«Spoiler Alert», This is no Spoiler : Mirativity, Assumption and Irony at Play

Abstract

ABSTRACT: The present chapter focuses on the pragmatic parenthetical «spoiler alert», which is used as a humorous, ironic device to underscore the obvious nature of a statement (e.g., «Four orcas chase a penguin and spoiler alert, it doesn’t end well», NOW). This corpus-based study first traces the history of this relatively recent innovation –which originates as a disclaimer to warn readers of potential plot revelations in online discussion forums– to then explore the meanings and pragmatic functions that this expression has acquired over its short history. Corpus data for this chapter were drawn from COCA and NOW. My analysis shows that, despite its specialised origins in online forums, the expression has attained a remarkably wide dispersion. Moreover, the parenthetical itself has undergone an important semantic shift. A warning expression in origin, «spoiler alert» first acquired mirative extensions, i.e., meaning related to surprise and unexpectedness, to then acquire assumed evidential extensions, expressing evidence based on assumption or logical reasoning. This shift from mirativity to assumed evidentiality was brought about through pragmatic enrichment, as a result of humorous and ironic uses of the parenthetical: «spoiler alert» no longer introduces surprising or revealing information, but a predictable or self-evident fact.