Стилистический анализ текста на английском языке = Stylistic Analysis of the Text

М.В. Черкунова
Е.В. Пономаренко
Ю.С. Старостина

СТИЛИСТИЧЕСКИЙ АНАЛИЗ ТЕКСТА  
НА АНГЛИЙСКОМ ЯЗЫКЕ
_____________________________________________________

STYLISTIC ANALYSIS OF THE TEXT

Учебное пособие

Москва
Издательство «ФЛИНТА»
2023

УДК 811.111’38 (075.8)
ББК  81.432.1-5я73
         Ч-48

А в т о р ы:

Черкунова Марина Владимировна — д-р филол. наук, проф. Самарского национального 
исследовательского университета им. академика С.П. Королева;
Пономаренко Евгения Витальевна — д-р филол. наук, проф. Московского 
государственного института международных отношений (университета) МИД России;
Старостина Юлия Сергеевна — канд. филол. наук, доцент Самарского национального 
исследовательского университета им. академика С.П. Королева

Р е ц е н з е н т ы:

Вишнякова Ольга Дмитриевна — д-р филол. наук,  

проф. Московского государственного университета им. М.В. Ломоносова;
Малахова Виктория Леонидовна — д-р филол. наук, проф. Московского государственного 
института международных отношений (университета) Министерства иностранных дел РФ

Черкунова М.В.

Ч-48       Стилистический анализ текста на английском языке. = Stylistic Analysis of the 
Text : учеб. пособие / М.В. Черкунова, Е.В. Пономаренко, Ю.С. Старостина. —  Москва :
ФЛИНТА, 2023. — 144 с. : ил. — ISBN 978-5-975-5382-8. — Текст : электронный.

Данное учебное пособие предназначено для студентов старших курсов, обучающихся по 
направлениям «Филология», «Лингвистика», «Перевод и переводоведение». «Стилистический 
анализ текста на английском языке (Stylistic Analysis of the Text)» ставит своей целью
ознакомить студентов с основными принципами стилистической дифференциации современного 
англоязычного дискурса. Авторы раскрывают лингвостилистические параметры научного, 
публицистического, медийного и официально-делового стилей, а также стиля художественной 
литературы в их непосредственной связи с выполняемой коммуникативной задачей. Кроме 
того, предлагается комплекс упражнений, направленных на выявление специфических 
языковых маркеров, обеспечивающих прагматическую эффективность разножанровых 
текстов в процессе реальной речевой коммуникации на английском языке.

Ключевые слова: стилистика, текст, уровень текста, жанр, средства выразительности, 
стилистические приемы, функциональный стиль, медиа стиль, научный стиль, 
публицистический стиль, художественный стиль, поэзия, драма, проза, фонетические 
средства, морфологические средства, лексические средства, синтаксические средства.

Keywords: stylistics, text, textual level, genre, expressive means, stylistic devices, 
functional style, media style, scientific style, publicistic style, belles-lettres style, poetry, 
drama, emotive prose, phonetic means, morphological means, lexical means, syntactic means.

УДК 811.111’38 (075.8)
ББК  81.432.1-5я73

ISBN 978-5-9765-5382-8 
© Самарский университет, 2023
© МГИМО Университет МИД России, 2023
© Черкунова М.В., Пономаренко Е.В., Старостина Ю.С., 2023
© Издательство «ФЛИНТА», 2023

ОГЛАВЛЕНИЕ

INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................5

PART 1. SCIENTIFIC FUNCTIONAL STYLE ...................................................8

Sub-style of humanitarian / natural sciences ...................................................8

Practice ..................................................................................................... 11

Sub-style of popular scientific prose .............................................................15

Practice ..................................................................................................... 18

PART 2. PUBLICISTIC FUNCTIONAL STYLE . .............................................23

Spoken Variety of publicistic functional style (oratories and speeches) .......24

Practice .....................................................................................................26

Written variety of publicistic functional style ...............................................30

Practice ..................................................................................................... 31

PART 3. NEWSPAPER (MEDIA) FUNCTIONAL STYLE ..............................34

Brief news items .............................................................................................34

Practice ......................................................................................................37

PART 4. FUNCTIONAL STYLE OF OFFICIAL DOCUMENTS ....................42

Practice .....................................................................................................44

PART 5. BELLES-LETTRES FUNCTIONAL STYLE .....................................49

Language of poetry ........................................................................................50

Language of drama ........................................................................................50

Language of emotive prose (fiction) . .............................................................50

Practice .....................................................................................................53

