Pragmatics - BRU

Meaning in Language
Meaning in Language
Meaning in Language
PRAGMATICS
Meaning in Language
Pragmatics Course Content
Pragmatics WHAT IS PRAGMATICS
 If a single group of words such as It's hot in here! could mean so

many different things at different times, how do we work out
what it actually does mean on one specific occasion?
 And why don't people just say what they mean?
 These, and many other issues, are addressed within the area of
linguistics known as pragmatics.
Pragmatics DEFINING PRAGMATICS
 Pragmatics is a branch of linguistics concerned with the use of

language in social contexts and the ways people produce and
comprehend meanings through language.
 The study of meaning in human language is often partitioned into

two major divisions:
- Semantics The distinction between semantics and
- Pragmatics pragmatics is useful and important.

Pragmatics The levels of meaning
The meanings of three different types of linguistic units
 Lexical Meaning
 Sentence Meaning
 Uterrance Meaning (or speaker meanign)
 The first two units are hopefully already familiar to the reader.
In order to understand the third level, “utterance meaning”,
we need to distinguish between sentences vs. utterances.
Pragmatics The levels of meaning
 A sentence is a linguistic expression, a well-formed string of

words, while an utterance is a speech event by a particular
speaker in a specific context.
 When a speaker uses a sentence in a specific context, he

produces an utterance.
 The term sentence meaning refers to the semantic content of

the sentence: the meaning which derives from the words
themselves, regardless of context.
Pragmatics The utterance meaning
 The term utterance meaning refers to the semantic content

plus any pragmatic meaning created by the specific way in
which the sentence gets used.
 Cruse (2000: 27) defines utterance meaning as “the totality of

what the speaker intends to convey by making an utterance.”
 So, interpreting an utterance depends heavily on context in

which it can be used:
- Đi đâ u mà só m thế?
Pragmatics The utterance meaning
 The term utterance meaning refers to the semantic content

plus any pragmatic meaning created by the specific way in
which the sentence gets used.
 Cruse (2000: 27) defines utterance meaning as “the totality of

what the speaker intends to convey by making an utterance.”
 So, interpreting an utterance depends heavily on context in

which it can be used: May be equivalent to that of the English
expressions Hello or How do you do?
- Ă n gì chưa?
Pragmatics Understanding concepts
 It looks beyond the literal meaning of an utterance and considers

how meaning is constructed as well as focusing on implied
meanings.
 It considers language as an instrument of interaction, what people

mean when they use language and how we communicate and
understand each other.
Pragmatics Understanding concepts
 Pragmatics studies deal with the utterances in context (the

physical and social world) and assumptions of knowledge that
speaker and hearer share.
 Linguistic expressions can only occur in particular contexts; as a

result, working out what role context plays in the determination
of meaning is an important part of semantic analysis.
Pragmatics Meaning and context
 For the purposes of deciding what a piece of language means, no

utterance can be considered as a self-standing whole: words only
exist within particular contexts, and we will not be able to achieve an
adequate description of meaning if we don’t take these contexts into
account.
Pragmatics What is context
 According to George Yule (1996), context is “the physical

environment in which a word is used”. This environment may
be social, conceptual, cultural, historical or political or it may be
a combination of them.
Pragmatics What is context
 Charles Goodwin (1992): Context is “a frame that surrounds

the event and provides resources for its appropriate
interpretation”.
 Leech (1983) defines the ‘context’ as “any background

knowledge assumed to be shared by speaker and hearer and
which contributes to his interpretation of what speaker
means by a given utterance.”
Pragmatics The significance of context
 Many linguists illustrate the outstanding impact of context on

understanding any text.
 When speakers express their ideas in a complex way, hearers

should rely on the context as it can be considered the clue to
indirect meanings.
“The meaning of any single word is to a very high degree

dependent on its context.”
 Hymes (1962): context can decrease the possible interpretations

of a text and choose the most appropriate understanding
depending on the background of interlocutors and the previous
incidents.
 With the help of ‘context’, we can solve the ambiguity, reveal

hidden meanings and decode the indirect speech.
 Meaning can change from one context to another due to the fact
that meanings are not stable.
 In other words, meanings are dependent on ‘context’ so when

context change, they change consequently.
- It’ s hot in here.

How do we interpret?
- The door, please!
Pragmatics Types of context
 There are two main types of context:
• Linguistic context
• Social context
Pragmatics Linguistic context
• Context refers to the words and sentences that surround any part
of a discourse and that helps to determine its meaning.
• Linguistic context is how meaning is understood without relying on

intent and assumptions.
Pragmatics Linguistic context
Examples:
1. Police believe the gunmen ran off into the woods.
2. The hallway ran the length of the villa.
3. He laughed and ran his fingers through his hair.
4. His stepfather ran a prosperous paint business.
5. Tears were running down her cheeks.
6. Could you run me up to Baltimore?
Pragmatics Social or Interpersonal context
• Context may refer to any aspects of an occasion in which a speech-

