On Relevance Theory In The Interpretation Of Chinese Commercial Advertising Euphemism

Euphemism plays an indispensable part in our social life, which aids to achieve successful social interchange and co-ordinate human rapport. Euphemism is also widely used by the advertiser to avoid taboos, to beautify expressions, to relegate responsibility for certain implicatures and to avoid conflicts between competitors in advertising communication.Despite a large number of studies done on euphemism, commercial advertising euphemism, as a sub-stream, still gives us further room to explore, and studies of the issue from the perspective of relevance theory are much fewer. Considering the differences between commercial advertising euphemism and other euphemism in everyday use and the importance of commercial advertising euphemism in information society, we believe that it is of significance to study the issue. The investigation of the generating mechanisms and interpretation process of the effective way of advertising communication—commercial advertising euphemism provides a new way to explore euphemism and advertising language. In view of these facts, this dissertation endeavors to analyze the generating mechanism and the advertising audience's interpretation mechanism of Chinese commercial advertising euphemism from the perspective of relevance theory and justify its existing grounds.Relevance theory holds that every act of ostensive communication communicates the presumption of its own optimal relevance. The theory claims that human cognition processes are geared to achieving the greatest possible cognitive effect for the least processing effort. In other words, when interpreting an utterance, one is always maximizing its "contextual effects" and minimizing its "processing effort" to interpret the utterance as optimally relevant. Chinese commercial advertising euphemism, be it spoken or written, shows no essential difference from any other kind of utterance communication. Therefore, Chinese commercial advertising euphemism can be interpreted by relevance theory.The dissertation is composed of six chapters. Chapter One presents a general picture of the current study, including the significance, the objectives and research questions of the present study. Research methodology and organization of the whole dissertation are also given in this chapter. Chapter Two is literature review of the theoretical researches on euphemism, advertising and euphemism in commercial advertisements at home and abroad, and it also provides necessity of the relevance theory approach to the interpretation of euphemism in commercial advertising. Chapter Three gives a panoramic view of commercial advertising euphemism, including definitions of euphemism, commercial advertising, communicative functions of commercial advertising euphemism and more importantly, definition of commercial advertising euphemism, which we hope to pave a way for our further analysis. Chapter Four introduces the theoretical framework of relevance theory, including its theoretical background and its related notions—ostension, inference, cognitive environments, mutual manifestness, and optimal relevance which serve as the theoretical foundation for the analysis of Chinese commercial advertising euphemism. Chapter Five is the emphasis of the whole dissertation, devoted to bringing relevance theory into the specific cases of Chinese commercial advertising euphemism. By analyzing Chinese commercial advertising euphemism produced in the forms of figurative devices, the dissertation verifies the role of relevance theory in the interpretation of Chinese commercial advertising euphemism. Chapter Six is the conclusion of the present study. Besides a brief summary, some limitations of the research and suggestions for further study are also proposed in the chapter.This dissertation intends to investigate Chinese commercial adverting euphemism with a view to gain a better understanding of how advertising messages are communicated and interpreted. It is sincerely hoped that this study might, to some extent, enrich and contribute to the research of advertising. It is also expected to be a real help to the advertiser in the design of advertisements and to the advertising audience in the interpretation and appreciation of commercial advertisements.