英语影视剧幽默对白的语用分析【毕业作品】

英语

英语影视剧幽默对白的语用分析

A Pragmatic Analysis of Humorous Dialogue in English

Films

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摘要

幽默是对语言的一种有意识的积极运用，反映出幽默制造者的知识、修养、智慧以及交际技巧，颇有审美价值。作为交际中言语活动的结果和一种会话含义的体现，幽默离不开合作原则和认知语境，他们都是语用学关键概念之一，所以幽默可以从语言学那里找到理据。本文旨在从合作原则和认知语境两个角度分析幽默的语用理据。合作原则对人处于不理想状态时所说的不相关话语而引起的幽默具有解释力，而认知语境能够解释不同的心理机制引起的幽默。将二者互相配合解释幽默语言是语用学关注的新焦点。本文选取深受我国广大观众喜爱的美国情景喜剧中部分幽默言语事例，从合作原则和认知语境两个角度探讨言语幽默，比较各自对幽默言语的解释力以及不足，并将分析得出违反合作原则及分析认知语境相结合是分析英语幽默产生的重要源泉。本文对于人们笑声背后幽默系统如何运作进行了尝试性的论述，它可以增进我们对美国情景喜剧和日常会话幽默的理解和欣赏。

关键词：英文影视剧;语言幽默;合作原则;认知语境

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Abstract

Humor is one of the conscious positive application of language in communication. It

reflects the humor producer’s knowledge, cultivation, wisdom and communication techniques.

Humor, as the result of speech event and one kind of conversational implicature, is associated

with cooperative principle and cognitive context which are key notions in pragmatics. Such

pragmatic motivations, in perspective of cooperative principle and cognitive context, can be

found in some concrete humorous utterances. Cooperative Principle does a better job in

explaining verbal humor by speaking irrelevant utterance when the speakers are in bad moods,

while Cognitive Context is more effective in analyzing verbal humor for different psychology.

The combination of the two complements is a new focus on analyzing verbal humor in

pragmatic study. This thesis intends to analyze the examples of verbal humor in the American

sitcom with the help of pragmatic theories involving Cooperative Principle and Cognitive

Context. It finds that applying the Cooperative Principle and Cognitive Context is of the great

importance in English humor. Based on these analyses, the deep structure of English verbal

humor has been tentatively explored. The findings of this thesis can help the English learners

to comprehend and appreciate the verbal humor in English sitcoms as well as in daily

communication.

Key words: English films; verbal humor; Cooperative Principle; Cognitive Context

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Contents

Abstract in Chinese ········································································· i

Abstract in English ········································································ ii

Contents ··················································································· iii

1. Introduction ············································································· 1

2. The Linguistic Study of Verbal Humor ············································ 2

2.1 The Definition of Humor ·························································· 2

2.2 Verbal Humor & Non-verbal Humor ············································ 3

2.3 Verbal Humor Studies Abroad ···················································· 4

2.4 Verbal Humor Studies at Home ·················································· 4

3. Cooperative Principle & Cognitive Context ······································ 5

3.1 Cooperative Principle & Violation of the CP in Verbal Humor ············· 7

3.1.1Violation of Maxim of Quantity ········································· 7

3.1.2Violation of Maxim of Quality ·········································· 8

3.1.3Violation of Maxim of Relation ········································ 10

3.1.4Violation of Maxim of Manner ········································· 11

3.2 Cognitive Context & Verbal Humor ············································ 13

3.2.1The Definition of Context ················································ 6

3.2.2The Application of Cognitive Context in Verbal Humor ············· 6

4. Comparison of Cooperative Principle & Cognitive Context ················· 13

4.1 Limitations of CP on Analyzing Verbal Humor······························· 13

4.2 Limitations of Cognitive Context on Analyzing Verbal Humor ············ 14

5. Conclusion ··············································································· 17

Bibliography ··············································································· 18

Acknowledgements ······································································· 19

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1. Introduction

Humor is mankind’s greatest blessing as Aristotle once observed. It provides us with a totally

different access to please, to convince, to forgive, and to survive in the world we live in.

