scholarly journals The Role of Pragmatics in Literary Analysis: Approaching Literary Meaning from a Linguistic Perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 29-40
Author(s):  
Kanhaiya Kumar Sinha
Keyword(s):  
Relevance Theory ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Politeness Theory ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
Literary Meaning ◽  
Spoken Interaction ◽  
Linguistic Approaches ◽  
The Relationship

The present paper aims to produce a detailed account of the term ‘pragmatics’ and explore, by presenting and reviewing different models, its role in literature as it appears to be evident in different linguistic approaches to the study and analysis of literary genres. It is a fact that various pragmatic approaches such as speech act theory, conversational implicature, politeness theory, and relevance theory are developed mainly in relation to spoken interaction, yet, as some studies suggest, they offer invaluable insights to the study of literary texts. Consequently, the paper also strives to shed some light on the relationship these two terms – literature and pragmatics – enjoy so that their commonalities can be unmasked. It also tries to explore how pragmatics may help find out the ‘context’ and ‘meaning’ of literary discourse.

scholarly journals Literary Pragmatics

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fareed Hameed Al-Hindawi ◽  
Mariam D. Saffah
Keyword(s):  
Speech Act ◽  
Relevance Theory ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Conversational Implicature ◽  
Politeness Theory ◽  
Strong Assumption ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Literary Pragmatics

The present study aims at presenting a thorough account of the field termed literary pragmatics which emerges in a consequence of applying the different pragmatic approaches to the study and analysis of literary genera. Additionally, it also attempts to explore and shed some light on the relationship between the two domains: pragmatics and literature in order to reveal their commonalities. There exists a strong assumption that these have something in common as they both have to do with language users and how meaning is conveyed. Despite the fact the various pragmatic approaches including speech act theory, conversational implicature, politeness theory and relevance theory are developed mainly in relation to spoken interactions, the study has revealed that they offer invaluable insights to the study of literary texts. Moreover, the process of analyzing literary texts has led to the development and the explanation of the pragmatic approaches themselves.

Literary stylistics, authorial intention and the scientific study of literature: A critical overview

2018 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 196-217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josephine M Guy ◽  
Kathy Conklin ◽  
Jennifer Sanchez-Davies
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Method ◽  
Scientific Study ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Literary Biography ◽  
Cognitive Poetics ◽  
Authorial Intention ◽  
Literary Meaning ◽  
Linguistic Approaches ◽  
Critical Overview

A tendency by literary stylisticians to overlook the role of the author in the generation of literary meaning has been a significant source of tension between linguistic approaches to literariness and other practices in the discipline, such as text-editing and literary biography. Recently, however, efforts have been made to close this gap, with a branch of stylistics, cognitive poetics, claiming to have developed a new and empirical method of integrating an appreciation of authorial imagination and creativity into the study of readers’ responses to the language of literary texts. We examine these claims critically, testing the grounds of assertions about scientific rigour in relation to demands about model testing and falsifiability associated with the scientific study of literature more generally. We then explore how some other methodologies, technologies and insights associated with this last branch of the discipline might be brought to bear on the topic of authorial intention, with the aim of determining whether, and in what ways, our understanding of authorial intention, and its role in literary processing, might be furthered through empirical enquiry.

Language Pangs

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ilit Ferber
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Philosophical Text ◽  
Origin Of Language ◽  
Pain Expression ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship

Language and pain are usually thought of as opposites, the one being about expression and communication, the other destructive, “beyond words,” and isolating. Language Pangs challenges these familiar conceptions and offers a reconsideration of the relationship between pain and language in terms of an essential interconnectedness rather than an exclusive opposition. The book’s premise is that the experience of pain cannot be probed without consideration of its inherent relation to language, and vice versa: understanding the nature of language essentially depends on an account of its relationship with pain. Language Pangs brings together discussions of philosophical as well as literary texts, an intersection especially productive in considering the phenomenology of pain and its bearing on language. The book’s first chapter presents a phenomenology of pain and its relation to language. Chapters 2 and 3 provide a close reading of Herder’s Treatise on the Origin of Language (1772), which was the first modern philosophical text to bring together language and pain, establishing the cry of pain as the origin of language. Herder also raises important claims regarding the relationship between human and animal, sympathy, and the role of hearing in the experience of pain. Chapter 4 is devoted to Heidegger’s seminar (1939) on Herder’s text about language, a relatively unknown seminar that raises important claims regarding pain, expression, and hearing. Chapter 5 focuses on Sophocles’ story of Philoctetes, important to Herder’s treatise, in terms of pain, expression, sympathy, and hearing, also referring to more thinkers such as Cavell and Gide.

