Pleonasms and lapalissiadas in your life. Speech errors. tautology and pleonasm. paronyms How pleonasm differs from tautology

Speech redundancy- this is a problem, born largely due to the author's unwillingness to spend time and effort on polishing his own text. That is, instead of denoting his thought with a couple of precisely formulated phrases, the writer indulges in long explanations, which give us verbal redundancy.

Speech redundancy in the text can manifest itself in various forms.

Sometimes you can observe an obsessive explanation of already known truths: Daily consumption of milk is a healthy habit, not only children, but also adults eat milk, the habit of milk can persist until old age. Can this habit be called bad? Should it be abandoned? Of course no!

Speech redundancy also occurs when the same thought is retransmitted. For instance: Russian athletes arrived at the Olympic Games in order to take part in competitions in which not only ours, but also many foreign athletes will participate.

In some cases, the manifestation of speech redundancy can border on the absurd: The body was obviously dead and showed it with all its appearance.. In literary theory, such examples are called lapalissiades. The name of the term is derived from the name of the French marshal Marquis La Palis, who died in 1525. The fact is that the soldiers composed a song about the deceased commander, which contained the following words: Our commander was alive 25 minutes before his death. Lapalissiades give speeches an inappropriate comedy, asserting obvious truths. And inappropriateness, as a rule, is expressed in the fact that such turnovers emerge in situations associated with the most tragic circumstances.

Pleonasm.

Pleonasm (from gr. pleonasmos - excess) - this is the use in speech of words that are close in meaning and therefore unnecessary words ( anticipate, speak aloud, dark night, etc..). Pleonasms arise mainly due to the stylistic negligence of the author. For example, when combining synonyms: dull and boring; helped and contributed; nevertheless, however; for example.

However, in addition to obvious errors and oversights, there is the concept of " imaginary pleonasm", which the writer uses consciously as a means of enhancing the expressiveness of speech: Not will come back the time when the history of our country was rewritten to please someone's petty interests. Such a deliberate discrepancy attracts the reader's attention, enhancing the expressive effect.

It would not be superfluous to mention that the use of pleonastic combinations is very characteristic of folklore. As is known, expressively colored pleonasms have long been used in oral folk art, such as lived-were, sea-okiya, path-track and others.

Tautology.

A special case of pleonasm is tautology. Tautology(from Gr. tauto - the same, logos - word) occurs as when repeating words with the same root ( make a riddle, stop at a bus stop), and when combining a foreign and Russian word that duplicates its meaning ( young child prodigy, first debuted, interior design). The second case is often called hidden tautology, and often this indicates that the speaker does not understand the exact meaning of the borrowed word.

In general, tautology - and in fact, the unintentional use of combinations of words with the same root - is a very common mistake. And even with careful proofreading of the text, it is not always possible to find all the tautological links. However, I believe that such repetitions should not always be considered as errors. After all, in many cases it is simply impossible to avoid tautology, and the exclusion of a single-root word from a sentence, replacing it with a synonym does not always give the desired effect - very often this leads to a distortion of the meaning or impoverishment of speech. We can assume that a pair of cognate words in a close context is stylistically justified if such words are the only carriers of the corresponding meanings and cannot be replaced by synonyms ( edit - editor; cook - jam, etc..)

Exceptions should also include the use of terminological vocabulary, which also often gives rise to tautological combinations ( dictionary of foreign words, investigation of investigating authorities, etc..)

12. Correlation between the concepts of "clericalism", "stamp", "standard".

When analyzing errors caused by the unjustified use of stylistically colored vocabulary, special attention should be paid to words associated with the official business style. Elements of official business style, introduced into a context stylistically alien to them, are called bureaucracy. It should be remembered that these speech means are called clericalisms only when they are used in speech that is not bound by the norms of official business style.

Lexical and phraseological clericalisms include words and phrases that have a coloring typical for official business style ( presence, in the absence of, to avoid, reside, withdraw, the above, takes place etc.). Their use makes speech inexpressive ( If there is a desire, much can be done to improve the working conditions of workers; There is currently a shortage of teaching staff.).

As a rule, you can find many options for expressing thoughts, avoiding clericalism. For example, why would a journalist write: Marriage is a negative side in the activity of the enterprise if you can say: It is bad when an enterprise releases marriage; Marriage is unacceptable at work; Marriage is a great evil that must be fought; It is necessary to prevent marriage in production; It is necessary, finally, to stop the production of defective products!; You can't put up with marriage! A simple and specific wording has a stronger effect on the reader.

