Vulgarisms

coarse <special colloquial words> with a strong emotive meaning, mostly derogatory, normally avoided in polite conversation

e.g.: There is so much bad shit between the two gangs that I bet there will be more killings this year.

See: <slang>, <jargonisms>, <dialectical words>

Source:

dialectical words

such <special colloquial words> which

a) are normative and devoid of any stylistic meaning in regional dialects, but used outside of them, carry a strong flavour of the locality where they belong;

b) markedly differ on the phonemic level: one and the same phoneme is differently pronounced in each of them;

c) differ also on the lexical level, having their own names for locally existing phenomena and also supplying locally circulating synonyms for the words, accepted by the language in general.

e.g.: ”son of a bitch”, “whore”, “whorehound”

e.g.: A hut was all the (= the only) home he ever had.

e.g.: Mary sits aside (= beside) of her sister on the bus.

See: <slang>, <jargonisms>, <vulgarisms>.

lexical stylistic devices

lexical SDs

include: <metaphor>, <personification>; <metonymy>, <synecdoche>; <cluster SDs>; play on words, <irony>, <epithet>, <hyperbole>, <understatement>, <oxymoron>

See: <cluster SDs>, <syntactical SDs>, <lexico-syntactical SDs>, <stylistic device>

transference

act of name-exchange, of substitution of the existing names approved by long usage and fixed in dictionaries by new, occasional, individual ones, prompted by the speaker’s subjective original view and evaluation of things, for the name of one object is transferred onto another, proceeding from their similarity (of shape, colour, function, etc.), or closeness (of material existence, cause/effect, instrument/result, part/whole, etc.)

See: <metaphor>, <metonymy>

metaphor

<transference> of names based on the associated likeness between two objects, on the similarity of one feature common to two different entities, on possessing one common characteristic, on linguistic semantic nearness, on a common component in their semantic structures.

e.g.: ”pancake” for the “sun” (round, hot, yellow)

e.g.: ”silver dust” and “sequins” for “stars”

The expressiveness is promoted by the implicit simultaneous presence of images of both objects – the one which is actually named and the one which supplies its own “legal” name, while each one enters a phrase in the complexity of its other characteristics.

The wider is the gap between the associated objects the more striking and unexpected – the more expressive – is the metaphor.

e.g.: His voice was a dagger of corroded brass. (S.Lewis)

e.g.: They walked alone, two continents of experience and feeling, unable to communicate. (W.S.Gilbert)

See: <personification>, <simile>, <lexical SDs>

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personification

a <metaphor> that involves likeness between inanimate and animate objects (V.A.K)

e.g.: ”the face of London”, “the pain of ocean”

e.g.: Geneva, mother of the Red Cross, hostess of humanitarian congresses for the civilizing of warfare. (J.Reed)

e.g.: Notre Dame squats in the dusk.(E.Hemingway)

See: <synecdoche>, <lexical SDs>

sustained metaphor

prolonged metaphor

a group (cluster) of <metaphor>s, each supplying another feature of the described phenomenon to present an elaborated image

metonymy

<transference> of names based on contiguity (nearness), on extralinguistic, actually existing relations between the phenomena (objects), denoted by the words, on common grounds of existence in reality but different semantic

e.g.: ”cup” and “tea” in “Will you have another cup?”

e.g.: ”My brass will call your brass” (A.Heiley)

e.g.: Dinah, a slim, fresh, pale eighteen, was pliant and yet fragile.(C.Holmes)

See: <synecdoche>, <lexical SDs>

synecdoche

a <metonymy> based on the relations between the part and the whole

e.g.: He made his way through perfume and conversation. (I.Shaw)

e.g.: His mind was alert and people asked him to dinner not for old times’ sake, but because he was worth his salt.(S.Maugham)

See: <personification>, <lexical SDs>

cluster SDs

a small group (cluster) of SDs, which

a) operate on the same linguistic mechanism: namely, one word-form is deliberately used in two meanings;

b) have humorous effect, and

c) include: <pun> or <paronomasia>, <zeugma>, <violation of phraseological units>, <semantically false chains>, <nonsense of non-sequence>;

See: <lexical SDs>, <syntactical SDs>, <lexico-syntactical SDs>, <stylistic device>

Source:

pun

paronomasia

simultaneous realisation of two meanings through

a) misinterpretation of one speaker’s utterance by the other, which results in his remark dealing with a different meaning of the misinterpreted word or its homonym

e.g.: ”Have you been seeing any spirits?” “Or taking any?” – added Bob Allen. (Ch.Dickens) [com](The first “spirit” refers to supernatural forces the second one – to strong drinks)[/com]

b) speaker’s intended violation of the listener’s expectation

e.g.: There comes a period in every man’s life, but she is just a semicolon in his. (B.Evans) [com](a punctuation mark instead of an interval of time)[/com]

e.g.: There are two things I look for in a man. A sympathetic character and full lips.(I.Shaw)

Source:

See: <cluster SDs>

zeugma

a cluster SD, when a polysemantic verb that can be combined with nouns of most varying semantic groups is deliberately used with two of more homogeneous members, which are not connected semantically

e.g.: He took his hat and his leave. (Ch.Dickens)

e.g.: She went home, in a flood of tears and a sedan chair. (Ch.Dickens)

See: <semantically false chains>, <cluster SDs>

semantically false chains

a variation of <zeugma> when the number of homogeneous members, semantically disconnected, but attached to the same verb, increases

e.g.: A Governess wanted. Must possess knowledge of Roumanian, Russian, Italian, Spanish, German, Music and Mining Engineering. (S.Leacock)

e.g.: Men, pals, red plush seats, white marble tables, waiters in white aprons. Miss Moss walked through them all. (A.Milne)

See: <cluster SDs>