A Pragmatic Study of Aggression in Some English Comic Strips

Abstract

Aggression can be detected in speakers' language for many purposes such as criticism, refusal, delivering unpleasant messages or even solidarity among people. To cover the disagreeable consequences of such aggressions, speakers usually utilize humour as the appropriate way to go about it. Thus, humour is considered the ‘smooth’ way to deliver messages that might hurt the hearer. However, it seems that this kind of language use is still unexplored and has not been given its due attention despite its importance. One of the interesting forms of media that include "humour-coated" aggression is comic strips. The study is intended to answer the following questions: 1) What is the pragmatic structure of aggression in comic strips? 2) What are the types of aggression utilized in comic strips? and 3) How does aggression function in comics? The data are taken from Rudy Park, Candorville, and Pickles comic strips which are syndicated in The Washington Post. The findings of the analysis show that: 1) aggression is a process that has three pragmatic stages that mainly employ non-observance of Grice's maxims and impoliteness strategies. 2) Aggression in comic strips serves some functions such as criticism, showing power, amusing and annoying. 3) Aggression in comic strips has two main types: direct (hostile) and indirect (instrumental)