Pragmatic Analysis of English Verbal Humor

Paper Keywords Verbal Humor Pragmatic Presupposition Speech Act Theory Relevance Theory Abstract The key to the effect of verbal humor lies in breaking

Pragmatic Analysis of English Verbal Humor

Paper Keywords Verbal Humor Pragmatic Presupposition Speech Act Theory Relevance Theory Abstract The key to the effect of verbal humor lies in breaking through the conventional usage of language, which largely depends on the abnormal use of pragmatic factors such as deixis, pragmatic presupposition, speech act, relevance, quality standard, quantity standard, relationship standard and mode standard. ? "The so-called linguistic humor is the humor created through the variation and application of various elements of language." "The successful dynamic expression of linguistic humor in discourse stems from its unconventional language structure, that is, under the restriction of dialectical logic, it breaks through the general laws of linguistics, philology, lexicology, grammar and formal logic and uses language materials in different ways, thus producing words that cannot be understood literally. The key to the effectiveness of verbal humor is to break through the conventional usage of language. It is not enough to analyze verbal humor only from the perspective of rhetoric. This paper attempts to analyze English verbal humor from deixis, pragmatic presupposition, speech act theory, conversational implicature theory and relevance theory with the help of pragmatic theory. ? 1. Deixis and English verbal humor? Deixis includes personal pronouns, demonstrative pronouns and demonstrative adverbs. Their indicating objects should determine the meaning of words according to the time and place of use, the identities of speakers and listeners, and the objects and events in actual situations. Deixis in discourse is the key to understanding discourse. If deixis is not clear, discourse will be puzzling or even misleading. In verbal communication, the speaker must change the deixis appropriately according to the context. When the deixis should be changed, but the speaker fails to change it for some reason, it often leads to a sense of humor because of violating the convention. For example:? A boy wants a few more days off. He called? Where to? That? Teacher? And then what? Are you online? Answer? Voice, he wants to sound like his father:? " I regret to tell you that Smith is ill in bed and can't go back to school for three or four days. " ? " "Oh," said the teacher, "I'm sorry to hear that; Who's talking? " ? " My father, sir. " ? In this humorous story, the little boy called the teacher for leave in the name of his father, but when the teacher asked who was calling, he did not change the personal demonstrative pronoun in time and still answered "my father", which produced a humorous effect, and the little boy's strategy was also seen through because of this instruction error. ? It can be seen that although there are some similarities between grammatical pronouns and pragmatic deixis, pragmatic deixis is based on the speaker, and the listener should make corresponding changes when understanding the text. ? Second, pragmatic presupposition and English humor? Presupposition is the premise of using sentences. When one sentence presupposes another, the second sentence must be true, whether the first sentence is true or not. For example, the premise that he will stop beating his wife is that he has beaten his wife before. "Contextual presupposition is pragmatic presupposition" refers to the conditions that must be met to effectively implement an illocutionary act through one sentence. Pragmatic presupposition has two characteristics: one is appropriateness, that is, presupposition should be closely combined with context, and presupposition is the premise of speech act; The second is * * * intellectuality, that is to say, pragmatic presupposition should be information that both speakers know. The speaker expresses himself through words, and I hear that people can understand. However, the loss of intellectuality when setting first will lead to communication failure and sometimes humor. For example:? One day, Brown was walking in the street with his wife and his big family. A policeman grabbed him by the shoulder and stopped him. ? "Wait," protested Brown. "What did I do? " ? " Me? Sure, okay? No idea? What do you have? "OK," replied the policeman, "but I want to know why people follow you. " ? In this humor, the premise for the police to arrest Mr. Brown is that as a policeman, he should ask the bad guys; Mr. Brown was chased by a group of people again. He must be a bad guy. But this presupposition lacks intellectuality. Mr. Brown didn't know that the police regarded himself as a bad person, so this farce happened. ? Speech Act Theory and English Verbal Humor? Speech act theory was first put forward by the British philosopher Austin, who first divided sentences into two categories: narrative sentences and performative sentences. A narrative sentence refers to a sentence that describes something, and a performance sentence refers to a sentence that carries out some kind of behavior. Later, he thought that his division was unscientific, and any speech act could include three kinds of acts: 1 speech act, that is, the act of saying something meaningful; Act, that is, the act of explaining the speaker's intention; Effective behavior, that is, the effect after speaking. It's cold here. This sentence needs to be said; The intention expressed is that the listener needs to take warm measures; As a result, the window was closed. ? Searle revised and developed Austin's theory. Searle believes that speaking language is to complete a series of language activities, such as statements, commands, questions and so on. Could you pass the salt, for example? Not to ask the listener whether he has the ability to pass salt, but to ask the listener the ability to pass salt. He called the above speech acts indirect speech acts, that is, an act is implemented indirectly through words, so the speaker's discourse meaning is often inconsistent with the sentence meaning. Humor is sometimes caused by misunderstanding or incomprehension of speech acts. For example:? One morning, a London boy was sitting on the bus to school. He kept sniffing around. Like