The Study Of English Deliberate Misinterpretation Based On Relevance Theory

In human verbal communication, misunderstanding often results from the hearer’s failure to understand the speaker’s intended meaning; whereas in some cases, urged by certain communicative needs, the hearer, based on correct understanding of the speaker may deliberately opt for the interpretation that differs from what the speaker intends to convey. Then deliberate misinterpretation occurs.With Sperber&Wilson’s relevance theory as the general conceptual framework, guided by the previous studies on deliberate misinterpretation, the thesis makes a tentative exploration of DMI in terms of its triggers, ways of realization and pragmatic functions. It is found that triggers of DMI lies in the loss of ostension in speaker’s utterance. Factors leading to loss of ostension include homophone, polysemy, deictic expression, structural ambiguity, indirectness and implicitness of the speaker’s utterance, which make it possible for the hearer to deliberately misinterpret his intention on the basis of correct understanding. According to relevance theory, four means account for the realization of DMI. That is, deliberately ignoring the ostension in the speaker’s utterance, extending context, utilizing different cognitive information between the speaker and the hearer and making use of the contradiction between maximal relevance and optimal relevance. Finally, five pragmatic functions of DMI are presented separately:breaking the ice, resolving interpersonal relationship, maintaining interpersonal relationship, creating humorous effect and refusing request.The research may be instructive and enlightening in daily communication. The improvement of communicative performance of language users can be reflected in the good knowledge and application of DMI. Thus, language users can facilitate the communication effectively.