An impetus into researching into linguistic features of Oxymoron used in literary works in English and in Vietnamese.

Abstract

This data-based study is aimed at the syntactic and semantic features of Oxymoron used in literary works in English and in Vietnamese. The analysis, discussions and comments have been made to point out the syntactic and semantic similarities and differences of Oxymoron in the two languages. In addition, the distribution of this stylistic device has been clearly presented based on a survey of 200 samples of Oxymoron in English and another 200 in Vietnamese. First of all, both quanlitative and quantitative approaches are exploited to analyze the corpus in an attempt to explore the syntactic and semantic characteristics of Oxymoron. Then, some suggested Oxymoron combinations have been mentioned. Finally, the implications on understanding and effective use of Oxymoron for language learners as well as translators are set forth.