The clerical coloring of speech is often given verbal nouns formed with suffixes -eni-, -ani- and etc. ( revealing, finding, taking, inflating, closing) and non-suffixed ( tailoring, theft, day off). Their clerical shade is exacerbated by prefixes not-, under- (undetected, failure). Russian writers often parodied the syllable "decorated" with such clericalisms [ The case of gnawing the plan thereof by mice(Hertz.); The case of flying in and breaking glass by a crow(Pis.); Having announced to the widow Vanina that in her non-sticking of the sixty-kopeck mark ...(Ch.)].

Verbal nouns do not have the categories of tense, aspect, mood, voice, person. This narrows their expressive possibilities in comparison with verbs. For example, the following sentence is inaccurate: From the farm manager V.I. Shlyk was shown a negligent attitude towards milking and feeding cows. You might think that the manager milked and fed the cows poorly, but the author only wanted to say that Farm manager V.I. Shlyk did nothing to facilitate the work of milkmaids, to prepare fodder for livestock. The impossibility of expressing the meaning of voice by a verbal noun can lead to ambiguity in the construction of the type professor's statement(Professor claims or his claim?), love singing(I love sing or listen when they sing?).

In sentences with verbal nouns, the predicate is often expressed in a passive form of the participle or a reflexive verb, this deprives the action of activity and enhances the clerical coloring of speech [ At the end of the sightseeing tour, tourists were allowed to take pictures of them.(it is better: Tourists were shown sights and allowed to photograph them)].

However, not all verbal nouns in the Russian language belong to the official business vocabulary, they are diverse in stylistic coloring, which largely depends on the characteristics of their lexical meaning and word formation. Verbal nouns with the meaning of a person have nothing to do with clericalisms ( teacher, self-taught, confused, bully), many nouns with an action value ( running, crying, playing, washing, shooting, bombing).

Verbal nouns with book suffixes can be divided into two groups. Some are stylistically neutral meaning, name, excitement), many of them -tion changed in -ne, and they began to designate not an action, but its result (cf.: baking pies - sweet biscuits, sour cherries - cherry jam). Others retain a close relationship with verbs, acting as abstract names for actions, processes ( acceptance, rejection, rejection). It is precisely such nouns that are most often characterized by clerical coloring; only those that have received a strict terminological meaning in the language ( drilling, spelling, joining).

The use of clericalisms of this type is associated with the so-called "splitting of the predicate", i.e. replacing a simple verbal predicate with a combination of a verbal noun with an auxiliary verb that has a weakened lexical meaning (instead of complicating, it leads to complication). So, they write: This leads to complication, confusing accounting and increased costs., but it is better to write: This complicates and confuses accounting, increases costs.

However, in the stylistic assessment of this phenomenon, one should not go to extremes, rejecting any cases of the use of verb-nominal combinations instead of verbs. The following combinations are often used in book styles: took part instead of participated, instructed instead of indicated etc. Verb-nominal combinations are fixed in the official business style to declare gratitude, to accept for execution, to impose a penalty(in these cases the verbs thank, fulfill, commend inappropriate), etc. In the scientific style, such terminological combinations are used, such as visual fatigue occurs, self-regulation occurs, transplantation is performed etc. Expressions function in a journalistic style workers went on strike, there were clashes with the police, an attempt was made on the minister etc. In such cases, verbal nouns are indispensable and there is no reason to consider them clericalisms.

The use of verb-nominal combinations sometimes even creates conditions for speech expression. For example, a combination take an active part more capacious in meaning than a verb participate. The definition with a noun allows you to give the verb-nominal combination an exact terminological meaning (cf .: help - provide emergency medical assistance). The use of a verb-nominal combination instead of a verb can also help eliminate the lexical ambiguity of verbs (cf.: give a beep - buzz). The preference for such verb-nominal combinations over verbs is naturally beyond doubt; their use does not damage the style, but, on the contrary, gives greater effectiveness to the speech.

