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Chapter One Introduction

1.1 Research Background
The study of verbal humor has attracted more attention, especially in theacademic disciplines including psychology, philosophy, sociology and linguistics. Inpsychology, incongruity, superiority, and relief theories play an prominent role in thestudy of humor. According to Thomas Hobbes, the Superiority Theory states that aperson laughs about misfortunes of others, because these misfortunes assert theperson's superiority on the background of shortcomings of others. Critically reversingthe superiority theory, Robert Solomon (2002) developed an inferiority theory ofhumor. The Incongruity Theory states that humor is perceived at the moment ofrealization of incongruity between a concept involved in a certain situation and thereal objects thought to be in some relation to the concept. Relief Theories attempt todescribe humor along the lines of a tension-release model. In spite of defining humor,they discuss the essential structures and psychological processes that producelaughter.In the semantic field, Victor Raskin’s Script-based Semantic Theory of Humorand the revised version General Theory of Verbal Humor focus on the meaning oftexts. In the pragmatic field, western linguists believe that humor is generated duringthe transformation between register, discourse and pragmatic mechanism. The Grice'sCooperative Principle, Austin's Speech Act Theory, Sperber and Wilson's RelevanceTheory are often applied to explain the phenomenon of verbal humor. Some domesticscholars also make a contribution to the study of verbal humor. Zhang Shujing (1998),Chen Chunhua (1999) and Li Lanping (2002) used a large number of interestingexamples to demonstrate how to generate verbal humor. Jiang Chengsheng and LiaoDingzhong (2005) analyzed the pragmatic theoretical basis of humor, and theyassumed that humor can’t be revealed without context. The cognitive study towardshumor is a relatively new research subject. Wang Wenbin and Linbo (2003) appliedthe complementarity of Conceptual Integration Theory and relevance theory tointerpret humor mechanism. Liu Guohui (2006) explored the generating mechanismof verbal humor, from the perspectives of traditional cognitive framework, conceptintegration and cognitive contrast effect.
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1.2 Objective and Significance of the Study
In the light of Fauconnier and Turner’s Conceptual Integration Theory, theobjective of this thesis is to analyze the dynamic process of verbal humor in Americansitcom Two Broke Girls. Furthermore, the thesis aims to figure out how how the fourtypes of verbal humor are distributed in American sitcom Two Broke Girls.Humor is a necessity in any language or culture. Many scholars have studied itfrom many perspectives and they have achieved some fruits. In this study, verbalhumor will be analyzed from the cognitive linguistics. The significance of this studyis concluded as follows:First of all, in this thesis, from the perspective of theoretical values, ConceptualIntegration Theory will be employed as a new way to explain and analyze thedynamic process of verbal humor. The explanation process of Conceptual IntegrationTheory is different from that of the traditional theories. This new way of explanationenable us to understand humorous utterances better.Secondly, through analyzing the underlying cognitive mechanism of verbalhumor, audiences can better appreciate the sitcom and further learn of the differ