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FUNCTIONS OF PARALINGUISTIC MEANS
Abduazizova Durdona Abduzuhurivna
DSc., assist. professor of Tashkent institute
E-mail: jemchujina1970@mail.ru
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11518811
Annotation
The article considers the functions of paralinguistic means in written and oral
speech. The use of paralinguistic means is very diverse and is used in all speech acts,
both in oral and written communication. In the structure of the utterance, paralinguistic
means act as paraphonational and parakinesic means. The author analyzes excerpts of
works by foreign writers and makes an argument about the polyfunctionality of
paralinguistic means.
Keywords: linguistic and paralinguistic means, paraphonetic and parakinetic
means, polyfunctionality, emotivity, expressivity, functionality.
The main task of communication is to strive for a correct and complete
understanding of communicants. In order to adequately convey his thought, a
person uses various means offered by language, as well as non-verbal means.
The language does not always have enough linguistic expressive means to fully
convey the content invested in them. As the researchers note, “these tools in any
language are more or less limited, incomplete and insufficiently perfect.
Language very often expresses something approximately, it is forced to go to its
goal in complex and roundabout ways” [4, c.91]
A large branch of science that studies the transmission of information in a non-
verbal way is called paralinguistics. Paralinguistics, which studies nonverbal
components, is divided into three types:
a)
paraphonetic (various types of filling pauses, tempo of speech, timbre, volume,
melodization, etc.), specific speech sounds (ethical, social and dialect);
b) parakinetic (gestures, facial expressions, gestures, posture, etc.); c) graphic
(punctuation marks, handwriting, graphic additions, symbols such as §, & etc.).
These tools are called the term “paragraph”. [3, c. 367]
Despite a significant number of works devoted to the study of paralinguistic
phenomena, many issues related to the problems of socio-cultural, pragmatic, cognitive
factors determining the functional essence of paralinguistic phenomena remain
insufficiently developed.
The actual problem of paralinguistics is the problem of functional conditionality
of paralinguistic means. Functionality is the main parameter, the essential feature of
paralinguistic tools.
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Currently, the attention of linguists is mainly focused on the study of the
functional aspect of paralinguistic means. However, the functions associated with the
expression of various emotions are mainly noted. In recent years, studies have
appeared on the comparative nature and functioning of non-verbal means in German,
English, Chinese, Korean, Tatar, Kazakh languages (M. Kurbanov, I. Kreidlin, O.V.
Mudraya, N.V. Dutova, etc.); issues of verbal and non-verbal transmission of emotions in
different linguistic cultures (E.Y. Mirtskhulava, M.D. Gorodnikova, etc.); national and
cultural specifics of paralinguistic means A.F. Losev, P.A. Florensky, A. Gehlen, N.A.
Bernstein , M. Moss, etc.).
A review of the linguistic literature on this issue has shown that the following
functions of paralinguistic means are mainly considered:
a) expressive, aimed at enhancing the expressiveness of speech;
b) emotional, aimed at expressing various emotions and describing the inner
emotional state of the communicant;
c) the function of characterizing communicants in terms of their age, gender,
social characteristics, cultural, educational, and professional level.
Paralinguistics, as the science of nonverbal communication, is characterized by
various approaches to the analysis of paralinguistic means.
In fiction, especially in the speech of the characters, the paralinguistic means that
are used in various communication situations are most clearly reflected. Considering
paraphonetics, it is necessary to focus on the concept of "phonation". Phonation, in
general, is defined as a physiological phenomenon associated with the properties of the
human vocal apparatus. Phonation signs such as timbre, voice strength, overtones,
diction, etc. are noted. It is important to keep in mind that certain phonation signs can,
on the one hand, characterize the physiological properties of a person (innate features
of timbre, diction, speech defects, etc.), on the other – the properties of a person's voice
caused by his internal psychological state, for example, voice volume, gnashing of teeth,
whispering, etc. Only in the second case, in our opinion, phonation signs can be
considered as paralinguistic means, since they carry a certain semantic and functional
load
Ernest Hemingway's short story “The First Forty-nine” contains words of a
paralinguistic nature:
“Finish your breakfast and we’ll be starting.”