The influence of formal business style often explains the unjustified use of denominative prepositions: along the line, in a section, in part, in business, by virtue of, for the purposes of, to the address, in the area, in plan, at the level, due to and others. They have become widespread in book styles, and under certain conditions their use is stylistically justified. However, often their passion is detrimental to the presentation, weighing down the style and giving it a clerical coloring. This is partly due to the fact that denominative prepositions usually require the use of verbal nouns, which leads to stringing of cases. For instance: By improving the organization of repayment of arrears in the payment of wages and pensions, improving the culture of customer service, the turnover in state and commercial stores should increase- the accumulation of verbal nouns, a lot of identical case forms made the sentence heavy, cumbersome. To correct the text, it is necessary to exclude the denominative preposition from it, if possible, replace verbal nouns with verbs. Let's make an edit like this: In order to increase the turnover in state and commercial stores, it is necessary to pay salaries on time and not delay the pension of citizens, as well as improve the culture of customer service.

Some authors use denominative prepositions automatically, without thinking about their meaning, which is still partly preserved in them. For instance: Construction has been suspended due to lack of materials.(as if someone foresaw that there would be no materials, and therefore the construction was suspended). Incorrect use of denominative prepositions often leads to illogical statements.

The exclusion of denominative prepositions from the text, as we see, eliminates verbosity, helps to express the thought more concretely and stylistically correctly.

The use of speech stamps is usually associated with the influence of the official business style. Speech stamps become widely used words and expressions with erased semantics and faded emotional coloring. So, in a variety of contexts, the expression get a residence permit begins to be used in a figurative sense ( Each ball that flies into the goal net receives a permanent registration in the tables; Muse Petrovsky has a permanent residence in the hearts; Aphrodite entered the permanent exhibition of the museum - now it is registered in our city).

Any frequently repeated speech means can become a stamp, for example, stereotyped metaphors, definitions that have lost their figurative power due to constant reference to them, even hackneyed rhymes ( tears - roses). However, in practical stylistics, the term "speech stamp" has received a narrower meaning: this is the name for stereotypical expressions that have a clerical coloring.

Among the speech stamps that arose as a result of the influence of the official business style on other styles, one can first of all single out formulaic turns of speech: at this stage, in this period of time, to date, emphasized with all sharpness etc. As a rule, they do not contribute anything to the content of the statement, but only clog the speech: In this period of time, a difficult situation has developed with the liquidation of debts to supplier enterprises; At present, the payment of wages to miners has been taken under unremitting control; At this stage, the crucian spawning is normal, etc. Deleting the highlighted words will not change anything in the information.

Speech stamps also include universal words, which are used in a wide variety of, often too broad, indefinite meanings ( question, event, series, conduct, deploy, separate, specific etc.). For example, a noun question, acting as a universal word, never indicates what is being asked ( Of particular importance are nutrition in the first 10-12 days; The issues of timely collection of tax from enterprises and commercial structures deserve great attention.). In such cases, it can be painlessly excluded from the text (cf.: Nutrition in the first 10-12 days is especially important; It is necessary to collect taxes from enterprises and commercial structures in a timely manner).

Word be, as universal, is also often superfluous; this can be seen by comparing two wordings of sentences from newspaper articles:

The unjustified use of linking verbs is one of the most common stylistic flaws in professional literature. However, this does not mean that linking verbs should be banned, their use should be appropriate, stylistically justified.

Speech stamps are pair words, or companion words; the use of one of them necessarily suggests the use of the other (cf.: event - held, scope - wide, criticism - sharp, problem - unresolved, overdue etc.). The definitions in these pairs are lexically defective, they give rise to speech redundancy. Speech stamps, relieving the speaker from the need to look for the right, exact words, deprive the speech of specificity. For instance: This season was held at a high organizational level- this proposal can be inserted into the report on hay harvesting, and on sports competitions, and on preparing the housing stock for winter, and harvesting grapes ...

The set of speech stamps changes over the years: some are gradually forgotten, others become "fashionable", so it is impossible to list and describe all the cases of their use. It is important to understand the essence of this phenomenon and prevent the emergence and spread of stamps.

Language standards should be distinguished from speech stamps. locale are called ready-made, reproduced in speech means of expression used in a journalistic style. Unlike a stamp, "the standard ... does not cause a negative attitude, as it has clear semantics and economically expresses an idea, contributing to the speed of information transfer." The language standards include, for example, such combinations that have become stable: Public sector employees, employment service, international humanitarian aid, commercial structures, law enforcement agencies, branches of Russian government, according to informed sources, - phrases like household service (nutrition, health, recreation etc.). These speech units are widely used by journalists, since it is impossible to invent new means of expression in each specific case.

