Verbal Genres Research Articles

Многоликий жанр в концепции филолога В. С. Вахрушева

This article presents an interdisciplinary conception of genre proposed by the Russian philologist from Balashov, Professor Vladimir Serafimovich Vakhrushev. The feasibility of this task can be mainly seen in two aspects. First of all, Vakhrushev conceives genre as an ideal model generating versatile phenomena not only of discursive, but also of social, cultural, and historical processes. His broad understanding of genre can contribute to the comprehension of the specific speech genres, studied within the specific disciplines isolated so far by their primary tasks, as the elements of a coherent macro system “Genre – Text – Man – Society – Culture – Nature”. Within this macro system, the genres of verbal texts appear to be the structures similar to those of other types, existing elsewhere beyond the realm of art or everyday speech, namely, in nature, history and society. According to V. Vakhrushev, verbal genres and the genres of natural and sociohistorical phenomena share a number of intrinsic properties which are determined by the global ecological law of their adaptation to the ever-changing environment. Secondly, this publication is timed to coincide with Professor Vakhrushev’s 90th anniversary, which falls on September 2022, thus providing a motive for presenting his theoretical legacy to a wider community of linguists, literary scholars, cultural studies scholars, perhaps sociologists, historians, and natural scientists to engage them in a critical discussion. Researchers of speech genres and literary studies may be particularly interested in Vakhrushev’s phenomenological definition of genre and in the ways he is reasoning the isomorphism and the presence of analogies between text genres and the genres of other life forms, such as biology, daily social life and history.

Amazonian shamanic enquiry: formulaic composition and specialized discourse

AbstractThis article investigates the styles of enquiry involved in Lowland South American Amerindian shamanic and narrative discourse genres. The article argues in favour of the existence of an Amazonian mode of thinking strictly related to formulaic composition, commonly found in different verbal poetic genres and its contemporary transformations into written texts published as books by Amerindian researchers and narrators. Taking into account philosophical and anthropological discussions about speculative thinking, this study aims to revise the role of narrative verbal genres in Amerindian ethnology and its ontological backgrounds, as well as offering an alternative perspective on the contrast between writing and oral traditions. The article is based on translations of songs and testimonies collected among the Marubo of Western Amazonia.

Brazil: Roots of Popular Culture (experience of interpretations)

The roots of Brazilian folk culture have different forms, structure and history. These roots have been formed over a long period, they have intertwined and influenced one another. Authentic cultures (Indian tribes) and «newcomers» (African and European culture) have been interacting with one another in complex socio-political realities. Together these cultures have created a vivid aesthetic image of the country. The aesthetic principle is most clearly expressed in folklore, the forms of which are diverse and multifaceted. The culture of the people is dynamic; it speaks through folklore in a variety of verbal and non-verbal languages: plastic art, music, dance, folk crafts, national costumes, works of the verbal genre (fairy tales, epics, legends, myths, etc.). Folk culture defines the identity of society, it is reflected in the high aesthetics of professional visual art, music, literature and gradually enters into mass culture and show business. Modernism, the art trend of the early 20th century, became a vivid reflection of the folk features of Brazilian culture. Over time, the tendency to rely on folk national culture has intensified, affecting all aspects of society — from mass culture to social policy. The cultural construction of society in close interaction and cooperation with the folk tradition, the consolidation and renewal of tradition ultimately determine the mentality of the nation, the stability of its existence and self-preservation. The study of Brazilian folk culture opens up new horizons for those who yearn to understand the world of diversity and the world of beauty. The coexistence in a single space of the people of many traditions and aesthetic images that do not oppose, but complement each other, inspires historical optimism which is «colored» by our experience of interpreting the culture of Brazil.

Музыкально-фольклорные жанры свадьбы луговых мари

The traditional weddings of the Meadow Maris, known as süàn is a multiphase ritualistic complex consisting of various ritual actions extended in time and carried out in a definite succession of events. Many aspects of the Mari spiritual culture accumulated in them: the sacred-magical ritual elements, the symbolism of traditional clothes, food, poetry, music, and dance, as well as the semantics of ancient pagan thinking. The present article examines the folk music genres of the weddings of the Meadow Maris concisely specified in the wedding ritual and being a part of the acoustic code. The acoustic code of the Meadow Mari wedding is characterized by an unfolded system of intonational behavior of the participants of the ritual and includes verbal genres — prayers and expressions of good will pronounced by the kart(the priest); musical genres — the wedding songs süàn múro and pochésh múro, performed by the participants of the wedding procession, from the directions of the bridegroom and the bride, folk tunes played on ritual instruments — the shúvyr (bagpipe) and the túmyr (drum) strictly established in the structure of the ritual; and musical-choreographic genres presented by solo dances of the main characters of the ritual and mass dances of the participants of the wedding procession. The musical code of the traditional wedding of the Meadow Maris organically includes “corpora music”: sounding pendants on the wedding costumes of the female participants of the wedding processions, stamping in rhythm, clapping hands, exclamations, interjections, and whistling all carried out by the participants of the weddings. The peculiarities of conducting rituals with their musical components make it possible to classify the weddings of the Meadow Maris to the type of “merry weddings” characteristic to the cultures of the peoples of the Volga embankments.

