Lecture 2. General notes of functional styles (fss) as a field of stylistic investigation

OUTLINE

1. Functional Styles

2. Literary fSs Classification

3. Varieties Of Language

1. Functional Styles

The types of texts that are distinguished by their pragmatic aspect of communication are called functional styles of language (FS)/ discourses/registers.

Being the second field of investigation, FSs touch upon the following linguistic issues: oral and written varieties of language, the notion of literary (standard) language, the constituents of texts larger than a sentence, the generative aspect of literary texts, etc.

A FS/discourse/register of a language is a system of interrelated language means which serves a different aim in communication. It is thus to be regarded as the product of a certain task set by the sender of a message (I. Galperin).

Func­tional styles appear mainly in the literary standard of a language. The literary standard of the English language is not homogeneous. It has fallen into several subsystems each of which has acquired its own peculiarities which are typical of the given functional style.

Functional styles are differentiated according to the function of communication. Every functional style has its own primary object to pursue: to convey some information, to affect the feeling and mentality of the audience, to create a poetic work. Different linguistic situations demand different means of their realization. Accordingly functional styles are roughly divided into literary and colloquial.

2. Literary fSs Classification

Among literary styles most scholars single out belle-lettres (poetry, emotive prose, drama), publicistic literature, scientific prose, official documents and newspaper functional styles.

The belle-lettres style has the following sub-styles: poetic style, style of emotive prose, drama style. Poetic substyle stands apart due to its poetic form. Formal stanza arrangement with a definite measure and rhyming pattern is its obvious differentiating feature. Besides, poetic style is characterized by its poetic diction, the wealth of imagery and syntactical expressiveness. Poetry is an original and unique method of communication that we use to express our thoughts, feelings and experiences.

The publicistic FS comprises the following sub-styles: the language style of oratory; the language style of essays; the language style of feature articles in newspapers and journals.

Scientific prose. The primary function of this style is informative. Its object is to report the results of a scientific research, to describe new concepts in various spheres of knowledge. The text is logical and coherent, unemotional and impartial. All means of emotional expressiveness are avoided. Syntactical structure of sentences is complete, terms are used for the chosen field of research. Here we have the following divisions: the language style of humanitarian, "exact" sciences and of popular scientific prose.

Official style is the style of official documents. It is so conservative that words, structures and formulas used for decades are still preserved in official documents. The text is formalized and regulated by strictly observed rules. There are the following substyles within it: the language style of diplomatic, business and military documents.

Newspaper style is found in newspapers. But newspaper articles are so diverse in character that not all of them come under “newspaper style”. Since newspapers are mass media their primary function is to inform the reader. The informative material includes newspaper headlines, brief news items, press reports, advertisements and announcements.

a) Newspaper headlines aim at attracting attention to certain events or facts. Since newspapers are usually looked through in a hurry headlines help to find items of interest. They can outline the event, evaluate it or treat it ironically. They can attract by picking out the most intriguing sentence or mystifying the reader by a hint. E.g. Sarkozy vs. Ryanair.

 b) Brief news items inform the reader without any comment. The event is presented in a matter-of-fact unemotional way. French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his girlfriend Carla Bruni are suing low-cost airline Ryanair over a picture of the couple it used in an advert.

c) Press reports include analytical material, editorials, articles and press reviews of known public figures and journalists. Since they seek to influence public opinion they abound in words and phrases of evaluative connotation.

d) Advertisements and announcements are not purely informative, their main aim is to attract the eye of the reader, get hold of the listener, to grip his/her attention, then to inform about the product in a convincing way.

The signs of difference between FSs are sometimes almost vague between poetry and emotive prose, between newspaper and publicistic FSs, a scientific article and an essay.