Irony

Sign reading "I CAN'T AFFORD AN ACTUAL SIGN" held at a protest.
An ironic protest sign.

Irony (from the Ancient Greek εἰρωνεία eirōneía, meaning dissimulation or feigned ignorance)[1] is a rhetorical device, literary technique, or situation in which there is an incongruity or discordance that goes beyond the simple and evident meaning of words or actions.

Verbal and situational irony are often used for emphasis in the assertion of a truth. The ironic form of simile, irony used in sarcasm, and some forms of litotes emphasize one's meaning by the deliberate use of language which states the opposite of the truth — or drastically and obviously understates a factual connection.

In fictional dramatic irony, the author causes a character (acting as the author's mouthpiece) to speak or act in a way contrary to the truth. This technique highlights the literal facts by portraying a fictional person who is strikingly ignorant of them.

In certain kinds of situational or historical irony, a factual truth is highlighted by some person's complete ignorance of it or his belief in the opposite of it. However, this state of affairs does not occur by human design. In some religious contexts, such situations have been seen as the deliberate work of Divine Providence to emphasize facts and to taunt humans for not being aware of them — when they could easily have been enlightened (this is similar to human use of irony). Such ironies are often more evident, or more striking, when viewed retrospectively in the light of later developments which make the truth of past situations obvious to all.

Much irony involves commentary that heightens tension in the life situation of someone who needs to learn an easily known fact but somehow fails to learn it.

Contents

Definitions

Henry Watson Fowler, in The King's English, says “any definition of irony—though hundreds might be given, and very few of them would be accepted—must include this, that the surface meaning and the underlying meaning of what is said are not the same."

Also, Eric Partridge, in Usage and Abusage, writes that "Irony consists in stating the contrary of what is meant."

The word "ironic" is sometimes used as a synonym for "incongruous" in situations where there is no “double audience” and no contradiction between the ostensible and true meaning of the words. An example of such usage:

“Ironically, Sir Arthur Sullivan is remembered for the comic operas he found embarrassing, rather than the serious works he hoped would be his legacy.”

The American Heritage Dictionary's secondary meaning for irony: “incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs.”[2] This sense, however, is not synonymous with "incongruous" but merely a definition of dramatic or situational irony. The majority of American Heritage Dictionary’s usage panel found it unacceptable to use the word ironic to describe mere unfortunate coincidences or surprising disappointments that “suggest no particular lessons about human vanity or folly.”[3]

Types of irony

Modern theories of rhetoric distinguish among verbal, dramatic and situational irony.

Verbal irony

According to A glossary of literary terms by Abrams and Hartman,

Verbal irony is a statement in which the meaning that a speaker employs is sharply different from the meaning that is ostensibly expressed. The ironic statement usually involves the explicit expression of one attitude or evaluation, but with indications in the overall speech-situation that the speaker intends a very different, and often opposite, attitude or evaluation.[4]

Verbal irony is distinguished from situational irony and dramatic irony in that it is produced intentionally by speakers. For instance, if a man exclaims, “I’m not upset!” but reveals an upset emotional state through his voice while truly trying to claim he's not upset, it would not be verbal irony by virtue of its verbal manifestation (it would, however, be situational irony). But if the same speaker said the same words and intended to communicate that he was upset by claiming he was not, the utterance would be verbal irony. This distinction illustrates an important aspect of verbal irony - speakers communicate implied propositions that are intentionally contradictory to the propositions contained in the words themselves. There are, however, examples of verbal irony that do not rely on saying the opposite of what one means, and there are cases where all the traditional criteria of irony exist and the utterance is not ironic.

Ironic similes are a form of verbal irony where a speaker intends to communicate the opposite of what they mean. For instance, the following explicit similes begin with the deceptive formation of a statement that means P but that eventually conveys the meaning not P:

The irony is recognizable in each case only by using stereotypical knowledge of the source concepts (e.g., that mud is opaque, that root canal surgery is painful) to detect an incongruity.

Verbal irony and sarcasm

A fair amount of confusion has surrounded the issue regarding the relationship between verbal irony and sarcasm.

Fowler's A Dictionary of Modern English Usage states:

Sarcasm does not necessarily involve irony & irony has often no touch of sarcasm.

