CONCERNING SOME COGNITIVE-LINGUISTIC APPROACHES TO HUMOUR

Irena V. Matveeva (All-Russian

Distance Institute of Finance &

Economics, Orel Dpt.)

iriha@valley.ru

All forms of trope afford equal opportunity for jests.

Quintilian

One function of humor is to call attention to the ambiguity of all things.

Warren Shibles

Jokes are incredibly fragile linguistic and conceptual constructs whose meaning depends vitally on a nexus of quantitative criteria (such as the timing of delivery, and the activation of key expectations) and qualitative criteria (such as social context, cultural taboos, shared world models, etc.). The fragility of humor makes it an ideal linguistic form in which to theorize about the relationship between the quantitative and qualitative aspects of language and cognition.

Without any intention to depreciate existing theories of humor, like Raskin's semantic-script theory (SSTH), Attardo's general theory of verbal humor (GTVH) and some other not always purely linguistic theories, we would like to appeal to relatively minor linguistic phenomena - those of enantiosemy, litotes and zeugma, which, to our way of thinking, inform CL approaches to humor.

• Litotes (understatement) as a result of Gricean categories of Quality & Relevance violation.

Analysis of litotes results in unexpected outcome. More often it is explained within the limits of stylistic functioning of negation and is set against hyperbole imparting stressed temperance, but not emphasis to the utterance.

G.P. Grice describes litotes being a result of the 1^st Maxim of Category of Quality violation – «Do not say what you believe to be false» (Grice 1975: 46, 53).

But can it be justified to call litotes deliberate dethroning, unmasking of one dialogue participant idea by another one? We mean only those cases, when such a dethroning has nothing to do with lying. That is we are not talking about irony. E. g.:

Лемкус обижался:

- Вы не пониманте, что такое религия. Религия для меня…

- Понимаю, - жестом останавливал его Тарасевич. – Источник заработка.

(Филиал)

Lemkus being offended would say:

- You can’t understand what religion is for me…

- I can, - Tarasevich interrupted him by gesture. - It’s a source of earnings.

(Dovlatov, V. 3, p. 108)*.

The way Tarasevich finishes the utterance started by Lemkus evidently understates its termination be it made by Lemkus himself. But in this particular situation it is not impartially false which deprives us of the possibility to regard it as an irony. We would rather assume such cases to be litotes illustrating the 3^rd Gricean Category of Relation («Be relevant») violation. Usually such a violation results in communicational discomfort that is not peculiar to stylistic effect, produced by litotes.

Thus, the same trope, being a result of different Gricean maxims violation can realize different, even opposite, communicational intentions. With litotes it can be either escaping communicational discomfort or deliberate making of it.

Interesting, that litotes showing up frequently intensifies the negative component of meaning, makes it possible to compare incomparable things, creates «white lie» effect, but is not lying actually. The last mentioned function of litotes draws this phenomenon together with irony, at least from the point of view of stylistic effect produced by the latter and purpose of using. Compare:

У Марианны было запущенное лицо без дефектов и неуловимо плохая фигура.

(Заповедник)

Marianna had a desolate face without defects and somehow imperfect figure.

(Dovlatov, V. 1, p. 339).

Конечно, отец выпивал. Пожалуй, не больше, чем другие. Но как-то заметнее.

(Наши)

Of course, my father liked a drink. May be not heavier than others, but somehow more obviously.

(Dovlatov, V. 2, p. 200).

Книга вышла с одной единственной опечаткой. На обложке было крупно выведено: «ФЕЙХТВАГНЕР»

(Иностранка)

The book was published with only one misprint. On the cover it was traced out in large letters: «FEICHTWAGNER».

(Dovlatov, V. 3, p. 11).

It is a good car: It goes forward and backward.

(Shibles, Ch. «Contradicting Humor»).

