格莱斯合作原则理论指导下的《生活大爆炸》言语幽默研究英语论文.doc

本科生毕业论文（设计）册

学院 XXX学院
专业 英语教育
班级 XXXX级英语教育X班
学生 XXX
指导教师 XX

XXXX大学本科毕业论文（设计）任务书
编 号：
论文（设计）题目：格莱斯合作原则理论指导下的《生活大爆炸》言语幽默研究 学院： XXX学院 专业： 英语教育 班级： XXX级英语教X班
学生姓名： XXX 学号： XXXX 指导教师： XX职称：副教授_
论文（设计）研究目标及主要任务
本论文的研究目标是探讨《生活大爆炸》中，违背合作原则产生的幽默。其主要任务是通过分析这些幽默产生的原因帮助观众更好的理解幽默并培养幽默感。
2、论文（设计）的主要内容
本论文分为四章，第一章介绍进行该研究的原因、合作原则和《生活大爆炸》，第二章文献综述，第三章对《生活大爆炸》中违背合作原则产生的幽默案例。最后一章是对本论文的总结。
3、论文（设计）的基础条件及研究路线
本论文的基础条件是不同的学者对《生活大爆炸》中产生的幽默从不同角度进行研究。
研究路线是对《生活大爆炸》中违背合作原则产生的幽默的目的进行阐述，并将其分别应用在日常生活中和之后幽默情景剧的台词设计中。
4、主要参考文献
Attardo, Salvatore. 1994. Linguistic Theories of Humor.
New York : Mouton de Gruyter.
Chiaro , Delia. 1992. The language of Jokes: Analyzing Verbal Play
London and New York: Routledge.
Grice, H. P. 1975. Logic and Conversation. New York: Academic Press.
何兆熊，1989，《语用学概要》，上海：上海外语教育出版社。
胡壮麟，2006，《语言学教程》，北京：北京大学出版社。
5、计划进度

阶段
起止日期
1
确定初步论文题目
3月16日前
2
与导师见面，确定大致范围，填开题报告和任务书，导师签字
3月16日-3月23日
3
提交论文提纲
3月23日-3月30日
4
交初稿和文献综述
3月30日-4月20日
5
交终稿和评议书
5月8日前
指 导 教师： XX 年 月 日
教研室主任： 年 月
注：一式三份，学院（系）、指导教师、学生各一份

XXXX大学本科生毕业论文（设计）开题报告书
XXX 学院 英语教育 专业 XXX 届
学生
姓名
XXX
论文（设计）题目
格莱斯合作原则理论指导下的《生活大爆炸》言语幽默研究
指导
教师
XX
专业
职称
XXX
所属教研室
英语基础教研室
研究方向
语言学

课题论证：从违背格莱斯合作原则等方面论证违背合作原则在《生活大爆炸》中产生的幽默及其应用。

方案设计：第一章介绍研究该论题的原因、合作原则和《生活大爆炸》，
第二章文献综述，
第三章对《生活大爆炸》中违背合作原则产生的幽默进行个例研究，
第四章对本论文进行总结。

进度计划：3月16日前确定初步论文题目
3月23日前写开题报告、任务书
3月30日前提交论文提纲
4月20日前提交初稿和文献综述
5月8日前交终稿和评议书
指导教师意见：