This suggests that the two concepts are linked but may be considered separately. The OED entry for sarcasm does not mention irony, but the irony entry reads:

A figure of speech in which the intended meaning is the opposite of that expressed by the words used; usually taking the form of sarcasm or ridicule in which laudatory expressions are used to imply condemnation or contempt.

The Encyclopedia Britannica has "Non-literary irony is often called sarcasm”; while the Webster's Dictionary entry is:

Sarcasm: 1 : a sharp and often satirical or ironic utterance designed to cut or give pain. 2 a : a mode of satirical wit depending for its effect on bitter, caustic, and often ironic language that is usually directed against an individual.

Partridge in Usage and Abusage would separate the two forms of speech completely:

Irony must not be confused with sarcasm, which is direct: sarcasm means precisely what it says, but in a sharp, caustic, ... manner.

The psychologist Martin, in The psychology of humour, [5] is quite clear that irony is where “the literal meaning is opposite to the intended”; and sarcasm is “aggressive humor that pokes fun ...”. He has the following examples: For irony he uses the statement "What a nice day" when it is raining. For sarcasm, he cites Winston Churchill who, when told by a lady that he was drunk, said "my dear, you are ugly … but tomorrow I shall be sober" [6], as being sarcastic, while not saying the opposite of what is intended.

Psychology researchers Lee and Katz (1998) have addressed the issue directly. They found that ridicule is an important aspect of sarcasm, but not of verbal irony in general. By this account, sarcasm is a particular kind of personal criticism leveled against a person or group of persons that incorporates verbal irony. For example, a woman reports to her friend that rather than going to a medical doctor to treat her cancer, she has decided to see a spiritual healer instead. In response her friend says sarcastically, "Oh, brilliant, what a genius idea, that's really going to cure you." The friend could have also replied with any number of ironic expressions that should not be labeled as sarcasm exactly, but still have many shared elements with sarcasm.

Most instances of verbal irony are labeled by research subjects as sarcastic, suggesting that the term sarcasm is more widely used than its technical definition suggests it should be (Bryant & Fox Tree, 2002; Gibbs, 2000). Some psycholinguistic theorists (e.g., Gibbs, 2000) suggest that sarcasm ("Great idea!", "I hear they do fine work."), hyperbole ("That's the best idea I have heard in years!"), understatement ("Sure, what the hell, it's only cancer..."), rhetorical questions ("What, does your spirit have cancer?"), double entendre ("I'll bet if you do that, you'll be communing with spirits in no time...") and jocularity ("Get them to fix your bad back while you're at it.") should all be considered forms of verbal irony. The differences between these tropes can be quite subtle, and relate to typical emotional reactions of listeners, and the rhetorical goals of the speakers. Regardless of the various ways theorists categorize figurative language types, people in conversation are attempting to decode speaker intentions and discourse goals, and are not generally identifying, by name, the kinds of tropes used

For example:

Dramatic irony

Dramatic irony is the device of giving the spectator an item of information that at least one of the characters in the narrative is unaware of (at least consciously), thus placing the spectator a step ahead of at least one of the characters. Dramatic irony has three stages - installation, exploitation and resolution (often also called preparation, suspension and resolution) - producing dramatic conflict in what one character relies or appears to rely upon, the contrary of which is known by observers (especially the audience; sometimes to other characters within the drama) to be true. In summary, it means that the reader/watcher/listener knows something that one or more of the characters in the piece is not aware of.

For example:

Tragic irony

Tragic irony is a special category of dramatic irony. In tragic irony, the words and actions of the characters contradict the real situation, which the spectators fully realize.

Ancient Greek drama was especially characterized by tragic irony because the audiences were so familiar with the legends that most of the plays dramatized. Sophocles' Oedipus the King provides a classic example of tragic irony at its fullest.

Linda Hutcheon suggests that irony threatens authoritative models of discourse, by removing the semantic security of the one signifier - one signified equivalency.[7]

Irony has some of its foundation in the onlooker’s perception of paradox that arises from insoluble problems. For example, in the William Shakespeare play Romeo and Juliet, when Romeo finds Juliet in a drugged death-like sleep, he assumes her to be dead and kills himself. Upon awakening to find her dead lover beside her, Juliet stabs herself with a dagger.

