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Jakobson

The document outlines Roman Jakobson's six functions of language: 1) The Referential Function describes situations and objects. 2) The Expressive Function relates to the speaker's internal state through interjections. 3) The Conative Function directly engages the listener through vocatives and imperatives. 4) The Poetic Function focuses on the message itself, as seen in poetry and slogans. 5) The Phatic Function facilitates interaction through greetings and small talk. 6) The Metalingual Function uses language to discuss itself.

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Javier Galiano
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268 views

Jakobson

The document outlines Roman Jakobson's six functions of language: 1) The Referential Function describes situations and objects. 2) The Expressive Function relates to the speaker's internal state through interjections. 3) The Conative Function directly engages the listener through vocatives and imperatives. 4) The Poetic Function focuses on the message itself, as seen in poetry and slogans. 5) The Phatic Function facilitates interaction through greetings and small talk. 6) The Metalingual Function uses language to discuss itself.

Uploaded by

Javier Galiano
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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The six functions of language Roman Jakobson defined six functions of language (or communication functions), according to which

an effective act of verbal communication can be described.[1] Each of the functions has an associated factor: 1. The Referential Function Corresponds to the factor of Context and describes a situation, object or mental state. The descriptive statements of the referential function can consist of both definite descriptions and deictic words, e.g. "The autumn leaves have all fallen now." 2. The Expressive (alternatively called "emotive" or "affective") Function relates to the Addresser and is best exemplified by interjections and other sound changes that do not alter the denotative meaning of an utterance but do add information about the Addresser's (speaker's) internal state, e.g. "Wow, what a view!" 3. The Conative Function engages the Addressee directly and is best illustrated by vocatives and imperatives, e.g. "Tom! Come inside and eat!" 4. The Poetic Function focuses on "the message for its own sake"[3] and is the operative function in poetry as well as slogans. 5. The Phatic Function is language for the sake of interaction and is therefore associated with the Contact factor. The Phatic Function can be observed in greetings and casual discussions of the weather, particularly with strangers. 6. The Metalingual (alternatively called "metalinguistic" or "reflexive") Function is the use of language (what Jakobson calls "Code") to discuss or describe itself.

The six factors of an effective verbal communication

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