Journal of Pragmatics最新文献_第3页

Pragmatics of irony in performance: Politeness, offense, and audience reception in Chinese stand-up comedy 表演中的反讽语用：中国单口喜剧中的礼貌、冒犯与观众接受

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2026-01-01 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.12.003

Liwei Yang

This study focuses on the context of Chinese stand-up comedy and examines the operation of irony as a pragmatic strategy along the politeness–impoliteness continuum. The data consist of the complete performance transcripts of 57 comedians from the preliminary stage of a television competition show. Combining qualitative and quantitative methods, the study proposes a dual-pathway analytical framework of polite irony and mock impoliteness. The results show that irony constitutes a core discursive resource in Chinese stand-up comedy, primarily realized through these two strategies. Polite irony cushions potential conflicts by employing a “surface compliment–underlying critique” pattern, while mock impoliteness reframes offensive expressions as benign violations, enabling sensitive issues to be accepted by the audience. At the same time, irony demonstrates diverse functions: it can directly target social authorities and public issues to deliver critique and expose issues, or merge with self-deprecation and everyday narratives to create intimacy and entertainment. The findings indicate that irony in Chinese stand-up comedy simultaneously reconciles politeness and impoliteness, entertainment and critique, highlighting its role as an important vehicle of social criticism and cultural expression. This study is the first to systematically compare the division of labor and collaboration between polite irony and mock impoliteness in Chinese stand-up comedy. It not only provides new empirical evidence for pragmatics and humor research but also offers practical insights into how humor can balance critique with harmony in specific cultural contexts.

本研究以中国单口喜剧为研究对象，考察了反讽作为一种语用策略在礼貌-不礼貌连续体中的作用。该数据是某电视竞赛节目初赛阶段的57名喜剧演员的完整表演记录。本研究结合定性和定量方法，提出了礼貌反讽和模拟不礼貌的双途径分析框架。结果表明，反讽是中国单口喜剧的核心话语资源，反讽主要通过这两种策略来实现。礼貌的讽刺通过采用“表面的赞美-潜在的批评”模式来缓冲潜在的冲突，而模仿的不礼貌则将冒犯性的表达重新定义为良性的侵犯，使敏感的问题能够被观众所接受。同时，反讽也表现出多种功能：既可以直接针对社会权威和公共问题进行批判和揭露，也可以与自嘲和日常叙事相融合，制造亲切感和娱乐性。研究结果表明，中国单口喜剧中的反讽同时调和了礼貌与无礼、娱乐与批判，凸显了其作为社会批判和文化表达的重要载体的作用。本研究首次系统地比较了中国单口喜剧中礼貌反讽与嘲弄不礼貌的分工和协作。它不仅为语用学和幽默研究提供了新的经验证据，而且为幽默如何在特定的文化背景下平衡批评与和谐提供了实践见解。

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引用次数: 0

Swearing across times: A study of the Spanish dubbing of swearwords in the 1990s and the 2020s 跨越时代的咒骂：对20世纪90年代和20世纪20年代西班牙语咒骂配音的研究

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-23 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.12.002

Roberto A. Valdeón

In recent years, translation scholars have paid attention to the importance of pragmatics in general and swearing in particular. This article aims to compare the translation strategies used to render the swearwords of US television programs into Spanish in the 1990s and in the 2020s in order to assess the so-called ‘vulgarization hypothesis’, i. e., whether the tendency to increase swearwords in contemporary European Spanish is comparable to the situation in the later part of the twentieth century. The comparative study will analyze four seasons of two comedies and two dramas in order to establish whether Spanish dubbed programs have evolved from the omission of swearwords as the main translation strategy in the 1990s to intensification in the 2020s. It will compare the use of (very) mild, moderate and (very) strong swearwords in the source and target languages by considering four translation strategies: preservation, intensification, toning down and omission. The findings show that the main tendency in the dubbed programs of the 1990s was the preservation of mild swearwords followed by omission, while in the 2020s the main strategy is intensification followed by preservation.