Situational irony

This is a relatively modern use of the term, and describes a discrepancy between the expected result and actual results when enlivened by perverse appropriateness.

For example:

Irony of fate (cosmic irony)

The expression “irony of fate” stems from the notion that the gods (or the Fates) are amusing themselves by toying with the minds of mortals with deliberate ironic intent. Closely connected with situational irony, it arises from sharp contrasts between reality and human ideals, or between human intentions and actual results. The resulting situation is poignantly contrary to what was expected or intended. More recently in English, the mere "coincidental or unexpected" has been called ironic, and this usage appears to be gaining ground. It is still considered a minor usage.[3]

Some examples of situations poignantly contrary to expectation:

In art:

In history:

Historical irony (cosmic irony through time)

When history is seen through modern eyes, there often appear sharp contrasts between the way historical figures see their world's future and what actually transpires. For example, during the 1920s The New York Times repeatedly scorned crossword puzzles. In 1924, it lamented "the sinful waste in the utterly futile finding of words the letters of which will fit into a prearranged pattern." In 1925 it said "the question of whether the puzzles are beneficial or harmful is in no urgent need of an answer. The craze evidently is dying out fast." Today, no U.S. newspaper is more closely identified with the crossword than The New York Times.[10]

In a more tragic example of historical irony, what people now refer to as "World War I" was originally called "The War to End All Wars" or "The Great War." Historical irony is therefore a subset of cosmic irony, but one in which the element of time is bound to play a role. Another example could be that of the Vietnam war, where in the 1960s the U.S.A attempted to defeat the Viet Cong (Viet Minh) from taking over South Vietnam. However it is an often ignored fact that the U.S. originally supported the Viet Minh to prevent imperialist ambitions.

Historical irony also includes inventors killed by their own creations, such as William Bullock - unless, due to the nature of the invention, the risk of death was always known and accepted, as in the case of Otto Lilienthal.

Irony in use

Ironic art

One point of view has it that all modern art is ironic because the viewer cannot help but compare it to previous works. For example, any portrait of a standing, non-smiling woman will naturally be compared with the Mona Lisa; the tension of meaning exists, whether the artist meant it or not.

While this does not appear to exactly conform to any of the three types of irony above, there is some evidence that the term "ironic art" is being used in this context.[11] This definition could extend to any sort of modern artistic endeavour: graphic design or music (sampling, for example).

For example: A South African weekly published a cartoon by Zapiro of the Prophet Mohammad complaining that his followers lack a sense of humor, angering Muslims and raising fear of reprisal attacks during the 2010 World Cup.

Comic irony

Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice begins with the proposition “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.” In fact, it soon becomes clear that Austen means the opposite: women (or their mothers) are always in search of, and desperately on the lookout for, a rich single man to make a husband. The irony deepens as the story promotes his romance and ends in a double wedding.

Metafiction

Metafictions are kinds of fiction that self-consciously address the devices of fiction. It usually involves irony and is self-reflective. Metafiction (or “romantic irony” in the sense of roman the prose fiction) refers to the effect when a story is interrupted to remind the audience or reader that it is really only a story. Examples include Henry Fielding’s interruptions of the storyline to comment on what has happened, or J.M. Barrie’s similar interjections in his book, Peter Pan. The concept is also explored in a philosophical context in Sophie's World, by Jostein Gaarder.

Notable attempts to sustain metafiction throughout a whole novel are Christie Malry's Own Double Entry by B.S. Johnson, in which none of the characters are real and exist only within the author's imagination, and In The Night Room by Peter Straub, in which the narrator is an author, whose fictional character comes to life and accompanies him through the book.

Post-irony

Post-irony is a technique that uses the juxtaposition of empty symbolism and loaded evocations to create humor whose roots lie not so much in the mocking of any one ideology proper so much as in mocking the stupidity that lies at the roots of the propagation of modern ideologies.

