The Violation of Cooperative Principles and Four Maxims to Create Humor in American Sitcom “Friends”

Abstract

This paper attempts to explore how the characters in the famous American sitcom Friends create humor by violating the four maxims of Grice’s Cooperative Principle, and which maxim is the most frequently flouted one in this context. Data under analysis is extracted randomly from five episodes of the sitcom. The findings suggest that all maxims are violated to different extents by the characters out of different purposes to amuse the audience, among which the maxim of quality is the most often violated one, followed by the maxim of relation, quantity, and manner. Given the limitations of this study, implications for future research are provided.