All stated above is not anyhow coordinated with traditional relation to litotes being a contribution to the English national tradition, reflected in speech etiquette of the last. Litotes being limited in that way is not able to make communicational discomfort deliberately. And even constructions containing litotes expressing a thought by denying its contradictory can not be associated with this or that national tradition. Phrases like «не слишком старался», «it is not likely», or «nicht allzu klug» can be met in equal measure in many languages. Use of such phrases is indicative of belonging to common polite people or those forced to be polite for some reason or other. In his ’Humor Reference Guide: Comprehensive Classification and Analysis’ W. Shibles writes: «It would turn society upside down if everyone always told the complete truth in every way. In the courtroom, one is not allowed to tell everything, but only to answer the questions asked. And not all evidence, or truth, is even allowed to be considered. If one always tells the truth it may be impolite. We select things to say».

Of course, not all cases of litotes can be explained by their reference to their role in enhancing politeness. To elucidate the motivation for litotes, G. Leech calls upon yet another principle: one that has been acknowledged by psychologists under the title of the ‘Pollyanna Hypothesis’. This states that people will prefer to look on the bright side rather than on the gloomy side of life, thus resembling the optimistic heroine of H. Porter’s novel Pollyanna (1913).

About negative constructions containing litotes see also G. Leech 1983: 146-149 and R. Blutner 2001.

• Semantic & logical confusion as a figurative means.

Cognitive theories typically analyze the structural properties of humorous stimuli or the way they are processed; sometimes these two levels are also mixed up.

Perhaps beginning with Aristotle, incongruity was considered to be a necessary condition for humor. In this tradition, humor involves the bringing together of two normally disparate ideas, concepts, or situations in a surprising or unexpected manner.

Among tropes zeugma can be cited as a striking example of such an incongruity.

Zeugma occurs when a word (usually a verb) has the same grammatical relation to two or more other words, but a different meaning in each application, e. g. ’There’s a certain type of woman that would rather press grapes than clothes’.

Zeugma often constitutes a violation of the Maxim of Relation ’Be relevant’. In such cases homogeneous parts of the sentence are syntactically linear, but evidently not regulated semantically. Such a state of chaos turns out to be a productive means of comic effect creation. E. g.,

Зарецкий любил культуру и женщин.

Zaretsky loved culture and women.

(Dovlatov, V. 3, p. 44).

Её одинаково раздражали цифры, чужие болезни и посторонние дети.

She got irritated equally at figures, another’s illnesses and strangers' children.

(Dovlatov, V. 3, p. 37).

Pretty often metaphor constituting a violation of the 1^st Maxim of the Category of Quality ’Do not say what you believe to be false’ can be noticed next to zeugma. Thus, metaphor and zeugma combine and thrust two steps of interpretation on the utterance addressee, and beyond all question enrich the utterance aesthetically. E. g.,

Таяло мороженое. Улыбались женщины и светофоры.

The icecream was thawing. Women and traffic lights were smiling.

(Dovlatov, V. 3, p. 226).

*All illustrations from Sergey Dovlatov’ prose are translated by the author.

• Enantiosemy as a phenomenon of semantic change.

Theories on the importance and interest of words with opposite meanings find its place in a long tradition of studies. The analysis of enantiosemy represents a consistent formal effort to contribute to an analysis of the nature of context. In the light of the findings we propose a bridge between the enantiosemy and the Grice′s Cooperative Principle. It seems fair to conclude, even from this brief and selective survey, that enantiosemy should be examined in a broader scale than just a wordplay, a pun or a kind of language curious.

What are the cognitive and communicational costs/benefits of the exploitation of ambiguity? Why do we actively seek ambiguity (wit/word play/humor) in certain circumstances and do not always disambiguate automatically? Why do utterances and written texts based on the exploitation of ambiguity work so well? What happens in conversation when we use words/phrases with multiple meanings? Can we feel the polarity of signs within one word (illustrating enantiosemy) taken out of context? On what quantitative terms are enantiosemy and dialogue, enantiosemy and monologue? Are cases of enantiosemy deliberate or spontaneous? These are the main questions to be answered.

The phenomenon of enantiosemy is also worthy of attention because it raises the question of the relation between linguistic and non-linguistic knowledge and reveals the dynamic and interactive nature of understanding the meaning of utterances.

Notes:

*All illustrations from Sergey Dovlatov’ prose are translated by the author.

References:

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