后现代文本偏离现象的文体研究

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Chapter One Introduction

I write this paper with the aim to show that deviation as an efficient stylistic

approach contributes a lot to the aesthetic value of postmodernist texts. It serves as a

bridge to link the aesthetic concern with linguistic concern and as a relatively objective

device for appraising the stylistic effects.

When I came across the headline of the news ￥10000 > ￥230,000(quoted from

People’s Daily, 10th, Aug. 1987), apparently it is a divergently spurious. However, after

having read over the whole passage, I found that what the headline actually expresses

was that a loss of over 2300,00 RMB was due to people’s not willing to spend money to

repair the road. This strange formula passing on strange information caught my

attention and in-depth thoughts: deviation produces prominent effects. As a linguistic

major, I further explored the relations between deviation and the nature of language. I

think that from language itself, the birth of deviation lies in two aspects: on one hand,

language is limited to the linear alignment. Despite the diversification of arrangement of

language elements, the linear alignment would be in contradiction with the pluralism

and complexity of the meaning it eventually conveys. On the other hand, linguistic signs

are characteristic of polysemy and semantic transference. Language allows users to take

deviant devices to bridge the discrepancy between the insufficiency of language and the

boundlessness of thoughts.

The excitement I felt while reading a well-written piece, such as Pride and

Prejudice, was quickly squashed when I read The French Lieutenant’s Woman. Does

Charles marry Sarah? What’s the story of Ernestina? What is the author implying? My

curiosity was aroused by the suspense. From the angle of stylistics, I understand it is a

deliberate arrangement of the ending. And later, when I read If on a Winter’s Night, a

Traveler, I was fascinated by the aesthetic value of deviation at the surface

structure---the form.

I was encouraged by Prof. Deng to read some postmodern theories such as

Derrida’s deconstruction, Foucault’s power-discourse theory, reader-response theories

etc. I found that all of them contribute a lot to legitimizing deviation as an efficient

strategy for expression. This finding spurs me to write a paper on a stylistic study of

deviation in postmodernist texts.

Deviation can be traced back to Aristotle’s theory, which says that best language

manifests both clarity and vulgarity. For him, “The clearest one is certainly necessary

for the day to day wording, but it is inevitably vulgar. The use of unusual words,

redundant sentences and other variables can work wonders”（quoted from 伍蠡甫，

1979：90）. In 1930s, Chen Wangdao, also remarked that innovation usually deviates

from conventional wording, grammatical usages and logics (quoted in 陈望道, 1994,

4 ). The same theory is echoed by Wyatt’s words that deviation is the supreme vehicle of

figure of speeches (ref: 黄龙,1986：202). In 1960s, Leech categorized eleven kinds of

deviation: lexical deviation including neologism and nonce-formation, grammatical

deviation, phonological deviation, graph logical deviation, semantic deviation,

dialectical deviation, deviation of register, temporal deviation, and mix of foreign

languages (quoted in 胡壮麟，2000：95~98).

Traditional linguistics prescribes language; it “aims to lay down rules for ‘correct’

behavior, i.e., to tell people what they should say and what they should not say…they

set models for language users to follow…..it tells the learner what he should say, or

what is supposed to be correct usage.” (quoted from He zhaoxiong, Mei deming,

1999:4).

With the coming of Modern linguistics, language is mostly descriptive. “The task

of linguists is supposed to describe the language people actually use, be it ‘correct’ or

not” (ibid，p.4). They began to view deviation as an important stylistic device for the

sake of ornament. From literary perspective, the main characteristic of modern texts is

deviation by adopting discontinuous narrative, random collages, fragmented forms, a

rejection of elaborate formal aesthetics and so on. When entering into the postmodern

era, postmodernists develop these deviant devices to the extreme. Unlike modernists,

who lament the idea of fragmentation, incoherence, collage, postmodernists welcome

the deviant approaches to manifesting that the world is meaningless, and appealing to

play with nonsense.

