The pragmatics of verbal parody

Abstract

In this paper, we develop a model of verbal parody based on the view that parody is a human behavior. We argue that verbal parody involves a highly situated, intentional and conventional expressive made up of four essential acts: (1) the intentional re-presentation of the object of parody, (2) the flaunting of the verbal re-presentation, (3) the critical act, and (4) the comic act. To successfully create a verbal parody, a speaker must manipulate all four essential acts with the intent to create parody. In the second section of our paper, we address the potential scope of parody in real communication. We explain how parody serves to celebrate the object it apparently ridicules, by appealing to politeness theory (Brown and Levinson, 1987). We also argue that the object of parody may be anything in the world; that a single parodic act may have multiple objects; and that the re-presenting verbal expression of the parodic speech act may function as a direct or indirect non-parodic speech act, which may be enhanced or inhibited by the parody.