Popularization and/or Trivialization of Philosophy in Voltaire's Narrative Candide or Optimism

CLEaR ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 32-39
Author(s):  
Ivana Majksner ◽  
Tina Varga Oswald
Keyword(s):  
Structure Characterization ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Historical Period ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
General Readership ◽  
Narrative Techniques ◽  
Philosophical Writings

Abstract Voltaire produced his works within the literary-historical period of Classicism and Enlightenment, in which the prevalent role of literature was educational. The period also dictated what genre, theme, style and structure authors should follow. However, more and more changes of literary genres appear, and the process of stratification of literature into high and trivial takes place. The aim of this paper is to describe the polarization of two mutually different processes involved in the literary shaping of Voltaire's philosophical narrative Candide or Optimism. In Voltaire's narrative, the popularization of philosophy, in order to simplify and illuminate the philosophical writings of G. W. Leibniz, results in the changes of style and content that become understandable to the general readership since they work within the scheme of an adventure novel. In this process, trivialization does not affect only the genre, but is also present in other parts of literary analysis and interpretation such as the theme, motifs, structure, characterization, narrative techniques, stylistic features, and so on.

The Novel in the Era of Plessy

2019 ◽  
pp. 15-86
Author(s):  
Christine Holbo
Keyword(s):  
Henry James ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Literary Realism ◽  
Sentimental Novel ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Uncle Tom's Cabin ◽  
Literature And Philosophy ◽  
The Relationship

The transformation of literary realism in the late nineteenth century took place within the context of a categorical shift in American social epistemologies. The first chapter presents an interdisciplinary, generational portrait of this shift by examining a set of key texts from the years 1896–98 as summaries of the reconstruction of law, literature, and philosophy since the Civil War. Two important works by the James brothers, philosopher William James’s “The Sentiment of Rationality” and Henry James’s What Maisie Knew, demonstrate how the relationship between “sentiment” and “rationality” had been transformed. By attacking the nineteenth century’s trust in the emotions alongside its belief in a transcendent concept of reason, William and Henry James made a case for a new kind of moral imagination grounded in the uncertainty of the emotions and the unknowability of other selves. While the James brothers greeted the collapse of the sentimental paradigm as an emancipatory moment for individuals and for the novel itself, the lawyer and novelist Albion Tourgée saw it as imperiling the ability of Americans to speak, write, or think about freedom. Best known as Homer Plessy’s lawyer in Plessy v. Ferguson, Tourgée was also the most passionate defender of the emancipatory role of the sentimental novel. Exploring Tourgée’s opposition to pluralistic relativism in his brief on behalf of Homer Plessy and his literary analysis of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, this chapter explores the opposition between the Jameses’ celebratory vision of epistemological perspectivalism and Tourgée’s defense of sentimental reason.

NEW INSTRUMENTS OF LITERARY RESEARCH: INTERDISCIPLINARY CHALLENGES

Via Latgalica ◽  
2013 ◽  
pp. 76
Author(s):  
Indrė Žakevičienė
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Interdisciplinary Studies ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Reception Theory ◽  
Cognitive Poetics ◽  
Literary Research ◽  
New Instruments

The aim of the article is to reveal the new possibilities of interdisciplinary studies and to ponder upon possible contribution of the researchers of the humanities into the work of environmentalists and ecologists while seeking effective solutions, concerning the whole biosphere and ecosystem, to discuss the possibilities of cooperation of the researchers of different fi elds of interest (linguists, psychologists, philosophers) while analysing literary texts, to emphasise the role of literature trying to revive the so- called ecological sub-consciousness of an individual, and changing one’s attitude towards the environment, to introduce the Reception Theory and the Cognitive Poetics as specifi c literary tools, basic to modern literary analysis because of their emphasis on readers’ reactions and their particular cognitive processes, experiencing literary texts.

