Rhetorical Style: The Uses of Language in Persuasion

466 Pages·2011·2.73 MB·English

by  Jeanne Fahnestock

rhetorical style
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Rhetorical Style
THE USES OF LANGUAGE IN PERSUASION
J eanne F ahnestock

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Copyright © 2011 by Oxford University Press, Inc.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Fahnestock, Jeanne
Rhetorical style : the uses of language in persuasion / Jeanne Fahnestock.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-19-976412-9 (hardcover : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-0-19-976411-2 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Persuasion (Rhetoric) 2. English language—Rhetoric. 3. English language—Style. I. Title.
P301.5.P47F34 2011
808'.042—dc22 2010053171
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
To Stephen
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Table of Contents
Introduction 3
Style in the Rhetorical Tradition 6
Schools of Language Analysis 9
Rhetorical Stylistics and Literary Stylistics 12
Plan of the Book 13
Source of Examples 16
What Th is Book Is Not—and Is 17
Notes 19
part one | word choice
1. Language of Origin 23
Th e Historical Layers of English 23
Th e Old English Core 24
Th e Norman French Contribution 25
Th e Language of Learning fr om Latin and Greek 27
Incorporations fr om World Contact 29
An American Vocabulary 30
Homonyms and Synonyms from Diff erent Origins 31
Clarity and Sincerity: When Core Words Dominate 32
Elevation and Panache: Featuring French Borrowings 33
Formality and Erudition: Words from Latin and Greek 34
Analyses with Word Origins 35
Summary 39
Notes 40
viii Contents
2. New Words and Changing Uses 42
From Nonce Constructions to Wider Use 42
1. Foreign Borrowings 43
2. Compounds 44
Free versus Bound Morphemes 45
3. Adding Prefi xes and Suffi xes 45
Prefi xes that Change Meaning 45
Suffi xes that Change Use 46
Derivational Families 46
4. Clipping 47
5. Blends 47
6 . C onversions 4 8
7. Catachresis 49
8. Acronyms 50
9. Proper Names to Common Nouns 50
10. Analogy 50
11. Fabrication 51
12. Onomatopoeia 51
13. Taboo Deformation 52
14. Doubling 52
Loss and Migration 53
Junk : A Case Study 54
Accumulating Senses 57
Summary 58
Notes 59
3. Categories of Word Choice 61
Lexical Field 62
Level of Generality 63
Abstract versus Concrete Diction 64
Levels of Generality in Argument 66
Ad Hoc Levels of Generality 68
Functional Categories 70
Taking a Census of Parts of Speech 70
Modern Rhetoricians on Word Choice: Burke and Weaver 75
Summary 76
Notes 77
4. Language Varieties 79
Low, Middle, and High 80
Geographical and Social Varieties of English 81
Contents ix
Regiolects and Sociolects 82
Idiolects 83
Registers: Occupation, Avocation, Discipline 83
Genre and Register 85
Shift ing and Mixing Language Varieties 86
Language Varieties and Humor 88
Spoken versus Written Style 90
Familiar Language 91
Prepared Phrases, Clichés, and Idioms 92
Maxims and Proverbs 94
Allusions 95
Summary 96
Notes 97
5. Tropes 100
Synecdoche 101
Metonymy 102
Antonomasia 103
Metaphor 104
Extended Metaphor and Allegory 107
Simile 109
Full Analogies 110
Irony 111
Irony in Written Texts 112
Irony and Intention 114
Th e Persuasive Eff ects of Irony 115
Intolerable Irony 116
Hyperbole and Litotes 117
Th e Amphiboly and Paradox 118
Paralepsis/Praeteritio: Denying while Saying 119
Grice’s Maxims and the Detection of Other Meanings 120
Analysis: Women Drivers 121
Summary 122
Notes 123
6. Figures of Word Choice 127
Schemes of Words 127
Agnominatio 127
Metaplasms: Altering a Single Word 129
Polyptoton 130
Spreading Concepts through Polyptoton 132