Whether you are a language student, teacher or a language enthusiast, it is important that you understand the huge role context plays in shaping meaning—how context influences the messages we convey in conversations. This turns our focus to the concept of pragmatics.
What is Pragmatics?
Think of pragmatics as an investigation of a crime scene where detectives and crime scene investigators look around for evidences of a crime committed. Pragmatics is the study of the context that contributes to meaning making. It has to do with the unspoken factors that accompany speech helping to clarify a message or its meaning. The study of pragmatics focuses on how both linguistic features—that is, spoken features—and non-linguistic features influence meaning in discourse. Just like the analogy used earlier, you can think of pragmatists as investigators, but these investigators are not primarily concerned with crime scenes, however, they are interested in finding out other details in a speech environment—the setting of a conversation—beyond the speech itself that contribute to the meaning communicated by interlocutors—people involved in a conversation.
Key Concepts in Pragmatics
The following are some of the key concepts in pragmatics:
Context
Since the major preoccupation of pragmatics is the study of context, it makes sense that context is one of the major concepts studied in pragmatics. Context has to do with both the linguistic and non-linguistic features connected to a discourse which contribute to the meaning communicated. There are a number of contexts that exist ranging from linguistic context dealing with words, physical context which deals with the location and time of a conversation, socio-cultural context which deals with the norms of the people involved in a conversation, etc.,. These types of context and more are considered in determining meaning in pragmatics.
Deixis
Deixis is a concept in pragmatics that has to do with words that serve the purpose of pointing to persons or places. These words serve the purpose of pointing in the direction of a person, place or object without directly specifying who or what is being referred to, just like arrow signs that help with navigation and pinpointing locations. The types of deixis include: person deixis which points to persons using the personal pronouns such as: I, me, we, you, they, us, etc., place deixis which points to locations such as: here, there, up, under, etc., and time deixis which point to temporal settings e.g.,. now, then, before, after, etc.,. None of these deitic references, as they are called, specify what they make reference to but they point to them thus contributing to meaning making in pragmatics.
Cooperative Principles
Cooperative principles is a theory that was propounded by Paul Grice, and it is based on the notion that we humans do not speak in a progression of disconnected remarks. That is, we do not just speak at random without purpose or achieving anything, rather we cooperate on some unspoken rules in our conversations to ensure that we are understood when we speak, and we understand when spoken to which ensures that messages are are effectively communicated. Now these unspoken rules of communication birth the four maxims: maxim of quality which states that your contribution to a discourse must be reliable, maxim of quantity which states that you must provide sufficient information, maxim of relation which states that your contribution must be relevant, and maxim of manner which states that your contribution must be ordered.
Implicature
Implicature is an accompanying theory propounded also by Paul Grice and this theory was based on the meaning that is communicated beyond what is said. It basically refers to that which is implied. So Grice identifies two types of implicatures, namely: conventional implicature which refers to that which is implied within a text, and conversational implicature which refers to that which is implied beyond the text. He stated that conversational implicature which can be achieved from context, shared background knowledge among others, is obtained when one or more of the four maxims is violated or flouted. This is because the hearer or listener in a conversation assumes that the speaker is still trying to be communicative by dumping the maxims, hence they observe the context to be able to make out what the speaker is trying to say. This contributes to meaning making in conversations.
Presupposition
Presupposition is a concept in pragmatics that is based on assumption. That is, it has to do with a speaker's assumption that their listener or audience can interpret or make meaning of what they are communicating to them. For instance; when you ask a person for their name in English, you assume that the person you are enquiring from is either a native of the language or can at least speak the language, otherwise you would know that asking such a question would be futile if the person in question did not know the language.
Speech Act Theory
Speech Act Theory is a concept in pragmatics that is based on the notion that whenever we speak, we do not just do so for the sake of it. We do not just speak because we have speech organs and are capable of producing words, rather we speak because we hope to get things done by virtue of speaking. So basically, our words are meant to perform actions which is why the theory was named: speech act theory. In order to solidify this claim, three types of speech acts were identified namely: locutionary act, illocutionary act, and perlocutionary act. Locutionary act refers to well formed grammatical sentences—speech in its base form for example; Give John a pat on his back, illocutionary act, then, refers to the actions performed by those grammatical sentences such as issuing a command, making a statement, asking a question, etc., and perlocutionary act refers to the effect a speech has on the listener or audience which can range from conviction to fear, excitement, shock, surprise, etc.,.
So, pragmatics is concerned with the evaluation of context and how it contributes to meaning. It deals with how the meaning embedded in our messages are influenced by the context or environment in which we produce those speeches. Some of the basic concepts in pragmatics include; Context, Deixis, Cooperative principles, implicature, presupposition, etc.,. Understanding the concept of pragmatics would make you more adept to your environment and to be able to detect meaning beyond what is said, and make good use of such information which could ultimately lead to making informed decisions among others.
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