Syntactical expressive means and stylistic devices. Problems concerning the composition wider than the sentence

Problems for discussion:

1. The Study of Structural Design of Senten?ces

The Syntactical Whole

The Paragraph

Key words:the peculiarities of the structural design of senten?ces, superphrasal units, paragraphs and texts, the term syntactical whole, the paragraph as a compositional device, syntactical whole, paragraph, topic sentence, emotive prose.

1. Stylistics takes as the object of its analysis the expressive means and stylistic devices of the language which are based on some significant structural point in an utterance, whether it consists of one sentence or a string of sentences.

The peculiarities of the structural design of senten?ces certainly have some emotional colouring and that's why they are considered stylistic and emotionally colou?red. In order to understand the nature of the emotional charge of such syntactical structures, we must be aware of the norm of syntactical usage. By the norm of syntactical usage we mean the rules of the language according to which the word combinations, sentences, superphrasal units, paragraphs and texts constructed.

The beginning and the end of the sentence are the most important parts of utterance. At the beginning of the sentence the full force of the stress is clearly felt. At the end of the sentence there is always a pause, after which a new sentence begins. The authors use this peculiarity of syntax and place the most important ideas either at the end or at the beginning of the sentence.

Problematic question: What does the emotional charge of syntax originate from? The emotional charge of syntax originates from the oral type of speech. The basis may be different in each case. Sometimes the speaker may be in an agitated state of mind. In such cases he repeats or omits certain parts of the utterances (repetition, ellipsis), he may change the word order of the sentence without changing the essential mea?ning of the sentence (inversion).

We distinguish three groups of syntactical stylistic devices. The first- stylistic devices established by the peculiarities of oral type of speech. The second group of stylistic devices is characterized by the use of different connectives. The third group of syntactical stylistic devices is based of the interrelation of structural meaning.

2.The term syntactical whole is used to denote a larger unit than a sentence. It generally comprises a num?ber of sentences interdependent structurally and semanti-cally. Such span of utterance is also characterized by the fact that it can be extracted from the context without losing its relative semantic independence. This cannot be said of the sentence, which, while representing a complete syntactical unit may lose the quality of independence. A sentence from the stylistic point of view does not neces?sarily express one idea. It may express only part of an idea. Thus the sentence "Guy glanced at his wife's untou?ched plate" if taken out of the context will be perceived as a part of a larger utterance.

Here is the complete syntactical whole:

Guy glanced at his wife's untouched plate.

"If you've finished we might stroll down.

I think you ought to be starting". She did not answer. She rose from the table. She went into her room to see that nothing had been forgotten and then side by side with him walked down the steps. (S. Maugham)

So the syntactical whole may be defined as a com?bination of sentences. Any syntactical whole will lose its unity if it suffers breaking.

A syntactical whole, though usually a part of the paragraph, may occupy the whole of the paragraph. In this case we say that the syntactical whole coincides with the paragraph.

3. A paragraph is a term used to name a group ofsentences meaning a distinct portion of written discourse. In fact the paragraph as a category is half linguistic, half logical.

Paragraph in the belles-lettres and publicistic styles is strongly affected by the purport of the author. To secure the desired effect, a writer finds it necessary to give de?tails and illustrations, to introduce comparisons and cont?rasts, etc.

The length of a paragraph normally varies from eight to twelve sentences. The longer the paragraph is, the more difficult is to follow the purport of the writer. In newspaper style, however, most paragraphs consist of one or two or three sentences.

So the paragraph is a compositional device. The paragraph, from a mere compositional device, turns into a stylistic one. It discloses the writer's manner of depicting the features of the object or phenomenon described. It is in the paragraph that the main function of the belles-lettres style becomes most apparent.

The paragraph in some style, such as scientific, publicistic and some others has a topic sentence, i.e., a sentence which embodies the main idea of the paragraph or which may be interpreted as a key-sentence disclosing the chief thought of the writer. In prose the topic sentence is placed either at the beginning or at the end of the para?graph. In the belles-lettres style the topic sentence may be placed in any part of the paragraph.

It is sometimes impossible to decide which sen?tence should be regarded as the topic one. Each syntactical whole of several combined into one paragraph, may have its own topic sentence or be a topic sentence. IrK other words, there are no topic sentences in emotive prose as a rule.

Questions

1. What are the peculiarities of the structural design of senten?ces?

2. What is the syntactical whole?

3. May the syntactical whole be a part of a paragraph?

5. What is the paragraph?

6. How many sentences do most paragraphs in newspaper style consist of?

Literature:

1. Akhmanova O. S. Linguostylistics. Theory and Method. M., MGU,1972

2. Anderson W. E. The Written Word. Some uses of English. Oxford University,1971

3. Arnold I. V. The English Word. M., Higher School, 1973

4. Galperin I. R. Stylistics M., Higher school, 1977

5. Murry, J. Middleton. The problems of Style. Ldn, 1961

6. Turner G. W. Stylistics. Peguim Books,1975

7. Warner A. A. Short Guide to English Style

8. ?????????? ?.?. ?????? ???? ????????????. ?., ?қ??????, 1995

9. www.linguistlist.org

LECTURE 9

Date: 2016-06-12; view: 571