A study of deictic shift theory as a stylistic approach in the analysis of point of view effects in fictional discourse

Abstract EN

Traditionally, most approaches to stylistic analysis are not related to cognitive processes by which readers are engaged and conceptualized to a particular point of view while reading a text.

Against this account , emerged through 1980s and 1990s, various stylistic models for identifying categories of point of view in fiction, and this brings a cognitive perspective in analysis of narrative stylistics.

Deictic shift theory is an act to demonstrate how readers are completely engaged in narratives, to a degree that they interpret events in narrative as if they were experiencing them from a position within the story world.

According to Segal(1995,p15),deictic shift theory (henceforth DST) means that '' the reader often takes a cognitive attitude within the world of narrative and interprets the text from that perspective' 'and this happens as a result of deictic shifts within the narratives that change the deictic center from which the sentences of the text are interpreted.

It follows that such changes in the deictic center across the course of a text will result in changes in the point of view that readers will be exposed to(Mclntyre,2006,p92).

The present study aims to investigate the role of deictic shift theory as a cognitive perspective to point of view effects in the selected poem written by Seamus Heaney in his famous poem '' Mossbawn'' .

The emphasis will be shifted away from narrative techniques towards theconceptual framework that tackles the cognitive processes of both reading and interpretation.

However, the study will show how applying DST is an indispensable in tackling stylistic analysis to point of view which develops our understanding of the construction of viewpoints in language.

The analysis has shown that the cognitive work of DST is used as a device in the poem in order to arrive at the comprehensive meaning of text.

The poet uses different deictic shifts and projection of viewpoints of personal pronoun, locational, and temporal deixis and references which are interrelated between the fictional text world of the poem and the real central world of the reader.

Also, it is seen that in cognitive terms there is a shift between the past and the present, a rapid back and forth shift of deictic center and field which is tackled by the reader's perspective