Министерство образования и науки Российской Федерации
Федеральное государственное бюджетное образовательное
учреждение высшего профессионального образования
«Ярославский государственный педагогический университет
им. К.Д. Ушинского»
Кафедра английского языка
Направление подготовки 44.03.05 Педагогическое образование
РЕФЕРАТ
На тему: « Main Problems of Phonostylistics»
Работа выполнена студенткой
2 курса, 422 А группы
Руженцовой Софьей Андреевной
Научный руководитель
кандидат педагогических наук,
старший преподаватель
Слободская Юлия Владимировна
Ярославль
2015
Contents:
1. Introduction……………………………………………………………………….3
2. The Notion, Development and Problems of Phonostylistics……………………..4
3. The Notion of Style……………………………………………………………….7
4. Style-Forming and Style-Modifying Factors……………………………………..8
5. Classification of Phonetic Styles………………………………………………...13
6. Conclusion……………………………………………………………………….14
7. Bibliography……………………………………………………………………..16
2
Introduction
Like units of any other level of language, unit of phonetic level can be considered
as a subject of selection and a combination, so – to be object of stylistics, the discipline
studying the principles, mechanisms, the purposes and results of speech selection.
The measure of the importance and independence of selection of sound units in
the course of formation of the speech is often recognized almost insignificant compared
with the importance of selection of units at other, higher levels of language. However
such representation develops first of all where attempt of the isolated consideration of a
role of elements of separate levels of language is made. The stylistics, by G. O.
Vinokur's definition, "studies language on all section of its structure at once, i.e. both
sounds, and forms, both signs, and their parts".[3]
The section of stylistics studying realization potential functional and stylistic opportunities of language at the phonetic level depending on the purposes and problems of
communication, the type of the content, type of thinking and various situational opportunities of communication in this or that social sphere is called phonostylistics. [6]
Studying of problems of the sounding speech is one of the actual directions of modern
linguistics. It is caused, on the one hand, by insufficient number of the system researches conducted in different languages, and with another - constantly increasing practical
needs for the translation, teaching foreign languages, creation of advertizing and other
texts of influence. In the center of attention of phonostylistics there are sound graphic
means making impact on the listener both on conscious, and at the subconscious level.
Such influence is based on ability of sounds to cause primary associative communications and to be perceived by the person to the logical analysis of the lexical contents of
the statement. The importance of the sound part of the text as areas both organizing,
and organized was obvious already to poetics and rhetoricians of antiquity. [2]
3
The Notion, Development and Problems of Phonostylistics
Phonostylistics - the new scientific direction which arose on a joint of phonetics
and stylistics and representing one of sections of stylistics of resources of language.
Phonostylistics is a rapidly developing and controversial field of study though a
great deal of research work has been done in it. Linguists were until recently not aware
of this way of analysis and awareness came only as a result of detailed analysis of spoken speech.
Before describing in detail what the problems and tasks of phonostylistics are one
should give some understanding of what gave a mighty impulse to this new way of
looking at phonetic phenomena. The point is that during the first half of our century linguists have shown interest in written form of the language and so the emphasis in language study was laid on analyzing written speech. It is only during the last thirty-five
years that the situation has changed. It may be said that it was the invention of the taperecorder and other technical aids that was the real turning point in phonetics and linguistics in general. Linguists got a good opportunity of studying the other form of language
realization — spoken speech — the variety which had hit her to (up to this time) been
largely or completely ignored. It is not only the absence of mechanical aids which accounts for the lack of linguistic research that has been carried out into this variety of
language and the procedure difficulty of obtaining reliable data to investigate. There is,
however, a further reason. Until quite recently theory and research on language was
based on the assumption that it is only the written form of language realization that can
serve a reliable object of investigation, while the spoken form is not worthy of scientific
analysis because it produces deviations from the literary norm.
Nobody would want to deny the fact that spoken speech is the primary medium of
language expression. So when linguists became involved in investigating language in
use they realized that language is not an isolated phenomenon, it is a part of society. In
real life people find themselves in various and numerous situations. In these situations
language is used appropriately, i.e. people select from their total linguistic repertoires
those elements which match the needs of particular situations.
4
This fact changed the whole approach to the language. Rather than viewing language as an object with independent existence, a thing to be described for its own sake,
it became evident that it must be seen as a tool, a means to an end outside itself. That
end is, of course, communication and it is only in the context of communicative situation that the essential properties of a linguistic system can be discovered and analysed.
So it is taken to be reasonably obvious that much of what people say depends directly or
indirectly on the situation they are in.
