从关联理论角度分析英语言语幽默_图文

1、西南财经大学硕士学位论文从关联理论角度分析英语言语幽默 姓名:佘佼屿申请学位级别:硕士专业:外国语言学及应用语言学 指导教师:李天行20081201摘要 摘要幽默在人们的同常生活中无处不在。它不但可以惹人发笑,让人心情愉悦, 也能够排减压力,缓解气氛,帮助人们摆脱窘迫。幽默不仅反映了人们对生 活的态度,也展示了人类语言的魅力和人们智慧的结晶。幽默,作为一种特 殊的语言现象自古就引起了人们的关注,结合幽默的定义及其分类的研究, 本文以英语言语幽默为对象,对其特征及其产生原因进行分析,并着重从关 联理论的角度,结合幽默理论之一的乖讹论来探讨英语言语幽默问题。随着语言学在理论上的迅速发展和突破,尤其

2、是语用学的日趋成熟,他们 给言语幽默这一特殊语言现象的研究提供了更新的角度和更广的视野。因此 有越来越多的国内外学者从语用学的角度对幽默进行研究。其中Sperber& Wilson著的关联:交际与认知一书中所提出的关联理论给语用学带来了 巨大影响,也为言语幽默的研究提供了新的认识工具。Sperber&Wilson认为人类的交际行为实际上是一种认知活动。并把这种交 际活动看成是一个涉及信息意图和交际意图的明示一推理过程,而每个明示 交际行为不仅传达了说话者的新信息,还自动传递了说话者在最佳关联下的 假设。因此以关联原则为依据,听话者可以通过对说话者的这一明示行为所 传达的新信息及其假设的分析,以

3、及不断调整的认知语境,找出话语中的最 佳关联从而达到理解说话者的真正交际意图。基于这样的理论,本文对言语 幽默的研究也是通过他们进行的,即说话者通过明示行为传递具有最佳关联 信息的幽默言语。由于说话者为了达到幽默效果,他通常会打破常规使用间 接的,关联性小的信息来传递他的交际意图;而对于在寻找幽默话语最佳关 联的过程中所出现的不和谐,听话者以关联原则为依据,通过付出额外的努 力最终消解了不和谐,同时也获得一种除了说话者交际意图之外的特殊的语从关联理论角度分析英语言语幽默境效果,也就是人们所说的一种意想不到的幽默感受。本文从Sperber&Wilson提出的关联理论的角度出发,运用关联理论的基

4、本观点,对大量的英语幽默进行探讨。并从幽默的产生与理解两大方面入手, 分析幽默的产生过程以及如何理解言语幽默。通过这些分析本文认为语境为 英语幽默的产生和理解提供重要的关联信息,而说话者在幽默话语中所起的 主导作用为幽默的产生提供可能,听话者的理解以及所付出的努力实现了幽 默话语的完成。在这个过程中,关联性贯穿始终,说话者在明示的过程中提 供隐含的关联信息,听话者在关联原则的指导下进行推理并付出额外努力从 而得到关联信息并获得幽默感受。总之,关联理论结合了语用学和认知理论 对言语幽默有很强的解释力,使得人们对幽默的研究从语用学的角度扩展到 了认知学领域。因此借助关联理论对幽默的研究,读者便对英

5、语言语幽默有 了一个更深刻也更全面的理解。关键词:言语幽默;关联理论;产生;理解AbstractHumor is everywhere in the daily life.It not only brings people laugh,but also reduces pressure,relaxes intensive atmosphere,and helps people avoid embarrassing situation.Meanwhile humor can also reflect peopleS attitude towards life and shows the char

6、m of human beingslanguage and their wisdom. Because of those special characteristics of humor,people have long before put their attention to the humor research.The present thesis will focus on the verbal humor inEnglish from its definition and classification.Several factors that give rise to the ver

7、bal humor are also put forward.Combining the incongruity theory, the keystone of this thesis falls on the analysis of verbal humor from the perspective ofRelevance Theory.With the rapid development of theories on language research,especially the progress of pragmatics.,these theories provided a bran

8、dnew and wide horizon to humor research.Among those theories,Relevance Theory raised by Sperher& Wilson in their book:Relevance:Communication and Cognition provides a new tool to the study of humor.Sperber&1Wilson believe that communication is a虹nd of cognitive activity, and view such cognitive acti