Humor is the tendency of particular cognitive experiences to provoke laughter and provide

amusement. The term derives from the humoral medicine of the ancient Greeks, which taught

that the balance of fluids in the human body, known as humorous, controls human health and

emotion. People of all ages, cultures, and even races will respond to humor naturally. The

majority of people have the experiences of savoring humor, i.e., to be amused or to laugh at

something interesting, thus they are considered to have a sense of humor. How humor is

produced is an eternal and attractive question to plenty of disciplines, such as psychology,

physiology and linguistics. Linguistic experts have been employing pragmatic theories and

concepts in analyzing the generation of language humor, which is connected with Grice’s

Cooperative Principle(CP), Leech’s Politeness Principle(PP),Austin’s Speech Act

Theory(SAT), and so on. Many Chinese linguistic experts such as Zhang Shujing(1998), Li

Lanping(2002), Yan Weihua(2002), Zhao Yingke(2006) talk about verbal humor from the

perspective of pragmatics, exploring the generation of humor or conversational humor via the

maxims of CP, Sperber & Wilson’s Relevance Theory (RT)is also employed. Fortunately, in

recent years, as advocated by Professor Hu Wenzhong, more and more attention has been paid

to teaching foreign language through films and TV plays. Because in this way, language

learners can have a better understanding of the conversational humor in a more vivid and

dynamic language context; meanwhile, they can cultivate their “communicative competence”

as well as “linguistic competence” with the help of extralinguistic means of communication,

such as the speaker’s and listener’s action, postures, expressions, and the distance between

them, etc (Hu Wenzhong,1989:5-7). Accordingly, with Cooperative Principle and Cognitive

Context as theoretical frameworks, this thesis attempts to reveal understanding of humorous

language by analyzing the instances of verbal humor in English films, and further, comparing

the two theories in terms of their power in verbal-humor interpretation and their limitations.

2. The Linguistic Study of Verbal Humor

Nowadays, humor is prevalent in our daily life, from our daily conversation to political

speeches, from literary works to commercial advertisements and television shows. It is

obvious for us to perceive the existence of humor, for it not only brings us delight and

amusement, but also provides us with an opportunity to savor the happiness of life. It is

common that we regard humor as something that can produce laughter. However, when asked

what humor is and how does it work, the majority may not have a clear understanding of its

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definition, let alone its operational mechanism.

2.1 The Definition of Humor

Humor has been the study of multi-disciplines, but a generally agreed definition of humor has

never been put forward. It goes without saying that the definition of humor ultimately depends

on the purpose for which it is used. So an exact and convincing definition of convincing

definition of humor seems not easy to define.

Etymologically, according to Attardo (1994), “humor” is derived from the Latin word for

“Liquid” or “fluid” and has much to do with the “theory of humors” of medieval medicine. As

Attardo (Attardo, 1994:103-104) points out, in the field of literary criticism, there is a need

for a fine-grained categorization, whereas linguistic has often accepted broader definitions,

arguing that whatever evokes language or is left to be funny is humor, e.g. that humor can be

deduced from its effect. Nevertheless, such language is not necessarily a precondition for

humor, and to put this in mind, Attardo considers the pragmatic definition of humor as a text

whose perlocutionary, e.g. intended, effect is language, to be a more fruitful approach. More

specifically, through centuries, humor is whatever intended to be funny, and it gradually lost

its original sense and came to refer to a specific mood or quality to understand, enjoy, and

express what makes people laugh, even if it might not always be perceived or interpreted

(Attardo, 1994:195-229).

Then a more comprehensive definition from the Webster’s Third New Collegiate

Dictionary renders humor as follows:

(a): that quality in a happening, an action, a situation or an expression of ideas

which appeals to a sense of the ludicrous or absurdly in congruous: comic or amusing

quality (b): the mental faculty of discovering, expressing, or appreciating ludicrous or

absurdly in congruous elements in ideas, situation, happenings, or acts (c): the act of

or effort at being humorous (Webster’s Third New Collegiate Dictionary: 1976;

1102).

The above definition has approached humor from a broader perspective. In most cases, it

is verbal that is discussed in linguistic study. Verbal humor, as its name indicated, is humor

related to language, or exactly speaking, it is humor created through the use of linguistic

elements.

