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Irony, Hyperbole, Jokes and Banter

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Formal Models in the Study of Language

Abstract

In the last 10 or 15 years, following the collapse of the traditional definition of irony as a matter of saying one thing and meaning the opposite, a range of disparate phenomena including hyperbole, banter, understatement, jokes and rhetorical questions have been commonly treated as forms of irony in the experimental literature. Drawing on recent work by Wilson and Sperber (Explaining irony: 123–145, 2012a) and Wilson (J Pragmat 59: 40–56, 2013), I will argue that these phenomena are not inherently ironical, display none of the distinctive features of irony in most of their uses, and should not be seen as falling within the scope of an explanatory theory of irony.

With warm thanks to Jacques Moeschler for friendship and inspiration over the years. Thanks, too, to Dan Sperber, Greg Currie, Ingrid Lossius Falkum and Georg Kjoll for valuable discussions of irony.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University College London, Linguistics, London, UK

    Deirdre Wilson

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  1. Deirdre Wilson
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Correspondence to Deirdre Wilson .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dept of Linguistics, University of Geneva, Genève, Geneve, Switzerland

    Joanna Blochowiak

  2. Batiment Landolt, 7th Floor, Univ of Geneva, Dept of Linguistics, Geneva, Switzerland

    Cristina Grisot

  3. Dept. of Psycholinguistics, University of Geneva Dept. of Psycholinguistics, Geneva, Switzerland

    Stephanie Durrleman

  4. Department of Linguistics, University of Geneva, Genève, Geneve, Switzerland

    Christopher Laenzlinger

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Wilson, D. (2017). Irony, Hyperbole, Jokes and Banter. In: Blochowiak, J., Grisot, C., Durrleman, S., Laenzlinger, C. (eds) Formal Models in the Study of Language. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48832-5_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48832-5_11

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

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  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-48832-5

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