Lesson 6: Pragmatics البراغماتية

[ESAL SPIRIT]

Pragmatics

In this lesson we deal with Pragmatics the study of "how to do things with words" (the name of a well known book by the philosopher J.L. Austin), or the study of the meaning of language in context. Crystal considers it to be part of the wider field of discourse analysis. Pragmatics is "the study of the contribution of context to meaning".

Pragmatics starts from the observation that people use language to accomplish many kinds of acts, known as speech acts (as distinct from physical acts like drinking wine or mental acts like thinking about drinking wine). The aim of Speech acts is asking, for instance, for a glass of wine, making promises, issuing warnings or threats, giving orders, making requests for information, and many others.

There are three basic types of speech acts. A) Locutionary: saying a sentence with a specific meaning. B) Illocutionary: the intent that the speaker has while saying the sentence. C) Perlocutionary: the result achieved by the sentence. Locutionary acts, however, are those with explicit meaning ‘My cat is an Exotic Shorthair’ where I only intend to give information about my cat’s race (it includes statements, descriptions, assertions).

Illocutionary acts have different varieties according to Searly. Representatives represent a state of affairs: statements, descriptions, assertions. Directives intend to give the listener orders, requests, instructions. Commissives normally intend to commit the speaker to some future action: promises, threats, offers. Expressives express an attitude of the speaker: thanks, apologizes, welcomes.

Grice takes pragmatics farther than the study of speech acts. Discourse analysis examines coherence in speech and writing. When we are conversing with our friends, coherence is essential in order to be understood by our friends. Therefore subconsciously we follow certain Maxims of Conversation or simply conversational rules.

The maxims are four and conversationalists are enjoined to respect.
1. The maxim of quality. Speakers' contributions ought to be true.
2. The maxim of quantity. Speakers' contributions should be as informative as required; not saying either too little or too much.
3. The maxim of relevance. Contributions should relate to the purposes of the exchange.
4. The maxim of manner. Contributions should be "perspicuous -- in particular, they should be orderly and brief, avoiding obscurity and ambiguity" (Crystal, p. 117).

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