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Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1 The definition of Euphemism
Verbal communication is one of the most important methods people apply to maintain the social relationship. In order to avoid the offensiveness in communication, people usually use some polite or pleasant words to replace the rude or embarrassing ones. Therefore, euphemism emerges.
Euphemism is a common linguistic phenomenon in all cultures, it takes an very important role in people?s daily communication. Euphemism is originated from the Greek. Its prefix “eu” means good, pleasant, and its root “pheme” means speech. Thus, euphemism literally means “to speak with good words or in a pleasant manner” (Neaman and Silver, 1990:32). According to Allan and Burridge (1991:11), the definition of euphemism is: A euphemism is used as an alternative to a dispreferred expression, in order to avoid possible loss of face: either one?s own face or through going offense, that of the audience, or of some third party. Many people have defined euphemism. There are some definitions of euphemism below:
(1) mild or vague expression substituted for a harsher or more direct one. (Pocket Oxford English-Chinese Dictionary, Oxford University Press, 1996) (2) the substitution of a mild, indirect, or vague expression for one thought to be offensive, harsh or blunt. (Webster?s Dictionary of American English, Random House, Inc.1997)
(3) (an example of) the use of a more pleasant, less direct name for something thought to be unpleasant. (Longman English-Chinese Dictionary of Contempo- rary English, Longman Group UK Limited, 1988)
(4) A euphemism is a polite, pleasant, or neutral word or expression that is used to refer to something which people may find upsetting or embarrassing to talk about, for example, sex, the human body or death. (Collins Cobuild English Dictionary, SFLEP, 2000)
(5) Rhetorical trope: a pleasant replacement for an objectionable word that has
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pejorative connotations. (Routledge Dictionary of Language and Linguistics, FLERP, 2000)
In China, Chen Wangdao (1997) defined euphemism as a figure of speech in which roundabout and implicit words and expressions are used to substitute direct expressions to hint the meaning. “Weiwan (委婉)” is a figure of speech in Chinese. It is also called “wanqu (婉曲)” or “wanzhuan(婉转)”. Another figure of speech in Chinese is called “bihui (避讳)” or “huishi (讳饰)”. The combination of the figure of speech “weiwan (委婉)” and the figure of speech “bihui (避讳)” in Chinese is equivalent to the figure of speech “euphemism” in English (Li Guonan, 2001:190).
1.2The features of Euphemism
1.2.1 National characteristic
Euphemism is a common language phenomenon in the world culture. However, different countries and different nations in different surroundings and social environment have different production and living manners, and their culture depositions are also different. So euphemism in different language has some differences either. The differences are the representation of the national characteristic. There is a typical example about the word “poor”, it described an young woman who lived with hard condition. The paragraph uses several euphemisms of poor:
“I used to think I was poor. Then they told me I was not poor, I was needy. Then they said it was self-defeating to think of myself as needy, that I was culturally deprived. Then they told me deprived was a bad image, that I was underprivileged. Then they told me that underprivileged was overused, that I was disadvantaged. I still do not have a dime but I have a great vocabulary!”
Needy (lack of commodity), culturally deprived(lose the opportunity of education), underprivileged (having less money and fewer opportunities than most people in society), disadvantaged (humble). Those four words are the euphemisms for “poor” which the government used to cheat the public. 1.2.2 Regional feature
Different regions have different customs, so do the language. For instance, bread
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is a kind of daily food in British, and the phrase “take bread out of someone?s mouth” means to go off with someone?s job. And there is another example.
An Australian woman married to an American man. They spent their honeymoon in America. And one day, the couple intended to go to a party together. But the bridegroom could not find a suitable full dress. The bride took out a birthday suit that she gave him as a present a few days ago and said: “Why not wear your birthday suit?” However, the whole family were all astonished because in American English, “in one?s birthday suit” is the euphemistic expression of “naked”. So this embarrassing situation was resulted from the regional differences in euphemism. 1.2.3 Indirect and implicit
The most important feature of euphemism is indirect and implicit. The purpose of euphemism is to use some indirect expressions to avoid something that makes people unhappy. And this is the indirect character. Euphemism always gives people hints in a roundabout way. We can infer the deeper meaning and intention from the conversation.
For example:
--“Don?t you think my cooking is wonderful?” The girl asked. --“Are you fishing for compliments.” Her boy friend responded.
In the conversation above, the boyfriend not only answered the girl implicitly, and did not embarrass his girlfriend. Similarly, when someone is ill, we always say he is under the weather. If someone is mad, we say he is soft in mind. 1.2.4 Universality
Universality is something that is well-known and accepted by all of the human beings. Euphemism almost exists in every language and culture. And each language has its own taboos, such as taboos connected with sex, death, or body functions. Hence, those taboos are replaced by euphemisms. While we say someone is dead in English, we always do not use the word “die”. We prefer to use “pass away” or “kick the bucket”. 1.2.5 Humor
Using euphemisms makes the language more interesting and humorous. It helps
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the public face something cruel and the unpleasant reality freely and happily. For instance, “push up daisies” replaces “be buried”, “hare-brained” refers to “mad”. “bay window” is a substitution for “belly”, “weekend worries” for “prostitutes”, “to lose one?s lunch” for “to vomit”. Nowadays, in some families, husband is afraid of his wife, and this kind of husband is called “hen-pecked husband”. 1.2.6 Vagueness
The formation of many euphemisms are made use of the vagueness of language, it makes the meaning broader. The vagueness of euphemisms can conceal the cruel. Just like the conversation below:
Devizes: Is the pain worse?
Surtees: It is no great pain, sir. I have been to one specialist, sir? Yesterday，it is ? Devizes: He couldn?t be sure. An operation?
Surtees: Too late, he said, for that. If I had been operated on long ago, there might have been a chance.
After reading the conversation above, we may not understand what they discuss about, what do the “it” and “that” indicate. It is difficult to understand the conversation correctly. Actually, Devizes and Surtees are talking about the cancer. Since cancer makes people unhappy, they use “it” and “that” to replace it tactfully.
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