Euphemism

Zhuo Jing-Schmidt
University of Oregon
Table of contents

The word euphemism is of Greek origin where eu ‘well’ and phēmē ‘speaking’ form a compound that means ‘the use of auspicious words’. Euphemisms come handy whenever we cannot say what we really mean because what we really mean is verboten, offensive, or simply sounds jarring. Definitions of euphemism are many. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED, http://​www​.oed​.com/) defines euphemism as (1) “That figure of speech which consists in the substitution of a word or expression of comparatively favourable implication or less unpleasant associations, instead of the harsher or more offensive one that would more precisely designate what is intended”, and (2) “An instance of this figure; a less distasteful word or phrase used as a substitute for something harsher or more offensive.” Allan and Burridge (1991: 11) define euphemism as “an alternative to a dispreferred expression, in order to avoid possible loss of face: either one’s own face or, through giving offense, that of the audience, or of some third party.” Cameron (1995: 73) defines euphemism as “a term used deliberately to avoid or soften the negative associations of words that deal directly with taboo subjects.” Burridge (2012: 66) defines euphemisms as “sweet-sounding, or at least inoffensive, alternatives for expressions that speakers or writers prefer not to use in executing a particular communicative intention on a given occasion.” Lutz (2000: 231) defines euphemism as “an inoffensive or positive word or phrase designed to avoid a harsh, unpleasant, or distasteful reality.” Hughes (2006: 151) defines euphemism as “the use of deliberately indirect, conventionally imprecise, or socially ‘comfortable’ ways of referring to taboo, embarrassing, or unpleasant topics.” Brain (1979: 83) characterizes euphemism as a verbal instrument of overcompensation that involves “a reluctance to face reality.”

Full-text access is restricted to subscribers. Log in to obtain additional credentials. For subscription information see Subscription & Price.

