论文总字数：33823字

摘 要

1. Introduction 1

1.1 Research background 1

1.2 Need of the study 1

1.3 Research purposes and significance 2

1.4 Outline of the study 2

2. Literature Review 4

2.1 Definitions of euphemism 4

2.2 Classifications of euphemism 4

2.3 Politeness Principle 5

2.4 Previous studies of euphemism 6

2.5 Previous studies of Politeness Principle 7

2.6 Research gap 7

3. Research Methodology 9

3.1 Research questions 9

3.2 Research design 9

3.3 Data collection 9

3.4 Data Analysis 10

4. Results and Discussion 11

4.1 Euphemisms about death embodying Tact Maxim 11

4.2 Euphemisms about sex emdodying Tact Maxim 12

4.3 Euphemisms about refusal embodying Agreement and Sympathy Maxim 12

4.4 Euphemisms about political words embodying none of maxims of PP 13

4.5 Euphemisms about abusive words embodying Approbation and Tact Maxim 14

4.6 Discussion 15

5. Conclusion 17

5.1 Major findings 17

5.2 Implications 18

5.3 Limitations of this study and suggestions for future research 18

References 19

Acknowledgments

First of all, I would like to thank my supervisor, Professor. SunLi sincerely. From the topic selection to thesis writing, she has given me a vital guidance. Her professional knowledge and some valuable suggestions provided essential help for my thesis writing.

Next, I would like to express my gratitude to the professors in the School of Foreign Languages and Literature in Nanjing Tech University. They shared their professional knowledge selflessly, which broadens my horizon and improves my English writing, so I can finish my thesis writing.

Last but not least, I want to thank my friends and my families who gave me care and support during my thesis writing and made a great contribution to the completion of it.

Abstract

Euphemism is a linguistic and cultural phenomenon that occurs in the process of people's communication. In modern society, people are more and more inseparable from the use of euphemism. Many Chinese and foreign scholars have studied euphemism and achieved fruitful achievements. Although many scholars have analyzed euphemism from the perspective of pragmatics, but what is the exact relationship between euphemism and Politeness Principle? Therefore, this study aims to answer this research question:Which maxims of Politeness Principle are embodied in the English euphemisms?

In this study, the euphemisms in the movie Forrest Gump are used as data. They are divided into five categories: death, sex, refusal, political words and abusive words, and then I use the six maxims of Politeness Principle to analyze them one by one.

The main findings of this study are as follows:

1. The euphemisms in Forrest Gumpembody the maxims of Tact Maxim, Approbation Maxim,Agreement Maxim and Sympathy Maxim, but the Generosity Maxims and Modesty Maxim are not embodied. This is related to the characteristics of the research materials, but also to the relationship between the Tact Maxim and Generosity Maxim, Approbation Maxim and Modesty Maxim. Because they complement each other, it is difficult to be reflected at the same time.

2. The use of euphemisms does not mustembody the six maxims of Politeness Principles. For example, euphemisms about political words do not match the maxims of Politeness Principle.

The theoretical implications of this study is to find that the study of euphemism should be placed in a specific context. The majority of euphemisms in Forrest Gump can not be seen as euphemisms when viewed alone, but they belong to euphemisms when placed in a specific context. The teaching implications of this study is that English teaching should pay attention to the study of euphemism, and at the same time, it should connect euphemism with the cultural connotation behind it, so that students can learn

euphemism better and make their English expression more authentic.

Keywords:Euphemism; Politeness Principle; Forrest Gump

中文摘要

委婉语是人们交际过程中产生的一个语言和文化现象。在现代社会，人们越来越离不开委婉语的使用。很多中外学者都对委婉语进行了研究并取得了丰硕的成果。尽管有不少学者从语用学的角度去分析委婉语，但是，委婉语和礼貌原则的关系究竟是怎样的？因此，本研究旨在回答一个问题：委婉语的使用，体现了礼貌原则里的哪些准则？