指导教师签名： 年 月 日
教研室意见：

教研室主任签名： 年 月 日
XXXX大学本科生毕业论文（设计）文献综述
Literature Review
The notion “context” has a long history. Different linguists have different understandings about it. Context only refers to the neighboring sounds, words, or phrases in Saussure’s modern linguistics. In his 1923 The problem of meaning in primitive languages, Malinowski first used the notion “language context”. In his opinion, language is a mode of action other than a symbol of thought. The function of language is to organize human’s common action. Malinowski argues that the utterances itself becomes only intelligible when it is placed within its context of situation. According to him, there is no way to categorize the meaning of utterances or the basis of internal considerations of language alone, and the meaning of its functions in the particular situation, with reference to the given culture (Hu zhuanglin, 1988:35). There is no doubt that the meaning of language is situation and culture. However, it also resides in the relation to the linguistic context. Linguistic context here refers to the internal consideration of language. Linguistic context cannot entirely take the place of physical and cultural contexts, but it often helps in understanding the particular meaning of the words, phrases etc. Utterances are also never detached from the linguistic context.
Based on these theories, Firth forms and develops his own context theory. Firth believes that context has different levels and that the “sound context” is the most fundamental one in the context system and there is no lower contextual level. Firth denies that the meaning of a language comes from the language itself. On the contrary, he thinks that “each word when used in a new context is a new word” (Firth, 1957:190). Firth views that a context of situation for linguistic work brings into a relation of the following categories: A. the relevant features of participant: persons, personalities. (i) the verbal action of the participants; (ii) the non-verbal action of the participants; B. the relevant objects; C. the effect of the verbal action. He claims that the meaning of the language should be studied through a hierarchy of contexts in the sense that meaning may be defined as the relationship between an element of any level and its context on that level: (i) the relationship of each phoneme to its phonetic context; (ii) the relationship of each lexical item to the others in the sentences; (iii) the morphological relations of each word; (iv) the sentence type of which the given sentence is an example; (v) the relationship of the sentence to its context of situation.
Both Malinowski and Firth regard language as a social process and a way of living. They both choose the actual language used in a certain context as their researching objects. Another linguist who has made great contributions to linguistics is Halliday. He receives and develops Firth’s two basic theories: “context of situation” and “system”. He thinks that language is a form of doing, not a form of knowing. In his opinion, language only differs in linguistic behavior potential and actual linguistic behavior. Language is the product of social process (Halliday, 1978: preface), and it is not a kind of knowledge or competence. Different with the traditional view that context acts only as a background, Halliday treats context as importantly as language. Context and language affect each other. Contexts determine the ways of language expressions whereas specific language expressions’ methods create certain contexts. Halliday’s another contribution to linguistics is the development of the notion “register”. By virtue of its use, various languages can be distinguished. Language varies as its function varies; it differs in different situations. According to him, register involves what features of context determine the choice of language in the particular context and it can be classified in terms of field of discourse, tenor of discourse, and mode of discourse. These three dimensions of classification collectively define the context of a discourse.
After Halliday, another great linguist needs to be mentioned is Hymes. He is an American socialist and classifies the context into eight components: setting; participant; ends; art characteristics; key; instrumentalities; norm of interaction and of interpretation; genres. He analyses context and language together other than treating them as related opposites. He believes that there is no language that can exist without context and no context that has nothing to do with language. His notion of context has some similarities with that of Halliday. It is concerned with what determines the appropriateness of the utterances in the particular context , just as himself says, “In expecting to find a scientific theory of such interaction of language and social setting, one in effect expects theory based where and when, for what purpose and with subject to what norms of interaction and of interpretation; as instances of what speech acts and genres of speaking? How do community and personal beliefs, values and practices impinge upon the use of language?” (Hymes, 1967:20-25)
Some linguists describe context as the knowledge held by language users and think that it is an important part of people’s communicative competence. Lyons is one of them. He lists six kinds of knowledge exemplify the components of context as the following: (i) each of the participants must know his role and status. (ii) the participants must know where they are in space and time. (iii) the participants must be able to recognize the situation in terms of its degree of formality. (iv) the participants must know what medium is appropriate to the situation. (v) the participants must know how to make their utterances appropriate to the subject matter. (vi) the participants must know how to make their utterances appropriate to the province or domain the situation belonging to (Lyons, 1997:574-585).
In this thesis, context is classified as intra-linguistic context and extra-linguistic context. Intra-linguistic context refers to the relevant texts based on which a certain expression can be used to express a certain meaning in communication. It contains words factors (words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs and styles) and sounds factors. Extra-linguistic context refers to the objective and subjective environment based on which a certain meaning gets its best expression in communication. It includes dominant factors, such as places, times, participants, natural environments, etc. and recessive factors, such as politics, economics, cultures, customs, conventions, etc. In other words, intra-linguistic context focuses on the factors within the language used in communication while extra-linguistic context concerns about the environment in which the communication takes place.

本科生毕业论文

题目:格莱斯合作原则理论指导下的《生活大爆炸》言语幽默研究

作者姓名： XXX
指导教师： XX
所在学院： XXX学院
专 业： 英语教育
班 级： XXX级X班

完成日期 2013 年 5 月 8 日

On Verbal Humor in Big Bang Theory under the Theoretical Framework of Grice’s Cooperative Principle

BY
XXX
Prof. XX , Tutor

A Thesis Submitted to Department of English
Language and Literature in Partial
Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree of B.A. in English
At XXXXUniversity

May 8th, 2013

27

Abstract

Humor，as the obbligato means of daily communication, has attracted much attention from academia for a long time. Life without humor is tedious and boring; People without humor are rigid and unpopular. Therefore, in order to have a better communication with others, people have to build the sense of humor. In this way, he/she can improve his/her personal charisma. Humor helps us live in harmony with others. It is unavoidable to have misunderstanding and tension with others during work and study. But humor can ease these problems quicker than angry words or quarrels. With it you can always keep on good terms with others.
This paper analyzes the humor generated by violation of Cooperative Principle, using Big Bang Theory as a corpus. The aim of this paper is to discover how the humor is generated by the violation of the Cooperative Principle. The author downloaded the video and subtitle firstly, based on the background laughter, analyzed the language humors in this TV series.
This paper tests and verifies the emerging of humor by violating the Cooperative Principle. The author hopes that this discovery can help more people understand and appreciate the humor in Big Bang Theory, at the same time their personal sense of humor can also be improved.