Currently researches on phonostylistics are conducted at the level of words and
phrases, the offer, the phrase, the paragraph. And the last years were marked by the appeal to the integral sounding text as to object of phonostylistic researches. [9]
In this regard the content of the concept "phonostylistics" and its subject considerably extended. So, the phonetic stylistics as area of linguistics include not only studying of expressional properties of pronunciation variants of words and phrases (according
to O. S. Akhmanova), but also studying of expressional properties of all phonetic means
of a certain language system, and also studying of acoustic-articulatory and prosodic
properties of functional styles of the literary language.
According to I. U. Myltseva, the central question of phonetic stylistics is presented by studying of style forming opportunities of sound means of language. In this plan
the phonostylistics can be considered as:
"1) the science studying phonetic synonyms which are stylistic options in phonetics (M.
V. Panov);
2) science about actually phonetic styles (styles of a pronunciation) which classification
is based on phonetic signs of segment level (L.R. Zinder);
3) science about the phonostylistic means of language (options and modifications of
sound and prosodic structures) functioning in different phonetic styles of the speech,
understood more widely, than in the second case (K. K. Baryshnikov, S. M. Gayduchik,
etc.);
4) area of studying of the use of free versions of sound units in the text (I.R.Torsuyeva);
5) science about the sound means of language among other language means forming
functional varieties of language (K. B. Karpov, etc.)" [7]
5
Depending on what point of view the phonetic aspect of language is investigated,
different researchers put forward various questions as the central problems of pronunciation stylistics. So, E. Nurakhmetov lists the following main problems of phonostylistics:
1) studying of reflection of emotions in the speech;
2) studying of phonetic styles, registers;
3) studying of phonetic features of various genres and types of oral communication
(spontaneous conversation, lecture, oratorical speech, interview, recitation and so forth);
4) studying of sociolects and idiostyles;
5) studying of sound symbolism;
6) determination of phonostylistic features of reading the art and literary text.
From the listed problems, according to E.Nurakhmetov, "definition of notion
«phonetic style», the description of repertoire of segmental and suprasegmental means
and their functions, a problem of existence of phonostylistic units, and also a problem of
additional coding of the statement"[8] are central.
In the research we will take a closer look at phonetic style, its factors and classification.
6
The Notion of Style
It must be noted that the category of style is not new in linguistics. As it was said
above much of what people say depends on the situation. On the one hand, variations of
language in different situations it is used in are various and numerous , but on the other
hand, all these varieties have much in common as they are realizations of the same system. That means that there are regular patterns of variation in language, or, in other
words, language means which constitute any utterance are characterized by a certain
pattern of selection and arrangement. The principles of this selection and arrangement,
the ways of combining the elements form what is called the style. Style integrates language means constructing the utterance, and at the same time differentiates one utterance from another.
The branch of linguistics that is primarily concerned with the problems of functional styles is called functional stylistics. Stylistics is usually regarded as a specific division of linguistics, as a sister science, concerned not with the elements of the language
as such but with their expressive potential. A functional style can be defined as a functional set of formal patterns into which language means are arranged in order to transmit
information. A considerable number of attempts have been made in recent years to work
out a classification of functional styles. The terms that are most commonly dealt with
are: scientific style, publicistic style, business style, belles-lettres style and colloquial
style. It should be noted that in the process of studying the characteristics of functional
styles phonetic level of analysis has been completely ignored. [9]
Phonetic style (style of a pronunciation) can be defined as a kind of a pronunciation with this or that differential expressional and estimating function. Oral speech has
its own specific characteristics and the quality of various forms and kinds of oral speech
is by far larger than in written speech. So it is quite clear that description and comparison of all these variations is a matter of severe complexity as, on the one hand, each
form is specific and, on the other hand, there are regular patterns of partial likeness between them. Now one thing is evident, that the sets of phonetic style-forming features
do not correspond to functional styles in pure linguistic approach.
7
Style-Forming and Style-Modifying Factors
Certain nonlinguistic features can be correlated with variations in language use.
The latter can be studied on three levels: phonetic, lexical and grammatical. The first
level is the area of phonostylistics. Phonostylistics studies the way phonetic means are
used in this or that particular situation which exercises the conditioning influence of a
set of factors which are referred to as extralinguistic. The aim of phonostylistics is to
analyze all possible kinds of spoken utterances with the main purpose of identifying the
phonetic features, both segmental and suprasegmental, which are restricted to certain
kinds of contexts, to explain why such features have been used and to classify them into
categories based upon a view of their function
Before describing phonetic style-forming factors it is obviously necessary to try
to explain what is meant by extralinguistic situation. It can be defined by three components, that is purpose, participants, setting. These components distinguish situation as
the context within which interaction (communication) occurs. Thus a speech situation
can be defined by the cooccurrence of two or more interlocutors related to each other in
a particular way, having a particular aim of communicating about a particular topic in a
particular setting.