SUPPLEMENT ....................................................................................................58

Expressive means and stylistic devices (based on classification  
by I.R. Galperin) ............................................................................................58

Phonetic EMs and SDs .............................................................................59

Lexical SDs ..............................................................................................59

Syntactic SDs ...........................................................................................63

Practice .....................................................................................................66

SAMPLE TEXTS FOR STYLISTIC ANALYSIS ..............................................72

Humanitarian sciences ...................................................................................72

Popular scientific texts ...................................................................................79

Speeches .........................................................................................................92

Essays and opinion articles ..........................................................................102

Brief news items ........................................................................................... 114

Official documents .......................................................................................120

Emotive prose (fiction) .................................................................................126

QUOTED TEXTS.............................................................................................. 138

REFERENCES AND RECOMMENDED LITERATURE ............................. 141

INTRODUCTION

Any human language basically represents a system of various language 
units (including phonemes, morphemes, words and grammatical construc-
tions), which are hierarchical and structurally organized. This system is 
extremely complex, but in general the number of its elements is finite, 
observable and well-described. 
However, in real life language serves as a means of human communica-
tion, an instrument for producing written or spoken speech. It is actually 
used to achieve concrete aims in a huge variety of different situations. 
While constructing connected speech users constantly mix and match all 
the resources of the language to find ways of making the composition flow 
fluently while at the same time express the nuances they wish to convey. 
Thus, in the process of human interaction the features of language appear 
in an apparently unlimited number of combinations and variations. It is 
these concrete combinations of different language matter that produce vari-
ous effects, which are sometimes rather obvious and straightforward, but 
more often than not they are quite subtle and indeterminate (it is espe-
cially true for the more creative areas of language use such as literature,  
advertising, etc.). 
To reveal the effects of concrete language uses, as well as to disclose 
the linguistic mechanisms of ensuring the desired effects, specific type of 
analysis should be applied to communicative products known as texts. This 
analysis should combine two approaches, the first one being a “bottom up 
approach”, concentrating on how the language units are organized into larger 
meaningful wholes and focusing on the role played by specific features of 
language in facilitating successful interaction. The second approach can 
be called “top down”, stemming from a broadly defined area of language 
application (e.g. science, politics, etc.) or a communicative genre (e.g. recipe, 
joke, etc.) and examining the range of linguistic features which are found 
within it.
Thus, stylistic analysis of the text aims at revealing the system of lin-
guistic features of different textual levels, which, being combined, allow 

the author to achieve a certain goal in communication and to secure a 
desired pragmatic effect.
Since the situations of language use are extremely varied, and not always 
easy to define, it is most common for the Russian linguistic tradition to 
analyse texts within the framework of functional styles (FS), understood 
as “systems of interrelated language means which serve a definite aim in 
the process of communication”*. Within each functional style, texts can be 
further distributed to one of the related genres, or “relatively stable generic 
structures with their characteristic formal properties, social functions and 
contextual appropriateness”**. 
The exact number of functional styles, as well as their names and constitu-
ent elements (genres), are the questions still open to discussion, however, 
one of the most established classifications of functional styles includes the 
following ones:
1) scientific FS;
2) publicistic FS;
3) newspaper (mass media) FS;
4) FS of official documents;
5) belles-lettres FS.
When investigating concrete examples of language application (texts), 
it is practicable to work within a hierarchy of the following notions: situa-
tions give rise to texts, and texts make use of sets of distinctive features in 
various unique combinations. Thus the suggested scheme of text analysis 
goes along the following lines:
1) the title of the text under analysis (The text under analysis is entitled..; 
The title of the text I’m going to analyse is .., I am going to deal with 
an extract from the text which bears the title.., etc.);
2) a brief summary of the text (1—2 sentences) (the text tells the story 
of..; the article renders the idea of..; the texts is devoted to the problem 
of...; the extract describes how to..; the story depicts the events in..; 
the author gives an account of.., etc.);
3) the functional style of the text under consideration + the main function 
of the FS;
4) general characteristic features of the functional style;

* Galperin I.R. Stylistics. — М.: Высшая школа, 1977. — C. 32.
** Wales K.A Dictionary of Stylistics. — Pearson Education Limited, 2001. — P. 177.