BRICOLAGE AND NON-SELECTION AS LANGUAGE STRATEGIES OF THE RAP GROUP "MUTANT KHVLAM"

The purpose of the article is to determine the features of the rap discourse as an original linguistic integral phenomenon of the XXI century, to characterize the language strategies of one of the underground Russian rap groups. The relevance of the work is due to the little research of rap as an artistic discursive formation. The object of the analysis is the texts of the rap group “Mutant Khvlam”. The subject of consideration is the linguistic features of poly code works, the use of postmodern principles in the organization of the band’s tracks. As a result of the study, a contextual correlation was established between the current cultural paradigm and the development of a new musical and verbal genre. A postmodern angle of view on the ideological and linguistic foundations of the existence of rap was involved, an assumption was given about the neo-mythological nature of the rap narrative. Conclusions: Rap is a single type of spoken discourse, regardless of the poetic or prose tradition; has a hybrid nature and a flexible structure that allows the subject of speech to act freely within the genre, to resort to language experiments and play. The creative heritage of the rap group “Mutant Khvlam” is characterized by the form-making principles of non-selection and bricolage, with the help of which the author’s neo-mythological world is constructed. Non-selection as the lack of consistency and completeness of the narrative manifests itself at the lexical, grammatical, and syntactic levels. The fragmentariness and illogic nature of speech constructions in the texts of the group disorient the recipient in the information space, forcing him to unsuccessfully think up potential inter-image connections, intentions of speech, and the axiology of a decentralized narrative. Bricolage as a tool “recycles” the fragments of cultural codes of various origins into an eclectic linguistic kaleidoscope, enhancing the effect of the chaos of non-selection, and creating a network of primary sources for multiple interpretations.

USAGE OF PASTICHE GENRE IN INTERTEXTUAL PRACTICE OF ADVERTISING MEDIA DISCOURSE

Foreign language learning presupposes the acquisition of language code but it is also an entrance to a new communicative community which is culturally defined by its verbal genre. Access to knowledge is an admission to scientific communities which have their own discursive forms for presentation, discussion and allocation of knowledge. The educational activity is responsible for learners’ perception of “discursive fusion” which is a process of education. Contemporary higher school learners ought to master discursive forms which are not a part of their immediate communicate experience. The study of relationships between literature and advertising presumes deep understanding of their location in a cultural practice. Contemporary advertising genre widely uses scriptural matrixes of completely different discursive genres. Particular preference is given to pastiche and parody. In considering the phenomenon of modern rewriting one should not claim the decision of a difficult problem of pastiche definition. It is more necessary to emphasize valorization of such processes as imitation and transposition assuming the relation of traditions to new conceptions in French context. Pastiche should be considered as a practice which allows inquiring genre borders. This practice takes the form of a game intended to participation of an advertising message receiver. Beginning from the point of emergence pastiche became a part of social and institutional universe, the same piece of work and any other. In contemporary advertising the usage of pastiche is allowed in the name of free expression on condition that the risk of the fusion with hypotext is absent as well as an imitator has a humorous plan excluding either intention or possibility to harm anybody. The article concerns the demonstration of didactical usage efficiency of secondary literary genre, pastiche, in an intertextual practice of advertising media discourse. The emergence of this form of imitation in the course of the French language learning as a foreign one is an original means of a traditional pedagogical practice renovation of text imitation and, at the same time, the increase of learner’s motivation with the help of amusing live contact with various discursive genres.

