A Comparative Study Of Deliberate Misinterpretation And Misunderstanding

Deliberate misinterpretation and misunderstanding are two different notions that are easy to be mixed up. Most researchers just touch upon the phenomena of deliberate misinterpretation or misunderstanding respectively; few scholars have done deeper comparative analysis in these fields. In the previous researches, their definitions, triggers and pragmatic effects are far from complete, largely because rare studies have chosen these two phenomena as their research subjects. All the researchers conduct the"by-studies"of deliberate misinterpretation in the studies of misunderstanding or vice visa. All in all, there has been no integrated comparative study between deliberate misinterpretation and misunderstanding up to now.Misunderstanding (shorted for MU) occurs when the hearer's understanding of the speaker's utterances is not identical with the speaker's intended one. However, in some cases, the hearer may intentionally choose the interpretation diverging from the speaker's intended meaning in order to achieve certain communicative effects. This kind of linguistic phenomenon can be called deliberate misinterpretation (shorted for DMI).DMI and MU are clearly distinguished by comparison, which is followed by a review of the previous literature conducted both at home and broad. And the limitations of the previous researches and significance of the present study are introduced. Until now,the scholars have done studies on DMI and MU for quite a long time,but there still no strict definitions about these two specific phenomena and the description of the pragmatic effects of DMI and MU are far from complete. This leaves a margin for the comparative study of DMI and MU. This thesis concentrates on the triggers and pragmatic effects of DMI and MU. The triggers are discussed from two aspects: one is the minimal information provided by the speaker, and the other is the inherently problematic nature of the speaker's utterance. The latter can be further discussed from three layers. They are speaker's utterance content (which contains content ellipsis, lexical ambiguity, and fuzziness of deixis), the speaker's utterance force and speaker's conversational implicature.Concerning DMI and MU, they can achieve the same effects in communication: positive and negative effects. As frequently happening in communication, DMI and MU often occurs between very close friends, spouses, parents and their children, teachers, and students. Sometimes, they are humorous. Sometimes they could be dangerous and destructive that might result in anger, quarrel and conflict.Theoretically speaking, the thesis also contributes to the analysis of the similarities and differences of DMI and MU from presupposition, illocutionary act and politeness respect. (1) DMI and MU both will produce pragmatic presupposition. In terms of MU, the first speaker make wrong estimate about the second speaker, regarding that the presupposition he makes is also the mutually known information by the second speaker. Whereas, in terms of DMI,the second speaker completely knows the mutually known information, but he deliberately utilizes another false pragmatic information. (2) DMI and MU can both make the perlocutionary act disaccord with the illocutionary act. In terms of DMI, the second speaker is clearly aware the first speaker's illocutionary act, he intentionally adopts the action which goes against with the first speaker's intention and enable the perlocutionary act deviate from the illocutionary act. MU occurs when the second speaker is not aware the first speaker's illocutionary act, therefore he adopts the action which goes against with the perlocutionary act. (3)DMI is exploited as a control to restore composure and self-image on embarrassment when people are undermined in certain situations, especially when they are teased, mocked or scolded by others. It can enhance his or her own face, but cause the counterpart's loss of face. MU can achieve some effects: creating humorous atmosphere, creating a sense of novelty, causing a quarrel or conflict, resulting in a miscommunication, achieving a sarcastic effect, confusing the counterpart, causing antipathy etc. In most cases, it can cause loss of face of both sides. MU can not only threaten the counterpart's face, but also slander his or her face.Practically, the study of the pragmatic effects of DMI and MU can be helpful for our communication. We must maximize positive effects and minimize negative ones of DMI and MU.The comparative study between DMI and MU not only sheds light on the understanding of and DMI and MU but also provides a relatively more brand new perspective of looking at other related language phenomena. At the same time, it may guide the communication practice, and may be useful for the study of other languages and the cross-linguistic and cross-cultural study of DMI and MU.