The accumulation of verbal nouns, chains of identical case forms, speech clichés firmly “block” the perception of such statements that cannot be comprehended. Our journalism has successfully overcome this "style", and it "decorates" only the speech of individual speakers and officials in state institutions. However, while they are in their leadership positions, the problem of combating clericalism and speech stamps has not lost its relevance.

13. Literary editing as one of the components of the profession of a journalist: the concept of literary editing; the place of literary editing in the process of preparing a manuscript for publication; literary editing tasks

Literary editing - the search for the most accurate verbal expression of formulations, certain ideas, specific judgments or concepts, as well as arguments proving the author's position. Literary editing - this is such a reading of the text, which may require not only the correction of individual errors, but also the alteration of individual fragments of the text, the restructuring of sentences, the removal of unnecessary repetitions, the elimination of ambiguity, etc., so that the form of the text best matches its content.

Literary editing involves correcting stylistic flaws. Stylistic errors are understood as various kinds of errors associated with a violation of style and, in general, the Literary norm, including the wrong choice of the form of a word, the choice of an inappropriate stylistic variant that does not correspond to the general style of the text, etc.

Tasks lit. editing:

Evaluation of the manuscript in terms of relevance of the text to the goal

Identification of substantial advantages and disadvantages, verification of the accuracy and reliability of facts

Evaluation of the literary qualities of the text: compositional, genre, stylistic and logical

In linguistics, the term "lexical pleonasm" (examples of which will be discussed later in the article) denotes turns of speech containing duplication of some semantic element. In addition, the same "excesses" include the use of several language forms that have the same meaning in any completed segment of speech or text.

Close in essence to pleonasm is a tautology, which we will also talk about later.

The most common violations in oral speech

In the process of communication, we often - sometimes out of a desire to be accurately understood, and sometimes for "beauty" - abuse linguistic excesses. “The main essence”, “in the month of December”, “to meet for the first time” - each of these turns is pleonasm. Examples of them are very frequent in everyday speech, and in journalistic reviews, and in the mouths of officials giving interviews. Unfortunately, such contamination is a very common occurrence.

Pleonasms are especially common when using borrowed words, for example: free vacancy (“vacancy” is the “free position”), price list (“price list” is a price guide), the most optimal (“optimal” is the most favorable) .

Surely many of you have repeatedly heard about “prospects for the future”, received a “memorable souvenir” or conducted “timekeeping” - all these are vivid examples of pleonasms that have entered the speech of undemanding citizens. But the word “prospects” already implies views of the future, and “souvenir” is already a keepsake, not to mention the word “timing”, which translates as “measurement of time”.

Pleonasm: sentence examples

Pleonasms in linguistics are divided into semantic and syntactic. If redundancy concerns the use of service parts of speech, then such a phenomenon is defined as syntactic pleonasm. Examples of unnecessary use of conjunctions are found not only in the writings of schoolchildren who are learning the basics of linguistics, but also in official documents.

“He did not hear what the employees were saying” (in this situation, “that” can be omitted without distorting the meaning of the sentence). The same redundancy is observed in the sentence: "I know that I will have to face problems" (the conjunction "what" is superfluous in combination with the phrase "I know").

Note that both of these sentences are grammatically correct, but nevertheless suffer from redundancy.

What is perissology?

Perissology, the so-called synonymic repetition, is considered as a type of semantic pleonasm. It implies the use of word combinations in which the meaning of one is already included in the other, as already mentioned above.

In business speech, such mistakes are very common:

labor activity (labor is activity);
negotiation, educational or labor process (but negotiations, study and work are already a process).

Even in the laws one can find more than one pleonasm. Examples of such combinations of words are probably well-known to everyone: money (money is money), penalties (a fine is a punishment, that is, a sanction), legal opportunities (right means the possibility of something).

There are many such pleonastic expressions, and they are gradually fixed in the language, turning over time into normative ones.

What is a tautology?

Examples of lexical errors - pleonasm - often include the use of words that have not only a similar meaning, but also the same sounding roots. For example: “Solve unresolved problems”, “lean on your elbow”, “open the door wide open”, or “re-start activities”. This phenomenon is called a tautology. It lubricates the impression of what was said and often betrays the speaker's low level of linguistic culture.

