英语语用学论文

2012 年 秋 季学期研究生课程考核 读书报告 研究报告 考核科目 语 用 学 学生所在院 系 外 国 语 学 院 学生所在学科 外 国 语 言 学 及 应 用 语 言 学 学 生 姓 名 X X 学 号 学 生 类 别 非 定 向 考核结果阅 卷 人 The Cooperative Principle of Pragmatics XX Harbin Institute of Technology Abstract The research of language has never interrupted since the language was born Humor is an important part of our lives without which the life will be boring Pragmatics is a main branch of Linguistics with the development of pragmatic theory many linguists from many angles have an analysis on verbal humor and achieved fruitful results While cooperative principle as one of the most important pragmatic principle makes a systemic study about language use and lays a solid foundation for later development of pragmatics The violation of cooperative principle can often generate conversational implicative or achieve certain communicative effects On the basis of previous humor and pragmatic theory research This paper will analyze from the point of the cooperative principle of those verbal humorous dialogue in the sitcom Home with Kids Key words Cooperative Principle pragmatics language 中文摘要 中文摘要 自从语言产生之后对语言的研究从未停止 幽默是我们生命中重要的一部 分 没有它生活会变得非常无聊 语用学是语言学的一个主要分支 随着语用学理论 的发展 许多语言学家对幽默进行了分析并取得了很多研究成果 而合作原则 作为 语用学重要的理论组成 对于语言的使用进行了系统的研究并为语用学后来的发展奠 定了坚实的基础 违反合作原则会产生会话歧义或是导致其它语言效果 本文在语用 学理论和幽默的基础上从合作原则的角度分析了 家有儿女 中的各种幽默 关键词关键词 合作原则 语用学 语言 Contents Chapter 1 Four Maxims of the Cooperative Principle Chapter 2 Violating CP Maxims and Humor Production 2 1 Violating the Quantity Maxim 2 2 Violating the Quality Maxim 2 3 Violating the Manner Maxim 2 4 Violating the Relation Maxim Chapter 3 Conclusion Reference The research of language has never interrupted since the language was born Humor is an important part of our lives without which the life will be boring Pragmatics is a main branch of Linguistics with the development of pragmatic theory many linguists from many angles have an analysis on verbal humor and achieved fruitful results While cooperative principle as one of the most important pragmatic principle makes a systemic study about language use and lays a solid foundation for later development of pragmatics The violation of cooperative principle can often generate conversational implicative or achieve certain communicative effects 1 Four Maxims of the Cooperative Principle In 1975 the language philosopher H P Grice published a seminal article entitled The Cooperative Principle which created quite a stir in the linguistic world and generated a large number of linguistic publications that are built on Grice s postulates According to Grice people usually try to reach a common goal by mutual efforts or at least make the conversation develop in the direction of their expectation in conversational exchange To achieve this people need to cooperate with each other Grice theory of the cooperative principle explains how it is possible for the speaker to convey more than what is literally said and foe the hearer to understand The four maxims of CP are Quantity Maxim Quality Maxim Manner Maxim and Relation Maxim The maxim of quantity has two sub maxims that require the cooperative speaker to say as much as but no more than is required for his particular purposes in the talk exchange The maxim of quality also has two sub maxims which demands that the speaker say only what he believes to be true and for which he has sufficient evidence The maxim of relation urges the speaker to make his contribution relevant to the communication context The maxim of manner requires the speaker to be methodical and to avoid ambiguity prolixity and obscurity In short as Grice put it for the cooperative principle make your conversational contribution such as is required at the stage at which it occurs by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged The cooperative principle is the foundation of pragmatic interpretation of humor of which the flouting of maxims plays a very important role 2 Violating CP Maxims and Humor Production In actual conversation a participant may deliberately flout CP maxims for some reasons or special need As an important category of non observance of the