本研究采取电影《阿甘正传》里的委婉语作为研究材料。将委婉语分成五类，分别是：死亡、性、拒绝、政治性词汇和辱骂性词汇，再用礼貌原则的六大准则一一对它们进行分析。

本研究主要发现如下：

1. 《阿甘正传》里的委婉语体现了礼貌原则中的得体准则、赞誉准则、一致准则和同情准则，而没有体现慷慨准则和谦逊准则。这与研究材料的特点有关，也与得体准则和慷慨准则之间，赞誉准则和谦逊准则之间的关系有关。因为它们两两互补，所以很难同时得到体现。
2. 委婉语的使用并非全都符合礼貌原则的六项准则。比如关于关于政治性词语的委婉语就与礼貌原则的准则不相匹配。

本研究的理论意义是发现委婉语的研究要放在特定语境中。《阿甘正传》中绝大多数的委婉语如果单独来看并看不出属于委婉语，但置于特定语境就属于委婉语范畴。本研究的教学意义是英语教学要重视委婉语的学习，同时要将委婉语与其背后的文化内涵意义相联系，从而能使学生更好地学习委婉语，使他们的英语表达更地道。

关键词：委婉语；礼貌原则；阿甘正传

1. Introduction

1.1 Research background

Euphemism is not only a common linguistic phenomenon, but a cultural phenomenon in our daily life. It plays an important role in daily communication, we use euphemism to avoid talking about taboos, to express our feelings indirectly, and to save face in some embarrassing situations. In modern society, nobody can deny that euphemism has become an indispensable part in their communicative activities.

Many studies have been made about euphemism, such as the usage of euphemism in public situation, like politics and business, the comparison of euphemism between west and east, and the analysis of euphemism from pragmatic perspective. Nevertheless, when other scholars made pragmatics analysis on euphemism, they were inclined to emphasize the violation of Cooperative Principle that was put forward by American linguistic philosopher Grice in 1975. There is no doubt that we use euphemism for politeness, so the use of euphemism must follow Politeness Principle. The limitation is that previous studies did not point out clearly that euphemism follows which maxims of Politeness Principle. Therefore, this thesis is aimed at the analysis of English euphemisms from the perspective of Politeness Principle, and the data is the dialogue of the movie Forrest Gump.

1.2 Need of the study

Making clear which maxims of Politeness Principle are embodied in the English euphemisms is meaningful for academic research and English study. First, it helps us to have a deeper understanding of English euphemisms. If we use Politeness Principle to analyze English euphemisms, we can clearly know the function of euphemism and understand the importance of them. In other words, we can know why it is polite to use euphemism in some particular situations. Second, it helps English learners to use euphemism more accurately in their English study. When we speak or write in English,

we seldom use euphemism, we may just speak or write everything directly. The present study analyzes euphemism from the perspective of Politeness Principle, which leads English learners to use euphemism more frequently and accurately so that their expression will become more and more authentic. Last but not least, we can learn English culture from the study of English euphemisms and cultivate the cross-culture awareness. Because both the Politeness Principle and movie Forrest Gump belong to Western culture, so there exists a cultural difference between west and east. For example, in Chinese culture, people always tend to behave humbly when they are praised, while in Western culture, it is more reasonable to accept the compliments from others naturally. Therefore the analysis of English euphemisms from theperspective of Politeness Principle will help English learners to know the cultural background of English euphemisms and help them to learn more about English culture.

1.3 Research purposes and significance

This thesis is aimed to investigate which maxims of Politeness Principle are embodied in the English euphemisms. In other words, this study aims to make clearthe relationship between English euphemisms and Politeness Principle. Through the analysis of euphemism from the perspective of Politeness Principle, we can have a clearer understanding of the relationship between them. This thesis can also help us understand the functions and meanings of euphemism, which can bring some inspirations to euphemism teaching.

1.4 Outline of the study

This thesis falls into five chapters. Chapter one gives an general introduction of euphemism, the need of study, research purposes and significance, and outline of the study. In chapter two, definitions and previous studies of euphemism and Politeness Principle are to be reviewed. Chapter three is about the research methodology of the study, including research questions, research design, data collection and data analysis. Chapter four serves as the main body of this thesis, which is result of the analysis, also

including the discussion of the result. Chapter five is the conclusion of the thesis, giving the major findings, the implications and limitations of this study and suggestions for future research.

