Course paper

Chapter II

Communication and euphemisms

II. 1 Taboo and euphemisms

The roots of modern euphemisms go back to ancient times. The concept of euphemism is inextricably linked with the phenomenon of taboo, which is studied by ethnography.

"Taboo" is a word of Polynesian origin, meant the prohibition of certain conduct, the violation of which was usually associated with punishment. The ancient taboos were associated with various aspects of everyday life: eating, disease, birth, weddings, funerals, agricultural labor, and other human activities.

Among all kinds of prohibitions significant place were occupied by linguistic taboos - bans on the use of certain words and expressions. They have been associated with the belief in the magic of language function, that is, the belief in the possibility of a direct impact on the world through language.

Among primitive peoples a taboo was imposed on certain words. Among the latter there are:

- Names of gods and spirits;

- Names of people;

- The names of animals, plants, minerals, and natural phenomena;

- The names of diseases and death;

- The names of the body parts.

By virtue of the superstitious fear of punishment for violating the ban, avoid to use the word taboo in all speech situations.

Taboo entails the appearance of euphemisms which are replacements of the banned words, although the relationship between them is not always symmetrical. Replacing the taboo word can be done by non-linguistic means (gestures, facial expressions), or the taboo word in speech can be simply omitted without attempting to use a substitute "euphemisms are impossible without taboo, although there can be taboos without euphemisms”.

The fact that the phenomenon of taboo arose at the dawn of human society, and continues to exist in the modern civilized world, allows us to consider this phenomenon as part of a single process of human history.

A well-known ethnographer D. Fraser underlines an exceptional impact, which an ancient system of restrictions on the superstitious explanation had on the human mind at all times and in all countries.

L.A. Bulakhovsky¹⁶ notes that different kinds of verbal taboos are observed as in very superstitious people like the Polynesians, as well in our compatriots, who fear that to name something that can jinx.

However, in the process of historical development of society in the system of taboos there is a change of evolutionary nature.

According to R. Holder,¹⁷ the author of the dictionary of euphemisms, taboos vary from generation to generation (even though some of them have shown remarkable ability to persist). Discarding such taboo that were typical to the Victorian era, the modern society, in its turn, creates new taboos.

D. Niemann and K. Silver¹⁸ who are authors of the "Thesaurus of euphemisms," argue that linguistic changes regarding euphemisms, are clearly a reflection of cultural change.

Speaking about the role of taboos in modern society, Warren B¹⁹ notes that although many ancient taboos ceased to exist in our society, there are modern words that "cover" taboo words, phrases, or ideas.

In ancient times, the emotional basis of a taboo was a sense of superstitious fear of punishment for violating the ban can be defined as religious motives of euphemisms, as well as feelings of shame and disgust against certain physiological acts which constitute moral motives of euphemisms.

In more recent times, with the development of society, while preserving some of the ancient (e.g., religious) taboo, еhe scope of moral motives euphemisms has significantly expanded. There appeared restrictions associated with some activities of man, his low social status, compliance with the rules of conduct adopted by the relevant social group, tact considerations, psychological relevance, and so on.

The notion of "taboo" has expanded. Everything connected with prohibition began to be understood as taboo. It has evolved to include a "genuine taboo in languages ​​of primitive peoples, and taboo in corporate and group jargons as well as political taboo."

In modern society the use of taboo words is avoided not because of fear of incurring the death or personal injury, but due to common understanding that these expressions are considered unacceptable in the present social context, as they may offend the sensibilities of a particular audience.

It should be noted that what is subject to prohibition is not the concept itself, which can not be removed from the language of communication, but only some of the words that serve to express the given concept.

Researchers of euphemisms and taboos note many of the common features of these phenomena in different people. This means that these phenomena must be considered as a universal not only in time but also in spatial terms. At this stage of development of a society subject-conceptual scope of the prohibitions in different languages ​​are basically the same, although there are some differences related to the specificity of national cultures, history, social and economic differences.

The list of subject-conceptual spheres of modern taboo, proposed in this paper is shown in the example of the English language. The lists of subject-conceptual areas of taboo in this language are given in the works of many authors. This list is based on the most advanced among them a list from the dictionary of euphemisms edited by R. Holder. In parentheses are the original names of conceptual subject-spheres with a Russian translation.