this? Answer? Noise? With what? His? Nose? That? That? The others on the bus began to shake their heads. ? Finally, an old man sitting next to him said, "little boy, do you have a handkerchief?" " ? " Yes, I do? Answer? Clean? Handkerchiefs? Are you online? "My pocket," said the boy, "but I can't give it to you. Mom? Say what? It? Is it? Rude? Where to? Ask? Is anyone here? For what? Handkerchiefs. You must own and use your own. " ? The reason why this story makes people laugh is that the little boy misunderstood the words and actions of the old man. When the old man asked the little boy if he had a handkerchief, the little boy mistakenly thought that the old man wanted to borrow it from him. The speech act of the old man should be to let the little boy wipe his nose with a handkerchief, instead of sucking his nose to make a sound. Its effective behavior should be that the little boy stops sucking his nose. But because boys misunderstand behavior, there is no effective behavior. ? Fourth, the theory of conversational implicature and English verbal humor? Grice believes that people's normal language communication is not a series of unrelated languages, and speakers cooperate with each other. Only by assuming that the speaker abides by a principle and strives to achieve the goal of the dialogue can the meaning of the dialogue be guided. He called this principle the principle that people abide by cooperation. The principle of cooperation is divided into four standards: quality standard, quantity standard, relationship standard and mode standard. ? Conversational meaning can come from two aspects: observing and violating principles and norms, and correspondingly there are two conversational meanings: general conversational meaning and special conversational meaning. Humor is often a deliberate violation of principles. 1. Violation of quality standards and English humor? Flying car; Of course, we know that the driver was stopped by the police because he was driving too fast, but the police with a sense of humor said that the driver was driving too slowly. He deliberately violated the quality standards and said something inconsistent with the incident, which not only showed that the driver was driving too fast, but also eased the tense atmosphere. ? 2. Violation of quantitative norms and English verbal humor? Menstruation: How did Jimmy do in the history exam? Good, but it's not his fault. Why did they ask him about what happened before the poor boy was born? As long as my mother answered "I didn't do well in the exam", she deliberately violated the quantitative standard and said superfluous words, which not only made the matter less serious, but also easily shirked the responsibility for Jamie. ? 3. Violation of relational norms and English humor? Customer: Waiter, there is a fly in the soup. ? Attendant: OK, I'll get you a fork. ? The waiter is very witty and humorous. Instead of being at a loss or going to the manager on duty as people thought, he answered a very irrelevant sentence: "I'll get a fork"-a fork can neither be used to fork flies nor drink soup, and a situation that might affect hotel business and other customers' appetite was reversed by this irrelevant sentence. It is conceivable that the customer's mood will be improved and things will be solved satisfactorily. ? 4. Violation of stylistic standards and English verbal humor? One? Day? Answer? Pupils? Went? Where to? Do you see it? His? Teacher? Will you punish a boy for something he didn't do? " ? The teacher said, "No, Tommy. I would never punish a boy for something he didn't do. But why do you ask? " ? The boy replied, "I asked because I didn't do my homework." " ? Modal principle requires concise and orderly speech. However, the students deliberately came out of order. First, they asked the teacher if they would punish the students for what they didn't do, and then they said that they didn't do their homework. Moreover, it is not concise, instead of directly asking the teacher, "I didn't do my homework, will you punish me?" "However, his deliberate violation of etiquette norms can bring good results. Even a strict teacher will not punish his students when he hears such questions. ? Relevance Theory and English Verbal Humor? Sperber and others believe that "there is only one relevance principle in language communication, that is, the discourse itself has the characteristics of relevance." If one sentence P and another sentence Q, together with background knowledge, can produce new information that cannot be produced by adding background knowledge alone, then P and Q are related. "The principle of relevance does not care whether it is observed or not", but only the degree of relevance. We usually think that the speaker and the listener adopt the maximum relevance criterion. ? The smooth development of a communicative activity is based on the background knowledge of both parties, that is, "the basis of language communication is the cognitive environment of both parties." With this background knowledge or cognitive environment, the speaker may choose the appropriate speech form for the listener, and the listener can understand the speaker's speech behavior. This background knowledge includes people's impressions of the world, all kinds of old information and the assumptions arising from it. Due to different cognitive environments, people have different understandings of the same speech act. For example:? Bessie is a little girl. She is only five years old. She doesn't go to school. Of course, she doesn't know how to read and write. But what about her sister Mary? Is it? A schoolgirl. She is ten years old. ? One day, Mary saw her little sister sitting at the table with a pen in her hand and a big piece of paper in front of her. ? What are you doing, Bessie? She said. ? "Me? Writing? Answer? Letter? Where to? Mine? Friends? Katie. " Seth Bessie. ? "But how can you?" Her sister said, "You can't write." ? "Well," said? Bessie, "it doesn't matter, how? Because Katie doesn't know how to read. " ? This kind of humor is based on two people's different cognitive environments. My sister went to school and thought that writing letters must be able to understand the contents of the letter, but my sister didn't go to school. She thinks her friend can't read, so it doesn't matter what she writes.