An Interpretation Of Humor In Chinese "Cold" Jokes From The Perspective Of CIT

Chinese "cold" joke, as a special linguistic phenomenon, has been gaining popularity in recent years among Chinese. The humor in Chinese "cold" joke is a special type of humor based on the absence of the punch line in a narration which is the kernel of the traditional joke. The Chinese character "leng" as an adjective here, describes the nature of Chinese "cold" joke, which refers to using the illogical and irrational reasoning to amuse people.As far as the current situation of researches on Chinese "cold" jokes is concerned, a majority of studies, only from pragmatics perspective investigate how Chinese "cold" joke can be explained by Relevance Theory and Speech Act Theory, are treating the semantic analysis of Chinese "cold" joke as an ostensive—inferential communicative act. They pay little attention to the study of Chinese "cold" joke from the Perspective of Conceptual Integration Theory. The present study intends to conduct a cognitive approach to Chinese "cold" joke which we hope will contribute to later explorations in related fields.The application of the above mentioned Conceptual Integration Theories to Chinese "cold" joke analysis involves two aspects of meaning. Firstly, applying the Conceptual Integration Theories to the analysis of Chinese "cold" joke can achieve a better representation of the conceptual blending processes of Chinese "cold" joke, hence arriving at a more in—depth understanding of the mechanism of Chinese "cold" joke and facilitating the comprehension and appreciation of Chinese "cold" joke. Secondly, applying the Conceptual Integration Theories to analyzing natural—language discourses can provide a general examination of the explanatory power of these theories, in an attempt to test the adequacy and descriptive power of Conceptual Integration Theory and to get some new insights to extend the research scope that is essential to prove the generality of Conceptual Integration Theory.This thesis is a preliminary attempt to applying Conceptual Integration Theories to the interpretation of the Chinese "cold" joke. We arrive at the following observationsFirstly, we find that the connector of the punch line in traditional jokes is open. On the contrary, the connector of the punch line in Chinese "cold" jokes is closed.Secondly, in Chinese "cold" jokes, there are two input spaces with at least one input that contains a framework. And the two inputs in each integration network can be connected by some common information. According to different examples drawn from the chosen Chinese "cold" jokes, the four basic types of integration networks involved in Blending Theory can be established separately, displaying the distinctive features of them. In spite of those differences, the three component processes of blending Composition, Completion, and Elaboration are always in motion in the dynamic meaning construction.Thirdly, as a phenomenon of language and culture, the conceptual integration networks of humor in Chinese "cold" jokes may have its own characteristics.This thesis is made up of five chapters.Chapter one is the sketch of the whole thesis, including the purpose, significance, feasibility, methodology and outline of the study. Chapter Two is the literature review, which reviews the current studies of Chinese "cold" jokes. Chapter three provides an overview of CIT, its main ideas and key notions are made clear in this chapter. Chapter four is the core of this thesis. Several Chinese "cold" jokes are analyzed within the framework of CIT. Chapter five is the conclusion. It sums up the major findings, points out the limitations of the study and gives some suggestions for further.