Chapter 1. Responding to style

Bell, Alice; Browse, Sam; Gibbons, Alison; Peplow, David

doi:10.1075/lal.36.01bel

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

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“…There is growing empirical evidence in stylistics (e.g. Bell et al, 2019;Fernandez-Quintanilla, 2020;Grisot et al, 2020;Bell et al, 2021) of the relationship between language and reader response. Specific linguistic features can have a concrete effect on how readers engage with and respond to a text.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What triggers perceptions of racism in Heart of Darkness? A reader-response analysis

Mastropierro,

Conklin

2023

Language and Literature: International Journal of Stylistics

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This paper combines reader-response analysis and stylistic insights to investigate what may be triggering perceptions of racism in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. It presents the results of a survey that asked participants to read extracts from the novel in which Africans are described and to highlight words and phrases they found problematic. Participants were then asked to answer some questions about their perception. Linking quantitative examination of the patterns emerging from participants’ highlighting with a qualitative analysis of participants’ answers, this paper provides a comprehensive picture of the linguistic features and structures that contribute to the perception of racism in Heart of Darkness. By doing so, this paper not only offers a novel perspective on the discussion about race and racism in Conrad’s canonical text, but it also provides further empirical evidence of the relationship between language and reader response.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%