2. Literature Review

2.1 Definitions of euphemism

There are lots of definitions about euphemism. According to Wikipedia, an euphemism is a generally harmless word, name, or phrase that substitutes an offensive of suggestive one. Some euphemisms intend to amuse, while others intend to give positive appearances to negative events or even mislead entirely. Euphemism also often take the place of profanity.

According to Webster's Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language, an euphemism is the substitution of a mild, indirect, or vague expression for one thought substituted.

According to Oxford Advanced Learner's English-Chinese Dictionary, an euphemism is the use of pleasant, mild or indirect phrases in place of more accurate or direct ones.

In this thesis,euphemism means an indirect and mild expression, which substitutes some offensive and direct words. If the speaker say something in another indirect way, I will consider the speaker used euphemisms.

2.2 Classifications of euphemism

Hugh Rawson (1981) divided the euphemism from the perspective of semantics into two categories: positive euphemisms and negative euphemisms. Positive euphemisms refer to the beautification of semantic, the description of something indecent or poor to something decent and good, such as “senior citizen” , “sanitary engineer”. While negative euphemisms refers to weakened semantic. For example, in ancient China, people call their children as “quan zi” to other people.

According to the content of euphemism, Cai Xiao yan (2014) think euphemism can be divided into these categories: god, sex, body parts, excretion, death, disease, war, diplomatic decree, etc.

In this thesis, I classify the euphemisms of Forest Gump according to their contents, and I divide them into five categories: death, sex, refusal, political words, and abusive words

2.3 Politeness Principle

In 1983, G.Leech put forward the Politeness Principle(PP). It includes six maxims that are stated below. The "self" in the maxims will normally be identified with speaker and "other" will be generally identified with hearer.

1. Tact Maxim

a. Minimize cost to other.

b. Maximize benefit to other.

Tact Maxim means that the words of both sides of communication should reduce the information that is harmful to others, try to conform to others’ habits and psychology, and do not make others feel uncomfortable.

1. Generosity Maxim

a. Minimize benefit to self.

b. Maximize cost to self.

Generosity Maxim means that the words of both parties should reduce the information that is beneficial to themselves, and try to let the other party get favorable information in the conversation.

(3)Approbation Maxim

a. Minimize dispraise of other.

b.Maximize praise of other.

Approbation Maxim refers to avoid belittling the other party in the verbal communication behavior and try to praise the other party more.

(4)Modesty Maxim

a. Minimize praise of self.

b. Maximize dispraise of self.

Modesty Maxim means that trying to maintain a humble attitude in verbal communication, trying to be humble in self-evaluation. Do not exaggerate self-strengths and ignore or cover up self-weaknesses.

(5)Agreement Maxim

a. Minimize disagreement between self and other.

b. Maximize agreement between self and other.

Agreement Maxim means that in verbal communication, we should try to reduce the differences with the other party as much as possible, and try to get closer to the other party ’s views on non-principle issues to increase consistency.

(6)Sympathy Maxim

a. Minimize antipathy between self and other.

b. Maximize sympathy between self and other.

Sympathy Maxim means that both communicating parties should reduce their emotional confrontation with each other and increase their mutual understanding as much as possible.

2.4 Previous studies of euphemism

Many scholars have make researches on euphemism from different perspectives. Narmina. F. A (2015) studied the main functions of euphemism in modern society. He believed that the demand for euphemism as a polite means is gradually disappearing. Instead, the need of to cover up the cruel reality of modern life with euphemism is increasing. As long as there is poverty, war and economic turmoil in the world, euphemism will always exist. Shan Cheng(2019) also studied euphemism in modern western society, in recent decades, more and more English euphemisms appeared, involving almost all aspects of modern life, but excessive euphemism will also affect people’s communication,we need to master the appropriate method of using euphemisms. However, Yi Luyang(2017)point out that: “Euphemism is a variation form of the general language produced to comply with the principle of communication and violate of the cooperative principles”. In other words, although euphemism violate the Cooperative Principle, it can reduce the negative association and uncomfortable feelings of people, which is closely relevant to politeness.

2.5 Previous studies of Politeness Principle

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