The Genre of Invective in Public Discourse

The relevance of this research project lies in the increasing interest of the general public and professional linguists towards public discourse and the specific type of the communicative personality whose verbal behavior shakes up the normative framework and leads to violations of linguistic security. Such a speaker prefers non-normative linguistic means with the strongest communicative and stylistic charge, because they support her desire for self-expression and attract the attention of others; needless to say they often include invective. The rejection of normative expressive means is also due to the deliberate or spontaneous intention of the speaker to humiliate, ridicule, or offend the interlocutor and assert herself, which is much easier to do with invective vocabulary. Looking at the functions of the invective, its paralinguistic and linguistic features, and the intentions of the speakers, the article describes the invective genres of hating and flaming. Hating is viewed as a deliberate communicative action aimed at discrediting a person or at her social stigmatization. Flaming is characterized by spontaneity and is due to the speaker’s communicative emotionality, asociality, and propensity towards conflicts. The author determines risks of using verbal abuse, invective genres, and pejoratives in public discourse, emphasizing the importance of regulating these through relevant legislation, since, as experience shows, invective may become a form of expressing linguistic extremism and lead to physical violence. The author discusses the immediate need of introducing mandatory moderation (both automated and manual) of chats on social networks, forums, public websites, messengers, TV shows and other media in order to prevent negative consequences of invectizing public discourse and to ensure linguistic security for communication participants.

The African Verbal Genre as Literature and Performance

The African Verbal Genre as Literature and Performance

The African Verbal Genre as Literature and Performance

There is a view that the African verbal genre is not literature and its nature does not include bodily performance; it belongs to sociology and not literature because literature is the art that is written while African verbal genre is presented orally. Thus, the present study aims to demonstrate that, despite its oral nature, the African verbal genre is both literature and oral performance that includes bodily performance and that its literary and performative constituents synergize to achieve the purpose of the genre.

The African Verbal Genre as Literature and Performance

There is a view that the African verbal genre is not literature and its nature does not include bodily performance; it belongs to sociology and not literature because literature is the art that is written while African verbal genre is presented orally. Thus, the present study aims to demonstrate that, despite its oral nature, the African verbal genre is both literature and oral performance that includes bodily performance and that its literary and performative constituents synergize to achieve the purpose of the genre.

The African Verbal Genre as Literature and Performance

This research paper is my attempt, through a blow-by-blow analysis of a fictional work of a rising star in postcolonial writing, to grapple with the manifold discontents that attend the event of migration. Migration is an astoundingly painful experience to go through, whose multifaceted toll on the subject may be beyond repair. Using NoViolet Bulawayo’s We Need New names as a stepping-stone, I argue that migration, albeit a time-honoured phenomenon has picked up speed in the twentieth-century and continued into the twenty-first century with a most heavy human toll. The paper emphasizes that even though the act of migration is underpinned by a hope for betterment, it may turn out to be a damp squid. No end of landmines and hiccups dot the migratory journey. The long-suffering postcolonial subject, hallmarked by the stifling strictures of marginality owing to a long history of race-based oppression that stretches back to the gruesome eras of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and colonization, is on the receiving end of the horrors of migration. I tap into key terms in postcolonial theory cum sociology-informed perspectives to make a valid point about the dehumanizing fallout from the migratory experience.

The African Verbal Genre as Literature and Performance

The African Verbal Genre as Literature and Performance

Russian Post-Soviet Folklore: Modern Oral Folk Stories about Merchants

The verbal genres are of great importance in the oral lore of any nation. Nowadays more and more attention is drawn to popular stories of the past, of people who lived long ago, and so on. This article focuses on the stories about merchants that are classified as memorates (precursors of legend) and chronicles. The perception and image of merchants in the narratives under consideration are of particular interest. Modern storytellers show the representatives of the merchant class as creative people of great soul, deep faith, and high morals rather than money-grubbers. The verbal story is characterized by narrators’ striving to describe the events, preserving the factual authenticity. Like any folk text, an oral story is a collective genre: it is orally transmitted, it has variations, i.e. each storyteller participates in its creating and existing in their own way. Although there are text variants, the main storyline usually does not vary in oral narratives. Thus, modern oral stories about representatives of the merchant class of the past times do not break with the tradition that is an attribute of folklore. That gives grounds for arguing that such a thematic type of oral narrative as a story about merchants is independent. The independent position of the genre under study is also proved by its attributes that distinguish it from other types of folk prose. The article discusses the genre characteristics of oral stories about merchants, gives their thematic classification, and explains the style features. The texts have significant potential for historical reconstructing the persons and events associated with a particular region. They also reflect the general trends in Russian literature – to avoid a one-sided view on the past, to perceive and understand everything from the standpoint of truth, goodness, and beauty. In addition, the authors of the article focus on the issue of naming characters in oral stories about merchants. The role of the storyteller (narrator) as a subject of naming activity, as well as general mechanisms of character naming, is also shown. Naming the characters is presented as a process determined by the genre features of the folk stories under study, the corresponding ways and techniques of depicting reality.

