学士学位论文—-浅析英文民生新闻标题中的反语.doc

3广师天河学院毕 业 设 计（论 文）题 目： 浅析英文民生新闻标题中的反语 （英文）： An Analysis of Irony in English Civic News Headline 系 别： 外语学院 专 业： 英语 姓 名： 冯淑婷 学 号： 2012073243408 指导教师： 沈悦英 日 期： 2016年5 月 An Analysis of Irony in English Civic News Headline English Contract ABSTRACT With the dramatic development of economic globalization, Chinas communication with outside world has become more frequent than ever before. Meanwhile English news is one of the most important resources for people. With the living standard continually being improved, people pay more and more attention to their civic situation and problems. For the whole piece of the news, the headline is crucial, and it determines whether readers will read the whole piece of news. So the headline is the eye of the whole news which brightens the news. As a kind of rhetorical device, pun is not only widely used in literary works, but also accounted for a place in the news headlines. Simple to say, irony can make news headlines become more humorous, more real, and closer to life. In order to be able to understand the real meaning expressed by the news headlines, it is necessary for people to be familiar with irony. So this paper is going to study irony in English civic news headline. The first part of this paper is a brief introduction to the research object of the paperthe irony in English civic news headlines. The second part is to introduce the basic definition of irony and the relationship between irony and English news headlines. The third part is to analyze the characteristics of irony in English civic news headlines. The fourth part is to analyze the functions of irony in English civic news. The last part is to summarize the whole paper.Key Words: irony; English civic news headline; characteristics; functions浅析英文民生新闻标题中的反语摘 要随着经济全球化快速发展，中国与世界的交流越来越频繁了,英文新闻成为了最重要的信息来源之一。 随着人们生活水平的不断提升， 他们越来越关注民生状况和其问题。新闻标题对于一整篇新闻来说是至关重要的，它决定了读者是否会查阅一整篇新闻，所以说标题是新闻的眼睛，它点亮了整篇新闻。反语作为一种修辞手法，除了被广泛地运用在文学作品中，在新闻标题中也占了一席之地。简略的说，反语能够实让新闻标题更加幽默，更加真实，更加贴近生活。为了能够很好的理解新闻标题所表达的真正意义，熟知反语是非常的重要的。所以本论文浅略地研究分析英文民生新闻标题中的反语。本论文的第一部分是简略的介绍了论文要研究的对象，也就是英语民生新闻标题中的反语。 第二部分是介绍反语的基本定义和反语与英文新闻标题的关系。第三部分是分析反语在英文民生新闻标题中的特征。第四部分是分析反语在英语民生新闻中的作用。最后的一部分就是总结全文。关键词：反语; 英文民生新闻标题; 特征; 功能 1广师天河学院本科毕业论文广师天河学院本科毕业论文Contents. Introduction1.The Relationship between Irony and English News Headline.2 2.1 Definition of Irony3 2.2 The Role of Irony in English News Headline.4 . The Characteristics of Irony in English Civic News Headline4 3.1 Criticize Civic Problems with Ironic Humor5 3.2 Express the Civic Situation Impressively 6 3.3 Describe the Civic Events Obligingly7. The Functions of Irony in English Civic News Headline9 4. 1Dispense the Inherent Vapidity 134.2 Ironically Highlight the Prevalent Peoples True Feelings14V. Conclusion15Bibliography17Acknowledgements19 13I. Introduction News headline is one of the most important parts of the news. It is eye-catching highlight which attracts readers attention and previews the whole news. Compared with other English news, English civic news is ignored by scholars. The same as the English civic news, irony is not taken seriously by scholars compared with other English rhetoric devices. When people want to know more about irony, and they search the information of English rhetoric devices, the first thing which shows up is always not irony. In order to find out what is really needed, digging harder for irony is always the important thing. At the end of it, frustration shows up after finding out the truly situation about irony. Although irony is commonly used in our daily life, but it seems that people dont really care about it. Such being the case, paying more attention to irony and English civic news is extremely necessary, because they are common in daily life and are very important. This paper is going to study on the irony in English civic news headline. The definition of irony in Websters New World Dictionary is “a method of humorous or subtly sarcastic expression in which the intended meaning if the words used is the direct opposite of their usual sense.”(Michael E. Agnes 284). Actually, irony is commonly used in the English civic news headline. Irony in English civic news headline seemed quite immaterial to scholars so that people started to neglect the importance of irony. Therefore, it is high time to pay attention to it for its development. This paper works on analyzing the characteristics and functions of irony in English civic news headline. Meanwhile, this paper will provide some unique characteristics and functions on irony in English civic news headline to serve the readers and provide some information to figure out the significance of irony in English civic news headline. The characteristics will help to criticize civic problems with ironic humor, express the civic situation impressively and describe