On The Role Of Pragmatic Presupposition In The English News Headlines

This dissertation mainly discusses the functions of pragmatic presupposition in English headlines. The headline is the fundamental part of any piece of news. It informs readers of the main idea of the news so that they could determine whether to read on or not. It is often described as the 'eye' of news reports, and can summarize the content of the news. The reason why headlines attract the readers a lot, presupposition plays the main role. In order to be concise, understandable and influence the readers, sufficient presuppositions should be provided in headlines. Though many scholars have discussed the stylistic features and the skills of writing headlines, few scholars have discussed headlines with theories. This dissertation is an attempt to analyze the headlines systematically and comprehensively on the basis of the theory of presupposition.This dissertation had reviewed the historical and theoretical background of the study of presupposition, and attempted to analyze the function of presupposition in headline. Presupposition plays several functions in headlines. First it can make the language of headlines be concise; second it can help inform the readers the content of the news; third it can help the headlines become more attractive, euphemistic, and humorous; last it can mislead the readers.This study is implicational both practically and theoretically. Practically, this study can give theoretical guidance to the applying of presupposition and in headline language and help headline designers create more scientific and attractive designing of headlines. Theoretically, it might shed light on the significance of presupposition, and enrich the understanding of presupposition and the study of headlines.