Abstract：With the continuous development of China’s economy, Chinese foreign trade becomes more and more frequent. Business English, as a kind of functional variant of General English, has developed into normalized professional language because of its special pragmatic value. This thesis attempts to analyze Business English language from the perspective of pragmatics, shed new light on general pragmatic features of Business English. Its linguistic features are analyzed and discussed. The discussion is designed to find the speciality of Business English, spurring further study of it. In this article, the author will discuss the study of the language features of Business English in three parts. The first part will discuss the meaning of Business English, and in part two, some basic common principles of pragmatics will be discussed. And the third part, from the perspective of pragmatics, with principles of pragmatics, is to make a list of the language features of Business English through analyzing some examples. It is hoped that this thesis could give a reference to further research.

Key words:  Business English; pragmatic principals; the features of Business English

CONTENTS

Abstract

摘要

1. Introduction1

1.1 Research Background

1.2 The Definition of Business English

1.3 The Development of Business English

2. The Concept of Pragmatics2

2.1 The Definition of Pragmatics

2.2 Relevant Pragmatic Principles

2.2.1 Cooperative principle

2.2.2 Politeness Principle

2.2.3 Economy Principle

2.2.4 Vague Language Principle

3. The Features of Business English .5

3.1 The Features of Profession

3.1.1 Professional Words

3.1.2 Professional Sentences

3.2 The Features of Economy

3.2.1 Terseness and Conciseness

3.2.2 More short words

3.3 The Features of Politeness

3.3.1 The Usage of Passive voice

3.3.2 The Usage of Relaxation Method

3.4 The Features of Vagueness

3.5 The Features of Cooperation

4. Conclusion10

Bibliography. 12

Acknowledgements.. 13