Characteristics of Language, Narrative, Drama, and Lyrical Texts

Posted on Oct 2, 2024 in Language

ITEM 1 – Characteristics of Languages

The languages that give humans the faculty of language share several characteristics:

  1. Arbitrariness: There is no direct relationship between the elements of a language and the reality they represent. The link between form and meaning is arbitrary.
  2. Displacement: Messages can relate to events removed in time and space from the communicative situation.
  3. Deception: Language allows for the possibility of sending false messages.
  4. Reflexivity: Language can refer to itself. It can be used to talk about language itself.
  5. Differentiation of Units: Languages use a small number of elements (sounds) that contrast sharply with each other.
  6. Double Articulation: Language is a dual system, organized on two levels: discrete units combine to form other elements (like words) that carry meaning.
  7. Productivity: Double articulation allows for the creation of infinite messages from a small number of elements (monemes).

Contexts

Context refers to the circumstances, beliefs, and knowledge relevant to producing and interpreting utterances.

Types of Context:

  1. Linguistic Context (Co-text): Comprises what was said before and after an utterance. It can clarify the meaning of statements.
  2. Situational Context: The reality outside the communicative act. For example, “the window is open” makes sense in an interior space with a closed window.
  3. Sociocultural Context: Encompasses social conditions and their suitability to different circumstances. Greetings and linguistic registers vary across cultures and situations. Within the sociocultural context are frameworks that classify communication situations and participant roles, which depend on the communicative goal and framework.

The Linguistic Sign

Principles of the Linguistic Sign:

  1. Arbitrariness: The link between the signifier (e.g., the word “house”) and the signified (e.g., the concept of a house) is arbitrary.
  2. Linearity of the Signifier: The signifier unfolds in time, forming a chain of phonemes in a coherent order.
  3. Immutability and Mutability: The linguistic sign is immutable for the community using it, but it can change over time.

ITEM 4 – Consonant Phonemes

The Spanish phonological system has 19 consonant phonemes, which differ based on their mode and place of articulation, and the behavior of the vocal cords.

Mode of Articulation:

  1. Occlusive: Articulators are completely closed.
  2. Fricative: Articulators are almost closed.
  3. Affricate: Occlusive followed by a fricative.
  4. Nasal: Air passes through the nose.
  5. Lateral: The tip of the tongue splits the airflow.
  6. Vibrant: The tip of the tongue vibrates against the alveoli.

Place of Articulation:

  1. Bilabial: Lips come together.
  2. Labiodental: Lower lip touches upper teeth.
  3. Interdental: Tongue is between the teeth.
  4. Dental: Tongue touches upper teeth.
  5. Alveolar: Tongue approximates the alveolar ridge.
  6. Palatal: Tongue approximates the hard palate.
  7. Velar: Tongue approximates the soft palate (velum).

Vibration of the Vocal Cords:

  1. Voiceless: Vocal cords do not vibrate.
  2. Voiced: Vocal cords vibrate.

ITEM 11 – The Lyrical

The lyrical genre imitates moods.

Characteristics of Lyrical Texts:

  1. They offer a subjective perspective.
  2. They do not develop a story.
  3. They usually focus on one aspect and are generally brief.
  4. They often appear in verse, although lyrical prose exists.

Poetic Forms:

  1. Popular Song: Themes include love and religion, with satirical variations. It often uses monologue but can include dialogue. Vocabulary and syntax are simple, with varied meter and a predominance of minor art. Examples: jarchas, carols.
  2. Petrarchan Song: Similar themes but with an individualistic tone and worship. Metrically, it consists of five to ten stanzas. Examples: Garcilaso de la Vega.
  3. Eclogue: Presents rural life as an idyllic state, with a nostalgic and melancholic tone. Usually includes an introduction, closing, and dialogues between shepherds, often about love. Varied meter. Examples: Eclogues 1, II, and III by Garcilaso de la Vega.
  4. Hymn: In ancient Greece, it praised gods, heroes, and ideals. Since the Middle Ages, it also includes liturgical hymns. Varied meter. Examples: Hymn to the Sun by Espronceda.
  5. Epigram: Initially focused on praise, but now incorporates various circumstances with a surprising ending. Varied meter. Examples: Gongora’s burlesque sonnets and Quevedo.
  6. Elegy: Mixes sadness, melancholy, sentimentality, and remembrance. Varied meter. Examples: Verses on the Death of His Father by Jorge Manrique.
  7. Ode: Dedicated to great people, beautiful scenery, or contemplative speculation. Elevated language. Examples: odes of Fray Luis de León.