Genres of Music and Verbal Speaking in Music Works (Theoretical Aspects, Interaction, Study Methods)

The purpose of the article is devoted to consideration of the problem of interaction verbal and musical speech genres in musical works and determination of optimal methodological approaches and techniques for analyzing such interaction. In the context of this problem the holistic methodology of studying and illumination is for the first time proposed the issue of the specific speech acts in the music speaking, direct and indirect speech acts, taxonomy of musical speech genres and exercise of semiotic and discoursive analysis of music and musical narratives. All research positions are illustrated by the analysis of musical works by M. Mussorgsky and Sir Paul McCartney. Conclusions. The same nature of speech genres in verbal and music speaking has been proved, their taxonomy has been proposed and set out, methods of interaction have been revealed and research methods have been proposed.

Cenas do rádio em Los Diarios de Emilio Renzi e em Black out

O artigo propõe um diálogo entre Los diarios de Emilio Renzi, de Ricardo Piglia (2015, 2016, 2017), e Black out, de María Moreno (2016a), a partir da leitura de alguns fragmentos nos quais se põe em cena uma “imaginação intimista” (Link, 2007) ou, recorrendo às palavras de Renzi em seu diário, a “pré-história de uma imaginação pessoal”. A evocação de escutar rádio nos dias de infância e juventude, comum aos narradores de ambos os livros, remete a uma experiência vital, a um imaginário de época e à genealogia de uma poética que busca equacionar registros verbais e gêneros discursivos heterogêneos, e abrir-se à experimentação e à “escuta das reverberações do mundo”, como cita Horacio González (2017), na escrita.

Verbal charms and narrative genres. International conference

"Verbal charms and narrative genres. International conference" (Budapest, December 8-10, 2017)

From the Editor

From the Editor Siyuan Liu This issue starts with a special section on the 2016 quatercentenary celebration of Tang Xianzu and William Shakespeare. Alexa Alice Joubin served as guest editor for this special cluster to shed new light on the performances and festivities around the quatercentenary of Tang (1550–1616) and Shakespeare (1564–1616) in East Asia and beyond. The promotion of these national poets and playwrights is very much part of Sino-British cultural exchanges and China's bid for global influence. With three essays and Joubin's brief introduction, this cluster enriches our understanding of intercultural theatre, the larger phenomenon of Asian Shakespeares, and Asian drama in the context of world theatre. The special section is followed by four articles, starting with Seokhun Choi's "Pansori Hamlet Project: Taroo's New Pansori Shakespeare for the Local Audience." Choi proposes an alternative model to the notion of "Global Shakespeare" by devoting attention to overlooked small-scale productions and verbal genres such as pansori, arguing that by relying on indigenous language and music, Taroo's pansori adaptation was geared toward the local audience, as "a powerful vehicle of sympathy and renewal of tradition." The essay provides a notable counterargument to the global orientation of the quatercentenary celebration that focused on the so-called "national poets." In "Politics and Tactics in Revolutionary Performance: A Sino-Burmese Arts Troupe in Transnational Circulation," Tasaw Hsin-chun Lu offers an engaging study of a Sino-Burmese performance troupe that was formed in Rangoon in the 1990s and migrated to Taiwan in 2006. Through this group of five sisters, the article examines the rarely documented phenomenon of leftist performance among Chinese expatriates in Burma, first in the 1950s and 1960s and, after the 1967 anti-Chinese riot and subsequent government restrictions, in the 1990s. Lu offers illuminating insight on the group's navigation between ideology and cultural identity by adapting its performance content and style from Rangoon to Taipei. [End Page v] The next article by Meera Baindur and Tapaswi H M continues the theme of ritual performance in recent ATJ issues. Titled "Bhuta Kola Ritual Performances: Locating Aesthetics in Collective Memory and Shared Experience," it concentrates on the case of the south Indian ritual performance of bhuta kola. In addition to detailed observations of the performances, the authors also offer two conceptual frameworks that focus on the aesthetics of order and place embedded in the audience's collective memory and on the shared aesthetic experience among the community members. The final article in this group is Shiao-ling Yu's "Tradition and Modernity: Two Modern Adaptations of the Chinese Opera Hezhu's Match," a comparative study on the influence of social and political conditions on literary and artistic creations. Specifically, the article examines two adaptations of the traditional Chinese play Hezhu's Match into spoken drama in China in the 1960s and in Taiwan in 1980. Yu focuses on the impact of ideology in the former case and the pioneering role of the latter in Taiwan's little theatre movement. The three emerging scholar articles offer perspectives from India, Taiwan, and Singapore. In "Applying/Contesting the Brechtian 'Model': Calcutta Repertory Theatre's Galileor Jibon (Life of Galileo)," Dwaipayan Chowdhury examines a 1980 production of the play directed by the German Brechtian expert Fritz Bennewitz. Specifically, Chowdhury focuses on the contradictions in applying the Brechtian "model" in the production headed by the famous actor Shombhu Mitra in the lead role, who borrowed techniques from the traditional form of jatra. In "Performing Intercultural Trauma: State, Land, and Women in Troy, Troy… Taiwan," Sophia Yashih Liu studies three versions of the Trojan War story by Taiwan's Golden Bough Theatre from the 1990s to the 2010. She views the iterations as linking the myth's traumatic connotation to the issues of state power, land, and women respectively while also serving to establish the identities of the theatre, Taiwan, and the director. In the group's final article, Nathan F. Bullock brings us to Singapore with "Spaces of Citizenship in Contemporary Singaporean Theatre: Staging the 2011 General Election." Focusing on two plays on the 2011 election, Bullock engages current studies of space and political identities by demonstrating how...

