Denotation and Connotation Denotation refers to the literal meaning of a word, the "dictionary definition.

." For example, if you look up the word snake in a dictionary, you will discover that one of its denotative meanings is "any of numerous scaly, legless, sometimes venomous reptilesKhaving a long, tapering, cylindrical body and found in most tropical and temperate regions." Connotation, on the other hand, refers to the associations that are connected to a certain word or the emotional suggestions related to that word. he connotative meanings of a word exist together with the denotative meanings. he connotations for the word snake could include evil or danger.

!mages and how they were rendered Figures of speech (1) "oets often deviate from the denotative meanings of words to create fresher ideas and images. #uch deviations from the literal meanings are called figures of speech or figurative language. !f you giddily whisper to your classmate that the introduction to literature class is so wonderful and exciting that the class sessions seem to only last a minute, you are using a figure of speech. !f you say that our textbook is your best friend, you are using a figure of speech. here are many different kinds of figures of speech, such as metaphors, similes, personification, hyperbole, understatement, paradox, and pun. !t$s important that you understand several kinds of figures of speech. % simile is a comparison between two dissimilar ob&ects using a word like as or like to connect them. For example, if you say, "my boyfriend is like a watermelon in the summer ," you are creating a simile that compares your boyfriend with a watermelon. !f on the other hand you are mad at your boyfriend and say, "he's like a typhoon in the house," you$re comparing your boyfriend with a typhoon. % metaphor is similar to a simile, except that a metaphor compares two dissimilar ob&ects without using a word like as or

like. !f you write, "my boyfriend is an angel" or "my motorcycle is a bomb on wheels," you are creating metaphors. !f you present an inanimate ob&ect, animal, or abstraction with human 'ualities and characteristics, as though it were a person, you are using personification. !f you tell yourself that you have to put your new pencil back in the pencil box because it$s lonely and wants to go home, you are personifying your pencil. !f you say that you have to talk sweetly to your computer because it is temperamental, you are personifying your pencil. Figures of Speech(2): verbal rony !rony involves a contradiction. "!n general, irony is the perception of a clash bet!een appearance and reality" bet!een seems and is, or bet!een ought and is" ()arper )andbook*. #erbal irony++"#aying something contrary to what it means" ()arper )andbook*. !n daily language, being ironic means that you say something but mean the opposite to what you say. ",h, how lucky we are to have #, -%./ online materials offered by the !ntroduction to 0iterature class1" you said, and you might mean it, or you might be &ust ironic. !f you are ironic, there is a contradiction between your literal meaning and your actual meaning++and this is what we call verbal (rhetoric) irony. 2hen the narrator in #hirley 3ackson$s " he 0ottery" says, "%lthough the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones," the tone is ironic because the villagers seem civili4ed, but they are actually barbaric. 5esides verbal irony, we have two other kinds of irony6 dramatic irony and situational irony. $Dramatic irony$++"saying or doing something while unaware of its ironic contrast with the whole truth. 7ramatic irony, named for its fre'uency in 7rama, is a verbal irony with the speaker$s awareness erased" ++ so that the irony is on the speaker him8herself, but not what s8he talks about. here are a lot of examples in 7ramatic -onologues. For instance, when the duke in "-y 0ast 7uchess" says of the

late duchess, " here she is, as if alilve," the irony is on him because the duchess S dead (though seems alive*. )ere the irony is not the duke$s9 it is on him because he thought he posesses her, though he cannot ++ alive or dead. Situational irony++ "events turning to the opposite of what is expected or what should be. he ironic situation ++the "ought" upended by the is ++ is integral to dramatic irony"()arper )andbook*. !n %lanis -orissete$s "!ronic," we can see a lot of situational ironies ++ or ironies of fate. (%hetoric) Figures of Speech (2) &yperbole (sometimes called overstatement* occurs when you exaggerate a point that you are trying to make. !f you say that the lights in our classroom are too bright because they are brighter than ten thousand suns, you are using an example of hyperbole. ,r if you say that you$re so hungry you could eat a million cookies and six gallon of ice cream, you$re using hyperbole. 'thers: (nderstatement is related to hyperbole in that understatement is the opposite of hyperbole6 understatement implies more than is actually stated. 0et$s say on the exam over short stories, you receive a grade of :;; when the class average is <:. !f one of your classmates ask you how you did on the test and you reply, "! did okay," that is understatement. % sentence that contains a parado) seems initially to have contradictory elements in it but after some reflection those elements later make sense. o say, for example, that morning is the darkest time for me is parado)ical since mornings are bright and full of light but they seem mentally "dark" to me because !$m a night+person. % pun is a play on words that occurs when one word is used that reminds you of another word or words. /ou can, for example, use a word that looks like or sounds like another word. For example, if my dad says, "he is the son and all the world to me," there is a pun on the words son and sun. %mbiguity means confusion about what is conveyed, since the current context may lead to different interpretations of meaning.