Purpose can be defined as the motor which sets the chassis of setting and participants going, it is interlinked with the other two components in a very intricate way. The
purpose directs the activities of the participants throughout a situation to complete a
task. Such purposes can be viewed in terms of general activity types and in terms of the
activity type plus specific subject matter. There appear to be a considerable number of
quite general types of activities, for example: working, teaching, learning, conducting a
meeting, chatting, playing a game, etc. Such activity types are socially recognized as
units of interaction that are identifiable. It should be noted that activity type alone does
not give an adequate account of the purpose in a situation. It only specifies the range of
possible purposes that participants will orient toward in the activity but not which specific one will be involved. The notion of purpose requires the specification of contents
8
at a more detailed level than that of activity type. This we shall call "subject matter" or
"topic".
Another component of situation is participants. Speech varies with participants in
numerous ways. It is a marker of various characteristics of the individual speakers as
well as of relationships between participants.
The last component we have to consider is called setting, or scene. It is defined
by several features. The first of them is a physical orientation of participants. This is to
some extent determined by the activity they are engaged in; thus in a lecture the speaker
stands at some distance from and facing the addressees whereas in a private chat they
are situated face to face to each other. It is quite obvious now that speech over an intercom and speech in face-to-face communication is obviously phonologically distinguishable in a number of ways. The second is that Scenes may be arranged along dimensions:
public – private, impersonal – personal, polite – casual, high-cultured – low-cultured,
and many other value scales. In large part these diverse scales seem to be subsumed under one bipolar dimension of formal – informal. The kind of language appropriate to
scenes on the formal or "high" end of the scale is then differentiated from that appropriate to those on the informal or "low" end and we may expect pronunciation features to
be markers of the scene or at, least of its position in the formal – informal dimension.
We can single out, a number of factors which result in phonostylistic varieties.
They are:
1. the purpose, or the aim of the utterance;
2. the speaker's attitude;
3. the form of communication;
4. the degree of formality;
5. the degree of spontaneity (or the degree of preparedness or the reference of the oral
text to a written one).
It should be mentioned right here that the purpose or the aim of the utterance may
be called a phonetic style-forming factor. All other factors cause modifications within
this or that style and that is why may be referred to as style-modifying factors. All these
9
factors are interdependent and interconnected. They are singled out with the purpose of
describing phonetic phenomena so that to give a good idea of how the system works.
The first factor we should consider is the purpose of the utterance and the subject
matter. As the subject matter in large part determines the lexical items, it is the aim of
the utterance that affects pronunciation. So in this respect the aim could be spoken of as
the strategy of the language user and so it may be called a style-forming factor. On the
phonetic level there are variations related to describe what language is being used for in
the situation: is the speaker trying to persuade? to exhort? to discipline? Is he teaching,
advertising, amusing, etc.? Each of the above-mentioned variants makes the speaker select a number of functional phonetic means with the purpose of making the realization
of the aim more effective.
Another extralinguistic factor most often referred to is the speaker's attitude to
the situation or to what he is saying or hearing. This factor can well be said to greatly
differ oral form of language realization from its written form. Its most common linguistic realization is intonation varieties which can be numerous like varieties of attitudes
and emotions an individual can express in various life situations.
Considering the form of communication we should say that nature of participation
in the language event results in two possible varieties: a monologue and a dialogue.
Monologuing is the speaking by one individual in such a way as to exclude the possibility of interruption by others. Dialoguing (conversing) is speaking in such a way as to
invite the participation of others. They are also characterized by more phonetic, lexical
and grammatical cohesion. Monologues usually have more apparent continuity and selfcontainedness than conversation. Phonetic organization of either of the two varieties
cannot he analogical since each kind is characterized by specific usage of language
means of all the three levels
Among the social factors determining the usage of stylistic means it is the formality of situation. Considering a communicative situation from the point of view of sociolinguistics we would have to admit that the dichotomy formal – informal (official – unofficial) can be understood here as the absence or presence of socially realized necessity
to follow certain rules while generating an utterance. Informal communication does not
10
make the speaker use obligatory forms, it allows to use them. The influence of this factor upon the phonetic form of speech is revealed by variations of rate of articulation. In
a formal situation the language user tends to make his speech distinct, thorough and
precise. In an informal situation he would prefer less explicit and more rapid form because this form would be more appropriate and would function efficiently as a mode of
communication.
One of the most important style-modifying factors is the degree of spontaneity.
So if we examine the situations in which people speak rather than write from the point
of view of psychology we can distinguish between those in which they are speaking
spontaneously as opposed to those in which they are speaking non-spontaneously as the
actor and the lecturer are most often doing. If an utterance is qualified as fully spontaneous from linguistic point of view it means that its verbal realization is taking place at
the moment of speaking, though, of course, it could be thought over in advance. While
spontaneous speech is taking place (when no notes are used) the process of psychic activity consists of two equally important items, i.e. a) the process of searching (remembering) information and the ways of expressing it verbally and b) the process of giving
(transmitting) information. The speaker has got an intention to express some ideas and
he should choose an adequate linguistic form to express these ideas and in this way to
generate the utterance. [9]
Analysing extralinguistic factors we should add some more to the abovementioned ones. They are: the speaker's individuality, temporal provenance, social
provenance, range of intelligibility, sex and age of the speaker.
