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with those other constituents of contemporary discipline of humanities such as linguistics.
Rhetoric provides us with means and practical explanations of the devices for which language enables us to perform the various tasks of persuading, convincing, and arguing.
In an ideal world, according to Aristotle, the rhetorician will know the truth; by employing rhetoric, or linguistic strategies at his disposal as means of disclosing the truth. Plato, on the other hand, viewed rhetoric as a weapon used to bring the listener into line with the tune of argument; ‘… which happens to satisfy interests or personal affiliations of the speakers, neither of which will necessarily correspond with the truth’
(Bradford, 1997: 5).
It is argued that, Ferdinand de Saussure’s in-depth studies in linguistics in the 20th century, for which rhetoric served as a base, greatly influenced the basis for modern ideas about language and reality. Saussure’s most quoted and influential proposition concerns his distinction between the ‘signified’ and the ‘signifier’; a pronouncement to demonstrate that in language there are only differences without positive terms; the
‘signifier’ is the concrete linguistic sign [spoken or written], and the ‘signified’ as the concept represented by ‘sign’. A third element which is the ‘referent’; the pre-linguistic object or condition stands beyond the ‘signifier-signified’ relationship (Bradford, 1997:
8).
Later in the 1960’s, literary studies at this period evolved a much broader networks of inter-disciplinary practices such as structuralism, post-structuralism, feminist criticism among others, which have contributed immensely to the present character of modern literary criticism; with each drawing its methodologies and expectations from intellectual fields beyond the traditional enclosed realms of rhetoric and aesthetics. And of all these movements that benefitted from these developments, New Criticism is said to be the most obvious inheritors of the discipline of rhetoric. It is claimed to have maintained a belief in the empirical differences of literature and other types of languages, and have attempted to specify this disparity in terms of style and effect.
The fissure of linguistic studies with analysis of literature has proven to be a very useful exercise in modern times. Though linguistics cannot supply a complete machinery to account for specific qualities of literature, it has, however provided the means for describing literary works based on the general linguistic theory, and therefore relates the text as a complex whole in which it is written (Sebeok, 1971). Though modern linguistics is claimed to be full of conflicting theories, yet most modern linguistic models, from
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Saussure onwards, offer a fuller and coherent account of how language operates more than traditional grammar ever did; consequently, providing possibilities of describing the textual qualities of literary discourses far more accurate than it was achievable with the application of principles from traditional grammar and metaphorical criticisms of texts (Jefferson and Robey, 1988) ; making the study of style relevant in literature.
In spite of the fact that there are various definitions of stylistics, literary analysts like Bradford (1997), Verdonk (2003), Dada (2003), and Osundare (2008) are of the opinion that all these definitions have provided explanations that, stylistics is simply the study of style; the study is concerned with the choice and use of linguistic elements in literary discourses. Stylistics is therefore a discipline which is concerned with the analysis of the various linguistic properties that constitute the texture of texts.
Apparently, the aim of stylistic analysis is usually for the purpose of extrication of the various linguistic qualities in the texture of discourses. What is of interest in these linguistic descriptions is the extraction of the various principles capable of explaining particular linguistic choices in the textual networks of discourses.
Furthermore, Bradford (1997) is of the opinion that the subject matter of stylistics consists of two basic categories which he classifies as textual and contextual. He contends further that, the formalists and the new critics are merely concerned with the textual aspects and consider the stylistic features in textures as being solely for the purpose of production of an empirical unity and completeness in texts. This implies that, for the formalists and the new critics, stylistics is only concerned with the analysis of how the various lexical and grammatical elements are deployed in the texture of texts. With this argument, therefore, textuality is considered as the literary quality that concerns only with how the linguistic properties functions in the texture of discourses.
The aspects of context, on the other hand, involves a far more loose and disparate collection of methods. The concern of this mode of analysis is to demonstrate the influence context exerts on the texture of the texts. Bradford (1997) is of the opinion that, the unifying characteristics feature of a literary discourse is its dependence on the relationship existing between the text and the context. These arguments have added weight to Verdonk’s (2003), Dada’s (2004), and Osundare’s (2008) explanations of the relationship existing between style and context. Verdonk (2003), in particular, poignantly points out that style does not arise in a vacuum; but that its production, purposes, and
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effects are deeply embedded in a particular context in which both the writer and the reader play distinctive roles in the realisation of a particular brand of style.
Since style does not arise in a vacuum, stylistics explores the various linguistic complexes in the texture that determines the range of influences the context exerts on the choice of linguistic elements that constitute texture of texts. These choices, invariably, affects the textual quality of the literary discourse. Style is built with language; and language, which is the heart of social action, is determined by the context. As a result, style is influenced by these socio-cultural indices which are transmitted through language. Stylistic analysis is used to unravel these linguistic intricacies and provide for other possible interpretations of the lexical and grammatical networks in literary discourses. This means that with stylistic analysis, the textual qualities of a literary discourse are overtly revealed. However, it is important to recognise that stylistics is not just about qualities of style alone but rather a detailed account of the intricate linguistic quality of literary discourses. An account of this nature, necessarily, highlights the various strategies which underline the textual networks of discourses.
Verdonk (2003), Dada (2004), and Osundare (2008) are of the opinion that, stylistics analysis depends so much on the analytical tools provided by linguistics, and that as the techniques for text analysis are becoming more sophisticated, there is also a corresponding growth in the investigative methods of operation and application of these linguistic principles in stylistics analysis of texts. This might have been the reason behind Ahmad’s (2010) assertion that there is a vast presence of techniques employed in stylistics other than those recognised in the literary cannon as analytical tools; though all of these techniques still rely heavily on the linguistic principles to analyse texts.
Apparently, as a result of the divergent networks of textures, stylistics is now being considered as the study of linguistic systems, in discourses, whose networks situate language in a context, and tries to establish principles capable of accounting for the particular choices made by individuals and social groups in their use of typical forms of language (Fowler, 1960). As a result, stylistics analysis is now meant not only to establish the linguistic networks but as part of understanding of the probable meanings in the texture of texts (Coulthard, 1985; Fairclough, 1992; and Ahmad, 2010). Stylistics is, therefore, not only about the linguistic networks in the texture of texts but an analytical means which uses insights from linguistics to account for how the lexical and
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grammatical elements employed in texts are discursive means to project various aspects of social realities in the texture of such texts.