Key Words: Cooperative Principle Humor Big Bang Theory Violation

摘要

幽默是人类日常交际中不可缺少的方法手段，长期以来受到学术界的广泛关注。人们的生活离不开幽默。没有幽默的生活是单调乏味的，没有幽默感的人们是呆板、不受欢迎的。所以，为了能更好的跟别人交流沟通，人们需要培养幽默感。这样就可以更好的使用幽默，来增加个人魅力。幽默能帮助我们与他人和谐相处。在工作和学习中，与别人产生误会是不可避免的。但是，幽默比愤怒的言语或吵架更能缓解这类问题。有了幽默，你就能更好的与他们保持良好的关系。
本文以生活大爆炸为语料，对其中由于违反合作原则产生的幽默进行了分析，旨在通过这一研究来探讨剧中言语幽默的产生。作者先从网上下载视频和字幕，以观看过程中的背景笑声为依据，对剧中的言语幽默进行标注，进而对其进行分析。
本文验证了对合作原则违反会导致幽默产生。作者希望这一发现有助于人们更好的理解和欣赏《生活大爆炸》中的幽默，同时能提高自身的幽默感。

关键词： 合作原则 幽默 《生活大爆炸》 违反

Content
Abstract……………………...……………………………………………………….III
摘要………………………………………………………………………………..…IV
Content…………………………………………………………………………….….V
1． Introduction 1
1.1 Rationale of the Study 1
1.2 Cooperative Principle 2
1.3 Big Bang Theory 3
2． Literature Review 5
2.1 Definition of Humor 5
2.2 Classification of Humor 6
2.3 Previous Studies of Humor 7
3． Analysis of Verbal Humor in Big Bang Theory from
the Perspective of CP………………….………………………………...……………..…..9
3.1 Humor Generated by Flouting the Maxim of Quality 10
3.2 Humor Generated by Flouting the Maxim of Quantity 14
3.3 Humor Generated by Flouting the Maxim of Relation 18
3.4 Humor Generated by Flouting the Maxim of manner 21
4． Conclusion 25
Bibliography………………………………………………………………………….26

1． Introduction
“Humour or humor (see spelling differences) is the tendency of particular cognitive experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement”（Wikipedia）. It is a pervasive phenomenon, commonly embodied in newspapers, magazines, literatures, advertisements, TV series, films, etc. Not only does humor serve to close interpersonal relationships, but also to amuse the communication atmosphere. Nowadays in China, people, especially college students, are keen on Big Bang Theory. But most of them are confused about the humor in it. They can not understand the meaning of them. So it is necessary to do some research about humor in Big Bang Theory, which is helpful to both the better understanding of this series and the establishment of humor sense in our daily life. There are numerous humors in Big Bang Theory. In this paper, the author focus on the humors generated from the violation of Grice’s Cooperative Principle and its four sub-maxims. In our daily life, people technically have to obey the maxims of Cooperative Principle in order to make the conversation smoothly and continuously. But sometimes people usually violate the Cooperative Principle deliberately for some purposes, and this violation can generate humor.
1.1 Rationale of the Study
The reasons to analyze the verbal humor in American TV series Big Bang Theory from the perspective of Cooperative Principle are as follows:
Firstly, as a universal phenomenon, humor has drawn much attention of scholars from different aspects. The late 1970s witnesses a linguistic turn in humor research. At the same time, linguistics occupies an important position in the leading humor researches. With the development of pragmatic, there has been a considerable growth of pragmatic studies on humor. Grice’s Cooperative Principle is an important component of pragmatics. Ever since Cooperative Principle and its relative maxims were formulated by Grice in 1975, many researches have tried their best to illustrate how humors are created by the violation of Cooperative Principle. And Grice’s Cooperative Principle has been an effective framework;
Secondly, compared with canned jokes, verbal joking or spontaneous humor does not draw much attention. Humor utterances feature largely in situational comedy. Big Bang Theory, as one of most popular sitcoms, contains numerous humor lines, which providing sufficient data source for the present study;
Thirdly, as we all know, a sitcom can not be acted out without dialogues or conversations, because the dialogues and conversations are the natural embodiment of humor. Therefore, it is necessary to deal with the verbal humor within linguistic fields.
1.2 Cooperative Principle
As what has been mentioned above, the intended aspect of this paper is a case study of verbal humor in American sitcom Big Bang Theory from the perspective of Cooperative Principle. In social science generally and linguistic specifically, the Cooperative Principle describes how people interact with