The previous chapters have introduced some basic knowledge about humor, humor theories and the relevant pragmatic theories, and this chapter will specially analyze the
Links of London uk pragmatic effects reflected in English verbal humor by means of lots of examples so as to lead to a more comprehensive understanding of pragmatic effects in English humor.
The cooperative principle in verbal humor
English verbal humor very often appears in the violation of cooperative principle. Cooperative principle contains four maxims. The violation of every maxim in
Links of London best English verbal humor will be discussed as follows.
Humor created by violating the maxim of quantity
The violation of maxim of quantity contains two situations: one is that the utterance doesn’t contain sufficient information needed by the hearer. The other is
Links London Watches that the utterance contains too much information.
(18)A woman telephoned an airline in New York and asked, “How long does it take to fly to Los Angeles?”
The clerk said, “Just a minute.” “Thank you.” said the woman, and hung up. (Xiao 25)
In this story, the clerk wanted to tell the woman to hold on a moment and he would check the information for the woman, but he didn’t give
Links of London sufficient information. As a result, the woman misunderstood the meaning of “Just a minute.”, and she thought the clerk told her it only needs one minute to fly to Los Angeles.
(19)I become somewhat excited at my son’s school football games. One night when he made a particular good tackle, I punched the person next to me and loudly proclaimed, “That’s my son who made that tackle.”
“I know,” she replied, “He is my son, too.” (Xiao 25)
In this piece of humor, the speaker offered more information than required. We can see the hearer is the wife of the speaker. So when the
Links rings speaker said, “He is my son” in fact, it’s unnecessary to say this. The hearer said humorously, “He is my son, too.”
Humor created by violating the maxim of quality
The maxim of quality requires that the speaker should tell the truth and not say something lack of evidence. However, sometimes in order to get a humorous
Links of London sweetie effect, people may use metaphor, exaggeration, irony, self-contradictory or some other techniques to say something that is not true. At this time, we say the maxim of quality is violated.
(20) Two travelers arrived at the hotel and were shown a rather dingy room.
“What does this pigsty cost?” One said.
Promptly the proprietor replied: “for one pig two dollars, for two pigs three dollars.”(Live 53)
It is inappropriate to say a dingy room is a pigsty. The traveler violated the maxims of quality firstly. His utterance is a metaphor. The proprietor also used a metaphor to refute the speaker. The two witty metaphors bring out humor.
(21) “My new year’s resolution is to stop correcting people.”
“If you can stick to a resolution, you
Links of London bracelets will have more power than me.”
“More power than I.” (Live 53)
In this story, the speaker’s resolution is to stop correcting people, but when the hearer made a mistake in his utterance, the speaker made correction at once. The speaker’s utterance obviously disobeys his own willing. It is self-contradictory, and thus humor occurs.
Humor created by violating the maxim of relation
The maxim of relation requires the utterance must be relevant with the subject. To communicate successfully, the communicators have to make
Links of London stores their conversation relevant. Otherwise, their conversation will be blocked or even stopped, and sometimes it also brings out humor. Here are some cases: