Pragmatic Analysis Of Vague Language In Daily Conversation And Its Translation

Vagueness is an inherent nature and a frequent phenomenon in all natural languages. It plays an unsubstitutable role in daily conversation.Since Greek philosopher Eubulides put forward his Sorites Paradox, vague phenomenon of natural language draws more and more attention from the scholars worldwide. Vague linguistics, a new subject which has its basis from the Fuzzy Sets theory put forward by L. A. Zadeh in 1965, now turns its focus from semantic research to pragmatic research. The reason why vague language is used in various aspects of our human daily conversation indicates its pragmatic nature.Scholars around the world study vague language from various aspects, but they haven't made a thorough study of communicational functions of the frequent and abundant use of vague language in daily conversation. Based on the previous studies of vague language by others, through the introduction of the diverse definitions, clarifications and features of vague language, together with the employment of vague language in daily conversation, the author finds that the most important and frequently used function of vague language in daily conversation is its politeness function.So taking Leech's and Gu's politeness principles as the theoretical framework, the author focuses his attention on how people employ vague language in daily conversation in English and Chinese cultures to realize its politeness function and finally reach their communicational goals. In this thesis, translation of vague language guided by some translation strategies and skills is also discussed.Through the above analysis, we can come to a conclusion that vague language is not a defect but a elastic use of natural language. As a communicational strategy, vague language can help people to be more polite and flexible, and express their thoughts euphemistically, thus reaching their communicational goals.