A Study Of The Puns In Romeo And Juliet Based On Figure-ground Theory

Puns are commonly seen in both English advertising and in literal works. And as a significant rhetorical device, pun plays an extremely important role especially in literary works. Figure-ground theory, as one theory in cognitive linguistics, is based on prominence principle and now it is used to analyze the puns that appear in different contexts. Figure, as the most prominent part in perception, is the focus of people’s attention, and the ground refers to the less prominent part in cognition and also the reference to embody the figure.This thesis mainly analyzes the puns in Romeo and Juliet from the perspective of figure-ground theory. Firstly, the figure-ground theory and its relevant theories are introduced in detail in the literature review in order to analyze the puns in Romeo and Juliet further in the following chapters. Secondly, this thesis adopts the qualitative analysis and collected the homophonic and homographic puns in Romeo and Juliet according to the definition of puns. At the same time, three research questions are proposed to better interpret the puns in this play, namely the prominent features of the figure of the puns in Romeo and Juliet; interpretation of the figure and ground of the puns in Romeo and Juliet from the reference point model and also the functions of the figure and ground of the puns in Romeo and Juliet. And lastly, regarding these three research questions, the author analyzes the puns that are collected and reaches the following conclusions:Firstly, there is one meaning of the puns that is focused and emphasized whether it is in the homophonic puns or in the homographic puns, which is called the figure of the pun and the less prominent meaning of the pun is regarded as the ground of the pun; Secondly, the ground of the pun is the meaning that is interpreted from the explicit context and acts as the reference point to provide a guidance in finding out the figure meaning from the implicit context; Thirdly, the figure of the pun plays a prominent role and the ground plays a subsidiary role in contributing to the success of the pun.This thesis has enriched the perspective of the studies on puns within literary works, and by using the figure-ground theory, the prominent features of the figure and the subsidiary features of the ground are easily perceived, which enables the readers to comprehend the deep meaning of the puns in Romeo and Juliet more easily. Besides, the puns help Shakespeare vividly express the humor of the characters in Romeo and Juliet, which is also the intention of Shakespeare. And the same time, this thesis has provided some inspirations for future literary works.