the civic events obligingly. And the functions dispense the inherent vapidity, ironically highlight the prevalent peoples true feelings and trenchantly expose the civic problems.II. The Relationship between Irony and English News HeadlineWith the high speed development of the Internet, people gather information more easily. Living in an era full of all kinds of information, people need to get valuable information through all sorts of media. And as the widespread information resource media, news is one of the most popular sources for people gathering information. In one hand, as news headline is the highlight for the whole news, news headline seems to be the widespread media for reader to absorb the information quickly. In the other hand, as the official languages of the most populous countries, English is the worlds most widely-used language. So on the whole, English news is easier to spread. Above all, English news headline is the most effective way to convey information. In this part of the paper, it concentrates on the relationship between irony and English news headline.2.1 Definition of IronyIrony (from Ancient Greek (eirneía), meaning "dissimulation, feigned ignorance"), in its broadest sense, is a rhetorical device, a literary technique, or an event in which what appears, on the surface, to be the case, differs radically from what is actually the case. Irony may be divided into categories such as verbal, dramatic, and situational. Muecke, DC described irony in his book The Compass of Irony: “Verbal, dramatic, and situational irony are often used for emphasis in the assertion of a truth. The ironic form of simile, used in sarcasm, and some forms of litotes can emphasize one's meaning by the deliberate use of language which states the opposite of the truth, denies the contrary of the truth, or drastically and obviously understates a factual connection.” (Muecke 80) Henry Watson Fowler, in The King's English, says “any definition of ironythough hundreds might be given, and very few of them would be acceptedmust include this, that the surface meaning and the underlying meaning of what is said are not the same.” (Henry 126) The use of irony may require the concept of a double audience. Fowlers A Dictionary of Modern English Usage says:Irony is a form of utterance that postulates a double audience, consisting of one party that hearing shall hear & shall not understand, & another party that, when more is meant than meets the ear, is aware both of that more & of the outsiders' incomprehension.(Fowler 156)The American Heritage Dictionarys secondary meaning for irony: “incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs”. (Houghton 215) This sense, however, is not synonymous with "incongruous" but merely a definition of dramatic or situational irony. It is often included in definitions of irony not only that incongruity is present but also that the incongruity must reveal some aspect of human vanity or folly. Thus the majority of American Heritage Dictionary's usage panel found it unacceptable to use the word ironic to describe mere unfortunate coincidences or surprising disappointments that "suggest no particular lessons about human vanity or folly." On this aspect, The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) also says:A condition of affairs or events of a character opposite to what was, or might naturally be, expected; a contradictory outcome of events as if in mockery of the promise and fitness of things. (James Murray 403) Its difficult to give irony a perfect explanation. In Samuel Johnsons Dictionary, irony is defined as a mode of speech in which the meaning is clearly contrary to the words.（Samuel 147） Now according to the Oxford Advanced Learners English-Chinese Dictionary, irony is the expression of ones meaning by saying the direct opposite of ones thoughts in order to be emphatic, amusing, sarcastic, etc. D. Sperber and D. Wilson published On Verbal Irony and it claimed “an ironical utterance is traditionally analyzed as literally saying one thing and figuratively meaning the opposite. Thus the ironical remark what lovely weather would have the figurative meaning what awful weather, and so on.” (Sperber Wilson 60).Although irony has so many definitions there is no integrated definition for irony. However, the present research of English irony seems to describe the meaningful idea instead of definition.2.2 The Roles of Irony in English News Headline Irony is in a particular language environment. The functions of irony are to satirize and to create humorous atmosphere. Sometimes irony is more powerful. Adopting opposite words to express real intention is the feature of irony. It is more interesting for readers to read.News headline is the eye of the news. The most important function of it is to reveal the main content of the