ostranenie (defamiliarization or estrangement)
A central concept in *Russian Formalism's attempt to describe and define what constitutes *literaturnost (literariness). A neologism, it implies two kinds of actions: making strange, and pushing aside. Consistent with this double meaning, the concept refers to the techniques writers use to transform ordinary language into poetic language, which for the Russian Formalists is language which induces a heightened state of perception. Habit, according to the Russian Formalists, is the enemy of art, therefore to produce art the writer has to force the reader outside of the usual patterns of perception by making the familiar appear strange or different. The principal theorist of this concept, ... ...
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