Re: sarcasm & irony (was: Re: Re : Re: A request from a non-conlanger)

I was just thinking about sarcasm in English. My mom was reporting a
conversation with a neighbor of ours who often helps with construction and
stuff who I thought might be able to re-solder a part on my guitar, and she
says "and he didn't seem particularly enthusiastic about doing it."

Almost always, it seems, the words "especially", "particulary", etc., when
combined with a negative, mean "not all all":

Q: "How didn't your presentation go?"
A: "The teacher didn't seem particularly impressed."

Literally, this means the teacher didn't get up and clap. Probalby, it
means she looked like she was about to throw up.

Odd.

A sarcasm morpheme seems a contradiction: irony/sarcasm always don't convey
the literal meaning. But certain words end up associated far more
frequently with sarcasm, such that they lose the need for non-standard
voice inflection, etc. The best example I can think of is "yeah, right" in
English.

sam



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