Analysis On Pragmatic Functions Of Hedges

In daily communicative cases, people sometimes choose precise language toexchange information, while sometimes people prefer to employ fuzzy language toexpress their ideas. Fuzziness is an intrinsic feature in human language. Hedges, as one ofthe most typical and active parts of fuzzy language widely exist in daily communicationand play a significant and effective role in human communication. In the1970’s, most ofthe linguists just studied hedges from the perspective of semantics. Nevertheless, in the1980’s, more and more scholars began to investigate hedges from the viewpoint ofpragmatics because of the growing influence of pragmatic research.The proper use of hedges in communication can improve the expressive force andcommunicative effect of language, making the expressions more natural, flexible, politeand efficient. What’s more, a harmonious interpersonal relationship between the twoparties in communication can be successfully achieved by the appropriate applying ofhedges. Foreign linguists have investigated hedges from various different kinds ofperspectives since the1970’s, but the intensive research of hedges in the conversations ofAmerican TV dramas at home is still relatively rare.Due to the above reasons, with the aid of the conversations in Season One of theAmerican TV drama Desperate Housewives, the study which is based on fuzzy theoryintends to adopt the method of typical example analysis to investigate and analyze thepragmatic functions of hedges under the guidance of some significant pragmatic theories.The research questions for this study are:(1) Based on a qualitative analysis of the hedges in the conversations, what kinds ofpragmatic functions can be found in Season One of Desperate Housewives?(2) What is the significance of the use of hedges in the communication in SeasonOne of Desperate Housewives?Firstly, the script of Season One of Desperate Housewives is downloaded from thewebsite of shooter (http://shooter.cn/). And then, Season One is watched and re-watchedwith attentiveness and the script. Secondly, according to Prince et al’s classification of hedges, all of the conversations of Season one of Desperate Housewives which containhedges are identified, recorded and classified. Thirdly, thirty typical conversations whichcontain typical hedges are chosen and saved as examples to be analyzed. At last, in thequalitative analysis, through the descriptive way, the author intends to employCooperative Principle, Conversational Implicature, Polite Principle and FTA Theory toexplore the pragmatic functions of hedges.Based on the analysis, the pragmatic functions of hedges are summarized as thefollowing:(1) providing the right amount of information;(2) smoothing the conversation;(3) self-protection and (4) politeness.