Chinese scholar Lin Yutang, is the first one who translated “humor” as “you mo” into

Chinese in early 20th century, and he held the view that “humor is a popular art form to

express one’s viewpoint and even perceptions of the real world”. (胡范铸, 1987:7-8)

Although definitions might be different, we can still find something in common: humor

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is laugh causing and needs people’s deep thinking. Therefore, as far as the author is concerned,

humor is kind of advanced activities of human intelligence which can make people feel funny

and light-hearted. Thus, the author will apply this meaning to the analysis of humor in

American sitcom Friends.

2.2 Verbal Humor & Non-verbal Humor

Humor is an indispensable part in our daily life, generally, it can be divided into two main

parts: verbal humor and non-verbal humor. I would like to illustrate both of them respectively.

Verbal humor, one of the categories of humor, is related to linguistic symbols, rather than

pictures, expressions or actions. And it is not simply related to language, it is created through

language. What is more, verbal humor derived specifically from the manipulation or

exploitation of the convention of spoken language or pre-established verbal forms, such as

familiar phrases or song lyrics (Zhao Yingke, 2006:13-14).

Varying types of verbal humor are used liberally by comedy writers to spice their work,

such as pun, innuendo, malapropism, spoonerism and mixed metaphor. As verbal humor is an

important and pervasive phenomenon in our daily life, humor in language has been heatedly

discussed by scholars of linguistics. During 1980s, linguistic survey of humor gradually

aroused increasing interest, which makes remarkable contributions to humor research.

On the other hand, non-verbal humor mainly refers to the body language and the posture

which can convey the humorous information through the individual body and behavior. When

people refer to the non-verbal humor, a master of non-verbal humor will definitely appear in

our mind—Charlie Chaplin. The enormous entertainment he has brought us is the precious

treasure of the whole human history.

2.3 Verbal Humor Studies Abroad

The ultimate cause or motivate of humor has been the concern of over 200 theories from

different discipline (Holland, 1982:24), mainly psychology, philosophy， aesthetics and

linguistics. A commonly accepted classification divides traditional theories of humor into

three groups (Attardo, 1994: 47): superiority theory, release theory and incongruity theory.

Attardo (1994) labeled these three theories as “social”, “psychoanalytical”, and “cognitive”

respectively. Generally, they are called “three basic conventional humor theories”. On the

basis of these classic theories, many new accounts for humor keep emerging, especially from

linguistic approach.

With the development of modern linguistics, linguistic study of verbal humor began to

flourish in the late 20th century. Studies of humor in this field mainly focus on the semantic

aspects of humor, such as the semantic structure, the rhetoric devices, genres, ect, later with

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more attention to pragmatic aspects. Among these studies, Semantic-Script Theory of Humor

(SSTH), General Theory of Verbal Humor (GTVH) developed by Raskin and Attardo is

considered the most prominent modern linguistic theory of humor.

Recent years, various studies of humor from the pragmatic perspective are fruitful.

Pepicello (1983) summarizes the linguistic analysis of genres of linguistic humor and riddles

in particular. Nash (1985) mainly sets out to link the content of humor to the perception of its

linguistic or stylistic structure, particularly in locative or formulaic jokes. Chiaro (1992)

explores the pragmatics of word play and examines the narrative structure of various joke

forms. Norrick (1993, 2003) puts his research focus on humorous conversation. To him

conversation is the natural home of various forms of humor. Attardo (1994) conducts an

extensive and comprehensive review on linguistic literature on humor. Davies (2003) takes a

different perspective on the performance of humor. Davies sees joking as a speech activity

and component of one’s communicative competence.

2.4 Verbal Humor Studies at Home

Many Chinese scholars begin to apply the linguistic theories to the study of language humor

in early 1980s. The famous linguist Hu Fanzhou (1987) in his book linguistics of Humor

explores humor mainly from the perspective of rhetoric devices, which contributes a great

deal to humor research in China.

Most of the researches of humor which were done by Chinese scholars are based on the

pragmatic theories. These scholars apply pragmatic notions such as presupposition,

implicature, and speech acts to the analysis of humorous utterances. Among these researches,

a notable area is the application of Grice’s Cooperative Principle (CP) to the analysis of

humor, which can be found in Lv Guangdan (1998) and He Wenzhong (2003), ect.

