Ironic Expression
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An Ironic Expression is a humorous expression whose superficial meaning differs significantly from its intended meaning.
- Context:
- It can range from being an Overstatement Expression to being an Understatement Expression.
- It can range from being Verbal Irony to being Written Irony.
- It can range from being Situational Irony to being Dramatic Irony.
- It can be uttered by an Ironist.
- It can include a Raised Eyebrow.
- It can be an (ironic) Sarcastic Expression.
- …
- Example(s):
- “That movie was great. Not! ”
- “I started out with nothing & still have most of it left.”
- “I pretend to work. They pretend to pay me.”
- “Sarcasm is just one more service we offer.”
- “Errors have been made. Others will be blamed.”
- “Well, this day was a total waste of makeup.”
- “I thought I wanted a career, turns out I just wanted paychecks.”
- “Chaos, panic, & disorder - my work here is done.”
- “Never trust a dog to watch your food.”
- “You're just jealous because the voices are talking to me.”
- “... we approached the ticket window. The lady behind it informed me that the price for the elder two was such-and-such and the little’un was free. 'What if I pay you a bit extra and you keep them?' I suggested. The kids snortled and started naming prices that might clear the market. ...”
- ...
- Counter-Example(s):
- See: Paraprosdokian, Pun, Dissimulation, Rhetorical Device, Simile, Context-Dependent Word, Comedic Work.
References
2018
- (Wikipedia, 2018) ⇒ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony Retrieved:2018-7-21.
- Irony ([1] ), in its broadest sense, is a rhetorical device, literary technique, or event in which what appears, on the surface, to be the case, differs radically from what is actually the case. Irony can be categorized into different types, including: verbal irony, dramatic irony, and situational irony. Verbal, dramatic, and situational irony are often used for emphasis in the assertion of a truth. The ironic form of simile, used in sarcasm, and some forms of litotes can emphasize one's meaning by the deliberate use of language which states the opposite of the truth, denies the contrary of the truth, or drastically and obviously understates a factual connection. [2] Other forms, as identified by historian Connop Thirlwall, include dialectic and practical irony.[3]
- ↑ Liddell & Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, v. sub .
- ↑ Muecke, DC., The Compass of Irony, Routledge, 1969. p. 80
- ↑ Preminger, A. & Brogan, T. V. F. Brogan, The New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, MJF Books, 1993, ISBN 9780691032719, pp. 633–635.
2016a
- (Wiktionary, 2016) ⇒ https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/irony#Noun
- QUOTE:
- A statement that, when taken in context, may actually mean something different from, or the opposite of, what is written literally; the use of words expressing something other than their literal intention, often in a humorous context.
- Dramatic irony: a theatrical effect in which the meaning of a situation, or some incongruity in the plot, is understood by the audience, but not by the characters in the play.
- Ignorance feigned for the purpose of confounding or provoking an antagonist; Socratic irony.
- The state of two usually unrelated entities, parties, actions, etc. being related through a common connection in an uncommon way.
- QUOTE:
2016b
- (1843 Magazine, 2016) ⇒ http://www.1843magazine.com/people/the-daily/being-german-is-no-laughing-matter
- QUOTE: But we deliberately spoke German, to help us acclimatise to our new home. In a mood of levity, we approached the ticket window. The lady behind it informed me that the price for the elder two was such-and-such and the little’un was free. “What if I pay you a bit extra and you keep them?” I suggested. The kids snortled and started naming prices that might clear the market. The lady stared back, horrified. Then, slowly, she leaned forward to look at my children, who stiffened. “Your dad does not really mean that,” she said. “He does not really want to sell you.” …
… That’s not to say that Germans live in a world that’s devoid of comedy or laughter; but it is a world that’s empty, almost, of irony, overstatement and understatement. … Instead of a raised eyebrow, we get full-body signals to laugh now. Punchlines don’t twist meaning ironically so much as invert it: in short, they rely on sarcasm – the lowest form of humour. …
… The steady drip of micro-miscommunications produces a feeling of loneliness. Not connecting is always painful. Not connecting in the way that ironists do, as a means of coping with a depressing world, is more so.
