English Taboo Words and Its Pragmatic Functions 英语禁忌语及其语用功能.docVIP

English Taboo Words and Its Pragmatic Functions Abstract: Different countries have different taboos. Furthermore, linguistic taboos change with the development of society. With the increasing importance of communication between English and Chinese, English taboo words usually become block for English learners.Therefore, learning English taboos and their pragmatic functions is quite essential. The paper firstly tries to make an analysis of what linguistic taboo is on the basis of some research study and its significance. Secondly, it introduces several important classifications of English taboo. The paper points out that different taboos have different pragmatic functions and the ways of avoiding taboo. Key Words: English taboo words; evolution; pragmatic functions; forms Ⅰ. Introduction In language communication, for some reasons, certain words are avoided to be used by people. They consider them sacred, dangerous, unpleasant or offensive. These words are to be forbidden in many situations, particularly in modern civilization, but only allowed and used by certain people in some specific circumstances. This phenomenon is what we call linguistic taboo. Taboo phenomenon has been widely found in all cultures in the word. When this phenomenon is extended to language, linguistic taboo comes into being. Language and culture are closely related, and the differences between cultures have a tremendous impact on the features of language. Therefore we can conclude there is vast difference in English and Chinese taboo.However, not everyone knows their specific difference which causes easily to make mistakes and embarrassment in cultural exchange. For example, in China, we usually ask people how old they are. On the contrary, in England, it is extremely not polite to ask their age, which is regarded as an exceedingly private question. What’s more, some words may lead to relevant psychological behavior of using those reverent or unpleasant words. These words perhaps result