But in speech there are also such examples of the use of tautological expressions that have firmly entered our speech without causing complaints: “black ink”, “white linen”, etc. Although I would especially like to note the rooted expression “today”, which is also tautology. The fact is that the word "today" is easily decomposed into "today", that is, "on this day", which means that we essentially pronounce: "on this day is the day." Instead of this cumbersome phrase, it is better to say: "for today."

Pleonasm can beautify speech

But our speech is not a dry set of rules. It lives and changes, so the desire for correctness should not be brought to the point of absurdity. It is impossible to safely remove from communication or from poetic lines stable constructions that formally represent pleonasm. Examples: “I saw it with my own eyes”, “he heard it with my own ears”, “I don’t know”, “I don’t know” or “live-live”, “sea-ocean”, “bitter grief”, “darkness- dark", etc.

The use of pleonasms in literature makes it possible to make the hero or his speech bright, juicy and, paradoxically, do not require additional descriptions. Remember at least Chekhov’s non-commissioned officer Prishibeev with his “drowned dead corpse” or the heroes of Mikhail Zoshchenko’s stories, who walked “on their own legs” to the “negro negro operetta” or sat in line “to the nervous doctor, for nervous diseases.” This literary device is called lexical amplification.

Pleonasm cannot be judged unambiguously

As you can see, pleonasm and tautology, examples of which were given in the article, are very ambiguous phenomena. Redundancy, excess, of course, should not be welcomed in a normal speech situation - this clogs speech and burdens it with words that do not carry additional information. But the conscious use of pleonasm as a literary device is completely justified.

What do the news clips that the video below has in common? Right! In each of them, the same phrase "unpleasant incident" is used. And in each of them, the editorial staff missed the airing of a news text with a lexical error. Let's figure out what's the matter here.

We look in the explanatory dictionary for the lexical meaning of the word "incident".

INCIDENT-a; m. [from lat. incidens (incidentis) - happening] An incident, an incident of an unpleasant nature; misunderstanding. border incidents. Possibility of incidents between smb. I. is exhausted (has no bad consequences). Great Dictionary of Russian language. - 1st ed.: St. Petersburg: Norint S. A. Kuznetsov. 1998.

As we can see, the word is borrowed. In its meaning in Russian, not only information about the event is encoded, but also its specific assessment. In this case, this is some kind of misunderstanding that happened to someone. By adding the adjective “unpleasant” to the word incident, we duplicate information and, of course, make a lexical error. This phenomenon is called pleonasm.

The discussion about total speech errors in our time is becoming more and more relevant. Even the speech of media workers, which should be a reference, is replete with such misunderstandings, to say nothing of ordinary people. That is why, apparently, there are ideas to introduce the oral part into the Unified State Examination in the Russian language, so that the conversation about speech errors is conducted in the classroom in a substantive and constant way. But it is never too late to become a schoolboy again for a while.

Pleonasm, lapalissiads, perissology, isosemy, tautology... Don't be afraid, they are not contagious.

Although it is not only media workers and writers who need to carefully monitor them. Such mistakes do not adorn anyone. They, like weeds, are capable of disfiguring our speech. In order to “remove them by the root” whenever possible, it is necessary to “know the enemy by sight”.

We have already met with pleonasm. This is a fairly common language phenomenon, although many may read its name for the first time. Its main distinguishing feature is redundancy, excess. In Russian, in such cases, they usually say "butter oil". By the way, such a repetition of single-root words is called tautology. Many linguists believe that tautology is a kind of pleonasm.

Semantic pleonasms are associated with semantics, the lexical meaning of a word. Such pleonasms often include borrowed words. It's not hard to guess what the reason is. A person does not quite understand what this word means, and adds another word, already Russian, which duplicates the meaning of the first. Such a phenomenon is called perissology. Here are the most common examples:

