Linguistic Features in “How I Met Your Mother”. A Linguistic Analysis

This text is a detailed analysis of the most valuable word plays and their underlying types of word formation in "How I Met Your Mother". It puts special focus on the combination of different word formations being involved at the same time.

"How I Met Your Mother" – often abbreviated to HIMYM – is an American sitcom that follows a non-linear story in which the life of five friends living in New York is described. As a framing device the main character Ted Mosby tells his children how he met their mother. Using retrospective view he recounts in how far different actions and events in his and his friends’ past finally made him get to meet his future wife. His narration covers a time of 25 years and is told throughout eight seasons in 208 episodes. Throughout the story different kinds of linguistic word formations are used, often in types of puns and word plays to create humorous situations. Especially Barney Stinson, one of Ted Mosby’s best friends uses recurring puns by inventing new terms which he uses over and over again throughout the story.