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 STYLISTICS
Ikenna Kamalu

Introduction

This chapter aims at introducing the reader to some of the branches, methods, and approaches
adopted in stylistic analysis of texts. It will also endeavour to define the concept of style and
explain its relationship with stylistics. Therefore, we shall begin our study by answering the
question “What is stylistics?” Most scholars consider stylistics to be the linguistic study of
literature or a linguistic approach to literature. Properly put, stylistics is the study of the
language of literature (Toolan, 1996: viii, Syal and Jindal, 2010: 25, Norgaard, Montoro and
Busse, 2010: 1). It is concerned with the ways meaning is created through language in
literature and in other non-fictional texts. Traditionally, literature has been the major concern
of stylistics, however, contemporary stylistics has shown interest in the linguistic features of
other discourses. Consequently, stylistic approaches can and have been employed to study
non-fictional or non-literary texts like advertising, academic writing, political speeches, news
reporting, and other semiotic regimes as TV and pictorial advertising, film, multimodal
publications, etc. Stylisticians largely make use of linguistic models, theories, and
frameworks in the analysis of texts so as to enable them to explain how and why a text
appears the way it does and how and why it yields itself to certain or different dimensions of
meaning. Stylisticians pay close attention to the peculiar features of language which may be
identified and studied under headings such as lexis, grammar, semantics, phonology, or
sound patterns. Norgaard, et al note that modern stylistic analysis may also take into
account the pragmatic or discoursal features of texts and the cognitive aspects involved in the
processing of those features by the reader (1). A detailed account of some (or all) of these
features enables the analyst to arrive at a more objective interpretation or evaluation of a text.

Stylistics as an academic discipline is a 20th century invention that has historical ties with
(classical) rhetoric – “the art of speech, an art concerned with the use of public speaking as
means of persuasion” (Bradford, 1997:3). The rhetorical art in classical Greece began as an
oral performance. It was not until towards the end of the fifth century B.C.E that oral
communication started to give way to the written form (Webb and Thomas, 1994:5). The
dominant oral communication that was typical of the Greek society aided rhetors in no small
measure in the practice of rhetoric. Thus, the ability to use words fluently and eloquently
became a skill that had to be acquired if one were to be listened to and understood with the
right impact. Speech was usually perfectly structured in poetic form, not just to create
aesthetic harmony but to convince or persuade the listener/audience (See Bradford 1997 for
more on the historical relationship between stylistics and rhetoric). Classical rhetoric
recognized five constituents of rhetoric: inventio (the creative faculty), dispositio or ordo
(form and structure), elocutio (diction and style), memoria (memory), and pronuntiatio
(delivery). Style (elocutio) is recognized and studied as the third part or aspect of rhetoric and
over time scholars began to treat style as superior to other parts of rhetoric.
Stylistics Issues in the Study of Language and Literature: Theory and Practice

The emphasis on elocutio in the Middle Ages – Renaissance period saw to the emergence
of books like Richard Sherry‟s Treatise of Schemes and Tropes (1550) and Figures of
Grammar and Rhetoric (1555); Tataleus‟ Institution Oratores; Henry Peacham‟s Garden of
Eloquence; George Puttenham‟s Arte of English Poesie; Peter Ramus‟ Dialectique (1551);
and Butler‟s Rhetorical Libre Duo. All these books emphasized elocutio as being supreme to
other parts of rhetoric. The quest for decorative ideas or ornamental speeches was so
prominent that several books dedicated themselves to how to manicure speech. These books
plainly presuppose that rhetoric is essentially style.

The two groups of critics who exercised enormous influence on the identity and direction
of twentieth-century English studies were the Russian and central European Formalists, and
the disparate collection of British and American teachers and writers of the 1920s and 1930s
known as the New Critics (New Criticism). Both groups aimed at defining literature as a
discourse and art form and tried to establish its function as something that can be properly
studied (Bradford, 1997:12). They wanted to make the study of literature more “scientific”.
They based their analyses purely on the linguistic features of the text such as its phonology,
lexis, grammar and structural forms like parallelism and linguistic deviation. Norgaard et al
(2010: 2) argue that the flourishing of stylistics in Britain and the United States in the 1960s
was largely spurred by the works of proponents of Russian Formalism such as Roman
Jakobson and Viktor Shklovsky.

Origin, Definition and Concept of Style

The constraints of space will not permit us to dwell extensively on the items we have
mentioned for examination in this part of the study. However, we shall endeavour to provide
a brief insight into the origins, definitions, and concept of style. Stylistics is generally
regarded as the linguistic study of style. But the question is: what is style?

Gerald McMenamin (2002:126) contends that style is not a uniform concept in language.
The indeterminacy of the word “style” dates back to its Latin etymology, stilus, meaning an
instrument of or for writing upon waxed tablets. Eco (2004:161) notes that from the way it
first appeared at the beginning of the Latin world right down to contemporary stylistics and
aesthetics, the term “style” exhibits a history that is anything but uniform. The word “stilus”
underwent several semantic transformations in the course of history, ranging from being used
to describe a sharp instrument - both for writing and as a weapon of war. It later became
associated with instrument for engraving. It was also used to refer to surgical instrument. And
in modern time, the last use of stilus was in reference to gramophone needles. All these were
derived from the Latin word “Stilus” and share the characteristics of being sharp and capable
of being used to mark hard objects. The word “Stilus” was later to gain a semantic
transference to penmanship – this is the first etymological transference of the word. Later,
style became associated with the manner of expression characteristic of a given writer. The
protean nature of style explains why Esser (1993: 172) concludes that “style is like a
chameleon.” Commenting on the chameleonic nature of style Eco (2004:161) argues that

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“Even though there is an original nucleus that can be identified, which means that from the
word „stilus‟ – the instrument from it derives by metonymy – style becomes synonymous
with „writing‟ and therefore with the way one expresses oneself in literary terms, it is
nevertheless true that this way of writing is understood in different ways and with different
intensities over the course of the centuries.” (See Style in Language [1960] edited by Thomas
A. Sebeok, and Literary Style: A Symposium [1971] edited by Seymour Chatman for some of
the different ways scholars have perceived and studied the concept of style in the last century
and in the centuries before it.) The 21st century, like the one before it, has witnessed
significant and radical approaches by linguists, literary and culture critics to the study of
style. An insight into the interdisciplinarity of stylistics (the study of style) can be seen in 4.0
below.

Enkvist (1964:6) in his essay “On Defining Style,” recounts the age long battle between
the literary critic and the linguist over the interpretation of a literary text. He observes that
linguistics and literary analysis have “met, or clashed on the territory of style” through the
ages. The clash between these two disciplines has in turn informed the multiplicity of attitude
to the theory of style. When a critical view is taken of the ways the concept of style has been
defined and applied in literary and linguistic criticisms, one cannot but agree with Thonssen
and Baird (1948:405) that, “surely no term has been bandied about more freely, or has
provoked a fuller measure of controversy” as style. Hence Richard Ohmann (1971: 243)
submits that “there is no cause to be disturbed by the multiplicity of definitions… no single
definition can draw a neat line around style.” We shall therefore examine just a few of the
definitions of style advanced by scholars.