Price list. Price list (German Preiskurant, from Preis - price and French courant - current) - a guide to prices for goods.
Timekeeping. Timing (Greek chronos - time and metreo - measure) - a method of studying the time spent on performing cyclically repeated manual and machine-manual operations.
Internal interior. Interior (fr. interieur
Debuted for the first time. Debut from fr. début - beginning, appearance). Debut - the first appearance of an artist in public. Debut (chess) - the beginning of a chess game.
atmospheric air. Atmosphere (from other Greek ἀτμός - "steam" and σφαῖρα - "sphere") - the air shell of the Earth.
First premiere. Premiere (fr. première - "first") - the first show, the first performance.
There are many such examples: other alternative, free vacancy, the most optimal, nostalgia for the motherland, top priority, incriminate guilt, hair removal, memorial monument, memorable souvenir, folklore, biography of life, my autobiography, patriot of the motherland, work colleague, national referendum, demobilize from the army , extra bonus, gripping thriller, interactive interaction, informational message, highly extremist, 24/7 non-stop, local native, people's democracy, unusual phenomenon, optional elective, unexpected surprise, main leitmotif, retaliatory counterattack, future prospects, complete fiasco, full house, popular hit, preliminary announcement, high-level summit, stable stabilization, strict taboo, screen shot.
Sometimes native speakers misunderstand the lexical meaning of native words. There are also our, domestic, semantic pleonasms that go beyond the limits of the language norm: torrential downpour, five rubles of money, thirty construction workers, the month of March, eventually going back, met for the first time, gestured with his hands, nodded his head, blinked his eyes, temporary reprieve, illegal gangs, the main point, there is a place to be, the real truth, short moment, me personally, surprisingly strange, initial basics, unconfirmed rumors, flock of sheep, retreat back, feathered birds, repeat again, completely destroyed, preliminary planning, warn in advance, equal half, mix together, joint meeting, see with your own eyes, hear with your ears, employment for a job, climb up/down the stairs.

Remember these expressions and do not let them into your speech again. This is exactly the case when there is a clear redundancy, duplication of information.

On the other hand, language - this is a very complex living organism, and, of course, there are times when everything is not so simple.

Types of pleonasms

Recently, pleonasms have begun to appear more and more often, which include the abbreviation: CD, ERD diagram, IT technology, RAID array, VIP person, GPS system, SMS message. It is more difficult to get rid of duplication in this case, since the main lexical meaning is encoded in just one letter. And this letter - Latin, and the word that is encrypted in it is also foreign, most often English. The Russian equivalent in the expression acts as an explanation. There are also domestic pleonasms-abbreviations. For example, "power line lines" or "AvtoVAZ".

Some pleonastic combinations have already taken root in the language and have become the norm. A prime example is the "butter sandwich".

The original meaning of the word borrowed from the German language was gradually erased in the memory of native speakers. A sandwich in our understanding can be not only with butter, but also with sausage, caviar, cheese, and so on.

Verbosity is considered another kind of semantic pleonasm. Example: he walked towards the house. This phrase contains words that add nothing to its meaning. - "towards".

Pleonasms are not always errors. Stylistic pleonasm is characteristic of colloquial, journalistic and artistic speech, especially folklore, where pleonastic epithets and comparisons can crystallize into stable poetic formulas: path-path, field-field, sadness-longing, grief-grit, fate-fate, young-green, sea-okian.

Stylistic pleonasms (they are also called expressive) are often used consciously in fiction. This is the author's technique, not a mistake.

About the field, field, who are you
dotted dead bones?
Whose greyhound horse trampled you
In the last hour of a bloody battle?

Agree that Pushkin's pleonasm from "Ruslan and Lyudmila" adds imagery.

And here is a vivid speech characteristic of one of Chekhov's characters. “Take at least this case for example ... I disperse the people, and on the shore on the sand drowned corpse of a dead person. On what basis, I ask, does he lie here? Is this something in order? What is the officer looking at? Why, I say, officer, do you not let the authorities know? Maybe this drowned dead man drowned himself, or maybe this thing smells like Siberia. Maybe it's a felony murder..."(A.P. Chekhov, "Unter Prishbeev")

In fairness, it must be said that pleonasm in linguistics is not considered exclusively a speech error. Scholars define it more broadly. This is precisely the speech turnover, which, under certain circumstances, either goes beyond the boundaries of the norm, or is considered quite acceptable. In colloquial speech, it can be used to enhance emotionality or comedy.

Lapalissiada: what kind of animal is this?

Here is an interesting example - the English poem "Guinea pig" (translated by S.Ya. Marshak):

Guinea pig
Was
Mala
And, therefore, she was not a big pig.
Legs worked
The little pig
When I ran away
She is on the path.
But she didn't stand
When I ran
And did not remain silent
When she screamed.
But suddenly for some reason
She died,
And from this moment
Was not alive.