9、vity as an ostensiveinferential process which involves informative iutemion and communicative intention.They hold that every ostensive behavior automatically conveys some assumptions which abide by the optimal relevance.And based on the principle of relevance,hearer can find out the optimal relevanc

10、e between those assumptions and cognitive environment.By inferring speakerS utterance,hearer will obtain the speakerS real intention.Therefore,theAn Analysis ofVerbal Humor in English from the Perspective ofRelevance Theorystudy of verbal humor carl also fall on such discipline.That is to say,throug

11、h ostensive behavior,speaker of humor conveys his utterance wim optimal relevance. The speakerusually uses indirect and less relevant expression to convey his communicative intention,for he aims to make humorous effect.While under the guidance of relevance principle,hearer makes extra effort to find

12、 out the congruous resolution of incongruity in the utterance and finally gets what the speaker means.And at the same time the hearer gains a special contextual effect which is called the unexpectedhumorous effect.This thesis mainly goes to analyze the production and comprehension of humor from the

13、perspective of Relevance Theory.This analysis is based on an abundance of humor examples.By such thorough analysis,it is found that cognitive environment provides all the important information for the humor production and comprehension.The priority of speaker makes the production of humor possible,

14、and the processing effort of hearer makes up the final comprehension of verbal humor.In this process,relevance functions all the time both in the speakerS ostensive behavior and hearerS inferential process.To sum up,Relevance Theory which combines pragmatics and cognitive theory provides a powerful

15、tool to utterance understanding.Such advantage of Relevance Theory is well explicated in the analysis of verbal humor.Thus the method of analysis within the framework of Relevance Theory expands the research on humor from the perspective of pragmatics to the field of cognitive theory.Therefore,by su

16、ch analysis from the perspective ofRelevance Theory,readers will have a deep and thorough understanding of verbal humor in English.Key words:verbal humor;relevance theory;production;comprehension西南财经大学学位论文原创性及知识产权声明本人郑重声明:所呈交的学位论文,是本人在导师的指导下,独立进行 研究工作所取得的成果。除文中已经注明引用的内容外,本论文不含任何其 他个人或集体已经发表或撰写过的作品成果

17、。对本文的研究做出重要贡献的 个人和集体,均已在文中以明确方式标明。因本学位论文引起的法律结果完 全由本人承担。本学位论文成果归西南财经大学所有。特此声明学位申请人:年 月 日Introduction Motivation of the StudyIntroductionWith thedevelopment of current society,people are facing more and more pressure in their daily life.So a lot of mental and physical illnesses have become familiar t

18、o many people.And humor as a kind of measure to release thosepressures is thus attracting more and more peopleS attention,for humor Can helpthem reduce tension and make them relax,which Can be good tohumanS health. Besides,humor Call also be used as a form of entertainment since it makes people feel

19、 happy,lets them laugh and creates comfortable situation for people to communicate.And to some extent,humor reflects wisdom and creativity of human beings which have something philosophical.And more than that,humor call be taken as a powerful weapon to fight against hardship,misfortune and embarrass

20、ing situation.It Can also help peoplefacilitate their relationships with others and can encourage them to take optimistic attitude towards life.Therefore,as for most of people,they take the sense of humor as a kind of necessary ability ofhuman beings in their daily life.In short,humor plays a signif

21、icant role in the daily life.If peoplewant to obtain the sense of humor and figure out why humor can bring them those benefits,what its nature is and how it affects the life,it is necessary for them to do some research about humor.Purpose and SignificanceThis thesis attempts toexplorethe understandi

22、ng of humor within the framework of Relevance Theory(thereinafter RT.And in this thesis,the author mainly focuses on the English verbal humor to analyze its production andAn Analysis ofVerbal Humor in English from the Perspective ofRelevance Theoryinterpretation in the hope that people can get a bet

23、ter understanding of humor mechanism.At the same time,by such analysis,it could benefit those English learners as well.And in the end,the author hopes that this study ofhumor will be helpful to the research ofhumor in the future.Moreover,since Cooperative Principle(CPwas brought forward by Grice, H.

