本科生毕业论文（设计）册
学院 XXX学院 专业 XX 班级 XXXX级笔译X班 学生 XXX 指导教师 XXX
XXXX大学本科毕业论文（设计）任务书
编 号：
论文（设计）题目： 从合作原则角度分析《生活大爆炸》中的对话幽默 学院： XXX学院 专业： 笔译 班级： 2XXXX级笔译X班 学生姓名： XXX 学号： XXXXXX 指导教师： XXX 职称：XX
1、论文（设计）研究目标及主要任务
本论文的研究目标是探讨合作原则在情景喜剧《生活大爆炸》中的应用及产生的幽默效果。其主要任务是通过分析合作原则的应用提高我们沟通、交流能力 。
2、论文（设计）的主要内容
本论文分为四章，第一章介绍合作原则、幽默的定义及其分类，第二章介绍中外语言学家关于言语幽默的语言学研究成果，第三章分析《生活大爆炸》中由于违背合作原则而产生的众多幽默效果，第四章探讨研究合作原则的重要意义。
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语言学家关于言语幽默的研究结果。
研究路线是对《生活大爆炸》中的幽默对话进行整理归类，并运用合作原则进行分析阐述。
4、主要参考文献
Attardo, S. 1994. Linguistic Theories of Humor. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Grice, H.P. 1975. “Logic and Conversation”. Syntax and Semantics: Speech Acts No. 3,
41-58.
Hu, Zhuanglin. 2006. Linguistics: A Course Book. Beijing: Beijing UP.
Zhang, Yan. 2002. “The Violation of the Cooperative Principles in Catch-22.” Diss. Hebei
Normal University.
5、计划进度 阶段 1 确定初步论文题目 与导师见面，确定大致范围，填开题报告和2 任务书，导师签字 3 提交论文提纲 4 交初稿和文献综述 5 交终稿和评议书 指 导 教师： 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
起止日期 3月14日前 3月14日-3月19日 3月19日-3月28日 3月28日-4月18日 5月8日前 XXXX大学本科生毕业论文（设计）开题报告书
XXX 学院 XX 专业 XXXX 届 学生 姓名 XXX 论文（设计）题目 从合作原则角度分析《生活大爆炸》中的对话幽默 指导 专业 所属教英语基础研究方XXX XX 语言学 教师 职称 研室 教研室 向 课题论证：从违背格莱斯合作原则角度论证情景喜剧《生活大爆炸》中的幽默对话效果。 方案设计：第一章介绍合作原则、幽默的定义及其分类， 第二章介绍中外语言学家关于言语幽默的语言学研究成果， 第三章分析《生活大爆炸》中由于违背合作原则而产生的众多幽默效果， 第四章研究合作原则的重要意义。 进度计划：3月14日前确定初步论文题目 3月19日前写开题报告、任务书 3月28日前提交论文提纲 4月18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）评议书
姓 名 论 文 题 目 XXX 学院 XXX学院 专业 XX 年级（班） 完成时间 XXXX级笔译X班 2013/5/4 从合作原则角度分析《生活大爆炸》中的对话幽默 论 文 内 容 摘 要 本论文主要以情景喜剧《生活大爆炸》中的对话为例，分析由于违背格赖斯的合作原则而产生的众多幽默效果。第一章主要对合作原则及其会话含义，幽默的定义及其分类作简要概述。第二章主要讨论中外语言学家关于言语幽默的语言学研究成果。 第三章从四个角度分析在《生活大爆炸》中通过违反合作原则所产生的幽默效果。第四章讲述研究合作原则的重要意义。因为它不仅可以帮助我们更好的欣赏电视节目，还可以提高我们理解他人，与他人交流的能力，从而使我们更好的享受生活。 指 导 教 师 评 语 年 月 日 职称 初评成绩 指 导 教 师
姓名 组长 成员 职称 教研室 答辩小组答辩记录： 记录人签字： 年 月 日 答辩小组意见： 组长签字： 年 月 日 学院意见： 评定成绩： 签章 年 月 日 XXXX大学本科生毕业论文（设计）文献综述
Literature Review 1.Linguistic Approaches on Verbal Humor Study Abroad Humor research has a long and glorious history. However, linguistics held an assured position in the late 1970s among the central player of humor research, which was traditionally psychology, sociology, and philosophy (Attardo, 1997: 395). Linguistic study on humor is concerning with linguistic devices such as exaggeration, ambiguity, pun etc is very common. Pepicello in his work The Language of Riddles (1984) pointed out that humor had a close relationship with ambiguity , and humor depended on the indecipherable ambiguity until the punch line resolved it in an unexpected way. Raskin?s the Semantic Script Theory of Humor (SSTH for short) (1985) is the semantic theory on verbal humor from the point of cognitive linguistics. The aim of the SSHT is, “ideally, a linguistic theory of humor should determine and formulate the necessary and sufficient linguistic conditions for the text to be funny”( Raskin, 1985:47). A text can be characterized as a single-joke-carrying text if both of the conditions are satisfied:”the text is compatible, fully or in part, with two different scripts and, the two scripts with which the text is compatible are opposite” (Raskin, 1985:81). Here the script refers to a large chunk of semantic information surrounding the word or evoked by it. Therefore the “script” here contains more meanings than the lexical meanings offered by the dictionary. The opposition of the script is the most important element to influence a joke. Attardo and Raskin cooperate with each other and set up a new theory named the “General Theory of Verbal Humor” (GTVH for short), which is a revision of Raskin?s SSHT. As Attardo puts forward:” whereas the SSHT was a semantic theory of humor, the GTVH is a linguistic theory for it includes other areas of linguistics as well, including , most notably, textual linguistics, the theory of narrativity, and pragmatics”(Attardo, 1994:222). Comparatively speaking, the GTVH contains more linguistics knowledge than the SSHT. Raskin?s Semantic Script Theory of Humor and its further developed version General Theory of Verbal humor are the two most influential theories on humor study from the perspective of linguistics. Coulson is the initiator who employs conceptual blending theory to study humor. In his paper” what?s so funny? Conceptual integration in humorous examples” (2002), he paid much attention to the humorous examples from political cartoons, and aimed to explore the role of Conceptual integration in these examples. He focused on the cultural concepts involved in these examples, and examined how conceptual blending works. There is a special topic on humor study from the cognitive linguistic way on the eighth International Cognitive Linguistics Association conference in 2003. G. Rithchie?s the Linguistic Analysis of Joke (2004) and Alan Partington?s the Linguistic of Laughter (2006) are the masterpieces of humor study in this field. G. Rithchie takes one subclass of joke-pun- as example, aims to discover the inner generation mechanism of jokes. Partington?s work examines the phenomenon of “laughter-talk” with the assistance of language corpora. The author tries to investigate “what speakers try to achieve by engaging in laughter-talk and what both speakers and hearers mat be signaling when then produce laughter” ( Partington, 2006:1) 2.Linguistic Approaches on Verbal Humor Study at Home It was Lin Yutang, a great writer, who introduced the word “humor” for its current meaning in 1923. So humor study at home is relatively new, and scholars began to study language humor from linguistic aspects in 1980s. From that time on, theories on humor take on a new look, and the studies on humors go further. Around the 1990s, humor studies concentrated on rhetoric. Hu?s Linguistics of Humor (1987) and Tan?s Humor and Language Humor (1997) are the