文体学课程论文：Stylistic Analysis of Daily Conversation

第1 页共 5 页 Stylistic Analysis of Daily Conversation I. Introduction Daily conversation, the representation of spoken English, is an important part of the study of discourse. This paper is going to analyze the daily conversation, which excerpts from Gossip Girl, one of the most popular American soap opera. It is well known that Gossip Girl mainly talks about the story of Manhattan's upper social class, and shows the lives of the rich kids. In this soap opera, what attracts the audience attention is not only the fashion, but also the ups and downs of friendship, love, family, and so on. The conversation, which I am going to analyze, between Blair and Serena, the two main characters in Gossip Girl, focuses on their friendships. Blair and Serena used to be best friends, but a year ago, Serena’s leaving without notice completely broke Blair’s heart, now her return is absolutely a threat to Blair’s queen status. At the same time, the unusual relationship between Blair's boyfriend, Nate and Serena makes Blair more sensitive. So, at the beginning, Blair is hostile to Serena. Can Serena fix their friendship succeful? The conversation centers around this issue. II. Textual Analysis 1. At the Phonological Level 1) Using stress Through the overall analysis of the conversation, the stress is frequently used at beginning of the sentence. For example: In [Appendix A] Blair:Y ou can go now. Sorry. Serena:No, that's okay. I got a lot of stuff to do anyway. Serena:No, go ahead. Blair! Think we could meet tonight? In [Appendix C] Blair:I must have totally blanked on the part where I invited you over. Serena:I called you. Blair, it's Sunday morning. Coffee, croissants. "Breakfast at Tiffany's." It's our tradition. Blair:I have new traditions now. In the above examples, the marked words are stress words. Frequently using the stress can attract the audience attention. Also, the strong emotions are expressed by these stress words. Here, Blair uses you and I to indicate that their friendship has been changed, expressing her unhappiness. While Serena affects not to care about not being invited by saying No. Certainly, the changing emotion is a bright spot to attract the audience. 2) Using quick tempo The overall tempo of the speakers trends to very quick. They make the tempo go fast by using elision, such as in the above examples, blanked,invited ,called. More to the point, because of the fast tempo, the contractions are frequently used, such as in [Appendix A], when's, you're, we're, that's, I'd, in [Appendix B]how's, I'm, didn't, don't, Let's, it's. In real life, the pace of life is always very fast. So to reflect the life truly, quick tempo is used. 3) Normal non-fluency The normal non-fluency appears in the conversation. For example, in [Appendix B] Serena: No, I-I know, I was just...Boarding school is like... Serena: I just...I-I had to go. I just…I need to get away from everything. Please, just trust me. Serena: Let's fix that. I saw you at school with... With Katy and is, and I-I get it. I-I don't want to take any of that away from you... Serena: No, that... That's not what I mean. I...I miss you. As I have mentioned at the introduction, Blair is hostile to Serena. Facing Blair’ doubt, Serena is trying to explain and fix their friendship. But maybe because of her nervousness or anxiety, her words are not well planned. That is the normal non-fluency, Like I was just... like... I just... with... that... you... I...I miss. 2. At the Graphological Level From the viewpoint of graphological, the features of daily conversation are not obvious. In general, the conversation are arranged in the flush-left. Moreover, occurring in the daily life, between two good friends, the conversation is full of randomness and spontaneity. so the choice of punctuation is not strict. Periods , commas, apostrophes and ellipsis, are frequent used. 3. At the Lexical Level 1) Short and simple Anglo-Saxon words Most of the words are short and simple Anglo-Saxon words, and most of them are informal, monosyllabic. Such as , in [Appendix A], can go, got, do, meet, but; in [Appendix B], for, call, write, need, me, fix , take, have, keep. These words are very good to read and easy understand. Because Gossip Girl, as a popular soap opera, should be geared to the needs of public audience, who come from the different social background. So to help the audience understand the story better, simple words are used. 2) Colloquial words and slangs Some colloquial words and slangs are used in the conversation. For example, kinda, okay ,Yeah , Well, Hmm,um, are colloquial words. While, In [Appendix C] Serena:Hey, I got two bone-dry caps and Audrey. Gossip Girl:Serena's visit was short and apparently not very sweet. But you know what is?Revenge is a dish best served cold. Here, the mark words are slangs. Bone-dry caps refers to the non-milk cappuccino, and Audrey refers to the film starred by Audrey Hepburn. These thing are well known by average people. All the scenes in the Gossip Girl are of daily life, and the speakers are good friend, thus deciding that it is no need to use those formal and official words. 