1 UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES HOÀNG THỊ XUÂN QUÝ THE LINGUISTIC DEVICES MAKING WITTINESS IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE HUMOUROUS STORIES: A STUDY OF CONTRASTIVE DISCOURSE ANALYSIS ( Các phương tiện ngôn ngữ tạo nên sự dí dỏm trong truyện hài Anh-Việt: Nghiên cứu đối chiếu phân tích diễn ngôn) *** M.A Thesis – Program 1 Field:Linguistics Code: 602215 HÀ NỘI-2012 2 UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES HOÀNG THỊ XUÂN QUÝ THE LINGUISTIC DEVICES MAKING WITTINESS IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE HUMOUROUS STORIES: A STUDY OF CONTRASTIVE DISCOURSE ANALYSIS ( Các phương tiện ngôn ngữ tạo nên sự dí dỏm trong truyện hài Anh-Việt: Nghiên cứu đối chiếu phân tích diễn ngôn) *** M.A Thesis – Program 1 Field:Linguistics Code: 602215 SUPERVISOR: NGÔ HỮU HOÀNG, Ph.D TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION I ACKNOWLEDGEMENT II LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES AND ABBREVIATIONS III TABLE OF CONTENTS IV ABSTRACT VI INTRODUCTION 1 1. Rationale 1 2.Aims of the study 5 3.Scope of the study 5 4.Method of the study 6 5.Organization of the study 6 DEVELOPMENT 7 CHAPTER 1: THE THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 7 1.1. Discourse 7 1.1.1. Definition of Discourse 7 1.1.2. Types of Discourse 8 1.2. Context 9 1.3. Humour and Its Categories 10 1.4. Overview of Humourous Stories 12 1.5. The Incongruity Theory in Humour 14 1.6. Figure of Speech as Linguistic Devices in Humourous Stories 16 1.6.1. Metaphor 16 1.6.2. Metonymy 18 CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY 20 2.1. Methodology 20 2.1.1. Data Collection 20 2.1.2. Procedure 20 2.2. Data Analysis 21 2.2.1. Metaphor 21 2.2.2 Metonymy 29 2.3. Discussion and Contrastive Findings 33 2.3.1. Discussion 33 2.3.1.1. Metaphor 33 2.3.1.2. Metonymy 34 2.3.1.3. Context in the Interpretation of Jokes in the Humourous Stories 34 2.3.2. Contrastive Findings 37 2.3.2.1. Similarities 37 2.3.2.2. Differences 37 CHAPTER 3: IMPLICATIONS OF TRANLATION AND TEACHING 39 3.1. Implications of Translation 39 3.2. Implications of Teaching 43 CONCLUSION 45 1.Major Findings 45 2.Suggestions for the Translators, Teachers and a Further Study 46 2.1. Suggestions for the Translator and Teachers 46 2.2. Suggestions for a Further Study 47 ABSTRACT Reading humourous stories is the good means of entertainment because it can help the readers to release the stress and reduce the tension. Beside the function of entertainment, humour is the special means of reaching the better things which satisfy the progressive thoughts and the lower-class‟s dream of equality. This study is aimed at investigating the figure of speech as linguistic devices in the English humourous stories and Vietnamese humourous stories. The analysis is carried out on 50 samples collected from the different books of English and Vietnamese humourous stories. The results show that there is the similarity in the using of metaphor between these two languages. Besides, Vietnamese humorous stories have the higher percentage of metonymy, comparing to English humourous stories. Context is the important element that helps the reader to understand and interpret the figure of speech in the humourous stories. Furthermore, the study offered the implications of translating and teaching so that the translator and teachers can use in their jobs. INTRODUCTION 1. Rationale It cannot be denied that humour plays an important role in the human life and the whole society because it is not only the means of entertainment but also the weapon to criticize the groups of people with the purpose of clearing away the negative attitudes, the out-date thoughts, the discrimination existing in the society. Besides, humour is the special means of reaching the better things which satisfy the progressive thoughts and the lower-class‟s dream of equality. The laughter at the specific objects with the deeply social meanings always carries the humour and exists long in the spiritual products of human beings. In the relation with the humour, the laughter is indispensable, but the humour may also include wittiness, joke, criticism, etc. About these categories, the researcher is going to mention in the next part of the study so that there is a full overview of what is investigated into. It is said that Aristot is one of the first author that investigated the nature of humour when he stated that the humour is aesthetic. However, it is necessary to note that the humour is aesthetic only when it is aimed at the specific object with the deeply social meanings. The humour was born out of hostility. If there had been no hostility