近年来，翻译学者普遍关注语用学的重要性，尤其是对脏话的关注。本文旨在比较20世纪90年代和20世纪20年代美国电视节目中粗口语的翻译策略，以评估所谓的“庸俗化假说”，即当代欧洲西班牙语中粗口语的增加趋势是否与20世纪后半叶的情况相当。对比研究将对两部喜剧和两部电视剧的四季进行分析，以确定西班牙语配音节目是否从20世纪90年代以省略脏话为主要翻译策略到20世纪20年代的强化。本文将比较源语和译语中（非常）温和、中等和（非常）强烈脏话的使用情况，并考虑到四种翻译策略：保留、强化、淡化和省略。研究结果表明，上世纪90年代配音节目的主要趋势是保留温和的脏话然后省略，而20世纪20年代的主要策略是加强脏话然后保留。

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引用次数: 0

“Voilà un film original!”: A local grammar of evaluation in French film reviews “你看，电影原创！”：法国电影评论中的一种本地评价语法

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-17 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.12.001

Rong Wen , Zhichao Wang , Xinyue Yao , Oleg Averyanov

Recent studies of local grammar have demonstrated its value for capturing the lexicogrammatical realizations of discourse functions. However, studies focusing on languages other than English remain scarce. This study addresses the gap by developing a local grammar of evaluation in French, based on a corpus of over 700,000 words of online film reviews. All instances of explicit overall evaluation were manually annotated with reference to seven functional elements typically associated with evaluative discourse. The analysis yielded 66 recurrent local grammar patterns that conform to a near-Zipfian distribution, comprising a small set of highly frequent configurations (e.g., “Target + Evaluation”, “Initiator + Evaluation + Target”) and a long tail of infrequent patterns. The results reveal convergence between French and English in the use of core functional elements, such as the Evaluation, Target, and Evaluator, but also divergence in word order and in the distribution of less commonly attested elements, notably the Initiator. These findings show that local grammar provides a principled framework for distinguishing cross-linguistically valid patterns from language-specific configurations. More broadly, the study demonstrates the potential of local grammar as a comparative tool for investigating the grammar-discourse interface across languages.

最近对地方语法的研究已经证明了它在捕捉语篇功能的词汇语法实现方面的价值。然而，关注英语以外语言的研究仍然很少。本研究基于超过70万字的在线电影评论语料库，通过开发法语本地评价语法来解决这一差距。所有显式整体评估的实例都被人工注释，参考了与评估话语典型相关的七个功能元素。分析产生了66个符合近似zipfian分布的重复局部语法模式，包括一个小的高频配置集（例如，“Target + Evaluation”，“Initiator + Evaluation + Target”）和一个不常见模式的长尾。结果表明，法语和英语在核心功能要素（如Evaluation、Target和Evaluator）的使用上趋同，但在词序和较少被证实的要素（尤其是Initiator）的分布上也存在差异。这些发现表明，局部语法为区分跨语言有效模式和特定于语言的配置提供了一个原则性框架。更广泛地说，该研究证明了本地语法作为研究跨语言语法-话语界面的比较工具的潜力。

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引用次数: 0

Refutation in presidential debate: Metadiscourse and co-occurring gestures 总统辩论中的反驳：元话语与共现姿态

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-17 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.11.010

Chung-Chen Chen, Yen-Liang (Eric) Lin

Political debates are central to the electoral process, offering candidates opportunities to persuade voters through both verbal and nonverbal means. Among these, refutation strategies play a pivotal role in challenging opponents and reinforcing credibility. While prior research has examined either metadiscourse or gestures in debates, relatively little attention has been given to how these modes operate in tandem. Grounded in Systemic Functional Linguistics and multimodal discourse analysis, this study investigates how metadiscourse and gesture co-construct persuasive refutation in political communication. Specifically, it analyzes the multimodal strategies of Kamala Harris and Donald Trump in the second 2024 U.S. presidential debate. The analysis revealed that Trump employed a greater number of metadiscourse markers overall, particularly text connectives and illocution markers, while Harris used them more selectively but strategically. Gesture analysis showed that metaphoric gestures were most frequent, with iconic gestures least used. Both candidates tended to align attitude markers with metaphoric gestures, text connectives with beat gestures, and illocution markers and code glosses with metaphoric gestures. The findings indicate that Harris and Trump adopted distinct pragmatic strategies, yet in both cases, speech and gesture functioned as integrated multimodal resources that reinforced the persuasiveness of their refutations. This study demonstrates the value of examining political debates through a multimodal lens, highlighting how verbal and nonverbal strategies converge to shape persuasive performance.

