Pleonasm
A pleonasm ( Greek πλεονασμός pleonasmós ; abundance, exaggeration, enlargement [in the story]) is a rhetorical figure ; it is characterized by a wealth of words without any gain in information.
A pleonasm occurs when a certain meaning is expressed several times within a group of words in different ways (often with different types of words, e.g. adjective / noun ) or when expressive means are used that do not provide additional information. This figure can thus be redundant at the semantic level , but control the effect of a statement.
The pleonasm is used to reinforce, clarify or emphasize what has been said ("cold ice", "touched with my own hands"). Fixed expressions with a pleonastic character arise when one of the components (such as an unusual word or a foreign word) loses its original meaning and the expression is supplemented by an element of the same meaning for clarification ("foot pedal", "hairstyle", "cutter knife", "rice risotto" "," Chronometer "). The less the original meaning is accessible to the speaker, the less the overall expression can be viewed as pleonasm. Pleonastic word creations without a recognizable intended rhetorical background are considered bad language style or style blooms ( style errors ).
Form opposites to pleonasm, depending on the intended use, e.g. B. the oxymoron or the ellipse . Pleonasm and tautology are often used interchangeably .
Examples
For rhetorical reasons
Jet black or pitch black , round ball , female Federal Chancellor , old man , two twins (if you mean a pair of twins)
As a fixed expression
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As an increase in absolute adjectives or indefinite pronouns that can no longer be increased
An example of this is the phrase "would be most optimal ...", although the word "optimal" already means "the best possible under the given conditions" and consequently no further improvement is possible (similar to "ideal"). This fact is also often found with the word “only” (“She is the only one who ...”) and with the word “none” (“in no way” instead of “in no way”). Further examples are the expression "to our complete satisfaction", which is often used in job references, or the common phrase "in the truest sense of the word".
As a stylistic device (stylistically conspicuous)
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Redundant acronyms
There are also redundant acronyms such as:
In formulations that, depending on the context, can form pleonasma
Wet rain , big giant , small obolus ( obolus [ancient Greek] "small coin"), political party (if the political character of the party is already obvious from the context).
Etymologically , but no longer in its current meaning
Digit zero (the Arabic aṣ-ṣifr , from which this expression comes, simply means “the zero”), people 's democracy ( demos [Greek] “people”; however, a people 's democracy is different from a democracy ), guerrilla war ( Guerrilla [span.] "Small war")
Apparent pleonasm
Some terms appear to be pleonasms at first glance, but they are not. Just as ignorance of the etymology of a word can lead to the formation of pleonasms, ignorance of technical details can lead to the view that multiple designations of the same or similar properties would be an improper exaggeration, although from the point of view of experts it is not is.
Example: "White mold " is not a pleonasm, because horses called molds do not have a white coat from birth and there are also a number of other color and drawing variants, e.g. B. the apple mold .
Grammatical pleonasm
In linguistics , particles are also referred to as pleonasms that have no meaningful content and often only fulfill a pragmatic function:
- "And read probably actually also (quote from too much" Arthur Schnitzler : dance , not emphasis in original)
See also
literature
- Georg Michel : Pleonasm. In: Jan-Dirk Müller u. a. (Ed.): Reallexikon der Deutschen Literaturwissenschaft . Volume 3. De Gruyter, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-11-015664-4 , p. 91 f. ( limited preview in Google Book search).
Web links
- Learning and teaching German - working materials Deutsche Welle (PDF)
- Pleonasm on schuelerlexikon.de
- Double mocked , article with examples in the news magazine Der Spiegel
Individual evidence
- ^ A b Wilhelm Pape : Greek-German Concise Dictionary . 3. Edition. Vieweg & Sohn, Braunschweig 1914 (6th reprint of the 3rd edition from 1880).
- ↑ a b c Georg Braungart, Harald Fricke, Klaus Grubmüller, Jan-Dirk Müller, Friedrich Vollhardt, Klaus Weimar: Reallexikon der deutschen Literaturwissenschaft: revision of the real dictionary of German literary history. Volume III: P-Z. Walter de Gruyter, 2007, p. 91.
- ↑ Klaus Mackowiak: The most common style mistakes in German - and how to avoid them. CH Beck, 2011, p. 135.
- ^ Wilhelm Wackernagel: Poetics, Rhetoric and Stylistics. Georg Olms Verlag, 2003, p. 344.
- ↑ Gero von Wilpert : Specialized Dictionary of Literature (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 231). 4th, improved and enlarged edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 1964, DNB 455687854 , p. 515.
- ↑ Duden, Ren, das
- ↑ Bastian Sick in the onion fish column 48 examples of pleonasms
- ↑ Josef Kurz, Daniel Müller, Joachim Pötschke, Horst Pöttker, Martin Gehr: Stylistics for journalists. Springer- * Verlag, 2010, p. 33 ( online ).
- ↑ Arthur Schnitzler: Reigen - The young woman and the husband in Project Gutenberg-DE