Means of cohesion in the Ivorian tales of Bernard Dadier: communicative-discursive approach

The article examines the linguistic specificity of the text of African literary tales on the basis of the material of “African Legends” by Bernard Dadier. The analysis reveals a close interrelation between the meanings and the linguistic component of the narrative that results in the formation of a matrix of expressive means, built up by various elements of textual cohesion. The analysis is carried out in the context of the communicative-discursive approach. It is based on theoretical studies on the linguistic specificity of African narratives, previously carried out by Russian, French and Ivorian researchers, as well as on the analyses of works devoted to the issues of cohesion and coherence, which serve the integrity of the text, the interrelation of meanings and linguistic means. The main objective of the study is to identify the main characteristics of Ivorian tales in general and of tales about the Ivorian people reflected in the collection of legends by Bernard Dadier, a famous Ivorian writer and screenwriter, in particular. The main research methods include intertextual, semantic-stylistic and motive analysis, as well as the “word-image” method, which seem to be most relevant for examining the author's approach to achieving coherence and highlighting the musicality and rhythmicity of the tales. From the study, the authors conclude that the cohesion of the discourse of Ivorian literary tales is mainly achieved through the use of uncomplicated homogeneous elements and diacope, the repetition of words at certain intervals within a sentence or at the junction of short sentences / clauses. Less productive are gradation and gradational repetition, as well as reduplication and anadiplosis. However, these devices often complement the images created by the author