Maxim Flouting in Guardians of the Galaxy: A Qualitative Gricean Analysis
2023 (English)Independent thesis Basic level (professional degree), 10 credits / 15 HE credits
Student thesis
Abstract [en]
Communication was developed about 70,000 years ago. Since then, our communication methods have evolved from sounds to grammatical languages, humor, and conversational principles like Grice’s cooperative principle. The researcher analyzed whether the characters Quill, Gamora, and Rocket from Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy followed Grice’s principle. The researcher did this by posing two research questions to the material: What maxims were flouted by the characters in the film, and in what ways were they flouted? Are there any differences between what maxims the characters flouted and how they flouted them? The researcher also examined whether humor was part of the Guardian's communications. The analysis was conducted systematically, where the first step wastranscribing the material from the movie. Then, the non-observances were identified and categorized using event trees and cell charts. The Guardians are a diverse mix of characters from different backgrounds, cultures, and planets. One issue with Grice’s model is that it does not consider that people from different backgrounds, cultures, and planets have other notions of how to speak and not. This study confirmed some of these limitations with the theory. The study concluded that the characters flouted all the maxims in different ways, and humor was related to maxim flouting.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2023. , p. 81
Keywords [en]
Guardians of the Galaxy, Cooperative Principle, Implicature, Maxim Flouting, Humor, Superhero, Communication
National Category
Specific Languages
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:hv:diva-21160Local ID: EXE400OAI: oai:DiVA.org:hv-21160DiVA, id: diva2:1825335
Subject / course
Educational science
Educational program
Teacher Traning Programme
Supervisors
Examiners
2024-02-162024-01-092024-02-16Bibliographically approved