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Abstract：Language is the main communicating tool for human beings， including body language， written language and spoken language. Here this paper is trying to restrict the discussing point to spoken language， language users and the context of communication. When speaking，people tend to think less carefully than writing something down on paper. Failed and inefficient communication often happens when people talk vaguely and ambiguously without consciousness.Yet，vagueness can also bring about some unexpected wondrous effects，such as showing politeness，creating humor and entertaining. In addition to it，this paper is also intended to introduce the usage of vagueness of context in brain teaser to reach the astonishing effect.
Key words： vagueness；language；pragmatics
1、Introduction
Language is a code system to express our thought and given information. It has many properties， namely， arbitrariness， duality， creativity and displacement. Apart from these， language also has a special property of vagueness. As early as 1957， British linguist D.Jones began to realize the property of vagueness in language. He said，"almost all of us tend to use inexact， ambiguous and hard-to-define terminology and principles in speaking and writing. （Jiang Youjing，1992：2）.
The concept of vagueness was proposed by professor L.A.Zadeh in California University， which stirred up a wide range of attention and attraction to language vagueness in linguistic field. Gradually， people come to understand that the property of language is deeply embedded in the natural language of human beings inseparably. Language vagueness abounds everywhere. He Ziran （1988）has said， "Pragmatic vagueness refers to the any uncertain meanings existing in the process of using language. It includes vagueness， uncertainty， possibility， ambiguity and generalization. Language vagueness is not only manifested in phonetics， morphology， syntax and semantics but also in pragmatics." That is to say， in the process of language using， intentionally or unintentionally， people resort to the effective technique of language vagueness to prevent the communication proceeding smoothly or to bring about some unexpected humorous or other good effects to help maintain good relationship among people.
2. Inconvenience of Language Vagueness
During the long history of development， language has come into a relatively mature phase. There
are words for even every old or new-coming thing in the world. Since there are enough words for things in the world， people can communicate freely. But language is composed of vocabulary， in which words must own the meaning to make connection with the outside objective world. But meanings of words are conceptual and they are always mixed with culture and context. So meaning becomes vague very easily and many words， like adjectives， nouns， and numerals don't have the definite denoting boundaries.
Naturally， using this kind of words， the users can not express exactly what they really want to say even they make a second thought before sentences coming out of the lips. Meaning is hard to master. It has the feature of indeterminacy. This causes inconvenience in communication， because people can not clearly determine the category boundaries of objects in the natural world around them using the mathematical way or yes-or-no method. For example， such pronouns like “we， you”， we find it hard to make out an exact domain as to what they refer to. It is the same as in “here， there”. As explained generally， “here” refers to a relatively close place， while “there” a relatively far-away place. However， one is far from sure to apply them under some conditions. So， they can also be categorized into the vagueness expressions. In addition， we can take the adjectives “beautifulz” and “ugly” for example. When hearing one person use one of these two adjectives for describing a person， the hearer just imagines the appearance based on his own association. Probably the appearance emerging in two hearers' mind is largely different， because their standards of beauty and categorization are different. Suppose Nicholas told Jim that he met a very beautiful girl， maybe in Jim's mind a shining image would appear， which caters for his taste perfectly， and which is maybe quite different from what Nicholas' description. Maybe we can say that one man's meat is another's poison. Just because of the indeterminacy of the meaning of beautiful， there's a huge misunderstanding between Jim and Nicolas.
There are huge amounts of such kind of examples， like most of the adjectives， many numerals， etc. Even a language master can not make out exactly what the adjectives denote. For example， to what extent， a head can be said to be bald. Is there a clear-cut boundary between bald and hairy? How high one person is can be said to be tall? All these don't have absolute standards， and no one can dare say that he can make a clear denotation to all these adjectives. It is the same case with some nouns， like mountain and hill， daybreak， night， midnight， noon， morning， dawn， etc. It is a kind of fuzziness of cognitive boundaries. Their boundary lines are puzzling. Besides， the degree of a good many of adverbs is also undetermined. You never know to what extent “mostly， relatively， always， more or less， once in a while， seldom， sometimes ” refer to. Also many numerals denote unclearly， likea lot of， masses of， a touch of， etc.
