| Many linguists have studied verbal humor from the perspective of pragmatics and have helped bring humor research into a new stage.Universally acknowledged, public speech is one of the most effective and significant ways to communicate among people. Through the public speech, the speakers may be able to declare opinions, express emotions, and inspire the audience. Though many scholars have done research on verbal humor and public speeches from various perspectives, the research on the humor in public speeches is far from enough. Therefore, the perception and interpretation of the verbal humor in public speeches is a very meaningful research topic.In the present thesis, a qualitative research is conducted on the verbal humor of commencement speeches in the U.S. and the mechanism of verbal humor generation is analyzed under the theoretical framework of the three pragmatic theories:the Cooperative Principle, the Politeness Principle and Relevance Theory. Through the analysis in the present thesis, it points out that humorous effects could be achieved by violation of the maxims of Cooperative Principle, abiding the maxims of the Politeness Principle and the gap between the maximal relevance and the optimal relevance and the different cognitive context between the speaker and the hearer. Neither of the Cooperative Principle, the Politeness Principle and the Relevance Theory alone could analyze all humorous utterances. Thus, the three pragmatic theories should be integrated to interpret the mechanism of humor generation.Theoretically, it broadens the studying scope of verbal humor by focusing the humor in the commencement speeches, and proves the explanatory power of pragmatic theories in the studies of humor and public speeches. Practically, it could not only help listeners to better appreciate the humor in the commencement speeches, but also help the learners of public speaking create more humorous utterances in the daily life, especially in making public speeches. |
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