Page 123 - The Language of Humour

110 INDEX OF TERMS
A feature of spontaneous speech The connotations of a word are the
where an utterance is repeated in associations it creates. For
order to improve or correct it. example, the connotations of
bathos 44 December, mainly within British
Lapse in mood from the elevated and North American culture,
to the trivial. would be of ‘cold’, ‘dark nights’
bound morpheme 14, and ‘Christmas parties’.
see prefix and suffix Connotations are often either
butt 50 individual or cultural.
contradiction 31,
cataphoric reference see reference see paradox and oxymoron
clause 20 conversational implicature 39–40;
A structural unit which is part of a see Grice’s maxims and speech
sentence either as a main clause act theory in Unit 3.
which can stand alone and be cooperative principle 40 Refers to
equivalent to a sentence the way in which most
or as a subordinate or dependent conversations are conducted in a
clause. For example, ‘The owner, coherent manner with participants
who lives abroad, has written to acting towards one another as
all the neighbours’ consists of a efficiently and collaboratively as
main clause ‘The owner…has possible.
written to all the neighbours’ and a
subordinate clause ‘who lives deixis 22
abroad’. Words which refer backwards,
clicté 30 forwards or extra-textually, e.g.
A phrase or saying used so often ‘that’, ‘here’.
that it has lost its freshness. discourse 8, 29, 40
collocation 17, 29 A term used in linguistics to
The way that terms are used and describe the rules and conventions
the words that tend to occur with underlying the use of language in
them. For example, you would say extended stretches of text.
‘dinner-lady’ but not ‘dinner-
woman’. ellipsis 96
comedy 71 Ellipsis refers to the omission of
A term used for a particular part of a structure. It is normally
structure and plot in drama. used for reasons of economy and,
complement 20 in spoken discourse, can create a
An element of clause structure. sense of informality. For example,
compound word 15 A word made in the sentence ‘She went to the
from two others, e.g. ‘newsagent’. party and danced all night’ the
conceit 34 pronoun ‘she’ is ellipted from the
An extended metaphor. second clause;
connotation 17, 29 in the dialogue ‘You going to the
party?’ ‘Might be’ the verb ‘Are’