Subject-conceptual sphere of modern taboos are:

- The names of supernatural forces:

(Religion and Superstition / religion and prejudice);

- Names of human vices

(Boasting, Flattery and Lying / lies, flattery, bragging; Cowardice / cowardice; Drunkenness / drunkenness; Narcotics / drugs; Stealing / theft);

- Names related to the criminal sphere

(Crimes; Police; Prisons and Prisoners);

- The names of the concepts associated with poverty

(Poverty; Charity; Unemployment);

- Names of human mental and physical deficiencies

(Mental Illnesses; Obesity; Illness and physical disabilities);

- Names related to the field of physiology

(Defecation, Diarrhoea, Farting, Urination; Parts of the Body; Lavatories; Pregnancy; Childbirth; Abortion and others.);

- The names associated with the concept of death

(Death; Funerals; Killing and Suicide; Deathly Illness);

- Names related to the sexual sphere

(Nakedness; Copulation; Breasts and Genitalia; Homosexuality and Sexual Variations/sexual minorities; Prostitution; Contraception; Veneral Diseases and other.);

- Names related to the area of ​​family and marriage

(Courtship and Marriage; Mistresses and Lovers; Bastardy / illegitimate children);

- Names related to politics

(Politics; Bribery);

- Names related to the field of education

- Names related to the field of business

(Commerce and Industry / Commerce and Manufacturing; Auctioneers and Estate Agents / auctions and estate agencies; Bankruptcy / bankruptcy; Dismissal / fired);

- Names related to the military sphere (Warfare / Military operations; Espionage );

- Names related to the field of ethnic, age, sex differences;

(Color, Gypsies and Slavery; Age;)

- The names of some items of clothing

- The names of animals and animal meat;

- Rough curses.

(Vulgarisms, Pornography and Swearing)

Thus, taking into account the statement that on the whole the subject-conceptual scope of the prohibitions in different languages coincide, one using the example of the scope of the types of linguistic taboos in modern English can create an overview of the areas of the language ban at the present stage of development of the society.

II. 2 Typical features of euphemisms, their classification and function

Euphemizing generally exists in almost every nation all over the world, no matter how civilized it is. In all natural languages ​​both large families of languages ​​and languages ​​of minorities using euphemism is a common phenomenon. Nearly all cultures seem to have certain notions or things that people try to avoid mentioning directly, which means using euphemisms in order to avoid painful, offensive or unpleasant words. Thus, universality, which is something that is well - known and accepted by all the people, is one of the characteristics of euphemisms.

Another feature of euphemisms is localization. Various regions have differences in customs, culture, history which embody the localization of language. There are two causes of regional differences. First is a regional cultural difference. In different regions, the culture there will effect the development of euphemism. For example, 'go to W.C.' in the Balliol college of Oxford University, students call 'go to toilet' as'to visit Lady Periam’ because the toilets of that college were built on the land donated by Lady Periam. Of course, the Americans will not agree with this expression. Second is the difference of geographic environment. for example, in seaside, death would be connected with sea and tide and they may use 'go with the tide' to express death. On the contrary, in American west mountain areas, the euphemism for die is' ​​(gone) over the range 'or' to cross the Great Divide-. These are the typical regional euphemisms²⁰.

The changes of language depend on the need and changes of the society. Language changes all the time, new words appear continuously while the old ones disappear. Euphemism is In not an exception and it undergoes a process of metabolism too. It bears a marked brand of times which means that contemporaneity is also characteristic to euphemisms. For example, 'She is pregnant' has many different euphemistic expressions in different eras.

(1) She has canceled all her social engagements. (1856)

(2) She is in an interesting condition. (1880)

(3) She is in a delicate condition. (1895)

(4) She is knitting little bootees. (1910)

(5) She is in a family way. (1920)

(6) She is expecting. (1935)

(7) She is pregnant. (1956)

But after 1960s, euphemisms of pregnant develop slowly because in modern times, people are not so implicit. They always mention things directly. And now, the phenomenon of pregnancy is a cheerful thing and people will not be shy when mentioning it.

It is thought that only upper and middle class use euphemisms but this conclusion is too absolute and can be analyzed in three aspects: difference of gender or age, difference of profession or identity, and difference of style or context. Considering the first aspect it can be said that a study shows that females use more euphemisms than males do. There is a saying in English: 'horse sweat; men perspire; young ladies glow. It shows that women use obscure words to express the action of sweat. The difference of gender and age usually influences the choice of the synonyms of euphemisms. For instance, there is a variety of expressions about 'to go to toilet'. Men use the expression 'to shoot a lion', adults may say 'to go to w.c.' while children say 'to go to the pot." Euphemism also changes while the profession and identity changes. For example, the word 'die' can be used in many different ways. In military, people use the expression 'to lose number of one's mess' which orients from the mess system of UK navy. However, in the press, people often use the word 'thirty' because they usually mark '30' in the end of a news article, which means ending. Bearing in mind the difference of style or context it can be noted that stylistically, for instance, the word 'die' has hundreds of euphemisms but in daily communication, people may use 'to be gone" or "to be no more'. in obituaries, people use ' to pass away 'or' to depart 'but "to die' also has some witty expressions such as 'to pop off’ or 'to kick the bucket' (www.chledu.com). In brief, the general characteristics of euphemisms are universality, localization, contemporaneity, difference of gender or age, profession or identity, and difference of style or context.