政治辩论是选举过程的核心，为候选人提供了通过口头和非口头手段说服选民的机会。其中，反驳策略在挑战对手和增强可信度方面发挥着关键作用。虽然先前的研究已经检查了辩论中的元话语或手势，但相对较少关注这些模式是如何协同运作的。本研究以系统功能语言学和多模态语篇分析为基础，探讨元语篇和手势如何在政治交际中共同建构有说服力的反驳。具体来说，它分析了卡玛拉·哈里斯和唐纳德·特朗普在2024年第二次美国总统辩论中的多模式战略。分析显示，特朗普总体上使用了更多的元话语标记，尤其是文本连接词和非言语标记，而哈里斯则更有选择性但更有策略地使用它们。手势分析显示，隐喻手势使用频率最高，而符号手势使用频率最低。两位候选人都倾向于将态度标记与隐喻手势、文本连接词与节拍手势、非言语标记和暗语注释与隐喻手势对齐。研究结果表明，哈里斯和特朗普采用了截然不同的语用策略，但在这两种情况下，言语和手势都是整合的多模式资源，增强了他们反驳的说服力。这项研究展示了通过多模态视角审视政治辩论的价值，强调了语言和非语言策略如何汇聚在一起，形成有说服力的表现。

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引用次数: 0

Correction in embodied interaction: How teachers and children reflexively manage a preschool mobile formation in traffic 具身互动的纠正：教师和儿童如何在交通中反射性地管理学龄前移动编队

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-11 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.11.003

Mathias Broth, Annerose Willemsen , Jakob Cromdal

While correction in interactionist research has largely been studied as it emerges in, and operates on, talk, this study concerns verbal correction that targets a particular class of embodied behavior: the movement and aspects of peer alignment of children walking in a group. We describe correction of mobile behavior as not only a sequential but also a micro-sequential and reflexive accomplishment. Based on data from preschool walks, where teachers and children embody a particular mobile formation by jointly orienting to expected ways of walking, the analysis focuses on how teachers initiate corrections and how children respond to them in an embodied way. By verbally initiating correction, teachers publicly index current behavior by one or several children as deviating from the expected ways of being part of the mobile formation. Through the precise timing of their embodied responses to verbal correction initiations, children display how they understand the nature of the trouble and the remedy that is called for. A central contribution of the paper is to show how each of the elements that make up correction sequences in this setting – correctable behavior, verbal correction initiation and the embodied correction of the behaviour – is observably constituted as participants reflexively orient, verbally and bodily, to each other's emerging actions. We unpack this real-time co-production of the correction sequence by demonstrating how children may start correcting their walking behavior successively, early and delayed in relation to the verbal correction initiation by the teacher.

虽然互动性研究中的纠正已经在很大程度上被研究，因为它出现在谈话中，并对谈话起作用，但这项研究关注的是针对特定类别的具体行为的言语纠正：儿童在群体中行走的运动和同伴对齐的各个方面。我们认为移动行为的纠正不仅是一个顺序的，而且是一个微顺序的和反身性的成就。基于幼儿园步行的数据，教师和儿童通过共同引导预期的步行方式来体现特定的移动形态，分析重点是教师如何发起纠正以及儿童如何以具体化的方式回应这些纠正。通过口头发起纠正，教师公开指出一个或几个孩子的当前行为偏离了作为移动形成的一部分的预期方式。通过他们对言语纠正的具体反应的精确时间，孩子们展示了他们如何理解问题的本质和所需要的补救措施。本文的一个核心贡献是展示了在这种情况下，构成纠正序列的每一个元素——可纠正的行为、言语纠正的发起和行为的具体化纠正——是如何被观察到的，因为参与者在语言和身体上反射性地指向彼此的新行为。我们通过展示孩子们是如何开始纠正他们的行走行为的，先后的，早期的和延迟的，与老师的言语纠正有关，来解释这种实时的纠正序列的共同生产。

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引用次数: 0

Explicit and implicit compliments and compliment responses in German and Italian social networks 德语和意大利语社交网络中的显性和隐性赞美及赞美反应

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-07 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.11.007

Miriam Ravetto

Compliment is a widely studied speech act, as the large number of investigations dealing with this topic shows. However, existing research has focused almost exclusively on explicit compliments, probably because they are more frequent than the implicit ones. Explicit compliments openly express a positive evaluation often through formulaic structures (Manes and Wolfson, 1981; Alfonzetti, 2009), while implicit compliments are those where hearers «need to infer the corresponding implicature for their interpretation» (Maíz-Arévalo, 2012:983).

