On Prominence In English Repetition

Prominence was first introduced into psychology by Danish psychologist Edgar Rubin in 1915.It was found that people couldn't notice two figures at a time leaving other things to be ground when they observe the world. It was Leonard Talmy who first introduced the concept of prominence into linguistic research. Since then, the principle of prominence has been considered as a basic cognitive principle by which language can be organized and understood. With the theoretical background of prominence in cognitive linguistics, repetition" which is very common in English has been observed and studied. By analyzing the generative mechanism of English repetition, explanations are expected to be given to the fact that though the forms of repetition do not adhere to the Economy Principle, it has been existing and developed in English.This thesis is based on the studies on prominence, the studies of which as well as that of repetition was reviewed first. As a common phenomenon in language, repetition is widely used both in English speaking and wrting. It is a rhetorical device, a device of cohension, and a strategy for communication. Fruitful researches on repetition have been done, ranging from the perspective of rhetorics, discourse analysis, psycholinguistics, pragmatics to language acquisition.epresentative researchers abroad include Halliday & Hasan,Hoey,Tannen Jensen & Vinther and so on; famous scholars at home are Chen Wangdao,Zhang Wenting, Wen jun,Feng Cuihua, et al. However, most of them had merely put emphasis on the description and analysis of the features of the forms, classifications, functions in cohesion, and stylistic distribution of English repetition, and few had paid attention to the generative mechanism of it. Their studies didn't give explanation to the reason why the forms of English repetition does not adhere to the Economy Principle, but still has long been existing and developed in English.Then the features of prominence in English repetition has been studied. In this part, based on the studies by American cognitive linguist Langacker and other scholars, this thesis has studied on the forms of prominence in language first. Results show that prominence can be found in different aspects of language, such as phonetics, phonolory, syntax,discourse and so on.Besides, it can fix the meanings of language in different situations, can reveal the focuses in a certain language unit, and can create discourse as well.On the basis of these studies, the features of prominence in English repetition has been studied.And the results show that prominence makes repetition work in four aspects, which are phonological aspect, semantical aspect, syntactical aspect, and discoursal aspect.The thesis has also studied on the functions of prominence in English repetition and the generative mechanism of English repetition, with the help of the concept of value in general linguistics, the theory of qualitative change in dialectical materialism, thematic progression and dual-coding theory, etc. The functions of prominence are reflected in English repetition by creating aesthetical sensibilities, revealing focuses, deepening meanings and constructing discourses.And the influence of prominence upon the existance of English repetition can be found as well. Repetition also has enfluence on prominence. Though in form English repetition seems not to adhere to the Economy Principle, it can't be kept in English, factually it is not true. As one of the important forms of language, literary works of different historical periods have fully shown the traces of the usage of English repetition. It is the functions of prominence that increase the value of repetition as an expressing tool of people. So it is clear that one of the reasons of the existence of English repetition lies in the prominence in it.The study of the thesis not only illustrates how prominence works in English, but also pushes the studies on English repetition to the level of its generative mechanism. It is hoped to provide researches of other language phenomena with a new perspective, and to be valuable to the fields of rhetorics, English reading and writing, English teaching and translation practice.