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Glossary: foregrounding

Explanation

A term used to describe whereby a particular linguistic feature 'stands out' or is ‘highlighted’. Foregrounding can be achieved via any part of the language system: phonology, lexis, grammar, semantics, etc. It is done by creating patterns (known as parallelism) or breaking away from established patterns (known as deviation).

Foregrounding

Foregrounding is a widely-used term in text analysis, literary linguistics and stylistics, referring to patterns of language that stand out in a text. The term itself is derived from art and film criticism, and is best understood by a visual analogy.

Goal

Noticing and exploring linguistic patterns in literary texts.

Here is a picture of San Francisco:

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