LIN 382

STYLISTICS
 COURSE DESCRIPTION
This course introduces the students to the elements of style
and stylistics in written texts. With their knowledge of the
core areas of semantics, morphology, phonology and
semantics, the students are introduced to the relationship
between stylistics and these levels of language. The first
part of the course introduces the students to stylistics in
general and also demonstrates to them how style violates
some of the rules of grammar they have learnt up to this
point. The second part is practice-oriented and involves the
analysis of styles of different literary texts to establish which
levels of language and predominantly manipulated by the
author(s).
 COURSE OUTLINE
• Introduction
– What is Stylistics?
– Stylistics and Levels of Language
– Grammar and Style
• Language Rules in Literature
– Category Rule Violation
– Selectional Restriction
– Linguistic Foregrounding and Linguistic Rules
• Paradigmatic/Semantic Relationships I
– Synonymous Relations
– Contextual Conditioning
 COURSE OUTLINE (contd)
• Paradigmatic/Semantic Relationships II
– Neutralization of Semantic Opposition
– Coupling and Semantic Compounding
• Linguistic Parallelism
– What is Parallelism
– Types Parallelism
•The Purposes of Linguistic Parallelism in Literary Texts
• Exercise: Analysis of Linguistic Patterns
• Exercises
 REFERENCE MATERIALS
Leech, G. 2008. Language in literature: Style and foregrounding. Edinburgh: Pearson
Education Ltd.

Niazi, N. & Gautam, R. 2010. How to study literature: Stylistic and pragmatic
approach. New Delhi: PHI Learning.

Onwuekwe, E. 2012. An introduction to general and literary stylistics. Owerri: Alphabet

Nigeria Publishers.

Toolan, M. 1998. Language in literature: An introduction to stylistics. London: Hodder

Education.

Simpson, P. (2006). Stylistics. London: Routledge.

Yankson, K.E. (1987). An introduction to literary stylistics. Obosi: Pacific College Press.
INTRODUCTION
 What is stylistics?
Niazi & Gautam (2010:3) – Stylistics is the study
of style used in literary and verbal language, and
the effect the writer/speaker wishes to
communicate to the reader/hearer.
- It attempts to establish principles capable of
explaining the particular choices made by
individuals and social groups in their use of
language, such as socialization and the production
and reception of meaning.
 What is stylistics? (contd)
Crystal (2003:440) – A branch of linguistics
which studies the features of situationally
distinctive uses (varieties) of language, and tries
to establish principles capable of accounting for
the particular choices made by individual and
social groups in the use of language. He identifies
five branches of stylistics:
 Branches of stylistics
• General stylistics – this branch studies non-dialectal varieties of a
language.
• Applied stylistics – this branch studies contextually distinctive
varieties of language, especially with reference to the style of
literary and non-literary texts.
• Literary stylistics – this branch studies the variations characteristic
of literature as a genre and of the ‘style’ of individual authors.
• Stylostatistics or stylometry – this branch concerns itself about
quantifying stylistic patterns; that is, it studies the statistical
structure of literary texts (usually with the help of computers).
• Phonostylistics – this branch studies the expressive or aesthetic
function of sound.
 Stylistics and levels of language
The definitions of stylistics and the branches as
identified by Crystal show that stylistics operates
at all the levels of language: syntactic,
morphological, phonological and semantic.
Beyond this, we see with reference to the branch
of stylistics, general stylistics and, of course,
applied stylistics that stylistics has an
implication for sociolinguistics, pragmatics and
applied linguistics.
Stylistics and levels of language (contd)
• With reference to the levels of language where stylistics applies, it
is evident that we can talk about stylistics as a branch of
linguistics. This raises an argument about what we should call
considerations that involve identifying thematic contents (themes,
sub-themes, images etc) and how they have been conveyed using
language. Of course, when this is the case, we are talking about
literary stylistics. Hence, we can talk about literary stylistics versus
linguistic stylistics, i.e., ‘what’ versus ‘how’.
• May we note that contrary to the fact as evident here, stylistics is
used more commonly to refer to literary stylistics with linguistic
stylistics very silent as if non-existent. In this course we emphasize
linguistic stylistics.
 Grammar and style
• Grammar is in simple language the totality of the
rules that apply to or operate in a language. The rules
are grouped in linguistics as follows:
• Phonology – rules of arrangement of sounds in a
language
• Morphology – rules that describe the nature of words
• Syntax – rules that describe how words are ordered
in sentences
• Semantics – rules that specify the meaning of words,
phrases, and sentences
 Grammar and style (contd)
These rules are idealized to be constant but there is
copious evidence that the rules are violated by users for
there to exist varieties of a language. This violation is
more commonly viewed as a product of style. For
linguistics, the output of the violation is ungrammatical
and unacceptable. Hence, the evolution of linguistic
stylistics which applies models of linguistics to
appreciate the degree and patterns of the violation,
which, of course, are acceptable to known users.
Violation is also referred to as deviation or
foregrounding
 Grammar and style (contd)
Consider the following data; what do you observe?
Map – Speaker A: [mæp]
Speaker B: [map]
Speaker C: [maph]
Map(pl) – Speaker A: maps
Speaker B: mapz [mæbz]
Speaker C: mapies
Speaker A: The book is on the table.
Speaker B: On the table is the book.
Speaker C: The book on the table is.