The concept of style has been viewed from many approaches, among which are: style
as the study of the linguistic characteristics of a writer/literary work; the use of language in a
particular genre, period or school of writing; style as choice; style as the individual; style as
deviation from norm; style as a dress of thought; style as a manner of expression, etc. Let us
now examine some of these views.

Style as the linguistic characteristics of a work of art refers to the linguistic elements
employed by a writer in the creation of a particular text. Leech and Short (1981:12) refer to
style as “the linguistic characteristics of a particular text”. This agrees with Millar and
Currie‟s (1984) view of style as the “linguistic techniques” a writer employs to present
his/her vision of the world. Here, the study of style will examine the linguistic features of the
text such as its lexical, semantic, phonological, grammatical, structural and graphological
features. The analyst who sets out to examine the linguistic features of a literary text will
endeavour to see how these linguistic elements enhance the creation of meaning in the text
under study.

Style as the way language is used in a particular genre, period, or school of writing. This
view of style may be in reference to the language habits shared by a group of people at a
moment; or over a period of time. For example, one can talk of the style of Augustan poets,
style of old English. It can also be in reference to generic style like magical realism,
autobiographical or historical novels (see Crystal and Davy, 1969:10). Thus, the analyst who

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wants to examine the style of magical realist texts in Nigeria may start with Amos Tutuola‟s
The Palm-wine Drinkard down to Ben Okri‟s The Famished Road. The study will look out
for the language habits shared by both writers and how the linguistic elements enhance the
realization of their thematic concerns. Again, one may decide to examine the style of civil
war novels or poems in Nigeria, particularly those written during the combat period of 1967-
1970. A study of the style of these texts will reveal the mood of the writers and their attitude
towards the war and the Nigerian nation.

Style as the individual. It was the French naturalist, Buffon, who once said “Le style est
l’homme meme,” which means that “style is the man himself.” This statement has generated a
lot of controversy as to what Buffon actually meant. A school of thought claims that one‟s
manner of writing or speaking reveals one‟s inner character. In other words, one speaks or
writes as one really is. This concurs with Roger Murray‟s (1971:144) view that “we can
examine a style just as we would a manner.” Louis Milic (1971:79) however observes that
Buffon has been misunderstood as he never meant the aphorism in that context. Rather,
Buffon was only emphasizing that “style arises from the proper ordering of one‟s thoughts”,
as against emphasis on ornamentation and manipulation of words. Some scholars however
argue that some authors can be identified with a particular use of language. Each writer has
his/her own kind of “individuality”, “signature”, or “thumb-print” that sets him/ her aside
from others. Thus, the African reader should be able to differentiate Chinua Achebe‟s work
from Wole Soyinka‟s, Ben Okri‟s from Amos Tutuola‟s, Elechi Amadi‟s from Ferdinand
Oyono‟s, etc. based on the linguistic peculiarities of each of these writers. Josephine Miles
(1971:27) explains that certain linguistic features or codes should explicitly be associated
with a writer. A writer is therefore considered as having “no style” if these linguistic features
are used in “such muddled way that no clearly characterizing manner can be discerned”.

Style as choice. Enkvist (1964:21) refers to style as the selection and ordering of language.
Stylistic choice is not just lexical selection, but also involves phonetic, morphemes, phrases,
clauses, sentences and larger units. It is the selection and arrangement of those linguistic
features which are open to choice (Devito, 1972:231). This notion can be extended to
embrace Richard Ohmann‟s (1964:431) assertion that “The notion of style calls for different
ways of expressing the same content.” This involves choice of words, varying of expressions
to state the same content. What is not certain however about style as choice is whether the
choice of what to write is consciously dictated by the writer or the supernatural influence of
divine madness as Plato once asserted. The extent of a writer‟s consciousness or otherwise is
uncertain. This explains Osundare‟s (2003:15) critique of Milic‟s dichotomy of conscious
“rhetorical choice” and unconscious “stylistic option”. Osundare says that Milic committed a
fundamental error for overlooking “the significant interface between the two”. In a nutshell,
style as choice tends to examine why a writer chose a particular word/phrase/clause or
syntactic pattern against the other. For example, why did Ben Okri use words like “pepper
soup”, “ogogoro”, and “bush meat” in The Famished Road which many non-Nigerian readers
may not readily understand? Could it be they have no English equivalents? Why did he use a
typical Nigerian pidgin expression as “We showed them pepper” which is likely to confuse
many non-Nigerian readers? Or “What kind of question is dat”? The last example is

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particularly interesting. The reader would be wondering why Okri chose “dat” as a
morphological variant of the demonstrative “that” particularly when the sentence is not
rendered in the Nigerian pidgin. The sentence, therefore, constitutes of elements of Standard
English and the Nigerian pidgin. The examples above show that style can be seen as the
linguistic choices made by the writer in the process of creating meaning and it ranges from
his/her lexical choices, syntactic choices, phonological choices, morphological choices, etc to
several other aesthetic choices.

Style as deviation from norm. Every speech community has a stock of vocabulary that
constitutes its language. This language from which every member of the community draws
constitutes what is known as the common core. Deviations occur when a speaker makes
departures from the norms or common core. The common core can be manipulated by a
writer to suit his/her individual creative world. Deviation does not necessarily lead to the
breakdown in communication. However, some of the questions that readily come to mind are:
What constitutes a norm? When does deviation occur in language use? Who determines what
constitutes a deviation? Izvetan Todorov (1971:30) states that style as deviation is
“infraction, transgression of a norm… the individual work is referred to the set of writing of
an author, and this set is seen as a deviation from the norm constituted by the current
language.” The problem with Todorov‟s assertion is its inability to provide us with what
constitutes the norm of a language and the parameter for its determination. Eco (2004:157)
contends that “where there is no recognizable rule there cannot even be deviation from
norm.”

Leech and Short (1981:48) distinguish between qualitative and quantitative deviations.
Qualitative deviation is a deviation from the language code itself, that is, a breach of some
rule or convention of the language, say English, while a deviation from expected frequency is
known as quantitative deviation. Both qualitative and quantitative deviations are part of
foregrounding. Osundare‟s (2003:28) taxonomy of deviation makes a distinction between
extronormic deviation (unexpected violation of rules, e.g. ungrammatical formations in
language), and intro-normic deviation (expected compliance with the rules of a deviant norm,
e.g. the naturalisation of those formations within the context). This shows that deviation can
be a norm-breaking or norm-making linguistic feature. He further explains that deviation can
be intra-authorial (syntagmatic) ; that is, an author may break the rules of his own norm. This
type of deviation is usually associated with writers whose stylistic traits have become well
established, either through a long period of writing or the sheer volume of their work. When
deviation is inter-authorial (paradigmatic), it means the author may break the rules of a norm
he shares with others. Deviation is an important aspect of literary style. Ruqiya Hasan (1971:
231) however cautions that “No writer, no matter how deviant he is, can afford to be
randomly deviant, for the simple reason that the effect of deviance would be meaninglessness
and a total lack of communication.” Thus, the chief goal of deviation should be to
communicate meaning coherently by means of foregrounding.