Pansori Hamlet Project: Taroo's New Pansori Shakespeare for the Local Audience

This essay focuses on the South Korean performance group Taroo's locally-oriented aesthetics in Pansori Hamlet Project (2014) as an alternative model to the notion of "Global Shakespeare" which presupposes intercultural spectatorship as well as intercultural practice. A natural corollary of this "global" discourse is overlooking smallscale productions and verbal genres such as pansori despite their artistic merit and cultural significance for the local audience. Taroo's pansori Shakespeare features four Hamlets who tell the story of the Danish prince with reference to Korean popular culture in local dialects. The pluralization and localization of the Shakespeare's melancholic hero transform Hamlet into a play of contemporary Korean young adults going through a difficult time together while recreating the traditional form of pansori as a popular genre they call "gugak musical." Taroo's pansori adaptation showcases a local Shakespeare that is not motivated by "bardolatry" or universalism underlying many intercultural Shakespeares but relies on indigenous language and music as a powerful vehicle of sympathy and renewal of tradition for the local audience.

Microgenesis of language creativity: Innovation, conformity and incongruence in children's language play

The study examines young children's engagement in language creativity, in this instance, spontaneous language play. It presents an analysis of peer group interaction in a multilingual preschool setting for 3- to 6-year-olds in Sweden. Combining video-ethnography and detailed interactional analysis, it explores the interactional organization, textual features, evaluative/affective stances and social functions that characterize language play. The theoretical perspective draws on interactional sociolinguistics and the Vygotskian (2004) notion that imagination and creativity are built on patterning (i.e., recognizability), innovative transformations and manipulations of prior materials, experiences and understandings. Here, creativity is shown to be a collective and normatively guided process: it is located in peer group collaborative performances, and involves peer group language, affective and aesthetic socialization. The analysis shows that children's spontaneous language play is characterized by an aesthetic in which that which is incongruent, unexpected and also recognizable is exploited and appreciated. It feeds on the ongoing tension between predictability (routine of culturally recognizable activities) and the novelty/improvisational character of in situ performance. Creative language use serves as a multifaceted locus for aesthetic, affective and normative (ideological) stance taking and mutual socialization. Through their performances, the children socialize each other into sensitivity to what kind of contributions constitute valued verbal genres of the peer group culture.

СЕМАНТИКА ИМЕННЫХ ГРУПП ПОЭТОНИМОВ И ИХ ФУНКЦИОНАЛЬНЫЕ ОСОБЕННОСТИ В РУССКОМ ЯЗЫКЕ

Цель. Статья посвящена проблеме изучения поэтонимов как пласта именных лексем русского языка, употребляемых в художественных произведениях. Предметом анализа выступают имена собственные, которые являются неотъемлемым компонентом семантико-стилистической системы словоупотребления эпиграммистов. Автор ставит целью раскрыть роль поэтонимов в организации семантического пространства текста русских эпиграмм.Метод или методология проведения работы. Основным методом исследования является описательный с непосредственным наблюдением и интерпретацией языковых фактов. Он позволяет наглядно показать зависимость употребления поэтонимов от целевого назначения жанра эпиграммы.Результаты. Результаты работы заключаются в том, что автор проводит семантический анализ имен собственных в текстах эпиграмм и показывает эволюцию жанра в использовании поэтонимов: обобщенные имена лиц с определенными нравственными недостатками сменяются каламбурно обыгрываемыми реальными именами и фамилиями адресатов.Область применения результатов. Результаты исследования могут быть применены в практике преподавания стилистики русского языка, истории русского литературного языка, в спецкурсах по языку художественно-словесных жанров, в лингвистическом анализе художественного текста.