Speaker A: I have some bread to buy meat

Speaker B: Some dough will buy me meat
Speaker C: I have money to buy meat
 Grammar and style (contd)
From the data above, style is evidently all about choosing
what appeals best to a speaker or a group of speakers; the
constraint being choosing from the resources available in a
language but not constrained by the rules that apply or
operate in the language. Hence, we can talk about
‘constraint within no constraint’: while maps, mapies,
mapz [mæbz] are possible, mapus or mapum may not
because in the linguistics resources of English there are no
plural markers, -us or -um. Constraint within no
constraint is the basis of what we have called violation,
deviation or foregrounding
LANGUAGE RULES IN
LITERATURE
 Category rule violation
Lexical category misapplication – this is the use of a word to
function as a member of a category it does not conventionally
belong:
- The Professor schooled himself in confectionaries
Inflectional misapplication – this is mapping a word that does not
adjust itself to inflection onto inflection. For instance, in
English, uncountable nouns do not adjust themselves by any rule
to inflection for number but user may operate this against any
known rule:
- He left his footprints in the sands of time
Of course, inflectional misapplication overlaps with lexical
category misapplication in that it has an implication for applying
a word to the operate as a member of a category or sub-category
 Category rule violation (contd)
 Phrase raising – this is the formalization of structures as
higher structures. Particularly, it involves formalizing words
and phrases as sentences. This violation is highly productive
in poems.
 The support for this draws from the principle of expansion,
which operates with words that accept complements: nouns,
verbs, adjectives, adverbs and preposition. Hence, a word,
noun, can become a phrase by taking a complement(s). In
other words, a word by the expansion principle can be
formalized as a phrase. The possibility of this applies to the
phrase, which can, but not particularly by expansion
principle, but by pragmatic function be applied as or raised to
a sentence. Consider the poem below written by J. P. Clark:
 Category rule violation (contd)
In the streets the jungle-geared jeeps roar
Glint of SMG, flare of mortar, tremor
Of grenades occupying ministry
And market, and like hens, men go
To bed with the setting sun, the sun
Setting over the land, afraid
It will get on their individual days
- How many sentences are in this poem?
- Is every line in the poem a sentence?
- Is it appropriate to consider every line in the poem a sentence?
- What is the implication of formalizing every line in the poem as a sentence?
 The last question points to the fact of structure part recovery either
progressively or retrogressively.
Note that in most cases the structure part is recovered implicitly.
 Other violations
Use of covert expression – covert expressions are words
or phrases that are a part of a structure but are not
physically represented. Evidently, the use of covert
expressions has an implication for phrase raising. We
can say that the part of a sentence that is not physically
represented in a phrase formalized as a sentence is
covert. However, we must appreciate the fact that a
distinction exists in domain. While phrase raising
applies to sentence, covert expressions may apply in the
phrase as a category and, of course, in the sentence.
Consider the following lines:
 An unlucky creation;
His mother, a street walker
His lying father,
A champion producing bastards
[The bastard is] an unlucky creation
His mother [is] a street walker;
[He has a] *(his) lying father;
[The man is] a champion producing bastards
Of course, as in phrase raising, the covert
expression is recoverable. This is evident in the
illustration above. However, we may add the
application of anaphoric and cataphoric recovery.
 Other violations (contd)
Word order misapplication – this is applying another word order upon the language of
use. The following word orders are known to exist in languages of the world:
- SVO, e.g.: English and Igbo; VSO, e.g.: Tagalog and Arabic; SOV, e.g.: Japanese and
Persian; OVS, e.g.: Barasano and Apalai; OSV, e.g.: Apurina and Xavante; and VOS,
e.g.: Cakchiquel and Huave.
- Beyond this, there is the order between the head of a phrase and its complements: some
languages have head last phrase structure while others have head first:
English NP is head last: A handsome boy
Igbo NP is head first: Nwoke oma

