An Analysis Of Conversational Implicature In English Version Teahouse From The Perspectives Of Cooperative Principle And Politeness Principle

Laoshe’s Teahouse is a classical literature work in the history of Chinese literature. Most researches done before on Teahouse have been focusing on the literature translation and translation theories. There are few analyses of utterances in Teahouse from the perspective of pragmatics. This dissertation aims to analyse characters’utterances in Teahouse using Cooperitive Principle and Politeness Principle. It may offer an angle for the study of characters’utterances of literature works and also it may provide some inspirations to the literature translation.The theoretical framework of this dissertation is Grice’s Cooperative Principle and Leech’s Politeness Principle. The combination of the two theories and analysis on the characters’utterances extracted from the play Teahouse are the core of the dissertation. This dissertation proposes to conduct a qualitative case analysis from the approach of pragmatics. On the basis of conversations from Teahouse, the dissertation is mainly concerned with the violation of the Cooperative maxims and the maintenance of the Politeness Principle out of which conversational implicature is produced and interpreted. The detailed analysis reveals how pragmatic theories can be possibly applied in Laoshe’s literature works.There are five chapters in the dissertation---introduction, literature review, theoretical framework, studies on characters’utterances in Teahouse, conclusion. Studies on Characters’Utterances in Teahouse in chapter four is the core of the dissertation. Through the analysis in the dissertation, readers can access to this play better and enjoy the beauty of traditional Chinese cultures. On the other hand, we can gain some knowledge of social skills and interpersonal communication, which may help us construct a successful conversation and then establish and maintain a harmonious relationship with others. Finally, limitations of this dissertation and suggestions for further studies are provided.