A Stylistic Analysis Of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichieâ The Thing Around Your Neck

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A Stylistic Analysis Of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichieâ The Thing Around Your Neck

ABSTRACT

 Stylistics is the study and interpretation of texts from a linguistic and literary perspectives. This work was done to examine the basic linguistic features that have been used by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in The Thing Around Your Neck to pass some messages across to the readers and the society. A functional approach was adopted, an approach where particular note is taken of the stylistic function, effect and thematic significance of linguistic features in a literary text. The stylistics tools employed were morphology, graphology, phonology, syntax, lexico-semantics and point of view. After applying these tools the novel, it was discovered that language is an integral part of any work of art and that the success of a work depends on how the writer has been able to manipulate language. Adichie had effected changes through a systemic use of language which helped a better understanding of her work.

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Title page                                                                                            i

Certification                                                                                        ii

Dedication                                                                                           iii

Acknowledgement                                                                              iv

Abstract                                                                                              v

Table of Contents

CHAPTER ONE GENERAL INTRODUCTION

  • Introduction 1
  • Statement of the problem 2
  • Purpose of the study 3
  • Scope of the study 3
  • Justification 4
  • Methodology 4
  • The Author 5
  • Data Description 6

CHAPTER TWO

LITERATURE REVIEW

  • Introduction 8
  • The concept of style 8
  • Historical Development of Stylistics 9
  • Criticism and the meeting point of linguistics and literary stylistics 10
  • Stylistics 11
  • Levels of stylistic study 15
    • Morphology 15
    • Graphology 16
    • Phonology 17
    • Syntax 18
    • Lexico-semantics 19
  • Point of view 20
  • Conclusion 22

CHAPTER THREE

STYLISTIC ANALYSIS OF THE THING AROUND YOUR NECK

  • Introduction 23
  • Morphology 23
3.3 Graphology   26
3.4 Phonology   31
3.5 Syntax   33
3.6 Lexico-Semantics   39
3.7 Proverbs   44
3.8 Point of view   45
3.9 Findings   46
3.10 Conclusion   48
    CHAPTER FOUR  

 

Summary, Recommendation and Conclusion                                     49

References                                                                                          50

 

CHAPTER ONE

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

1.1               INTRODUCTION

Stylistics is the study and interpretation of texts from literary and linguistic perspectives. As a discipline it links literary criticism and linguistics. A stylistic analysis entails studying in details the features of written or spoken texts and stating what functions they perform in the context of the texts. The features chosen from any text are dealt with in three ways; identification, description and purpose. The method of analysis is purely scientific.

Carter (1989, p.162) suggests that the practice of stylistics comes about at any point of intersection of the language of a text with the elements which constitute literariness of that text. The point of focus in stylistics is the recognition of how a text works as a whole. It attempts to establish principles capable of explaining the particular choice made by social groups in their use of language and the production or reception of meaning. Stylistics is practiced as a part of understanding the possible meanings in a text. It is also generally assumed that the process of analysis will reveal the qualities of a work.

Stylistics is the study of style used in literary and non literary texts and the effect a writer or speaker wishes to communicate to the reader or hearer. It is mainly concerned with the idea of style, the analysis of literary texts and the application of linguistics to literary and non literary texts. Since every writer possesses his or her own particular way of writing and thinking, language use is different from one writer to another. To appreciate a literary work, it is important to see how the language and style used by the writer affect the interpretation of the work. Stylistics focuses on texts and gives much attention to the devices and style. It therefore, discusses theoretical matters alongside whatever practical analysis they provide.

Stylistic analysis besides helping one to acquire an explicit basis for deciding between interpretations also helps one to become more consciously aware of the processes of interpretation which are used in order to get to grips with the text one has read.

1.2               STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Adichie, being a young writer in exile, has written many books which have won several awards including her latest novel The Thing Around Your Neck. So many reviews have been done on the book and that is why the Daily Telegraph

(UK) says this about the book “Adichie writes with an economy and precision that makes the strange seem familiar, she makes story telling seem as easy as a bird song”.

It is therefore important to study how Adichie has been able to manipulate language to create stylistic effects to pass her message across to the readers.

1.3               PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purpose of this work is to examine the basic linguistic features that have been used by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in The Thing Around Your Neck to pass her message across to the readers and the society.

Since language is an important tool used in literature, and language use differs from one writer to another, how then has the writer been able to employ language to create stylistic effects? The effect of her language use on the overall appreciation of the work will be studied.

1.4               SCOPE OF THE STUDY

This work will make use of Adichie’s The Thing Around Your Neck as its primary source. A stylistic analysis shall be done to know how the writer has been able to manipulate language to achieve certain effects. This analysis shall be

conducted using the following elements of stylistics, graphology, morphology, phonology, syntax, lexico-semantics and point of view.

1.5               JUSTIFICATION

A study of this nature is important as it helps us to know how language contributes to meaning generation in Adichie’s The Thing Around Your Neck which has qualified the book published in 2009, to win various prizes. Since a literary work cannot be complete without an effective use of language, it is significant to study how Adichie has employed language to create stylistic effects.

This work will expand the frontiers of knowledge. It will make a place in the body of knowledge and help upcoming researchers to understand how Adiche has employed stylistic devices in her text.