Any reversal of the order whether at the sentential or phrasal level constitutes word
order misapplication. Appreciate the following lines:
Go men; all the pieces of gold pick
Come women; all that smell remove
Your men come with the gold
To, more beautiful, make you.
 Other violations (contd)
Semantic misapplication – This is the use of words, phrases and sentences to mean what they do not mean
conventionally. Evidently, therefore, there is lexical misapplication and phrasal or sentential
misapplication.
 Lexical misapplication involves deliberate narrowing or broadening of the meaning of known words; it
also involves creative use of a word to express a meaning beyond its semantic scope. Again, it involves
creative generation of likely words of a language and using them to express any meaning as intended.
Appreciate the following lines:

He gave me meat
And I got enough edibles that could last a century
I got chicken, my best meat
I got mistral, my best grain
I got milk, the dress for ages

 The evidence that has emerged here is the power of contextual conditioning (we’ll devote some attention
to this later). Here, we look at the product of this conditioning, which further illustrates linguistic
foregrounding or deviation or as we have used here, violation or misapplication. Of course, foregrounding
or deviation more technically applies to remove the negative implication of unacceptability or
ungrammaticality conveyed by misapplication or violation.
The product of contextual conditioning is generation of a new
paradigm from a normal one. See the table below:

Normal Paradigm New Paradigm

inches
inches
feet away feet Normal
yards away
yards

farmyards Deviant

Worthy of note, so far, is that everything about linguistic

foregrounding is violation of linguistic rules. However, for the
purpose of stylistics, this violation is considered with reference to
its communicative strength, affective and evaluative.
Lastly, lexical misapplication involves violation of selectional restriction.
Words of a language are naturally known to select other words with which
they occur. This is motivated by semantic feature correspondence. Consider
the lines below:

With my heart in the heat, I stood

Ready to run all the hatreds of the world

‘Run’ naturally selects ‘errand’ or ‘life’ as in:

- Run an errand for the teacher
- You won’t run my life for me

In other words, ‘to run all the hatreds’ is a selectional violation or a
misapplication of selectional restriction: using words that are not semantically
compatible as if they are.
We note that lexical semantic violation is the locus for the framing of figures
of speech such as personification, simile, metaphor, metonymy, oxymoron etc.
 Other violations (contd)
 Sentential misapplication – this is the use of a
sentence to mean what it does not mean
conventionally.
 We note that ironies are good examples of
sentential misapplication
Linguistic Foregrounding/Linguistic Rules

