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Introduction
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[stylistics] is expanded so as to incorporate
most of the concerns of both traditional
literary criticism and traditional rhetoric.. it
insists on the need to be objective by focusing
sharply on the text itself and by setting out to
discover the ‘rules’ governing the process by
which linguistic elements and patterns in a
text accomplish their meanings and literary
effects. (284)
Mick Short asks the question, “Who is stylistics?” and describes “her” as a
friend of his. He says “she” is an approach to the analysis of literary texts
using linguistic description” (1).
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Katie Wales observes that stylistics, as the study of style, has the goal
“not simply to describe the formal features of texts for their own sake, but in
order to show their functional significance for the interpretation of the text;
or in order to relate literary effects to linguistic causes where these are felt to
be relevant” (438).
This is stylistics viewed from the broad notion of the linguistic study of
all types of linguistic events from different domains of life. It is used as a
cover term for the analysis of non-literary varieties of language, or registers
(Wales 458). Hence, one can undertake a stylistic study of a religious
sermon, a sport commentary, a legal document, a political speech, a
business conversation, etc.
2. Literary Stylistics:
This is the type of analysis that focuses on literary texts. In the broad
sense, such a study may be linguistic or non-linguistic, but in the more
specialized sense, it is essentially linguistic. To make this linguistic
orientation clearer, the terms linguistic stylistics or linguostylistics are
sometimes employed to denote the linguistic analysis or interpretation of
literary events. Other types of stylistics below are largely subtypes of this
linguistic literary stylistics.
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understanding of the artist’s intention which was hardly subject to the
objective verifiability emphasized by the scientific claim of modern
linguistics.
4. Interpretative Stylistics:
6. Evaluative Stylistics:
7. Discourse Stylistics:
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indeed, longer texts…. In the basic
elementary definition, it is the application of
discourse analysis to literature. (5)
8. Contextualist Stylistics:
This has various factions that are united in their emphasis on the
ways in which literary style is formed and influenced by its contexts. These
involve (1) the competence and disposition of the reader; (2) the prevailing
sociocultural forces that dominate all linguistic discourse, including
literature; and (3) the systems of signification through which we process and
interpret all phenomena, linguistic and non-linguistic, literary and non-
literary” (Bradford 73).
9. Phonostylistics:
This has been described by Hartman and Stork as “the study of the
expressive function of sounds” (223). In practice, phonostylistics may not be
considered as a distinct type of stylistics but rather as one of the
phonological levels at which a stylistician could analyse a text, (other levels
of linguistic analysis being the grammatical, the syntactic and the
morphological, the lexical (vocabulary), the semantic and the contextual).
Such a phonological analysis would involve the identification (and functional
interpretation) of both the segmental patterns (vowels and consonants) and
suprasegmental features (syllable, stress, rhythm, tone, intonation, etc).
Phonological schemes like alliteration, assonance, consonance, chiming,
volume, onomatopocia, etc are discussed.
10. Sociostylistics:
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11. Feminist Stylistics:
It is apparent from the two view points that feminist stylistics cannot
be divorced from sexism and gender-oriented issues.
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The obvious weakness of this approach is the probability that writers
change their personality and language over time and text and that a change
in one does not necessarily accompany a change in the other.
Carter and McRae claim that stylistics in its pedagogical application “has
been accused of tending towards the simplistic” (xxxi). However, since the
aim of teaching and learning is to make things clearer or simpler than they
seem, pedagogical stylistics would be considered a positive development.
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structuralism, poetics and reader-response criticism in the analysis of
literary texts.
Conclusion
WORKS CITED
Carter, Roland, and John McRae. Introduction. Language, Literature and the
Learner.
Ed. Roland Carter and John McRae. London: Longman, 1996. xix-
xxviii.
Crystal, David and Derek Davy. Investigating English Style. New York:
Longman, 1992.
567
Mills, Sara. Feminist Stylistics. London: Routledge. 1995.
Short, Mick. Exploring the Language of Poems, Plays and Prose. London:
Longman,
1996.
568