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1、A Study of Verbal Humorfrom the Perspective of Relevance TheoryAuthor: Li YixianTutor: Li XiangAbstract：(College of Foreign Languages, HApinultural UniversChangsha 410128 )Verbal humor is a usual phenomenon in human communication.lt has attracted the attension of many researchers in many fields such
2、 as philosophy, aesthetics physiology, sociology, psychology and linguistics. In the field of linguistics, some explorations have already been made in regard to its semantic and rhetorical aspects,but due attention has not been paid to it in pragmatics in that in everyday verbal communication, humor
3、ous utterances are easy to enjoy but hard to define. Apart from its capability of laughter-making, language humor is more often than not, produced to implicitly perform some communicative functions, not achievable by explicit expressions. Relevance Theory was put forward by Sperber and Wilson in 198
4、6 aims to explain how the audience infers the communicators intended meaning. In this paper, a cognitive approach to humor is adopted within the framework of theRelevance Theory to elaborate the realizing process of verbal humor and learn how to appreciate verbal humor.Key words： Verbal Humor; Relev
5、ance Theory; Cognitive Effects; Processing Effort从关联理论看言语幽默作 者：李怡娴指导老师：李湘（湖南农业大学外国语学院，长沙410128）扌商要：言语幽默是人们的交际行为中一种常见的语言现象，许多学者已从心理学，社会学 等方面进行过广泛而深入的研究。在语言学方面，也从语义修辞的角度进行了详细的探讨，然而语 用学这一语言学的分支，还未对幽默语言的研究引起高度注意，原因在于在日常交际中，幽默语言 易于欣赏，却难于把握。幽默语言不但生动有趣，另人捧腹，而且更主要的是在引人发笑的过程中 还传递着其他的交际含义或意图。关联理论于1986年由Sperbe
6、r和Wilson提出，它旨在揭示听话 者对发话者话语意义的推理理解过程。本文以关联理论为分析工具，从认知的角度出发，对言语幽 默的实现过程进行分析研究，阐述了幽默发出者交际意图的实现过程，从而揭示了在关联理论视角 下的幽默的产生，并学会如何欣赏言语幽默。关键词：言语幽默;关联理论;语境效果;处理努力IntroductionIn our daily life , humoris a word that is frequently used. People enjoy humor because they can derive great pleasure and relaxation from
7、it .Over the centuries, writers of diverse interests have attempted to define it, to supply reasons for it, and to analyze it. Nevertheless, most works on humor tend to be concerned with themes such as its physiological, psychological and sociological aspects and in comparison fewer in history have
8、worked on the linguistic aspects of the comic mode. It is certainly not the case that no attention has been paid to linguistic investigations of humor. However,讦 we compare the efforts in this area with efforts in other research areas such as translation theory and practice, American and British lit
9、erature and teaching methodology, then we have to admit that the amount of attention is still minimal.Up to now, a great deal of research has been done from the viewpoint of psychology and sociology. In the field of linguistics, some explorations have already been made in regard to its semantic and
10、rhetorical aspects, but due attention has not been paid to it in pragmatics.In the eighties of last century, cognitive pragmatics arose when the cognitive study of language in communication became increasingly important in the field of the present cognitive linguistics. Relevance Theory (RT), put fo
11、rward by Sperber and Wilson, is the basis of cognitive pragmatics. Mainly concerned with communication and cognition, RT tries to reveal the nature of communication and provide a psychological explanation of the interpretation unfolded in the audiences mind.Basically, we could divide humor into verb
12、al humor, visual humor and physical humor. Verbal humor is a usual phenomenon in human communication. It is an interdisciplinary subject connected with a wide range of learning. As a special kind of verbal communication, verbal humor can avoid embarrassment, and improve the relationship of the diffe
13、rent people.The study of verbal humor is of great practical value. Relevance Theory (RT) provides a brand new angle to interpret verbal humor, that is,from the cognitive point of view. It is not a theory specially designed for the analysis of verbal humor, but its theoretical hypotheses are suitable
14、 to deal with how humorous utterances are produced and interpreted.This thesis attempts to explain the procedure of production and understanding from the cognitive perspective with the support of Relevance Theory. By using the two principles the maximal relevance(cognitive principle) and optimal rel
15、evance(communicative principle), it tries to reveal the essence of verbal humor: the transition from the maximal relevance to the optimal relevance.This thesis comprises the four parts:Part one introduces the notion about humor and reviews related literature on verbal humor from the angles of pragma
16、tics. Part two describes the relevance theory, including the definition of relevance, context, two principles of relevance, cognitive effect and processing effort, and optimal relevance.Part three analyzes the production and the comprehension of verbal humor on the basis of relevance theory. Part four gives a conclusion to the whole paper.1 Overview of Verbal HumorIn this section , introduces the definition about “humor” explored f
