0 Aristotle: dejinition of irony: the rhetorical Jigure which names an object by using its opposite name 0 purpose of irony: criticism or praise 0

Transcription

1 IRONY

2 Irony 0 < Greek eironi 0 classical Greek comedies: the imposter vs. the ironical man: the imposter the pompous fool who pretended to be more than he was, while the ironist was the cunning dissembler who posed as less than he was and always won 0 Socratic irony: proving the relativity of dogmas; apparent agreement with interlocutor, leading him on until you prove him wrong

3 0 verbal irony vs. situational irony 0 verbal irony = intentional 0 situational irony reveals events which are ironic irrespective of the speaker s implication: we cannot deliberately do smth. ironic, we merely recognize the irony around us I now risked dying from oxygen toxicity as the excessively high amount of oxygen threatened to burn up my nervous system, lungs, and eyes. An ironic death for someone with a leaky space suit: too much oxygen.

4 0 Aristotle: dejinition of irony: the rhetorical Jigure which names an object by using its opposite name 0 purpose of irony: criticism or praise 0 Cicero: irony appropriate for humorous purposes: saying smth else than what is apparent

5 0 classical rhetoric: verbal irony = trope 0 irony = the opposite of the literal meaning 0 ironic understatement = strengthening of literal meaning

6 0 Grice: irony = conversational implicature: Jlouting the Maxim of Quality => irony = we express the opposite of what we mean You re a big help.

7 a. I m glad we didn t bring an umbrella. b. Did you remember to water the Jlowers? c. It seems to be raining. d. Oh, to be in England/Now that April s here (Browning) 0 obviously irrelevant utterances, ironical understatements, ironical quotations, ironical interjections (Sperber & Wilson 1981)

8 What a wonderful party!???opposite of: What an awful party!

9 a. I wouldn t mind a man of your kind working for me. How much does Nero Wolfe pay you? Nothing. I work for love of the job. I meet interesting people like you. b. That s extremely signijicant, so please tell me what it signijies.

10 0 later work: Grice : 0 irony = expression of (hostile, derogatory) feeling, attitude, evaluation [of a vandalized car] Look, that car has all its windows intact????irony

11 0 no obligatory formal features (intonation) 0 interpretation as ironic will depend on external circumstances 0 speaker draws attention to the context, dissociates himself from the content and expresses attitude towards the content 0 speaker is mentioning the utterance rather than using it 0 irony = echoic allusion (Sperber & Wilson 1981)

12 That went well! =allusion to and mockery of an occasion when she/ someone else had suggested that it would go well + dissociative attitude to a tacitly attributed utterance

13 0 echoes a remark so as to suggest that it is untrue or inappropriate: Who that knows what his misfortunes have been can help feeling an interest in him? His misfortunes, repeated Darcy contemptuously, yes his misfortunes have been great indeed. (Sperber & Wilson 1981)

14 earlier: A: It is not true that cars are being vandalized in this neighbourhood later: B: [of a vandalized car] Look, that car has all its windows intact = irony

15 0 echo = many functions A: I had dinner with Chomsky last night. B: You had dinner with Chomsky! = = = acceptance, endorsement, questioning, mockery, rejection

16 0 mention = more or less explicit A: I almost won. B: He says he almost won. He almost won. Allegedly. He almost won. (imitating A) He almost won. (brightly)

17 Irony as pretence 0 suggested by the etymology of the word: irony = assuming a role 0 pragmatic insincerity 0 purpose: to draw attention to discrepancy between reality and failed expectation, norm, defective perspective 0 it only works if discrepancy is obvious (Clark and Gerrig 1984, Recanati 2004, Walton 1990 Currie 2002, etc.)

18 0 recognition of irony: understanding the discrepancy between what the speaker is and what they pretend to be 0 if hearer recognizes irony and joins in : joint pretense, hearer also assumes fake identity 0 non-ironic answer: hearer chooses to preserve real identity A: Well done! B: Thanks!/Sorry.

19 ???To speak ironically,. To speak metaphorically = OK announcing the pretence = spoil the effect (Grice 1967)

20 SEINFELD: Hello Newman. We should throw all these immigrants, legal or illegal, out of the US (Attardo)

21 0 principle of least disruption (Attardo) tolerate violations as long as they are kept to a minimum in terms of cognitive efforts 0 an utterance is ironical if it is: 1. inappropriate 2. relevant 3. intentionally so: hearer understands that the utterance is an evaluative judgment (usu. negative)

22 0 literature: impersonation irony (Simonin) 0 speaker/writer adops persona in order to criticise : e.g. Swift s Modest Proposal I have never seen any rich people. They were quite poor. They didn t know where to turn for ten thousand dollars. I had imagined that because a woman rode down-town in a limousine to buy a Jifty-dollar hat, she must be well-to-do. Not at all. They are cramped. They say it themselves. Pinched, I think, is the word they use. (Leacock, in Wilson 2006)

23 0 asteism, polite mockery, genteel irony: 0 backhanded compliments: a. You look fantastic for someone your age. b. I m amazed by the level of success people have after following your advice. c. I always feel more intelligent after reading your thoughts and ideas. d. He had written a book called Modern Crime Detection. Yes. A book that every intelligent criminal should send as a gift to every detective he knows.

24 0 affectionate irony, banter: "Hallo, Bertie, you old ass," was her very matey greeting. "I thought I shouldn't Jind you far away from the food.

25 0 Kierkegaard: contradictions and paradoxes should not be resolved in order to become more meaningful: they should be evaluated, experienced 0 a contradiction can correspond to and specify an attitude, which is a kind of evaluation 0 an attitude is a stance taken towards an idea rather than an idea per se 0 =>the contradiction implied at the surface level of an ironic utterance does not need to be removed for the irony to be understood 0 it is the contrast between the literal statement and the shared background which specijies the attitude (Bernsten & Kennedy 1996)

26 0 asymmetry in the use of irony:?how stupid! (=how clever)?how clumsy (=how graceful) That went well! (echo hope) That went badly! (only if the speaker can refer back to an exaggerated fear which he can then echo ironically)

27 the Tinge Hypothesis 0 positive meaning tinges the negative intended meaning, resulting in a less critical evaluation Well done! 0 ironic praise: the literal negative meaning tinges the positive intended meaning, resulting in a more critical evaluation How difjicult it must have been! 0 hearers process both literal and non-literal meaning: 0 literal meaning is activated alongside ironic meaning and is retained in order to dilute criticism/praise (Dews & Winner 1999)

28 SARCASM: 0 a more hostile kind of irony, more face threatening 0 agressive 0 more obvious 0 rude

29 Purpose of irony (Attardo) a) alleviate tension, enhance intimacy - solidarity, bonding, familiarity b) decommitment (possibility of taking back) c) defunctionalization: the loss of meaningfulness