| Identity research has always been a hot topic in sociology,psychology,philosophy and other disciplines.Scholars tend to take various views on identity research,and have different understandings concerning definitions and characteristics of identity.The traditional view of identity holds that identity is static,fixed and given in advance.However,with the development of identity research,some scholars propose that identity is consciously constructed by people and has the characteristic of dynamic choice.It has gradually entered into the vision of linguists,for identity and language are inextricably linked.Contemporary pragmatics has noticed that the views of identity change play an important role in speech communication,which has brought identity research into the scope of pragmatic research.The conception of pragmatic identity points to a new research direction for identity research and is a contextual and dynamic identity,which can be used as a pragmatic resource.Both communication participants choose language through the current context;construct the current identity and do things with words of identity.The dynamic and contextualized features emphasized by pragmatic identity are precisely in line with the views of adaptation theory.Adaptation theory emphasizes that language use is a process of continuous selection.Therefore,it is feasible to study identity from the perspective of adaptation theory.This thesis adopts the adaptation theory as the theoretical framework,takes the play King Lear as the corpus,and combines documentation,quantitative and qualitative analysis methods to discuss the types of Lear’s pragmatic identities,the dynamic adaptability of Lear’s pragmatic identities and analyzes the realization of his identities.This study has founded that:Firstly,communicators can achieve their communicative goals through the use of different pragmatic identities.Lear constructs three types of pragmatic identities:the governor identity,the father identity,and the homeless identity.As a governor,Lear is eager to get people’s support.When he steps down from power,he wants to enjoy his old life.When he communicates with his daughters,he constructs the father identity because he longs for the love of his children.Because of his wrong decisions,he leaves his country and wanders in the wilderness.Thus,he constructs the homeless identity when he interacts with others.Secondly,the realization of Lear’s pragmatic identity construction mainly chooses from the macro-discourse level and micro-discourse level to construct a suitable discursive practice.Thirdly,Lear’s pragmatic identity construction conforms to the relevant contextual factors through discourse.This thesis mainly analyzes and explores how the physical world,social world and mental world influence Lear’s pragmatic identity construction.This thesis pro vides a new research path for literature research.Combining pragmatics with literature,the author can more comprehensively analyze the characteristics of Lear’s image,and also broaden the use of pragmatic identity. |