References

Abijo, J. A. & Akandeo, O.
2018 “The linguistic taboos in Yoruba society and their relevance to teaching-learning in Nigerian secondary schools.” Proceedings of 190th The IIER International Conference, Oxford, UK 19th-20th September 2018.Google Scholar
Al-Azzam, Bakri, Mohammad Al-Ahaydib, Norah Alkhowaiter & Husam Al-Momani
2017 “Social and cultural euphemism in Saudi Arabic: A semantic, a pragmatic and a sociolinguistic analysis.” Advances in Language and Literary Studies 8(2): 64–69. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Allan, Keith
2015 “When is a slur not a slur? The use of nigger in ‘Pulp Fiction’.” Language Sciences 52: 187–199. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Allan, Keith & Kate Burridge
1991 Euphemism and Dysphemism: Language Used as Shield and Weapon. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Allan, Keith, & Kate Burridge
2006 Forbidden Words: Taboo and the Censoring of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Andrews, K.
2009 “Understanding norms without a theory of mind.” Inquiry 52(5): 433–448. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Apperly, Ian
2011 Mindreaders: The Cognitive Basis of “Theory of Mind”. New York: Psychology Press.Google Scholar
Asaah, Augustine H.
2006 “To speak or not to speak with the whole mouth: Textualization of Taboo Subjects in Europhone African Literature.” Journal of Black Studies 36(4): 497–514. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Asim, Jabari
2007 The N Word: Who Can Say it, Who Shouldn’t, and Why. New York: Houghton Mifflin.Google Scholar
Bamgbose, Ayo
1986 “Yoruba: A language in transition.” Lagos: J F Odunjo Memorial Lectures Organising Committee.Google Scholar
Baumeister, Roy F., Ellen Bratslavlavsky, Catrin Finkenauer & Kathleen D. Vohs
2001 “Bad is stronger than good.” Review of General Psychology 5(4): 323–370. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Blum, Susan
1997 “Naming practices and the power of words in China.” Language in Society 26(3): 357–379. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Braatz, T.
2004 “Clash of cultures as euphemism: Avoiding history at the Little Bighorn.” American Indian Culture and Research Journal 28(4): 107–130. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Brain, James
1979 The last taboo: Sex and the fear of death. Garden City, NY: Anchor Press/Doubleday.Google Scholar
Brown, Penelope & Stephen C. Levinson
1987 Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Burchfield, Robert
1985 “An Outline History of Euphemisms in English”, In Fair of Speech. The Uses of Euphemism, ed. by Dominique Enright, 13–31. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Burridge, Kate
2012 “Euphemism and language change: The sixth and seventh ages.” Lexis https://​journals​.openedition​.org​/lexis​/355#tocto2n5. DOI logo
Cameron, Deborah
1995 Verbal Hygiene. London/New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Castiel, Luis David
2005 “The misuse of euphemisms in public health: The case of ‘food Insecurity’.” Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 59(8): 618.Google Scholar
Chovanec, Jan
2019 “Euphemisms and non-proximal manipulation of discourse space: The case of blue-on-blue.” Lingua 225; 50–62. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chwastiak, Michele
2015 “Torture as normal work: The Bush administration, the Central Intelligence Agency and ‘Enhanced Interrogation Techniques’.” Organization 22(4): 493–511. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
David, Leslie
1875 Among the Zulus and Amatongas. Edinburgh: Edmonston & Douglas.Google Scholar
Diez-Arroyo, Marisa
2016 “English words as euphemisms in Spanish fashion.” English Today 32(3): 30–39. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fairhurst, G. & R. Sarr
1996 The Art of Framing. San Francisco: Jossey-BassGoogle Scholar
Fandrych, Ingrid
2012 “Between tradition and the requirements of modern life.” Journal of Language and Culture 3(4): 67–73.Google Scholar
Frazer, Sir James G.
1911 The Golden Bough, Part II: Taboo and the Perils of the Soul. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Gernsbacher, Morton Ann, Raimond, Adam R., Balinghasay, M. Theresa, and Boston, Jilana S.
2016 “’Special needs’ is an ineffective euphemism.” Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications 1(1): 1–13. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Goddard, Cliff
2005 The Languages of East and Southeast Asia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Goffman, Erving
1959 The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Garden City, NY: Doubleday Anchor Books.Google Scholar
1974 Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience. New York: Harper & RowGoogle Scholar
Grice, Paul
1957 “Meaning.” The Philosophical Review 66: 377–388. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1989 Studies in the Way of Words. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Griffin, J.
1985 “Euphemisms in Greece and Rome.” In Fair of Speech, ed. by D. J. Enright, 32–43. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gründler, Hartmut
1982 “Kernenergiewerbung. Die sprachliche Verpackung der Atomenergie – Aus dem Wörterbuch des Zwiedenkens.” In Holzfeuer im hölzernen Ofen, ed. by Hans J. Heringer, 203–215. Tübingen: Narr.Google Scholar
Hasegawa, Hiroshi
2005 “Euphemism in English and Japanese: A pragmatic contrastive study.” Doctoral dissertation, University of Tasmania.
Herrero-Ruiz, Javier
2018 “Exaggerating and mitigating through metonymy: The case of situational and cause for effect/effect for cause metonymies.” Language and Communication 62: 51–65. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hughes, Geoffrey
2006 An encyclopedia of swearing: The social history of oaths, profanity, foul language, and ethnic slurs in the English-speaking world. Armonk: M.E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Isaacs, David, Stephen Isaacs & Dominic Fitzgerald
2015 “MEMEs: Modern evolutionary medical euphemisms.” British Medical Journal 351: H6107. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Isenberg, Nancy
2021 “Left behind: The trouble with euphemism.” The Hedgehog Review 23(1): 46.Google Scholar
Jing-Schmidt, Z.
2007 “Negativity bias in language: A cognitive-affective model of emotive intensifiers.” Cognitive Linguistics 18(3): 417–443. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2019 “Cursing, taboo, and euphemism.” In The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Applied Linguistics, ed. by C. R. Huang, Z. Jing-Schmidt & B. Meisterernst, 391–406. London: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Jing-Schmidt, Z. & Vsevolod Kapatsinski
2012 “The apprehensive: Fear as endophoric evidence and its pragmatics in English, Mandarin, and Russian.” Journal of Pragmatics 44: 346–373. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Jing-Schmidt, Z., Z. Zhang & J.-Y. Chen
2016 “Identity development in the ancestral homeland: A Chinese heritage perspective.” The Modern Language Journal 100(4): 797–812. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Keller, Rudi
1990 Sprachwandel : Von Der Unsichtbaren Hand in Der Sprache. Tübingen: Francke.Google Scholar
Kennedy, Randall L.
2002 Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word. New York: Vintage Books.Google Scholar
Kvalnes, Øyvind
2019 Moral Reasoning at Work. Cham: Palgrave Pivot. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kwon, Jihyun