4. At the Grammatical Level 1) Simple sentences, using active voice and direct speech Typically, most of the sentences are simple sentences, using active voice and direct speech. Also, the tense are mostly past tense and simple present tense. For example: in [Appendix A] Serena:Hi. So...When's the party? Blair:Y ou can go now. Sorry. Serena:No, that's okay. I got a lot of stuff to do anyway. Serena:No, go ahead. Blair! Think we could meet tonight? Using the simple sentences, on one hand, make the plot easy to understand. On the other hand, it sounds more like the dialogue in daily life, very casual, rather than the art of theater Performances. This is the reason why Gossip Girl is so popular. 2) Incomplete, loosely coordinated sentences There are some incomplete, loosely coordinated sentences, such as: Serena:The palace. 8:00? Nate will wait. Serena: Let's fix that. I saw you at school with... With Katy and is, and I-I get it. Serena: …Y ou know, and with our families...We need each other. Serena:I called you. Blair, it's Sunday morning. Coffee, croissants, "Breakfast at Tiffany's." It's our tradition. The marked sentences are incomplete, which do not square with the accepted rules of grammar. But here, this conversation occurs mainly between two friends, that is, the atmosphere is very easy and casually. So the speaker do not need to pay much attention to the grammar. More to the point, such loose sentences are closed to our daily life. 5. At the Semantic Level 1) Exophoric expressions There are some exophoric expressions in this conversation, such as: Serena: Let's fix that. I saw you at school with... With Katy and is, and I-I get it. I-I don't want to take any of that away from you... Serena: Blair, how can I fix this? In the example, that refers to Serena left without notice, and this refers to Serena hided her affair with Blair’s boyfriend. All these things are known by themselves, and they do not need to speak out. Using these exophoric expressions implies their intimate relationship. 2) Randomness of subject matter The subject matter they are talking about is changing randomly, such as: in [Appendix B] Serena: So how's your mom doing with the divorce and everything? … Serena: No, I-I know, I was just...Boarding school is like... Blair: I don't even know why you went, to boarding school to being with. Do you know how it felt, … Serena: Let's fix that. I saw you at school with... With Katy and is, … Serena: I just want things to go back to the way they used to be... Blair: Y ou missed some classic Eleanor Waldorf meltdowns. … In this conversation, the marked phrases are the subjects the two speakers have talked, which are changing in high frequency. By changing the subject constantly, they make an in-depth communication and gain a good understanding of each other, thus helping to fix their friendship. For the audience, the randomness of subject matter brings them the sense of reality and homely. III. Conclusion Through the stylistic analysis of the daily conversation in Gossip Girl, we can draw a conclusion that, in the overall, this conversation shows the features of socialization, filling with colloquialism, realism. Though I have been exposed to the concept of stylistics nearly a semester, I find that my understanding just rests on the theoretical level. So this paper is definite good chance for me to put the theory into practice. But obviously, the analysis of this paper is not comprehensive enough, because to some extent, I just select those aspects in Gossip Girl, which are more representative in stylistics, and try my best to make the analysis intensive, from a well-grounded understanding of Gossip Girl. During this process of analyzing, I gain a better comprehension of daily conversation. And more importantly, it make me know that our study should be thorough, in-depth and systematic, instead remaining at the theoretical level. Especially to those theoretical courses, it is preferable for us to have our own notions of the theory and try to make our judgments. References [1]张德禄. 英语文体学教程[M]. 高等教育出版社2008.2[2012/6/12] [2] 邓小丽.从文体学角度 分析 定性数据统计分析pdf销售业绩分析模板建筑结构震害分析销售进度分析表京东商城竞争战略分析 电影对白中的随意会话[J]. 2011.07[2012/6/12]. [3]朱曼.从文体学角度看<<老友记>> 台词的文体特征[J]. 2012.03[2012/6/12]