Abstract: Euphemism is an important method to maintain social relationship, so people often use the indirect or pleasant expressions in the place of those considered unpleasant, rude or offensive in communication. It is not only a linguistic phenomenon, but also a kind of social phenomenon and cultural phenomenon. It reflects some kinds of corresponding cultural traditions. This paper mainly focuses on the ways of expression, the major function and the social influence of euphemism in English, which could help us to understand the mode of thinking, social values, moral concepts, and cultural traditions in English-speaking country, and improve our language communicative ability.
Key words: euphemism, social influence, positive, negative
Introduction
Euphemism is originally from Greek, meaning, “speak with good words”. “eu” means “well or sounding well”; “pheme” means “speech”. Its definition in Oxford English Dictionary is “(example of the) use of pleasant, mild, or indirect words or phrases in place of more accurate or direct ones.”[1] The appearance of euphemism is based on two reasons: one aims to take the place of “taboo”. When giving up a taboo word, people will find another new one to take the place of it, which creates a euphemism. The other aims to avoid offensiveness during the communication. It is a figure of rhetoric by which an unpleasant or offensive thing
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