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HYPERBOLE AND IRONY AS SITCOM PROPSAbstract
The present study discusses the role played by irony and hyperbole withinnetworks of face-threatening acts which are recurrent in sitcom dialogues. Irony andhyperbole will be defined and illustrated in terms of key concepts such as pretense,interpretive resemblance, relevant inappropriateness, all of which accelerate the dynamicsof protagonist interaction in sitcoms. To this end, the implications of both irony andhyperbole upon politeness phenomena such as face-threatening acts and facework-relatedstrategies will be envisaged.key-words: sitcom, irony, hyperbole, FTAs
1. Aim of the present study
After a critical evaluation of contemporary views on irony and hyperbole, particular stress will be laid on the overlappings and dissimilarities between variousaccounts in order to unveil the communicative mechanisms triggered by ironical andhyperbolical utterances in the dynamics of sitcom interactions.
2. On verbal and situational irony
A clear-cut distinction needs to be made between verbal irony, a linguistic phenomenon exploiting the incongruity between reality and expectation, and situationalirony, a state of the world which is normally perceived as ironical (Gibbs 1994). Withverbal irony, the speaker intentionally creates a juxtaposition of incompatible actions or words. On the other hand, situational irony discloses events which appear as ironicregardless of the speaker’s implication. developing awareness of some discrepancy between expectation and reality is indicative of irony not being a matter of language butof mode of thought: “As philosophers claim that no true philosophy is possible withoutdoubt, by the same token, one may claim that no authentic human life is possible withoutirony” (Keirkegaard in Gibbs 1994: 363). Proverbial examples of situational ironyreinforce the presence of an ironical mode of thought in human reasoning: thus, the manwho invented the guillotine was beheaded by it; the man who built the Bastille wasimprisoned in it; the bishop who invented the iron cage was the first to be confined in it.If verbal irony is intentional, situational irony cannot be anchored in the speaker’sintention of doing something ironic:Verbal and situational irony, though mostly distinct, are related in oneimportant way, in that the speakers’ intentional use of verbal irony reflectstheir conceptualization of situations as ironic… We conceptualize events,experiences and ourselves as ironic and our language often reflects thisfigurative mode of thinking (Gibbs 1994: 371).
 
 Both verbal and situational irony revolve around a juxtaposition of incompatibles andemploy
incongruity
to suggest a
distinction between facts and expectations
(saying onething and meaning another) while keeping in mind the audience’s awareness of both.Should such incongruity be made explicit, clear semantic markers are to be used:“<
 Ironically>
or <
The irony of fate
 
is that 
> the man who invented the guillotine was beheaded by it”.
3. Recent views on irony processing
Two views prevail in contemporary approaches to the processing of irony. On theone hand, some scholars (Grice 1975, Dews and Winner 1999) maintain that irony presupposes a two-stage processing: first, the processing of a meaning of a specificutterance is rejected and, subsequently, a reinterpretation of the utterance is triggered. Onthe other hand, relevance-centred views such as that promoted by Sperber and Wilson(1986) claim that ironic meaning is arrived at directly, without being mediated by way of some rejected interpretation.
3.1. Grice’s view: irony as conversational implicature.
As Grice sees it, irony is a case of conversational implicature, engendered by aflouting of the Quality Maxim (Grice 1975: 46) which ends up in implying the oppositeof what is said. In other words, the ironist says something he does not believe to be truewhile having no intention to tell a lie. Such intention on the part of the ironist urges thehearer to look for an additional meaning, which, in Grice’s view, is “some obviouslyrelated proposition. The most obviously related proposition is the contradictory of the onehe purports to be putting forward” (Grice 1975: 53). The initial stage in ironycomprehension involves identifying non-observance of the Quality Maxim, which prompts the addressee into rejecting the literal meaning and subsequently deciphering theimplied meaning.Later on, in ‘
 Further Notes on Logic and Conversation’ 
(1978) Grice extends thedefinition of irony and argues that irony is a way of pretending and, consequently, of adopting an attitude towards a state of affairs: “To be ironical is among other things, to pretend (as the etymology suggests) and while one wants the pretence to be recognized assuch, to announce it as pretence would spoil the effect” (Grice 1978: 125). The claim thatirony expresses an attitude on the part of the speaker significantly broadens the scope of irony and adds an affective tinge to its interpretation.
3.2. Searle’s ‘Three Stage Model’ of irony comprehension
According to both Grice and Searle, the search for a non-literal meaning startswhen the hearer realises that the speaker’s utterance is context-inappropriate. In Grice’sframework, a non-literal utterance blatantly flouts a maxim, while in Searle’s, such anutterance fails to make sense against the context. Both Grice and Searle rely on the sameassumption which will be later questioned, namely that, analysing the initial, literal
 
meaning of an utterance is a mandatory stage in reaching the implied, non-literalmeaning. Bearing in mind the distinction between literal and non-literal utterances, Searleasserts that “in non-literal utterances, speakers do not mean what they say, but insteadmean something else”
 
(Searle 1979 in Dews and Winner 1999:1581). Searle’s ‘ThreeStage Model’ consists of three successive stages:1) Derive the literal meaning2) Test this meaning against the context3) If the literal meaning fails to make sense, seek an alternative non-literal meaning.
3.3. Berntsen and Kennedy’s view on contradiction underlying irony
Berntsen and Kennedy do not so much endeavour to explain the way hearers process irony, but choose to focus on the attitude conveyed by ironical utterances. Thisattitude emerges from the contradiction existing between a literal statement and what thereceiver regards as the sender’s belief: detachment, derogation, reservation, superiority or indignation.To produce a statement about a subject matter which opposes apparentlyindisputable knowledge or beliefs can be a way of displaying the subjectmatter is taken by the speaker to be amusing or ridiculous or absurd or  beneath contempt, depending on the context. That is, the contrast between theliteral statement and the shared background knowledge can be a way of specifying an attitude (Berntsen and Kennedy 1996: 21).Bernsten and Kennedy (1996) endorse Kierkegaard’s view on contradiction when theyclaim that irony involves an opposition or contradiction between a literal statement andwhat the receiver takes to be the sender’s belief. Such a contradiction is expected toarouse a certain attitude on the part of the receiver, which is defined as “a kind of evaluation, dealing with feeling and affect, interests and ideas. An attitude is preconceptual because it is a stance taken towards an idea, rather than an idea per se”.(Kierkegaard in Berntsen and Kennedy 1996: 16). Consequently, an addressee recognizesan utterance as ironical if he\she is aware that the speaker contradicts commonknowledge or beliefs in order to express an attitude towards them and to specify that s/heconsiders them amusing, ridiculous, absurd or even contemptible.
3.4. Irony as ‘Pretense’.
Clark and Gerrig’s ‘
 Pretense Theory
’ (1984) claims that a person who uses anironic utterance assumes a role and consequently borrows an ironic voice. An ironicalspeaker does not only echo an interpretation s/he dissociates from, but can also
enact 
the person to whom the respective thought or attitude is attributed:A speaker pretends to be an injudicious person, speaking to an uninitiatedaudience; the speaker intends the addressee of the irony to discover the pretense and thereby see his or her attitude toward the speaker, the audienceand the utterance (Clark and Gerrig 1984: 12)
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