But some people， especially those in business circle， make use of the characteristics of this language on purpose to cheat the public. If paying a little attention to the overwhelming TV advertisement， one may find that the vagueness of language is widely used to fool the audience. For example， the sentence “The most natural kind of beauty for every kind of skin”， is the advertisement for the skin care product. But if you examine this sentence in detail， you may find its meaning very unclear. When the adjective “natural” is picked out， one hundred people may have one hundred explanations. No one can tell exactly what “natural” refers to. So here the tricky merchants cater for people's taste of nature and achieve a good effect of advertising. So when hearing an utterance， be sure to make clear what the purpose of the speaker and learn to tell right from wrong. In addition to these inconvenience language vagueness has brought to us， there are also some favorable functions it can provide to us.
3. Enchantments of language vagueness
3.1Humor and Entertainment
In spite of the vagueness on the lexical level， the English and Chinese language is also vague on the pronunciation and sentence level. The homonyms often cause fun in actual communication. For example：
A： I went to watch the football match last night.
B： Which won （one）?
A： which one? I've got only one wife. （Lv Ruizhong： 2004）
If this dialogue is going on in a written form， then definitely there will be no misunderstanding at all. But in spoken language， it is different， because the English words “won” and “one” have the same pronunciation， it is very easy to make misunderstandings.
3.2Politeness and Saving Face
The vagueness of language does not merely have the disadvantage of bringing inconvenience in communication. It can also help motivate the proceeding and continuum of a conversation. The two sides of communication need not to state their attitudes clearly by taking advantage of this characteristic of language. The language vagueness helps speakers reduce the embarrassment by the direct harsh words and show politeness to each other. Brown and Levinson developed a framework， in which politeness involves us showing the awareness of other people's face wants.， which is in accordance with the Chinese face-valued principle. People tend to resort to roundabout expressions to state their opinions or feelings， a fact that is based on the principle of politeness. Politeness， according to Brown and Levinson's explanation， is an issue of face （Brown & Levinson，1978）. It is quite essential to save face for speakers， and this can also bring a great many benefits for oneself as in winning other people's goodwill gestures for oneself. So here is another example. A is waiting in line but B jumps the queue.
A： I was waiting.
B： Oh， I'm sorry. （Lv Ruizhong： 2004）
B's words show that he has realized his wrongness， and has expressed his apology.
3.3Aesthetic Effects
Due to the intrinsic rules of vagueness， we can make the most of it to achieve a lot of incredible effects in language. A good command of vagueness language and suitable use of it can bring out amazing and wondrous expressive effects， which can by no means be rivaled by any other linguistic form. That is， it can bestow us with beautiful feelings and aesthetic effects.
Let's see an example in “Dream of Red Mansion”， in which a sequence of utterances is to express the dying Lin Daiyu.
e.g猛听黛玉直声叫道：“宝玉，宝玉，你好…….”说到“好”字，便浑身冷汗，不做声了。紫娟等急忙扶住，那汗愈出，身子便渐渐的冷了.（《红楼梦》第九十八回）
So， what does “好”here refer to exactly? Is it “好狠心—very cruel”， or “好无情—very unfeeling”， or “好傻—very foolish”? This suspense has triggered much debates by scholars， yet until now no acknowledged views upon it have been established. This vague expression， being incredibly wonderful， leaves us much room for vivid imagination and everlasting search. Well， let's just suppose here， if the exact meaning of this language is expressed very clearly and distinctly through another linguistic form， then will the artistic spell and enchantment lying deep in the literary works last?
Let's see another example：
e.g.妇女主任问：“……和赵振华订婚你愿意不愿意？”刘巧儿回答，“愿意不愿意你去问他”（韩起祥《刘巧儿》）
The utterance “愿意不愿意你去问他”seems to be unclear and precarious. However， it is just this short question with markedness that convinces us LiuQiaoer’s shyness but ecstasy. Indeed， it is so well depicted and clearly stated.
4. Conclusion
Vagueness in spoken language exists frequently not only in phonetics， morphology， syntax. It also appears in pragmatics in which context vagueness matters greatly. Because of the language vagueness， the failure and misunderstanding in communication is often brought about. So in daily communication， we should try not to use the vague language and decide the context prudently. In the meantime， vagueness also produces some favorable effects. It can show one's politeness， avoid making mistakes by using too absolute words and save others' face and showcase aesthetic feelings. Sometimes， we also use the vagueness in phonetics to produce humor and entertain ourselves. Brain teaser is the one that greatly uses the context vagueness to challenge our usual experience-oriented way to decide the possible context. In understanding it， we can become more effective to answer the brain teaser questions.
