The Classification of Inappropriate Diction in the English Descriptions

◎王麗麗

The Classification of Inappropriate Diction in the English Descriptions

◎王麗麗

Nappropriate diction in the English Descriptions is complex and difficult to solve． In my study, I introduces four types of inappropriateness classified on the basis of related linguistic theories that deal with the choice of words． The four types of inappropriate diction are entitled respectively semantic inappropriateness, pragmatic inappropriateness, stylistic inappropriateness and social inappropriateness．

Product descriptions play an important role in the selling process, because the descriptions are supposed to provide enough information that may satisfy the needs of consumers. Their descriptions are supposed to be written in standardized English. In order to facilitate my study, I manage to classify the inappropriate diction according to the following principles.

Criterion of classification

When I classify the inappropriate diction in the product descriptions, I follow a set of principles or criterion so that the classification can be expected to be reliable and valid, thus paving the way for a smooth and scientific research.

1.Culture-relevant principle

“Culture, in a broad sense, means the total way of life of a people, including the patterns of belief, customs, objects institutions, techniques, and language that characterizes the life of the human community. In a narrow sense, culture may refer to local or specific practice, beliefs or customs, which can be mostly found in folk culture, enterprise culture or food culture etc”. (Dai Weidong &He Zhaoxiong： 2004).

2.Context-relevant principle

Context is “the parts of a piece of writing, a speech, etc. which surround a word or passage and which influence or help to explain its meaning.” (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, 2001：321). Context is the essence of pragmatic study.

3.Reference-relevant principle

According to Lyons (2000： 294),“reference is a context-dependent aspect of utterance-meaning. It is a relation that holds between speakers and what they are talking about on particular occasions.” Now that reference reveals the extra-linguistic relations between words and the world they describe, it is definitely a proper tool to investigate the inappropriateness of diction in product descriptions.

Types of inappropriate diction

Under the guidance of the above principles and after a deep analysis, I have classified the inappropriate diction into four types based on different linguistic perspectives.

1.Semantic inappropriateness

Lexical semantics has two aims： (a)“to represent the meaning of each word in the language；and (b) to show how the meanings of words in a language are interrelated.” In other words, the first aim emphasizes the interpretation of each individual word while the second aim lays stress on the sense relations between words within the same language.

2.Pragmatic inappropriateness

According to Levinson(1983：54),“The single most obvious way in which the relationship between language and context is reflected in the structures of languages themselves is through the phenomenon of deixis.” Deixis concerns “the use of demonstratives, first and second person pronouns, tense, specific time and place adverbs like here and now, and a variety of other grammatical features tied directly to the circumstances of utterance.”

3.Stylistic inappropriateness

Stylistic is the study of that variation in language which is dependent on the situation in which the language is used and also on the effect the writer or speaker wishes to create on the reader or hearer. “Stylistics is concerned with the choices that are available to a writer and the reasons why particular forms and expressions are used rather than others”(Jack Richards, 2000：452).

4.Social inappropriateness

I use the term social inappropriateness to refer to those cases of improper use of words that occur due to the lack of consideration of social aspects of a language. In the words, language reflects people’s social identities. The fact is that people with different social identities interact differently in the way they choose their words, which we must take into account when describing products to our prospective customers.

Summary

To sum up, the terms semantic inappropriateness, pragmatic inappropriateness, stylistic inappropriateness and social inappropriateness are created mainly for the convenience of study. Besides, the domains of semantics, pragmatics, stylistics and sociolinguistics often overlap, but each has its own focus as mentioned above.

（作者單位：日照職業技術學院 會計學院）