FUNCTIONALITY OF TAUTOLOGY IN SOME SELECTE AMERICAN SONG LYRICS AND POEMS

Abstract

Although the term' tautology' predicts negative connotation, it is often employed by poets and lyric writers to communicate more implied meanings. Through the use of tautological expressions, they exchange ideas, give more possibilities to readers to detect the meaning behind the tautological words and thus suggest details not openly communicated in the poem. Ten American song lyrics and ten American poems have been selected to be the data for the study. Data analysis is conducted on the basis of three steps:(i) identifying the type of tautology used ,(ii) detecting the syntactic realization of the tautology  and (iii) finding the functions of the use of tautology in these lyrics and poems. The study concludes that song lyrics and poems manipulate various types of tautologies in order to convey various types of meaning and to serve various functions with reference to their contexts. These functions are concerned with the eloquence and expressiveness of these lyrics and poems, including  emphasizing  a point ,  specifying  attitudes ,  eliciting  facts , and communicating  the need to accept or resign oneself to something.