representatives; both of the works are analyzing humor from the viewpoint of rhetoric. They take humor as a kind of rhetoric, and pay a lot attention to the rhetorical structures and techniques of humor; however, they overlook the internal mechanism, causation and process of humor. Many scholars pay attention to how the humor comes into being. Yuan (2002) studies how the humor efforts are produced from the perspective of language deviation. Her paper, the humorous effect of language deviation, shows the efforts are produced from the perspective of language deviation. Her paper, the Humorous Effect of Language Deviation, shows the formation of language deviation and its humorous effect by taking different deviations and the humorous effect as examples, such vocabulary deviation and humorous effect, grammar deviation and humorous effect, semantic deviation and humorous effect, etc. Zhang (1993) and Cai (2001) do that research on humor from the ambiguity and misunderstanding respectively. Study on humor from pragmatics is popular recently. Duan (2002) applies conversational maxims, Politeness principle, Deixis, and Pragmatic Vagueness to study the humor in Chinese. Wu (2005) wrote a paper named The Cooperative Principle and Humor in Sit-coms. She used Cooperative Principle to show that how the humorous effect was achieved due to the violation of a certain maxim of the Cooperative Principle. Compared with humor study abroad, the humor study at home is not sufficient enough whether in scope or in depth. Not so much interest is invested in this field; articles on humor published on the journals and works on humor study are rare, so more emphasis should be put on humor research.
本科生毕业论文设计
题目：从合作原则角度分析《生活大爆炸》中的对话幽默
作者姓名： XXX 指导教师： XXXX 所在学院： XXX学院 专业（系）： XX系XX专业 班级（届）： XXX届
完成日期 XXX 年 5 月 4 日
On Verbal Humor in the Big Bang Theory From the Perspective of Cooperative Principle
BY XXX Fu XXX, 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 4th,XXXX
Abstract
This thesis mainly aims to explore the numerous humorous effects brought about by violating Grice?s Cooperative Principle (CP) with examples from the dialogues of the sitcom the Big Bang Theory. The first chapter gives a brief introduction about the CP, its implicatures, and humor. The second chapter presents the previous researches on humor, done from foreign theories to domestic theories. The third chapter investigates the humor brought about by violating the CP from four aspects. The last chapter summarizes the significance of conducting research about CP since it could not only help us appreciate some TV programs better, but also improve our ability to understand and communicate with others, and make us enjoy the life better.
Key words: cooperative principle implicature humor
xi
摘要
本论文主要以情景喜剧《生活大爆炸》中的对话为例，分析由于违背格赖斯的合作原则而产生的众多幽默效果。第一章主要对合作原则及其会话含义，幽默的定义及其分类作简要概述。第二章主要讨论中外语言学家关于言语幽默的语言学研究成果。 第三章从四个角度分析在《生活大爆炸》中通过违反合作原则所产生的幽默效果。第四章讲述研究合作原则的重要意义。因为它不仅可以帮助我们更好的欣赏电视节目，还可以提高我们理解他人，与他人交流的能力，从而使我们更好的享受生活。
。
关键词： 合作原则 会话含义 幽默
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Table of Contents
Chapter1 Introduction….........................................................................................................1
1.1Cooperative principle…………………………………………………………..1 1.2 Humor Introduction………………………………………………………….2
1.2.1 Definition of Humor…………………………………….....................2 1.2.2 Classifications of Humors…………………………………………….4 1.3 Significance of Present Research………………………………………………4
Chapter2 Literature Review…………………………………………………..........................6 2.1 Linguistic Approaches on Verbal Humor Study Abroad………………………6 2.2 Linguistic Approaches on Verbal Humor Study at Home……………………...7 Chapter3 Violation of CP on Humor in the Big Bang Theory...................................................9 3.1 Humor created by violating the maxim of Quantity…….……………………..9 3.1.1 Use of repetition………………………………………….........................9 3.1.2 Use of ellipsis…………………………………………………………….10 3.1.3 Use of roundabout sentences…………………………….........................11 3.2 Humor created by violating the maxim of Quality……………........................12 3.2.1 Use of irony……………………….......................................................... 13 3.2.2 Use of metaphor…….…….……………………………………………..14 3.2.3 Use of rhetorical question….....................................................................15 3.3 Humor crated by violating the maxim of Relation……………........................15 3.3.1 Partial irrelevance…..................................................................................15 3.3.2 Complete irrelevance …………………………………………………...17 3.4 Humor created by violating the maxim of Manner…..........................................18 3.4.1 Use of prolix sentences………………………………………………….18
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3.4.2 Use of hyperbole………………………………......................................19 Chapter4. Conclusion……………………………………………………………………….21 Bibliography…………………………………………………………….…..........................22
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Chapter1. Introduction
1.1 Cooperative Principle
Cooperative Principle (CP) was proposed by an Oxford philosopher Herbert Paul Grice. It first became known to the public in 1967 through the William James lectures Grice delivered at Harvard. Part of the theory was published in his Logic and Conversation in 1975. “In a conversation, a speaker and a hearer are supposed to respond to each other in their turn and exchange with needed information that benefits both of them” (Crowley and Mitchell, 1994: 140). Only through this can the participants create a successful and smooth conversation. According to Grice (Grice, 1975), to achieve such effect, people are supposed to follow a certain set of principles, that is, the Cooperative Principle.