The poet used in this text a lapalissiade . This is another kind of speech redundancy - the statement of obviously obvious facts, bordering on the absurd. They usually create a comic effect in inappropriate, sometimes even tragic situations: "he was dead and did not hide it."

The Lapalissiades got their exotic name under very interesting circumstances. The term is derived from the name of the French Marshal Marquis Jacques de La Palis. According to legend, the soldiers composed a song about him, in which there was a play on words: "S'il n'était pas mort, Il ferait encore envie" (if he was not dead, he would be envied). The phrase can be read differently: "S'il n'était pas mort, Il serait encore en vie" (if he were not dead, he would be alive).

Tautological tautologies

One of the varieties of semantic pleonasms, many scientists recognize tautology. This term is better known and usually strongly associated with the phrase "butter oil", which we have already mentioned above. These are expressions, which include the repetition of the same (single-root) or similar words. Most often this repetition is unfounded: smiled a smile, a young girl, re-renew, ask a question.

If pleonasm is an unreasonable excess, verbosity, as they say, “woe from the mind,” then tautology is considered a grosser speech error, since it usually indicates poor vocabulary and illiteracy.

But even here there are exceptions. Sometimes the tautology is a variant of the norm. For example, in colloquial and poetic speech, the following combinations are used: bitter grief, wonderful miracle, marvelous marvel, black night, white day, icy water, mortal anguish. Such epithets are considered quite a characteristic feature of poetic speech.

On the Internet, I found a wonderful example of a parody that perfectly explains the essence of the tautology. Moldovan comic duet "Ostap and Bender" came up with a miniature called "Unusual Lesson", where tautological expressions are intentionally included in almost all dialogues. At the end of the scene, there is this poem:

Lukomorye has a crafty bow,
Chain chain on that chain.
Half day to noon
Somewhere in the afternoon
Walker stilted walker.
Go right, right - right,
Go left - left there.
There miracles of miracles are more wonderful,
There were no miracles.
There on unknown paths
Traces follow, follow.
There's a chicken on chicken legs
Kurei oversees by smoking.
And I've been there, been there, been there
I drank honey with honey ...

In addition to semantic pleonasms, there are also syntactic ones. In them, redundancy, duplication of information extends not to one expression, but to entire syntactic constructions. Compare two sentences: “She told me that she would come tomorrow” and "She told me she would come tomorrow."

Both sentences are grammatically correct, but the words “about that” are considered in this case as pleonastic, that is, redundant.

Time to test yourself

Let's consolidate the result now and try ourselves in the role of a strict and impartial television editor. Find semantic pleonasms in the suggested videos. By the way, all of them have already met earlier in this article. At the same time we will check and attention.

If you personally found all 15 errors, then you can consider that the test on the topic “Lexical errors. Pleonasm" in your pocket. It looks like you learned your lesson well in the end.

Sometimes our speech is clogged tautology and pleonasm .

Tautology(from Greek tauto- the same and logos- word) is the repetition of the same words or case forms of one word within a small text, or a paragraph in written speech, or a fragment of a speech, or even within a single phrase.

An example from a student's review of a journal article by Professor L.I. Skvortsov "What threatens the Russian literary language?":

author articles are categorically against the clogging of the Russian language with foreign words. author is of the opinion that if we use "foreign" words, then our culture will no longer be purely Russian. author writes that the extinction of Russia is already being felt.

An example from a student's response to a questionnaire question: "What role does the culture of speech play in the legal profession?"

Everyone needs to improve the culture of speech people but this is especially important for people, who work with people: for lawyers, journalists, teachers, doctors, sellers.

To avoid tautology in your speech, it is enough to replace one of the identical words with another word or some pronoun. So, in the second example, the genitive form of the noun (for people) should be replaced by a similar form of the demonstrative pronoun (for those).

Pleonasm(from Greek pleonasmos- overabundance) is a verbal excess, when one of the two words carries redundant, duplicating information.

Such an episode from the biography of A.M. Gorky. While reading the manuscript of a short story by an aspiring writer, he came across the following phrase: Don't poke his nose where it doesn't belong. A.M . Gorky underlined this phrase and made the following note in the margin of the manuscript with a pencil: "How can you poke someone else's nose?"

Other examples with pleonasm:

in December month (because december is the name of the month)

One hundred rubles money (because the ruble is the name of the banknote)

twenty five student man (one of the last two words is redundant)

belyashi with meat (there are no whites without meat)

my autobiography(this foreign word itself, literally translated into Russian, means “my biography”)

price-list prices (literally translated into Russian, the word price list means "current price").