act takes place, including the social setting and the status of both
the speaker and the person who's addressed.
"Our choice of words is constrained by the context in

which we use the language. Our personal thoughts are shaped
by those of others,“
(Claire Kramsch, Context and Culture in Language Teaching. Oxford
University Press, 1993.
Pragmatics Social or Interpersonal context
• In common use, almost every word has many shades of meaning,

and therefore needs to be interpreted by the context.
• Meaning should be analyzed not only within the linguistic system

but also taking into account the social system in which it occurs. In
order to accomplish this task, both text and context must be
considered. Based on the context, people make predictions about
the meanings of utterances.
Pragmatics Deixis or Deictic expressions
 A technical term used in semantics and pragmatics for linguistic items

that encode sensitivity to context and for uses of linguistic items that
involve this kind of sensitivity.
 The deictic expressions are those elements whose linguistically

encoded meaning includes a certain kind of sensitivity to context.
You have to bring it back tomorrow because she isn’t here today.
How do we understand this sentence?
 Out of the context, this sentence is really vague. It contains a large

number of deictic expressions that rely on knowledge of the context for
their interpretation.
 They include pronouns like you and we, demonstratives like this and
that, other indexicals, such as here, there, now and then, and terms that
encode sensitivity to the social context, including second person singular
pronouns in many European languages, such as French tu and vous.
 Inflectional morphology (endings on verbs, markers of grammatical

agreement and so on) often encodes context-sensitivity.
 Examples include tense morphology, inflection for grammatical person,

and inflection for respect-level, social distance and other social factors
(as in Japanese, Korean and Austronesian languages).

 Different types of deictic expressions:
• Person deixis: personal pronouns
• Spatial deixis: adverbs (here, there), demonstratives (this, that, etc.),

verbs (go, come)
• Time/Temporal deixis: adverbs and in tensed languages, tense is

deictic with the primary centre of deixis at the speaker’s time.
• In tenseless languages such as Vietnamese, Chinese, lexical

or pragmatic devices suffice for communicating reference
time.
Pragmatics Reference and Inference
 In discussing deixis, we assumed that the use of words to refer to

people, places and times was a simple matter.
 However, words themselves don’t refer to anything. People refer.
 We have to define reference as an act by which a speaker (or writer)

uses language to enable a listener (or reader) to identify something.
 To perform an act of reference, we can use proper nouns (Chomsky,

Jennifer, Whiskas), other nouns in phrases (a writer, my friend, the cat)
or pronouns (he, she, it).
 We sometimes assume that these words identify someone or something

uniquely, but it is more accurate to say that, for each word or phrase,
there is a “range of reference.” The words Jennifer or friend or she can be
used to refer to many entities in the world.
 To perform an act of reference, we can use proper nouns (Chomsky,

Jennifer, Whiskas), other nouns in phrases (a writer, my friend, the cat)
or pronouns (he, she, it).
 Historically, there was only one person called George Washington,

the first president of the United States. He can be referred to in a text in
many ways, such as the president, Mr. Washington, He or even My friend.
 We can also refer to things when we are not sure what to call them. We
can use expressions such as the blue thing and that icky stuff and we can
even invent names.
 For instance, there was a man who always drove his motorcycle fast and
loud through my neighborhood and was locally referred to as Mr.
Kawasaki. In this case, a brand name for a motorcycle is being used to
refer to a person.
 As in the “Mr. Kawasaki” example, a successful act of reference depends

more on the listener/reader’s ability to recognize what the
speaker/writer means than on the listener’s “dictionary” knowledge of
a word that is used.
 For example, in a restaurant, one waiter can ask another, Where’s the
spinach salad sitting? and receive the reply, He’s sitting by the door.
 If you’re studying linguistics, you might ask someone, Can I look at

your Chomsky? and get the response, Sure, it’s on the shelf over there.
 And when you hear that Jennifer is wearing Calvin Klein, you avoid
imagining someone called Calvin draped over poor Jennifer and
recognize that they are talking about her clothing.
 These examples make it clear that we can use nouns associated with
things (salad) to refer to people, and use names of people (Chomsky,
Calvin Klein) to refer to things.
 The key process here is called inference. An inference is additional

information used by the listener to create a connection between
what is said and what must be meant.
 In the Chomsky example, the listener has to operate with the

inference: “if X is the name of the writer of a book, then X can be
used to identify a copy of a book by that writer.”
 Similar types of inferences are necessary to understand someone

who says that Picasso is in the museum, We saw Shakespeare in
London, Mozart was playing in the background and The bride wore
Giorgio Armani.
Pragmatics Presupposition
 Inferences are important because they describe the kinds of

reasoning that enable language users to transition from one
information state - the premises to another - the conclusion,
which is one communicative purpose of language—if not its
main communicative purpose.
 There is another kind of inference, called a presupposition, that

is not an entailment but also cannot be classified as abductive or
inductive.
 Intuitively, a presupposition constitutes a necessary

assumption required to understand the meaning of a sentence.
i. You have a sister a. Hey, your sister is looking for you.
ii. John kissed Mary b. John regrets that he kissed Mary.
iii. Mary has been beating her c. Mary has stopped beating her
boyfriend boyfriend.
iv. John has been to Cambridge before d. John returned to Cambridge.
v. John tried to give up smoking e. John managed to give up smoking.

