The Pleasure and Pain in Taboo Exploitation

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear author(s),

In my opinion, this is an excellent research paper, a very valuable contribution to the field of swearing in particular and linguistic interdiction in general that I enjoyed reading. The subject matter is fascinating, its development its more than adequate and the discussion is well conducted. In addition, the paper is written in a brilliant (I would say), academic English. 

I have indicated in the pdf file attached a couple of suggestions that you may consider and a few (minor, very minor) formal corrections to be made in the section of References. 

The article can be accepted in present form. I would just recommend you to revise the section of references, add a few commas, avoid capital initial in some words and complete a couple of references. Nothing else.

Best regards. 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

I am grateful for the reviewer's comments and have taken the following actions.

Comment at line 165: I have incorporated most of the reviewer's comment as a quote in endnote 6.

Comment at line 205: I have incorporated most of the reviewer's comment as a quote in endnote 7.

The remainder of this reviewer's comments result from the anonymization of the ms and are dealt with in full in the revised submission

Reviewer 2 Report

“The pleasure and pain in taboo exploitation” examines the emotional motivation for the special case of taboo exploitation—swearing—mainly from the perspective of the swearer. The strength of the paper is that while the pleasures and pains are subjective and individual, the experience seems to be universal. This is demonstrated and supported by rich and relevant examples from various dialects of English (British, American, and Australian) and from other languages, yet not sufficiently asserted.

I have several suggestions:

·       The paper converses with several linguistic sub-disciplines of speech acts, relevance of context in pragmatics, and sound symbolism. The value of the paper for taboo studies and for the contribution of studying taboo to the study of language at large would increase if these links are pointed to, even if only with several words and a few relevant references.  

·       Section 8, “Swearing that characterizes an individual’s behavior” should distinguish between what characterizes an individual (personality) and what characterizes a group to which an individual belongs (e.g., clinical population of Tourette or women).

·       I suggest to be careful with sentences like “Swearing seems to be located and processed in a different part of the brain.” “processed” - yes! But “located” implies a computer-like model of hardware/ software that does not agree with the current processual understanding of the brain.

Author Response

I am grateful for the reviewer's comments and have taken the following actions.

The reviewer writes: "The strength of the paper is that while the pleasures and pains are subjective and individual, the experience seems to be universal. This is demonstrated and supported by rich and relevant examples from various dialects of English (British, American, and Australian) and from other languages, yet not sufficiently asserted." As I understand this comment it is that I do not strongly assert that the pleasure and/or pain are universal among human beings: I cannot, though I suspect it to be true. I can only assert it for the populations I have investigated.

The reviewer writes: "The paper converses with several linguistic sub-disciplines of speech acts, relevance of context in pragmatics, and sound symbolism. The value of the paper for taboo studies and for the contribution of studying taboo to the study of language at large would increase if these links are pointed to, even if only with several words and a few relevant references." I submit that references are given and relationships discussed, so I cannot act further on this comment.

The reviewer writes: "Section 8, “Swearing that characterizes an individual’s behavior” should distinguish between what characterizes an individual (personality) and what characterizes a group to which an individual belongs (e.g., clinical population of Tourette or women)." This has led me to rephrase the relevant paragraph, llines 599-611. However, I maintain that what characterizes a group are teh common characteristics of its members.

The reviewer writes: "I suggest to be careful with sentences like “Swearing seems to be located and processed in a different part of the brain.” “processed” - yes! But “located” implies a computer-like model of hardware/ software that does not agree with the current processual understanding of the brain." I deal with this comment at line 672 in endnote 14, which reads "Anonymous reviewer 2 objects that “’located’ implies a computer-like model of hardware/ software that does not agree with the current processual understanding of the brain”. It is true that brain imaging often shows processing to activate a number of different locations in the brain, but they are nonetheless locations."