24、P,it has exhibited its.powerful explanatory force in the language research.But later,Relevance Theory by Sperber and Wilson who develop the theme of CP has become an even more popular theory in the practice.And the present thesis provides a specific way to show readers how this theory works in thehu

25、mor analysis.Through the study,thisthesis combines the theory and practice together and finally deepens readersunderstanding of both Relevance Theory and humor, which paves the way for the further study on the relative research.General Introduction to Research of HumorIn fact,humor as a linguistic p

26、henomenon has already attracted many scholarsattention in their study for a long time.In the old time,humor which bears distinctive features of its own had become the issue of philosophers, physiologists,psychologists,sociologists,historians and SO on.They tried their best to analyze humor from diff

27、erent perspectives leaving US abundance of study about humor.However,those studies mainly focus on the definition of humor,few talk about its production and interpretation.It Was not until the late 1970s that a more comprehensive study on humor from the perspective of linguistics came into being.A l

28、ot of people analyzed humor on the base of lexics,semantics,syntax,and rhetoric.And also from that time on,the development of pragmatics accelerates the study of humor.Many scholars al e now conducting humor researches under the guidance of Deixis, Cooperative Principle(CP,Polite Principle(PP,Presup

29、position,Speech Act Theory,Relevance Theory(RTand SO on.But most of them usually explain the2Introduction understanding ofhumor in a very shallow way.However,humor is a kind of complicated phenomenon,and how Can peopleget an entirecomprehension of humor?According to the current popular theory ofprag

30、matics-RT,the author adopts that theory and gives her research method upon humor.She aims to use RT toexplicate howthe theory works in the allaround explanation of humor.Methodology of the StudyThe present thesis adopts ease studies to interpret the English verbal humor. And the arguments are based

31、on the application analysis of verbal humor.Main ideas of Relevance Theory are used tO conduct the comprehensive study of verbal humor.And meanwhile,the examples used in this thesis are collected from relevant books on humor,RT.Some of them are chosen from articles of other researchers.Contents of t

32、his ThesisThis thesis is composed of five major parts.They are introduction,literature review,humor study,relevancetheoretic account of verbal humor and conclusion respectively.Introduction includes motivation of the study,purpose and significance of this thesis,general introduction to research of h

33、umor,methodology of the study and the contents of this thesis.It aims to help readers of this thesis to gain a general Impresslon.Chapter One is the literature review which makes a brief introduction to Relevance Theory from several parts:background of the theory,introduction to Relevance Theory,and

34、 basic ideas of Relevance Theory.It provides the key theory for the latter analysis.Chapter Two is the study of humor whichgives a comprehensive elaborationof humor from its definition,classification,feature to its relative theories.And in 3An Analysis ofVerbal Humor in English from the Perspective

35、ofRelevance Theorythe latter part of this chapter,several factors giving rise to verbal humor arepresented.And this chapter helps readers to explore verbal humor in a verysystematic way.Chapter Three is devoted to the relevancetheoretic account of verbal humor. First,it presents cognitive context ac

36、count of verbalhumor.Second,it probes into Relevance Theory and the production of verbal humor.Then it endeavors to analyzeRelevance Theory and the comprehension of verbal humor.This chapter is the main body of thisthesis.And it conducts the main account of verbal humor within the framework of Relev

37、ance Theory in detail.Conclusion summarizes the major ideas of this thesis and meanwhile comes to the limitations of the study.Suggestions for further research are also pointed out.4Chapter One Literature ReviewChapter One Literature Review1.1Background of the TheoryEverything new can not emerge ove

38、rnight.It must have some sources and reasons,sodoes the Relevance Theory.As for the language research,from Aristotle to the outcome of Semiotics,most of the eommunicative theories are based on the Code Model.It is widely thought that communication is a process of encodingand decoding.That is,the spe

39、aker encodes the thought in the form of language and the hearer gets what speaker means by decoding his language. However,communication is not so simple.Many philosophers,linguists, psychologists,anthropologists and S0on all put their efforts to explore the true nature of communication from differen

40、t perspectives and have raised different optmons.American philosopher H.P.Grice holds that people in the communication not only say something explicitly,but alsomean something implicitly.He put forward Cooperative Principle(CPin the William James lecture at Harvard in 1967and latter developed this p

41、rinciple to Conversational Implicature to explain what is said and what is implied in the communication.After the proposing of CP,scholars in western linguistics field have taken great interest in the study of Conversational lmplicature.And this study has experienced a rather long developing process

42、 from classical theory to neoGricean conversational implicature.Those scholars who devoted to that study include Leech,Gazdar,Horn,and Levinson.Each of them developed GriceS theories from different perspectives.John LangshawAustin 5An Analysis ofYerbal Humor in English from the Perspective of Releva