According to historical classification, euphemisms can be divided into euphemisms in the Middle Ages, euphemisms in the Victorian Age, euphemisms in the 201'1 century, and contemporary euphemisms. In terms of the prevailing time, whether it is long or short, euphemisms can be divided into temporary euphemisms and persistent euphemisms. Some euphemisms are created on impulse on a certain occasion and are never repeated later, while others are coined and reused and ratified by many people and last for generations, even centuries. In these cases, we have nonce euphemisms and sustained euphemisms. For instance, most of the euphemisms concerning the Vietnam War and the Watergate Incident are one-day wonders while many euphemisms connected with taboo areas have become everlasting terms; some have even become idiomatic expressions²¹.

Euphemistic function is fulfilled by means of lexical substitutions and especially through discursive euphemistic strategies as discussed below.

Lexical substitution is, generally speaking, an effective way to mitigate the pejorative overtones of words considered too blunt or offensive in a given context. Clearly, euphemism responds to the desire to avoid certain taboos that can negatively affect conventional norms of tact as well as the speaker and addressee's social images. This is the case in the allusion to certain taboo concepts deemed unfit for polite conversation, such as sexual organs and sexual play, scatological concepts or ethnic differences. In this way, the substitution of the terms 'fuck', 'shit' and 'nigger' for 'copulate', 'defecate' and 'colored' respectively is a means of showing respect and deference, not only towards the subject matter, but also towards the interlocutor.

Different types of indirect discursive strategies, directly motivated by the politeness principle as a socio-cultural phenomenon, are more obviously related to the speaker's desire to maintain social relationships. It is interesting to note that these indirect verbal tactics tend to minimize the illocutionary force of a speech act without modifying the content of the message. This is so because indirect speech acts offer a greater degree of optionality to the receiver and minimize their impositive or pejorative strength. In order to avoid conflict in interpersonal communication, language users resort to the following types of palliative strategies:

- Mitigating apology expressions like "I'm sorry to say", "I'm afraid", "If you forgive my asking" or the more elaborate "I would not like to appear too inquisitive, but ...". These expressions constitute previous or subsequent apologies for conflictive illocutions, and, thus, are at the speaker's disposal to mitigate the face-affronting power of a distasteful speech act.

- Pseudo-imperative expressions, that is, those which downplay the imposition of certain directive speech acts, namely orders, commands or direct requests, modes of verbal behavior which are considered intrinsically impolite in social discourse. Within this type of strategies, the following euphemistic locutions are to be distinguished:

a) tag questions which accompany directive speech acts, as in "Shut the door, will you?" ',

b) hedging modal verbs (may, could, would, should, etc.). These mitigating modal verbs are employed in cases such as "May I ask you to put out your cigarette?" and "I would do it again", in which the verbs in italics soften the imposition of orders like "Put out your cigarette" and "Do it again", respectively;

c) downtoning adverbs (possibly, perhaps, etc.) which allow for some mitigation in conflictive utterances, as in the request "Could you possibly help me?";

many institutional euphemisms which convert madhouses into mental hospitals, colleges into universities, and small business establishments into emporiums, parlors, and salons. The desire to improve one's surroundings also is evident in geographical place names, most prominently in the case of the distinctly nongreen Greenland, but also in the designation of many small burgs as cities.

The negative euphemisms deflate and diminish. They are defensive in nature, offsetting the power of tabooed terms and otherwise eradicating from the language everything that people prefer not to deal with directly. The negative euphemisms can be called traditional euphemisms or narrowing euphemism. They are extremely ancient, and closely connected with the taboos. A euphemism and its corresponding taboo are in fact two faces of the same coin. They refer to the same thing though they have different looks, the euphemism having a much more pleasant face than the taboo.

Euphemisms, whether positive or negative, can be also divided into unconscious euphemisms and conscious euphemisms. The criterion for classification is the euphemistic meaning whether correlative with the original meaning or not. Unconscious euphemisms, as its name implies, were developed long ago, and are used unconsciously, without any intent to deceive or evade. For example, now standard term as 'cemetery' has been a replacement for the more deathly 'graveyard' since the fourteenth century. 'Indisposition' has been a substitute for 'disease' for a long period; people seldom realize that its original meaning is incapacity for dealing with something. Take 'dieter' for another example, the original meaning taking food by a rule or regulation has been substituted by the euphemistic meaning 'the one moderate in eating and dining for losing weight'. From the above we can conclude that unconscious euphemisms were developed so long ago that few can remember their original motivations. Conscious euphemisms are widely employed, which involves more complex categories. When people communicate with each other, speakers are conscious to say tactfully, and the listeners understand their implied meanings. For example, when a lady stands up and says that she wants to 'powder her nose' or 'make a phone call' at a dinner party, the people present realize the euphemism means' something else ', that is,' going to the ladies "room".

