KRIANGKRAI VATHANALAOHALANGUAGE CENTRE, INTERNATIONAL COLLEGE FOR

SUSTAINABILITY STUDIES, SWU

Pragmatics and Humors: A Case Study of Phoebe Buffay’s Verbal Acts in ‘Friends’

Objectives

To explore the linguistic characteristics of Phoebe Buffay’s humorous turns by frameworks of CP and Impoliteness Theory

To apply pragmatic theories to reflect on Phoebe’s specific characterization

Phoebe’s Characteristics

Eccentric Telepathic/ déjà vu Exasperated, reverts to a harsher

"Street Phoebe" persona

Note The first Emmy award winning

character among the others

Literature Review: Humors

Humor Theories1. Superiority 2. Incongruity3. Relief4. Semantic Script

Pragmatic Theories

1. Cooperative Principle

2. (Im) politeness

Humor Theories

Superiority“laughter is an expression of sudden glory and a realization of being superior to someone else” (Hobbes, cf. Berger (1993))

Incongruity“a conflict between what is expected and what actually occurs in a punch line”

Relief“when the surge of energy is in excess of what is needed, the surplus is dispelled through laugher (Morreall, 1983)”

Humor Theories

Semantic Script “humor involves a semantic-

pragmatic process which includes a semantic opposition between the scripts” (Raskin, 1985)

Patient: Is the doctor at home?Doctor’s Wife: No, you can come in and wait for me in bed.

Pragmatic Theory Grice’s (1975)Cooperative Principle

Maxim of Relationbe relevantMaxim of Qualitymake your contribution one that is trueMaxim of Quantitynot make more or less informative than requiredMaxim of Manneravoid ambuiguity/obscuritybrief/orderly

Breaking Maxims can threat some people’s faces.

Positive Face Want – want respect from others

Negative Face Want – not want other people to impede his/her freedom

Avoid Face Threatening Act Brown and Levinson’s (1975) Politeness

Superstrategies

Bald on record (“the most direct, clear, unambiguous and concise way possible”)

Positive Politeness (“paying attention to the hearer, expressing interest, approval or sympathy”)

Negative Politeness (“mollifying the force of an utterance, deference”)

Off-record (“performed by means of an implicature (Grice 1975)”)

Withhold the FTA (“silence”)

Impoliteness’s Strategies Bald on record impoliteness: the FTA is performed

in a direct, clear, unambiguous and concise way Positive Impoliteness: ignore the other, exclude the

other from an activity, be disinterested, unconcerned, unsympathetic

Negative Impoliteness: frighten, condescend, scorn, ridicule, belittle, invade the other’s space

Sarcasm or mock politeness (irony): obviously insincere, using politeness for impoliteness.

Off-record impoliteness: implicature but in such a way that one atrributable intention clearly out-weighs any others.

Withhold politeness: the absence of politeness work

(Im) PolitenessQuestion: “How was my midterm

paper?”

Perhaps it could have been improvedIt wasn’t goodIt was badIt was crapYou must have shit for brains

Politeness

Impoliteness

Impoliteness can only happen when

1) the speaker communicates face-attack intentionally, or

2) the hearer perceives and/or constructs behavior as intentionally face-attacking,

3) a combination of 1) and 2)

Culpeper’s impoliteness

Bald-on-RecordPositiveNegativeOff-recordWith-hold FTA-------------------------------------------SarcasmOff-recordNegativePositiveBald-on-Record

Face EnhancingStrategies

Face Aggravating/Attacking Strategies

Note

It is almost impossible when confronting jokes without conversational jokes, conversational form.

DATA COLLECTION

Friends 1st season Phoebe Buffay’s humorous turns:

Analysis of the Cooperative Principle The maxim mostly violated by

Phoebe isMaxim of Relation (16.17%)Maxim of Manner (25.15%)Maxim of Quality (47.30%)Maxim of Quantity (11.38%)

Violating the Maxim of Quality Speakers have to try to make their

conversational contribution correspond to the truth.

exaggeration, irony, excuse, pretending

Ep 7

Exaggeration – refers to the way that the speaker overstates the features, defects or the strangeness of someone or something

Rachel: So Pheebs, what do you want for your birthday?

Phoebe: Well, what I really want is for my mom to be alive and enjoy it with me .

Ep 6 Irony – “expresses utterance completely

different from the literal meaning”

Ross: You know, there's nothing wrong with speaking correctly.

Rachel: "Indeed there isn't"... I should really get back to work.

Phoebe: Yeah, 'cause otherwise someone might get what they actually ordered. 

Rachel: Ohh-ho-hooohhh. The hair comes out, and the gloves come on.