Through a brief literature review, a conclusion can be drawn that many recent studies

have attached importance to humor from the pragmatic perspective, and meanwhile most of

the studies focus on the Cognitive Context of humor as well. The research of humor with the

application of pragmatic theories, especially the newly developed ones, has just unfolding. Up

to now, pragmatics becomes the natural place to locate the linguistic aspect of the

interdisciplinary study of humor. Therefore, we should adequately apply them to verbal

humor study to explore the generation and appreciation of humor and scholars should pay due

attention to the pragmatic factors of humor.

English films are very prevailing among Chinese college students. The main reason of its

popularity is the expression of classic conversations which can easily amuse viewers. This

paper attempts to reveal understanding of humorous language by analyzing instances of

verbal humor in English films, with Cooperative Principle and Cognitive Context.

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3. Cooperative Principle & Cognitive Context

Cooperative Principle does a better job in explaining verbal humor by speaking irrelevant

utterance when the speakers are in bad moods, while Cognitive Context is more effective in

analyzing verbal humor for different psychology. I would like to share the effect of them in

analyzing the verbal humor with you respectively.

3.1. Cooperative Principle & its Violation

Cooperative principle was put forward by the American philosopher H. Paul Grice. He

believes that to conduct the successful and happy interaction, people are actually observing

the cooperative principle of some kind. CP is grounded on the belief that human conversation

is not made out of utterances that are irrelevant with each other and that in order to

communicate smoothly with each other. The communicative partners will voluntarily observe

some pragmatic principles, which are referred to by Grice as CP: “Make your conversational

contribution such as is required at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or

direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged” (Grice,1975: 307). It is the very

cooperation between the communications that makes them carry on their communication. To

specify the CP further, Grice introduced four categories of maxim as follow:

The maxim of quantity

a. Make your contribution as informative as required (for the current purpose of

the exchange)

b. Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.

The maxim of quality

a. Do not say what you believe to be false.

b. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.

The maxim of relation

Be relevant

The maxim of manner

a. Avoid obscurity of expression.

b. Avoid ambiguity.

c. Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity).

d. Be orderly(Grice, 1975: 307-308).

Grice also listed briefly one such analog for each conversational category.

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1. Quantity. If you are assisting me to mend a car, I expect your contribution to be

neither more nor less than is required. If, for example, at a particular stage I need

four screws, I expect you to hand me four, rather than tow or six.

2. Quality. I expect your contributions to be genuine and not spurious. If I need

sugar as an ingredient in the cake you are assisting me to make, I do not expect

you to hand me salt; if I need a spoon, I do not expect a trick spoon made of

rubber.

3. Relation. I expect a partner’s contribution to be appropriate to the immediate

needs at each stage of the transaction. If I am mixing ingredients for a cake, I do

not expect to be handed a good book, or even an over cloth (though this might

be an appropriate contribution at a later stage).

4. Manner. I expect a partner to make it clear what contribution he is making and

to execute his performance with reasonable dispatch (Grice, 1975: 308-309).

Grice’s concept of the CP and its four associated maxims is considered as a major

contribution to the area of pragmatics. The CP is successful example showing human

communication is governed by general principles.

Humor, in its broad sense, refers to anything that can cause people to laugh in the process

of communication. After “Grice’s original suggestion that irony and humor might be

connected to violation of the conversation maxims”, a lot of work has been done to analyze

the specific relationship between humor and the violations (Attardo, 1994:195-229). These

researchers include Zhang Jingshu (1998), Xu Lixin (2003), and Lin Yamhua (2002), Liu Ping

(2005) and Gao Yujie (2006). Xu believes that some conversational humor can be accounted

for by the flouting of the maxims of the CP. Lin and Gao perform a case analysis of some

humorous conversation by the flouting of the maxims of the CP. Liu approaches humor from

the perspective of the CP; she observes that humor is in a paradoxical position, on the one

hand, humor is a successful mode of communication, on the other hand, humor violations the

maxims of the CP, a general principle for successful communicative exchange.

According to the survey conducted above, we know it has theoretical and practical value

for this paper to try to analyze verbal humor in some English films in view of the violation of

maxims of the CP.

3.1.1. Violation of Maxim of Quantity

As described in the maxim of Quantity, people provide sufficient quantity of information in

order to continue their conversation. However, in humorous dialogues, we may find a totally

different case, as illustrated by the following examples:

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Case 1

Rachel: All right. What’s your news, Amy?

Amy: Oh! Um…Well…I’m getting married.

Rachel: What? Oh my God! To who?