*ragmatic meaning+edit, -ain article6 "ragmatics "ragmatics is the study of how context affects meaning. he two primary forms of context important to pragmatics are linguistic context and situational context. 0inguistic context is how meaning is understood without relying on intent and assumptions. !n applied pragmatics, for example, meaning is formed through sensory experiences, even though sensory stimulus cannot be easily articulated in language or signs. "ragmatics, then, reveals that meaning is both something affected by and affecting the world. -eaning is something contextual with respect to language and the world, and is also something active toward other meanings and the world. 0inguistic context becomes important when looking at particular linguistic problems such as that of pronouns. #ituational context refers to every non+linguistic factor that affects the meaning of a phrase. %n example of situational context can be seen in the phrase "it$s cold in here", which can either be a simple statement of fact or a re'uest to turn up the heat, depending on, among other things, whether or not it is believed to be in the listener$s power to affect the temperature. Semantic meaning+edit, -ain article6 #emantics #emantics is the study of how meaning is conveyed through signs and language. 0inguistic semantics focuses on the history of how words have been used in the past. =eneral semantics is about how people mean and refer in terms of likely intent and assumptions. hese three kinds of semantics6 Formal, )istorical, and =eneral+#emantics are studied in many different branches of science (methods of studying meaning vary widely*. >nderstanding how facial expressions, body language, and tone affect meaning, and how words, phrases, sentences, and punctuation relate to meaning are examples of #emantics. 7enotations are the literal or primary meaning?s@ of ?a@ word?s@. Aonnotations are ideas or feelings that a word invokes for a person in addition to its literal or primary meaning. during the :Bth century "hilosopher 3ohn #tuart -ill defined semantic meaning with the words "denotation" and "connotation".?C@ he original use of "meaning"

as understood early in the C;th century occurred through 0ady 2elby, after her daughter translated the term "semantics" from French. Conceptual meaning+edit, -ain article6 concept 0anguages allow information to be conveyed even when the specific words used are not known by the reader or listener. "eople connect words with meaning and use words to refer to concepts. % person$s intentions affect what is meant. -eaning (in Dnglish* as intent harkens back to the %nglo+ #axon and is associated today still, with the =erman verb "meinen" as to think or intend. Semiotics+edit, -ain article6 semiotics Ferdinand de #aussure described language in terms of Signs, which he in turn divided into signifieds and signifiers. he signifier is the sound of the linguistic ob&ect. he signified is the mental construction, or image associated with the sound. he sign, then, is essentially the relationship between the two. #igns themselves exist only in opposition to other signs, which means that "bat" has meaning only because it is not "cat" or "ball" or "boy". #igns are essentially arbitrary, as any foreign language student is well aware6 there is no reason that bat couldn$t mean "that bust of .apoleon over there" or "this body of water". #ince the choice of signifiers is ultimately arbitrary, the meaning cannot somehow be in the signifier. #aussure instead defers meaning to the sign itself6 meaning is ultimately the same thing as the sign, and meaning means that relationship is between signified and signifier. %ll meaning is both within us and communal. #igns "mean" by reference to our internal lexicon and grammar, and despite their being a matter of convention, signs can only mean something to the individual (what red means to one person may not be what red means to another*. )owever, while meanings may vary to some extent from individual to individual, only those meanings which stay within a boundary are seen by other speakers of the language to refer to reality6 if one were to refer to smells as red, most other speakers would assume the person is talking nonsense (although statements like this are common among people who experience synesthesia*.

2. Cognitive -ehaviors how. ranslation as an act is two+fold, in that the components and processes (mappings* are different, yet simultaneous, aspects of the translation model from the behaviors of the translator. 5asically, how translation occurs is the cumulative cognitive behaviors of the translator and what is the transition of the sign and its components from the source language to the target language. 2ilson$s translation model accounts for what happens in that it draws on 2olfram 2ilss$ (:BBE passim* cognitive behaviors, as they present the most accurate portrayal of this aspect of the translation process for the translation model. 2ilson$s model represents the sum of the translator$s behaviors as "analy4e, interpret, reformulate" with the assumption that they exist in the same terms depicted in Figure 2 and under the assumption that they occur at all levels of the model. his set of behaviors is not a closed set, and as such, forms a flexible group that is dependent upon the translator, the translation material and the translation situation9 i.e., what is the goal, who is the target reader, etc. %t a minimum, translation involves cognitive functions such as problem+ solving and decision+making. 0inguistic skills in two languages are not sufficient, as translation is a complex cognitive function that extends beyond linguistic skills. herefore, any approach to producing or analy4ing a process of translation, such as 2ilson$s model, must view translation as such. !f we decide to describe and explain translation processes by means of a cognitive framework of representation and legitimation, this has meaning only if we are prepared to investigate these processes in accordance with operational concepts. #uch concepts are action, behavior, problem solving, decision+making, creativity, intuition, and the strategies, methods, techni'ues, and routines of translation. (2ilss :BB;6C:*