委婉语的文化内涵与翻译研究.pdfVIP

On the Cultural Connotation of Euphemism and Translation Abstract The term “euphemism” originates from Greek. The prefix “eu-” means “good” and “-pheme” means “speech”, so “euphemism” refers to “words of good omen” or “good speech”. People of all over the world try to use mild and agreeable language when speaking of unpleasant or embarrassing facts. Almost all people, almost all the time, seem to have certain things or notions that they avoid mentioning directly. Sometimes they use pleasant, polite or harmless sounding terms instead of those considered unpleasant or offensive. The application of English euphemism is related to all the aspects of human life. It is a very important linguistic phenomenon in English language. This paper presents a preliminary study of the cultural connotation of euphemism and translation of euphemism in order to have a better understanding in the translating activity and human communication. This paper is developed into four parts. The first part is the introduction, stating the thesis and scope of research, and making a brief introduction of the definition of euphemism. The second part probes into the cultural connotation of euphemism. At first, the author illustrates three principles of forming euphemisms, which includes the distance principle, the relation principle and the pleasantness principle. These three principles interact on and restrict each other. And then, the author illustrates the cultural connotation of euphemism from different aspects of society. The third part illustrates the application and translation of euphemism. People use euphemisms differ from men to women, from past to present, from situation to situation and from re