2004 “Expressing refusals in Korean and in American English.” Multilingua 23(4): 339–64. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
La Cour, Anders & Joakim Kromann
2011 “Euphemisms and hypocrisy in corporate philanthropy.” Business Ethics (Oxford, England) 20(3): 267–279. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lakoff, George
1987 Women, fire, and dangerous things. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson
1980 Metaphors we live by Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Lakoff, Robin
1975 Language and Woman’s Place. New York: Harper & Row.Google Scholar
Liszka, James J.
1990 “Euphemism as transvaluation.” Language and Style 23: 409–424.Google Scholar
Littlemore, Jeanette
2015 Metonymy: Hidden Shortcuts in Language, Thought and Communication. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lutz, William
1988 “Fourteen years of doublespeak .” The English Journal 77(3), 40–42. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1992 “The first casualty.” English Today 8(1): 48–49. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2000 “Nothing in life is certain except negative patient care outcome and revenue enhancement.” Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 44(3): 230–233.Google Scholar
Majeed, Suhayla H., & Fakhir Omar Mohammed
2018 “A content analysis of euphemistic functions In Evro Bahdini Daily Newspaper.” IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science (IOSR-JHSS) 23(2): 87–99.Google Scholar
Mangum, Douglas
2020 “Euphemism in Biblical Hebrew and the euphemistic ‘bless’ in the Septuagint of Job.” HTS Theological Studies 76(4): a6140. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
McGlone, M. S. & J. A. Batchelor
2003 “Looking out for number one: Euphemism and face.” Journal of Communication 53(2): 251–64. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
McGlone, Matthew S., Gary Beck & Abigail Pfiester
2006 “Contamination and camouflage in euphemisms.” Communication Monographs 73(3): 261–282. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
McWhorter, John
2021 Nine Nasty Words in English. New York: Avery Publishing.Google Scholar
Meng, Bingchun
2011 “From steamed bun to grass mud horse: E gao as alternative political discourse on Chinese internet.” Global Media and Communication 7: 33–51. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Nübling, Damaris
2006 Historische Sprachwissenschaft des Deutschen. Eine Einführung in die Prinzipien des Sprachwandels. Tübingen: Narr.Google Scholar
Olúránkinse, Olánipekun
1992 “Euphemism as a Yorùbà folkway.” African Languages and Cultures 5(2): 189–202. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Orwell, George
1946 “Politics and the English language.” In Shooting an Elephant and Other Essays. London: Secker & Warburg.Google Scholar
Penn, D. C. & D. J. Povinelli
2007 “On the lack of evidence that non-human animals possess anything remotely resembling a ‘theory of mind’.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 362(1480): 731–744. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
People’s Daily
. 人民网评：为香港市民安居乐业撑起“保护伞” [Put up a protective umbrella for Hong Kong residents to live and work peacefully]. May 28 2020 http://​opinion​.people​.com​.cn​/n1​/2020​/0528​/c223228​-31727642​.html
Pinker, S.
1997 How the Mind Works. New York: W. W. Norton.Google Scholar
Pinker, Steven
2007 The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature. New York: Penguin.Google Scholar
Pulley, Jerry L.
1994 “Doublespeak and euphemisms in education”. The Clearing House 67(5), 271–73. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Pyers, Jennie
2006 “Indicating the body: Expression of body part terminology in American Sign Language.” Language Sciences 28: 280–303. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rawson, H.
1995 Dictionary of Euphemisms and Other Doubletalk (Rev. ed.). New York: Crown.Google Scholar
Rozin, Paul & Edward B. Royzman
2001 “Negativity bias, negativity dominance, and contagion.” Personality and Social Psychology Review 5(4): 296–320. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rudwick, Stephanie & Magcino Shange
2009 “ Hlonipha and the rural Zulu woman.” Agenda 23(82): 66–75, DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ruiz de Mendoza, Francisco J.
2005 “Linguistic interpretation and cognition.” In Cultural Matrix Reloaded: Romanian Society for English and American Studies Seventh International Conference, ed. by E. Croitoru, D. Tuchel & M. Praisler, 36–64. Bucarest: Didactica Si Pedagogica.Google Scholar
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1959/2011 Course in General Linguistics. Eds. Charles Bally & Albert Sechehaye. Trans. Wade Baskin, subsequently edited by Perry Meisel & Haun Saussy. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Škifić, Sanja & Anita Pavić Pintarić
2019 “Tracing the space between euphemisms and dysphemisms: The case of obesity in English and German.” ELOPE (Tiskana zd.) 16(2): 93–114. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sperber, Dan & Deirdre Wilson
1995 Relevance: Communication and Cognition (2nd ed.). Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Sze, Felix, Monica Wei and Aaron Wong
2017 “Taboos and euphemisms in sex-related signs in Asian sign languages.” Linguistics 55(1): 153–205. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tanaka, Toshiyuki
2002 Japan’s Comfort Women, Sexual Slavery and Prostitution during World War II and the US Occupation. London/New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Tang, Lijun & Peidong Yang
2011 “Symbolic power and the internet: The power of a ‘horse’.” Media, Culture and Society 33(5): 675–691. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tayler, J.
2005 “Doctors’ use of euphemisms and their impact on patients: Beliefs about health; An experimental study of heart failure.” Patient Education and Counseling 57(3): 321–326. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Taylor, John R.
2003 “Category extension by metonymy and metaphor.” In René Dirven and Ralf Pörings, ed. Metaphor and metonymy in comparison and contrast, 323–348. Berlin/New York: Mouton De Gruyter.Google Scholar
Terri L. Rittenburg, George Albert Gladney & Teresa Stephenson
2016 “The effects of euphemism usage in business contexts.” Journal of Business Ethics 137(2): 315–320. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Toomey, C.
2001 “Waiting in pain.” The Australian Magazine, February 24–25: 29–31.Google Scholar
Walker, Alexander C., Martin Harry Turpin, Ethan A. Meyers, Jennifer A. Stolz, Jonathan A. Fugelsang and Derek J. Koehler
2021 “Controlling the narrative: euphemistic language affects judgments of actions while avoiding perceptions of dishonesty.” Cognition 211: 104633. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Warren, Beatrice
1992 “What euphemisms tell us about the interpretation of words.” Studia Linguistica 46(2): 128–172. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Werner, A.
1905 “The custom of hlonipa in its influence on language.” Journal of the Royal African Society 4 (15): 346–356. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Winter-Froemel, Esme
2017 “The pragmatic necessity of borrowing: Euphemism, dysphemism, playfulness and naming.” Taal en Tongval: Variation in the Low Countries 69(1): 17. DOI logoGoogle Scholar