A variation of pleonasm is the use in one phrase of the 3rd person pronoun (he, she, it, they) after the noun in the role of the same member of the sentence (most often the subject).

For instance:

Studies, she requires a lot of effort. Legend, she created during the life of the artist Malevich(from the TV show).

Pronoun 3rd person here it is possible only in a new phrase.

For instance:

It was a legend, it was created during the life of the artist Malevich.

In the basement of the tautology club was discovered
deadly dead corpse

Pleonasms and tautology are quite close concepts. Both of these are characterized as verbosity.

PLEONASM - a turn of speech in which some element of meaning is duplicated; the presence of several language forms expressing the same meaning, for example, "the conversation was long and lengthy"

TAUTOLOGY - the repetition of the same or similar words in meaning, for example, "clearer than clear", "cries, bursts into tears."

In colloquial speech, pleonasms are common - “I saw it with my own eyes”, “What are you doing here - are you thinking of joking?”, “I completely and completely agree”.
In this case, pleonasms are used to emotionally enhance the effect of an utterance or to create a comic effect.

Take at least this case for example .. I disperse the people, and on the shore on the sand is the drowned corpse of a dead person. On what basis, I ask, does he lie here? Is this something in order? (Chekhov. Unter Prishbeev)

In folklore and poetry, pleonasm contributes to the melodiousness of speech, the creation of imagery - “path-path”, “pole-field”, “woe-crook”.

But without fear, without fear, Shengibis went to battle (Song of Hiawatha, trans. Bunina)

For the linguist - the people, the great artist of the word, one rationalistic side in the language is not enough. He needs speech to be coherent and harmonious, so that there is rhythm in it, there is music and, most importantly, there is expressiveness. (Chukovsky. Live like life)
In the combination of “shame and disgrace”, Chukovsky heard the poetic meter (anapaest). And the fact that two words here “begin with a single sound [s], ... plays an important role.” This phrase is "so expressive, so flawless in rhythm and sound writing." - “And to unclean chimney sweeps - shame and disgrace! Shame and disgrace!" (With)

Most of the time, alas! - pleonasm is a defect in style and indicates insufficient literacy of the author.

Who among us is not a sinner and has not written:
"going down the stairs" - can you go down?
“I nodded my head in agreement” - is it possible to nod in disagreement with your foot?
“Soft light of the evening sunset…” - and the sunset happens in the morning?
and so on.

Everyone admits such slips, but! only graphomaniacs offer readers texts full of turns - “price list”, “timing of time”, “patriot of the motherland”, “young girl” and so on.

Pleonasms are syntactic and semantic.

Syntactic pleonasm is the result of excessive use of official parts of speech, for example: “He told me that he was hired for another job” (“that” can be omitted without losing the meaning)
or “I know that he will come” (the conjunction “what” is optional when connecting the sentence with the verb phrase “I know”).
Both sentences are grammatically correct, but the words "about" and "what" are considered in this case as pleonastic.

Semantic pleonasm is more a matter of style and use of grammar.
Perissology (or synonymic repetition) and verbosity are distinguished as separate types of semantic pleonasm.

In perissology, the semantic meaning of one word is included in another, for example:
- We went up the stairs.
- Each buyer receives a free gift.
- There is no other alternative.

With verbosity, sentences or phrases include words that do not increase the overall semantic load, for example, "He walked towards the house." "In direction" is redundant.

Here is a short list of expressions to avoid:

joint meeting, joint agreement, joint alliance, joint cooperation, mutual cooperation

Memorial monument, souvenir, folklore, biography of life, my autobiography

Young girl, young boy, old man

Illegal gangs, deliberate slander, defamatory slander, patriot of the motherland

Colleague at work, free vacancy, the most profitable, the most optimal solution, the answers of the respondents

SI system, CD-ROM, VIP persona, wood products from wood, apple charlotte, first debut

Overturned and turned over, dreamed in a dream, poisoned with poison, clenched his fist, stop at the bus stop, glanced up, climbed up

The list can be continued, but I think everything is clear.

What to do? How not to embarrass yourself in front of a caustic reader?

Subtract! Read and read again!

And then in your novels, a white albino will never ask a black negro: “Is it true that butter is oil?”