Abstract

The Cooperative Principle and its four maxims are widely believed by linguists to be essential in the implementation of conversations. However, the Cooperative Principle is also frequently violated during the process of conversations. As one of the verbal humor carriers, sitcom has become more and more popular with the globalization of information dissemination. American sitcom How I met Your Mother originally ran on CBS from 2005 and turned out a big success which, to some degree, is owed to the violation of the Cooperative Principle that helps portray humorous characters and brings about enormous comic effects in this sitcom.
In this paper, the author attempts to analyze the verbal humor of How I met Your Mother from season 1 to season 4 from the violation of four maxims of the Cooperative Principle. It aims at enriching the means of humor in our daily communication and further enhancing communicative skills and art of conversation. Chapter one introduces American sitcoms and How I met Your Mother; chapter two, based on the definition of the Cooperative Principle and its four maxims, focuses on humor produced by violating the Cooperative Principle; chapter three analyzes humorous dialogues in How I met Your Mother. The analysis of humor due to violation of the Cooperative Principle is conducted from four maxims, namely maxim of quantity, maxim of quality, maxim of relation, maxim of manner. Finally, the paper concludes that verbal humor generated by the violation of the Cooperative Principle does add much glamour to the daily communication.

Key words: verbal humor; the Cooperative Principle; violation; How I met Your Mother

摘  要

语言学家认为合作原则及其四大准则对会话的实现是非常重要的。然而，在人们会话的过程中，违反合作原则的例子却十分常见。作为言语幽默的载体之一，情景喜剧随着信息传播的全球化大获成功。美国情景喜剧《老爸老妈的浪漫史》于2005年在CBS电视网首播并大获成功，这在一定程度上应该归因于剧中大量对话对合作原则的违反，这有助于塑造幽默的人物并产生了巨大的喜剧效果。
在本篇论文中，作者希望从对合作原则中四大准则的违反，分析《老爸老妈浪漫史》前四季中的言语幽默，旨在丰富日常交际中幽默方式的使用，从而提高交际能力和会话艺术。论文第一部分介绍美国情景喜剧及《老爸老妈浪漫史》；第二部分，基于合作原则的定义及其四大准则，分析违反合作原则产生的幽默效果；第三部分，分别从合作原则各个准则（即：数量准则、质量准则、关系准则、方式准则）的违反对剧中幽默对白进行实例分析。最后，论文得出结论：由于违反合作原则而产生的言语幽默的确能为人们的日常交流增光添彩。

关键词：言语幽默；合作原则；违反；《老爸老妈浪漫史》