 Presuppositions have distinct properties from those of entailments.
 Entailment is the principle that under certain conditions the truth of

one statement ensures the truth of a second statement:
a. Lee kissed Kim.
b. Kim was kissed by Lee.
c. Kim was kissed.
Lee kissed Kim passionately. d. Lee touched Kim with her lips.
 We will need to explore these differences so we can sharpen our

intuitions regarding presuppositions and our understanding of
entailments.
 One thing that is clear is that, like entailments, presuppositions are tied
to the conventional meaning of words and phrases.
 However, presuppositions are preserved under negation. It can

easily be shown that entailments are not. This contrast between
presuppositions and entailments:
1. John regrets that he kissed Mary.
John kissed Mary
2. John didn’t regret that he kissed Mary.
3. John embraced Mary.  John touched Mary
4. John did not embrace Mary.  John touched Mary
Pragmatics Pragmatic Markers
 Speakers have other ways of indicating how their utterances are to be

interpreted.
 They can include short forms such as you know, well, I mean, I don’t
know, well, which are optional and loosely attached to the utterance.
 These are pragmatic markers and they can be used to mark a speaker’s
attitude to the listener or to what is being said.
Pragmatics Pragmatic Markers
 Speakers can use you know to indicate that knowledge is being treated
as shared, and I mean to self-correct or to mark an attempt to clarify
something:
They had been reading something by Charles Wright, you know, the
famous poet and well, I mean, he’s famous in America at least, but em
they didn’t really understand it.
Pragmatics Politeness
 In pragmatics, when we talk of ‘politeness’, we do not refer to the

social rules of behaviour such as letting other people go first through a
door or wiping your mouth on a serviette/napkin rather than on the
back of your hand.
 We are referring to the linguistic expressions that people choose to use

to give others space and to show a friendly attitude towards them.
Pragmatics Politeness and Impoliteness
 Linguistic politeness is a matter of rapport management: it is

concerned with how language is used to
• show sensitivity towards one’s interlocutor’s feelings and desires,
• establish and maintain interpersonal relationships,
• comply with the rules of appropriate behaviour in a given culture.

 Politeness is not the same as deference, which is a polite form

expressing distance from and respect for people of a higher status and
which does not usually include an element of choice.
 Deference is built into languages such as Korean and Japanese and can
be seen in the pronouns of many European languages, in which the first
of these couples is informal and familiar and the second formal and
showing respect.
 It is rare to find it grammatically signalled in English, although it is

present in honorifics such as ‘sir’ and ‘madam’.
 Impoliteness, on the other hand, is concerned with language and

behaviour which conflict with expected behaviour in a specific context
and which can cause offence and lead to negative emotions on the part
of the hearer or reader.
Pragmatics Politeness and Face
 To enter into and maintain social relationships, we have to

acknowledge and show an awareness of the face, the public self-image,
the sense of self, of the people whom we address.
 Brown & Levinson (1987) claimed that it is a universal characteristic

across cultures that speakers should respect each other’s expectations
regarding self-image, take account of their feelings, and avoid face-
threatening acts (FTAs).
 Let us look at the politeness strategies for dealing with FTAs:
• When FTAs are unavoidable, speakers can redress the threat

with negative politeness (not meaning being impolite),
which respects the hearer’s negative face: their need to be
independent, to have freedom of action, and to not be
imposed on by others.
• The speakers can redress the FTA with positive politeness, which
attends to the positive face: their need to be accepted and liked by
others, to be treated as a member of the group, and to know that
their wants are shared by others.
 Positive face
• An individual's desire to be liked, admired, ratified, etc.
• Maintaining a positive face means maintaining and exhibiting a

positive self-image to the rest of society.
 Positive face
• An individual's desire to be liked, admired, ratified, etc.
• Maintaining a positive face means maintaining and exhibiting a

positive self-image to the rest of society.
• For example, we might compliment someone's outfit, congratulate

someone on their achievements, or agree with something they say.
 Neagtive face
• An individual's desire not to have their basic rights and freedoms

impeded by others.
• An individual's need to be independent and free from imposition.

