventional procedure, e.g. I do in a marriage ceremony. However, the performative hypothesis has been disregarded. Felicity conditions have been theorised to bridge the gap between locutionary level and illocutionary force and to stress why performatives are so important:

a conventional procedure is executed correctly and completely to produce a conventional effect; people behave appropriately, as specified in the procedure; feelings, thoughts and intention aim to fulfil the procedure correctly and completely. If all these conditions are fulfilled, the communication is felicitous. Paul Grice was a philosopher of language. Pragmatics is divided into grician and post-grician pragmatics. Grices Cooperative theory (1975) reads: Make your contribution such as it is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged. Four maxims are therefore made operational. They translate the principle in a set of guidelines, not rules, that is we are not obliged to follow them. The features of communication are: 1. quantity (dont say too much or too little) 2. quality (dont lie) 3. relevance (be relevant) 4. manner (be brief, orderly, perspicuous, i.e. clear, transparent) We communicate because we want to be cooperative. Cooperation is taken for granted. You dont say something you think its wrong or for which you lack evidence. However, we sometimes have our reasons to cause a communication breakdown or subtle reasons for not being the perfect communicator: by B. A: Does your dog bite? B: No. [A strokes the dog and receives a bite.] A: But you said it didnt bite! B: I didnt say this was my dog either. A should have asked: Is this your dog? A starts from the premise B will be cooperative. However, B replies to the locutionary force and shows this is not necessarily the case. In this case, there is lack of cooperation. Speakers can decide to flout maxims: they can decide not to follow the maxims on the formal level, but they nonetheless expect the hearers to understand (disambiguate, decode) the implied meaning. Speakers make it clear to the other interactants that they are doing so. Therefore, the maxims are being observed at a deeper level. A: Good grief, what a boring lesson! B: Look, it has started to rain! B refuses to develop the subject of conversation attempting to save As face. As a result, the cooperative principle, i.e. relevance, is flouted. Relevance is flouted when the speakers perform apparently non-relevant flouting a maxim violating a maxim maxims can clash opting out of a principle (external reasons prevent us from being cooperative, e.g. priests)

Humour is linguistically constructed, e.g. A meets B and B is accompanied by a dog, that is the dog walks

turns, i.e. change of subject. In the following example, A and B are friend. B doesnt want to hurt A and chooses the only positive detail he or she can think of: A: Well, how was your date with my brother yesterday? B: The restaurant was very nice. Quality is the most difficult maxim to flout: saying something you dont really believe or dont really think. In loose terms, flouting quality is saying a white lie. Speakers normally give either too much information (in general, hearers will get bored; therefore we tend to be implicit), or not enough information (in general, hearers wont be able to understand). Being explicit is a hindrance for communication. A: Well, do you like my new dress, sweetheart? B: The colour really suits you. As question is an yes/no one. Since no yes/no answer is given, the cooperative principle, i.e. quality, is flouted. The colour is much more related to the dress than the dating to the restaurant (cf. the previous example). At the end of a job interview: I am sure your skills will be better applied in another field. This is another white lie, that is something being said not to give offence. Some figures of speech such as hyperbole, metaphor, irony, sarcasm, banter deploy a violation of the maxim of quality. A: Im starving. B: I dont think you are dying of hunger you dont even look thin. Also in this case, B replies on the locutionary level. backward arretrato to go off rompersi to make oneself plain farsi capire to step ahead venire avanti despicable spregevole to entail includere

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