Life likes Irony...: April 2012

What Irony means!

Irony (from the Ancient Greek εἰρωνεία eirōneía, meaning dissimulation or feigned ignorance)[1] is a rhetorical device, literary technique, or situation in which there is a sharp incongruity or discordance that goes beyond the simple and evident intention of words or actions. Ironic statements (verbal irony) usually convey a meaning exactly opposite from their literal meaning. A situation is often said to be ironic (situational irony) if the actions taken have an effect exactly opposite from what was intended. The discordance of verbal irony is created as a means of communication (as in art or rhetoric). Descriptions or depictions of situational ironies, whether in fiction or in non-fiction, serve a communicative function of sharpening or highlighting certain discordant features of reality.
Other types of irony:
Comic irony: Irony that is humorous (whereas much irony is not)
Dramatic irony: When the audience (or reader) knows a fictional character is making a mistake, because the reader has more information than the character.
Tragic irony: A type of dramatic irony, in which the character's lack of knowledge leads to tragic consequences.
Historical irony: A kind of situational irony that takes a long period of years for the irony to become evident.
Socratic irony: When a person asks questions, pretending not to understand, to lure the interlocutor into a logical trap. (Socrates, in Plato's dialogues, was a master of this technique.)

Life likes Irony...

Irony's Offical Mark

4.17.2012

My favicon :)