The present investigation aims to examine and compare the use of these two types of compliments in a corpus of virtual exchanges in German and Italian social networks. The study focuses on explicit and implicit compliments, from both a qualitative and quantitative point of view, with a particular attention to the linguistic patterns used to express them in each language; then, referring to Castagneto and Ravetto's (2005) taxonomy it investigates the reactions of compliments' addressees, highlighting how these speech acts are perceived by German and Italian networkers. The analysis shows the use of a very narrow range of formulation strategies in both languages. Concerning the distribution of compliment response types, German and Italian online interactants manifest great similarities in the selection of the different compliment answers, preferring to accept the given appreciations rather than to reject or ignore them. Moreover, the corpus analysis reveals in both languages the tendency to accept implicit compliments more frequently and easily than the explicit ones.

大量的研究表明，赞美是一种被广泛研究的言语行为。然而，现有的研究几乎都集中在显性赞美上，可能是因为显性赞美比隐性赞美更频繁。外显赞美通常通过公式结构公开表达积极的评价（Manes和Wolfson, 1981; Alfonzetti, 2009），而内隐赞美则是听者“需要推断其解释的相应含义”（Maíz-Arévalo, 2012:983）。目前的调查旨在检查和比较这两种类型的恭维语在德国和意大利社交网络的虚拟交换语料库中的使用。本研究从定性和定量的角度着重于显性和隐性赞美，并特别注意在每种语言中用来表达它们的语言模式；然后，参考Castagneto和Ravetto（2005）的分类，它调查了赞美的接受者的反应，强调了这些言语行为是如何被德国和意大利的网络者感知的。分析表明，两种语言使用的提法策略范围很窄。在赞美回应类型的分布上，德语和意大利语在线互动者在选择不同的赞美答案上表现出很大的相似性，他们更倾向于接受给予的赞赏，而不是拒绝或忽视。此外，语料库分析还揭示了两种语言中隐性赞美比显性赞美更容易被接受的趋势。

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引用次数: 0

The three “waves” of compliment and compliment response research 恭维的三次“浪潮”与恭维反应研究

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-05 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.11.008

Carmen Maíz-Arévalo

Since the seminal studies carried out by Wolfson and Manes (1980) and Wolfson (1981, 1984), compliments have long attracted scholarly attention. Similarly, Pomerantz's (1978) pioneering study on compliment responses set the ground for interest in this related speech act. It could be argued that there are four different reasons for this fascination. First, compliments (and their corresponding responses) are extremely important in the construction of social rapport. Secondly, research has proven that they are far from simple despite their “formulaic” character. Third, contrastive research has found that there are remarkable cross-cultural differences, which often lead to misunderstandings or pragmatic clashes in intercultural exchanges. Finally, the increasing presence of digital communication has led to new ways to compliment and respond to compliments, based on the media affordances and constraints. This raises the question: what remains to be done in the study of compliments and compliment responses? The aim of this paper is, on the one hand, to present a comprehensive state of the art, which I argue can be divided into three main overlapping ‘waves’. This will be accompanied by a discussion of the main results and methodologies found in each wave. On the other hand, it intends to provide readers with some pointers to future research.

自从Wolfson和Manes（1980）以及Wolfson（1981, 1984）进行了开创性的研究以来，赞美一直吸引着学术界的关注。同样，Pomerantz（1978）对赞美反应的开创性研究为研究这一相关言语行为奠定了基础。可以说，这种迷恋有四个不同的原因。首先，赞美（以及相应的回应）对建立社会关系非常重要。其次，研究证明，尽管它们具有“公式化”的特征，但它们远非简单。第三，对比研究发现，在跨文化交际中存在着显著的跨文化差异，这些差异常常导致误解或语用冲突。最后，基于媒体的支持和约束，数字通信的不断增加导致了赞美和回应赞美的新方式。这就提出了一个问题：在赞美和赞美反应的研究中，还需要做些什么？本文的目的是，一方面，呈现一个全面的艺术状态，我认为这可以分为三个主要的重叠的“波”。这将伴随着在每一波中发现的主要结果和方法的讨论。另一方面，它旨在为读者提供一些未来研究的指针。

