淺談老友記中的模糊用語

1、 外國語學(xué)院本科生畢業(yè)論文（設(shè)計(jì)）題 目 research on vague expressions in friends學(xué) 院 外 國 語 學(xué) 院 專 業(yè) 英語專業(yè)(第二學(xué)位) 學(xué)生姓名 張茜茹 學(xué) 號(hào) 2014141211109 年級(jí) 2014 級(jí) 指導(dǎo)教師 余 黎 教務(wù)處制表二一八 年 四 月 十三 日淺談老友記中的模糊用語英語專業(yè)（第二學(xué)位）學(xué)生 張茜茹 指導(dǎo)教師 余黎“模糊性”作為自然語言的基本特征在口頭交流期間一直發(fā)揮著至關(guān)重要的作用。根據(jù)語料庫語言學(xué)理論，我們將老友記全十季的所有臺(tái)詞作為我們的研究對(duì)象。我們可以稱其為一個(gè)迷你語料庫。老友記作為一部情景喜劇其中的對(duì)話都是非正式的。本

2、文不僅對(duì)老友記中模糊語的生成方法、語用功能進(jìn)行定性分析，并且運(yùn)用統(tǒng)計(jì)軟件對(duì)劇中類型模糊語出現(xiàn)的時(shí)間數(shù)量進(jìn)行統(tǒng)計(jì)與分析。研究過程如下：首先從兩個(gè)方面對(duì)模糊表達(dá)的生成方法進(jìn)行了分析“詞義范圍模糊”和“模糊限制語”，并獲得了統(tǒng)計(jì)數(shù)據(jù)。然后我們將模糊表達(dá)分為六類：頻率模糊語、人稱模糊語、數(shù)量模糊語、表可能性的模糊語、表能動(dòng)性的模糊語和表不確定性的模糊語（上面已經(jīng)討論過2個(gè)類別。）我們通過統(tǒng)計(jì)軟件得到了每一類模糊語中每個(gè)詞的出現(xiàn)次數(shù)的數(shù)據(jù)。這可以幫助我們更好地理解老友記中的臺(tái)詞。劇中出現(xiàn)次數(shù)超過500的模糊語有很多，比如"something", "thing(s)"

3、;, "stuff", "anything", "maybe", "about", "around", "like", "i think", "i know", "i mean", "some", "little"等等。有了這些統(tǒng)計(jì)資料，人們?cè)趯W(xué)習(xí)老友記的臺(tái)詞的同時(shí)就會(huì)更加關(guān)注模糊用語，還可以為語用學(xué)的進(jìn)一步研究提供數(shù)據(jù)。此外，本文討論了語用模糊所起的積極作用和消極作用。語用模

4、糊在人們的口頭交流中起著重要的作用。作者旨在對(duì)老友記這部經(jīng)典情景喜劇的解讀和對(duì)模糊用語的理解有所幫助。最后，作者希望本文的研究能為老友記中模糊用語的翻譯提供一些有益的參考。關(guān)鍵詞：模糊語；語用模糊；老友記；數(shù)據(jù)；作用abstract"vagueness", as a basic attribute of natural language, plays an important role in verbal communication.based on the corpus linguistics theory, the author will use the speech

5、conversations in friends for the whole ten seasons as a research pair. we can call it a small corpus. friends as a sitcom, of which words are informal speech conversations.this article not only qualitatively analyzes the mode of production and pragmatic functions of the vague language in the dialogu

6、e of friends, and using a statistical software-antconc3.2.2, developed by laurence anthony on friends, the statistics and analysis of the number of occurrences of different kinds of vague language.in the course of the study, first of all, we analyze the generation methods of vague expression from th

7、e perspectives of "scope vagueness" and "hedges". and use the software to count the number of occurrences of related words. then follow different attributes classify vague language into six categories: vague frequency expressions, vague personal expressions, vague quantifying exp

8、ressions, vague likelihood expressions, vague modal verbs and vague indefinite expressions. (other two types are already mentioned above.) the generation and use of lingo are mentioned in statistics and analysis. ) there are many vague phrases appearing more than 500 times, such as: "something&

9、quot;, "thing(s)", "stuff", "anything", "maybe", "about", "around", "like", "i think", "i know", "i mean", "some", "little" and so on. with these statistics, people are trying to f

10、igure out when learning the lines of friends. and they will pay more attention to these vague expressions. and this can provide some data for further research on pragmatics.at the same time, the author also discusses the positive and negative effects of pragmatic vagueness. pragmatic vagueness in pe

11、ople's words plays an irreplaceable role. we hope that it could shed a light on the research of pragmatic vagueness and give several implications to the interpersonal communication. moreover, the vague language in friends provides some useful references for proper translation.key words: pragmati

12、c vagueness; vague expressions; friends; statistics; functioncontentsintroduction-2part 1 literature review- 41.1 about vagueness- 41.1.1 nature of vagueness-41.1.2 definition of vagueness-41.1.3 vagueness and ambiguity-51.2 pragmatic vagueness in daily communication-51.2.1 the necessity of pragmati