conversational maxims a flout is distinguished by deliberately triggering the hearer s search for an implicative The speaker employs this way seemingly against the cooperative principle to reinforce the communicative effect In this way the speaker can make his conversation humorous and thus produce the effect of humor In fact flouting of the CP is often seen in Chinese sitcoms Of course sitcom writers also deliberately flout the principle in order to achieve humorous effects 2 1 Violating the Quantity Maxim When a speaker offers more or less information than is required by the situation with the intention of generating an implicative he flouts the maxim of quantity Look at the following example 1 In Episode 093 Liu Xing goes to Internet caf and Liu Mei keeps asking what he did there Xing You d better not interfere with my business from now on 以后我的事情你少管 Mei What did you say I don t interfere with your business Why didn t you say it when I breast fed you Why didn t you say it when you were sick Why didn t you say it when you fell to the ground Why didn t you say it when you couldn t walk You don t want me to interfere with you now because you are grown up and can do whatever you want 你说什么呢 再说一遍 我少管 你小时候喝奶的时候怎么不说 小时候生病的时候怎 么不说呀 摔跟头时候怎么不说呀 学会走路时候怎么不说 这时候让我少管 你翅 膀硬了 自个会飞了 In this episode the mother is very angry about what Liu Xing did and said she is so angry that she can t help talking excessively about the matter which sounds humorous This obviously violates the second sub maxim of quantity Do not make your contribution more informative than is required 2 Let s take another episode as an example Dad didn t get home on time Liu Mei ask Xiao Yu to call his cell phone after made the phone call Mei Who answered the phone 谁接的电话 Yu A woman 一个女的 Mei What What did she say 嗯 说什么 Yu She said sorry you dial telephone temporarily unable to get through 对不起 您拨打的电话暂时无法接通 In this dialogue Xiao Yu intentionally did not say that it is the voice prompts but a woman to pick up the phone she did not give enough information at the beginning therefore she violated the lacking of information criteria in order to create a tense atmosphere 2 2 Violating the Quality Maxim The maxim of quality requires that one s verbal contribution to a conversation should be truthful The theory also claims that you violate the quality maxim when you deliberately lie or communicate in a way that does not reflect an honest intention The following are two examples drawn respectively from Home with Kids and Growing Pains which can explain how flouting the maxim of quality produces humor 1 In Episode 101 of Home with Kids the reorganized family just live together Xia Yu and his mother Liu Mei have such a dialogue Yu Mum my hand was bitten by the insect 妈 我的手被虫子给咬啦 Mei Oh what s the matter Was it bitten by mosquito Come on let me scratch for you 呦 怎么回事儿啊 蚊子给咬的吧 妈给挠挠啊 可怜了 Yu Why does the mosquito only bite me instead of Liu Xing This isn t my home 为什么蚊子只咬我不咬刘星 是不是这不是我的家啊 Mei Nonsense Of course this is your home Here are your dad and mum Do you know why the mosquitoes only bite you instead of Liu Xing 别胡说 这就是你的家啊 你看爸爸妈妈不都在呢 你知道为什么蚊子只咬你不 咬刘星吗 Yu Why Mei Because your blood is sweet while Liu Xing s is stinking 因为你的血是甜的 刘星的血是臭的 When a speaker says something that is false or for which he lacks adequate evidence he flouts the maxim of quality In this conversation it is obvious that the mother tells a lie to Xiao Yu As a mother and an adult she knows the reason well In order to hoax Xiao Yu and make him feel good she deliberately says something which is obviously false In this way Liu Mei doesn t observe the first sub maxim of quality Do not say what you believe to be false But it is just her deliberate flouting of the maxim that makes her son Xiao Yu feel better and at the same time generates a humorous effect 2 3 Violating the Manner Maxim Avoiding obscurity means what you say must be easily or clearly understood Avoiding ambiguity means there should be no existence of more than one meaning in what you say Being brief and being orderly mean what you say should be concise and well arranged The maxim of manner is flouted