Pragmatics Flashcards
What is Pragmatics?
Pragmatics is the study of meaning in context & interaction
What’s the difference between Semantics and Pragmatics?
Pragmatics: Implied meaning, context-dependent, specific meaning in a real-life situation
Semantics: Literal meaning, context-independent, ALL possible meanings (in general)
How would we interpret the sentence “Can you pass the salt” from a pragmatic perspective?
Something along the lines of: “Pass me the salt please”
Explain “co-text”
Refers to words around a particular word which give it meaning
(Like context but focused on the words itself not the situation, helps understand how words relate)
Explain “deixis”
Words/phrases that depend on context to be understood.
They point to things like people, places & times depending on who’s speaking& when
e.g. I, you, here, there, now, then
What different forms of sentences are there and what are their function?
Imperative > command/request
Interrogative > asks a question
Declarative > statement
Exclamatory > expresses emotion
According to Grice, there are 4 Conversational Maxims of:
Quantity
Quality
Relation
Manner
The Maxim of Quantity says:
Not more information than required, as informative as required
The Maxim of Quality says:
No false or misleading statements, only true contributions
The Maxim of Relation says:
No unrelated information, only relevant contributions
The Maxim of Manner says:
No ambiguity, only concise expression of information
Communication is effective when… (Grice)
…certain Maxims are followed
List the types of ambiguity
Syntactic > sentence structure
Lexical > ambiguous words
Semantic > context
Pragmatic > implied meaning
Referential > uncertain reference
Who’s behind the Speech Act Theory?
Austin
According to Austins Speech Act Theory, there are 3 acts:
Locution > literal meaning
Illocution > intention/implication
Perlocution > reaction & effect