- QUOTE: But we deliberately spoke German, to help us acclimatise to our new home. In a mood of levity, we approached the ticket window. The lady behind it informed me that the price for the elder two was such-and-such and the little’un was free. “What if I pay you a bit extra and you keep them?” I suggested. The kids snortled and started naming prices that might clear the market. The lady stared back, horrified. Then, slowly, she leaned forward to look at my children, who stiffened. “Your dad does not really mean that,” she said. “He does not really want to sell you.” …
2016c
- (Hanke & Ibe, 2016) ⇒ Michael Hanke, and Pierre Ibe (2016). Lies, irony, and contradiction — an annotation of semantic conflict in the movie" Forrest Gump". F1000Research, 5.
- QUOTE: Detection of semantic conflict is an important cognitive skill for human social interaction. It is required to identify lies (false statements made with the intention to deceive) but also to correctly interpret stylistic devices — such as sarcasm and irony (statements with direct meaning that is the opposite or contrary to the implied semantic content). As the interpretation of such events is highly context dependent, it is difficult to study how the brain processes these in the context of real-life like interactions in complex natural environments.
2015
- (Al Khawaldeh, 2015) ⇒ Suhaib Al Khawaldeh (2015). "Problems of Understanding English Ironic Expressions by MA Students of Applied Linguistics at Mu'tah University in Jordan". Journal of Education and Practice, 6(36), 158-161.
- QUOTE: Irony is a universal phenomenon, which is a literary device that merely includes all cultural uses in daily conversations, and yet 80% of the people are unfamiliar of its intended meaning and take it literally (Siger and Taha, 2012). According to Clark and Gerrig (1984) ironic expressions are understood when listeners distinguish the affectation underlying a speaker's statement. In many cases, ironic expressions accomplish their communicative intent by reminding listeners of some antecedent event or statement (Sperber and Wilson, 1986), or by reminding listeners of a belief or social norm collectively held by a speaker and a listener (Kreuz and Glucksberg, 1989).
There are two basic types of irony: verbal and situational. First, verbal irony is being formed when the speaker intentionally highlights the surface meaning of his or her utterance, usually for humorous purposes. Verbal irony succeeds when the listener receives the intended meaning otherwise, it will fail. Second, situational irony is the inconsistency between one’s beliefs or actions and how things actually are without his or her knowledge. Dramatic irony is simply defined as a type of situational irony that occurs in drama (Wolfsdorf, 2007).
(...) Ironic expressions need more time to be comprehended than direct meanings. In addition, one cannot understand ironic expressions without being aware of the context.
- QUOTE: Irony is a universal phenomenon, which is a literary device that merely includes all cultural uses in daily conversations, and yet 80% of the people are unfamiliar of its intended meaning and take it literally (Siger and Taha, 2012). According to Clark and Gerrig (1984) ironic expressions are understood when listeners distinguish the affectation underlying a speaker's statement. In many cases, ironic expressions accomplish their communicative intent by reminding listeners of some antecedent event or statement (Sperber and Wilson, 1986), or by reminding listeners of a belief or social norm collectively held by a speaker and a listener (Kreuz and Glucksberg, 1989).
2004
- (Hancock, 2004) ⇒ Jeffrey T. Hancock (2004). "Verbal irony use in face-to-face and computer-mediated conversations". Journal of Language and Social Psychology, 23(4), 447-463.
- QUOTE: A considerable amount of theoretical work has explored the linguistic mechanisms that a speaker uses to convey an ironic meaning that is different from what is literally said. In one of the earliest psychological models of irony, Grice (1975, 1978, 1989) argued that the ironist intentionally violates conversational maxims (e.g., the maxim of quality) during conversation, and that this type of violation suggests to the addressee that some figurative meaning may be implied by the utterance.
2003
- (Attardo et al., 2003) ⇒ Salvatore Attardo, Jodi Eisterhold, Jennifer Hay, and Isabella Poggi (2003). "Multimodal markers of irony and sarcasm". Humor, 16(2), 243-260.
- QUOTE: An important distinction, which needs to be kept very clear, is between the markers of irony/sarcasm and the actual phenomenon. The distinction boils down to the fact that an ironical utterance would still be ironical without any markers, but would cease to be such if we remove all its constituent factors, i.e., the copresence of (at least) two distinct meanings, their antiphrastic nature (or at least their difference), the contextual inappropriateness of the utterance, etc., according to one’s theory of irony. There exists the so-called “deadpan” delivery of humor irony which consists precisely in delivering irony, sarcasm or other forms of humor without any overt marker of ironical, sarcastic, or humorous intent. Conversely, if we remove the constituent factors of irony, it ceases to exist.
1986
- Lewis Hyde. (1986). “Alcohol and Poetry: John Berryman and the Booze Talking."