Cognitive context is the explanation of formations and functional mechanisms of context from the perspective of cognitive science.Hearers can identify and illustrate irony by the use of cognitive context.In the process of irony communication cognitive context undertakes both confinement and illustration functions.Its confinement function,which is mainly embodied in expression forms and choices of meanings,refers to cognitive context’s confinement to speakers’use of irony and hearers’understanding of irony.Its illustration function mainly refers to the fact that cognitive context specifies the meanings of the vocabulary and on the basis of cognitive context perceivers can infer irony speakers’intentions by the means of irony.