Abstract

With the development of globalization, a lot of foreign films and TV programs are introduced into our China. And Friends is one of them, and it has attracted a lot of attention of Chinese people. Vagueness especially pragmatic vagueness plays an irreplaceable role in verbal communication.
The thesis aims to take sitcom Friends as subject to analyze its oral English from the perspective of vague theory, especially from pragmatic vagueness. The thesis gives the definitions of vagueness and types, and definition and classification of pragmatic vagueness. Besides, the thesis analyzes the dialogues in Friends based on pragmatic vagueness in detail. Finally, the thesis points out the positive significance of the pragmatic vagueness in verbal communication.

Key Words: Friends  Vague  Pragmatic Vagueness   

摘 要

随着全球化趋势，许多的外国电影和电视节目被引进中国。《老友记》是其中之一，且吸引了很多中国人的注意。模糊尤其是语用模糊在日常交际中起着不可替代的作用。
本文旨在以《老友记》为研究对象从模糊理论尤其是语用模糊入手分析其中的口语。本文给出了模糊的定义和分类，语用模糊的定义和分类。 此外， 本文详细分析了《老友记》中对话中的语用模糊。最后，本文指出了模糊语在日常交际中的积极作用。

关键词：《老友记》 模糊  语用模糊

1 Introduction
With the development of globalization, a lot of foreign films and TV programs are introduced into our China. Friends is one of them, and it has attracted a lot of attention of Chinese people. Friends is a well-known American sitcom. It consists of ten seasons and it has originally been broadcast from 1994-2004. As one of the most popular TV series at that time, the show has been broadcast in more than one hundred countries and still continues to attract all over the world. It tells us different lives of six friends including Ross, Rachel, Monica, Chandler, Phoebe and Joey.
    Because of its popularity, in recent years, on this sitcom Friends, some researchers have studied it from different perspectives. Liu Yu makes a study of the humorous translation of the sitcom based on skopos theory. Cao Hua analyzes humor translation based on schema theory, and he points out some factors influencing the translator’s decision-making process in translating subtitles from the schematic perspective. Yin Yan uses Cooperative Principle and Relevance Theory to analyze humorous language in Friends.