A Pragmatic Study of Gender Differences in Verbal Communication.docVIP

A Pragmatic Study of Gender Differences in Verbal Communication 　　【Abstract】Male and Female languages refer to those which are usually used by men and women or those which characterize gender differences. Based on the theories of sociolinguistics and pragmatics， this thesis mainly provides a contrastive analysis of gender differences in conversation of Desperate Housewives from the perspectives of politeness principles. It aims at investigating how the pragmatic principles are violated or observed in the conversations of the characters in the series， finding out some to minimize the misunderstandings in inter-gender communication and achieve effective inter-gender communication. 　　【Key words】Gender differences； Politeness principle； Desperate Housewives 　　1. A Brief Introduction to Desperate Housewives 　　Desperate Housewives is an American television dramedy mystery series created by Marc Cherry and produced by ABC Studios and Cherry Productions. The show worked through domestic struggles and family life， while facing the secrets， crimes and mysteries hidden behind the doors of their， on the surface， beautiful and seemingly perfect suburban neighborhood. The popularity of the show aroused a worldwide cultural phenomenon. This research aims at studying gender differences in language use from pragmatic perspective by analyzing how the pragmatic principles are obeyed and violated in the dialogues between heroes and heroines in Desperate Housewives， and then tries to find the appropriate way to minimize the misunderstanding in the communications between women and men and finally achieve the successful inter-gender communication. 　　2. Politeness Principles 　　In order to improve and perfect Grice’s CP， Leech put forward the Politeness Principle. Politeness Principle improves and perfects the conversational implicature theory and explains the social language phenomenon. Leech further formulates his PP with the negative and positive forms： （in the negative form）“M