The attempt to find a definition to a concept as chameleonic as style has led us to the
examination of some of the perceptions of style. This study agrees with Leech and Short
(1981:12) that style should be seen as “the linguistic characteristics of a particular text” with

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their semantic implications. It also subscribes to the notion that style can be viewed as the
way language is used in a particular genre, like magical realism (Crystal and Davy).

Foregrounding

The word “foregrounding”, which derives from a free translation of the Czech term,
aktualisace is a concept that originated from the pre-war Prague school of linguistics and
poetics, under the influence of Russian formalist doctrines. It is used to represent the
abnormal use of language or medium in order to make it dominant, stand out or prominent in
perception. Foregrounding is closely related to the Russian Formalist concept of
“defamiliarization” (ostranenie, which means “estrangement”) that is, to make strange.
Viktor Shklovsky, who introduced the concept of defamiliarization into literary criticism,
claims that as things become familiar to us, we stop noticing them. Thus, the role of literature
or art in general is to make people view the world from a new perspective, to defamiliarize
the familiar, and then make them re-perceive what they have stopped noticing because of its
familiarity. This, he argues, will make them recognize the artistic qualities of the expression
or item. Defamiliarization makes the world of everyday perception appear unfamiliar and
thus renew the reader‟s lost interest in the entity as a result of their familiarity with it. In
short, defamiliarization enables the reader to perceive the familiar with a sense of newness.
Norgaard, Montoro and Busse (2010:95) argue that foregrounding is a central means of
defamiliarization.

The formalists are of the view that the primary aim of literature is to foreground its
medium. Roger Fowler (1973:75) observes that foregrounding, in literature, may be most
readily identified with linguistic deviation – the violation of rules and conventions, by which
a poet transcends the normal communicative resources of language, and awaken the reader,
by freeing him from the grooves of cliché expression, to a new perceptivity. An example is
the title of Dylan Thomas‟ poem “A Grief Ago.” This is a case of linguistic deviation at the
lexico-grammatical level because the adverbial group, “ago” usually collocates with temporal
deixis, that is, time elements/expressions like “an hour ago”, “a week ago”, “ten years ago”,
etc. But here, it is made to collocate with an emotional element, “grief.” Deviation may be
lexical, grammatical, semantic, phonological or graphological.

Parallelism is another form of foregrounding. This means that foregrounding is essentially

realized in deviation and parallelism. While deviation refers to deliberate violation of the
norms on all linguistic levels, parallelism is the repetition of structures or patterns. Through
the repetition of these features, attention is drawn to them. That is, they are made prominent
or foregrounded. Nigel Fabb (1997) defines parallelism as “sameness” between two sections
of a text which can be structural or semantic. Structural parallelism involves similarity of
structure and may be syntactic, morphological or phonological. Semantic parallelism occurs
where two sections of a text can be interpreted to have parallel meanings. The two words or
sections of the text can tie in their sameness (i.e. similarity) of meaning or in their
oppositeness (i.e. opposition) of meaning. Semantic parallelism often results as a result of
lexical parallelism (see Nigel Fabb for more on parallelism).

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M. A. K. Halliday (1971: 339) argues that foregrounding is prominence that is motivated.

According to him, prominence is motivated if it contributes to meaning-making or meaning
realization. It must contribute to the writer‟s total meaning. He contends that “unless it does,
it will seem to lack motivation; a feature that is brought into prominence will be
„foregrounded‟ only if it relates to the meaning of the text as a whole.” This is a functionalist
view of foregrounding which appears to contradict the formalist perspective that emphasizes
the linguistic or formal features of the text to the neglect of its socio-semantic dimension.

Branches in Stylistics

Stylistics which started as a linguistic study of literature, particularly poetry, has seen the
injection of insight, knowledge and methods of other disciplines and theories into text
analysis, thereby giving stylistics an interdisciplinary status. Thus, the eclectic nature of
stylistics has given rise to some of the “branches in stylistics” that will be discussed in this
part of the study.

Some of the branches in stylistics identified by Norgaard, Montoro and Busse (2010)
include cognitive stylistics/cognitive poetics, corpus stylistics, critical stylistics, feminist
stylistics, formalist stylistics, functionalist stylistics, historical stylistics, multimodal
stylistics, pragmatic stylistics, narratology, reader response criticism, emotion: stylistic
approaches, empirical study of literature, film stylistics/the stylistics of film, forensic
stylistics, and pedagogical stylistics. Again, the constraints of space will only permit us to
discuss just a few of them briefly.

Cognitive stylistics, also known as cognitive poetics, originated from the application of
models used in disciplines such as cognitive linguistics, cognitive psychology and artificial
intelligence to the study of literature. Cognitive stylistics argues for the recognition of the
mental component of meaning creation process in textual analysis. It tries to capture issues
such as “what do people do when they read” and “what happens to people when they read”.
Cognitive stylistics therefore takes into account the mental aspect of reading in textual
analysis.

Critical stylistics, which is inspired and informed by insights from critical linguistics and
critical discourse analysis, is described by Norgaard et al (2010:11-12) as a term used to refer
to stylistic work investigating the ways in which social meanings are manifested through
language. Both critical linguistics and critical discourse analysis set out to uncover how
social meanings such as power and ideology are expressed through language and how
language in this respect may impact on the way we perceive the world. Besides recognizing
the crucial importance of contextual factors such as register, genre and ideology in the study
of language, critical discourse analysis also contends that certain discourses and the
ideologies they reflect have become so ingrained (and thereby naturalized) in society that
language users tend not to notice them as ideologies at all. Norman Fairclough describes this
as “naturalization”. Critical stylistics, therefore, is the fusion of stylistics and critical
discourse analysis in the analysis of the actual linguistic manifestation of social meanings.

