A Pragmatic Study Of English Conundrums

As a form of English riddles, English conundrum has attracted the attention of scholars of various persuasions for a long time. So far, a multitude of studies of English riddles have been made in folklore, rhetoric, anthropology, cognitive-psychology and linguistics. But, these researches mainly focus on the objective observation and static description of the form and content of the conundrum, which cannot provide full explanations for the internal mechanism of conundrums. In view of this, this thesis attempts to make a pragmatic study of the internal mechanism of English conundrums in the light of Conversational Implicature Theory and Presupposition Theory.In the present study, a qualitative method is adopted. After the review and analysis of the previous studies, and the selection and classification of the collected data, English conundrums are analyzed in accordance with the basic categories and properties of the two theories. This research aims to unveil the internal mechanism of English conundrum, prove the explanatory power of Conversational Implicature Theory and Presupposition Theory, and make the study of conundrums more profound and systematic.The present study provides a new point of departure for the study of English conundrums, which is a valuable attempt. Moreover, the present study is hoped to make valuable contributions to the creation of humor and amusement, and to English teaching and learning.