IS THERE A “COOKING GUIDE” TO IRONY? (evidence from Russian and Italian)
Author:
Viacheslav B. Kashkin, Ksenia M. Shilikhina
Affiliation:
Voronezh State University
Abstract:
The aim of the paper is to offer a dynamic model of verbal irony and to elucidate the creation and understanding of irony in discourse. The paper starts with a discussion of two approaches to verbal irony – extensional and intensional. Extensional approach underlies the majority of modern linguistic theories of irony. However, as it focuses mainly on non-unified manifestations of irony, it cannot offer an overarching framework for ironic discourse. In contrast, intensional approach focuses on those components that unite all varieties under a cover term of "irony". The authors propose an intensional model of irony that includes the following components: deliberate incoherence (which means breaking the semantic or pragmatic unity of the informational flow), deontic appraisal and the non-bona fide mode of communication. In the second part of the paper we give special attention to the concept of in-tended incoherence. Fauconnier and Turner's theory of blending and conceptual integration is applied to ironic utterances to explain the emergence of incoherence. Intended incoherence alone, however, does not constitute irony. The two other characteristics of ironic discourse are deontic appraisal and non-bona fide behavior of the speaker. The third section of the paper discusses how these three features interact in the creation of irony. We illustrate the theoretical discussion by a range of examples from Russian and Italian mass-media and computer-mediated discourse.
Keywords:
verbal irony, conceptual integration, coherence, incoherence, deontic evaluation, non-bona fide mode of communication
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URL: http://esquire.ru/ed_letter-57
URL: http://twitter.com/kermlinrussia
Pages:
98-106