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Feminist stylistics is perceived by Mills as being concerned with the analysis of the way that
questions of gender impact on the production and interpretation of texts (in Norgaard, et al
2010). Norgaard et al further quote Mills as having argued that the focus of feminist stylistics
is the assumption that notions of gender are simply not “a question of discriminatory
messages about sex difference embedded in texts”, rather, it is “concerned with unravelling
the complex messages which may be deduced from texts and also with analyzing the way that
readers piece together or resist these messages.” Feminist stylistics is radically different from
traditional feminist view of gender which seems to stop at recognizing the existence of
discriminatory values in the system. Feminist stylistics recognizes the crucial role of
language in the construction of these discriminatory values and also in the investigation of
linguistic structures such as direct and indirect speeches, and the way they are exploited with
reference to male and female characters. It believes that the micro-style of language is
ideologically loaded with messages, especially those in which female characters are presented
in a disadvantageous social position (Norgaard, et al 19). Thus, feminist stylistics leads the
analyst to recognize both the formal and informal (subtle) ways the resources of language
have been ideologically structured and patterned in the presentation of male and female
gender in texts.

Historical stylistics is mainly concerned with the application of stylistic approaches, tools
and methods in order to investigate diachronically changing or stable styles of particular
linguistic phenomena in historical (literary) texts, a particular situation, or a particular genre.
It also refers to the synchronic investigation of a particular historical (literary) text from
stylistic perspective (Norgaard, et al 2010). Historical stylistics may adopt the framework of
other approaches to which stylistics has branched out, like corpus linguistics/stylistics.
Historical stylistics describes the interplay between language and context as well as its
theorizing, and a focus on how a historical text means what it does. The challenging tasks
before the historical stylistician include how to make his interpretation valid and how to
reconstruct the past and establish the styles of a particular genre, a linguistic phenomenon,
etc.

Multimodal stylistics is said to be a fairly new branch of stylistics which aims at broadening
the modes and media to which stylistics can be applied. Multimodal stylistics is chiefly
concerned with developing a systematic descriptive “grammar” of all semiotic modes as
those already developed for the mode of wording, like the lexical and grammatical aspects of
verbal language. The multimodal approach to stylistics investigates how other semiotic
regimes or modes such as typography (or graphology), colour, layout, visual images,
including the book cover, paper quality and other aspects of the text (or the book) construe
meaning. Thus, multimodal stylistics is not just useful in the analysis of the printed word but
can also illuminate how the visual properties of the text contribute to meaning-making or
realization of meaning. Norgaard, Montoro and Busse (2010:31) identify scholars like Kress
and van Leeuwen (1996, 2001), O‟ Toole (1994), O‟ Halloran (2004), Baldry and Thibault
(2006) and Bateman (2008) who base their theoretical and methodological framework on
M.A.K. Halliday‟s “Social semiotics”; and other scholars like Forceville (1996) and Currie
(2004) whose work on filmic multimodality is informed by cognitive theory as two

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identifiable and recognizable approaches or models for multimodal stylistic studies.

According to them, “Multimodal stylisticians draw on the descriptive apparatus that these
pioneers of multimodal thinking have developed for modes other than the verbal. In addition
to wording, the semiotic modes most prominently involved in literary meaning-making are
those of typography, layout and visual images.”

Linguistic Approaches to Stylistic Analysis

Stylistic analysis has been approached from different theoretical perspectives by linguists and
literary critics alike. Even within the domain of linguistic stylistics analysts differ on the
“most appropriate” theory or method to adopt in text analysis. Jürgen Esser (1993:7) notes
that linguistic approaches to stylistics are chiefly “code-centred”, which means that “stylo-
linguists are interested in the selection and combination of language units.” This accounts for
both the form (how) and content (what) of what is being communicated. This part of the work
summarizes the major linguistic approaches to stylistic analysis identified by Esser (1993),
which implicitly or explicitly perceive style as choice.

Dimensions of Variation

The concept of variation has been approached from diverse linguistic approaches which
include the structural linguistic assumption that language is a homogeneous system and
recognises allo-units (allophones, allomorph, and allo-sentence) as variability of abstract
language units (i.e. phoneme, morpheme, and sentence pattern); the sociolinguistic approach
that relates linguistic variation to sociological distinction; and other related approaches that
perceive language variation as deriving from various language functions (like Jakobson‟s
referential, emotive, phatic, poetic, and metalinguistic functions). Working within the tenets
of Crystal & Davy (1969), Quirk et al (1972), and Gregory & Carroll (1978) Esser identified
the following linguistic dimensions of variation.

Time: This refers to features of an utterance that index exclusively diachronic information –
the temporal provenance of a piece of language. Crystal & Davy (1969:67) suggest “such
information would be of primary importance in any language study of English, both in the
general sense of language as a whole, and in the particular sense of the development of the
language habit of a single human being.” They further describe temporal features as the third
kind of fairly stable feature in the utterance of an individual. Thus, the following lines from
Shakespeare‟s Romeo and Juliet (Act 1, scene 1) suggest the period in English history that
produced it:

To move is to stir, and to be valiant is to stand, therefore if thou art mov‟d, thou
Runn‟st away.
It is the occurrence of the forms art and runn’st that index the quotation as belonging
to Early Modern English. Gregory and Carroll (1978:15) contend that by looking at the
differences in the speech of successive generations the linguist can determine whether a
variable is spreading or receding in the community. Hence, according to them, “descriptive
terms like „old‟, „modern‟, or „contemporary‟ English do not, then, refer to exact periods of

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time but rather to progressive stages of development. These epithets are used as well to
categorize temporal varieties of other languages at quite different dates.”

Region: Linguistic variation according to region is most prominent at the level of phonetics
and phonology. Esser posits that it only takes a few spoken words to identify a speaker
representing one of the well-knowing varieties of pronunciation, e.g. American, Northern
English, Irish, Nigerian, London, etc. Gregory and Carroll (1978:16-17) identify regional
“accent” or dialect as one of the most readily recognizable of linguistic traits. They
distinguish accent from dialect thus “accent normally refers to articulatory and acoustic
features of language while dialect refers to the totality of lexical, grammatical and
phonological features. Dialect incorporates accent but remains distinct from it” (12). Esser
(1993:14-15) notes that lexical and grammatical features of regional variation is less
extensive and less obtrusive but recognises the well-known differences in orthography,
lexemes and grammar in British and American English.

Social group: Gregory and Carroll (1978:18) argue that as time and physical
(regional/geographical) dimensions are reflected in language, so too is social “space.” This
they referred to as social dialect while Crystal and Davy (1969: 67) call it class dialect. The
argument is that the acquisition of a given social dialect depends on one‟s membership in a
class which may be determined by birth, education, profession, wealth, race or religion
(Gregory & Carroll, 1978). Thus, one‟s place in the social hierarchy reflects in the way one
speaks. Esser (1993:16) recalls that Quirk et al (1985) have a different distinction in mind in
terms of social dialect. For them the polarity between uneducated and educated speech is of
prime importance.