Amy: This guy! (Friends)

In case 1, while Amy told Rachel she would get married, Rachel asked whom she would

marry. Commonly, Amy at least, shall talk with her sister about her fiancé’s name, age, career

or even his family background, and some closely relevant information about her marriage. But

we all know that Amy marrying him is because of this guy’s money and big house, therefore,

she did not care about his other conditions. So what she said is serious not enough to provide

effective information that can make her sister know and recognize her fiancé. To the audience,

her useless answer makes people laugh and imaging.

Case 2

Rachel: Suppor…You wanna talk supportive? You didn’t even come and visit me when I

was in the hospital having the baby!

Amy: Oh yeah? Well, you didn’t come to see me in the hospital when I was getting my lips

done!

Rachel: I did the first time!

(Friends)

In case 2, Rachel complained that her sister, Amy hasn’t come to see her when she was

having the baby in the hospital, while, Amy retorted when she was getting cosmetic surgery

on her lips, Rachel didn’t see her too. Next, Rachel replied “when you do the first surgery, I

have been to!” Indeed, Rachel can respond directly that she has visited Amy, instead of

stressing “the first time” which is more informative than is needed. Therefore audiences can

infer Amy got cosmetic surgery more than once by Rachel’s deliberate emphasis. And the

extra letter leads to this humorous dialogue.

3.1.2. Violation of Maxim of Quality

Maxim of Quality tells participants in conversation to "try to make your contribution one that

is true". In a cooperative conversation, one is supposed to avoid lying, exaggerating or

bragging. However, many humorous dialogues have liars or braggarts as their protagonists.

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See the following examples:

Case 3

Dad: Po! Where are you going?

Po: To the Jade Palace.

Dad: But you're forgetting your noodle car. The whole valley will be there and you will sell

noodle to all of them.

Po: Selling noodles? But dad. You know I was kind of thinking,

Dad: Ya?

Po: I was kind of thinking,

Dad: Haa..?

Po: Could also sell the bean buns. They're about to go bad.

Dad: That's my boy! I told you that dream was a sign.

Po: Ya... I'm glad I had it.

(Kung Fu Panda)

In case 3, Po only wanted to run to the Jade Palace quickly to see the competition of Kong

Fu and wanted to know who would be the highest level of Kong Fu, but not sold noodles.

However, when Po’s father saw him throwing those bowls and asked where he was going. Po

finally said, “Could also sell the bean buns”, which couldn’t be true for he has never thought

of this. So the scene that Po had no choice but said of selling bean buns when he saw his

father’s eyes filling of eagerness, makes audiences delighted. But in fact, he should say that

he was going to see the competition. Po’s reply violates the first sub-maxim of quality: Do not

say what you believe to be false, and this violation is responsible for the humor in the

conversation.

Case 4

Sid: Okay, calm down. Calm down. I am good at making friends. I’ll make

my own herd. That’s what I’ll do! Hey! Me, amigo’s. Que pasa?

Sid: well, at least you still got your looks. Oh great!

(Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaur)

In case 4, when Sid realized that he and his friends all would have their own life, he was

upset and wandered alone. He promised himself he was good at making friends. Then he saw

some little animals and had greeting, but they ran away, which was opposite of his words and

turned out that his words were false. This makes people laugh. Next, he comforted he had

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good looked at least and looks at himself at the ice, but the ice broke. This is also a kind of

humor. And both of them violate the first sub-maxim of quality: Do not say what you believe

to be false. This kind of violation in the cartoon makes the film humorous. Let see another

example:

Case 5

Hurley: What’s that on your butt? It’s a birthmark. Never seen a birthmark?

I have seen that birthmark. Look at this. I got the same one.

Darwin: Don’t point that thing at me. It might go off.

Hurley: Seriously, just look at my butt. You see? You see? We must be related.

Darwin: No, I am a genetically engineered super spy.

Hurley: Yeah. That’s what they want you to think. So you’ll do tricks for

them. We must have been separated at birth. But fate has brought us

back together, my brother.

（G-force）

In case 5, Hurley insisted Darwin was his brother merely by some same hair on the same

place of their butts. It is lack of evidence, which violates the second sub-maxim of quality. It

produces humorous content and makes laugh.