“It’s not light yet,” she said. “This is a ridiculous hour.”
Just then the lion roared in a deep-chested moaning, suddenly guttural, ascending
vibration that seemed to shake the air and ended in a sigh and a heavy, deep-
chested grunt.
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“He sounds almost here,” Macomber’s wife said.
“My God,” said Macomber. “I hate that damned noise.”
“It’s very impressive.”
“Impressive. It’s frightful.”
[6, p.74]
In this passage, the phenomena of phonation are materialized by the following
lexical units:
“roared,
in a deep-chested moaning, suddenly guttural, ascending vibration
that seemed to shake the air and ended in a sigh and a heavy, deep-chested grunt.”.
The
author conveys phonation signs, describing and characterizing the moan of a lion,
expressed in the following units: «
deep-chested moaning»
, suddenly guttural with an
upward vibration that seemed to shake the air and ended with a sigh and a heavy, deep
chest grunt.
In this example, a detailed description of the phonational features of a roaring
lion fulfills the function of emotional impact on a person and characterization of the
character's internal psychological state, feelings of anxiety, nervousness and fear
experienced by him, which is confirmed by the linguistic context (
damned noise,
impressive, frightful.)
There is an opinion that there is a distinction between “paralinguistic means” and
“phonational signs” depending on the functions they perform. J.Catford distinguishes
“paraphonological, non-phonological and phonological” functions within “phonational
signs”. [1, p.26]
From this point of view, “paraphonological functions” mean those phonation
differences that are directly correlated with contextual differences: an example is the
difference between a voice and a whisper. The voice belongs to the natural, i.e.
unmarked, context, and the whisper belongs to the so-called conspiratorial context.
By non-phonological functions, J. Catford understands “those phonational signs,
the differences of which are directly related to the situation to characterize individual
speaking in a language or dialect, while phonational differences characterize gender,
age, health, etc., but they are not contrasting in a linguistic sense”. [1, p.30]
Paralinguistic means, which primarily include gestures and facial expressions, are
characterized, as already noted, by functional significance, which is the most important
parameter determining the essence of paralinguistic phenomena.
Let's turn to the work of A. Cronin “Three loves”:
“
Her gaze
,
shielded against the glare,
travelling across the road to Bowie’s
boatyard, picked up the figure of her son playing aboard the Eagle, helping or
hindering Dave as he worked on the deck of the tiny launch moored to the grey-
stone slip. More likely hindering, she thought, severely stifling all maternal fondness.
Half smiling
to herself,
she turned and paused
before the oak wardrobe, now
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confronting her image in the glass with the natural instinctive seriousness
of
a woman before a mirror…
She raised a hand to her dark brown hair
,
regarded herself only for a
moment,
then, folding the plain cotton dress she had worn during the day, she
placed it in the bottom drawer of the wardrobe and,
making a last swift
inspection
of the room to ensure its order, noting the shining linoleum, the
exactitude of the antimacassar upon the fluted rocker, the smooth hang of the white
bed-mat,
she gave a neat movement of satisfaction with her head, swung
round
, and went downstairs...”
[2, p.58]
In this passage, the gestures and facial expressions of the hero are expressed by
such linguistic means as «
gaze, shielded against the glare travelling across the road
»
),
half smiling, to herself, she turned and paused, raised a hand to her dark brown hair,
regarded herself only for a moment, gave a neat movement of satisfaction with her head,
swung round, and went downstairs”.
The use of these paralinguistic tools performs several functions in this text
fragment: 1) achieving the authenticity of the described situation through a detailed and
consistent enumeration of all the movements, gestures and facial expressions of the
character;
2) characterization of the character as a true woman (“considering his reflection with
seriousness”, “taking a cursory glance around the room”) 3) expressions of the inner state
of mind (“smiling”, “throwing with satisfaction”).