5) the genre of the text under analysis;
6) the linguistic features of the text, illustrated by concrete examples:
 • structural / compositional peculiarities,
 • phonetic peculiarities (where relevant, mainly in poetry),
 • morphological peculiarities,
 • lexical peculiarities,
 • syntactic peculiarities,
 • expressive means and stylistic devices;
7) conclusion (All the features mentioned above clearly prove that the text 
belongs to the... functional style. The whole complex of these features 
allows the author / text / article / speech / document, etc. to achieve 
the desired pragmatic effect, that is to inform / persuade / entertain, 
etc. the reader and to make them knowledgeable about / share the 
author’s point of view / start thinking about, etc.).

PART 1. SCIENTIFIC FUNCTIONAL STYLE

Sub-styles:
 • the language of humanitarian sciences;
 • the language of natural sciences;
 • the language of popular scientific prose.

SUB-STYLE OF HUMANITARIAN / NATURAL SCIENCES

The main function of scientific texts is an informative one. These texts 
mainly aim at providing information, presenting scientific knowledge, 
explaining scientific concepts, describing the results of experiments, prov-
ing hypotheses, etc.
The audience is a relatively small group of professionals well acquainted 
with the subject.
The most common genres can be divided into written (monograph, 
research article, textbook, research paper, report, etc.) and spoken ones 
(presentation, discussion, etc.).
Scientific texts exist mainly in the form of a monologue, which presup-
poses no immediate feedback. The situational context has no considerable 
influence on the perception of the message. Paralinguistic features are not 
prominent.
Pieces of scientific prose are clearly marked by a set of common features, 
which allow them to perform their function within the given situational 
context. Thus, the majority of such texts are:
 • objective and unemotional;
 • impersonal;
 • logical, unambiguous and precise;
 • explicit, demonstrative and convincing.
These requirements are met due to the use of certain linguistic instru-
ments, which can be traced on all the levels of the textual construction.

NB! Typical linguistic instruments of achieving the pragmatic goal of 
scientific texts that are going to be enumerated below are not necessarily 
present all together in every piece of scientific writing. They can be repre-
sented in different combinations each time producing a slightly different 
effect depending on concrete factors of the communicative situation (these 
factors may include the personality of the author, the concrete parameters 
of the addressee, the subject matter of the writing, etc.). What is more, 
the text may possess some individual, non-typical linguistic features, not 
mentioned in this chapter (e.g. pronoun I and the first person narration). 
The aim of the stylistic analysis actually consists in revealing the whole 
complex of such linguistic features (both typical and non-typical ones) 
and in interpreting their significance within the particular text.

Structural features:
 • a highly formalized set of structural elements (e.g. a research article 
will most likely comprise such structural elements as title, abstract, 
set of key words, body, which, in its turn, is divided into logical blocks 
entitled Introduction, Method, etc.). This type of structuring facili-
tates navigation within the text and helps make the search for con-
crete information easy;
 • the information within the body is organized according to chain pat-
tern, which means that there is rigid inner hierarchy; ideas are unfolded 
in strict logical order without referring back. The thesis statement 
tends to the beginning; the information is not repeated several times;
 • logical division of paragraphs — one paragraph contains one finished 
thought. This division if often supported by subheads;
 • extensive use of diagrams, charts, tables and illustrations enhance the 
demonstrative aspect of the text;
 • organizing information into all kinds of lists, which help structure the 
material logically and at the same time concisely;
 • use of footnotes for establishing references and increasing credibil-
ity of the information.

Morphological features: 
 • mostly Present Simple Tense is used as the information is presented in 
the chronological order without any digressions (although consistent use 

of Past Simple Tense can also be traced). Due to the absence of tense 
variations the text sounds more compact, logical and homogeneous;
 • Latin and Greek affixes are extensively used to coin terms and describe 
scientific concepts (e.g. nano-, multi-, mono-, poly-, a-, non-, ante-, 
ambi-, auto-, bi-, co-, counter-, de-, di-, semi-, hyper-, micro-, pseudo-, 
sub-, -ics, -ism, -ist, etc.).

Lexical features:
 • words are used in their primary logical meaning (which is opposed to 
figurative meaning) to avoid ambiguity;
 • lexical words (знаменательные части речи) prevail over grammati-
cal ones (служебные части речи), which increases the informational 
density of the text;
 • bookish words (e.g. negligible, obviate, propagate) and general aca-
demic vocabulary (e.g. process, effect, function, operate, modify) are 
employed in great numbers to establish general scientific background;
 • terms specific to a given branch of science are used for the sake of 
precision;
 • abbreviations serve as a means of economy and at the same time help 
to target the information at the prepared and interested reader;
 • proper names allow the author to establish links between different 
sources of information and thus enhance the credibility of the ideas 
that are being put forward;
 • words / abbreviations of Latin and Greek origin (e.g. phenomenon(a), 
apparatus, formula(ae), chronology, NB (Lat. nota bene), i.e. (Lat. 
id est = that is), ibid. (Lat. ibidem), op.cit. (Lat. opus citatum), et al. 
(Lat. et alii), etc.);
 • discourse markers of explanation and logical connection (e.g. in fact, 
in general, in other words, in this way, etc.) help to arrange the mate-
rial logically;
 • numbers and figures ensure precision;
 • special symbols.