These principles are what participants should follow in order to achieve a satisfactory and efficient conversation. However, Grice found that in many cases, people fail to fulfill them in various ways though they still want to create a successful communication. By violating them, people can express their deep meanings or use it as a strategy to communicate. Grice used a term “implicature” to refer to such kind of deep meaning. Generally speaking, if we study it further, we can find out that a lot of laughter and humor can be created and understood through understanding the implicature. The CP is stated as follows:
“Make you conversational contribution such as required at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged” (Grice, 1975:45).
To specify the CP further, Grice introduced four categories of maxims as follows: Quality: Try to make your contribution one that is true.
1. Do not say what you believe to be false.
2. Do not say what for which you lack adequate evidence. Quantity:
1. Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purpose of exchange).
2. Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.
1
Relation: Be relevant. Manner: Be perspicuous.
1. Avoid obscurity of expression. 2. Avoid ambiguity.
3. Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity). 4. Be orderly (Grice 45-46).
People observe the Cooperative Principle consciously or even unconsciously when communicating with others. Hu Zhuanglin has pointed that the CP is meant to describe what actually happens in conversation instead of telling the speakers how they ought to behave, though it is described in the imperative (Hu, 2006:192). That is to say, people usually disobey these maxims here and there due to various purposes and such condition is called violation. Through violation, some unexpected and intentional purposes will appear. Such deeper meaning in the conversation is the implication that the hearer has to think about, “Grice coined the term implicature” (Hu, 2006:191).
According to Grice?s theory, if the speaker violates the CP, it doesn?t mean that he/she doesn?t want to cooperate with his/her partner; instead, it indicates that he/she wants to have a better communication with the hearer. Through implicature, the speaker may express his/her deep meaning better. That is to say, implicature is very important in our communication since it can help us understand each other better.
1.2 Humor Introduction
People of all ages and cultures respond to humor. The majority of people are able to experience humor, i.e., to be amused, to laugh or smile at something funny, and thus they are considered to have a sense of humor. Humor is everywhere in our daily life. As a language phenomenon, humor plays an important role in our society since it can not only improve our personal relationship, but also display our wit and glamour.
1.2.1 Definition of Humor
Although humor has been studied by different scholars from different angles for thousands of years, there are still quite a lot of controversies about what humor is. Goldstein and McGhee
2
do not even attempt to define humor “for the simple reason that there is no single definition task it appears, a feasible definition of the humor acceptable to all investigation in the area” (Apte, 1985:13). Though a tough task it appears, a feasible definition of the key term” humor ?has to be presented since it is the very subject matter in this thesis.
The term ”humor “originates from the Latin word” liquid ”,”fluid”, or “ moisture”. Ancient physiologists tend to consider man?s temperature as the balance of four kinds of humor, namely choler, melancholy, blood and phlegm. In Plato and Aristotle?s views, laughter was regarded as the proper correction of the excessive, the ridiculous and the ludicrous. Those who possess the excess of any humor are called “humorists”, i.e. objects of laughter. Gradually, the four kinds of humors are respectively related to personality of four kinds. And therefore, humor comes to mean character or style, specifically, a fanciful state of mind. In modern usage, humor means the comic, the laughable, or that which is funny, witty, or in any way makes people laugh. In this period, the title of “humorist” comes to signify those who are amusing and skilled in the literary or artistic expression of humor.
According to Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th Edition), part of the definition of humor is as follows:
(a) That quality which appeals to a sense of the ludicrous or absurdly incongruous. (b) The mental faculty of discovering, expressing, or appreciating the ludicrous or absurdly incongruous.
(c) Something that is or is designed to be comical amusing.
Taking a closer look at the above three definitions, it can be obviously found that they emphasize something different: (a) defines humor as something that is someone?s attribute; (b) equates humor as a human cognitive faculty which functions in the perception of humor; (c) refers to the thing, idea or event that is of humor.
Similarly, many other scholars tend to emphasize different aspects of humor depending on their different research purposes and orientations. Among the many definitions, the very two ones in a general sense by two famous humor scholars are worth to be quoted here.
One scholar is Attardo(1994), who defines humor as a technical term, covering anything that is ( or maybe) perceived as funny ,amusing, or laughable. Another one is Raskin(1985), who, in the least restricted sense, proposes to consider” humor “as an interchangeable word
3
with “funny”. As far as this thesis is concerned, it suffices to adopt a general definition of humor, taking it as all-inclusive term. Or put it in another way, humor in this thesis covers the types of stimulation which are perceived as funny and which can elicit laughter, or which at least intends to do so.
1.2.2 Classifications of Humors
Involving classification of humor, scholars have tried to find a uniform method of classification; the criteria for the classification are varied in accordance with different criteria. For example, humor can be divided into verbal humor and non-verbal humor according to the relationship to language; humor can be grouped into intentional humor and unintentional humor according to speaker?s intention; humor falls into active humor and passive humor according to the receiver?s expected mental state. On the basis of semantic content, humor can be categorized into political joke, sex, religious joke, Jewish joke, etc. American scholars who join rhetoric and functions of humor together divide the humor into joke, satire, wit, irony, comedy, wise-crack, farce, pun, etc.
