English euphemism

1. euphemism in advertisement

advertising English is an applied language. It includes informative advertising and persuasive advertising. Euphemism really plays an important role in it.

As we know that the language in advertisements is the key of success, which should be easy to understand as well as attractive to the public. Euphemism is “(the use of a ) mild or vague pr periphrastic expression as a substitute for blunt precision or disagreeable truth.”(Flowler, 1991:24) it is obvious that euphemism has such characteristics that it suits for the purposes of advertisement very well. in order to achieve the persuasive effect, the language in advertisements should also be correct, concise and vivid, to impress the consumers deeply and arouse their desire to buy the products. For these reasons, the advertisement designer should have a good grasp of both the features and the functions of euphemism that it can cater for the business purpose. For example, a coffee brand named Maxwell House put its advertising in this way,” good to the last drop!” it shows that it is so good drinking that customers will eat the last drop. To some people, it really calls their attention to this brand production and even buy it.

Euphemism is widely used in advertisement; it makes the ads more creative and profitable.

2. in diplomacy

communication is important for human beings, especially to those diplomats or statesmen

because they deal with the relationships between countries of regions, so the words that they use are more sensitive than others. Otherwise, their communication may become difficult or break down and sometimes it can even affect the relations between countries. since the purpose of using euphemisms is using good words to reduce the unpleasantness of a term or notion. It is natural and reasonable that diplomats or statesmen will often use them. They can use euphemisms to soften harsh reality and pretend governmental inability to social problems. In reality we can also find that euphemisms are often used in press conferences and we may also find that sometimes communications may be difficult or even break down because of the incorrect use of diplomatic euphemisms or the misunderstanding of diplomatic euphemisms. So the study of diplomatic euphemisms seems to be of great significance and it can help people like diplomats to avoid misunderstandings or mistranslations in communications and it can also help them to improve their intercultural communication competence and ability.

In some cases, people especially the diplomats or statesmen do not want to say what they mean directly and hence they would choose to use diplomatic euphemisms in order to express their meaning in a roundabout way in order to conduct successful and happy interactions in press conferences. Therefore in communications like press conferences, the diplomats, journalists or speakers usually use diplomatic euphemism in order to be polite and keep face or for some other reasons under the cooperative circumstances.

As a kind of euphemism, diplomat euphemism shares the general features of euphemism. As it is mentioned before that euphemism is the substitution of mild or vague or roundabout expression for harsh or blunt or direct one; a polite, tactful or less explicit term used to avoid the drect naming of an unpleasant, painful or frightening reality. Hence from the definition, it can be found that euphemism is partly created for politeness 3. euphemism in journalism

the application of euphemisms in journalism English carry the attractive features in

propaganda, which is quite different from the linguists’ study in their fields and this has drawn my ateention on this part when the paper goes in.

when propagandaists use vivid, emotionally suggestive words, they are attempting to arouse their audience’s interest. In certain situations, however, the propagandists attempts to comfort the audience in order to make an unpleasant reality more palatable. This is accomplished by using words that are soft and euphemistic. For example, because war is particularly unpleasant, military discourse is full of euphemisms. Since the 1940’s, America changed the name of the war department of the department of defense. Under the Reagan administration, the MX-Missile was renamed the Peacekeeper.

So the typical political terms mentioned above show us the functions of euphemisms in journalism English and that is why this kind of device employed in news reporting is reagarded as the cosmetic words. Euphemisms, in three asprcts, do attract criticism. However, in a general sense, people use them mainly for the purpose of increasing the force of their message to accomplish their preactical need, or competing goals to avoid the uneasiness and serousness, or showing politeness to maximize benefit to other or minimize cost to self.