摘 要：《破产姐妹》是一部由迈克尔·帕特里克·金和惠特妮·卡明联手打造的美国情景喜剧，主要讲述了两个身份背景完全不同的都市女孩麦克斯和凯若琳共同创业的故事。本文主要运用语料收集法和文献分析法来研究剧中主要人物的性格和语言特色，使观众对这部剧有更加深刻的了解。同时，该剧又可以作为很好的英语学习素材,用来帮助提高我们的英语水平。希望通过本文对《破产姐妹》中主要人物性格的探索和语言特色的分析,可以帮助观众理解这部剧蕴含的意义。

关键词：《破产姐妹》；人物性格；语言特色

Abstract ：Two Broke Girls is an American sitcom which teamed up by Micheal Patrick King and Whitney Cummings. It mainly tells us about how to start a business of two girls, Max and Caroline, who have completely different background and identity. This paper uses the corpus collection method and the literature analysis method to study the personality and language features of the main characters, which can help the audience have a more profound understanding to the show. At the same time, this drama also can serve as a good material of learning English, so as to improve the level of our English learning. Hopefully this paper can help the audience understand the connotative meaning of the show by exploring the personality and analyzing the language features of the main characters.

Key words: Two Broke Girls; character analysis; language features

Contents

摘 要 i

Abstract ii

I. Introduction 1

II. The Background and Impact of American TV Series....2

2.1 The Background of American TV Series 2

2.2 Effect of American TV Series 3

2.3 The Correct Guidance of the American TV Show 4

III. The Personality Analysis of the Main Characters 5

3.1 The Personality of Max 5

3.2 The Personality of Caroline 5

3.3 The Personality of Oleg 6

3.4 The Personality of Earl 6

3.5 The Personality of Han 7

3.6 The Personality of Sophie 7

IV. The Languages Analysis of Two Broke Girls 8

4.1 Verbal Humor 8

4.2 Pun 9

4.3 Euphemism 11

V. Conclusion 14

Bibliography 16

Acknowledgments 17

The Character Analysis and Language Features of Two Broke Girls

I. Introduction

Two Broke Girls is an American television sitcom that debuted on CBS during the 2011–2012 television season. The series follows the misadventures of roommates Max (Kat Dennings) and Caroline (Beth Behrs), both financially poor, but they make efforts to start a cupcake business in the Williamsburg area of Brooklyn, New York.

The series has received a generally positive response since its debut. It was nominated for three 2012 Emmy Awards, winning for “Outstanding Art Direction for a Multi-Camera Series”. And in the Williamsburg neighborhood of the New York City borough of Brooklyn, the series chronicles the lives of two waitresses in their mid twenties, Max (Kat Dennings), who comes from a poor working-class family, and Caroline (Beth Behrs), who was born rich but now is disgraced and penniless due to her father, Martin Channing, getting caught operating a Bernard Madoff-esque Ponzi scheme. Max and Caroline work together at a Brooklyn restaurant. The two girls become friends and build toward their dream of opening a cupcake shop in the future.

There are main characters in the play who are working with them at the restaurant. One is their boss, Han Lee (Matthew Moy), a Korean American. Another one is Oleg (Jonathan Kite), an upbeat but perverted Ukrainian cook. And Earl (Garrett Morris), a 75-year-old African-American cashier. The other important one is their neighbor and the boss of their part-time jobs, Sophie (Jennifer Coolidge), a Polish immigrant who runs the housecleaning company. She has featured appearance in the first season. During most of the first season, Max is also a part-time nanny for the twin babies of Peach Landis (Brooke Lyons), who adopts Chestnut, the horse of Caroline. At the end of each episode a tally shows how much they have made toward their goal of $250, 000 needed to open their business. Early in the second season, Sophie lends the girls $20, 000, which is enough for them to start their business.