文献综述

英汉幽默语用分析对比基于电影《功夫熊猫》

A Comparative Pragmatic Analysis of the Humors in Kungfu Panda

1.Introduction

As a cognitive experience, humor is a special art which is able to stimulate laughter and give people entertainment. Humor is universal and everybody can use it with no limitation of people#8217;s ages or cultures. People can smile and laugh or play jokes to make something pleasant and funny when they want, thus, this behavior is regarded as being humorous. However, some of the humorous behaviors differ from region to region which are incompatible to each other. The thesis aims to analyze it from the perspective of pragmatic based on the movie Kungfu Panda. This part includes the research background and the need for the research.

1.1 Research background

In our daily life, humor plays a major role to make us feel excited and content. Life without humor is bored. In the meantime, it helps us to get self-satisfied from different realms. It help us to resist stress, to be more impressed by folks as well as leisure the talking environment and so on. On one hand, it improves our social network and boost relationship, which is considered the most significant. On the other hand, a person with humor is more likely to be mentally and physically healthy, because when we are conducting humor, our negative attitudes as well as tiredness are lightened. People with humor are more often open-minded. Of course, humor functions more than these, for instance, in advertising, in some components.

When we are in touch with American humor, we found it special as it reflects American treats being warm and cheerful as well as funny. Kungfu Panda, which is produced as a computer-animated action comedy martial arts movie, was on the American screen in 2008 with its film making company of Dream Works Animation as well as Paramount Pictures. The version of this film is based on a succession of ancient anthropomorphic talking animals and they live in a small village. The plot expands around a bumbling and lazy panda who wants to be a kung fu master. It is until the appearance of an evil kung fu warrior who has been prisoned for the whole twenty years that Po is compelled to be a final one to defeat the warrior. As a nominated comedy film, it#8217;s filled with numerous language skills, humorous characters and some delicate senses, coupled with lots of funny jokes. As a result. It#8217;s a perfect film which is worth watching and enjoying. It combines American humor style and Chinese culture which is famous as Kung Fu to make the plot more connotative and enjoyable. With funny tone, the whole movie becomes dynamic and more attractive, it seems like we are absorbing the philosophy of life without any tiredness.

1.2 Need for the study

Generally speaking, Kungfu Panda is a very famous film based on Chinese ancient talking anthropomorphic animals. When we are watching this film, it#8217;s not only the dynamic pictures, but also the combination of American cultures and Chinese cultures.

On the subject of humor, it#8217;s presented vividly in the film. The research aims to compare the application of humor in America and China based on Kungfu Panda. The author uses descriptive research, qualitative method, deductive reasoning as well as documentary research to conduct a thorough analysis from various realms.

2. Literature review

2.1. previous studies at home

In China, many academics take the consensus that humor can be categorized into a language field, also, related theories are applied into humor analysis. Wang Yan (2005) considers that humor is a language phenomenon essentially, and its effects depend on language context. She starts out from the perspective of humor-related theory trying to find the best and the most significant correlation between the understanding of humor skill and contexts. To achieve the desirable humor effects, many cognitive efforts must be paid and accustomed consumption which can bring laziness have to be overcame. Tu Jing (2007) points out that the breed of humor is from different understanding of mutual cognitive environments between two speakers. Huang Birong (2007) regards the psychological reaction which is brought from humor application as ”garden path phenomenon”, because she thinks the procession of humor understanding is a long term procedure from context consumption correlation to the growth and conversion of this correlation, demonstrating by this correlated theory, she considers there are two phases in humor understanding, the first is the ”garden path phenomenon”, the second is the ”the breaking of garden path phenomenon”. Xu Xiaoping (2005) also applies the theory of mental space to define the humor understanding. Wang Muqun (2007) analyzed how English humor use fallacy and sophistry to misinterpret elaborately language intent, he refers the special conception called ”stealing” in the application of humor. Mei Jinli (2013) considers that humor language has to possess some specific inner context to lead the speakers to generate conflicting context consumption so as to achieve humorous psychological effects. However, Wang Jinling (2004) analyzes the specific humor instance and think that the real implication of humor belongs to non-speaking knowledge and its application is limited by subjective and objective conditions. Wu Yong (2004) discussed the origin and mechanism of humor using from the perspective of ”fuzzy theory”. Zhang Yin (2008) consumes that humor is dualistic, namely, paradox of humor.

2.2. previous studies abroad

In recent years, there are tremendous theories which aim to give humor a more accurate definition and illustrate its social functions. Looking through those various theories that take attempt to explain why humor exist, three of them are considered more reasonable and acceptable: superiority theory, incongruity theory and relief theory. From Raymond Smullyan (2003) who thinks humor is very healthy and spiritual, from his perspective, humor is inexplicable. However, until now, there is no consensus about the definition of humor. Meyer, J. C (2000) suggested that humor is a double-edged sword and it functions in communication but sometimes humor is not probable. As is demonstrated by Veatch, T. C. (1998): each theory only refers to its own field and give its horizon narrowly, so instances of humor can be explained by several theories.

According to Kowstler (1993), humor is defined as a kind of communication in which a complicated amuses, mental stimulus illuminates, or triggers a stereotyped predictable response which is usually the laughter. Mcghee (1983) states that humor is something related to the mind but not the real world, and he stresses that humor is not a feature of certain events like jokes, cartoons and clowning acts neither an act such as smiling and laughing. Freud (1960) categorizes humor into three aspects: (a) wit, which is adopted to celebrate and exercise the intellect by the means of word play primarily, (b) joke, which is used to present tendentious material such as aggression and sex, and (c) humor, which is used to share the mirth enjoyment. Clearly, it is not simple to tell the three subsections from each other exactly for they frequently overlap each other in most cases. However, Palmer (1994) regards humor as everything that is able to create actual or potential fun and as the process of creating the ”fun”.