Situation comedy is famous for its humors which exist in diversified forms, and the two main types of humor are verbal humor and non-verbal humor. This paper only focuses on the verbal humor in that most or the humors in situation comedy exist in the form of verbal humor. Verbal humor is also known as language humor, which the humor effect is produced through the medium of human language, including humor expressed in language and humor created by using human language, that is to say the humorous effect comes into being with the help of word play making hearers laugh. From the name of non-verbal humor, it can be easily seen that such humorous effect is not generated through human language, so non-verbal humor is also named situational humor. The amusement of non-verbal humor depends on a certain situation or context and the understanding of the humorous meaning must depend on the context to a certain degree.
1.3 Significance of Present Research
This study is of particular significance from both theoretical and practical angles.
4
Theoretically, this study of humor functions as a specific application of pragmatics. Pragmatics, a rather new field in linguistics, studies how human interpret language and use it in real communication. It is mainly concerned with such topics as deixis, conversational implicature, presupposition, speech acts and relevance theory, etc. Through analysis, a better understanding of how the humorous effects are realized will be attained. As such, a comprehensive knowledge as to how to create humor and how to appreciate humor is crated.
Practically, the exploration of English humor and its implication can help Chinese viewers better understand foreign situational comedies. Nowadays in china, a lot of college students begin to get interested in hot foreign TV programs. Knowing the techniques of making humorous effect will help to grasp the essence of dialogues in the situational comedy.
In a word, no matter whether it is seen from the theoretical angel or the practical one, it can be seen that the study on humor from the pragmatic perspective is quite important and necessary.
5
Chapter2 Literature Review
2.1 Linguistic Approaches on Verbal Humor Study Abroad
Humor research has a long and glorious history. However, linguistics held an assured position in the late 1970s among the central player of humor research, which was traditionally psychology, sociology, and philosophy (Attardo, 1997: 395). Linguistic study on humor is concerning with linguistic devices such as exaggeration, ambiguity, pun etc is very common. Pepicello in his work The Language of Riddles (1984) pointed out that humor had a close relationship with ambiguity, and humor depended on the indecipherable ambiguity until the punch line resolved it in an unexpected way.
Raskin?s the Semantic Script Theory of Humor (SSTH for short) (1985) is the semantic theory on verbal humor from the point of cognitive linguistics. The aim of the SSHT is, “ideally, a linguistic theory of humor should determine and formulate the necessary and sufficient linguistic conditions for the text to be funny” (Raskin, 1985:47). A text can be characterized as a single-joke-carrying text if both of the condition are satisfied:”the text is compatible, fully or in part, with two different scripts and, the two scripts with which the text is compatible are opposite”(Raskin, 1985:81) . Here the script refers to a large chunk of semantic information surrounding the word or evoked by it. Therefore the “script” here contains more meanings than the lexical meanings offered by the dictionary. The opposition of the script is the most important element to influence a joke. Attardo and Raskin cooperate with each other and set up a new theory named the “General Theory of Verbal Humor” (GTVH for short), which is a revision of Raskin?s SSHT. As Attardo puts forward:” whereas the SSHT was a semantic theory of humor, the GTVH is a linguistic theory for it includes other areas of linguistics as well, including , most notably, textual linguistics, the theory of narrativity, and pragmatics”(Attardo, 1994:222). Comparatively speaking, the GTVH contains more linguistics knowledge than the SSHT. Raskin?s Semantic Script Theory of Humor and its further developed version General Theory of Verbal humor are the two most influential theories on humor study from the perspective of linguistics.
Coulson is the initiator who employs conceptual blending theory to study humor. In his paper” what?s so funny? Conceptual integration in humorous examples” (2002), he paid much
6
attention to the humorous examples from political cartoons, and aimed to explore the role of Conceptual integration in these examples. He focused on the cultural concepts involved in these examples, and examined how conceptual blending works. There is a special topic on humor study from the cognitive linguistic way on the eighth International Cognitive Linguistics Association conference in 2003. G. Rithchie?s the Linguistic Analysis of Joke(2004) and Alan Partington?s the Linguistic of Laughter(2006) are the masterpieces of humor study in this field. G. Rithchie takes one subclass of joke-pun- as example, aims to discover the inner generation mechanism of jokes. Partington?s work examines the phenomenon of “ laughter-talk” with the assistance of language corpora. The author tries to investigate “what speakers try to achieve by engaging in laughter-talk and what both speakers and hearers mat be signaling when then produce laughter” (Partington, 2006:1)
2.2 Linguistic Approaches on Verbal Humor Study at Home
It was Lin Yutang, a great writer, who introduced the word “humor” for its current meaning in 1923. So humor study at home is relatively new, and scholars began to study language humor from linguistic aspects in 1980s. From that time on, theories on humor take on a new look, and the studies on humors go further.
Around the 1990s, humor studies concentrated on rhetoric. Hu?s Linguistics of Humor(1987) and Tan?s Humor and Language Humor(1997) are the representatives; both of the works are analyzing humor from the viewpoint of rhetoric. They take humor as a kind of rhetoric, and pay a lot attention to the rhetorical structures and techniques of humor; however, they overlook the internal mechanism, causation and process of humor.
Many scholars pay attention to how the humor comes into being. Yuan(2002) studies how the humor efforts are produced from the perspective of language deviation. Her paper, the humorous effect of language deviation, shows the efforts are produced from the perspective of language deviation. Her paper, the Humorous Effect of Language Deviation, shows the formation of language deviation and its humorous effect by taking different deviations and the humorous effect as examples, such vocabulary deviation and humorous effect, grammar deviation and humorous effect, semantic deviation and humorous effect, etc. Zhang(1993) and
7
Cai(2001) do that research on humor from the ambiguity and misunderstanding respectively. Study on humor from pragmatics is popular recently. Duan (2002) applies conversational maxims, Politeness principle, Deixis, and Pragmatic Vagueness to study the humor in Chinese. Wu(2005) wrote a paper named The Cooperative Principle and Humor in Sit-coms. She used Cooperative Principle to show that how the humorous effect was achieved due to the violation of a certain maxim of the Cooperative Principle.