A situation in which someone expects another person to do
something that they do not want to do or that is not convenient.
Pragmatics What are face-threatening acts?
 A face-threatening act is when communication can damage a person's

sense of face or affect the needs and desires of someone's positive or
negative face.
 Face-threatening acts can be verbal, paraverbal (intonation), or non-

verbal (facial expressions or body language).
 According to Brown and Levinson, face-threatening acts may threaten

either the speaker's or the listener's face (either positive or negative).
Positive face-threatening acts damaging to the listener
 Acts that threaten the listener's positive face and self-image include
expressions of disapproval, accusations, criticism, and disagreements.
 Face-threatening acts can also be expressions that show that the

speaker does not care about the listener's positive face, for example
mentioning taboo or emotional topics, interruptions, and expressions
of violent emotions.
Positive face-threatening acts damaging to the listener:
a. I think your presentation was not concise enough.

b. You’re feeling sad because of your ex-boyfriend, aren’t you?
c. I'm definitely better at maths than you."
Positive face-threatening acts damaging to the speaker:

a. I think I made a huge mistake.
b. Boy: I saw your painting. It’s so beautiful.
Girl: Thank you for saying that. It means a lot to get that kind of
compliment form a painter like you.
c. Susan: That report you did last week was fantastic.
Ann: Thanks so much, Susan. I worked really hard on that
presentation, so it’s great to hear that you think it went well!”
Negative face-threatening acts damaging to the listener:
a. I really like you.

b. Pick that up for me please.
c. If you don’t apologize, I do not speak to you again.
d. I promise I’ll come tomorrow.
Negative face-threatening acts damaging to the speaker:
a. Thank you so much for your help.

b. I'm sorry for interrupting your presentation yesterday. I feel
embarrassed by the way I acted. I was wrong to treat you like that.
Negative face-threatening acts damaging to the speaker:

a. Thank you so much for your help.
b. I'm sorry for interrupting your presentation yesterday. I feel
embarrassed by the way I acted. I was wrong to treat you like that.
Pragmatics Politeness Strategies
 According to Brown and Levinson, there are four main strategies we

can use to limit the threat to the listener's face when face-threatening
acts are inevitable.
 Brown and Levinson propose four politeness strategies: Bald on-

record, Positive politeness, Negative politeness, and Off-record.
 The bald on-record strategy does not attempt to limit the threat to
the listener's face.
 We usually use this strategy when there is a sense of urgency if we

know the listener well, or if there is a low risk of threat to the listener's
face.
 When we use this strategy, we get straight to the point and do not use
any additional language to help soften our message.
 Bald on record:
1. Watch out!
2. Your headlights are on!
3. Pass me the hammer.
4. Don’t forget to turn off the light.
5. Leave it! I’ll clean it up later.
 Brown and Levinson's final politeness strategy is the off-record or

indirect strategy.
 This strategy involves some serious indirectness; the speaker typically

avoids saying the potentially face-threatening act altogether.
 Instead, the speakers' intentions are implied, and it is up to the

listener to interpret them.
 In this situation, the speaker can get credit for not imposing on the
listener, and the listener is given a chance to present themselves as
helpful or generous.
 However, this strategy relies heavily on pragmatics to convey the

intended meaning.
Off-record
1. A: I’m so tired. I couldn’t sleep last
night.
B: Why don’t you go home earlier?
2. A: I have a headache.
B: Oh dear. Here, take some of my
In both situations, the speaker never actually asks for anything and
painkillers.
therefore the imposition on the listener is reduced.
Pragmatics Positive Politeness
 Positive politeness strategies aim to reduce the threat to the listener's

positive face.
 Positive politeness strategies include: finding common ground;

juxtaposing criticism with compliments; telling jokes; and using
statements of friendship.
 These strategies make the listener feel good about themselves and
avoid conflict or offence by emphasising friendliness and politeness.
Pragmatics Positive Politeness
1. You look sad. Can I help you?

2. Hey, mate, could you lend me 3 dollars?
3. Don’t worry! You can do it well.
4. That's a nice haircut. Where'd you get it?
5. Yeah, it's rather long; it only looks short from a distance.
Pragmatics Negative Politeness
 Negative politeness strategies are aimed at the listener's negative

face and are meant to avoid any imposition on the listener.
 We use negative politeness strategies when we presume that our

speech will impose on the listener in some way and wish to avoid
feelings of awkwardness or embarrassment.
 Such strategies include hedging (a word or phrase that makes a

statement less forceful or assertive), minimizing the imposition,
apologizing, being indirect, and using questions rather than
commands.
1. Would you know where Oxford Street is?

2. Could you please pass the salt?
3. Could you print this off for me? It's only a few pages and won't take
long!
4. I'm so sorry, but could you help me?
Implicature
• A communicated implication of an utterance.
• A speaker can intend to mean more by her utterance than what the words that
she utters mean, as the philosopher Paul Grice pointed out.
Andy: I think we should get a pet.
Bess: Cats are my favourite animals.
• Bess intentionally and openly implied that she and Andy should get a cat or
cats as pets. Pragmatic theorists would say that she implicated that she and
Andy should get a cat or cats as pets.
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Implicature
• In his theory of conversation, Grice divided implicatures into

conventional and conversational, and subdivided conversational
implicatures into generalized and particularized.
• All of these types of implicatures are distinct from what is said in that they
do not contribute to the truth-conditions of an utterance.
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Conversational Implicature
• Conversational implicatures, like the one in the example above, are not
part of what the words of an utterance mean, but are inferred from what is
said.
• More precisely, they are inferred from the speaker’s saying of what is said,
that is, from the fact that it is said and the way it is put.
• In Grice’s theory of conversation the inference relies on a Cooperative

