Resumen de tesis doctoral: KALBERMATTEN, M. Verbal Irony as a Prototype Category in Spanish: A discoursive analysis

Wed Jul 19 10:40:27 UTC 2006

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Resumen de tesis doctoral:
KALBERMATTEN, Maria.  2006. Verbal Irony as a Prototype Category in
Spanish: A discoursive analysis. University of Minnesota
Información de Maria Isabel Kalbermatten  <mkalberm at gustavus.edu>
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1. Autora:
    KALBERMATTEN, Maria

2. Título:
    Verbal Irony as a Prototype Category in Spanish: A discoursive analysis
    2.1. Número de págs.: ca. 285
    2.2 Palabras clave: Análisis del discurso

3. Fecha de lectura o defensa:
    2006

4. Departamento, centro o laboratorio en el que se ha desarrollado:
    Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition
    University of Minnesota, EE.UU

5. Directores:
    Timothy L. Face
    Francisco Ocampo

6. Proyecto o línea de investigación en el que se incluye:
    Análisis del discurso

7. Resumen e índice

The  goal of the present research is to outline the parameters for
characterizing  verbal irony as a prototype category. Although many
scholars are aware  that different instances of irony exist, most of
them have defined irony  as a category with necessary and sufficient
conditions. Furthermore,  some of the definitions are based on the
analysis of ironic sentences  in isolation or in the context of a
constructed text. Therefore, these  definitions are too specific and
fail to explain many instances of irony  in naturally occurring
conversation.

I analyzed excerpts from multiparty conversations in Argentinean
Spanish  using ethnomethodology. I made observations on the data from
my intuition  as a Spanish native speaker and from the participants'
reactions and  their own analysis of the situations. The subjects are
my relatives  and friends. The benefit of the selected subject
population is that  I share with them a contextual background,
recognized as the main factor  in the interpretation of an utterance
as ironic.

My  research shows empirically that irony is a prototype category. I
found  in the data compelling evidence for graded membership in this
category.  The prototypic ironic instances present an opposition
between the literal  and the intended meaning of the utterance, a
hidden attitude of criticism,  a target, and shared experience and
knowledge that help the audience  infer the irony. In the
less-than-central members, the opposition between  what is said and
what was said in previous utterances leads the audience  to infer
irony. However, in the case of moderately marginal members  the
opposition between what the speaker says and the facts of the
situation  is what leads the audience to interpret the utterance as
ironic. In  the more marginal members, the ironic interpretation is
triggered by  the negation of the felicity conditions of a speech act,
or from the  echo of a previous utterance. Finally, the identification
of ironic  instances in real conversation is sometimes complicated by
the presence  of sarcasm and parody because these three phenomena are
closely related.  Indeed, I found good representative examples of each
of these categories  as well as instances in which two of them
overlap.

ÍNDICE

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
DEDICATION
ABSTRACT
LIST OF TABLES
LIST OF FIGURES

Chapter I: INTRODUCTION
1.1.Statement of the Problem
1.2.Purpose of the Study
1.3.Structure of the Dissertation

Chapter II: REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE
2.1.Theoretical and Experimental Approaches to Irony
2.1.1.The Classical Definition of Irony
2.1.2.Semantic Approach to Irony
2.1.3.The Traditional Pragmatic Approaches to Irony
2.1.4.The Psychorhetorical Approach to Irony
2.1.5.The Speech Act Analyses of Irony
2.1.6.Theories of Irony
2.1.6.1. Mention Theory
2.1.6.2. Pretense Theory
2.1.6.3. Display Theory
2.1.6.4. Echo Reminder Theory
2.1.6.5. Allusional Pretense Theory
2.1.6.6. Indirect Negation Theory
2.1.6.7. (In)appropriateness Theory
2.1.6.7. Implicit Display Theory
2.1.7.The Psycholinguistic Approach to Irony
2.1.8.The Politeness Approach of Irony
2.1.9.Analyses of Irony in Conversation
2.1.10.Analysis of Verbal Irony in Spanish
2.2.Theoretical and Experimental Approaches to Irony: Summary
2.3.Research questions investigated in the present study
2.3.1.Characteristic Attributes of Irony
2.3.2.Verbal Irony as a Prototype Category
2.3.3.Verbal Irony, Sarcasm and Parody

Chapter 3: RESEARCH DESIGN
3.1. Subjects
3.3. Data collection

Chapter 4: DATA ANALYSIS
	4.1. Identification of Ironic Instances	
	4.2. Categorization of the Ironic Instances
	4.3. Determination of the Internal Structure of the Category

Chapter 5: VERBAL IRONY AS A PROTOTYPE CATEGORY IN SPANISH
5.1. Verbal Irony as a Prototype Category in Spanish	
5.2. Verbal irony: Central Members	
5.3. Verbal Irony: Less-than-Central Members
5.4. Verbal Irony: Moderately Marginal Members	
5.5. Verbal Irony: Extreme Marginal Members	
5.6. Summary

Chapter 6: VERBAL IRONY, SARCASM AND PARODY
	6.1. Sarcasm
	6.2. Parody
	6.3. Summary

Chapter 7: DISCUSSIONS AND CONCLUSIONS
7.1. Salient Attributes of Verbal Irony
7.2. Internal Structure of the Category
7.3. Verbal Irony, Sarcasm and Parody
7.4. Summary of the Study
7.5. Limitations
7.6. Future Research
7.7. Final Thoughts

Appendices
Appendix A: Consent Form (Spanish Version)
Appendix B: Consent Form (English Version)
Appendix C: Examples of Ironic Remarks and Reactions to Ironic Remarks
Appendix D: Attributes of Verbal Irony, Sarcasm and Verbal Parody: Examples
References

LIST OF TABLES
Table
Table 4.1. Total Number and Mean Percentage of Reactions to Verbal Irony
Table 4.2. Types of Verbal Irony
Table 4.3. Characteristic Attributes of Verbal Irony	
Table 4.4. Total Number and Mean Percentage of Instances by Types of
Verbal Irony
Table 6.1. Attributes of Irony and Sarcasm
Table 6.2. Irony and Parody: Differences
Table 6.3. Attributes of Irony and Parody
Table 6.4. Attributes of Irony, Sarcasm and Verbal Parody	
Table 6.5. Attributes of Irony, Sarcasm and Verbal Parody: Examples
Table C.1. Examples of Reactions to Verbal Irony
Table D 1. Attributes of Irony, Sarcasm and Verbal Parody: Examples

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure
Figure 4.1. Verbal irony: Internal Structure of the Category

8. Correo-e de la autora:
   Maria Isabel Kalbermatten  <mkalberm at gustavus.edu>

9. Cómo obtener la tesis
    Contactar con la autora, Maria Isabel Kalbermatten, en:
    <mkalberm at gustavus.edu>

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