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引用次数: 0

Restricting impoliteness: (Re)asserting morality in third-party mediation of Chinese interpersonal conflict 限制不礼貌：（再）中国人际冲突第三方调解中的道德主张

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-04 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.11.004

Xiaoming Shang , Linlin Zhan , Chaoqun Xie

Although recent scholarship on impoliteness has experienced a ‘moral turn’, limited attention has been paid to the pivotal role of morality in third-party mediation. Drawing on data from the Chinese television program, Qiantang Lao Niangjiu 钱塘老娘舅 (The Maternal Uncle in Qiantang), this study examines how moral frameworks operate to constrain impoliteness in interpersonal conflicts. The analysis reveals that the absent audiences of television mediation programs function both as moral supervisors and as recipients of moral education, whose perceived existence discourages interactants from engaging in impoliteness. Moreover, third-party mediators frequently employ two interrelated strategies—invoking latent and non-latent forms of morality—to regulate conflictual discourse. These strategies work by reinforcing behavioral norms through moral appeals and eliciting emotional resonance through shared values. These findings underscore the distinctive influence of television as a mediated communicative environment and the irreplaceable role of morality in restricting impoliteness. More broadly, this study advances our understanding of the dynamic interplay among impoliteness, mediation, and morality in multi-party interaction.

尽管最近关于不礼貌的学术研究经历了“道德转向”，但人们对道德在第三方调解中的关键作用的关注有限。本研究利用中国电视节目《钱塘老娘娘学》的数据，探讨了道德框架如何在人际冲突中约束不礼貌行为。分析表明，电视调解节目中缺席的观众既是道德监督者，也是道德教育的接受者，他们的感知存在阻碍了互动者的不礼貌行为。此外，第三方调解人经常采用两种相互关联的策略——调用潜在的和非潜在的道德形式——来调节冲突话语。这些策略通过道德诉求来强化行为规范，通过共同价值观来引发情感共鸣。这些发现强调了电视作为媒介传播环境的独特影响，以及道德在限制不礼貌方面不可替代的作用。更广泛地说，本研究促进了我们对多方互动中不礼貌、调解和道德之间动态相互作用的理解。

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引用次数: 0

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-04 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.11.009

Nele Põldvere

引用次数: 0

The affective meanings of bowing in a web corpus of Japanese 日语网络语料库中鞠躬的情感意义

IF 1.7 1区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS

Journal of Pragmatics

Pub Date : 2025-12-02 DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2025.11.002

Eugenia Diegoli

This paper explores, through the lens of the Theory of Affective Pragmatics (TAP), the metadiscourse around bowing in a web corpus of Japanese. Bowing is a highly routinised non-verbal behaviour that, I argue, has come to be associated with specific functions and emotions in the Japanese context. Specifically, the study examines 136 mentions of bowing. These instances were identified through lexical searches and discuss, evaluate or prescribe the act of bowing, assigning specific meanings to it. The focus is on (a) (the representation of) the pragmatic functions of bowing; and (b) the emotions it is taken to express and/or elicit. The findings suggest that bowing is an emotional expression that can be used to engage in multiple and often overlapping speech acts (apologising, requesting, thanking, acknowledging/greeting) and based on which specific emotions (e.g. regret, shame, gratitude) can be inferred.

本文以情感语用学理论为视角，探讨了日语网络语料库中围绕鞠躬的元语篇。鞠躬是一种高度程式化的非语言行为，我认为，在日本语境中，它与特定的功能和情感联系在一起。具体来说，这项研究调查了136次提到的鞠躬。这些实例是通过词汇搜索来确定的，并讨论、评估或规定了鞠躬的行为，赋予它特定的含义。重点是(a)鞠躬的语用功能（表征）；(b)用来表达和/或引出的情绪。研究结果表明，鞠躬是一种情感表达，可用于多种且经常重叠的言语行为（道歉、请求、感谢、承认/问候），并可据此推断出特定的情感（如后悔、羞耻、感激）。

引用次数: 0