Syntactic features:
 • simple sentences always have extended structure including such means 
of compression as participial, infinitive and gerundial constructions, 
homogeneous parts of the sentence; 

• the majority of the sentences are composite with both coordinating and 
subordinating types of connection, which makes the text on the one hand 
more information-packed, but on the other hand, more difficult to read;
 • abundance of conjunctions (e.g. thus, however, therefore, also, fur-
thermore, nevertheless, consequently, etc.) establish cause and effect 
relations between the ideas;
 • passive constructions make the text sound impersonal and conse-
quently objective;
 • noun phrases with complex structure (e.g. research publication purpose; 
corpus technology data; syntactic phrase-structure dependency trees 
annotation; machine translation method; low-background, high-sen-
sitivity neutron detectors) increase the information density of the text;
 • parenthetic constructions (generally introduced in brackets) provide 
information of referential or explanatory character thus serving the 
aim of economy;
 • quotations make the information presented trustworthy and reliable.

Expressive resources:
 • these are not typical of scientific texts since the latter are supposed to 
be objective, unemotional and precise, however graphical expressive 
means including bold font and italics are widely used to highlight some 
key notions within the text and to draw the readers’ attention to them;
 • in rare cases trite metaphors and similes may be employed to explain / 
illustrate some concepts as these devices make use of the basic mech-
anism of human cognition through analogy and contrast.

Practice

Step 1. Read the following text:

10. Pragmalinguistics and Stylistics*

While the field of pragmatics in its widest sense is constituted of many 
diverse approaches (without clear-cut boundaries) united by a common func-

* Pragmalinguistics and Stylistics. — URL: https://www.pulib.sk/web/kniznica/
elpub/dokument/Ferencik1/subor/10.pdf

tional (social, cultural, cognitive) perspective on language in communication 
(cf. Verschueren 1999), pragmalinguistics (linguistic pragmatics, pragmatic 
linguistics, internal pragmatics) focuses primarily (though not exclusively) 
on the study of linguistic phenomena (i.e., code) from the point of view of 
their usage. As it is impossible to offer an exhaustive definition of pragmat-
ics, it might be easier simply to present a list of the topics studied: deixis, 
implicature, presupposition, speech acts and aspects of discourse structure 
(cf. Levinson 1983; for the scope of pragmatics and the detailed coverage 
of its major topics see Tárnyiková 2000).  

10.1. Deixis and Presupposition 
The phenomenon of deixis fixes the utterance in the physical (temporal 
and spatial deixis, see Reference, 5.1.1) and social (social deixis, which 
includes person deixis and attitudinal deixis, see also 9.1) context of its use. 
Deixis, which may also be used “self-referentially” to point to itself (discourse 
deixis, see Endophoric reference, 5.1.1), is realized by indexical (deictic) 
expressions, such as personal and possessive pronouns, adverbials, verbal 
categories of person and tense, but also by politeness and phatic formulae. 
Presupposition represents the amount of information assumed to be 
known by participants (background knowledge, common ground) and has 
direct impact on how much is explicitly said and how much remains implicit. 
Since it is normally not necessary, let alone possible, to be fully explicit, 
a certain level of balance is strived for by the participants who take into 
consideration various factors (see 3.2); for example, the medium of writing 
tends to be more explicit as participants do not share the time and space, 
often an unknown (general) addressee is projected with whom the amount 
of the shared knowledge can only be estimated.  

10.2. Speech Acts
The theory of speech acts (J.L. Austin and J.R. Searle) concerns the lan-
guage user’s intention to attain certain communicative goals by performing 
acts through the use of language. From the stylistic perspective, Austin’s 
three types of speech act (locutionary, illocutionary, perlocutionary) are of 
special relevance, since it is esp. the variety of possible illocutions (i.e., uses 
which language can be put to) which offers innumerable choices. The types 
of speech acts as proposed by Searle (assertives, directives, commissives, 
expressives, declarations) are (loosely) associated with certain linguistic