Compared with humor study abroad, the humor study at home is not sufficient enough whether in scope or in depth. Not so much interest is invested in this field; articles on humor published on the journals and works on humor study are rare, so more emphasis should be put on humor research.
8
chapter3. Violation of CP on Humor in the Big Bang Theory
The Big Bang Theory is very popular in the USA. It tells about eight young people, with different backgrounds, living together and creating many humorous stories in their daily life. This paper will focus on its dialogues as material to analyze the humor that is created by violating the CP.
Grice further distinguished literal meaning from speaker?s intention. Hearing the utterance, the hearer first works out its literal meaning and then assumes that the speaker is observing the CP. But sometimes, the utterance doesn?t fit the context. That is to say, the hearer must try to work out the possible implicatures corresponding to the speaker?s intention. “The clash between the initial literary interpretation and the implicature serves to generate humor. Therefore, the humor production is characterized as an intentional and regular violation of Grice?s maxims, especially the maxim of quality and relevance”. (Attardo, 1985: 541).
Next, we will use the dialogues in the Big Bang Theory as examples to illustrate the humorous effect created by violating the CP.
3.1 Humor created by violating the maxim of Quantity
An efficient speaker should know when and where to stop talking and not to overdo it. More information will enhance comprehension, but too much will lead to just the opposite. The result will be also unacceptable if people do not give enough information. The guidelines to distinguish whether this maxim is violated include:“if the speaker does circumlocution or not to the point; if the speaker is uninformative; if the speaker talks too short; if the speaker talks too much; if the speaker repeats certain words” (Grice, 1975:47). However, if the speaker violates this maxim deliberately, he/she generates some humorous effect. Then we will analyze it mainly by means of some rhetorical devices such as repetition and ellipsis.
3.1.1 Use of repetition
“Repetition is a powerful rhetorical device which creates good rhythm and parallelism to make the language musical, emphatic, attractive and memorable” (Zhang, 2005:116). As to the sitcom, the characters usually repeat some words or sentences apparently many times. He/she
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violates the maxim of Quantity for he/she gives more information than what is needed. However, by doing so, it can create humorous effect. The following are some examples:
1. SHELDON: New neighbor? LEONARD: Evidently
SHELDON: Significant improvement over the old neighbor.
LEONARD: 200-pound transvestite with a skin condition? Yes, she is. PENNY: Oh, hi! LEONARD: hi! SHELDON: hi! LEONARD: hi! SHELDON: hi!
Here, this is the first time Sheldon and Leonard meet Penny. As we all know, Penny is a very nice girl who is always on sexy dress. However, Sheldon and Leonard are young scientists whose topics are always concentrated on scientific studies and appear to be a little dumb. When they meet this attractive girl and know she is going to be their neighbor, they become nervous, embarrassed and excited. So they repeat the word “hi” many times just to delay the time and try to figure out what to say. Anyway, as in normal conversation, we don?t need others to say the same thing more than one time. Apparently, here Sheldon and Leonard violate the maxim of Quantity. But such sentences make the two guys lovelier and such stammer makes the audiences burst into laughing.
2. SHELDON: There is something I need to tell you. LEONARD: OK
SHELDON: I can?t tell you. LEONARD: Why
SHELDON: I can?t tell you why I can?t tell you. So I guess there are two things I can?t tell you.
Here Sheldon wants to tell Leonard the secret that Leonard?s girlfriend wants to break up with him but Sheldon has promised to his own girlfriend to keep the secret. One side is his girlfriend, the other side is his best friend, so he repeats the sentence” I can?t tell you” to think whether he should tell Sheldon the truth. If the audiences realize that Leonard?s girlfriend don?t
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want to break up with him and Sheldon makes too much fuss, he/she will understand the emotion in the utterance and smile for the poor guy?s behavior. As a result, a kind of humor arises here.
3.1.2 Use of ellipsis
Ellipsis means the act of “leaving out a word or words from a sentence deliberately, when the meaning can be understood without them” (“Ellipsis”). Through this, people can realize the implied meaning and can get more information though it deliberately violates the maxim of Quantity for it lacks the needed information. The following are some examples:
1. SHELDON: You, really? You can assess the quality of my work? OK, um, here. PENNY: “A proof that algebraic topology can never have a non-self contradictory set of aphelion groups “. I am just a blonde monkey to you, aren?t I?
Here, apparently, Sheldon wants someone with a rudimentary understanding of science to help him comb through his notes. Penny is interested in these notes and volunteers to help Sheldon. However, Penny is just a waitress and Sheldon don?t believe she has got the ability to sort out these notes. He rejects Penny indirectly by make her read an article. After reading some lines, Penny finds that she cannot understand these terms. Sheldon is staring at her with a strange expression and omitting the information like” look, you are not competent”. She stops utterance and knows how they look at her. So the humorous effect is generated by violating the maxim of Quantity. What?s more, after laughing, we may realize that there will appear a new role in the sitcom to be Sheldon?s assistant, which arises our curiosity.
2. LEONARD: She seems nice.
RAJ: Hey, you?ve already got a girlfriend. I call dibs. LEONARD: All I said was” She seems nice.” RAJ: Yeah, well. I love her.
In this scene, Leonard and Raj meet Sheldon?s new assistant Alex. They are shocked by the beauty of Alex. When Alex leaves, Leonard says to Sheldon that his new assistant is a nice girl. Raj, originally from New Delhi, India, is very shy around women and is physically unable to talk to them. Hearing Leonard?s words, Raj thinks Leonard will pursue Alex by interpretating his utterance as” she is nice, and I want her to be my girlfriend”. So he warns Sheldon that do
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not try to chase Alex and pretends to be more interested in this girl than Leonard. Actually, Leonard feels good about Alex although he explains to Raj. The later story proves that there is a vague relationship between Leonard and Alex. After drawing the inference, the humorous effect is generated by violating ellipsis.