Intelligibility: Esser (1993:16) notes that the dimension of (mutual) intelligibility is used to
distinguish between a standard dialect (or standard language) and a non-standard dialect (or
non-standard language). According to Gregory and Carroll (1978:6) a standard dialect need
not have a simple or direct reference to the influence of particular social or geographical
provenances, nor is it just a matter of accent. They define the term standard dialect thus “the
term is needed to indicate, where that is appropriate, what has been called „the universal
form‟ of a language (Abercrombie,1955, p.11): that set of semantic, grammatical, lexical and
phonological patterns which enable certain users of English (for example) throughout the
English-speaking world to communicate intelligibly with each other.” Esser suggests that the
term standard dialect comes very close to the concept of “common core” (Quirk et al, 1985).

Individuality: Esser (1993:17) says the factor of individuality in a speaker/writer accounts

for his idiolect. Crystal and Davy (1969:66) identify the marks of individuality as those
permanent features of speech or writing that set a particular speaker or writer apart from
others. According to them “in unselfconscious utterance, certain features occur – relatively
permanent features of the speech or writing habits – which identify someone as a specific
person, distinguish him from other users of the same language, or the same variety of the
language. Such idiosyncratic features, not normally altering over quite long periods of time in
adults, would be such effects as those constituting a person‟s voice quality or handwriting,
which provide the basis of his recognisability.” Thus, the individual is characterized by his

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voice qualities and handwriting at the levels of phonic and graphic substance. Esser observes
that an idiolect is also specifiable as a particular configuration of all other dimensions of
linguistic variation that pertain to the speaker/writer such as time, region, social group, etc
besides the features of substance and frequency noted above.

Interference: The dimension of interference is responsible for a learner‟s dialect and such a
variety is as a result of interference from another language, usually the mother tongue. The
dimension of interference is also responsible for the traces of one language in bilingual
settings, where English is a second language as in Nigeria, India, Quebec, South Africa, and
Kenya.

Medium: This is chiefly concerned with the two kinds of variability in language: the
difference between speech and writing. Some of the differences between speech and writing
include the following: while speech usually implies face-to-face contact between the
addresser and addressee (unless in telephonic situation), writing is without such contact;
speech is relatively transient while writing is relatively permanent; speech is handled at the
phonetic/phonological level and writing at the graphetic/graphological level. There are
certain lexical and grammatical features that are regarded as typical of spoken English. They
include filled pauses like em, and phrases like sort of, you know, and I mean. Similarly, there
are grammatical constructions and typographic means that help to compensate the lack of
intonation in writing (Esser, 1993: 19). Crystal Davy (1969:69) also note the following about
the two modes of communication: no spoken varieties can be written in traditional
orthography so as to reflect all contrasts present in speech, and there are also many cases of
written language which it is impossible to speak without destroying the original graphetic
coherence of the text. A good example is the unpunctuated written legal text, which has to be
broken down into units if it is to be spoken aloud, though these units do not exist in the
graphic form. They contend that “substantial differences of this kind make the central
distinction between speech and writing a very relevant one in linguistics, with implication for
stylistics”(69) and therefore of crucial importance for the stylistician, just as it is for the
general linguist.

Participation in discourse: This dimension discriminates between monologue and dialogue.

Gregory and Carroll (1978:39) talk about this dimension in terms of the important difference
between conversing and monologuing. Conversing, they observe, is characterized by the
possibility of spontaneous interchange between two or more people, which is not permitted in
monologuing. The constraints of space will not allow us to discuss in great detail the features
of conversation and monologue but Esser (1993:22) suggests that the absence of the
addressee in monologue (other than on stage) has general stylistic consequences.

Explicitness: Gregory and Carroll (1978:80) discuss the factor of explicitness under the
general theory of code. According to them “code determines the meaning potential of the
individual...The social system determines the entire range of meanings available to the
community. Code can be seen to embody a range of meanings access to which is determined
by the place the individual occupies in the social structure. Code controls the verbal
repertoire of the individual, his capacity to encode meaning lexically and grammatically.

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Code therefore determines which options will be selected as appropriate to the given
situation.” Gregory and Carroll‟s theory is based on Bernstein‟s classification of meaning
into universalistic and particularistic meanings. Universalistic meaning is expressed if the
addresser does not assume that the addressee shares the meaning (the text can be universally
understood) while particularistic meaning is expressed if the addresser assumes that the
meaning is shared (the text cannot be universally understood). The former therefore tends to
be individuated and personal while the latter tends to be „public‟ meaning. Universalistic
meaning is employed in elaborated code, particularistic meaning in a restricted code. Esser
(1993:24) concludes that a restricted code (or perhaps: non autonomous style) is likely to co-
occur with the features spoken and informal (familiar) and an elaborated code (autonomous
style) with the features written and formal.

Attitude: This dimension of linguistic variation is chiefly concerned with the social
relationship between the addresser and the addressee. Gregory and Carroll (1978:51) call this
personal tenor. Attitude has to do with how we say something. Esser (1993:24) notes that our
attitude (personal tenor) is usually marked in thanks: Thank you kindly is different from
Thanks. Attitude helps us to know whether an expression is formal or informal. Quirk et al (in
Esser, 1993:25) suggest there is a gradient in attitude between formal and informal. Thus, this
scale is termed: very formal; FORMAL; neutral; INFORMAL; and very informal. Quirk and
his co-authors however regard the label formal and informal as most important for their
description. While formal style is generally characterized as relatively stiff, cold, polite, and
impersonal, informal style is relatively relaxed, warm, rude, and friendly. Esser, relying on
Short and Svartvik (1975), observes that there are grammatical constructions that are typical
of formal, informal, polite and familiar styles. Esser says that many linguistic forms that are
classified as formal are at the same time typical of written such as statue drafting (which
belongs to the domain of law) whereas a football commentary on radio is bound to be
informal.

Field of discourse: This refers to what the speaker/writer wants to communicate. To

Gregory/Carroll and Crystal /Davy, field of discourse is more than subject matter. Gregory
and Carroll (1978:7) perceive it as “the consequence of the user‟s purposive role, what his
language is „about‟, what experience he is verbalizing, what is „going on‟ through language.
This includes, of course, topic and subject matter and reflects Gardiner‟s point (1932:p.98)
that speech events participants are revealing „an intelligible purpose.‟” Thus, field of
discourse covers both communicative purpose and subject matter. Crystal and Davy
(1969:71) discuss the importance of the kind of occupational or professional activity being
engaged in and maintain that it is difficult to pin down the number and the quality of fields of
discourse (providences). They identify public worship, advertising, science and law as
relevant categories for fields of discourse, while Quirk et al (1985: 24) have literary, legal,
religious, learned, scientific, technical, instructional, journalistic and bureaucratic fields of
discourse (Esser, 1993:27-28).