Besides the divisions mentioned above, euphemisms can be divided into seven semantic categories:

Superstitious taboos have their roots in the distant past of mankind when people believed that there was a supernatural link between a name and the object or creature it represented. Therefore, all the words denoting evil spirits, dangerous animals, or the powers of nature were taboo. If uttered, it was believed that unspeakable disasters would result not only for the speaker but also for those near him. That is why all creatures, objects and phenomena threatening danger were referred to in a round-about descriptive way. So, a dangerous animal might be described as the one-lurking-in-the-wood and a mortal disease as the black death Euphemisms are probably the oldest type of synonyms, for it is reasonable to assume that superstitions which caused real fear called for the creation of euphemisms long before the need to describe things in their various aspects or subtle shades caused the appearance of other synonyms.

The Christian religion also made certain words taboo. The proverb Speak of the devil and he will appear must have been used and taken quite literally when it was first used, and the fear of calling the devil by name was certainly inherited from ancient superstitious beliefs. So, the word devil became taboo, and a number of euphemisms were substitutes for it: the Prince of Darkness, the black one, the evil one, dickens (coll.). deuce (coll.), (Old) Xick (coll.).

The word God, due to other considerations, also had a great number of substitutes which can still be traced in such phrases as Good Lord !. By Heavens,, Good Heavens !, (My) goodness !, (My) goodness gracious !, Gracious me!

Professional euphemisms:

In western countries, mental work is considered to be the high job whereas physical labor is recognized as humble work, besides there is a great difference in the remuneration. Thus, most of the people hold that people with different occupations have different status in society. Some lowly paid or indecent jobs are often used in English culture just for saving face and expressing politeness. Therefore there are fewer occupations called jobs, many have become professions. Some words and forms like engineer are more popular among people in the communication. English euphemisms are used to express some fancy occupational titles, which can elevate the people's status. Many previously unwelcome professions have now taken more appealing names. For example, in profession euphemisms, people always use cleaning operative for road sweeper or dustman, sanitation engineer for garbage man, meat technologist for butcher, and hairdresser has turned into beautician, etc.

Disease euphemisms:

In the disease euphemisms, people always use long illness replaces for cancer, social disease replaces for syphilis and AIDS, also they use lung trouble substitutes for tuberculosis and so on. And if someone with a mental illness, we can not say psychosis directly, we should say he or she is a little confused, meanwhile, we should use hard of hearing instead of deaf.

Mental diseases also cause the frequent use of euphemisms.

A mad person may be described as insane, mentally unstable, unbalanced, unhinged, not (quite) right (coll.), Not all there (coll.), Off one's head (coll.), Off one's rocker (coll. ), wrong in the upper storey (coll.), having bats in one's belfry (coll.), crazy as a bedbug (coll.), cuckoo (sl.), nutty (sl.), off one's nut (sl.) , loony (si.), a mental case, a mental defective, etc.

A clinic for such patients can also be discreetly referred to as, for instance, an asylum, sanitarium, sanatorium, (mental) institution. and, less discreetly, as a nut house (sl.), booby hatch (sl.), loony bin (sl.), etc.

In the story by Evelyn Waugh "Mr. Loveday's Little Outing" a clinic of this kind, treating only very rich patients, is described as large private grounds suitable for the charge of nervous or difficult cases. This is certainly the peak of euphemistic "delicacy".

The great number of humorous substitutes found in such groups of words prove particularly tempting for writers who use them for comical purposes. The following extracts from a children's book by R. Dahl are, probably, not in the best of taste, but they demonstrate the range of colloquial and slang substitutes for the word mad.

"He's gone off his rocker!" shouted one of the fathers, aghast,

and the other parents joined in the chorus of frightened shouting.

"He's crazy!" they shouted.; "He's balmy!"; "He's nutty!"; "He's screwy!"; "He's batty!"; "He's dippy!"; "He's dotty! '; "He's daffy!"; "He's goofy!"; "He's beany!"

"He's buggy!"; "He's wacky!"; "He's loony!"; "No, he is not!" said Grandpa Joe.

(From Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by R. Dahl)

"What did I tell you!" - Cried Grandma Georgina. "He's round the twist! He's bogged as a beetle! He's dotty as a dingbat! He's got rats in the roof! ... "

All the above examples show that euphemisms are substitutes for their synonyms. Their use and very existence are caused either by social conventions or by certain psychological factors. Most of them have stylistic connotations in their semantic structures. One can also assume that there is a special euphemistic connotation that can be singled out in the semantic structure of each such word. Let us point out, too, that euphemistic connotations in formal euphemisms are different in "flavor" from those in slang euphemistic substitutes. In the first case they are solemn and delicately evasive, and in the second rough and somewhat cynical, reflecting an attempt to laugh off an unpleasant fact.