3.1.3. Violation of Maxim of Relation

Usually, the abrupt switch to an irrelevant topic will certainly cause disruption of the

conversation. But in some English dialogues, participants may, due to some intentional or

unintentional misunderstandings of the context give an irrelevant response and thus produce a

humorous effect.

Case 6

Gloria: When we get back, I might sign up for the breeding program.

Melman: Breeding program?

Gloria: I think we reach a point when we want to meet somebody. Settle down,

have a relationship.

Melman: What? Like dating?

Gloria: Yeah, dating.

Melman: her guys?

Gloria: What do you mean, other guys?

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Melman: Darn it! What is holding up that beverage service? I'm gonna go check.

(Madagascar-Escape 2 Africa)

In case 6, since the conversation took place at that circumstance Gloria didn’t know

Melman loved her and told him that she wanted to recognize other men, the context decides

that when Gloria asked “what do you mean”, the answer is expected that Melman would tell

Gloria his love to her. This is the first interpretation coming into audiences’ mind. However,

as the story goes, Melman said another topic which isn’t relevant to the asking, instead of

speaking out his love. The answer violates the maxim of relation and make out the humorous

communication.

Case 7

Po: Oh hey. Hi. You're up?

Crane: Am now.

Po: I was just… er... h? The Kung Fu stuff is hard work, right? Your biceps sore.

Crane: I've had a long day and rather disappointing day, so...er... I should probably get to

sleep now.

Po: Ya... Ya... of course. Okay. Thanks.

(Kung Fu Panda)

In case 7, we could see that Po hopeed to talk with Crane eagerly and started the talking

by asking, “I was just…er...h? The Kung Fu stuff is hard work, right?” Crane was

expected to something like “Yes, it’s not a easy thing”. Then Po could continue his

conversation. However Crane didn’t answer anything about his question but said, “I've had a

long day and rather disappointing day.” to show he just needed to have a sleep, which is not

relevant to Po’s greeting. It makes Po embarrassed and leads to a sense of humor.

From these two examples, we can find that, the hearer’s utterance which violates the

maxim of relation makes the conversation humorous.

3.1.4. Violation of Maxim of Manner

Maxim of manner can be violated in the following four ways: obscurity, ambiguity,

unnecessary prolixity and disorder.

The first sub-maxim of Manner is to avoid obscurity of expression. According to Grice,

if the CP is to operate, the speaker must intend that his partner can understand his words

despite the obscurity he imports into his utterance. Thus saying something too obscure to be

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understood is violating the first maxim of manner, which is often employed in some English

dialogues to produce humor.

Case 8

Crane: Look you don't belong here.

Po: Er...I know, I know. You're right. I don't have it. It's just, my whole life, I

Crane: No, no, no. I meant you don't belong here, I mean in this room. But this is my room.

Property of Crane.

Po: Oh, okay right, right. So...

(Kung Fu Panda)

In case 8, this humor violates the second sub-maxim of manner because Crane’s

utterance is ambiguity. In this case, Po was depressed for Crane’s language choice of the word

“here”. “Here” can mean the Jade Palace but can also mean Crane’s room. And in this case, it

is easily misunderstanding. So Po thought that he did not belong here and should have left,

but Crane’s utterance just refered to his own room, for he wanted to sleep at that time. The

word “here” plays an important role in disambiguation. It is really funny because of it. And

let’s look another example:

Case 9

Boy: We may be out of fuel.

Captain: Why do you think so?

Boy: We've lost and engine two is no longer fies.

Captain: Buckle up, boys.

Attention! This is your captain. I have good and bad news. The good news is,

we're landing immediately. The bad news is, we're crash-landing.

(Madagascar-Escape 2 Africa)

The third sub-maxim of manner requires people’s language to “be brief”. Obviously in

case9, this maxim is violated here deliberately. There is abundant unnecessary prolixity in the

captain’s statement. A common way serves to communicate this information would be

“Attention! This is your captain. It’s emergence. Buckle up, please”. However, the captain

adopted a gratuitous and prolix approach to provide it.

As is shown from the above examples，it is not difficult to see that in many English

dialogues, the humorous effect is achieved by the violation of the maxims of the cooperative

principle—the maxim of quantity, the maxim of quality, the maxim of relation and the maxim

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of manner.

3.2. Cognitive Context & Verbal Humor

Cognitive Context is an effective way in analyzing verbal humor for different psychology.