Communicative Process in Lyrical Texts:

The poetic voice can assume three positions:

  1. Apparent Objectivity: Presents an external reality using the third person.
  2. Appeal: The lyrical addressee (second person) is explicitly present.
  3. Pure Expression: The poetic voice expresses itself solely through the first person.

Other possibilities include splitting or self-address.

Narrative

Narrative texts tell stories through a narrator.

Characteristics of Narrative Texts:

  1. They develop a story, a sequence of actions, dominated by the referential and poetic functions.
  2. The story is told by a narrator.
  3. The predominant mode of discourse is prose.

Narrative Subgenres:

  1. Epic Poem: Extensive narratives in verse about a hero tied to their people’s fate. Characterized by the use of major art verse and epic epithets. Examples: Cantar de Mio Cid, La Araucana by Alonso de Ercilla.
  2. Short Story: Short prose narratives presenting a conflict with an open or closed ending. Usually develops in a single time and space, with short dialogues if any. Can contain a moral lesson. Examples: The Count by Emilia Pardo Bazán, Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges.
  3. Romance: Short narratives in verse (usually octosyllabic), with assonance rhyme in even lines. Examples: romances of the Cid, Roland, border ballads.
  4. Fable: Short stories in prose or verse with a moral or ideological purpose. Presents a conflict between two characters (animal or inanimate) highlighting vices. The moral can be explicit at the beginning or end, uttered by a narrator or character. Examples: Book of Good Love, fables by Iriarte and Samaniego.
  5. Novel: Extensive prose narrative featuring a diverse and complex world. The story can vary in space and time. Differs from the epic by its complex and nuanced characters. Examples: Lazarillo de Tormes, Don Quixote by Cervantes, realistic novels by Galdós and Clarín, One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez.

Levels of Narrative Analysis:

Narrative analysis considers two levels: story and discourse.

  1. Story: A sequence of actions in chronological and causal order, performed by characters in a specific time and space.
  2. Discourse: How the story is told, which may not respect the story’s chronological order.

Analysis of Story:

Involves characterizing its four elements: actions, characters, time, and space. Characters can be protagonists or secondary, performing actions to achieve goals. These actions involve other characters as allies or adversaries. Space can be varied. Time can range from minutes to years.

Analysis of Discourse:

The chronological order can be altered by:

  1. In medias res: Beginning in the middle of the action.
  2. Flashback: Evoking earlier moments.
  3. Prolepsis: Flashing forward to future events.

Time of Story and Narration Time:

The duration of the story can differ from the time it takes to tell it, affecting the pace of narration.

Narrator and Perspective:

The narrator can be first-person (character narrator, even protagonist) or third-person (witness narrator). The narrator’s degree of knowledge determines the perspective, which can change throughout the story.

The Drama

Drama comprises texts created for performance. Dramatic texts share these characteristics:

  1. They develop a story directly through the words and actions of characters.
  2. The primary form of verbal communication is dialogue.
  3. Although readable, their transmission and reception are essentially collective (a troupe and an audience).

Dramatic Text and Representation:

The dramatic text consists of the main text (characters’ words) and the secondary text (stage directions).

Forms of the Main Text:

  1. Dialogue: Verbal exchange between characters, creating a reversible communicative process where characters alternate as senders and receivers.
  2. Monologue: Extended interventions by one character, without verbal exchange, as the discourse is not directed at another character but at themselves or the audience (soliloquy).
  3. Aside: Brief interventions, often comic, made by a character unheard by other characters but heard by the audience.

Stage directions provide instructions on nonverbal aspects of the staging. Dramatic representation involves a double communication: between fictional characters and between actors and the audience.