in man, there had been no laughter (and, incidentally, no need for laughter). All the current humour and wittiness retain evidence of this hostile origin types. Furthermore, humour is the product of the society when people, by different means, make the laughter in the spiritual works like the HS, the play, the cartoons, the funny pictures and movies, etc. Among those types of literature, the short humourous stories (hereafter called HS) are really important in amusement by just some short sentences, and it is easy for the readers to provoke the laughter at ease to entertain or satire the negative sides of human beings or the whole society. Being different from the other types of art like cartoon, funny pictures and play; the humorous stories use the only means of language to express the laughter like the following story: Phát triển không đồng đều Buổi tối, anh thợ làm bánh mì thường dẫn người yêu ra ghế đá công viên. Có lần anh hỏi: - Em yêu, tại sao cứ nửa buổi hẹn hò là em đổi chỗ bên này qua bên kia vậy? Cô gái bẽn lẽn: - Tại vì nếu em cứ ngồi mãi một bên như vậy thì cơ thể em sẽ phát triển không đồng đều. Translated version: Develop unequally In the evening the baker often takes his girl friend to the park bench. Once he asked her: - My dear, why do you change your side after the half-date? She answered softly: - Because if I remain one side, my body would develop unequally. In the past, there were a lot of studies about the humour of scholars, humorists, philosophers and psychologists, dating back as far as Plato, Socrates and Aristotle, to Darwin and Freud, Eastman and Pittington, through to Koestler and Midess; plus more than 100 theories of humour and laughter, some of them brilliant investigations into the social and behavioral nature of humour and laughter. According to the standard analysis of Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (internet 23), humor theories can be classified into three neatly identifiable groups: the incongruity, superiority, and relief theories. Incongruity theory is the leading approach and includes historical figures such as Immanuel Kant, Soren Kierkegaard, and perhaps has its origins in comments made by Aristotle in the Rhetoric. The paradigmatic superiority theorist is Thomas Hobbes (1958: c.8, internet 5), who said that humor arises from a “sudden glory” felt when we recognize our supremacy over others. Plato and Aristotle are generally considered superiority theorists, who emphasized the aggressive feelings that fuel humor. The third group, relief theory, is typically associated with Sigmund Freud and Herbert Spencer, who saw humor as fundamentally a way to release or save energy generated by repression. Today, there are two well-known linguistics as Salvatore Attardo and Victor Raskin with Script-Based Semantic Theory Of Humour (SSTH) and The General Theory Of Verbal Humour (GTVH) respectively. The main hypothesis is quoted by Avro Krikman (2006:31, internet 7) as follows: SSTH is the theory refers to a text which can be characterized as a single-joke- carrying text if both of the conditions are satisfied. The text is compatible, fully or in part, with two different scripts. The two scripts with the text is compatible are opposite in a special sense defined in section 4. The two scripts with which the text is compatible are said to overlap fully or in part on this text. GTVH is presented as a theory that allows us to relate perceived differences between jokes to six hierarchically ordered Knowledge Resources (parameters), namely knowledge concerning Language; Narrative Strategies; Target(s); Situation; Logical Mechanism(s); Script Opposition(s). The investigation of the linguistic devices making the wittiness by discourse analysis is a large field that was implemented by the linguistics in the world. Generally, this matter is investigated and explored long before by many people in the field of language. However, everything seems to be different in Vietnam because the study of humour is less and the study by discourse analysis, especially the professional and contrastive one of English humourous stories and Vietnamese humourous stories (hereafter called EHS and VHS respectively). Let‟s begin with Vũ Ngọc Khánh who presented us the book named Hành Trình Vào Xứ Sở Cười (translation: The Journey to the Land of Laughter) in 1996. He gave us the overview of VHS, including the folklores and the scholar-styled literatures on the aspects of time and space. During the history, Vũ Ngọc Khánh (1996:7) claimed that from the 17 th century, VHS has developed with the appearance of Trạng Quỳnh collection whose the objects to be laughed at were the