From Parodic Words, Phrase To Word-formation Of Parody

Parody (fangni) has always been a popular rhetoric device which could be skillfully used by people at all levels, from young to old, famous writers to pupils. Parody could be seen almost everywhere, such as literature works, advertisements, newspapers, magazines. While walking on the street, we may find some of the names of the shops are made by parody. In all kind of media, it becomes a tendency to parody some well-known or conventional words and create new ones to name or describe the newly-appeared issues. Some sources of parody even become fixed suffixes. By using the suffixes, people may create numerous new words.The frequent use of parody draws the attention of many scholars. They studied parody and made great achievements. But those studies have taken parody and word-formation of parody separately. They involved either the external characteristics or the comparison between parody and other rhetoric devices. Some scholars studied parody together with word-formation of parody, however only limited within the scope of comparison, too. This thesis attempts to find out the inner and essential relationship between parody and word-formation of parody. We hold that language development and the corresponding language environment are closely related to each other. Language may gradually change and develop with the changing of the language environment and the well acceptance of the language users like the species evolution in biology. With this belief as the guideline, our paper tries to make a workable account for the underlying mechanism of word-formation of parody production.We believe that parody and word-formation of parody share similarities not just in the form and structure. In essence, word-formation of parody develops from parody. This paper uses the theories of language evolution to find out the mechanism of word-formation of parody, including the conditions, constraints, etc. For the limit of the length, we only focus our attention on the parodic words, phrases and other examples in Chinese. There are seven chapters in this paper.ChapterⅠis an introduction to the study. It points out the object of the research, raises the questions to be solved, presents the theory used in the thesis and the related terms describes the methods of the study and displays the arrangement of the thesis.ChapterⅡstarts with a literature review of the research on parody and word-formation of parody, including the definition, classification, functions and the study from different perspectives. As for these researches, the author also presents her own ideas. At the end of this chapter, the author raises the question to be studied in this paper: What's the inner relation between parodic words and phrases, form-parody and word-formation of parody? What happens from parodic words and phrases to form-parody? What is the mechanism behind the process from source to word-formation of parody? What are the basis and restraints?ChapterⅢis a description of the similarities between language development and species evolution in biology which serve as the basis of our study and make it possible to lend the theories of biological evolution in the study.ChapterⅣbriefly reviews the related studies of parody and word-formation of parody, and the theories and the analytic frameworks. It also introduces the guiding theory of this paper—the language evolution theory. It also covers the related concepts and terms. In line with the theoretical knowledge, the author establishes her own analytic framework of word-formation of parody.ChapterⅤis the analysis of the mechanism from source to parodic words and phrases and to word-formation of parody, which is divided into two processes: microevolution and macroevolution. We find that parodic words and phrases are produced on the basis of the purpose of the speaker and the change of the source. They are the variants of the source. The microevolution is realized when the variants of the source, namely parodic words and phrases, are understood and accepted in the concrete context.Some parodies which are unhealthy and improper in semantic, unreasonable and unacceptable in logic, and abnormal and destructive in grammar, are regarded as negative. Thus they will soon disappear and lose the chance to further develop. Some others might be used frequently within certain conditions and restraints; therefore they would become fixed types of parody. The fixed type of parody may enlarge its semantic meaning of the source, make it grammaticalized, lexicalized or semantically generalized, and finally develop into a way of word formation after the choice of the language users. Then they will not rely on the source and become independent and realize the macroevolution.On the basis of the abovementioned, we conclude that:.Parodic words and phrases are the variant of the source, which is the result of the natural choice..Parodic words and phrases are understood and accepted in communication but they closely rely on the source..Some parodies are unhealthy and improper in semantic, unreasonable and unacceptable in logic, and abnormal and destructive in grammar; therefore they do no good to the development and grasp of language. Those parodies are only used in limited contexts, and it is hard for the language users to accept them. This type of parody will soon disappear and would not evolve any longer..Some parodic words and phrases will be frequently and widely used for the concreteness and simplicity, and they would gradually become fixed in a steady form: a fixed type of parody..Some fixed types of parody become independent and enlarge the semantic meaning, owning the powerful ability of constructing numerous new words. They become suffixes, free from the restraint of the source and realize the macroevolution.The last chapter is the conclusion. It points out some question unsolved as well, so that the further researches on these issues are highly expected.