Abstract
This study undertakes a contrastive lexical-semantic analysis of a set of related verbs in English and French (English to joke and to kid, French rigoler and plaisanter), using the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach to semantic analysis. We show that the semantic and conceptual differences between French and English are greater than commonly assumed. These differences, we argue, have significant implications for humor studies: first, they shed light on different cultural orientations towards “laughter talk” in Anglo and French linguacultures; second; they highlight the danger of conceptual Anglocentrism in relying on English-specific words as a theoretical vocabulary for humor studies.
About the authors
Cliff Goddard is Professor of Linguistics at Griffith University. He is a proponent of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach to semantics and its sister theory, the cultural scripts approach to pragmatics. His recent publications include “Words and Meanings: Lexical Semantics Across Domains, Languages and Cultures” (co-authored with Anna Wierzbicka; OUP 2014), and the edited volumes “Happiness and Pain Across Languages and Cultures” (co-edited with Zhengdao Ye; Benjamins, 2016) and “Minimal English for a Global World: Improved Communication Using Fewer Words” (Palgrave, in press/2017). Email: c.goddard@griffith.edu.au.
Kerry Mullan is Convenor of Languages and a member of the Social and Global Studies Centre at RMIT University. She teaches French language and culture, and sociolinguistics. Her main research interests are cross-cultural communication and differing interactional styles – particularly those of French and Australian English speakers. She also researches in the areas of intercultural pragmatics, discourse analysis, language teaching and conversational humour. Email: kerry.mullan@rmit.edu.au.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on this paper. We would also like to thank Sophia Waters for research assistance with French, and Helen Leung for research assistance with WordBanks (English). We are especially grateful to Anna Wierzbicka and Bert Peeters for consultation about the explications, and to Diane de Saint Léger for her helpful comments. Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the Australasian Humour Studies Network Conference, Federation University Australia, Ballarat, February 3, 2017, and the Workshop on Minimal English and NSM Semantics, Australian National University, Canberra, March 18, 2017.
Appendices
Appendix A: Semantic Primes, French and English equivalents (after Peeters 2015) [32]
| JE, TU, QUELQU’UN, QUELQUE CHOSE ~ CHOSE, GENS, CORPS | substantives |
| I, YOU, SOMEONE, SOMETHING ~ THING, PEOPLE, BODY | |
| TYPES, PARTIES | relational substantives |
| KINDS, PARTS | |
| CE, LA MÊME CHOSE, AUTRE | determiners |
| THIS, THE SAME, OTHER ~ ELSE | |
| UN, DEUX, CERTAINS, TOUS, BEAUCOUP, PEU | quantifiers |
| ONE, TWO, SOME, ALL, MUCH ~ MANY, LITTLE ~ FEW | |
| BIEN, MAL | evaluators |
| GOOD, BAD | |
| GRAND, PETIT | descriptors |
| BIG, SMALL | |
| SAVOIR, PENSER, VOULOIR, NE PAS VOULOIR, SENTIR, VOIR, ENTENDRE | mental predicates |
| KNOW, THINK, WANT, DON’T WANT, FEEL, SEE, HEAR | |
| DIRE, MOTS, VRAI | speech |
| SAY, WORDS, TRUE | |
| FAIRE, ARRIVER, BOUGER | actions, events, movement |
| DO, HAPPEN, MOVE | |
| ÊTRE (QUELQUE PART), IL Y A, ÊTRE (QUELQU’UN/QUELQUE CHOSE) | location, existence, specification |
| BE (SOMEWHERE), THERE IS, BE (SOMEONE/SOMETHING) | |
| (EST) À MOI | possession |
| (IS) MINE | |
| VIVRE, MOURIR | life and death |
| LIVE, DIE | |
| QUAND ~ MOMENT ~ FOIS, MAINTENANT, AVANT, APRÈS, LONGTEMPS, PEU DE TEMPS, POUR QUELQUE TEMPS, INSTANT | time |
| WHEN ~ TIME, NOW, BEFORE, AFTER, A LONG TIME, A SHORT TIME, FOR SOME TIME, MOMENT | |
| OÙ ~ ENDROIT, ICI, AU-DESSUS, AU-DESSOUS, LOIN, PRÈS, CÔTÉ, DANS, TOUCHER | place |
| WHERE ~ PLACE, HERE, ABOVE, BELOW, FAR, NEAR, SIDE, INSIDE, TOUCH | |
| NE … PAS, PEUT-ÊTRE, POUVOIR, À CAUSE DE, SI | logical concepts |
| NOT, MAYBE, CAN, BECAUSE, IF | |
| TRÈS, PLUS | intensifier, augmentor |
| VERY, MORE | |
| COMME ~ FAÇON | similarity |
| LIKE ~ AS ~ WAY |
Notes
Exponents of primes can be polysemous, i.e. they can have other, additional meanings.