The verbal humor can not live without a specific context. In another word, when we analyse

the verbal humor in an English sitcom, we can rarely isolate the cognitive context, otherwise,

we can never have an accurate understanding of the verbal humor.

3.2.1. The Definition of Context

“Context” has been defined in many ways by scholars with different backgrounds and various

aims in mind. One of the most important notions proposed by Sperber & Wilson is the context

in perspective of cognition, and it is also for this reason the context in the book is called

cognitive context. According to Sperber & Wilson, the set of premises used in interpreting an

utterance constitutes what is generally known as the context. A context is a psychological

construct, a subset of the hearer’s assumptions about the world (Sperber & Wilson, 1986:

15-16).

When interpreting an utterance, the hearer or reader makes a set of assumptions, and it is

these assumptions, of course, rather than the actual state of the world, that affect the

interpretation of an utterance. Sperber & Wilson claimed that a context in this sense not

limited to information about the immediate physical environment or the immediately

preceding utterances: expectations about the future, scientific hypothesis or religious beliefs,

anecdotal memories, general cultural assumptions, beliefs about the mental state of the

speaker, may all play a role in interpretation. As the cognitive context belongs to the field of

mental phenomena, we can be assured that context is far from situation, which means the

interaction between objects in the real world. It is also different from the traditional context

which also called static context.

3.2.2. The Application of Cognitive Context in Verbal Humor

Cognitive context, created in use, produced by interaction between speaker and hearer or

reader, contributes a lot to the communicative and interpretive study of communication. Due

to its special characteristics, cognitive context can be applied to depict a whole picture of the

mental process in the interpretive study of verbal humor. We will analyze the characteristics

of cognitive context after stating its contents which helps further the understanding of its

features. For example:

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Case 10

Rachel: Has anybody seen my engagement ring?

Phoebe: Yeah. It’s beautiful.

(Friends)

In case 10, Rachel wanted to return back the engagement ring to her fiancé after running

away from the forced marriage. When she found she lost the ring, she asked whether

somebody saw her ring. Phoebe’s answer makes people laugh which is due to different

understanding or inference. Phoebe’s context assumption is as following: Rachel had a

wedding ring (old information), and Rachel asked if anyone saw her ring (new information).

According to the Principle of Least Effort, phoebe kept a context combined with the

assumption that “a very beautiful ring.” But, instead of Phoebe’s inferring, Rachel’s purpose

is certainly not it. When Phoebe’s cognitive assumption and Rachel’s new information are

contradiction, a sense of humor arises.

4. Comparison of CP & Cognitive Context

Cooperative Principle does a better job in explaining verbal humor by speaking irrelevant

utterance when the speakers are in bad moods, while Cognitive Context is more effective in

analyzing verbal humor for different psychology. As a matter of fact, both of them have their

limitations in analyzing verbal humor, thus the combination of the two complements is a new

focus on analyzing verbal humor in pragmatic study.

4.1. Limitations of CP on Analyzing Verbal Humor

From the above analysis of verbal humor, we can see that when speaker violates Cooperative

Principle intentionally in the case of communication, there will be humorous dialogues.

Cooperative Principle does a better job in explaining verbal humor. But can CP analyze all

verbal humor? Let’s see the following examples:

Case 11

Chandler: What if never find someone? Or worse. What if I’ve found her, but I

dumped her because she pronounced it supposably?

Joey: Chandler, come on, you’re gonna find somebody.

Chandler: How do you know that? How?

Joey: I don’t know. I’m just tryin’to help you out.

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Chandler: You’ll see, young guys are all gonna go off and get married, and I’m

gonna be alone. Will you promise me something? When you’re married,

will you invite me over for holidays?

Joey: Well, I don’t know. I don’t know what we’re gonna be doing. I mean, what

if we’re at her folks’place?

(Friends)

In case 11, when Chandler found the old man downstairs who was similar to him, passed

away, he was so worried that he would go through the same way as the old man, and he told

Joey about his worrying. From the view of CP, there is no violation of it, every word Joey said

is from heart and true. So what makes this dialogue humorous? Cognitive Context here can

explain it more effectively. Joey doesn’t deliberately go against any maxim of CP. He

continues the dialogue according to their cognitive context and a series of assumptions.

