At the Risk of Exaggerating: How Do Listeners React to Hyperbole?
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2003
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Abstract
The intensive focus on the reception process of figures of speech, in terms of the
psychological processes operated on their understanding, explains that nowadays a
crucial limitation in figurative language theories is the production process of non-literal
forms, as joint activities between speaker and hearer. Since the object of study has
traditionally been the figurative sentence, either in isolation or in the context of an
artificially constructed text, it is not surprising that the collaborative nature of figures
has been overlooked. This paper focuses on hyperbole, a long neglected trope, despite
its pervasive frequency of occurrence and co-occurrence with other tropes in everyday
speech. It attempts to explore, from a conversation and discourse analysis framework,
the ways in which hyperbole is used in interaction, paying special attention to listeners'
responses, since any full account of hyperbole, like any other act of linguistic creativity,
must refer to its interactive dimension. With this aim, a set of naturally-occurring
conversations, chosen at random from the BNC, were analysed, and the occurrences
of hyperbolic items identified. The results suggest that hyperboles need to be viewed
interactively, by including listeners' responses and further contributions to the unfolding
act, rather than being studied as single, creative acts by the speaker alone. Finally, the
data also shows that hyperbole might be classified as a low-risk figure, since the
chances of misunderstanding are low.
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Bibliographic reference
Cano Mora, Laura. At the Risk of Exaggerating: How Do Listeners React to Hyperbole?. En: Anglogermanica Online, 2003-2004, No. 2: 2-13