news to the readers concisely. And let the readers in the shortest possible time to obtain as much information as possible. When readers read the news, the first thing coming to the eyes is the headline. A wonderful news headline could strike a chord with other readers immediately which is just like a magnet to attract readers. On the contrary, dull headlines often cannot arouse the readers interest to read.The first role of irony in English news headlines is to create humor for catching readers eyes. Irony can produce a humorous effect. On one hand, it makes language vivid and impressive. It often has a surprising effect. On the other hand, it can increase the relationship between people, maintain humorous atmosphere.Example 1:Canadian start-up sells bottled fresh air to China, says sales booming. (CNN) In example 1, China now is shrouded in a pollution haze very badly. In a way fresh air become more and more precious to China. Actually, Canadian air is not that fresh as they say. But compared with Chinese air, it is the treasure. Here the news doesnt want to express that the Canadian air is fresh. On the contrary, it just wants to express that the Canadian air is the normal air which all the creatures breathe every day. But Chinese people are crazy to buy it. The result of this irony is to make active atmosphere and bring the interest to support readers to go through the whole passage. They want to figure out why China would need a bottle of air.A humorous atmosphere will relieve the readers emotion. And it will arouse the readers desire to dig out what exactly the news talk about. This is a very important function of irony in English news headlines which creates ironically humorous atmosphere to catch the readers eyes. The second role of irony in English news headlines is to satirize and deepen the news theme. An impressive headline is meaningful to the whole news. It can leave a deep impression on readers, which let reader notice that the news is worth taking time to read. Irony deepens the news theme which exactly fit in the English news headline.Example 2: Super-gonorrheas spread causing huge concern. (BBC) In Example 2, gonorrhea has been ignored for a long time. People dont see gonorrhea as a threat to their health even to their life. People always had regrets after catching gonorrhea and realized the terror of it. But before it, people just dont care about it and they do whatever they want. In front of the carnal desire, everything seems nothing. People do not pay enough attention to the preventive actions of gonorrhea. The news headline actually doesnt mean to say the disease cause a huge concern. What the headline truly wanted to say is people dont concern about that disease. And this piece of news headline satirizes the real situation of how people treat gonorrhea. And it mentioned that people should pay more attention to it because once get the disease there is no way to get rid of it.Satiric irony makes the news headline become more vivid and impresses the readers. Then it deepens the news theme which elevates the whole news.III. The Characteristics of Irony in English Civic News HeadlinePeople are increasingly concerned about civic news. A lot of television and news websites are also paying attention to civic news audience service. Civic news is an effective way for news media improving attraction and influence of news in the increasingly competitive situation. Because of the civic news viewpoint, deep original interview, and vivid and readable style of witting, civic news are welcomed by the broad masses of readers, and became a news style which is strengthen proximity, readability, and serviceability. Being a part in English civic news headlines, irony plays a key role in English civic news headlines. It criticizes the civic problems, expresses the civic situation and describes the civic events. 3.1 Criticize Civic Problems with Ironic HumorEnglish civic news headline is similar with other English news headline. But it tends to focus on the civic issues. The description of the English civic news uses more popular and easy-to-understand language. Part two of the paper has already clarified the characteristics of irony in English news headline. Obviously, the characteristics of irony in English civic news headlines are almost the same as those in other English news headline. But English civic news headlines still has some differences between them. And the following passage is going to analyze the characteristics of irony in the English civic news headline.One of the characteristics of irony in English news headline is to criticize civic problems with ironic humor. As mentioned above, one of the functions of irony in English news headline is creating humorous atmosphere. It also works in the English civic news headline. But English civic n