1.6               METHODOLOGY

This research will adopt a functional approach, an approach where particular note is taken of the stylistic function, effect and thematic significance of linguistic features in a literary text.

The essay will study the society created by the writer through the character and situations in the text. The Thing Around Your Neck will serve as the primary source. There will also be reliance on secondary materials such as text books, stylistics dictionary and internet sources.

1.7                 THE AUTHOR

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie was born in 1977 in Enugu, Nigeria. She studied medicine and pharmacy at the University of Nigeria then moved to the US to study communications and political science at Eastern Connecticut State University. She obtained an MA in creative writing from Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore.

After initially writing poetry and one play, For the love of Biafra (1998), she wrote several short stories published in literary journals. She has won various competition prizes. The first novel Purple Hibiscus was published in 2003 and is set in the political turmoil of 1990’s Nigeria. The narrative was told from the perspective of a 15-year-old Kambili Achike. Purple Hibiscus won the 2005 commonwealth writers prize (overall winner, best book) and was shortlisted for the 2004 orange prize for fiction. Her second novel, Half of a Yellow Sun 2006 was set before and during the Biafra war. It won the 2007 orange broadband prize for fiction.

Her latest book is a collection of short stories; The Thing Around Your Neck (2009), shortlisted for the 2009 John Llewellyn-Rhys Memorial prize and the 2010 commonwealth writers prize (Africa Region, Best Book). Chimamanda lives between Nigeria and the United States

 

1.8               DATA DESCRIPTION

In the novel published in 2009, the writer turns her penetrating eye on not only Nigeria but America, in twelve dazzling stories that explore the ties that bind men and women, parents and children, Africa and the United states with a few telling details that do not portray one culture superior to the other.

In “A private experience”, a medical student hides from a violent riot with a poor Muslim woman whose dignity and faith force her to confront the realities and fears she has been pushing away. In “Tomorrow is too far”, a woman unlocks the devastating secret that surrounds her brother’s death. In “Imitation”, a young mother finds her comfortable life in Philadelphia threatened when she learns that her husband has moved his mistress into their home in Lagos. “The Thing Around Your Neck” depicts the choking loneliness of a Nigerian girl who moves to America that turns out to be nothing like the country she expected though falling in love brings her desires nearly within reach, a death in her homeland forces her to re-examine them.

“Searing and profound, Suffused with beauty, sorrow and longing, the collision of two cultures and the deep human struggle to reconcile them”. The Thing Around Your Neck according to the back cover of the book, “is a resounding confirmation of the prodigious literary powers of one of our most essential writers”.

References

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  • Armah, Ayi Kwei. 1968. The Beautiful Ones Are Not Yet Born. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
  • Armah, Ayi Kwei. 1970. Fragments. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
  • Adorno, W. Theodor. 1997 [1970] . Aesthetic Theory. London and New York: Continuum.
  • Asoo, Ferdinand Iorbee. 2012. “The Short Stories of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.” AFRREV IJAH An International Journal of Arts and Humanities 1(4):13-27.
  • Ball, Karyn. 2005. “Paranoia in the Age of the World Picture: The Global ‘Limits of Enlightenment’.” Cultural Critique 61:115-147.
  • Horkheimer, Max and Adorno, Theodor. 1997 [1944] . Dialectic of Enlightenment, Philosophical Fragments. London, New York: Verso.
  • Luckács, George. 1967 [1923] . History and Class Consciousness. London: Merlin Press.
  • Madera, John. 2009. “Delightful Gumbo or Strange Brew?” A Review of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s The Thing Around Your Neck [Online] . Available: http://www.openlettersmonthly.com/book-review-neckchimamanda-ngozi-adichie/ [Accessed 2013, February 21] .
  • Memmi, Albert. 2004. Decolonization and the Decolonized. Robert Bononno (Trans.). Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press.
  • Miller, Robert Alvin and Onyeoziri, Gloria Nne. 2014. “Willful and/ or Imposed Alienation in Recent African Emigration Narratives: Chimamnda Adichie’s The Thing Around Your Neck, Fatou Diomé’s Le Ventre de L’Atlantique, and Henry Lopes’s Une enfant de Poto-Poto” in Fears, Doubts and Joys of Not Belonging. Benjamin Hart Fishkin and Bill F. Ndi (Eds.). Bamenda, Cameroon: Langaa Research & Publishing Common Initiative Group, pp.197-214.
  • Oguine, Ike. 2000. A Squatter’s Tale. Portsmouth, N.H.: Heinemann.
  • Omowumi, Jide. 2011. A Stylistic Analysis of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s The Thing Around Your Neck. BA Dissertation, University of Ilorin, Nigeria.
  • Rasna, Warah. 2011. Red Soil and Roasted Maize: Selected Essays and Articles on Contemporary Kenya. Bloomington: AuthorHouseBooks.
  • Tunca, Daria. 2010. “Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Short Fiction” in African Presence in Europe and Beyond. Kathleene Gyssels and Bénédicte Ledent (Eds.). Paris: L’Hartaman.
  • Wirngo Siver, Comfort. 2012. Self-Migration and Cultural Inbetweeness: A Study of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s The Thing Around Your Neck. Teacher’s Diploma Dissertation. University of Yaoundi 1, Camerron.

 

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