Principle and conversational maxims, discussed below.
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• Let us begin by considering the simple conversation as follows:

Arthur: Can you tell me where the post office is?
Bill: I’m a stranger here myself.
• As a reply to Arthur’s request for directions, Bill’s statement is clearly

intended to mean ‘No, I cannot.’
• But the sentence meaning, or semantic content, of Bill’s statement does not
contain or entail this intended meaning. 74
• When the same sentence is used in two different contexts, these are two
distinct utterances which may have different utterance meanings.
• But since the sentence meaning is identical, the difference in utterance

meaning must be due to pragmatic inferences induced by the different
contexts. Context 1 Utterance 1 Meaning 1
- It’s raining. Context 2 Utterance 2 Meaning 2
Context 3 Utterance 3 Meaning 3

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The following characteristics of conversational implicatures:
• The implicature is different from the literal sentence meaning; in Grice’s

terms, what is implicated is different from “what is said”.
• However, the speaker intends for the hearer to understand both the
sentence meaning and the implicature; and for the hearer to be aware that
the speaker intends this.
• Conversational implicatures are context-dependent.
• In Grice’s terms, conversational implicatures are defeasible, meaning that
they can be cancelled or blocked when additional information is provided.
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• Conversational implicatures are cancellable when additional information is

provided:
Bill: I’m a stranger here myself; but it happens that I have

just come from the post office, so I think I can help you.
77
• Conversational implicatures are not something strange and exotic; they

turn out to be extremely common in everyday language use. Once we
become aware of them, we begin to find them everywhere.
• They are an indispensable part of the system we use to communicate

with each other.
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Grice’s Maxims of Conversation
• The connection between what is said and what is implicated, taking

context into account, cannot be arbitrary.
• It must be rule-governed to a significant degree, otherwise the speaker

could not expect the hearer to reliably understand the intended meaning.
• Grice’s fundamental insight was that conversation is a cooperative activity.
• In order to carry on an intelligible conversation, each party must assume

that the other is trying to participate in a meaningful way.
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• The connection between what is said and what is implicated, taking

context into account, cannot be arbitrary.
• It must be rule-governed to a significant degree, otherwise the speaker

could not expect the hearer to reliably understand the intended meaning.
• Grice’s fundamental insight was that conversation is a cooperative activity.
• In order to carry on an intelligible conversation, each party must assume

that the other is trying to participate in a meaningful way.
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• Grice proposed a general Cooperative Principle and several specific sub-

principles which he labeled “maxims”.
The Cooperative Principle (Grice 1975: 45)
• Make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at

which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in
which you are engaged.
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• The Maxims of Conversation (Grice 1975: 45–46)

QUALITY: Try to make your contribution one that is true.
1. Do not say what you believe to be false.
2. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.
QUANTITY:
3. Make your contribution as informative as is required for the current
purposes of the exchange.
4. Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.
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RELATION (or RELEVANCE): Be relevant.
MANNER: Be perspicuous.
1. Avoid obscurity of expression.
2. Avoid ambiguity.
3. Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity).
4. Be orderly.
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• It is important to remember that Grice did not propose the Cooperative

Principle as a code of conduct, which speakers have a moral obligation to
obey.
• A speaker may communicate either by obeying the maxims or by breaking

them, as long as the hearer is able to recognize which strategy is being
employed.
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• The Cooperative Principle is a kind of background assumption: what is
necessary in order to make rational conversation possible is not for the
speaker to follow the principle slavishly, but for speaker and hearer to
share a common awareness that it exists.
• The sentence meaning is not just a means to trigger implicatures; it is itself

part of the meaning which is being communicated.
• Utterance meaning is composed of the sentence meaning plus any

pragmatic inference created by the specific context of use.
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• Grice described several specific patterns of reasoning which commonly
give rise to conversational implicatures:
 First, there are cases in which there is an apparent violation, but no

maxim is actually violated:
Bill: I’m a stranger here myself.
• Bill’s statement I am a stranger here myself was an apparent violation of the

maxim of relevance, but the implicature that it triggered actually was
relevant; so there was no real violation. 86
• Grice described several specific patterns of reasoning which commonly
give rise to conversational implicatures:
 Second, Grice noted cases in which an apparent violation of one

maxim is the result of conflict with another maxim:
A: Where does C live?
B: Somewhere in the South of France.
• B’s reply here seems to violate the maxim of quantity, specifically the first
submaxim, since it is not as informative as would be appropriate in this
context. 87
• A is expected to be able to infer that B cannot be more informative without

violating the maxim of quality by saying something for which he lacks
adequate evidence.
• So, the intended implicature is, “I do not know exactly where C lives.”
 Third, Grice described cases in which one of the maxims is “flouted”,

by which he meant a deliberate and obvious violation, intended to be
recognized as such.
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• A professor is writing a letter of reference for a student who is applying for

