Stylistics of language units

The stylistics of language units studies the stylistic potential of words, suffixes and sentence structures: which of several ways of expressing an idea best suits the situation. Exam questions include "Which sentence contains a stylistic error?" and "What is the stylistic meaning of the highlighted word?". This topic continues "Speech styles": there the whole text was analysed, here a single language unit is.

§1. Lexical stylistics: choosing the word

Synonyms are close in meaning but differ in colouring:

• vafot etdi (official, respectful) — o‘ldi (neutral) — jon berdi (literary) — qazo qildi (religious, bookish).
• yuz (neutral) — chehra, oraz (elevated) — bet (colloquial) — bashara, aft (pejorative).
• ko‘z — diyda (poetic).

Euphemism replaces a harsh or unpleasant word with a softer one: ko‘zi ojiz (blind), qulog‘i og‘ir (deaf), og‘iroyoq (pregnant), olamdan o‘tdi (died).
Dysphemism does the opposite, replacing a neutral word with a coarse one: tiqishtirmoq for yemoq, vaysamoq for gapirmoq.

Obsolete words: historicisms (mirshab, darg‘a) and archaisms (ulus — people, bitik — writing). They recreate the spirit of an era in historical fiction but are errors in a modern official text.
Neologisms (smartfon, blogger), dialect words (dada, bova) and jargon are used only for a stylistic purpose, usually in a character’s speech.

Paronyms sound similar but mean different things: asr (century) — asir (captive), amr (order) — amir (ruler), shox (branch) — shoh (shah). Confusing them is a lexical error.

Worked example

Kecha qo‘shnimizning bobosi o‘ldi, marosimga butun mahalla keldi. — assess it stylistically.

1. The sentence reports a sad event that calls for respectful wording.
2. o‘ldi is neutral and sounds blunt about a person.
3. A suitable synonym: vafot etdi or the euphemism olamdan o‘tdi.
4. Corrected: Kecha qo‘shnimizning bobosi vafot etdi...

§2. Morphological stylistics: suffixes

• Plural `-lar` — respect: Dadam keldilar; irony: Katta odam bo‘lib qolibdilar-da; approximation: soat beshlarda; intensification: ko‘z yoshlari.
• Subjective evaluation suffixes: -cha (qizcha), -jon (bolajon), -gina (uygina), -choq (toychoq) — affection, smallness, sometimes contempt (odamcha).
• Possessive suffixes: -imiz signals modesty or togetherness (kitobimiz — an author about his own book); -ingiz signals politeness (ukangiz).
• Case synonymy: uyga bordi — ; — .

§3. Syntactic stylistics: sentence structure

• Inversion — changing normal word order (predicate first, attribute after its head): Keldi bahor! Ko‘rdim seni. It adds expressiveness in poetry and speech.
• Rhetorical question — a question expecting no answer, reinforcing a statement: Kim o‘z ona tilini sevmaydi? (= everyone does).
• Rhetorical exclamation and address: Ey, ona yurt!
• Anaphora — repeating a word at the start of lines or sentences for emphasis and rhythm.
• Gradation of homogeneous parts: Kuldi, yig‘ladi, faryod chekdi.
• Parallel structures, incomplete sentences (dialogue), insertions and parenthetical words express the speaker’s attitude.
• Direct vs reported speech — direct speech is livelier, reported speech is more neutral and compact.
• The passive voice hides the doer and is typical of official and scientific styles: Qaror qabul qilindi.

Worked example

Kim ilmga intilmaydi? Ilm — nur, jaholat — zulmat. — which stylistic devices are used?

1. Kim ilmga intilmaydi? — a rhetorical question: no answer expected, meaning "everyone strives".
2. Ilm — nur, jaholat — zulmat — parallelism and antithesis (tazod): nur ↔ zulmat, ilm ↔ jaholat.
3. Nominal predicates with dashes create a compact, aphoristic tone.
4. Conclusion: an expressive structure typical of journalism and oratory.

§4. Pleonasm and other stylistic errors

Pleonasm — expressing the same meaning twice:

• eng go‘zalroq (eng and -roq do not combine) → eng go‘zal or go‘zalroq;
• bo‘sh vakansiya (a vacancy is already an empty post) → vakansiya;
• yosh go‘dak, o‘z avtobiografiyasi, bir nechtalar → go‘dak, avtobiografiyasi, bir necha.

Tautology — repeating words of the same root: yozuvchi yozgan yozuvi.
Needless repetition of a word in neighbouring sentences — replace it with a pronoun or synonym.
Wrong collocation: ahamiyat o‘ynaydi (correct: rol o‘ynaydi or ahamiyatga ega).

§5. Phonetic stylistics: sound and intonation

Stylistic effect is created not only by words and sentences but also by sound.

• Sound lengthening heightens emotion in colloquial speech and fiction: Ju-u-da chiroyli! (So-o beautiful!), Yo‘-o‘-q! (No-o!). In writing it is shown with hyphens; it is not used in official texts.
• Alliteration — the repetition of the same consonant in neighbouring words; in verse it adds musicality: Bahor bog‘larga barq urib keldi (a sentence made up for this lesson).
• Logical stress — singling out the most important word with the voice; it changes the meaning: in Men kecha keldim (I came yesterday), stress on men means "I, not someone else", while stress on kecha means "yesterday, not today". In writing, logical stress is often shown by word order: the stressed word goes directly before the predicate.
• Intonation — the same sentence can sound like a statement, a question or irony depending on intonation: Zo‘r ish qilibsan. (Well done — praise or irony.)

§6. The order of stylistic editing

When editing a text for style, follow this order:

1. Identify the style of the text (official, academic, journalistic, literary, colloquial).
2. Find words that do not fit the style: a colloquial word in an official text, an obsolete one in a modern text, and so on.
3. Remove pleonasm and tautology.
4. Replace needless repetition with a pronoun or synonym.
5. Replace incorrect collocations with standard ones.
6. Reread the corrected text and check that the meaning has not changed.

Worked example

Find and correct the stylistic errors: Majlisda eng muhimroq masala ko‘rildi, majlisda ko‘pchilik majlis qaroriga ovoz berdi.

1. eng muhimroq — pleonasm: eng and -roq are not used together → eng muhim.
2. The word majlis (meeting) appears three times in one sentence — needless repetition.
3. Drop the second majlisda, since the place was already given in the first clause.
4. Replace majlis qaroriga with a pronoun: uning qaroriga.
5. Answer: Majlisda eng muhim masala ko‘rildi, ko‘pchilik uning qaroriga ovoz berdi.

Check yourself

1. What device is qulog‘i og‘ir?

2. What is wrong with Bu eng qiziqroq kitob?

3. What does -lar mean in Ustozim kelmoqdalar?

4. What device is Kim vatanini sevmaydi?

5. 1918-yil. Qor yog‘moqda. Shahar sukutda. — which morphological device?

6. Correct Bu qaror katta ahamiyat o‘ynaydi.

7. Which phonetic device is in Ju-u-da uzoq yo‘l ekan!?

8. What is the error in Yig‘ilishda yig‘ilganlar yig‘ilish kun tartibini ma’qulladi.?

Common mistakes

• Treating a euphemism as an ordinary synonym (its purpose is precisely to soften).
• Analysing a rhetorical question as an ordinary question.
• Always reading -lar as a plural marker.
• Mixing up paronyms (asr — asir, shox — shoh).
• Missing pleonasms: bo‘sh vakansiya, eng yaxshiroq.
• Using colloquial sound lengthening or contracted forms in an official text.