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Unit 10 Pragmatics-part1

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Unit 10 Pragmatics-part1

Uploaded by

layanalotibi526
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Pragmatics

Pragmatics
• Communication clearly depends on not only recognizing the meaning of
words in an utterance, but also recognizing what speakers mean by their
utterances.

• Pragmatics: the study of speaker meaning and how more is


communicated than is said.
• It is the study of “invisible” meaning, or how we recognize what is
meant even when it is not actually said or written.

• In order for that to happen, speakers must be able to depend on a lot of


shared assumptions and expectations when they try to communicate.
Task

• Are they selling babies?

• How can you understand the message here?


Context
There are different kinds of context:
1. Physical context: the situation, time or place in which words are used.
• E.g., the word BANK on a wall of a building is understood as a financial
institution.
2. Linguistic context (co-text): the set of other words used in the same
phrase or sentence.
Examples:
• The banks of the River Dee...
• I went to the bank to withdraw some cash.
Deixis
Deixis (deictic expressions): from the Greek word deixis, which
means “pointing” via language; words that cannot be interpreted
unless the physical context of the speaker is known.
o E.g., You’ll have to bring it back tomorrow, because she isn’t
here today.

It is impossible to understand such sentence if we don’t know who


is speaking, about whom, where and when.
Deixis (deictic expressions) are classified as follows:

All these deictic expressions have to be interpreted in terms of


which person, place or time the speaker has in mind.
Reference
• Reference: an act by which a speaker/writer uses language to enable the
listener/reader to identify someone or something.
• To perform an act of reference, we can use:
- Proper nouns: (Chomsky, Ahmed)
- Nouns in phrases: (the cat, a writer, my friend, the war)
- Pronouns: (he, she, it)
• For each word or phrase, there is a “range of reference”; the words Ahmed,
friend, or she can be used to refer to many entities in the world.
• We refer to things we’re not sure what to call them (e.g., that blue thing)
• We invent names (e.g., Mr. Kawasaki).
Inference
• Inference: additional information used by the listener/reader to create a
connection between what is said and what must be meant.
• Examples:
A) We can use nouns associated with things to refer to people:
- Waiter 1: Where’s the Caesar salad sitting?
- Waiter 2: He’s sitting by the door.

B) We can use names of people to refer to things:


- Can I borrow your Chomsky?
- Sure, it’s on the table.
Anaphora
• Anaphora: use of pronouns and noun phrases with the to refer
back to something already mentioned.
• Antecedent: the first mention of someone or something later
referred to via anaphora.
E.g., we saw a funny home video about a boy washing a puppy in a small
bath. The puppy started struggling and shaking and the boy got really
wet. When he let go, it jumped out of the bath and ran away.
In this referential relationship, a boy, a puppy and a small bath are antecedents
and The puppy, the boy, he, it and the bath are anaphoric expressions.
• A less common pattern of antecedent-anaphora relationship is
called cataphora.
• In this pattern, the relationship is reversed by beginning with a
pronoun, then later revealing more specific information.

• This device is more common in stories, as in this beginning:


It suddenly appeared on the path a little ahead of me, staring in
my direction and sniffing the air. An enormous grizzly bear was
checking me out.
• The connection between an antecedent & an anaphoric expression
is created by use of:
1. A pronoun (it)
2. A phrase with “the” + the antecedent noun (the puppy)
3. Another noun that is related to the antecedent in
some way (The little dog ran out of the room).

• The connection between antecedents and anaphoric expressions is


often based on inference, an assumption made by the listener/reader.
We found a house to rent, but the kitchen was very small.
I got on a bus and asked the driver if it went near the downtown area.
Presupposition
• Presupposition: an assumption by a speaker/writer about what is
true or already known by the listener/reader.
• Examples:
>Why did you arrive late? Presupposition = you arrived late.
>Your brother is waiting outside. Presupposition = you have a brother.
>When did you stop smoking? Presupposition 1 = the speaker supposes
that you used to smoke; Presupposition 2 = the speaker supposes that you
no longer smoke.
• There is a test for identifying a presupposition called constancy
under negation. It involves comparing a sentence with its
negative version and identifying which presuppositions remain
true in both.
E.g., My car is old.
My car isn’t old.

• The presupposition => (I have a car) remains true although the


two sentences have opposite meanings.

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