king, officials, Gods and Budda, monks, traders, etc. Also from this century, we have had other scholar-styled authors like Nguyễn Bá Lân or Nguyễn Cư Trinh, and in the modern time there are Tú Mỡ, Tú Xương, Vũ Trọng Phụng, Nguyễn Công Hoan, Bút Tre, etc. About the aspect of space, he stated that the humour is created by people in the specific lands like Vĩnh Hoàng village, Đông Anh villages, Hòa Làng villages (Vũ Ngọc Khánh, 1996, p.54). One more point in his book is that he introduced us the linguistic uses for making laughter, including puns, slang and bad language. We can find the words having the co-equal meanings as follows: ‘Lên phố Mía gặp cô hàng mật, cầm tay kéo lại, hỏi thăm đường’ (Translated version: Downtown to Sugarcane street, see Miss. Treacle, ask her the direction). Another author should be mentioned is Nguyễn Hoàng Yến when he discovered the pragmatic mechanism through the disseration: „ Truyện Cười Dân Gian Việt Nam Dưới Góc Độ Dụng Học‟ (The Vietnamese Folklores: A Study of Pragmatics). Based on the cooperation principles of Grice Maxim, politeness principles, reference and implicature, Nguyễn Hoàng Yến (2011: 110) found out that implicatures in conversation appeared at the closings of the stories and played the substantial role in making laughter. The implicatures of the opening and the body is the only cause and condition for the closings and the lessons of morality would be from such implicatures. Nguyễn Thị Hồng Nhung is the author of the master thesis: ‘Implicature in English and Vietnamese funny stories’. In this study, she discovered both languages have the same implicature mechanism based on flouting or violating the maxims that are important for the writers in order to evoke feelings and reactions in their readers (Nguyễn Thị Hồng Nhung, 2010, p.37). It can be seen that there have not been any study of HS under discourse analysis and contrastive between English and Vietnamese implemented before by any researchers in Vietnam, so the author of this study believes that this would be the first time this subject is carried out and hopes that it would be new approach to the humour under discourse analysis in Vietnam as well as to the literature of which HS are the object of the study. In addition, the study would be helpful for the translators to be good at their translation from English and Vietnamese and vice verse because when reading the literature works, in terms of the discourse analysis views, the readers not only understand the humour mechanism, the linguistic devices, the nature of humour, etc but also are supplied with the knowledge of language, people characteristics, attitudes and thoughts of the culture the stories belong to. Besides, the study also is necessary for the teachers in their jobs because it is said that the successful teacher need to have good sense of humour. Through the study, the knowledge would be helpful for them to tell the jokes in the appropriate time to be the warm-up activities. 2. Aims of the study - In the study, the researcher investigates the figure of speech as linguistic devices making the wittiness and then help us to understand/explain why people laugh when reading EHS and VHS. - The role of context in the HS, then readers can understand the jokes by the context when reading them. - To provide implications for the translators to understand the jokes in the stories and have good interpretation with the right transfer. Besides, it is necessary to tell HS in language teaching, then the students can be supplied with language knowledge, cultures and motivated in learning, warm-up activities and release their study tension. 3. Scope of the study The types of humour can be cartoons, funny pictures, plays, etc. However, this study is limited to the verbal humour. The object of research is the EHS and VHS. This research is limited to investigate the figure of speech as the linguistic devices like metaphor, metonymy and others which make the wittiness in the selected EHS and VHS 4. Method of the study By means of quantitative method, the investigation is carried out through text analysis, previous researches, individual analysis and observations. Data are gathered in the books collection of EHS and VHS. Based on the collected books, the samples shall be sorted out in terms of the figure of speech as linguistics devices and types of the theory of humour. 5. Organization of the study There are three main parts in the study as follows: Introduction This part includes rationale, aims of the study, scope of the study, organization and methods of the study. Development Chapter 1: The Theoretical Background. [...]