Post-irony exists in the aesthetic lineage of Dadaism and Surrealism. This is evidenced by the premium it places on non-sequiturs as well as its tendency to ignore the meaning of a loaded symbol (such as the Twin Towers falling, a cross, or even some Freudian and Jungian symbols) and to recontextualize such symbols in forums (children's TV show parodies, marketing catchphrases, or pop song parodies) at odds with the gravity that has been ascribed to them. Post-ironic works also tend to be more reliant on an internal, almost musical logic than on a causal, narrative one.

Irony and post-irony may be simultaneously present in the same communication or reframing of a text or a picture. For instance, if a motivational poster with a skull, cigarettes and the block type text Smoke Now, Pay Later! is ostensibly claimed to be an advert for buying cigarettes on credit, this interpretation could rank as both ironic and post-ironic.

Irony as infinite, absolute negativity

There is a tradition that sees irony not as a limited tool in the sense of the three types of irony above, but as a disruptive force with the power to undo texts and readers alike. This tradition includes Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, 19th century German critic and novelist Friedrich Schlegel ("On Incomprehensibility"), Charles Baudelaire, Stendhal, and the 20th century deconstructionist Paul de Man ("The Concept of Irony"). Briefly, it insists that irony is, in Kierkegaard's words, "infinite, absolute negativity". Where much of philosophy attempts to reconcile opposites into a larger positive project, Kierkegaard and others insist that irony—whether expressed in complex games of authorship or simple litotes—must, in Kierkegaard's words, "swallow its own stomach". Irony entails endless reflection and violent reversals, and ensures incomprehensibility at the moment it compels speech.

Socratic irony

"The dissimulation of ignorance practised by Socrates as a means of confuting an adversary" (OED, under irony). Socrates would pretend to be ignorant of the topic under discussion, in order to draw out the inherent nonsense in the arguments of his interlocutors. Chambers dictionary has: "a means by which a questioner pretends to know less than a respondent, when actually he knows more."

Zoe Williams of The Guardian wrote: "The technique [of Socratic irony], demonstrated in the Platonic dialogues, was to pretend ignorance and, more sneakily, to feign credence in your opponent's power of thought, in order to tie him in knots." [12]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Liddell & Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, v. sub εἰρωνεία.
  2. ↑ "irony" at dictionary.com
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Usage note at dictionary.com
  4. ↑ Abrams, M. H., & Harpham, G.G., A glossary of literary terms, 9th Ed., Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2009.
  5. ↑ Martin, R.A., The psychology of humor: an integrative approach, Elsevier Academic Press, 2007. p13.
  6. ↑ http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Winston_Churchill
  7. ↑ Hutcheon, p. 13
  8. ↑ The Trial of John W. Hinckley, Jr. by Doug Linder. 2001 Retrieved 9 September 2008.
  9. ↑ Wall Street Journal, December 3, 2007, Page B1: It Dawned on Adults After WWII: 'You'll Shoot Your Eye Out!', retrieved October 29, 2009.
  10. ↑ Wordplay
  11. ↑ Guardian Online: The Final Irony
  12. ↑ Guardian Online: The Final Irony

Bibliography

  • Bogel, Fredric V. "Irony, Inference, and Critical Understanding." Yale Review ): 503-19.
  • Booth, Wayne C. A Rhetoric of Irony. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1975.
  • Bryant, G. A., & Fox Tree, J. E. (2002). Recognizing verbal irony in spontaneous speech. Metaphor and Symbol, 17, 99-115.
  • Colebrook, Claire. Irony. London and New York: Routledge, 2004.
  • Gibbs, R. W. (2000). Irony in talk among friends. Metaphor and Symbol, 15, 5–27.
  • Hutcheon, Linda. Irony’s Edge: The Theory and Politics of Irony. London: Routledge, 1994.
  • Kierkegaard, Søren. On the Concept of Irony with Continual Reference to Socrates. 1841; Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992.
  • Lavandier, Yves. Writing Drama, pages 263-315.
  • Lee, C. J., & Katz, A. N. (1998). The differential role of ridicule in sarcasm and irony. Metaphor and Symbol, 13, 1–15.
  • Muecke, D. C. The Compass of Irony. London: Methuen, 1969.
  • Star, William T. "Irony and Satire: A Bibliography." Irony and Satire in French Literature. Ed. University of South Carolina Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina College of Humanities and Social Sciences, 1987. 183-209.

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