The Arabic Novel and History

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Allen
Keyword(s):  
Literary History ◽  
Historical Novel ◽  
Arabic Literature ◽  
The Novel ◽  
History Of The Novel ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
History Of ◽  
Arabic Speaking ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter examines the relationship between the Arabic novel and history within the context of the Arabic-speaking world, and in particular the process of producing a literary history of the novel genre written in Arabic. It first considers the early development of the novel genre in Arabic as part of a cultural movement that gained impetus in the nineteenth century, with particular emphasis on the interplay of two cultural forces: the importation of Western ideas (including literary genres) and the role of the premodern Arab-Islamic cultural heritage in each subregion. It then discusses examples of narrative from the premodern heritage of Arabic literature before turning to the history of the Arabic novel. The chapter also presents examples of the Arabic historical novel, one of which is Sālim Ḥimmīsh’s Al-‘Allāma (2001, The Polymath).

scholarly journals Translation and Political Discourse

2015 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-158 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mátyás Bánhegyi
Keyword(s):  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Political Conflict ◽  
Research Field ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Cultural Backgrounds ◽  
Research Fields ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractThe paper describes the text linguistic research of political texts in the field of Translation Studies and presents an overview of critical discourse analysis-based studies. First, the relationship between text, power and ideology and its implications on the role of translation are explored. This is followed by a review of a number of studies on the translation of political texts and on the power relations involved. The paper classifies such studies into the following six categories representing distinct research fields: translators' professional roles and politics; translators acting as mediators in situations of political conflict; translators' professional responsibilities and the strategies they apply; the inference of translators' own historical, social and cultural backgrounds; manipulation in the translation of literary texts and other text types; and critical discourse awareness in Translation Studies. The most recent studies in the above research fields and their results are also presented. It is concluded that these approaches exhibit quite varied research methods and their results are almost impossible to compare. With a view to the future development of this research field, it seems expedient to introduce a unified research theory, method and tool.

“The Spirit of the Rebel Poet”

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Kevin M. Jones
Keyword(s):  
Mass Culture ◽  
Literary History ◽  
Cultural Landscape ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Role ◽  
Political Struggles ◽  
Social Acts ◽  
The Relationship

The introduction outlines the concept of rebel poetry and the relationship between poetry and the political struggles against colonialism and dictatorship in modern Iraq. It traces the broad contours of Iraqi political history and explains how poets shaped the cultural politics of important national debates and discourses. It challenges the traditional distinctions between high culture and mass culture that have traditionally consigned poetry to intellectual and literary history and shows how the unique cultural landscape of modern Iraq allowed poetry to maintain a liminal position between these distinct cultural strata. The introduction argues that the public role of poetry in modern Iraq made poems social acts as well as literary texts and that the very popularity of poetry made it a dangerous cultural endeavor.

“A Hand of Ivory”: Moving Objects in Psellos’ Oration for his Daughter Styliane. A Case-Study

2021 ◽  
pp. 175407392110401
Author(s):  
Aglae Pizzone
Keyword(s):  
Moving Objects ◽  
Core Values ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
New Model ◽  
Recent Interest ◽  
Narrative Patterns ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Being Moved

This paper takes its cue from the recent interest in materiality and “things” in the field of Byzantine studies, to explore the role of objects in evoking being moved. First, it advances a new model to explain the relationship between being moved and affordances. Second, it focuses on a specific case study, that is Michael Psellos’ funeral oration for his daughter Styliane (1054), who died of smallpox at the age of 9 years old. The paper sheds light on how affective affordances of an object contribute to the evocation of being moved in literary texts, working within and affecting narrative patterns. While building on the experience of ethical and spiritual principles clearly recognizable by the audience, such affordances point toward the activation of broader core values.

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