All these factors are interconnected and interdependent in everyday life situations and it’s normally the combination of several of them that characterizes the phonetic style. The task of phonostylistics is firstly, to identify the set of phonetic expressive means, which are stylistically significant; secondly, it must outline a method of
analysis, which would allow to arrange these features in such a way as to facilitate the
comparison of the use of one language with any other; thirdly it must decide on the
function of these features by classifying them into categories, based on the extralin-
11
guistic purpose they have. One of the most urgent problems of phonostylistics is the
classification of phonetic styles.
12
Classification of Phonetic Styles
Among the well-known classifications of phonetic styles we would like to mention the following three. One of them belongs to S.M. Gaiduchic. He distinguishes five
phonetic styles: solemn, scientific business, official business, everyday, and familiar. [4]
As we may see the above-mentioned phonetic styles on the whole correlate with functional styles of the language. They are differentiated on the basis of spheres of discourse. The other way of classifying phonetic styles is suggested by J.A. Dubovsky who
discriminates the following five styles: informal ordinary, formal neutral, formal official, informal familiar, and declamatory. [5] The division is based on different degrees
of formality or rather familiarity between the speaker and the listener. Within each style
subdivisions are observed.
M.A. Sokolova’s approach is slightly different. She distinguishes between segmental and suprasegmental level of analysis because some of them (the aim of the utterance, for example) result in variations of mainly suprasegmental level, while others (the
formality of situation, for example) reveal segmental varieties. It might be generally assumed that there are five intonational styles singled out mainly according to the purpose
of communication and to which we could refer all the main varieties of the texts generated in everyday communication of a modern man. They are as follows:
1. Informational style.
2. Academic style (Scientific).
3. Publicistic style (Oratorical).
4. Declamatory style (Artistic).
5. Conversational style (Familiar). [9]
But differentiation of intonation according to, the purpose of communication only
is definitely not enough. As was mentioned above, there are other factors that affect intonation in various extralinguistic situations. We could add that any style with very little
exception is seldom realized in its pure form. Each generated text is likely to include
phonetic characteristics of different styles. In such cases we talk about overlapping (fusion) of styles.
13
Conclusion
When used in speech phonetic units undergo various changes under the influence
of extralinguistic factors. The bundle of these factors forms the extralinguistic situation.
The extralinguistic situation determines the choice of language means, phonetic means
in particular.
Phonostylistics is a branch of phonetics which studies the way phonetic units
(both segmental and suprasegmental) are used in particular extralinguistic situations.
The extralinguistic situation can be described in terms of three components, i. e.
purpose, participants and setting. These components distinguish situations as the context
in which speech interaction takes place. Purpose is the most important factor that guides
the communication. It is the task that is achieved in the course of communication. Participants are people involved in communication. Speech is a marker of various characteristics of people, both individual and social: age, gender, family background, occupation, social roles. The scene (setting) includes the physical orientation of participants,
which is connected with the type of speech activity they are engaged in. Scenes can also
be described in the following tenus: public - non-public (private), formal - informal,
monologuing - dialoguing.
The extralinguistic factors that determine the choice of phonetic means and result
in phonostylistic variation are:
1. the purpose, or the aim of the utterance;
2. the speaker's attitude;
3. the form of communication;
4. the degree of formality;
5. the degree of spontaneity (or the degree of preparedness or the reference of the oral
text to a written one).
The purpose, or aim of communication may be called a style forming factor,
while all the others cause modifications within a particular style, which account for the
existence of different kinds and genres of texts within each phonetic style. All the factors are interdependent and interconnected.
14
The classification of phonetic styles is based on the purpose of communication,
which is the most significant extralinguistic factor. Five phonetic styles can be singled
out according to the purpose of communication:
1. Informational style;
2. Academic (Scientific) style;
3. Publicistic (Oratorial) style;
4. Declamatory (Artistic) style;
5. Conversational (Familiar) style.
Stylistic variations of sounds and intonation result from different combinations of
extralinguistic factors. Stylistic modifications of sounds are caused primarily by the degree of formality, while variations of intonation are basically determined by the aim of
communication. In formal situations pronunciation tends to be careful and is characterized by articulatory precision. In informal situations speech is generally faster and less
careful. In informal casual discourse (fast colloquial speech) the processes of simplification take place: assimilation, reduction, elision. Each of the five phonetic styles is used
in a particular sphere of discourse and is characterized by a set of prosodic features,
which in their combination form the model of the phonetic style.
15
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