• Linguistic foregrounding is a stylistic operation which violates

linguistic grammaticality and acceptability. In other words, it violates
the linguistic rules that account for grammaticality and acceptability.
• The violation of linguistic rules that account for grammaticality and
acceptability does not conclude to unacceptability. Instead, it
enhances communication, conveyance of message.
• All the instances of violation already presented and others including
parallelism (which is handled later) show the relation between
linguistic foregrounding and linguistic rules. This is the relation of
intended or unintended misapplication of linguistic rules which
produces aesthetic, evaluative or naturalistic effects. Moreover, the
relation provides the limits within which violation is possible. Hence,
the principle of Constraint within no Constraint.
 Paradigmatic/Semantic Relationship
 In linguistics, a set of grammatically conditioned forms derived from
a root or stem is known as a paradigm: boy, boys and boyish are
forms of the base, BOY. The forms are grammatically in
complementary distribution. Only one is selected and determined for
a particular grammatical environment.
 Paradigmatic relations could apply to a set of sounds in which the
selection of one opposes the selection of another: /p-/, /b-/ and /n-/ in
the context of /-it/; or, a set of words: the, a, this, much etc in the
context of ‘- cake.’
 At the core of any paradigm, meaning is crucial. In other words,
semantic relationship is implicit in paradigmatic relationship. We note
here that there is semantic relationship that is not perceptible as
describing a paradigm. However, technical analysis demonstrates that
all semantic relations describe a paradigm. We demonstrate this with
synonymy, antonymy, homonymy etc.
 Synonymy/Antonymy/Homonymy
 Synonymy – a relation of similarity in the meaning of words. A
set of words which have similar meaning is a paradigm. Even
though the selection of one means the selection of the other, it is
clear that in language use, the selection of one is constrained by
affective and evaluative preferences. That is, the selection of one
excludes the other.
 Antonymy – a relation of opposition. Words have meaning that
are cancelled or opposed by the meaning of other words. Here
too, we have the paradigm of the selection of a word suggesting
the dropping the word that opposes its meaning.
 Homonymy – a relation of different words with the same spelling
or pronunciation form. Of course, the selection of a member of
the set excludes the others.
 Contextual Conditioning
 Sense or meaning of words is argued to correspond to use. That is,
words are conditioned to mean one thing or the other in context as
opposed to their semantics as specified in the dictionary of the language.
 The semantics of a word is basically its conceptual or denotative
meaning, that is, its basic meaning. However, a word may have other
meaning which is associative. Associative here suggests meaning
produced by use and use cannot be devoid of context. The associative
meaning is classified into connotative, collocative, affective, stylistic,
reflected or thematic meaning.
 In other words, associating words in one way or the other with other
words in different contexts or with particular contexts produces other
types of meaning. These meanings could come by extension of the basic
meaning, narrowing, ameliorating or pejorative use of the word.
 Neutralization of Semantic Opposition

Opposition is a semantic relation in which one word has a

sense or meaning that negates or is, in the sense of scale,
distant from a related word.

• The contrast between two words may be lost. This is

possible in two ways: language change or language use:

He is very short
As short as the tallest man in Congo

• ‘Short’ as used here loses its contrast with ‘tall’. This

contrast is lost in the context of use.
 Coupling and Semantic Compounding
 There exists compounds, words which are combined to form new concepts.
Coupling words or combining words with different meanings is one of the
ways by which languages increase their vocabulary. This combination starts at
a micro or idiosyncratic level before spreading into the macrolectal language
system.
 The point here is that compounds start their journey from language styles
before gaining ground in conventional language form. Consider the following
examples:

He’s a go-between
The assignment is a must-do.
Eye-painting girls are troublesome.

 The two latter examples show that beyond the conventionalized compounds,
users are given to coupling to capture intended concepts.
Parallelism
In literature, parallelism refers to two or more words or phrases in
sentences that are the same grammatically, as well as meaning. It
can be used to make writing more interesting.

• Parallelism is a relation of similarity or correspondence.

• This correspondence can occur at any the levels of grammar,
phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics.
• At the level of phonology, correspondence in sound is treated
as sound devices in the use of language. The devices include
consonance, alliteration, assonance, rhyme and metre. That is
parallelism here is measured on repetition of particular sound
segments or suprasegments in particular patterns. Of course,
these devices are not regular in normal speech. Hence, they
constitute deviation.
 Parallelism (contd.)
• At the level of morphology, correspondence is measured at declensions
of words or repetition of entire words:
sweating meeting and going (different words with same
declension (class of nouns or adjectives having same type of inflectional
form)
go, up, go, up, always go up (the same words repeated

