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The following diagram illustrates how euphemisms can be constructed - according to Warren (1992:134):
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2.10.1 Positive euphemism and negative euphemism
Euphemisms have been classified in several ways, depending on the philosophical stance from which one interprets the use of language in particular situations. One of the earliest classifications distinguishes between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ euphemism.
Rawson (1981:1) divides euphemisms into two general types: positive and negative.
Positive euphemisms can also be called stylistic euphemisms or exaggerating euphemisms. According to Rawson (1981:1), “the positive ones inflate and magnify, making the euphemized items seem altogether grander and more important than they really are.” In order to avoid thrill, to be polite or to achieve cooperation, British and American people - especially contemporary Americans - prefer to use the technique of exaggeration to euphemise something unpleasant and embarrassing. In the modern times many new euphemisms have been coined regarding people’s ideologies and values and their ways of showing respect for others. Quite a number of positive euphemisms are doublespeak and use cosmetic words which normally appear in political, military and commercial vocabularies.
Negative euphemisms rather deflate and diminish; they are defensive in nature, offsetting the power of tabooed terms and, otherwise, eradicating from language everything that people prefer not to deal with directly (Rawson, 1981). They are extremely ancient and closely connected to taboos, i.e., negative euphemisms may be referred to as traditional euphemisms or narrowing euphemisms.
2.10.2 Conscious euphemism and unconscious euphemism
Euphemisms, whether positive or negative, can be divided into conscious or unconscious ones. The criterion is whether the euphemistic meaning correlates with the original meaning or not. Unconscious euphemisms were developed long ago and are used unconsciously, i.e., without any intention to deceive or evade. For example, a new standard term, cemetery has been a replacement for the more deathly one, graveyard, since the fourteenth century (Hu, 1991:7) and ‘indisposition’ has been a substitute for disease. From the above, it can be concluded that unconscious euphemisms were developed so long ago that few can remember their original motivations.
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Unlike unconscious euphemisms, conscious euphemisms are widely used and involve more complex categories. When two people communicate, speakers are conscious of saying things tactfully and listeners of understanding their implied meaning. For example, when a lady stands up and says she wants to ‘powder her nose’ or ‘make a phone call’ at a dinner party, the people present realize the euphemism means something else, i.e., she is going to the ladies room.
2.10.3 Metaphorical euphemism
Metaphor is a figure of speech as well as a common way of human thinking that exists in many languages. For instance, euphemisms for death include metaphors in English, such as: ‘going to his last home’, ‘to sleep the long/eternal’, ‘never ending sleep’, ‘to rest in peace’, ‘to beat rest’, and ‘has gone to heaven/paradise’. It is a belief of the state of the dead which is reflected even in the Old Testament; ‘sleep’
for dead is a euphemism as ‘sleep’ avoids the use of the more frightening word, dead. Similarly, in Genesis, Chapter 3:19 b there is a reference where God utters a curse on Adam: “Until you go back to the soil from which you were formed”; ‘Going back to the soil’ was used as a euphemism for “dying”. In the New Testament there is also an example of this kind of euphemism: in the book of John (11:11) where Jesus had the following to say about his friend Lazarus whom everyone in Bethany regarded as dead and had even been buried for four days: “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I will go and awake him up.” In the real sense Jesus meant that Lazarus had died, yet the disciples thought that he meant natural sleep. In this example we experience Jesus’ use of the euphemism ‘sleep’ in place of a taboo or frightening word, dead. Another example is found in Matthew (9:24) where Jesus commands the people at the funeral of the official’s daughter as follows: “Get out, everybody! The little girl is not ‘dead’ - she is only ‘sleeping.” In this story Jesus uses the word, ‘sleep’ as a euphemism for the word, dead.
2.10.4 Other classifications of euphemisms
Besides the classifications mentioned above, Samoskaite (2011) states that euphemisms can be divided into the following six semantic categories.
71 2.10.4.1 Profession euphemisms
In Western countries, mental work is considered to be a higher order job whereas physical labour is seen as humble work and there is a great difference in the remuneration of the two; the result is that people in different occupations are attributed with different status in society. Some lowly paid or ‘indecent’ jobs are often euphemised in English to save face and express politeness and fewer occupations are called jobs; many have become professions. Some names, like ‘engineer’, are popular in terms of English euphemisms using them for fancy occupational titles, which elevate the status of jobs. Many previously unwelcome professions have now acquired more appealing names. For example, in profession euphemisms, road sweeper or dustman is now acleaning operative, garbage collector is a sanitation engineer and butcher is a meat technologist (Samoskaite, 2011:14).
2.10.4.2 Disease euphemisms
Samoskaite (2011:14) states that in the disease euphemisms, long illness is a replacement for cancer, social disease replaces syphilisand AIDS and lung trouble is used instead of tuberculosis. If someone has a mental illness psychosis is not mentioned directly, but s/he is said to be a little confused; hard of hearing is used for being deaf.
2.10.4.3 Death euphemisms
In many societies, because death is feared people tend to avoid mentioning death directly and talk about it in a euphemistic way. They try to employ pleasant terms to express the idea of death; there are hundreds of soft, decent, and better-sounding names, such as: breathe one’s last, fall asleep, go west, join the majority, lay down one’s life, pass away, pay the debt of nature, reach a better world, to be at peace, to return to the dust and he worked until he breathed his last (Samoskaite, 2011:14).
2.10.4.4 Sex euphemisms
Euphemisms concerning sex include: the great divide, willing woman, gay boy, lost girl, loose woman, male homosexual and prostitute.
72 2.10.4.5 Crime euphemisms
Examples of euphemisms related to crime are: five-fingers, gentleman of the road, hero of the underground, the candy man are often used to substitute for pickpocket, robber, heroin, and drug pusher.
2.10.4.6 Political euphemisms
Since the function of euphemism is to reduce the unpleasantness of a term or notion, it is natural that announcements by government will often use them to understate the facts, for example student unrest can be used to replace student strike; police action, search and clear, war games are substituted for aggression, massacre and war exercise (Samoskaite, 2011:15).
From the above discussion on the classifications of euphemisms, it is clear that they may be sub-categorised differently, for instance: sex - negative - and also bodily functions, body parts. Others could relate to death, excretion, occupation or disease.
Euphemisms are interesting in the sense that there are situations when euphemisms are created, depending on the input of a certain occasion, and are never repeated while others are coined and reused later and ratified by many people and have lasted generations - even centuries.