... percentages of EHS and VHS are rather equal There are the equivalent percentages of metaphor jokes, the findings indicate that both the English and the Vietnamese are fond of using metaphor as the linguistic devices in their humours stories Mrs Robinson was a teacher in a big school in a city in America She had boys and girls in her class […][1] One day, she said to the children: ‘ People in a lot of countries... of these make the ambiguity Under the hidden meaning of ambiguity, the figure of speech makes the laughter to the reader, so despite the metaphor or metonymy, the researcher reckons that they all are ready-made or living The readers can find the ready-made linguistic devices in the dictionary because they exist naturally in the society with the conventional understanding For the living linguistic devices, ... grammar‟ About the name, Nguyễn H a also added that Harris (1952) was the first to use the term of discourse analysis and this has been called until now (2008, p.13) Discourse analysis involved in the language use and has been received the great concern in the second half of this century Discourse analysis is related to conversation analysis, pragmatics, some sort of text grammar, text linguistics in. .. superiority theory of humour brings the wittiness to the readers and we all know that the managers in the national organizations are of low education 2.3 Discussion and Contrastive Findings The researcher found there are 50 samples in the selected books of HS as mentioned in the part 2, in which metaphorical jokes are 37 and metonymical jokes are 13 The metaphor jokes and metonymy jokes are subdivided into the. .. which metaphorical jokes are 37 and metonymical jokes are 13 The metaphor jokes and metonymy jokes are subdivided into the categories of English and Vietnamese 2.2.1 Metaphor The aim of the study deals with the metaphor as linguistic device, so this part was paid special attention because of the purpose of the study A total of 37 samples as metaphor jokes in the books of humorous stories, there are 18.. .The researcher represents the ideas of other linguistics and researchers about their previous studies and books to build up the theory as the background for this study to be based on and develop Chapter 2: The Study This part gives the detailed description of the study, which includes data collection, data analysis and the results and discussion Chapter 3: Implication of Translation and Teaching In. .. texts/pieces of discourse are those form of meaningful whole Although discourse analysis is the new branch of the linguistics, it has developed for the recent years and received the great concern of the linguistics in the world According to Nguyễn H a (2008:13), discourse analysis was named officially by the linguistics caring the coherence and the structure of text, especially in the time of „post-functional... analyzed After doing the in- depth analysis, the cases of each phenomenon in each field will be quantified and the results are reflected in tables The count will be done manually and calculated in the percentage Alison Ross (1998:4) claimed that there have been two approaches to the study of humor: the functional and the descriptive The functional approach has emphasized the socio-psychological aspects of. .. quite the reserve In the schemata of the characters about the cognitive metaphor, the concepts of fire are burning and hot And, it is the universal knowledge of the character that fire is used in the figurative meaning lying deep under its form According to the Eastern philosophy, fire is one of the five factors ending the old things and starting the new things in the ring Yin-Yang Besides, it is said... disappointed and unsuitable For the structure of the story, Nguyễn Đức Dân (1977:1, internet 10) claimed that laughter is made at the end of the story Incongruity involves in the end of the story and makes the surprise of laugh or wittiness Nguyễn Đức Dân (1977:2, internet 10) also added that there are three stages of a HS, including the opening, the development and the closing (making laugh) In the . THE LINGUISTIC DEVICES MAKING WITTINESS IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE HUMOUROUS STORIES: A STUDY OF CONTRASTIVE DISCOURSE ANALYSIS ( Các phương tiện ngôn ngữ tạo nên sự dí dỏm trong truyện. them brilliant investigations into the social and behavioral nature of humour and laughter. According to the standard analysis of Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (internet 23), humor theories. - In the study, the researcher investigates the figure of speech as linguistic devices making the wittiness and then help us to understand/explain why people laugh when reading EHS and VHS.