3.1.3 Use of roundabout sentences
Roundabout sentences refer to the utterances that are not done or said using the shortest, simplest, or most direct way possible. Zhang Yan has pointed that in such cases, speakers deliberately avoid the theme of the topic and choose to say something in a roundabout way so as to convey something implied or to express something indirectly, which can create a ridiculous and humorous effect (Zhang, 2002:18). In such kind of conversation, the speaker tends to supply inadequate information at the very beginning, so it is a violation of the maxim of Quantity. Consider the following dialogue:
Bernadette: What about you, Penny? Penny: what about me what?
Bernadette: Do you think you and Leonard might ever get married？ Penny: oh, well, he is sweetie.
Amy: You are not answering the question. Do you love him? Penny: Yeah, sure, of course, I love him. Bernadette: It doesn?t sound like that. Penny: well, I do.
Bernadette: Do you tell him that? Penny: He?d just take it the wrong way. Bernadette: What does that mean?
Penny: I mean he is special and smart and nice.
The background is the three girls are talking about their boyfriends and their future marriage. Although Penny loves his boyfriend Leonard, but she never think to marry him. The other two girls feel unbelievable of Penny?s reflection and keep asking her true feeling. Penny avoids answering it directly but chooses her own topic and delays to give the required information. So she risks violating the maxim of Quantity just to bury her real thinking.
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Definitely, her tactful and innocent roundabout way makes the audience laugh immediately.
3.2 Humor created by violating the maxim of Quality
In our daily conversation, speakers observe this maxim for a successful communication. “In the formal circumstances, if we violate this maxim, we will lose some credibility. However, under some less serious circumstances, violating such maxim may lead to amusement and humor. The criteria of such violation are: “if the speaker lies or says something that is believed to be false; if the speaker does irony or makes ironic and sarcastic statement; if the speaker denies something; if the speaker distorts information” (Grice, 1975: 47). Such violation makes the audience laugh and leads them to infer the conversational implicature in the deep level.
3.2.1 Use of irony
This rhetorical device is the uppermost figure of speech applied in the Big Bang Theory. Irony is “a figure of speech in which the intended meaning of the words used is directly opposite to their usual sense” (Zhang, 2005:216). So in an irony, the relationship between the explicit utterances and the intentional meanings is opposite. Thus, the speaker violates the maxim of Quality—Do not say what you believe to be false. In the following, we will discuss some interesting examples.
1. PENNY: Oh, guys. So how was paintball? Did you have fun?
SHELDON: Sure, if you consider being fragged by your own troops fun.
In this scene, the four guys lose a paintball game. They feel depressed and shameful. Sheldon said the main reason why they fail the game is that some people in their group do not follow the chain of command and Wolowits shoot him in the back during the game. When they meet Penny, Sheldon expresses a kind of sadness with the opposite words. Apparently, Sheldon?s utterance is an irony and is absolutely opposite to the reality which is a violation of the maxim of Quality. From this, the audience can really feel the four guys? sadness and will burst into laugh for his humorous utterance which is really beyond expectation.
2. PENNY: hi, guys. I need some guinea pigs.
SHELDON: Ok, there is a lab animal supply company in Reseda you could try. But if
your research is going to have human applications, may I just suggest white mice instead? Their
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brain chemistry is far closer to ours.
PENNY: I swear to god, Sheldon, one day, I?m going to get the hang of talking to you. Actually, Sheldon uses too much technical terms while talking that others can not follow his speed and understand him. Penny do not really means that she will try her best to understand Sheldon, but to say that Sheldon speaks too fast and he must correct his utterance style in order to let people easily get his meaning. In fact, Penny swears to god that one day she will make Sheldon adapt to her, not let herself get used to Sheldon. So apparently, this is an irony. Penny sacrifices the maxim of Quality to convey his criticism and complaint. As audience, we will definitely laugh for the black humor created by the lovely girl.
3. PENNY: So, you and Leonard? SHELDON: Oh, dear, god!
PENYY: A little misunderstanding? Huh?
SHELDON: a little misunderstanding? Galileo and the pope had a little misunderstand- ing.
Sheldon and Leonard received a letter from the institute for experimental physics who wants them to deliver a speech about their research fruits. Sheldon refuses this invitation because he has no interest in standing in the rose room in front of a group of judgmental strangers who he thinks would not recognize true genius. While Leonard values this honor and strongly wish to attend it and has a quarrel with Sheldon. Penny wants to persuade the two guys to compromise, while Sheldon raises the example of Galileo and the pope to prove that they have totally different values and they have not just a little misunderstanding. Here in this scene, by means of irony, on the surface, Sheldon seems to agree that there is a little misunderstanding between he and Leonard, but on the deep level, he expresses his dissatisfaction and anger. By violating the maxim of Quality, Sheldon makes the audience laugh and feel special black humor.
3.2.2 Use of metaphor
“A metaphor uses words to introduce something different from their literal meaning—one thing is described in terms of another so as to suggest a likeness or analogy between them” (Zhang, 2002:161). Like irony, it also violates the maxim of Quality and causes conversational
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implicature. The use of metaphor is likely to produce humor and delight atmosphere. Now, let us take a look at the example below:
WOLOWITZ: See a penny, pick her up, and all day you?ll have good luck! PENNY: No, you won?t.
Here in this dialogue, Wolowitz sing a song about penny. As we all know, Wolowitz wants Penny to be his girlfriend at the beginning, and he tries to make Penny happy. In his song the word” penny”refers to a coin as well as the girl Penny, and the real meaning of the sentence is that if you see Penny, you will have a good luck all day.. However, penny?s answer is a direct rejection to Wolowitz?s love expression. Certainly, Wolowitz?s sentence is a metaphor and is definitely not true because having good luck has no relation with meeting Penny. Wolowitz says something false and thus violates the maxim of Quality. If the audience can sense his meaning and the background, they will definitely be amused by Wolowitz?s style of humor.
