A Study On The Special Usages Of Punctuation In News Headlines

This article aims to study and analyze the special usages of quotation mark, colon and ellipsis in news headlines. The article is composed of four sections.The first section mainly deal with and analyze the frequency and location of the punctuation in news headlines. And the frequency statistics aim to investigate the punctuation, which is most frequently used during the collection of news headlines: quotation mark, question mark, colon, comma, ellipsis, dash and exclamation mark; the location statistics aim at the seven punctuation as well. There are three types of locations: before the headline, in the headline and after the headline.The second section mainly study the special usages and pragmatic effects of quotation marks in news headlines. The quotation marks are frequently used in news headlines. The special usages of quotation marks include five sub-sections:changing semantics, intensifying part of speech, changing the sentimental color, changing the application fields and changing the fixed group of words. The pragmatic effect of quotation marks in news headlines can be summarized into two parts:arousing controversy and becoming lively and interesting.The third section analyses the special usages and pragmatic effect of colon in news headlines. The colon in the form "A:B"plays the role of discourse markers.So this thesis will analyze the "A"in the format of A:B". The"A"can be space or time, subject or object, modifier, comment, text type and appositive.And this paper also look into the relationship of "A" between "B" in the form"A:B",the relationship between "A" and "B"can be causation, source relation, description relation and supplementary relation. At last the colon has two effects:making the format concise and attracting readers.The fourth section examines the special usages and pragmatic effects of ellipsis in news headlines. The ellipsis is largely used as discourse markers from five aspects: making clauses as headlines directly, making phrases as headlines directly, the vacancy of sentence component, the completion of sentence and isolated structure. The ellipsis in news headline has two effects:attracting readers and arousing a provoking thought.