Chapter One introduces the motivation, the review, and the contents.

Chapter Two deals with the definition, background and characteristics of the

postmodernism. For the past two decades, the postmodern polemics have emerged over

whether or not modernism has ended. Many have begun to realize the influence on

cultural and intellectual fields brought by scientific development, and they have begun

to celebrate postmodern philosophy as well as literature which are characterized by

diversity and uncertainty.

In Chapter Three, I proffer a stylistic analysis of deviation in postmodernist texts in

different domains. As we shall see, deviation as an effective stylistic approach is largely

used, and serves to present the world as an absurd and fragmented one. It not only

“makes strange”, but also bridges the gap between the insufficiency limitedness of

language itself and boundlessness of thoughts.

Chapter Four is concerned with a theoretical interpretation of deviation in

postmodernist texts. A new postmodern philosophy associated with Derrida, Foucault,

Lyotard and many others set up a number of theories to explain the multifaceted aspects

of the postmodernism, in which we can find the theoretical explanation of deviation.

In Chapter Five I make a conclusion. Although deviation contributes a lot to

understanding the postmodernist texts, it does not mean we can not overstate it, for we

cannot ignore the normal elements which are the main parts of the texts.

444446111/16/2024Chapter Two Defining Postmodernism

Chapter Two Defining Postmodernism

2.1 Notion of Postmodernism

The concept of postmodernism is one that is still in flux and is slippery to capture.

“Logically in keeping with the idea of ‘post’ this term literally means ‘after modernity’.

It refers to the incipient or actual dissolution of those social forms associated with

modernity” (quoted from http:/www.Umanitoba.ca/centers/Ukrainian.ca

nadian /hlynk.a/ papers/ postmodernism.html);“Ism" refers to the abstract sociological

theories, a certain angle of cognition of the world, or a certain gross of culture

phenomena. Postmodernism is to describe “those diverse aesthetic forms and practices

which come after and break with modernism” (quoted from http://www.as.ua.edu

/ant/Faculty/Murphy/436/pomo.htm). A variety of statements—not necessarily

definitions will give the flavor of the postmodern condition.

Simplifying to the extreme, I define postmodernism as incredulity towards

metanarratives (Lyotard). Postmodernism has also been linked to "the culture of late

capitalism" (Jameson), the general condition of knowledge in times of information

technology (Lyotard), the replacing of a modernist epistemological focus with an

ontological one (McHale), and the substitution of the simulacrum for the real

(Baudrillard) “A postmodernist will develop actions, thought and desires by

proliferation, juxtaposition and disjunction [and] ... prefer what is positive and multiple,

difference over uniformity, flows over unities, mobile arrangements over systems.

Believe that what is productive and not sedentary, but nomadic (Foucault)” (see

http://www.umanitoba.ca/centres/ukrainian_canadian/hlynka/papers/postmodernism.ht

ml).

In short, postmodernism is a rejection of authority, the dissolution of hierarchy, the

merging of subject and object, an emphasis on fragmentation, a stress on multiplicity,

and a favor of indeterminacy.

2.2 Background of Postmodernism

2.2.1 Cultural Background

Postmodernism is also called the culture of the postindustrial society, culture of

information-based society, or the culture of periods of late industrialization or

multi-nationalization. Starting between the end of the 50s and the beginning of the 60s,

555556111/16/2024Chapter Two Defining Postmodernism

in the United States, it was widely accepted in the whole western world and prosperous

industrialized society in the 70s. Till the 80s it became popular around the world.

The rise of postmodernism came into being for various reasons.

First, the growing commercialization of social products gives rise to the so -called

“culture industry”. (ref. 刘登阁，2000: 94)

With the growing commercialization of social products, the merchandise laws and

the law of value not only take control over economic life in the western world, but also

permeate into people’s daily life, especially the cultural life. The so-called culture

industry is the marriage of cultural production and commercial industry. In a society

featured with culture industry knowledge takes the form of information-based

merchandise. Knowledge, regarded as productivity, will undoubtedly become focus of

world competition. The growing commercialization of social products is to give rise to

the growth of pragmatism, including utilitarianism of various kinds, commercialism,

relativism and so on.

