LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 11 : 11 November 2011
ISSN 1930-2940

Managing Editor: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Editors: B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. A. Sharada, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         Lakhan Gusain, Ph.D.
         Jennifer Marie Bayer, Ph.D.
         S. M. Ravichandran, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         L. Ramamoorthy, Ph.D.

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Foregrounded Irregularities in T.S. Eliot’s The Hollow Men

Abdul Baseer, M.Phil. (English), Ph.D. (English) Candidate
Sofia Dildar Alvi, M.A. (English), MS
Fareha Zafran, M.A. (English)

Abstract

Poetic language as quite a discrete account of expression has been an old-age topic of debate and investigation. Most of the discussion in this field is carried out by literary critics. Literary stylistics, as it is thought to be a science, unlike conventional literary theory, studies the language of literature through maximally objective and non-intuitive standpoint. This approach employs the methodology of linguistics while analyzing and interpreting a piece of literature. This is a scientific study of style.

This paper focuses on the semantic and graphological deviations in the language of TS Eliot’s poem The Hollow Men. Eliot’s poetic art is much striking and fascinating, particularly in foregrounding. He deliberately omits punctuation marks, uses interesting parallel structures, makes use of semantically unconventional expressions, and some graphological pattern of irregularities. The researchers have tried to show all this Foregrounding by picking up some irregularities of Eliot’s poetic expression, hence tried to look at the poem through a literary stylistic perspective.

Key Words: Literary Stylistics, Foregrounding, Linguistic Deviations, TS Eliot, The Hollow Men, Semantic Deviations, Graphological Deviations.

Conceptual Framework

A piece of art diverges from the standard norms of language. An abstract painting for example, diverges from the established rules of art. Such a painting acts against the background of norms and it attracts in an extraordinary and unanticipated manner the curiosity and attention of the viewers. The viewers observe the artistic deviation as prominent from its background which comes into the foreground of their visual field. In the area of literature the linguistic deviation from the accepted norms of language is the foregrounded element against the background of normal language. Foregrounding is a translated term from Czech word ‘aktualisace’ (Malmkjær, 1991). Malmkjær (1991), while talking about Viktor Shklovsky’s idea about foregrounding, writes that among diverse functions of art, ‘defamiliarization’ is most striking.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Abdul Baseer, M.Phil. (English), Ph.D. (English) Candidate
International Islamic University, Islamabad, Pakistan

Lecturer in Linguistics
Government College University, Faisalabad
Pakistan
abdulbasseer@yahoo.com

Sofia Dildar Alvi, M.A. (English), MS (UMT, Lahore)
Lecturer in English
Government College University, Faisalabad
Pakistan
sofia.alvi@yahoo.com

Fareha Zafran, M.A. (English)
Bahauddin Zakariya University
Multan, Pakistan
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