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Title Linguistic Representation of Possible Text Words in A Visit From The Goon Squad: A Cognitive Narratological Analysis

Author(s) FATIMA IFTIKHAR

Abstract Title: Linguistic Representation of Possible Text Worlds in A Visit from the Goon Squad: A Cognitive Narratological Analysis The semantics of a narrative is known to be determined through text-world representation (Semino, 2014). Text world brings up the discussion of a context, actual text scenario and the realities, disseminated through diverse linguistic and narrative practices. This thesis focuses on world building in A Visit from the Goon Squad; first through linguistic means and deictics and second through focalization and viewpoint analysis. The study adopts a qualitative approach to explore how text-world building helps in dealing with spatial and temporal shift and viewpoint shifts of various characters in the novel. For this purpose, the researcher selected a sub-text, identified world-builders and function advancing propositions, sorted out modal worlds and qualitatively analyzed those worlds to explore viewpoints of diverse characters. The analysis indicated that integrated approach combining both cognitive-linguistic and narratological aspects prove expedient in dealing with narrative complexity. Moreover, the findings reveal that speech and thought representation (free direct speech, free indirect speech, free indirect thought, free direct thought), deixis, change in narrative voice, use of adjectives and noun phrases (value-based expressions), definite and indefinite referential elements and schema-oriented linguistic expressions point towards change in viewpoint of multiple characters. The narrative events presented by either discourse participants or enactors influence semantics of the text. The meaning varies upon change in the perspective of a character, context of the participants and our already existing schemata. This study is significant in the fields of linguistics, narratology and classroom teaching as it explores how Text-world approach and focalization technique could better be employed to comprehend a disoriented narrative such as A Visit from the Goon Squad. It contributes to the existing literature on language and world-building, particularly in the ways that a writer uses language to guide a reader through the story world, generally in terms of temporal, spatial deictic and subjective experiences

Type Thesis/Dissertation

Faculty Languages

Department English

Language English

Publication Date 2023-08-09

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