The Stylistics of Street Poetry

Abstract

This article focuses on stylistic elements and their occurrence in traditional and street poetry. Over the years, street poetry has shaped its own Slovenian terminological system, in which some stylistic elements are the same as in traditional poetry (refren “refrain”, metafora “metaphor”), whereas others are the same, but bear a different name (besedna igra vs. wordplayi “wordplay”; primera vs. similes “simile”; moška, ženska, tekoča rima vs. enojna, dvojna, trojna rima “masculine, feminine, and dactylic rhyme”; mašila vs. filer “filler”), are similar in both types of poetry (metrum vs. flow “meter”), or are only typical of traditional poetry (carmina figurata) or street poetry (filer “filler”, deliveri “deliveries”, flow, punch, multiji “multis”). It has been established that in street poetry the majority of stylistic elements are simpler than in traditional poetry. Rhyme in street poetry is traditionally consecutive or folk-like and assonance hardly exists at all. It all seems that tradition continues in this regard. To make things easier to understand, two tables are added at the end of the article; the first one shows the stylistic figures used in street poetry and the second one compares the stylistic elements of traditional and street poetry. This is followed by the conclusion that, despite its “primitive” nature, street poetry is part of poetry in the broader sense. However, it cannot be placed at the same level as traditional poetry, just as this is not possible, for instance, for pornographic poetry, bathroom poetry, or marketing poetry.