3.2.3 Use of rhetorical questions
“A rhetorical question is one that does not need an answer, for the answer is suggested by the speaker, or presumed by the speaker to be fairly obvious or probably known to the audience” (Zhang, 2002:152-153). By asking rhetorical questions, the speaker doesn?t need any answer in fact and usually invites implicatures to express his/her anger, criticism, surprise, and irony, etc. and thus violates the maxim of Quality. Here is one example to illustrate this strategy.
1. PENNY: Good afternoon, gentlemen. And welcome to today?s physics bowl practice round. I?m Penny and I?ll be your host. Because apparently I do not have anything else to do in the Saturday afternoon. And isn?t that a just little sad? Ok, gentlemen, are you ready?
The four guys will attend a physics contest and they want Penny to help them practice,
Penny is a girl who knows little about scientific studies and has no interest in this contest. Therefore, being host for the four guy?s practice is a boring job for her. She uses a rhetorical question “And isn?t that a just little sad?” to express her frustration. Certainly she knows the answer clearly but she still uses a question. However, after violating the maxim of Quality, Penny?s rhetorical question leads the audience to burst into laugh immediately.
3.3 Humor created by violating the maxim of Relation
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The maxim of Relation requires that one?s contribution must be relevant. That is to say, relevance refers to an utterance that is relevant to the topic of the conversation or communication. However, it is this maxim that is violated most frequently in order to generate conversational implicature. As to this thesis, the violation of this maxim in the big bang theory falls into two kinds: partial irrelevance and complete irrelevance.
3.3.1 Partial irrelevance
Sometimes the information in the big bang theory is not completely related to the contemporary character or episode. Part of the utterance relates well with the dialogue or situation, while the rest is irrelevant to that. Such kind of switch is usually opposite to the audience?s consciousness. Therefore, such way of violation of the maxim of Relation can achieve various kinds of unexpected effects, including humor. This will be further illustrated by the following examples.
1. SHELDON: Penny, Penny, Penny! Good morning！ PENNY: Do you have any idea what time it is?
SHELDON: Of course I do. My watch is linked to the atomic clock in boulder,
Colorado. It is accurate to one-tenth of a second. But as I am saying this, it occurs to me that, once again, your question have been rhetorical.
The dialogue happens when Sheldon knocks the door of Penny?s room in the very early morning while Penny is still sleeping. As in normal situation, when Penny asks Sheldon question like do you have any idea what time it is, the usual response of the listener is to realize that he/she has annoyed others and immediately make apologize for disturbing others at inappropriate time. However, out of our expectation, Sheldon directly answer the question of Penny, explain how accurate his watch is and do not feel sorry for disturbing her. With little doubt, Sheldon violates the maxim of Relation for his utterance is partially irrelevant to the current situation. What?s more, in this sitcom, we may realize that Sheldon usually fails to grasp the important point of the current topic and pays attention to something else because of his over complicated-mindedness. However, it is his special response and performance that amuses the audience a lot and increases the humorous effect of the sitcom.
2. LEONARD: what are you talking about?
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SHELDON: Einstein.
LEONARD: yeah, I?m going to need a little more. SHELDON: Albert Einstein.
Here, the background is Sheldon is trying to solve a very difficult scientific problem which all other scientists have thought impossible to deal with. Every small step forward Sheldon makes, he would tell his best friend Leonard while Leonard feels so boring to hear it because Sheldon talks about his study without choosing appropriate time and place. This scene is Leonard is sleeping with his girlfriend. Sheldon suddenly breaks in and says his new findings, which makes Leonard angry. However, Leonard tries to listen to his new findings and hope to end this as soon as possible. Actually, Leonard says”I? m going to need a little more” means that please be quick and I?m sleepy. Out of our expectation, Sheldon says something that has nothing to do with his new findings but to waste time by add the last name of Einstein. Till now, the two characters? utterances are not related to each other. What Sheldon says actually has nothing to do with their current topic and is an obvious violation of the maxim of Relation. Hearing his words, the audience would definitely burst into laugh for the lovely guy. Therefore, the humorous effect is created here by such violation.
3.3.2 Complete irrelevance
Sometimes, the speaker violates the maxim of Relation so greatly that his/her utterance is completely irrelevant with the hearer or the topic. By such kind of behavior, the speaker may try to convey some deep meanings and create various conversational implicatures instead of showing that he/she doesn?t care of the current topic. The humor created by complete irrelevance is shown everywhere in the big bang theory and here are some examples.
1. RAJ: You won?t believe it. Somebody got the whole thing on a cell phone. And put it on the YouTube.
LEONARD: What? Now who would do that? RAJ: Hey, check it out. It?s a featured video. LEONARD: Oh, geez, does this suit look that bad?
SHELDON: Forget your suit. Look at my arms waving; I?m like a flamingo on Ritalin. In this scene, Sheldon and Leonard fight each other in front of a lot of scientists at a very
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important conference because Sheldon challenges Leonard?s speech at the end of the meeting, which makes their relationship get worse and worse. Their friend Wolowitz gets the whole fighting process on a cell phone and put it on the YouTube. While they are watching this video, we may think another fighting will break out. But then, out of everyone?s expectation, they do not blame Wolowitz for putting their fighting scene onto the website or quarrel with each other again. Instead, Leonard pretends to forger the unhappiness between he and Sheldon and talk about his suits. And Sheldon plays a joke on his fighting style without mention their misunderstandings. Therefore, it is a completely violation of the maxim of Relation. But if we think about it twice, we can figure out that Leonard and Sheldon are true friends. Both of them want to make up their relationship but they do not know where to start. Therefore, they change another topic to play joke on themselves as a kind of apologize. If we think about this, we may admire the art of speech and laugh at the two guy?s humor.
