ABSTRACT:In today's world, exchange between different culture becomes increasingly frequent. Along with the progress of science and the development of economy, especially the great achievements of Internet technology, the media industry has been burgeoning. The Newsroom is an American TV series themed with development of news, which has achieved popularity both at home and abroad. Many factors account for the success of this TV series, among which, a skillful use of verbal humor is an important reason. 

The previous studies have suggested that an analysis of the verbal humor in American situation comedy from the perspective of the Cooperative Principle is very effective. In the meanwhile, The Newsroom is understudied in this aspect. Thus it is necessary to analyze the verbal humor in this TV series on the basis of the Cooperative Principle, in order to help Chinese audience have a better understanding of the humorous and penetrating classic dialogues, the personalities of the characters, and the theme of the stories. 

On the basis of analyzing the conversation from season one and season two of The Newsroom, the paper investigates how humorous effects are generated from the perspective of violating the four maxims of the Cooperative Principle, namely quality maxim, quantity maxim, relation maxim and manner maxim. It has retested that the Cooperative Principle has a great explaining power for verbal humor. So it is suggested that audience may have some knowledge of the Cooperative Principle, in order to have a better understanding of the plot of American TV series. 

Keywords: the Cooperative Principle; American TV series; verbal humor; The Newsroom

Table of Contents

ABSTRACT

中文摘要

1 Introduction-1

1.1 Background and Significance of the Study -1

1.2 Objectives of the Study-2

2 Literature Review-2

2.1 Studies on the Cooperative Principle-2

2.1.1 Quantity Maxim-3

2.1.2 Quality Maxim-3

2.1.3 Relation Maxim-3

2.1.4 Manner Maxim-4

2.2 Previous Studies on Verbal Humor-4

2.3 Previous Studies on American Sitcoms on the Basis of Cooperative Principle-5

3 Analysis of the Verbal Humor in The Newsroom  from the perspective of Cooperative Principle-6

3.1 Data Collection-6

3.2 Humor Achieved by Violating the Cooperative Principle-6

3.2.1 Non-observance of Maxim of Quantity -6

3.2.2 Non-observance of Quality Maxim-8

3.2.3 Non-observance of Relation Maxim-11

3.2.4 Non-observance of Manner Maxim-13

4 Conclusion-15

References-17