a job as a philosophy teacher:
“Dear Sir, Mr. X’s command of English is excellent, and his attendance
at tutorials has been regular. Yours, etc.”
Mr. X is no good at philosophy = What the professor is implicating.
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• Speakers sometimes utter sentences which are tautologies or

contradictions.
• In such cases, the communicative value of the utterance comes primarily

from the pragmatic inferences which are triggered; the semantic content
of the sentence contributes little or nothing.
seen as flouting the maxim of
a. War is war.
Tautologies quantity, since their semantic
b. Boys will be boys.
content is uninformative
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• Metaphors, irony, and other figures of speech like those in the following
examples can be seen as flouting the maxim of quality, since their literal
semantic content is clearly untrue and intended to be recognized as such.
a. You are the cream in my coffee.
b. Queen Victoria was made of iron. (Levinson 1983: 110)
c. A fine friend he turned out to be!
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Types of Implicatures
 Generalized Conversational Implicature

• Two different types of conversational implicatures:
a. Particularized conversational implicatures, meaning that the

intended inference depends on particular features of the specific context
of the utterance.
b. Generalized conversational implicatures does not depend on

particular features of the context, but is instead typically associated with
the kind of proposition being expressed. 92
 Generalized Conversational Implicature

1. Some of the boys went to the rugby match.
Implicature: Not all of the boys went…
2. John has most of the documents.
Implicature: ….not all of the documents
3. John walked into a house yesterday and saw a tortoise.
Implicature: this house was not John’s
4. I broke a finger yesterday.
Implicature: this finger is my finger.
93
 Particularized Conversational Implicature
A: What on earth has happened to the roast beef?
B: The dog is looking very happy.
Implicature: “The dog ate the roast beef”
A: Where can I get fresh fruit here?
B: There's a daily market in the square.
Implicature: “You can buy fresh fruit there”
A: Have some cake?
B: Thanks, but I'm gluten intolerant.
Implicature: So I won't have any cake
94
 Conventional Implicature
• In contrast to conversational implicatures, which are context-sensitive
and motivated by the conversational maxims, conventional
implicatures are part of the conventional meaning of a word or
construction.
• This means that they are not context-dependent or pragmatically

explainable, and must be learned on a word-by-word basis.
95
 Conventional Implicature (CI):
1. I was in Paris last spring too.
CI: some other specific/contextually salient person was in Paris
last spring.
2. Even Bart passed the test.

CI: : Bart was among the least likely to pass the test.
• Conventional implicatures turn out to have very similar properties to

certain kinds of presuppositions. 96
 Distinguishing features of conversational implicatures

• Grice’s analysis of conversational implicatures implies that they will have
certain properties which allow us to distinguish them from other kinds of
inference.
• The most important of these, namely the fact that they are defeasible.
• This term means that the inference can be cancelled by adding an

additional premise.
97
• Conversational implicatures can be explicitly negated or denied without
giving rise to anomaly or contradiction:
a. Dear Sir, Mr. X’s command of English is excellent, and his attendance
at tutorials has been regular. And, needless to say, he is highly
competent in philosophy. Yours, etc.
b. John has most of the documents; in fact, he has all of them.
• This makes conversational implicatires quite different from entailments:
c. Tom killed a tiger, *but the tiger did not die.

98
• Conversational implicatures are suspendable: the speaker may explicitly

choose not to commit to the truth or falsehood of the inference, without
giving rise to anomaly or contradiction.
99
• Conversational implicatures are suspendable: the speaker may explicitly

choose not to commit to the truth or falsehood of the inference, without
giving rise to anomaly or contradiction.
100
Pragmatics Speech Acts
 In linguistics, a speech act is an utterance defined in terms of

a speaker's intention and the effect it has on a listener. Essentially, it
is the action that the speaker hopes to provoke in his or her audience.
 The action performed when an utterance is produced can be analysed
on three levels.
 Speech acts are an important part of communication.

 Speech-act theory is a subfield of pragmatics. This area of study

is concerned with the ways in which words can be used not only
to present information but also to carry out actions.
 Speech-act theory was introduced in 1975 by philosopher

Austin in "How to Do Things With Words" and further
developed by American philosopher J.R. Searle.
 Speech-act theory considers three levels or components of utterances:
• Locutionary acts
• Illocutionary acts or Illocutionary Force
• Perlocutionary acts or Perlocutionary Effect

 Locutionary acts: the making of a

meaningful statement, saying something A B
that a hearer understands = What is said.
“Shoot him!”
A said to the woman “Shoot him!”
meaning by shoot “shoot” and referring
by him to B
 Illocutionary acts = Illocutionary

Force = saying something with a
purpose, such as to inform = what is
done in uttering the words’, the
function of the words, the specific
purpose that the speakers have in
mind. A advised her to shoot B
 Illocutionary acts = Illocutionary

Force = saying something with a
purpose, such as to inform = what is
done in uttering the words’, the
function of the words, the specific
purpose that the speakers have in
mind. A advised her to shoot B
 Perlocutionary acts = Perlocutionary