References：
［1］關家玲：英语广告中词汇的模糊现象及语用功能探讨，中国矿业大学学报（社会科学版），2004年第二期。
［2］何兆熊：2000，《新编语用学概要》，上海：上海外语教育出版社。
［3］何自然：1988，《语用学概论》，长沙：湖南教育出版社。
［4］吕睿中：英语中的模糊语言及其艺术魅力，襄樊学院学报，2004年第一期。
［5］张维鼎：2002，《语言文化纵论》，成都：四川辞书出版社。
Key words： vagueness；language；pragmatics
1、Introduction
Language is a code system to express our thought and given information. It has many properties， namely， arbitrariness， duality， creativity and displacement. Apart from these， language also has a special property of vagueness. As early as 1957， British linguist D.Jones began to realize the property of vagueness in language. He said，"almost all of us tend to use inexact， ambiguous and hard-to-define terminology and principles in speaking and writing. （Jiang Youjing，1992：2）.
The concept of vagueness was proposed by professor L.A.Zadeh in California University， which stirred up a wide range of attention and attraction to language vagueness in linguistic field. Gradually， people come to understand that the property of language is deeply embedded in the natural language of human beings inseparably. Language vagueness abounds everywhere. He Ziran （1988）has said， "Pragmatic vagueness refers to the any uncertain meanings existing in the process of using language. It includes vagueness， uncertainty， possibility， ambiguity and generalization. Language vagueness is not only manifested in phonetics， morphology， syntax and semantics but also in pragmatics." That is to say， in the process of language using， intentionally or unintentionally， people resort to the effective technique of language vagueness to prevent the communication proceeding smoothly or to bring about some unexpected humorous or other good effects to help maintain good relationship among people.
2. Inconvenience of Language Vagueness
During the long history of development， language has come into a relatively mature phase. There
are words for even every old or new-coming thing in the world. Since there are enough words for things in the world， people can communicate freely. But language is composed of vocabulary， in which words must own the meaning to make connection with the outside objective world. But meanings of words are conceptual and they are always mixed with culture and context. So meaning becomes vague very easily and many words， like adjectives， nouns， and numerals don't have the definite denoting boundaries.
Naturally， using this kind of words， the users can not express exactly what they really want to say even they make a second thought before sentences coming out of the lips. Meaning is hard to master. It has the feature of indeterminacy. This causes inconvenience in communication， because people can not clearly determine the category boundaries of objects in the natural world around them using the mathematical way or yes-or-no method. For example， such pronouns like “we， you”， we find it hard to make out an exact domain as to what they refer to. It is the same as in “here， there”. As explained generally， “here” refers to a relatively close place， while “there” a relatively far-away place. However， one is far from sure to apply them under some conditions. So， they can also be categorized into the vagueness expressions. In addition， we can take the adjectives “beautifulz” and “ugly” for example. When hearing one person use one of these two adjectives for describing a person， the hearer just imagines the appearance based on his own association. Probably the appearance emerging in two hearers' mind is largely different， because their standards of beauty and categorization are different. Suppose Nicholas told Jim that he met a very beautiful girl， maybe in Jim's mind a shining image would appear， which caters for his taste perfectly， and which is maybe quite different from what Nicholas' description. Maybe we can say that one man's meat is another's poison. Just because of the indeterminacy of the meaning of beautiful， there's a huge misunderstanding between Jim and Nicolas.
There are huge amounts of such kind of examples， like most of the adjectives， many numerals， etc. Even a language master can not make out exactly what the adjectives denote. For example， to what extent， a head can be said to be bald. Is there a clear-cut boundary between bald and hairy? How high one person is can be said to be tall? All these don't have absolute standards， and no one can dare say that he can make a clear denotation to all these adjectives. It is the same case with some nouns， like mountain and hill， daybreak， night， midnight， noon， morning， dawn， etc. It is a kind of fuzziness of cognitive boundaries. Their boundary lines are puzzling. Besides， the degree of a good many of adverbs is also undetermined. You never know to what extent “mostly， relatively， always， more or less， once in a while， seldom， sometimes ” refer to. Also many numerals denote unclearly， likea lot of， masses of， a touch of， etc.
But some people， especially those in business circle， make use of the characteristics of this language on purpose to cheat the public. If paying a little attention to the overwhelming TV advertisement， one may find that the vagueness of language is widely used to fool the audience. For example， the sentence “The most natural kind of beauty for every kind of skin”， is the advertisement for the skin care product. But if you examine this sentence in detail， you may find its meaning very unclear. When the adjective “natural” is picked out， one hundred people may have one hundred explanations. No one can tell exactly what “natural” refers to. So here the tricky merchants cater for people's taste of nature and achieve a good effect of advertising. So when hearing an utterance， be sure to make clear what the purpose of the speaker and learn to tell right from wrong. In addition to these inconvenience language vagueness has brought to us， there are also some favorable functions it can provide to us.
