Literary Pragmatics Research Articles

Tellability and politeness in ‘the miller's tale’: First steps in literary pragmatics

Tellability and politeness in ‘the miller's tale’: First steps in literary pragmatics

Foregrounding norms and ironic communication

Researchers in literary theory, linguistic pragmatics, and rhetoric have identified three principal communicative functions of irony: (1) to give emphasis or reinforcement to the values of a friendly listener, (2) to attack or ridicule the values of an hostile or unsuspecting listener, and (3) to undermine an opponent's intellectual position. This essay goes further by (7) arguing that a process called the “foregrounding of norms” is crucial to ironic comprehension and (2) arguing that differences among these three ironic outcomes owe to differences in the target audience's personal relation to these norms as well as to the type of norms foregrounded.

T. S. Eliot and the Victorians

Previous articleNext article No AccessT. S. Eliot and the VictoriansCarol T. ChristCarol T. Christ Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Modern Philology Volume 79, Number 2Nov., 1981 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/391116 Views: 6Total views on this site Citations: 3Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1981 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Roger D. Sell A Humanizing Literary Pragmatics, 10 (Oct 2019).https://doi.org/10.1075/fillm.10Anna Budziak T. S. Eliot's "La Figlia Che Piange" and the tradition of decadent aestheticism, Brno Studies in English 40, no.22 (Jan 2014): 27–45.https://doi.org/10.5817/BSE2014-2-2Cory Bieman Davies “Natural Evolution” in “Dramatic Essences” from Robert Browning to T. S. Eliot, Browning Institute Studies 11 (Oct 2008): 23–37.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0092472500001413