Contrastive Metapragmatics and the Shifting Semantics of “Sarcasm” in English and Danish

Abstract

Abstract Despite valuable studies into the uses/functions of sarcasm, no previous investigation has focused on the semantics of “sarcasm” as an emic metapragmatic category. We provide a contrastive lexical study of English and Danish using the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach. We find that the English noun sarcasm has been undergoing semantic innovation and is now polysemous, as is its corresponding adjective. Roughly, older sarcasm1 expresses a positive message with an obvious negative intention, while newer sarcasm2 expresses a negative message with the aim of being amusing. For Danish, sarkasme is shown to closely align with sarcasm1, but semantic innovation has been happening in Danish too. A new expression sarkastisk humor overlaps with sarcasm2 but is tailored to fit into Danish humor discourses. The study sheds light on insider understandings and metapragmatic discourses in Anglo and Danish linguacultures. There are cautionary implications for the use of “sarcasm” as a second-order concept.