Effect = saying something that causes
someone to act
It is the effect on the hearer, the

hearer’s reaction
 To determine which way a speech act is to be interpreted, one must first

determine the type of act being performed.
 Locutionary acts are the mere act of producing some linguistic sounds or
marks with a certain meaning and reference.
 Illocutionary and perlocutionary acts can occur simultaneously when

locution of a statement happens.
 Illocutionary acts carry a directive for the audience.
 It might be a promise, an order, an apology, or an expression of thanks—or

merely an answer to a question, to inform the other person in the
conversation.
 These express a certain attitude and carry with their statements a certain
illocutionary force, which can be broken into families.
 On the other hand, perlocutionary acts bring about a consequence to

the audience.
 They have an effect on the hearer, in feelings, thoughts, or actions, for

example, changing someone's mind.
 Unlike illocutionary acts, perlocutionary acts can project a sense of

fear into the audience.
 Take for instance the perlocutionary act of saying, "I will not be your
friend."
 Here, the impending loss of friendship is an illocutionary act, while

the effect of frightening the friend into compliance is a
perlocutionary act.
 "A speaker utters sentences with a particular meaning -

locutionary act, and with a particular force - illocutionary act, in
order to achieve a certain effect on the hearer - perlocutionary
act."
Pragmatics Direct and Indirect Speech Acts
 An utterance is seen as a direct speech act when there is a direct

relationship between the structure and the communicative function of the
utterance. The following examples show that the form correspondences
with the function: Direct Speech Acts
a. A declarative is used to make a statement: “You wear a seat belt.”
b. An interrogative is used to ask a question: “Do you wear a seat belt?”
c. An imperative is used to make a command: “Wear a seat belt!”
 An utterance is seen as a direct speech act when there is a direct

relationship between the structure and the communicative function of the
utterance. The following examples show that the syntactic form
correspondences with the function:
a. A declarative is used to make a statement: “You wear a seat belt.”
b. An interrogative is used to ask a question: “Do you wear a seat belt?”
c. An imperative is used to make a command: “Wear a seat belt!”
 Another way of making a direct speech act is to use performative verbs:

Speech Act Verb that names Examples
Performative verbs
the speech act
assertion assert I assert that he washes the dishes.
question ask I ask who will wash the dishes.
order order I order you to wash the dishes.
request request I request that you wash the dishes.
promise promise I promise that I’ll wash the dishes.
advice advise I advise you to wash the dishes.
 An utterance which achieves a certain illocutionary force without

‘wearing it on its sleeve’ is an indirect speech act.
 For example, it is possible to request the butter by uttering the

interrogative sentence, ‘Could you pass the butter?’, instead of an
imperative.
 The grammatical form of this utterance is more closely associated with

asking questions than making requests, so this is an indirect speech act.
 In other words, an indirect speech is one that is “performed by

means of another”. That means that there is an indirect
relationship between the form and the function of the utterance.
- Close the door, John!  Direct Speech Act
- You left the door open, John.  Indirect Speech Act
 The speaker does not explicitly state the intended meaning

behind the utterance. It is the hearer’s task to analyse the
utterance to understand its meaning.
 The use of indirect speech acts depends partly on inference, partly on

knowledge of how the language is typically used in a certain culture.
 Context-sensitive inference is required to determine the intended

illocutionary force.
 In some cases, the hearer will be helped by his knowledge of linguistic

and cultural conventions: ‘Can you . . .’, ‘Could you . . .’ and ‘Would it be
possible for you to . . .’ are conventional ways of framing requests.
 One utterance may express more than one illocutionary act at one
time.
 Consider the sentence uttered by a chair of the committee to members:
- We have a meeting at 9 in my office.
 Assertive and directive speech acts

Pragmatics Speech Acts Discourse and Pragmatics
 Searle's Classification of Speech Acts
a. Assertives
b. Directives
c. Commissives
d. Expressives
e. Declarations
Pragmatics Assertives
 TheThe different
speaker kinds
asserts are suggesting,
an idea, opinion, orputting forward,
suggestion. swearing,
The speaker
boasting, concluding
presents 'facts' of the world, such as statements and claims.
a. Paris is the capital of France.
b. I watched a great documentary last night.
c. The weather will be hot tomorrow.
d. No one makes a better cake than me.

Pragmatics Directives
 The speaker intends to get the listener to do something. This could be by

giving an order, offering advice, or making a request.
a. Pass me the salt please.
b. You should not drink that.
c. Don’t touch me!
d. Could you close the window?'

Pragmatics Commisives
 The speaker commits to doing something in the future. This could be

making a promise, a plan, a vow, or a bet.
a. I’ll see you at 6 tomorrow.
b. I am going to Paris next week.
c. We will not do that.
d. I’m going to get it right next time.