43、nce Theoryraises Speech Act Theory.He explains that when people utter,they are not simply stating something,but are performing a specific action.Searle amends AustinS theory and develops Indirect Speech Act to explain the model of inference in detail.Among those scholars,French scholar Sperber and E

44、nglish scholar Wilson absorb the core of those theories.In particular,they develop Grices Conversational Implicature and put forward a rather influent theory-Relevance Theory in their book Relevance:Communication and Cognition.In their theory, Sperberand Wilson also adopt J.A.FodorS cognitive theory

45、.In the book of the Modularity ofMind(1983,Fodor expounds that humanS brain is constituted of a central system and modules.Those modules have different functions which take the different stimulus from the outside.And that stimulus is then transferred to the central system to become the mental repres

46、entation and is settled by the central system.Combining the cognitive theory,Relevance Theory which is also called cognitive pragmatics by the West scholars brings some freshness to the language research.And after its publication,RT has great impact upon many areas such as linguistics,literature,psy

47、chology.and philosophy.In the following part,a detailed introduction to Relevance Theory will be put forward.1.2Introduction to Relevance TheoryAs for the Relevance Theory,it absorbs the research achievement of cognitivescience,psychology and behavioral science.And it alsoattempts toanswer bothphilo

48、sophical questions about the nature of communication and psychological questions about how the interpretation is processed in the hearerS mind.This theory combines the study of pragmatics with the study of cognition.It is regarded as breakthrough of GriceS theory about Conversational lmplicature.Sin

49、ce its appearance,RT has attracted more and more attention and is applied in many 6Chapter One Literature Reviewlinguistic research areas.Generally speaking,Relevance Theory is neither rule-based nor maxim.based, but it is based on a few ideas.(He Ziran,1997:123First,that every utterance has a varie

50、ty of possible interpretations(that is,different combination of explicit content,context,and implicature,are compatible with the information that is linguistically encoded.Second,that not all these interpretations are equally accessible to the hearer on any given occasion.Third,that the hearers are

51、equipped with a single,very general criterion for evaluating interpretations as they occur to them.Forth,that this criterion is powerful enough to exclude all but at most a single possible interpretation as that the hearer is entitled to弱sume that the first interpretation that meets the criterion is

52、 the only one.(Neil Smith&Deidre Wilson.1992It is widely known that communication is one of the most common social phenomena.And for most of the time,people go Oil their communication by language.So language acts as a vehicle to transfer the information,ideas,attitudes and opinions in the communicat

53、ion.Relevance theory assumes that the essence of such communicative activity is cognitive activity.And RT is an inferential theory of communication.It mainly aims to explain how the audience infers the speakerS intended meaning in his language.Verbal humor as a kind of communication needs addresseeS

54、 cognition to recognize humorous effect.Thus RT provides possibilities to interpret humorous phenomenon.Andbesides,Sperberand Wilson think that pragmatic interpretation must be established on the basis of the relationship with other things(Sperber and Wilson, 1986:172173.That is to say,humanS cognit

55、ion is relevanceoriented and aRention is paid only to the information that seems relevant to human beings.Both authors believe that tO understand the meaning carried by the language,people 7An Analysis ofVerbal Humor in English from the Perspective ofRelevance Theoryhave to find out the relevant asp

56、ects between the language and the information carried by the language.And such cognitive process can really conduct peopleSright interpretation.Sperber and WilsonS theory also regards communication as apurposefuland intended activity.SpeakerS intension can be understood because both speaker and hear

57、er have mutual knowledge of the cognitive environment;that is to say,whether the communication is successful or not relies on if both participants of communication manifest or mutually manifest their cognitive environment.(He Zhaoxiong,2000:181In order to obtain a successful communication,and accord

58、ing to Sperber and WilsonS relevance idea,the speakerand the hearer must use what Sperber and Wilson call theprinciple ofRelevance. In their shared cognitive environment,the speaker tries his best to manifest what he intends to say,and the hearer makes effort by combining those information he has re

59、ceived with his cognitive knowledge to interpreter what the speaker expresses.By this way,both speakerand hearer achieve a successful communication.If the speaker onpurpose does not manifest what he says directly, the hearer would wrongly match the information he receives、ritll irrelevant cognitive knowledge specifically.O