An Analysis of Verbal Humor in This Is Us from the Perspective of Cooperative Principle_英语论文

摘要

幽默是一个热门的话题，在日常生活中扮演着重要的角色。根据《牛津英语词典》，幽默一词通常指的是娱乐性、戏剧性以及逗乐他人，使他人发笑的能力。幽默作为一种独特的人类交际方式，给人们的生活带来了许多笑声和色彩。言语幽默，就是用来表达幽默的一种重要而常见的方式，它给说话者和听者带来极大的乐趣。那么人们是如何实现言语幽默的呢？根据格赖斯的理论，有一个普遍的原则引导着人们的会话顺利进行，这就是合作原则，它包括数量准则、质量准则、关系准则和方式准则。在格赖斯的理论中，说话者对这些准则的违反，加上听者对说话者并没有真正丢弃合作原则的假设，产生了言外之意，幽默效果也往往随之产生。由此可见，对合作原则准则的违反，是实现言语幽默的一种有效方式。《我们这一天》是一部热门美国电视喜剧，曾获得第74届金球奖最佳影片奖和第7届影评人奖剧情类最佳影片奖提名，此外，《我们这一天》还被美国电影协会评为顶级电视节目。近来，《我们这一天》以其幽默的语言和动人的情节受到越来越多中国观众的欢迎。本文从格赖斯的合作原则出发，通过分析《我们这一天》中的许多幽默对白来探讨说话者在会话中因违反合作原则的四个准则产生的幽默效果，这将有助于中国观众更好地理解和掌握英语幽默,提高鉴赏和运用英语幽默的能力。

关键词：我们这一天  合作原则  言语幽默 

Abstract

Humor is a trending topic and it plays an important role in daily life. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, normally humor is the quality of being amusing or comic and the ability to amuse other people. As a unique human communication, humor brings a lot of laughter and colors to people’s lives. Verbal humor which brings great delight to hearers and speakers is an important and common way of expressing humor. So how do people realize verbal humor? According to Grice’s theory, there is a general principle guiding a conversation to go smoothly, which is called the Cooperative Principle (CP for short), including Quantity Maxim, Quality Maxim, Relation Maxim and Manner Maxim. In Grice’s theory, the speaker’s flouting of a maxim combined with the hearer’s assumption that the speaker has not really abandoned the cooperative principle leads to an implicature, and the humorous effect arises with the implicature. So the flouting of cooperative principle is regarded as an effective way to contribute the formation of verbal humor. This Is Us is a popular American comedy-drama television series which has been nominated for Best Television Series – Drama at the 74th Golden Globe Awards and Best Drama Series at the 7th Critics' Choice Awards, as well as being chosen as a Top Television Program by the American Film Institute. Recently, This Is Us enjoys a growing popularity among more and more Chinese people for its humorous language and touching plot. Based on Grice’s cooperative principle, this paper will explore the formation of verbal humor conveyed by flouting of four maxims by analyzing lots of dialogues in This Is Us, and this will help Chinese audience to better understand English humor and to improve their ability to use humor.

Key words: This Is Us  the Cooperative Principle  Verbal Humor   

Contents

Chapter One  Introduction.1

1.1  Purpose and Significance of This Thesis1

1.2  Structure of This Thesis2

1.3  Research Method of This Thesis.2

1.4  Introduction to This Is Us3

Chapter Two  Literature Review4

2.1  Introduction.4

2.2  Cooperative Principle4

2.3  Previous Studies Based on Cooperative Principle at Home5

2.4  Previous Studies Based on Cooperative Principle Abroad.5

2.5  Previous Studies on Verbal Humor at Home6

2.6  Previous Studies on Verbal Humor abroad.6

2.7  Previous Studies on This Is Us7

2.8  Summary.8

Chapter Three  Theoretical Framework9

3.1  Introduction.9

3.2  Cooperative Principle9

3.3  Four Maxims.9

3.3.1 Quantity Maxim10

3.3.2 Quality Maxim10

3.3.3 Relevance Maxim.10

3.3.4 Manner Maxim11

3.4  Flouting of Maxims.11

3.5  Conversational Implicature.12

Chapter Four  Analysis of Verbal Humor in This Is Us from the 

Perspective of Cooperative Principle13

4.1  Introduction.13

4.2  Verbal Humor Created by Flouting the Quantity Maxim.13

4.3  Verbal Humor Created by Flouting the Quality Maxim.14

4.4  Verbal Humor Created by Flouting the Relevance Maxim16

4.5  Verbal Humor Created by Flouting the Manner Maxim.16

Chapter Five  Conclusion18

5.1   Major Findings of This Thesis18

5.2   Limitations of This Thesis and Suggestion for Future Study.18

Bibliography

Acknowledgments