Second, the consumer culture has been promoted by the steady development of the

society since the end of World War.

What with the increase of capital flowing and multinational corporations, what

with the economic recovery and fast expanse of economy and social wealth, in the

western world and even in the third world, the production-oriented society is now

becoming a consumer-based society. In other words, the society with sluggish and

slump economy is changing into a society of surplus and welfare economy. One of the

reasons is that the further production would be impaired, or even stopped, if the wealth

produced due to the economic prosperity is not to be consumed. Clinging to the legacy

of economy will prevent the society from intriguing its demand, deterring economic

growth. Therefore, extensive change is the emergence of consumer society, which lays

emphasis on the occupation of wealth and otherwise destroys the traditional value

system.

Finally, the effect of the science, technology and the economy of information has

been the emergence of vulgar culture.

In the culture of information data-flow has an almost autonomous determining

character. The advanced multi-media, especially television and network, brought forth a

new world for culture in which there is no monopoly of literature by elites or literary

genius, and in which everyone can publish their works without the bother of haunting

the publishing house. You feel free to voice your ideas without stooping to publishers or

authority. It is safe to say that network collapses the hierarchical distinction between

mass and popular culture, and narrows the gap between elite culture and civilian culture.

This means not only the change of the ways of public media—the change of surface

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structure, but also the drastic inner change of ideology, which is the appearance of

vulgar culture.

2.2.2 The Social Background

Firstly, People under various pressures are forced to look for consolation in

consumption in order to try to escape from reality.

With the development of deformed industrial civilization, and material civilization,

modern people are so squeezed that they can only breathe from the chink. Many of them

sustain multiple pressures both physically and mentally: for instance, the pressure of

clambering with each other. People are keeping on the run with their nerve in a highly

nervous condition, so they have no time for thinking over the meaning of top-grade

culture or classic culture but greet the leisurely reading materials, the hearsay that can

easily excite sensory feelings, the fairy tales of adults, or the culture of fast food with

simplex function of satisfying human beings. People turned to the soap opera that can

be dismissed with a laugh, to the golf club that can flaunt wealth, to the rock music that

can get things off peoples’ mind, or to rent a book written for children from a bookstall

to kill time.

Secondly, the gloomy appearance of a picture of the 20th century made people

doubt the progress of history; human beings who had ever dominated the society died.

Postmodern challenge confronts the world of unsettling, infectious ill being. World wars,

cold war, environment pollution, the exhaustion of resources, the nuclear threat, and the

expansion of the population, things like these, composed a gloomy appearance of a

picture of the actual 20th century, making people lose confidence in future. Heroes

whose praises were sung by Modernism seem to have gone forever. In the era of

absence of heroes, people are like walking corpses, losing selfhood, lingering in the

hollow homestead of consciousness. Especially after the Second World War, while the

western intelligentsia singing the dirge of human beings, the fast development of

technology makes people the slaves of machine. From then on, man cannot be regarded

as real man, but a component of a massive productive assembly line; thus human beings

lose the independent character and are lent to shattered pieces.

Finally, a series of political events of the sixties of the 20th century are an important

element for the “outbreak” of literature of post modernity.

The fifties of America is a period that was apparently at least filled with optimism:

with the fast development of the economy in domestic and the continuous consolidation

as the overlord of the world. Most Americans thought that they had realized the

American dream. However, in the atmosphere filled with the universal optimism,

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摘要：

1ChapterOneIntroductionIwritethispaperwiththeaimtoshowthatdeviationasanefficientstylisticapproachcontributesalottotheaestheticvalueofpostmodernisttexts.Itservesasabridgetolinktheaestheticconcernwithlinguisticconcernandasarelativelyobjectivedeviceforappraisingthestylisticeffects.WhenIcameacrossthehea...

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