Intention: Gregory and Carroll describe this dimension of variation as functional tenor but
Esser prefers to use the term intention for the same linguistic category because, according to
him, it makes it “more obvious that we are now dealing with speech acts” (29). Gregory and

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Carroll (1978:53) say “functional tenor is the category used to describe what language is
being used for in the situation. Is the speaker trying to persuade? to exhort? to discipline?
Language can be used for these purposes and many others...An advertisement is by definition
an attempt to persuade through both linguistic and visual means. The tenor of persuasion
defines the generic structure of „the ad‟, as the sermon is designed to exhort and to teach.”
Esser describes these categories as classical examples of speech acts.

Appropriateness of form to purpose: This dimension of linguistic variation belongs to what

Crystal and Davy (1969:74-76) describe under the title of modality. They contend that this
dimension has not usually been systematically distinguished in stylistic discussion. They
define the category as follows: “In it we describe those linguistic features correlatable with
the specific purpose of an utterance which has led the user to adopt one feature or set of
features rather than another, and ultimately to produce an overall, conventionalized spoken or
written format for his language, which may be given a descriptive label” (74). Esser
(1993:30) explains this to mean that the speaker/writer has to choose the appropriate medium
and format to communicate a given state of affairs or subject matter. According to him “to
communicate a given state of affairs (subject matter) in the written medium one can choose a
letter, postcard, a telegram or a memo. These require overall, conventionalized formats,
which are sometimes also thought of as text-types and which are related to the notion of
appropriateness.” Other formats identified by Crystal and Davy include lecture, report, essay,
monograph, textbook. Also genre distinctions like poetry, prose, short story, etc are seen as
modality distinctions. In all, the writer must ensure the format is appropriate to the purpose,
that is, suitable to the subject matter. For example, it is inappropriate to place a letter of
complaint in a postcard format or poetry in a drama format, etc.

Functional Stylistics

Functional styles, according to Esser (1993:32), belong to the category of objective style in
Prague-School terminology. Objective style recognizes the recurrence of situational factors
that have led to norms in certain areas of communication and thus opposed to individual style.
Esser regards the classic distinction between poetic and prose language – a distinction which
goes back to Aristotle and was confirmed by Wilhelm von Humboldt, as the forerunner of
functional stylistic differentiation. This distinction proceeds from the assumption or general
dictum that “form follows function” (the ends- and- means model). Esser sees Havránek‟s
1932 (translated and edited in 1964 by Garvin) influential article on the functional
differentiation of standard language as a positive statement in the study of functional
stylistics. In fact, Esser describes Havránek, a member of the Prague School, as “one
important authority in functional stylistics” (33). Havránek describes the difference between
standard language and folk speech and recognizes the four functions of standard language on
the basis of three general stylistic devices: intellectualization, automatization, and
foregrounding. Esser (1993:34) describes these as functional goals that determine the choice
of concrete linguistic entities such as the pronunciation of a word, a lexical item or a syntactic
construction. Havránek explains the three terms as follows: “By the intellectualization of
standard language, which we also call its rationalization, we understand its adaptation to the
goal of making possible precise and rigorous, if necessary abstract, statements, capable of

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expressing the continuity and complexity of thought, that is, to reinforce the intellectual side
of speech.” Intellectualization manifests itself more clearly in scientific language. According
to Havránek; “By automatization we thus mean such a use of the devices of the language, in
isolation or in combination with each other, as is usual for certain expressive purpose, that is,
such a use that the expression itself does not attract any attention” and “By foregrounding, on
the other hand, we mean the use of the devices of the language in such a way that this use
itself attracts attention and is perceived as uncommon, as deprived of automatization, as
deautomatized, such as a live poetic metaphor (as opposed to a lexicalized one, which is
automatized.” The devices of automatization and foregrounding work in a complementary
fashion (Esser, 1993: 35). The distinction between the two echoes, in fact, reflects the old
bipartition of prosaic and poetic language. Everyday communication is determined to a high
degree by automatization, particularly in the case of phatic communion where language has
the function of maintaining contact with the communication partner. The theory of
foregrounding has been widely accepted, particularly in the area of poetic language. Thus,
foregrounding has become the central concept in a functional poetic theory. Esser contends
that foregrounding may be regarded as a sideline of functional stylistics which narrows its
interest down to the definition and description of poetic language. Ian Mukarovsky and
Roman Jakobson are the two most important representatives of the theory. While
Mukarovsky was interested in the interpretation of poetic and standard language Jakobson
was interested in demonstrating that in a general framework of six language functions
(emotive, referential, conative, phatic, metalingual, poetic) the nature of poetic language
could be explained by one relatively simple principle, that is, parallelism of linguistic forms
and structures. It operates on equivalences of sound, stress, rhythm, images, syntactic
structures, etc.

Registers

Gregory and Carroll (1978:64) inform that contextual categories produce the text varieties
called register. They describe it as a useful abstraction linking variations of language to
variations of social context. The theory of stylistic registers is conceptually similar to the
theory of functional stylistics but it belongs to a different tradition. Registers, according to
Esser (1993:38), are a speciality of British linguistics, proponents of which are sometimes
called Neo-Firthians. John Rupert Firth, regarded as the father of British contextualism,
inspired by the anthropological works of Bronislaw Malinowski, argues that the social
context must be taken into account in the understanding of meaning. Therefore, meaning
cannot be restricted to information from the words but also from the context provided in a
given situation. The notion of “context of situation” was coined by Malinowski to explain the
interdependence of linguistic and situational phenomena in the study of meaning. Malinowski
and Firth however part ways in their approach to situation, for while the former had in mind
individual situations the latter abstracted from single situations to arrive at situation types. It
was Halliday, McIntosh and Strevens (1964) who later proposed and developed a linguistic
model to account for Firth‟s idea that language events could be classified as abstractions.
They distinguished three types of linguistic patterning that are dealt with at three distinct
levels of description: substance, form, and context. The notion of “internal patterning”

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(form) is complemented by the notion of “external patterning” (context). Halliday, McIntosh

and Strevens further distinguish language variation according to user and to use. While the
first is called dialect, the second is called register. Variation according to use may change
functionally from situation to situation. They further worked out a descriptive system of
register based on the classification of situation: field of discourse, mode of discourse and
style of discourse. These three distinctions correspond roughly to the three dimensions of
linguistic variation discussed in 5.1 above: field of discourse, medium, and attitude. Esser
(1993:41) contends that on the whole, the register dimensions of Halliday/McIntosh/Strevens
are not sharply defined. Consequently, the register approach developed by Halliday et al has
been modified by various scholars. Halliday (1978) later came up with a triad field, tenor
(replacing style) and mode which correlate with ideational (experiential & logical),
interpersonal and textual metafunctions of language.