Pragmatics Expressives
 The speaker states something about their psychological attitudes and

their attitudes towards a situation. The different kinds are thanking,
apologising, welcoming, deploring.
a. I’m so sorry that I lied to you.
b. I really appreciate your help.
c. Congratulations!
Pragmatics Declarations
 The speaker declares something that has the potential to bring about a
change in the world.
a. I now declare you husband and wife
b. You’re fired!
Pragmatics Direct or indirect illocutionary act
 No complete one-to-one correspondence between syntactic forms and

illocutionary acts: IA: Commissive - Offer
 Waiter: What can I get you? Syntactic form: Interrogative
 Customer: Can I have one hamburger with fries?
IA: Directive - Request Syntactic form: Interrogative
 The room needs to be cleaned.

IA: Directive - Request Syntactic form: Declarative
Illocutionary
Acts
Pragmatics Exercices
indirect directive - request, interrogative

 Student to a classmate: May I borrow a pen?
Indirect
 Waiter commissive
to customer: Can- offer,
I take interrogative
your order?
 Indirect
Customercommissive - request,
to waiter: Can I have ainterrogative
slice of Pizza?
 Friend todirect
friend: I’m going to- finish
commissive reading
promise, this book tonight.
declarative
 Wife to husband: Listen carefully,

Direct directive please.
- request, imperative
 Teacher to student: Are you going to leave the door wide open?
Indirect directive - order, interrogative.
Pragmatics Exercices
 Student Indirect directive

to a classmate: My request,
pen is notdeclarative
working.
 Boss toIndirect
secretarydeclaration
: Clear your-desk
firing,
by imperative
the end of the day!
Direct
 Husband expressive
to wife: - praising,
How beautiful exclamatory
you look today!
 Friend to friend:
Indirect You didn’t
question study lastinterrogative
- inquiring, night?
 Employee to manager: I quit.

Direct declaration- quitting, declarative

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Meaning in Language

 If a single group of words such as It's hot in here! could mean so

 And why don't people just say what they mean?

 Pragmatics is a branch of linguistics concerned with the use of

 The study of meaning in human language is often partitioned into

- Semantics The distinction between semantics and

- Pragmatics pragmatics is useful and important.

The meanings of three different types of linguistic units

 Uterrance Meaning (or speaker meanign)

 A sentence is a linguistic expression, a well-formed string of

 When a speaker uses a sentence in a specific context, he

 The term sentence meaning refers to the semantic content of

 The term utterance meaning refers to the semantic content

 Cruse (2000: 27) defines utterance meaning as “the totality of

 So, interpreting an utterance depends heavily on context in

 The term utterance meaning refers to the semantic content

 Cruse (2000: 27) defines utterance meaning as “the totality of

 So, interpreting an utterance depends heavily on context in

 It looks beyond the literal meaning of an utterance and considers

 It considers language as an instrument of interaction, what people

 Pragmatics studies deal with the utterances in context (the

 Linguistic expressions can only occur in particular contexts; as a

 For the purposes of deciding what a piece of language means, no

 According to George Yule (1996), context is “the physical

 Charles Goodwin (1992): Context is “a frame that surrounds

 Leech (1983) defines the ‘context’ as “any background

 Many linguists illustrate the outstanding impact of context on

 When speakers express their ideas in a complex way, hearers

“The meaning of any single word is to a very high degree

 Hymes (1962): context can decrease the possible interpretations

 With the help of ‘context’, we can solve the ambiguity, reveal

 In other words, meanings are dependent on ‘context’ so when

- It’ s hot in here.

 There are two main types of context:

• Linguistic context is how meaning is understood without relying on

• Context may refer to any aspects of an occasion in which a speech-

"Our choice of words is constrained by the context in

• In common use, almost every word has many shades of meaning,

• Meaning should be analyzed not only within the linguistic system

 A technical term used in semantics and pragmatics for linguistic items

 The deictic expressions are those elements whose linguistically

 Out of the context, this sentence is really vague. It contains a large

 Inflectional morphology (endings on verbs, markers of grammatical

 Examples include tense morphology, inflection for grammatical person,

(as in Japanese, Korean and Austronesian languages).

 Different types of deictic expressions:

• Person deixis: personal pronouns

• Spatial deixis: adverbs (here, there), demonstratives (this, that, etc.),

• Time/Temporal deixis: adverbs and in tensed languages, tense is

• In tenseless languages such as Vietnamese, Chinese, lexical

 In discussing deixis, we assumed that the use of words to refer to

 However, words themselves don’t refer to anything. People refer.

 We have to define reference as an act by which a speaker (or writer)

 To perform an act of reference, we can use proper nouns (Chomsky,

 We sometimes assume that these words identify someone or something

 To perform an act of reference, we can use proper nouns (Chomsky,

 Historically, there was only one person called George Washington,

 As in the “Mr. Kawasaki” example, a successful act of reference depends

 If you’re studying linguistics, you might ask someone, Can I look at

 The key process here is called inference. An inference is additional

 In the Chomsky example, the listener has to operate with the

 Similar types of inferences are necessary to understand someone

 Inferences are important because they describe the kinds of

 There is another kind of inference, called a presupposition, that