Exponents of primes may be words, bound morphemes, or phrasemes.
They can be formally complex.
They can have language-specific combinatorial variants (allolexes, indicated with ~).
Each prime has well-specified syntactic (combinatorial) properties.
Appendix B: Laugh’ = ‘rire’: A universal or near-universal building block for «humor» concepts
The explication below is adapted from one proposed by Wierzbicka (2014b) for English ‘laugh.’ We claim that it is equally valid for French rire. Note that the first component includes a durative element ‘for some time,’ which indicates that the explication is specifically tailored for “durative/imperfective” uses of laugh. A separate, closely related, explication is needed for “perfective/punctual” uses, and for contexts like ‘he laughed nervously’ or ‘she laughed scornfully’ (Goddard 2017).
The explication falls into three sections, labelled here (a), (b) and (c). Brief comments follow the explication.
Mary is laughing (= Marie rit)
a. this someone (i.e. Mary) is doing something for some time (at this time)
something is happening to some parts of this someone’s body because of it
b. people often do this when they feel something good for a short time because they think like this:
“something is happening here now
things like this don’t happen very often
people here can feel something good because of it”
c. when someone does it, it is like this:
some parts of this someone’s mouth [m] move for some time
other people in the place where this someone is can see it
at the same time these people can hear something because of it
like people can hear something when someone says something
a. ce quelqu’un (c-à-d Marie) fait quelque chose pour quelque temps (en ce moment)
il arrive quelque chose à quelques parties du corps de ce quelqu’un à cause de cela
b. les gens font souvent cela quand ils sentent quelque chose de bien pour un peu de tempsparce qu’ils pensent comme ça :
« il arrive quelque chose ici maintenant
des choses comme ça n’arrivent pas très souvent
les gens ici peuvent sentir quelque chose de bien à cause de cela »
c. quand quelqu’un le fait, c’est comme ça :
quelques parties de la bouche [m] de ce quelqu’un bougent pour quelque temps
d’autres gens à l’endroit où est ce quelqu’un peuvent le voir
en même temps ces gens peuvent entendre quelque chose à cause de cela
comme peuvent entendre quelque chose les gens quand quelqu’un dit quelque chose
Key points
Section (a) consists of very general components (termed Lexicosyntactic Frame in NSM parlance, cf. Goddard and Wierzbicka (2016)), shared with various other verbs, notably (to) cry.
Section (b) is a Prototypical Scenario. The word ‘often’ in the first line of course implies ‘not always.’ The scenario depicts laughing as typically triggered by a person experiencing a brief good feeling occasioned by subjective awareness that (roughly put) something “unusual” is happening here and that ‘people here can feel something good’ because of it.’
Section (c) is a description of the physical “mechanics” of laughing, which includes visual movement of the mouth and (often) an audible “vocal” sound. In some languages, the components about “audibility” vary slightly, cf. Chinese xiao ‘laugh/smile.’
The very final line hints at something like “expressiveness.”
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