Text-Types

Esser (1993:43) recalls that the notion of text-type has been used to describe the stylistic
diversity of texts. This notion has some relevance in everyday language. Thus, as language
users we have the competence to classify texts according to certain features. This competence
is, however, based on intuitive deductions which have to be made explicit in linguistic
theories, especially textlinguistic theories. Esser argues that due to the different approaches of
the textlinguistic models text-types can be understood and defined in various ways: it is, like
style, a notational term. Longacre (1976) offers a broad taxonomy which distinguishes four
kinds of deep structure genre: narrative, procedural, expository, and hortatory (behavioral)
discourses. It is claimed that these genres are universal. They are not language specific and
not necessarily tied to specific surface forms. Longacre also perceives four classificatory
dimensions that are implied by the four fold typology: person, orientation, time, and type of
linkage. Thus, it is therefore possible to characterize the four genres with respect to these
dimensions. Smith (1985) modified Longacre‟s genres which were impressionistically
classified by the speech act functions of the texts, in terms of “text-type clauses”. Smith
discovered that the attribution of genre labels in terms of speech act types (i.e functional
classification) is not necessarily linked to the surface structures realization of the deep
structure dimensions or to the deep structure dimensions at all. Smith therefore introduced the
notion of discourse framework to accommodate these facts. Discourse frames, Esser argues,
determine how a writer intends his whole text or part of it to function in a given situation.
Smith was able to demonstrate that text-types (i.e narrative, procedural, behavioral, and
expository discourses) may be characterized at the highest level by abstract performative
verbs and that given text-types may have embedded in them different text-types. Thus, a text
may be classified as a narrative and yet have its overall purpose encoded in expository
discourse.

Werlich (1976) has a classification of text-types that is similar to Longacre‟s. He

relates his five text-types to general cognitive procedures: description (perception in space);
narration (perception in time); exposition (comprehension); argumentation (judging); and
instruction (planning). This model provides that each text-type has a certain number of
subclasses called text forms and the text forms in turn have subclasses called text form

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variants. van Dijk (1980) proposed a different approach to text-types which postulates that
some text have a superstructure which determines the structure and the type of text
irrespective of its content or theme. Thus, the recounting of a burglary can have different
shapes: a story told or written to friends, a police report or an assessment of the damage for
an insurance company. He defines the superstructure as follows: “A superstructure is a kind
of abstract schema which determines the global organization of a text and which consists of a
number of categories whose possible combinations are based on conventional rules” (in
Esser, 1993: 48). van Dijk (in Esser, 1993: 48) further illustrates the superstructure thus:
Important categories for the text-type narrative are complication and resolution. Every
narrative deals with actions performed by people and these actions must be somehow
interesting in order to be worthwhile telling. The interesting point is usually a kind of
complication that has to be resolved by the protagonist. Complication and resolution form the
kernel of an everyday narrative; this kernel is termed event. Events take place in settings;
events and settings form episodes. Events and episodes make up a plot. The plot may be
evaluated; thus plot and evaluation constitute a story. The story may have a moral; story and
moral are the immediate constituents of a narrative. van Dijk does not claim that all text-types
are definable in terms of superstructure. For example, the macrostructure (semantic
invariable) of the text-type invitation is more important than the superstructure.

Norm and Deviation

The notion of style as deviation is generally associated with Russian Formalism, which was
one of the sources of functional stylistics. The formalists proposed to conceive literature
chiefly in terms of deviance from norm. We noted in 5.2 above that the notion of deviation is
principally associated with Ian Mukarovsky and Roman Jakobson. Mukarovsky‟s theory
explored the interplay of poetic language and the standard language. For him, the essence of
poetic language lies in the violations of the norms of the standard language. Similarly as with
Jakobson‟s definition of the poetic language, the interest is in the linguistic sign itself. But
while Jakobson stresses parallelism, Mukarovsky emphasizes the violation of rules (Esser,
1993:56).

Generative Approaches

The generative approach to stylistic analysis is derived from the theory of generative
transformational grammar. As Esser (1993:60) observes, it is in particular the optional,
stylistic transformations, which allow for alternative formulations, that have interested
stylisticians. Richard Ohmann‟s article “Generative Grammars and the Concept of Literary
Style” (1964) is regarded as the most influential work which has led to both criticism and
further development of this approach. In the article, Ohmann lays the theoretical foundation
and gives instructive examples of the generative approach to stylistic analysis. Working
within the tenets of generative grammar this approach subscribes to the dichotomy of form
and content. Generative grammar discriminates between surface structure (form) and deep
structure (content) hence sentences with the same basic meaning can be expressed by
different surface structures. Leech and Short (1981:15) opine that there is a strong tradition
which restricts style to those choices which are of MANNER rather than MATTER, of

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EXPRESSION rather than CONTENT. This approach perceives style a “way of writing” or a
“mode of expression.” The linguistic approach that recognizes the dichotomy of form and
content (meaning) is called dualism while the one that assumes the opposite is known as
monism. As Esser (1993:61) puts it “whereas in dualism the choices of expression (style) are
more or less independent of choices of content, in monism choices of expression are always
choices of content.” The theoretical approach chosen by Ohmann favours dualism against
monism, that is, privileges form over content (meaning). However, the New Critics favour
monism, that is, the identity of style and meaning. According to Leech and Short (1981:25)
“Monism, with its rejection of the form-meaning dichotomy, was a tenet of the New Critics.”
Leech and Short (1981:26) however call for an “accommodation between dualism and
monism rather than the rejection of one in favour of the other.” It is pertinent at this point to
mention that the form and content controversy predates both Ohmann and the New Critics. It
takes us back to the beginnings of literary theory - to Aristotle and Plato. The controversy,
according to Leech and Short (1981:15) has not yet been settled.

Transformations enable one to state the formal relations between alternative

constructions. The act of writing obviously involves the act of making choices of verbal
formulations by the writer. Esser therefore argues that this aspect can be modelled within a
generative framework. Ohmann however points out that the purpose of stylistic analysis is
not necessarily to apply the whole technical apparatus that is normally associated with
transformations in generative grammar. He contends that the analyst of style does not
generate sentences, rather, he takes given sentences and reduces them to kernel sentences by
undoing the transformations that have led to a given sentence (Esser, 1993:62). Ohmann
applied the generative approach in the analysis of Faulkner‟s “The Bear” and Hemingway‟s
short story “Soldier‟s Home.”

Quantitative Methods

Esser (1993:69) notes that many linguists and laymen alike implicitly consider quantitative or
statistical aspects as being essential in their conception of style. Several scholars have
attempted to clarify the relation between “ordinary” linguistic methods and quantitative
methods. Esser (1993:70) quotes Reed‟s (1949) description of both concepts thus:
“Quantitative analysis is a body of methods by means of which the nature and variety of
given phenomena are observed and classified. Quantitative analysis is a body of methods by
means of which the magnitude and frequency of such phenomena are observed and
classified....” while “Linguistic analysis, as ordinarily performed at present, tends to be
largely qualitative: the descriptive techniques of phonetics, phonemics, morphology, and
syntax aim generally to analyze the nature and variety of linguistic phenomenon rather than
magnitude and frequency of such phenomenon.” One can say that qualitative analysis
corresponds to categorical and deterministic statements and quantitative analysis to statistical
and probabilistic state. The linguist Dolezel sees style as a probabilistic concept. Esser
(1993:71) opines that if stylistics is associated with statistical and probabilistic statements it
must then be stressed that these quantitative aspects relate mainly to linguistic forms and not
to semantic units. This however does not mean that semantic units like figures of speech and

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speech acts cannot be counted. But linguists adopting qualitative approaches are usually more
comfortable with linguistic forms.

