Linguistics Meets Literature: More on the Grammar of Emily Dickinson

Matthias Bauer; Sigrid Beck; Saskia Brockmann; Susanne Riecker; Angelika Zirker; Nadine Bade

Published by De Gruyter Mouton 2020

Linguistics Meets Literature

More on the Grammar of Emily Dickinson

Matthias Bauer , Sigrid Beck , Saskia Brockmann , Susanne Riecker , Angelika Zirker and Nadine Bade

Volume 329 in the series Trends in Linguistics. Studies and Monographs [TiLSM]

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110646825

Overview
Contents

About this book

Until recently, collaborative efforts between formal linguistics and literary studies have been relatively sparse; this book is an attempt to bridge this gap and add to the hitherto small pool of studies that combine the two disciplines.
Our study concentrates on Emily Dickinson’s poetry, since it displays a highly uncommon and therefore challenging use of language. We argue this to be part of her poetic strategy and consider Dickinson an intuitive linguist: her apparent non-compliance with linguistic rules is a productive exploration of linguistic expression to reveal the flexibility and potential of grammar, leading to complex processes of interpretation. Our study includes a number of in-depth analyses of individual poems, which combine formal linguistic methods and literary scholarship and focus on specific aspects such as ambiguity, reference, and presuppositions. One of our findings concerns the dynamic interpretation of lyrical texts in which the pragmatic step of establishing what a poem means for the reader is postponed to text level.
We provide readers with a tool-box of methods for the formal linguistic analysis not just of Emily Dickinson’s poetry but of linguistically complex literary texts in general.

Author / Editor information

Matthias Bauer and Sigrid Beck, University of Tübingen, Germany.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	I
Foreword Publicly Available Download PDF	V
Table of Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	VII
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Part I: Individual Analyses
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	13
I.1 “To pile like Thunder”: Lexical Ambiguity Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	15
I.2 “You said that I ‘was Great’”: Scales and Contextual Parameters Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	26
I.3 “I’m Nobody!”: Interpreting Quantifiers Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	41
I.4 “This was a Poet”: Identifying Referents – Definites and Demonstratives Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	54
I.5 “If it had no pencil”: Identifying Referents – Pronouns Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	79
I.6 “My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun”: Semantic Mismatches and Coercion Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	99
Part II: Emily Dickinson: The Poet as Linguist, and the Linguist as Poet
II.1 The Poet as Linguist Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	133
II.2 The Linguist as Poet Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	158
Part III: Benefits of Interdisciplinary Work
III.1 Poetry as a Data Source for Formal Linguistics Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	179
III.2 Formal Linguistics as a Tool in Literary Studies Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	199
Appendix Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	221
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	239
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	249

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter Mouton
Audience: Literary Scholars; Linguists
Pages
- Front matter: 8
- Main content: 254
Illustrations
- Tables: 9
Keywords: Emily Dickinson; Literary Linguistics; Formal Semantics

eBook

Published: June 8, 2020
ISBN: 9783110646825

Hardcover

Published: May 18, 2020
ISBN: 9783110638806

Paperback

Published: January 31, 2022
ISBN: 9783110777475