The Linguistic Construction of the Five Stages of Grief in Ariana Grande’s Eternal Sunshine (Deluxe Edition)
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This study examines how Eternal Sunshine (Deluxe Edition) constructs and communicates the emotional progression of grief through multimodal discourse. Anchored in Kübler-Ross’s Five Stages of Grief and informed by discourse analysis, the research explores how linguistic, auditory, and visual resources collectively shape meanings of loss and recovery. Using a corpus-based qualitative approach, the study analyzes lyrics, vocal delivery, and official visual materials as interrelated discursive texts, focusing on clustered linguistic features, including lexico-syntactic patterns, figurative language, sound repetition, and pragmatic cues. The findings demonstrate that grief is represented as a fluid and cyclical process rather than a linear trajectory: informal and emotionally charged vocabulary indexes anger, fragmented structures signal denial, metaphorical language reflects bargaining, repetitive phonological patterns convey depression, and shifts in tone and discourse stance suggest movement toward acceptance. Intertextual references and multimodal cohesion further situate the listener within shared cultural narratives of loss, healing, and emotional resilience. Overall, the album functions as an affective discursive space in which personal sorrow is articulated, negotiated, and transformed. This study contributes to discourse analysis, music linguistics, and affective communication by highlighting how popular music operates as a culturally resonant medium for meaning-making around grief, with implications for language education and interdisciplinary cultural research.
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