13、c vagueness research-5part 2 research ideas and methods-7 2.1 research ideas-7 2.1.1 statement of the problem-72.1.2 research methods-72.1.3 introduction of corpus-72.1.4 features of corpus-7 2.2 significance of research-8 2.3 paper structure-8part 3 vague expressions research on friends-9 3.1 resea

14、rch on vague expressions generation-9 3.1.1 scope vagueness-9 3.1.2 hedges-12 3.2 classification of vague expressions-13 3.2.1 vague frequency expressions-13 3.2.2 vague personal expressions-14 3.2.3 vague quantifying expressions-14 3.2.4 vague likelihood expressions-14 3.2.5 vague modal verbs-15 3.

15、2.6 vague indefinite expressions-15part 4 function of vague expressions-17 4.1 positive effects-17 4.2 negative effects-18part 5 conclusion-19bibliography-20acknowledgements-21introductionas we all know, the definition of vagueness is still different and there is still no agreement. this article wil

16、l study the perspective is located on the fuzzy pragmatic level, namely, pragmatic ambiguity. how can the best communication be presented? are you using it precisely? this article will give a negative answer. on the one hand, the use of "vagueness" in real people-to-person communication is

17、 a ubiquitous and inevitable phenomenon. in fact, there are numerous expressions of vagueness in the real world. all of us (including those who talk about perfection and can't make a difference) are all frequently or unconsciously using vague words and vague techniques. many philosophers like pl

18、ato, descartes, hume, and russell all believe that all language expressions are more or less applied to “vagueness”. bertrand russel (1918/1985) even stated that all languages are vague to some extents, and many times the use of “vagueness” is exactly what the speaker is aware of when trying to expr

19、ess accuracy. he believes that the description words of color, such as "red," are vague, and he also mentioned that the same "vagueness" even exists in some measurement results, such as the description of "temperature" and "length." although accuracy is one of

20、 the most important features of scientific terms, he still believes that the descriptions of “temperature” and “l(fā)ength” are vague, because neither the “temperature” nor the “l(fā)ength” measurement can achieve absolute accuracy, and all measurements will be due to humans. there are certain errors in its

21、 own limitations (russell, 1923: 86), and there are few natural language words that contain only one layer of meaning, and the words convey much more than the words themselves. for example: ross:“hi.” joey: “this guy says hello, i want to kill myself.” this is the conversation between ross and joey

22、in friends. joey's answer cleverly used “vagueness”. he said that he wanted to commit suicide when he heard ross said hello, which means saying hello by ross brings dissatisfaction. there is sometimes a difference between what people are saying and what they say, even the opposite. for example,

23、one person borrowed a friend's book, and when the book was returned, the book was sketched in a mess, a friend might say: "my book is much cleaner than it was."on the other hand, in the real life, the role of vagueness is no less precise than precision. regardless of politicians, busin

24、ess people, advertising planners, poets and writers all have "vague" discourse thinking. also, using "vagueness" cleverly to convey information can reflect individual capabilities to some extent. for example:(1)q: mr. president, on russia. is the vladimir putin who said the unite

25、d states is undermining global security and provoking a new arms race the same vladimir putin whose soul you looked into and found to be trustworthy? has he changed? are u.s.-russian relations deteriorating?the president: i think the person who i was referring to in 2001 is the same strong-willed pe

26、rson. he is a person with who i have had agreements and disagreements throughout the course of my presidency and histheres a lot we can work together on, and thats whats important for american people to understand. we know that weve got common goals that make sense for both peoples so theres its a c

27、omplicated relationship. its a relationship in which there are many disagreements, but theres also a relationship in which we can find common ground to solve problems. and thats the spiritthats the spirit ill continue to work with vladimir putin on. (http:/www.white ) the above dialogue, th

28、e reporters question, asked about the relationship between vladimir putin, the former russian president, and the united states and russia. all questions just need to be answered with “yes” or “no”, but bush did not give a positive or negative answer. because as a politician, a high degree of politic

29、al sensitivity tells that it will make him look like unreasonable, and it seems that he is indifferent to us-russian relations. in the end he used a pragmatic vague strategy. for the first question, he used the vague terms “i think”, “the same”, and “strong-minded”. not only did he properly circumve

30、nt the risks involved in the response to the problem, he praised putin subtly. but compared to putin, bush paid more attention to the relationship between the united states and russia. he cited a large amount of data to reveal that the "same" between the united states and russia is much gr

31、eater than that of "difference", and "same" is much more important than "difference". why use "a lot" to describe the "same" between the two countries and the "many" to describe the "difference" existing in the two countries? the

32、nuance between these two words are also the result of carefully selected vague words. channell (2000) believes that the use of vague language is not all good, nor is it all bad.the key lies in how the vague language can be used reasonably. jakobson said that in the language used for communication, i

