Fischzüge der Liebe: Liebeskommunikation in deutschen und chinesischen SMS-Sequenzen

Abstract

One of the biggest problems with love talk is that the lovers want to make sure of their true and sincere love but that at the same time the assertion of truth and sincerity may also be interpreted as mere routine and the utterance of clichés. On the basis of a qualitative analysis of German and Chinese love communication by SMS it will be shown from a cross-linguistic and cross-cultural perspective how interactants cope with this dilemma. The data show that – paradoxically – one solution is to tease each other and produce intentional misunderstandings that yield low puns (a strategy found in the German data) or to enact the end of the love relationship (in the Chinese data).