2. LEONARD: Do we really have to wear this camouflage crap to play paintball? SHELDON: Who said that? Leonard, I can hear your voice. But I can?t see you. The background is Leonard decides to break up with his girlfriend and he is in bad mood. His best friend Sheldon wants to comfort him by making him laugh with strange utterance. Therefore, when Leonard asks a question, Sheldon pretends not seeing him but actually Leonard is standing right in front of him. Here, Sheldon?s sentence has no relation with Leonard?s question, which means he violates the maxim of relation. On the other hand, it also reflects Sheldon?s character: valuing friendship. So, by the violation of the maxim of Relation, Sheldon creates her particular kind of humor for the audience.
3.4 Humor created by violating the maxim of Manner
Zhang Yan says that if we say that the maxims of Quality, Quantity and Relation are about “what to say”, then the maxim of Manner is about “how to say” (Zhang, 2002:36). The standard of the violation of this maxim include: “if the speaker uses ambiguous language; if the speaker exaggerates something; if the speaker uses slang in front of people who do not understand it; if the speaker?s voice is not loud enough” (Grice, 1975:47). However, it is a very interesting phenomenon that the speaker sometimes goes out of the way to flout this maxim to avoid embarrassment, unpleasantness, offence, taboo and so on. Such violation may lead to
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misunderstanding or humorous conversational implicature. When it comes to this violation, the following devices are usually be used.
3.4.1 Use of prolix sentences
Prolix sentences refer to the utterances that “so long as to be boring; verbose” (“prolix”). The prolix utterance is more difficult to understand than the directly made utterance, so the speaker has to take more effort to infer the implied meanings. But it can cause humorous conversational implicature. The following examples belong to this type.
1. SHELDON: no, the word is “Polish”. See, look, Polish sausage. And the-the model of the solar system developed by Nicolaus Copernicus, a Polish astronomer. And then, finally, if that wasn?t enough-which it should?ve been-that is Madame Curie killing herself by discovering Radium, who, although she was a naturalized French citizen, was Polish by birth.
PENNY: Excuse me, the word is” polish”, see? Small “p”.
Here, the background is four guys are playing Pictionary. In this round, the word is “polish”. Sheldon draws many things that related to the word “Polish” on the board, but Leonard still cannot guess out what the word is. Therefore, Sheldon explains to Leonard but actually the word is the verb “polish” not the adjective “Polish” .So we understand the humor in Sheldon?s utterance if we realize that he violates the maxim of Manner deliberately in order to show how smart he is.
2. SHELDON: Don?t you need money? This is money I?m not using. PENNY: But what if you need it?
SHELDON: My expense account for 16.9% of my after-tax income. The rest is divided up between a small savings account, this deceptive container of peanut brittle and the hollowed-out buttocks of a superhero action figure who shall remain nameless for his own protection. Or her own protection. Take some.
In this scene, Penny hasn?t paid the rent and runs to Sheldon?s room to escape the house manager. After Sheldon hears it, he wants to lend some money to Penny. However, penny do not want Sheldon?s money because she can imagine how boring Sheldon would be if she borrows money from him. Sheldon explains his daily expense in such a detailed way that Penny knows she would begin to listen to his chatter without stop. So Sheldon here expresses his idea in a
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prolix way which violates the maxim of Manner. Thinking about this, we cannot help but laughing for the emotional and lovely boy.
3.4.2 Use of hyperbole
“This is a popular figure of speech known as exaggeration or over-statement. It refers to a case where the speaker?s description is stronger than is warranted by the state of affairs described” (Zhang, 2002:210). However, in the speaker?s mind, he is truly describing his/her intense feeling at the time. By using such device, the speaker can create some special kind of humorous effect. Now let?s look at some examples below.
1. SHELDON: I?m sorry; I don?t understand which social situation this is. Could you give me some guidance as to how to proceed?
PENNY: The building manager is showing on apartment downstairs, and I haven?t paid my rent.
SHELDON: Oh, I see. Penny. I?m not sure I?m comfortable harboring a fugitive from the 2311 North Los Robles Corporation.
In this scene, Penny does not pay rent and hide in Sheldon?s apartment. Sheldon does not know what happens. After he realizes the truth, he says he is harboring a fugitive, which means Penny commits crime and escapes. Apparently, it?s hyperbole because owing the rent is such a small affair. So Sheldon violates the maxim of Manner by exaggerating that Penny is a fugitive. However, through her utterance, we may feel the humor created by the interesting guy. After knowing the background, the humorous effect is generated simultaneously.
2. PENNY: Things are looking good.
LRONARD: So, are we still taking things slow? Because a gunshot wound today and last week I slammed my thumb in the kitchen drawer. We don?t know how much time I have.
Here, Penny and Leonard are dating. Leonard hopes to develop fast with Penny but Penny want to take things slowly in order to make sure they have a solid foundation of love. Penny thinks that everything is going smooth but Leonard says if they do not move forward he would die because he has got hurt twice. Obviously he is exaggerating. The exaggeration by Leonard to the Penny expresses the boy?s great aspiration for improving their relationship. And therefore, it is a violation of the maxim of Manner. And thus the humorous effect is generated.
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chapter4. Conclusion
The paper conducts the study on verbal humor created by violating the Cooperative Principle, an important theory of Pragmatics. All the examples used in this paper entirely stem from the popular American sitcom the big bang theory. As we all know, humor can create light-hearted and happy time for us in this busy world, make us feel easy about our life, and help us to concentrate on our work with a better mood and higher efficiency. That is to say, if we can learn to appreciate the humor created in the world better, we can enjoy our life better. By doing so, we can also improve our ability to communicate with others, because through this, we know how to say appropriate words to make the atmosphere easy. To achieve this goal, it is necessary for everyone to learn something about CP.
However, this theory has its own limitations. There is some inconsistency and redundancy among the CP and its maxims that need to be boiled down to a set of principles that are truly indispensable and do not overlap at the same time. Despite such shortages, the CP and its implicatures have supplied a new way of understanding the verbal humor.
All in all, learning CP and its relevant knowledge can not only help us find more laughter in our life, but also help us enjoy a better personal relationship and adopt to the society better.
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