Deictic Centre And Pragmatic Implications In Remi Raji-Oyelade’s Poetry
- November 25, 2020
- Posted by: RSIS Team
- Categories: English, IJRSI
International Journal of Research and Scientific Innovation (IJRSI) | Volume VII, Issue XI, November 2020 | ISSN 2321–2705
Deictic Centre And Pragmatic Implications In Remi Raji-Oyelade’s Poetry
Victor Oluwayemi
Department of English, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria
Abstract
Deixis is essentially core to pragmatics and it is deployed in poetry to achieve various ends. This study investigated deicticcentres and pragmatic implications in Remi Raji-Oyelade’s poetry. Working within the traditional classification of deixis, that is, person, time, and place deixis, and context in pragmatics, ten poems, five from each, were purposively selected from Remi Raji-Oyelade’s first two anthologies of poems – AHarvest of Laughters (1997)and Webs of Remembrance (2015) – because of their thematic relevance and deployment of deictic tokens. It was found out that: the poet chronicled his personal involvement in the political, social and economic happenings in his country. He also projected himself, through the use of deixis, into experiencing his friends’ dehumanisation in the hand of the military rulers. More so, it was revealed that the poet conflated his identity with that of the leadership in order to lampoon and expose the inhumane treatments of the citizenry by the corrupt political/military and religious leaders. Deploying inclusive plural pronouns, the poet encouraged the citizens to be critical and tactful in choosing competent hands to man their destiny and resources of the country
Keywords: Deictic centre, Pragmatics, Context, Poetry, African literature
1. Introduction
Poetry, as a major genre of literature, has been observed to employ linguistic tools in a radical way to project the intended messages, aesthetics and emotional state of the poet. Dasylva and Jegede (2005:13) aver that “poetry often makes use of sounds which are carefully selected and organised to give harmonious appeal through repletion, or metrical patterns, or rhythmic flow”. This means that words are not just sewn together without a critical and careful consideration of their semantic, pragmatic and aesthetic effects in poems. Ogunsiji and Ogungbemi (2016:377) see poetry as discourse which “deploys language in a special way to express intense feelings.