Because he didn’t do a better understanding of the meaning of Chandler, the dialogue goes

into a kind of funny. Joey is a simple person and his perspective is also unitary, which leads to

his misunderstanding of Chandler’s communication purpose. In other words, the failure of a

series of assumptions is because of his limited cognitive ability to understand Chandler. His

answer is not Chandler wanting, and when all audiences are aware of Joey’s limited cognitive

ability, the humorous effects arise. Therefore, their communication seems observe

Cooperation Principle, but still creates a sense of humor.

Case 12

Ross: (normal voice) No, go on! It’s Paul the Wine Guy!

Phoebe: What does that mean? Does he sell it, drink it, or just complain a lot?

(Friends)

In case 12, we have already known that Paul is the restaurant’s bartender, but Phoebe

didn’t know. Therefore, she asked what the meaning of “Wine Guy” was, whether he sold or

drunk liquor, or a person always complained a lot. From the perspective of CP, Phoebe didn’t

violate any maxim of CP, it happened just because she had a different understanding of

homonyms. It is not possible to analyze this humorous dialogue from view of CP. While from

the point of Cognitive Context, when Ross says “Wine Guy”, he thinks every one has known

it. But, Phoebe doesn’t understand it. So when she says a person loves complaining, we

learned that she has come to assume the wrong context, and humor arises.

4.2. Limitations of Cognitive Context on Analyzing Verbal Humor

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Cognitive context plays an important role in explaining and understanding verbal humor. The

speaker gives some express, and the hearer/reader gets right perspective of cognition, then the

communication can go smoothly. But nothing is perfect. Cognitive context also can’t explain

all verbal humor.

Case 13

Monica: She picked Rachel. I mean, she tried to back out of it, but it was obvious.

She picked Rachel.

Chandler: He took my joke, he took it.

Monica: It’s wrong. You know what else is wrong? Phoebe picking Rachel.

Chandler: You know who else picked Rachel? Ross, and you know what else

Ross did? He stole my joke. You know what? I’m going to get a

joke journal. You know? And document the date and time of every

single one of my jokes.

(Friends)

In case 13, Monica and Phoebe asked Rachel whom she would choose between them if

she wants to go fishing. And Rachel’s answer was Rachel, which makes Monica brooding and

depressed. While, Chandler also felt depressed, because Ross sent Chandler’s jokes to the

Playboy magazine and got published. Therefore when Chandler and Monica got together and

talked, both of them hoped they can get comfort from the other. But we can see what they said

was unconnected. From the perspective of the CP, the nonrelevance of communication makes

this dialogue humorous. Here we can analyze and understand the sense of humor well from

view of the CP. While from the perspective of Cognitive Context, they both give the other

enough express, and they can develop their conversation by same perspective of cognition,

but Monica and Chandler’s dialogue is bit related to each other. As a consequence, the related

dialogue leads to a sense of humor, which is because the two speaker are in bad moods and

don’t care what the other says. So, Cooperation Principle does better work in analysis of this

verbal humor.

5.

Conclusion

Based on the above analysis, it is clear to notice that the verbal humor plays an important role

in English films, it makes those movies more funny and saves people’ anxious life. What’s

more, learning the art of humor is a necessary way to understand western culture. The present

paper，using Cooperative Principle and Cognitive Context as theoretical frameworks, attempts

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to make a different between the two theories on understanding of humorous language in

English films. Cooperative Principle does a better job in explaining verbal humor by speaking

irrelevant utterance when the speakers are in bad moods, while Cognitive Context is more

effective in analyzing verbal humor for different psychology. Otherwise, Cooperative

Principle cannot give a reasonable explanation on the verbal humor resulting from contextual

assumption or cognitive ability, and Cognitive Context can make up for this shortcoming.

Therefore, this paper suggests the combination of the two theories provides the best

framework for interpreting verbal humor.

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Acknowledgements

I cannot sufficiently thank my supervisor, Professor You Yuxiang, whose invaluable

advice and painstaking instructions of the earlier drafts have a major impact on the final shape

of this thesis. My sincere thanks are due to all the teachers who have taught me during the BA

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course.

I am also grateful to Jiaxing University that has provided me a chance of this study.

Finally, the completion of my BA program could not have been possible without the

constant support, encouragements and enduring love from my parents, my wife and my son. I

want to express my special gratitude to them all.

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