Violating The Maxim of Quantity

Less information(When Rachel lost her ring)

Chandler and Joey: Oh! Yeah!Joey: Alright, when'd'ya have it on

last?Phoebe: Doy! Probably right before

she lost it!  

Violating the Maxim of Relation Irrelevant – “unrelated response so as to show

her diverted attention

Phoebe: Okay, they're just talking...Ross: Yeah, well, does he look upset? Does he

look like he was just told to shove anything?Phoebe: No, no actually, he's smiling.. and... Oh

my God, don't do that!!Ross: What? What? What?!Phoebe: That man across the street just kicked

that pigeon !

Ep 10 Changing the topic – divert attention from the

current situation

Ross: 'That' would be Marcel. You wanna say hi? Monica: No, no, I don't. Rachel: Oh, he is precious! Where did you get

him? Ross: My friend Bethel rescued him from some

lab. Phoebe: That is so cruel! Why? Why would a

parent name their child Bethel ?

Violating the Maxim of Manner Lexical ambiguity

Phoebe: (entering) Hi, sorry I'm late, I couldn't find my bearings.

Rachel: Oh, you-you mean your earrings?

Phoebe: What'd I say ?

Situational ambiguity

Rachel: Look-look-look-look-look, my first pay check! Look at the window, there's my name! Hi, me!

Phoebe: I remember the day I got my first pay check. There was a cave in one of the mines, and eight people were killed.

Monica: Wow, you worked in a mine?Phoebe: I worked in a Dairy Queen, why? 

(Im)Politeness

Sarcasm (11.32%) Off-record (17.75%) Negative (18.75%) Positive (18.75%) Bald-on-Record(33.42%)

Ep 5 Bald on Record

Joey: Ok, you know what blows my mind? Women can see breasts any time they want. You just look down and there they are. How you get any work done is beyond me.

Phoebe: Oh, ok, you know what I don't get? The way guys can do so many mean things, and then not even care.

Ep 7 Positive ImpolitenessRachel: Oh. (they knock at the next

door, Mr. Heckles answers) Hi. We just found this cat and we're looking for the owner.

Mr. Heckles: Er, yeah, it's mine.Phoebe: (trying to hold back the

struggling cat) He seems to hate you. Are you sure ?

Ep 8 Negative Impoliteness Phoebe: Ooh, wait.. wait, I see a

woman. Monica: Please tell me it's his

mother. Phoebe: Definitely not his mother. Monica: Oh, no... Phoebe: Oh, wait, she's walking

across the floor.. she's walking.. she's walking.. she's going for the pizza- (Yelling) Hey, that's not for you, bitch!    

Ep 10 Sarcasm/Mock Politeness

Phoebe: Well, c'mon, if it's important enough to discuss while I'm playing, then I assume it's important enough for everyone else to hear .

Chandler: (Quietly, to the others) That guy's going home with a note!

David: Noth- I was- I was just saying to my-

Phoebe: Could you speak up please ?

Violation/Flouting Grice’s Maxims

Impoliteness

Type % Type %

Quantity 11.38 Bald-on-Record 33.42

Quality 47.30 Positive 18.75

Relation 16.17 Negative 18.75

Manner 25.15 Off-record 17.75

Sarcasm 11.32

Discussion

The results show close relationship between humor and cooperative principle and FTA attached to Buffay’s utterances.

Maxim of Quality is violated mostly Bald on record is used majorly by

Phoebe Buffay Phoebe’s characteristics

“Eccentricity” and “Street Phoebe”?

ReferencesAttardo, S. (1994). Linguistic theories of humor. Berlin and New York: Mouton

de GruyterBrown, P. and Levinson, S.C. (1987) Politeness: some universals in language

usage, Cambridge Cambridge University Press.Culpeper J. (1996) “Towards an anatomy of impoliteness’, Journal of

Pragmatics 25: 349-67Raskin, V. , & Attardo, S. (1991). Script theory revised: Joke similarity and

joke representation model. Humor: International Journal of Humor Research, 4(3)

Wu Y., & Chen Y., Humor Strategies in the American Sitcom “Friends”: An Empirical Study, 54-71

Grice, P. (1975). Logic and conversation. In P. Cole, & J. L. Morgan (eds.), Syntax and semantics (vol. 3) New York: Academic Press.

Ross, A. The Language of Humour, London, RouledgeShu, Y. (2007). Linguistic Strategies Adopted in the American Sitcom Friends.

Unpublished master’s thesis, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei.Sperber, D., &Wilson, D. (1995). Relevance: Communication and cognition.

Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Thank you