• There are two types of repetition at the word, phrase or sentence level:
anaphora and anadiplosis. While anaphora is the successive repetition of
a word, phrase or sentence in a text, usually for emphasis, anadiplosis is
the repetition of an important word for rhetorical purposes:
come come the day dawns
come come and touch the heart of your mother
come come to prepare your mother for home
the home of rest in peace.
Parallelism (contd.)
joy is in the air
but its home is Heart
you would know when she’s home
Heart smiles and man smiles
she jumps and man jumps
she laughs and man laughs
the heart of man is home of joy
Parallelism (contd.)
 At the level of syntax, parallelism is measured on repetition
of a phrase or sentence or repetition of a pattern. The
following sentences are parallel by pattern:
Obi ate rice
Joy drank beer
Ike slapped Ada
 They are similar in structure as describe by the rewrite rule

S→ NP VP
NP→ PropN
VP→ V NP
NP→ N
 Parallelism (contd.)
 At the semantic level, parallelism is measured by relatedness in
meaning between words or phrases in a sentences or their contribution
to relatedness of meaning between two or more sentences. There are
different types of parallelism at this level. They are:

1) Synonymous parallelism – different sentences expressing the same

meaning or different parts of a sentence expressing the same meaning.

Proverbs 6:20
My son, keep your father’s commandment, and don’t forget your
mother’s teaching
Proverbs 19:5
A false witness shall not be unpunished. He who pours out lies shall not
go free
2. Antithetic parallelism – two related
sentences expressing meaning that opposes or
contrasts or two parts of a sentence expressing
a contrast.
Proverbs 10:2
Ill-gotten treasures are of no value, but
righteousness delivers from death

The heart of the wise inclines to the right, but the

heart of the fool to the left
3. Synthetic parallelism – two successive sentences in
the order of the latter providing explanation to the
former or two parts of a sentences with the latter
explaining the former.

This occurs when line B of a proverb or poem completes

or extends the thought of line A but presents neither the
same or opposite idea.
Here the units balance of being compared match, clause
for clause, with one unit building upon or adding to the
first.

Example
Happy are those who find wisdom, line A
and those who get understanding line B
4) Emblematic
This is a relation of meaning between two
sentences one of which literal and the other
metaphorical or a relation between two parts of a
sentence in which one is literal, the other
metaphorical.
• Example
A wise son maketh a glad father, but a foolish
son is the heaviness of his mother
Parallelism (contd.)
5. climatic parallelism – a meaning relation in which the
sense expressed in the first sentence is repeated in the
succeeding sentence with better or more detailed
explanation. It also applies to parts of a sentence with
the succeeding part repeating the sense in the preceding
part with purpose of providing a more detailed
explanation.
6. introverted or Chiastic parallelism – an arrangement
of four sentences or four parts of a sentence in a way
that the first is parallel in meaning with to the fourth
while the second is parallel in meaning to the third.
 Parallelism (contd.)
 Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgement, nor sinners in
the congregation of the righteous
 The blows of a friend are faithful; but the kisses of an enemy are
treacherous
 For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods
 Oh God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for
thee …
 In him was life, and the life was the light of man. And the light
shineth in darkness and darkness comprehended it not
 And it came to pass that when they came up to the temple, they
pitched their tents round about, every man according to his family,
consisting of his wife, and his sons, and his daughters, and their sons,
and their daughters, from the eldest down to the youngest, every
family being separate one from another. And they pitched their tents
round about in the temple
 Purposes of Linguistic Parallelism
 Literary impact: it gives a greater understanding of the text. The readers
are able to more fully understand the principle being taught. New levels of
knowledge are often reached and additional insights may be discovered; this
is because “the two members strengthen, heighten and empower each other.

 Emphasis – great heights of emphasis are reached through this method of

expression, imprinting upon the mind of the reader whether consciously or
unconsciously, the truth will be stated.

 Symbolism revealed – parallelisms may help in the identification of

symbolic meanings of words.
 It serves for easy memorization of texts
 It serves as a cue for recall
 It aids faster reading
Summary
• At the core of parallelism is repetition. As we
have seen, there are types of repetition that
seem to apply beyond the semantic purview of
the word, ‘repetition’. Hence, parallelism
better applies both to what is literally known
as repetition and the other cases of repetition
as evident on our discussion of parallelism.