It should be noted that in fiction, especially in the speech of characters, the
paralinguistic means that are used in various communication situations are most clearly
reflected, forming the so-called “paralinguistic context”.
Paralinguistic means can express the psychophysiological state of a person. For
example, in Jack London’s work “A Daughter of the Snows” phonation signs are used, i.e.
exclamations, prolongation and strength of vowel sounds, shouting in the act of
communication, narrowing and expanding the range of voice when transmitting
information, pauses and their duration, raising and lowering the basic tone of voice, etc.
Some of them are presented in the following a fragment.
«Jove! » - he muttered, doffing his cap gallantly. «There is a woman! » And a
sudden hunger seized him, and a yearning to see himself mirrored always in the
gray eyes of Frona Welse. He was not analytical; he did not know why; but he knew
that with her he could travel to the end of the earth. He felt a distaste for his
profession, and a temptation to throw it all over and strike out for the Klondike
whither she was going; then he glanced up the beetling side of the ship, saw the red
face of Thad Ferguson, and forgot the dream he had for an instant dreamed.
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Splash! A handful of water from his strenuous oar struck her full in the face. “Hope
…. you don't mind it, miss,” he apologized. "I'm doin’ the best I know how, which ain't
much.”
“So, it seems», she answered, good-naturedly”.
[5, p.116]
This passage reveals the feelings and state of the hero, which are expressed in the
text by many linguistic and paralinguistic means (exclamation marks, pauses, expressed
ellipses and lexical units). Expression «
doffing his cap gallantly
» characterizes the
character's manner of behavior, his gallantry. Exclamations
(Love! There is a woman!
)
convey a sense of admiration for a woman, and the pause expressed with the help of an
ellipsis indicates some confusion and a sense of timidity experienced by the character.
Adverb “
good-naturally
” is also a paralinguistic marker, as it indicates the character's
complacent tone. It should be emphasized that the functions of characterization of
characters, their emotional state in this example, as in many others, are carried out in
close interaction of linguistic and paralinguistic means.
It follows from this that the means accompanying communication, and thanks to
which communication becomes more effective, including paralinguistic means
expressing the psychological state of communicants, are included in the framework of
the study of paralinguistics.
The use of paralinguistic means is very diverse and is used in all speech acts, both
in oral and written communication. In the structure of the utterance, paralinguistic
means act as non-verbal phonational and kinesic means.
The analysis of our material indicates that the functional significance of paralinguistic
means is not limited to the emotive function. The unity of the form and content of an
utterance is achieved, in addition to purely linguistic means, also by paralinguistic
means, which are superimposed on linguistic expressions and perform various
functions aimed at expressing various psychological and emotional states of a person, as
well as characterizing a linguistic personality in terms of its age, gender, and social
characteristics. The most important parameter of paralinguistic tools is their functional
orientation, manifested in their multifunctionality in the process of speech
communication.
References:
1.
Catford J.C. Phonation types: the classification of some laryngeal
components of speech production. In Honour of Daniel Jones. – London:
Longmans, 1964. – Р.26-37.
2.
Cronin J. Thee loves. Published March 4. – U.S.: Lodge Press, 2009. – Р. 58.
3.
Nikolaeva T.M. Paralinguistics. Linguistic encyclopedic dictionary. – M.:
Soviet Encyclopedia, 1990. – C.367.
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4.
Serebrennikov B.A., Kubryakova E.S., Postovalova V. I. and others. The role
of the human factor in language. Language and the picture of the world. – M.:
Nauka, 1988. – p. 91.
5.
Jack London. A Daughter of the Snows. – L.: P.H “RUGRAM”, 2018. – Р.116.
6.
Hemingway E. M. Complete Short Stories. «The First Forty-nine». –
London: P. H. Scribner, 2007. – Р.74
