Emotional Constituent of Rhetorical Questions (Based on the Lyrics of English Songs)

Abstract

The article deals with rhetorical questions whose importance is evaluated, while interpreting the speaker’s psychological and emotional state. The author of the article offers theories about this grammatical unit, provided by foreign linguists. The theoretical aspects are supported with the examples from English songs of two long-plays A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships (2018) and Notes On A Conditional Form (2020), performed by the band The 1975. While writing lyrics, the author of the songs uses this or that type of rhetorical questions: the ones connected to the communicative function of preference (preference structure) or to the one of favour; either positive or negative rhetorical questions; or the questions starting with why question-word (wh-question). It is the diversity of emotions he wants to present to the audience that determines the author’s choice. Rhetorical questions help to realize the correlation of the author’s choice of a definite rhetorical question to the emotions of this very author.