Esser uses the terminological pairs universal linguistic statistics vs differential

linguistic statistics (terms coined by Enkvist, 1973) to discriminate between language-bound
or even universal statistics and a statistics that is amenable to stylistic analysis. The former
pertains to general statistical observations which appear to be properties of natural human
languages while differential linguistic studies are always concerned with comparison. The
comparison is between a text or a group of texts and another text or group of texts, the latter
sometimes being regarded as a norm. Esser further notes that quantitative analyses of style
can be and were carried out with different purposes, on different linguistic units and with
different methods. Instances of the three parameters, purpose, linguistic unit, method, can of
course be combined. Some of the methods of counting and of statistical treatment identified
by Esser include the counting of linguistic units such as syllables, words, phrases, clauses,
and sentences. Thus the length of words may be counted in terms of letters or syllables, the
length of clauses, in terms of words and phrases, the length of sentences in terms of words or
phrases. Esser contends that the more advanced studies use or develop statistical methods
which make judgements more reliable rather engage in simple establishment of the frequency
of linguistic units or of their length. Esser (1993) provides ample illustrations of several
stylostatistic investigations and methods, and their findings. He claims the methods are such
that they can be used without prior training in statistics.

Doing Stylistics

This part of the study provides a practical example of a stylistic analysis of texts. The
analyses of the stylistic elements in the texts are not exhaustive, therefore, the reader is
encouraged to identify and analyse other features that may not have been account for by the
analyst.

Ex.1:

...in order to identify the real challenges we need to confront in order to lead a revolution
which is in reality a call for us all to take up intellectual arms in waging war against the
forces arrayed against the black race.....the realities of the issues that stare us in the
face...situate the stark realities confronting the black race. The black race seems to be
racing unconsciously towards extinction (Bishop David Oyedepo. p.2)

Our main interest is in the author‟s deployment of the resources of foregrounding.

Martin and Rose (2003:214) observe that the key things to look for when selecting analyses
are foregrounding and co-articulation. We shall examine how the linguistic resource of
foregrounding enhances the realization of textual and ideational cohesion in the text under
study. Foregrounding is defined as “the tendency for texts to make some meanings stand out

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against others” (Martin & Rose, 2003:214). Foregrounding gives prominence to certain
lexical items or expressions. In the speaker‟s keynote address entitled: “Leading a revolution
in education towards the restoration of the dignity of the black race” we find foregrounding
as a major stylistic device. The text shows prominence being given to certain entities that the
speaker considers worthy of attention. These items are graphologically designed (and/or
foregrounded) in bold prints. Ideationally, he wants his readers/listeners to pay close attention
to the “realities” that “confront” the “black race”. Note the use of the verbal noun “racing” as
an ideational grammatical metaphor to foreground the threat facing the black race. The
highlighting of some key words and phrases like real/reality/realities; challenges/issues;
confront/confronting/stare us in the face; the black race/racing; revolution/arms/waging
war/forces underscore the urgency for intervention to save the black race from extinction.
The items, in their morphological and syntactic variants, tie in their sameness of meaning and
foreground the speaker‟s rhetoric about the social situation in Africa. It is also significant to
mention that most of these items are extracted from the domain of war and social conflict.
This reveals the speaker/writer‟s anxiety about the social conditions of the African nation.

Ex 2:

Who knows the destination of a dream? How many worlds do we live in at the same time?
When we sleep do we wake up in another world, in another time? When we sleep in that
other world do we wake up here, in this world? Is history the converging dreams of many
millions of people, living and dead? Have I just died and am I now living in another zone?
Are we asleep all the time? When we wake, is it to one level above the deep sleep of our
days? Do we wake when we die? (Ben Okri, Infinite Riches, p.6)

Except for the first two questions, the rest elicit a declarative Yes/No response from the
addressee. The dominant linguistic feature of the text is the use of interrogatives (rhetorical
questions). The rhetorical nature of the questions reveals the speaker does not really expect
an answer from the addressee (who seems to reside outside the situational context of the
discourse) to but uses the rhetorical mode to express his fears and worries about human
existence. The questions simply mirror the speaker‟s state of mind on the mystery of
existence and the decay in his society. The speaker is appealing to the emotions of the
reader/listener to understand the nature of his society; to reason along with him on the unique
existential realities of his society. Also stylistically significant is the speaker‟s shift from the
use of first-person plural pronoun “we” to its singular form “I” in the same discourse context.

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It is not clear why he chose to exclude himself or break away from membership of the
reference class or group on behalf of whom he seems to be speaking, to express personal
experiences within a group experience. However, it can be inferred from the narrative that the
“I” experience is a constituent or token of the group [“we”] experience which the speaker
shares with other members of the group. Thus, the personal pronoun “I” expresses the attitude
and feelings of an individual within a collective experience, feeling and attitude.

Conclusion

A stylistic study of texts enables the analyst to account for instances of variation in language
use by a writer or the linguistic choices made by the writer in the process of creating
meaning. The peculiar way a writer uses language to achieve an intended effect is known as
his or her style. Style in writing results from the recurrent choices the writer makes. The
recurrent choices made by the writer reflect his or her subconscious habits of regularly
choosing one linguistic form over others to express the same content. The linguistic choices
open to the writer are of two types: variation within a norm and deviation from a norm.
While variation within a norm refers to grammatical choices made by the writer that can be
regarded as generally “correct” and acceptable, deviation from a norm refers to choices that
are ungrammatical and unacceptable or incorrect. Thus, the analyst should pay attention to
instances of language use by the writer which may be studied as variation within a norm or as
deviation from a norm, and the intended effect the writer wants to achieve within the
discourse context.

References and Further Reading

Bradford, R. (1997). Stylistics. London: Routledge.

Chatman, S. (1971). Ed. Literary Style: A Symposium. London: Oxford University Press.

Crystal, D. and Davy, D. (1969). Investigating English Style. New York: Longman.

Devito, A.J. (1972). “Style and Stylistics: An Attempt at Definition.” In Contemporary

Rhetoric. D. Ehninger. Ed. Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Co.230-238.

Eco, U. (2004). On Literature. Orlando: Harvest-Harcourt, Inc .

Enkvist, E. N. (1964). “On Defining Style: An Essay on Applied Linguistics.” In Linguistics

and Style . J. Spencer. Ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.1-56.

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