Expressive means and stylistic devices.

Expressive means of a language are those phonetic, morphological, word-building, lexical, phraseological and syntactical forms which exist in language-as-a-system for the purpose of logical and/or emotional intensification of the utterance. They are concrete facts of language. (Diff. between SD and AM) - Expressive means are those linguistic means that are a part of language, that are registered in dictionaries, singled out in text-books and may have corresponding neutral synonyms. Expressive means have a greater degree of predictability than SDs.

A stylistic device is a conscious and intentional intensification (усиление) of some typical structural and/or semantic property of a language unit (neutral or expressive) promoted to a generalized status and thus becoming a generative model. They function in texts as marked units. They always carry some kind of additional information, either emotive or logical. (Diff. between SD and AM) - Stylistic devices reflect the creative ability of the language user. They are unique, individual, carry a great amount of information and require a considerable effort to be understood.

-Both expressive means and stylistic devices are particular means that foreground certain utterances that make them more prominent, effective and thus carry additional information.

The most powerful expressive means of any language are phonetic. The human voice can indicate subtle nuances of meaning that no other means can attain. Pitch, melody, stress, pausation, drawling out certain syllables, whispering, a sing-song manner and other ways of using the voice are much more effective than any other means in intensifying an utterance emotionally or logically. Among the word - building means we find the diminutive suffixes -y (-ie), -let, e.g. 'dearie', 'sonny', 'auntie', 'streamlet’, add some emotional colouring to the words. We may also refer to what are called neologisms and nonce-words formed with non-productive suffixes.

At the lexical level there are a great many words which due to their inner expressiveness constitute a special layer. There are words with emotive meaning only (interjections), words which have both referential and emotive meaning (epithets), words which still retain a twofold meaning: denotative and connotative (love, hate, sympathy), words belonging to the layers of slang and vulgar words, or to poetic or archaic layers. The expressive power of these words cannot be doubted, especially when they are compared with the neutral vocabulary.

All kinds of set phrases (phraseological units) generally possess the property of expressiveness. Set phrases, catch words, proverbs, sayings comprise a considerable number of language units which serve to make speech emphatic, mainly from the emotional point of view.

SDs function in texts as marked units. They always carry some kind of additional information, either emotive or logical.

Most SDs display an application of two meanings: the ordinary one, in other words, the meaning (lexical or structural) which has already been established in the language-as-a-system, and special meaning which is superimposed on the unit by the text, i.e. a meaning which appears in the language-in-action.

Date: 2015-01-29; view: 2767