吉林大学硕士学位论文

meanings, characteristics of the euphemistic items one by one. While traditional western scholars’ studies on euphemism were only restricted to the level of lexicon, D. Bolinger, an American linguist, broke down the limitation. He (1981: 148) pointed out: “There are grammatical ways of toning something down without actually changing the content of the message.” Under the influence of his theory, the grammatical ways to form euphemism such as negation, tense, voice, and mood have been paid attention to. Neaman and Silver (1983: 1) gave more precise

account of euphemism in their famous book—Kind Word: A Thesaurus of Euphemisms, “Euphemizing is generally defined as substituting an inoffensive or pleasant term for a more explicit, offensive one, thereby veneering the truth by using kind words.” They not only provided detailed interpretation of the euphemistic items, but also advanced a diachronic standpoint to study euphemism and culture: “What subjects and what portions of them were acceptable or forbidden have varied both from culture to culture and from one historical period to another within a single culture” (ibid: 167). D. J. Enright’s Fair of Speech: the Uses of Euphemism (1985) is a collection of many pieces of essays, and each discusses the use of euphemism in some specific domain. The

comprehensive presentation of the book is valuable for further studies on euphemism. According to Allan and Burridge, euphemism is defined with reference to concerns about face. They claimed in their famous book Euphemism and Dysphemism (1991), “A euphemism is used as an

alternative to a dispreferred expression, in order to avoid possible loss of吉林大学硕士学位论文 4

定芳) published his “New Investigation on Euphemism” in Foreign Languages. In this paper he enlarged the study scope of euphemism by applying pragmatic theories, and proposed three constructing principles—distant, relevant and sweet-sounding principle. The

Interpretive Capacity of the Theory of Fuzzy Linguistic Shown by the Devices of Euphemism was written by Wu Tieping (伍铁平) in 19. In this paper, professor Wu revealed that fuzziness (vagueness) is one important feature of euphemism.

Euphemistic expressions are ubiquitous and commonly used in

different languages as linguistic and cultural phenomena. Enright (1985: 29) told us “A language without euphemisms world would be a defective instrument of communication.” And Hugh Rawson (1981: 1) asserted, “Euphemisms have very serious reasons for existing. They conceal the things people fear the most—death, the dead, the supernatural. They cover up the facts of life—of sex and reproduction and

excretion—which inevitably remind even the most refined people that

they are made of clay, or worse. Euphemisms are beloved by individuals and institutions (governments, especially) that are anxious to present only the handsomest possible images of them to the world. Euphemisms are embedded so deeply in our language that few of us, even those who pride themselves on being plain-spoken, even get through a day without using them.”

The studies of the previous scholars have provided us with

abundant and solid theoretical basis for our further work on euphemism.吉林大学硕士学位论文 3

face or, through giving offence, that of the audience, or of some third party.” This book is very helpful to the study of euphemism from

pragmatic perspective. Beatrice Warren put forward such a definition of euphemism from the interpersonal communicative point of view in 1992: “We have a euphemism if the interpreter perceives the use of some words or expressions as evidence of wish on the part of the speaker to denote some sensitive phenomenon in a tactful and/or veiled manner”. In China, Chinese euphemistic expressions have existed since

ancient times, but scientific and systematic studies have been done from 1970s. Chen Wangdao(陈望道) was the first person who proposed a

definition of euphemism in 《修辞学发凡》 in 1979, “委婉是修辞的 一种，即说话不直白本意，只用委曲含蓄的话来烘托暗示”. Wang Xijie (王希杰) and Tang Songbo (唐松波) also gave us the definitions of euphemism, and the details will be introduced in 3.1. Kong Qingcheng

(孔庆成) asserted in 1993, “我们试着给 ‘委婉’ 下一个定义: 语言使 用者考虑到社会文化、社会心理等因素,为了避免对听者造成伤害, 通过使用一个礼貌的表达法及其他语言手段来代替一个直接的、普 通的说法.” Zhang Zhigong (张志公) researched euphemism in the scope of lexicology in 1980s. Chen Yuan（陈原）brought the study of euphemism into the category of sociolinguistics in his book《社会语言 学 》 (1983). The profound historical, social and psychological background of euphemism is discussed. The detailed interpretation of

the Chinese euphemized items could be looked up in《汉语委婉语词典》 edited by Zhang Gonggui (张拱贵) in 1986. In 19 Shu Dingfang (束1 吉林大学硕士学位论文 5

1.2 Central Ideas of the Thesis

Culture influences language by way of symbols and rules as well as our perceptions of the universe. Hartwell (1982: 316) asserted, “Euphemisms are a natural part of the social world of words.

Euphemisms, in fact, tell us a good deal about the values of a culture, for words in sensitive areas tend to pick up negative connotations and to be replaced by euphemisms.” When people from different cultures

communicate with euphemisms, they often misunderstand each other

and do not reach their expected goals in communication because they usually use their native cultural norms and social conventions as criteria to interpret and value their counterparts’ words. Therefore, a

comparative study on English and Chinese euphemism is valuable for cross-cultural communication, translating activities, foreign language teaching and learning, and so on.

This thesis focuses on a comparative study of English and Chinese euphemisms from the aspects of their definitions, formational devices, cultural and social values, and concludes that there exist much more differences than similarities between them since people from different cultures have different social conventions, cultural orientations and values, religious beliefs, life styles and customs and so on. Hence, to increase the awareness of cultural differences in the use of euphemisms is significant for communicators so that they can avoid culture conflicts and be successful in cross-cultural communication.

This dissertation consists of five chapters. Chapter one introduces吉林大学硕士学位论文