The Stylistic Features Of The Headlines In New York Times

The language of English newspaper headlines is very special and differs a lot from other styles of writing. Thus, to know the stylistic characteristics of it is of great importance to readers and contributors. On the basis of stylistic theories, this thesis aims at making an overall analysis of the stylistic features of the headlines in New York Times from four levels: graphological, lexical, grammatical, and semantic level, employing qualitative and quantitative methods. With the assistant of statistics, such as Chi-square tests, the main conclusions are drawn as follows: The language of newspaper headlines has the distinct characteristics at graphological, lexical, grammatical and semantic level. For example, in terms of language unit composing headlines, simple sentence headlines are the most common type;Midget words and acronyms are widely used in headlines;Simple present tense takes the place of most past tenses and perfect tenses in headlines;Many rhetorical devices are employed in headlines. Therefore, through learning the stylistic features of English newspaper headlines, readers can enjoy the beauty of language and understand headlines better.