
- •Introduction
- •Module 1. Classical Pragmatics
- •1. Basic Assumptions of Linguopragmatics
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Definition
- •Structural Ambiguity
- •Origins
- •Areas of Interest
- •Referential Uses of Language
- •Related Fields
- •Criticisms of Pragmatics
- •References
- •2. Speech Act
- •Issues Discussed:
- •J. L. Austin’s Taxonomy of Speech Acts
- •Speech Act and Language Development
- •Earlier Treatments of Speech Acts
- •Historical Critics of Speech Act Theory
- •References
- •3. Illocutionary Act
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Definition
- •Further examples:
- •Approaches to Defining "Illocutionary Act"
- •J. R. Searle’s Taxonomy of Illocutionary Speech Acts
- •Illocutionary Force
- •Illocutionary Force Indicating Devices
- •Illocutionary Negations
- •References
- •4. Indirect Speech Acts
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Definition
- •J. R. Searle's Theory of "Indirect Speech Acts"
- •Analysis Using Searle's Theory
- •References
- •5. Felicity Conditions
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Definition
- •Preparatory Conditions
- •Conditions for Execution
- •Sincerity Conditions
- •Felicity Conditions for Declarations
- •Felicity Conditions for Requests
- •Felicity Conditions for Warnings
- •References
- •6. K. Bach, r. Harnish and The Unified Theory
- •Issues Discussed:
- •K. Bach and r. Harnish on the Locutionary Acts
- •K. Bach and r. Harnish on the j. R. Searle’s Taxonomy of Illocutionary Acts
- •Communicative Acts versus Conventional Acts
- •The Speech Act Schema
- •References
- •Module 2. Contemporary Pragmatics
- •7. Contemporary Pragmatic Theory and Two Models of Linguistic Communication
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Contemporary Pragmatic Theory
- •Two Models of Linguistic Communication
- •References
- •8. D. Sperber, d. Wilson and Relevance Theory
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Basic Assumptions of Relevance Theory
- •The Principles of Relevance
- •Implicated Premises and Conclusions
- •References
- •9. Levinson's Theory of Utterance-Type-Meaning
- •References
- •10. Literalists, Minimalists, Contextualists and Others
- •References
- •Module 1. Classical Pragmatics Seminar 1. Referential Uses of Language
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Definition of Sign
- •Dyadic Signs
- •Triadic Signs
- •Molino and Nattiez's diagram:
- •Modern Theories of Sign
- •Indexicality
- •Pragmatics and Indexicality
- •Ch. S. Peirce's Trichotomy of Signs
- •Referential Indexicality
- •Indexical Presupposition and Performativity
- •References
- •Tasks and Questions
- •Seminar 2. Non-Referential Uses of Language
- •Issues Discussed:
- •First, Second, and Higher Orders of
- •Sex/Gender Indices
- •Affect Indices
- •Deference Indices
- •T/V Deference Entitlement
- •Affinal Taboo Index
- •Hypercorrection as a Social Class Index
- •Multiple Indices in Social Identity Indexicality
- •Oinoglossia (‘Wine Talk’)
- •References
- •Tasks and Questions
- •Seminar 3. Performative Utterance
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Origin of the Term
- •J. L. Austin's Definition
- •Categories of Performatives
- •The “Hereby” Test
- •Distinguishing Performatives from Other Utterances
- •Are Performatives Truth-Evaluable?
- •E. Sedgwick's Account of Performatives
- •Some Examples (Mainly of Explicit Performative Utterances)
- •References
- •Tasks and Questions
- •Seminar 4. H. P. Grice and Theory of Conversation
- •Issues Discussed:
- •H. P. Grice’s Definition of Conversational Implicature
- •H. P. Grice’s Cooperative Principle and Conversational Maxims
- •Conversational Implicature and Its Characteristics
- •Conversational Implicature versus Conventional Implicature
- •Particularized and Generalized Conversational Implicatures
- •Other Types of Conversational Implicature
- •Implicature versus Entailment
- •H. P. Grice’s Theory of Meaning and Communicative Intentions
- •References
- •Tasks and Questions
- •Module 2. Contemporary Pragmatics Seminar 5. Near-Side Classical Pragmatics
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Indexicality
- •D. Kaplan on Indexicals and Demonstratives
- •Pragmatic Puzzles of Referentialism
- •R. Stalnaker on Context and Content
- •Presupposition, Common Ground and Context
- •Propositional Concepts
- •References
- •Tasks and Questions
- •Seminar 6. Politeness Theory
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Politeness and Its Types
- •Techniques to Show Politeness
- •Linguistic Devices to Show Politeness
- •P. Brown and s. Levinson’s Politeness Theory
- •Positive and Negative Face
- •Face-Threatening Acts
- •Negative Face Threatening Acts
- •Positive Face Threatening Acts
- •Politeness Strategies
- •Bald On-record
- •Positive Politeness
- •Negative Politeness
- •Choice of Strategy
- •Payoffs Associated with each Strategy
- •Sociological Variables
- •Social distance between parties (symmetric relation).
- •The absolute ranking of the threat of the fta.
