THE PRAGMATICS OF PROVERBS IN ENGLISH DISCOURSE: A CORPUS-BASED STUDY
Keywords:
Proverbs; Pragmatics; Corpus Linguistics; Figurative Language; News Discourse; Literary Fiction; Social Media; Discourse Analysis; Genre Variation; Language and CultureAbstract
Proverbs are succinct, metaphorical expressions of collective cultural wisdom that endure across genres and eras. This study examines the pragmatic functions of proverbs in English by examining their use in three distinct written genres: news articles, literary fiction, and social media posts. From a balanced dataset of real-world texts, over 400 instances of proverbs were identified and coded using a qualitative corpus-based approach. The results indicate that proverbs' functions—including persuasion, evaluation, amusement, and social alignment—differ substantially across genres, despite their consistent form. Proverbs are frequently used in news articles to reinforce arguments or provide moral commentary. In fiction, they are used to reflect interpersonal dynamics and develop characters. On social media, they are frequently recontextualized for the purpose of irony, humor, or identity performance. These findings verify that proverbs are not only conventional expressions, but also dynamic instruments for rhetorical and social discussions. The research makes a valuable contribution to the disciplines of pragmatics, discourse analysis, and corpus linguistics by providing a deeper understanding of how figurative language is able to adapt to the communicative objectives of a particular genre.
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