by speaking redundantly disorderly or unclearly On this occasion the speaker seems very uncooperative but actually he intends to produce an implicative to be deduced by the hearer In verbal communication people often misunderstand the ambiguous expressions thus resulting in a humorous effect The following dialogue between Liu Mei and her son Liu Xing is a case in point Mei Why doesn t the gorilla evolve 猩猩为什么不进化啊 Xing Give me a reason for its evolution 给我一个进化的理由 Mei Why doesn t it talk 它为什么不说话啊 Xing What do you want me to say 您让我说什么呀 Mei It lies in its defect in listening 在于听力的缺陷 Xing My ears are quite good 我耳朵挺好哒 Mei Go away Don t bother me 去 别在这儿捣乱 Xing Aren t you talking about me 您不是说我呢吗 Mei I am talking about the gorilla 我这儿说大猩猩呢 The pronunciation of gorilla xingxing in Chinese language is the same with Liu Xing s nickname Liu Mei is talking something about the gorilla but Liu Xing misunderstands the meaning of xingxing Obviously this misunderstanding comes from the two possibilities to interpret the sound xingxing 猩猩 and 星星 The ambiguous use of the word sound which violates the maxim of manner is the reason of humor production here 2 4 Violating the Relation Maxim The maxim of relation tells us to make our contributions relevant The demand for relevance simply means that the speaker should only convey information that is relevant to the topic being communicated If one party wants to avoid the topic under discussion and starts another seemingly relevant topic he will flout the maxim of relevance And this seemingly relevant answer often makes another party feel funny The maxim of relation is flouted when a response is completely irrelevant to the subject or the goal of the conversation Look at the following example 1 After Xia Donghai comes back from the parents meeting held in Liu Xing s school he has a dialogue with Liu Mei Mei Are you OK There must be huge gap in your mind now Do you have the thought to find a way to escape 没受刺激吧 就你这种给小雪那种好学生开过家长会 的你肯定心理有巨大的落差 想找个地缝转进去 Dong Hai The meeting is quite well 开的还算比较圆满 Mei What did the teacher tell you about Liu Xing 老师都给刘星告什么状了 The grandma coughs indicating Xia Donghai not to tell the truth Dong Hai Err I take some medicine for grandma 啊 我给姥姥去拿点药去 Mei Quickly what did the teacher tell you 你快说啊 老师都说刘星什么了 Dong Hai Well he said nothing 他说啊 没什么 In this episode after the parents meeting from our basic understanding about Liu Xing and Xia Donghai s facial expressions we know that Liu Xing must have done something wrong in school If Xia Donghai told the truth to Liu Mei she must punish her son So Xia Donghai intends not to tell his wife the truth and avoids answering her inquiry His answer is apparently irrelevant to his wife s question In this light atmosphere he has created humor by flouting the relevance maxim 2 Let s look at another dialogue Xin Did you know today the teacher found a genius that s me 大家知道吗啊 今天老师发现一天才 这天才就是我 Mei Ha ha this peach is really sweet 呵呵 这桃真甜 Xin there are several kinds of genius not just the one who makes the high score dad is that right 这天才分好多种 不光是得高分的 对吧老爸 Dong Hai This peach let me remembered of the ginseng fruit in the Journey to the West 这桃子让人想起西游记里那人参果 Xin Ah you d listen to me Teacher lost her car key today and I found it 哎呀 你们倒是听我说啊 今天老师车钥匙丢了 是我给找着的 Dong Hai It seems that Sha Seng also love to eat 好像沙僧也爱吃 Xin Guess where did I find it In the car s lock She forgot to pull it down 你们猜我从哪找出来的 从车锁上找着的 忘了拔下来啦 Dong Hai Actually Tang Monk is also love to eat he is clever and don t want to say 其实啊 唐僧也特爱吃 他就是贼 不爱说出来 Xin While others did not think of it which suggested that I was a genius really just a little training I will become a detective scientist just like Sherlock Holmes 可是别人都没想到 就我想起来了 这说明我在这方面就是天才 真的 只要稍 微培养一下 就是个侦探学家 就跟福尔摩斯似的 Liu Xing was talking about what happened in the school while his parents were paid their attention to the peach Although in a same dialogue they talk about their own topics and without relation It is precisely this kind of irrelevant and the ignorance of Liu Xing s boast causes the humorous effect production 3 Conclusion A great number of samples selected