- •Criticism of the Politeness Theory
- •G. Leech’s Politeness Maxims
- •The Tact Maxim
- •The Generosity Maxim
- •The Approbation Maxim
- •The Modesty Maxim
- •The Agreement Maxim
- •The Sympathy Maxim
- •References
- •Tasks and Questions
- •Seminar 7. Deixis
- •Issues Discussed:
- •Definition
- •Types of Deixis Traditional Categories
- •Other Categories
- •Discourse
- •Anaphoric Reference
- •Deictic Center
- •Usages of Deixis
- •Deixis and Indexicality
- •Tasks and Questions
- •Questions for Module Control 1
- •Questions for Module Control 2
- •References
- •Some Definitions of Pragmatics (versus Semantics)
- •Glossary
Other Types of Conversational Implicature
The speaker deliberately flouts a conversational maxim to convey an additional meaning not expressed literally. For instance, a speaker responds to the question "How did you like the guest speaker?" with the following utterance: “Well, I’m sure he was speaking English.” If the speaker is assumed to be following the cooperative principle, in spite of flouting the maxim of quantity, then the utterance must have an additional nonliteral meaning, such as: "The content of the speaker’s speech was confusing."
The speaker’s desire to fulfill two conflicting maxims results in his or her flouting one maxim to invoke the other. For instance, a speaker responds to the question "Where is John?" with the following utterance: “He’s either in the cafeteria or in his office.” In this case, the maxim of quantity and the maxim of quality are in conflict. A cooperative speaker does not want to be ambiguous but also does not want to give false information by giving a specific answer in spite of his uncertainty. By flouting the maxim of quantity, the speaker invokes the maxim of quality, leading to the implicature that the speaker does not have the evidence to give a certain answer to where John is.
The speaker invokes a maxim as a basis for interpreting the utterance. In the following exchange: “Do you know where I can get some gas?” – “There’s a gas station around the corner.” The second speaker invokes the maxim of relevance, resulting in the implicature that “the gas station is open and one can probably get gas there”.
Scalar Implicature concerns the conventional uses of words like "all" or "some" in conversation. The sentence “I ate some of the pie” implies "I did not eat all of the pie." While the statement "I ate some pie" is still true if the entire pie was eaten, the conventional meaning of the word "some" and the implicature generated by the statement is "not all".
Implicature versus Entailment
Implicature can be contrasted with cases of entailment. For example, the statement "The president was assassinated" not only suggests that "The president is dead" is true, but requires that it be true. The first sentence could not be true if the second were not true; if the president were not dead, then whatever it is that happened to him would not have counted as a (successful) assassination. Similarly, unlike implicatures, entailments cannot be cancelled; there is no qualification that one could add to "The president was assassinated" which would cause it to cease entailing "The president is dead" while also preserving the meaning of the first sentence.
H. P. Grice’s Theory of Meaning and Communicative Intentions
Grice conceived that semantic notions like word and sentence meaning were ultimately based on speaker's meaning, and this on speaker's intention, what he called M-intentions. What he conceived as a study of the ontology of semantic notions has been received, however, as a characterization of communicative intentions, the mental causes of communicative acts, and those that the hearer has to understand for the communicative act to be successful.
So conceived, communicative intentions have these characteristic properties:
They are always oriented towards some other agent — the addressee.
They are overt, that is, they are intended to be recognized by the addressee.
Their satisfaction consists precisely in being recognized by the addressee.
These properties are already pointed out in the first version of Grice's M-intentions: "”A meant something by x’ is (roughly) equivalent to ‘A intended the utterance of x to produce some effect in an audience by means of the recognition of this intention’" [9, p. 220].
Grice later reformulated this definition, giving rise to a hot debate about the precise characterization of communicative intentions, mainly about two points:
Communicative intentions are intentions to produce some response on the part of the addressee, but what kind of response, exactly, should this be? Suppose I tell you, "It's raining." This act may have many results: perhaps you will hear the words, understand their meaning, come to believe that it is raining, search for your umbrella, fail to find it and grow angry, and finally become so angry you chew the rug. I may have planned all of this, but more typically I will have had in mind that you be prepared for the weather. But my communicative intention seems to be directed at a crucial subgoal. If I get you to believe it is raining, your own rationality will take over and you will get prepared. What I seem to aim at is changing your beliefs. It was this sort of response that Grice took to be typical in his early work on meaning. But it is really more in line with the spirit of his proposal that the crucial subgoal be to get the audience to believe that the speaker believes that it is raining. That's really the change that language can bring about; having gotten the audience that far, the speaker needs to hope that the audience trusts his weather-knowledge, will take the steps to themselves believing in rain, and then prepare adequately for the weather.
But even this rather modest subgoal may be too much to require for the success of the communicative action qua communicative action. Suppose I say that it is raining, and you hear me and understand the meaning of my words. But you don't think I am being sincere; you don't believe that I believe what I said. But still, I have said it. My overall plan to help insure that you don't get wet and catch cold may fail, but I do seem to have succeeded in saying what I set out to say. It seems that the only new mental state needed is the audience's recognition of the speaker's communicative intention; his understanding of the speaker's utterance. This is what has been called ‘illocutionary uptake’: “In the case of illocutionary acts we succeed in doing what we are trying to do by getting our audience to recognize what we are trying to do. But the ‘effect’ on the hearer is not a belief or a response, it consists simply in the hearer understanding the utterance of the speaker” [13, p. 47].
So the most common answer has been to follow Searle on this point and exclude perlocutionary results, beyond uptake of this sort, from the content of communicative intentions.
Communicative intentions must be wholly overt: “The understanding of the force of an utterance in all cases involves recognizing what may be called broadly an audience-directed intention and recognizing it as wholly overt, as intended to be recognized” [14, p. 459].
The exact formulation of this requirement has been a subject of intense debate, some arguing for a reflexive (self-referential) definition, others for a potentially infinite but practically finite number of clauses in the definition, with conceptual, logical or psychological arguments. What seems to be a matter of consensus is that every covert or even neutral (with respect to its intended recognition by the addressee) aspect of the speaker's intention must be left out of the definition of communicative intentions.