33、t can be appropriate. it is very important to use pragmatic vagueness.the generation of vagueness is sometimes the conscious speech exchange of speech participants, resulting in a specific context for a specific purpose. here's a typical example of pragmatic vagueness:(2)theres nearly no people

34、in the canteen.many people see this sentence at first glance will take it for granted as a statement of fact. but actually it is very likely that it is the speaker's intention to convey the request that “its the time we have lunch.” or“we should go to the canteen now to have lunch. ” without a s

35、pecific context, nor the correct understanding of the listener, one cannot confirm what the speaker wants to convey. but there are at least two options, namely "statements" and "requests."but more often, the existence of vagueness is due to the existence of a considerable amount

36、of vague language. some are because of the existence of scope vagueness, while others are a result of hedges. according to attributes, vague words can be divided into different categories. we will discuss this in detail in the following parts.part 1 literature review1.1 about vagueness1.1.1 nature o

37、f vaguenessin the use of language, blurring and accuracy are equally important. although previous people have done a lot of research on it. however, no agreement has been reached so far. scholars have different opinions about vagueness, so it is necessary to make a thorough study of the vagueness fr

38、om different perspectives. here we describe the nature of the fuzziness to facilitate the reader to correctly understand of vagueness.vagueness is one of the most important features of natural language. many scholars have paid attention to it. channell (2000:5) points out that the use of vague langu

39、age has drawn attention in several fields: literary criticism, language science, philosophy and psychology. scholars unanimously believe that vagueness is used in a large number of languages and therefore a complete set linguistic theories must cover vagueness.however, there are two different views

40、on the use of vague language. one thinks that vague language is the negative aspect of language, who emphasizes that language must be precise. the other one thinks that the existence of vague language is positive, and is also conducive to the smooth conduct of verbal communication.kit fine (1975: 26

41、8) thought that vagueness is a flaw in language. he described it as “defects of meaning”. many scholars also agree with this view of him.ullmann proposed an important aspect of vagueness, that "if we carefully observe the vague language, you will find that the language itself is vague”. the sit

42、uation he mentioned is not the only source of vagueness. there are many aspects of vagueness, and many factors can lead to vagueness.crystal and davy (1975) proposed from the perspective of applied linguistics that in informal conversations, vague language is used more often. they suggested that the

43、 scope of vagueness is related to the formal degree of the occasion. if one speaks with conscious discretion, he can make the language more precise.williamson (1996) studied the vagueness of language from the perspective of cognition. he mainly studied the source of vagueness. from a cognitive persp

44、ective, vagueness reflects that human knowledge is limited. and it is impossible to make everyone's point of view consistent. he also pointed out that words used to describe “vagueness” is vague itself.although there is no conclusion on whether the existence of vague language is good or bad, all

45、 the research on vague language are meaningful.1.1.2 definition of vagueness many scholars have studied the vagueness of language, but different people do not view the perspective of vagueness in the same way. thats why the definition of vagueness has so far failed to reach an agreement.charles. s.

46、pierce, is considered to be the first person to define vagueness. he gave the vagueness in 1902 the first definition. his views have been widely recognized, and everyone thinks that he properly describes the vagueness."when there is uncertainty about the description of objective objects, this p

47、roposition is vague. fundamentally speaking, the speaker has already thought about what he wants to say before he speaks, and he already knows whether these words are rejected or accepted by the subject. the intrinsic uncertainty is not caused by the observant's neglect, but because the speaker&

48、#39;s language habits are inherently uncertain, so the description of the objective object is sometimes understood as being accepted by the proposition, and sometimes it is excluded from the proposition, but we need to understand this, and find relevant information for inference to infer the speaker

49、's speech, because these problems cannot manifest themselves in the uncertainty of the speaker's habits come out."the first scholar to study vagueness in china was professor wu tieping (1999). he defines "vagueness" in this way: many languages used for expression have no clear

50、 boundaries and are all relatively vague concepts. he pointed out that words such as some words expressing time, color, and temperature do not have very clear boundaries. other scholars, such as chen zhian, also have their own views on vagueness: “vagueness is a state in which the description of an

51、object is unclear. specifically, vague language, as the operator of the symbol, has its vagueness in the inequality between the indicated objects and a certain language symbol. (1997:16)1.1.3 vagueness and ambiguity there are countless studies on ambiguity in the field of linguistics. for ambiguity,

52、 we need to pay a certain amount of attention, because some researchers think that many examples of vagueness are ambiguous. thus, its necessary to distinguish between vagueness and ambiguity through some examples. some studies in this area are discussed below.ambiguitywhat is ambiguity? ambiguity i

53、s a common linguistic phenomenon. it means that one word in a sentence can have different meanings from different perspectives. in other words, if a sentence can be understood as two or more meanings by the listener, then this expression is ambiguous. an example is often quoted by everyone.(3) flyin

54、g planes can be dangerous. there is ambiguity in this sentence. because "flying planes" itself has two irrelevant meanings: the plane that is flying and (person) driving the plane. in other words, "flying planes" can be understood by the listener in two ways. and the meanings are clear and irrelevant. discrimination be