3. Enchantments of language vagueness
3.1Humor and Entertainment
In spite of the vagueness on the lexical level， the English and Chinese language is also vague on the pronunciation and sentence level. The homonyms often cause fun in actual communication. For example：
A： I went to watch the football match last night.
B： Which won （one）?
A： which one? I've got only one wife. （Lv Ruizhong： 2004）
If this dialogue is going on in a written form， then definitely there will be no misunderstanding at all. But in spoken language， it is different， because the English words “won” and “one” have the same pronunciation， it is very easy to make misunderstandings.
3.2Politeness and Saving Face
The vagueness of language does not merely have the disadvantage of bringing inconvenience in communication. It can also help motivate the proceeding and continuum of a conversation. The two sides of communication need not to state their attitudes clearly by taking advantage of this characteristic of language. The language vagueness helps speakers reduce the embarrassment by the direct harsh words and show politeness to each other. Brown and Levinson developed a framework， in which politeness involves us showing the awareness of other people's face wants.， which is in accordance with the Chinese face-valued principle. People tend to resort to roundabout expressions to state their opinions or feelings， a fact that is based on the principle of politeness. Politeness， according to Brown and Levinson's explanation， is an issue of face （Brown & Levinson，1978）. It is quite essential to save face for speakers， and this can also bring a great many benefits for oneself as in winning other people's goodwill gestures for oneself. So here is another example. A is waiting in line but B jumps the queue.
A： I was waiting.
B： Oh， I'm sorry. （Lv Ruizhong： 2004）
B's words show that he has realized his wrongness， and has expressed his apology.
3.3Aesthetic Effects
Due to the intrinsic rules of vagueness， we can make the most of it to achieve a lot of incredible effects in language. A good command of vagueness language and suitable use of it can bring out amazing and wondrous expressive effects， which can by no means be rivaled by any other linguistic form. That is， it can bestow us with beautiful feelings and aesthetic effects.
Let's see an example in “Dream of Red Mansion”， in which a sequence of utterances is to express the dying Lin Daiyu.
e.g猛听黛玉直声叫道：“宝玉，宝玉，你好…….”说到“好”字，便浑身冷汗，不做声了。紫娟等急忙扶住，那汗愈出，身子便渐渐的冷了.（《红楼梦》第九十八回）
So， what does “好”here refer to exactly? Is it “好狠心—very cruel”， or “好无情—very unfeeling”， or “好傻—very foolish”? This suspense has triggered much debates by scholars， yet until now no acknowledged views upon it have been established. This vague expression， being incredibly wonderful， leaves us much room for vivid imagination and everlasting search. Well， let's just suppose here， if the exact meaning of this language is expressed very clearly and distinctly through another linguistic form， then will the artistic spell and enchantment lying deep in the literary works last?
Let's see another example：
e.g.妇女主任问：“……和赵振华订婚你愿意不愿意？”刘巧儿回答，“愿意不愿意你去问他”（韩起祥《刘巧儿》）
The utterance “愿意不愿意你去问他”seems to be unclear and precarious. However， it is just this short question with markedness that convinces us LiuQiaoer’s shyness but ecstasy. Indeed， it is so well depicted and clearly stated.
4. Conclusion
Vagueness in spoken language exists frequently not only in phonetics， morphology， syntax. It also appears in pragmatics in which context vagueness matters greatly. Because of the language vagueness， the failure and misunderstanding in communication is often brought about. So in daily communication， we should try not to use the vague language and decide the context prudently. In the meantime， vagueness also produces some favorable effects. It can show one's politeness， avoid making mistakes by using too absolute words and save others' face and showcase aesthetic feelings. Sometimes， we also use the vagueness in phonetics to produce humor and entertain ourselves. Brain teaser is the one that greatly uses the context vagueness to challenge our usual experience-oriented way to decide the possible context. In understanding it， we can become more effective to answer the brain teaser questions.
References：
［1］關家玲：英语广告中词汇的模糊现象及语用功能探讨，中国矿业大学学报（社会科学版），2004年第二期。
［2］何兆熊：2000，《新编语用学概要》，上海：上海外语教育出版社。
［3］何自然：1988，《语用学概论》，长沙：湖南教育出版社。
［4］吕睿中：英语中的模糊语言及其艺术魅力，襄樊学院学报，2004年第一期。
［5］张维鼎：2002，《语言文化纵论》，成都：四川辞书出版社。