Pragmatics Finals Notes PDF

Pragmatics Finals Notes What is Pragmatics? The study of the intended speaker meaning in discourse more than which is explicitly stated. What is Pragmatic Competence? The ability to understand another speaker’s intended meaning in discourse. The ability to communicate effectively that...

Pragmatics Finals Notes What is Pragmatics? The study of the intended speaker meaning in discourse more than which is explicitly stated. What is Pragmatic Competence? The ability to understand another speaker’s intended meaning in discourse. The ability to communicate effectively that involves both grammatical and pragmatic knowledge. o To build this competence instruction is needed however it can be acquired through natural environments too. Understanding the multiplicity of cultures and their linguistic and cultural norms. o Kasper and Rose on the instruction of pragmatics It is teachable İnstruction has a positive effect on it Explicit instruction with ample practice is needed What is Pragmatic Inference? The ability to understand intended meaning through indirect utterances. What is Context and Co-text? Linguistic material is co-text. The co-text limits the range of possible interpretations. Physical environment is context. It has a powerful impact on how referring expressions are to be interpreted. Situational Context: knowledge of the world, beliefs, time, setting, topic, speaker, hearer, and any third-party subject of the conversation time of the day. What is Speech Act? Actions performed via utterances are called speech acts. They have specific labels such as apology, complaint, compliment, invitation, promise, or request. There are three related acts: 1. Locutionary Act/ Direct Speech Acts: Basic act of utterance, or producing a meaningful linguistic expression. Referential value- meaning of code- the words used. 2. Illocutionary Act/ Indirect Speech Acts: Performed via the communicative force of an utterance. We might utter to make a statement, an offer, an explanation, or for some other communicative purpose. This is also known as illocutionary force of an utterance. It is the performative action- implication of speaker. It is classified as speech act. > the intended meaning a. I’ll see you later. > locutionary b. I predict that c. I promise you that d. I warn you that >>> all there is illocutionary acts of the sentence a.  3. Perlocutionary Act: Utterances with an intending effect. Also known as perlocutionary effect. Perceived effect- inference by addressee- the effect on the listener. There are 5 classification of speech acts: 1. Representative: state what the speaker believes to be the case or not. 2. Directive: speakers use to get someone else to do something. 3. Commissive: speakers use to commit themselves to some future action. They express what the speaker intends. 4. Expressive: state what the speaker feels. 5. Declarative: change the world via their utterances. What is Speech Events? It is the circumstances surrounding an utterance, including other utterances, which help determine the interpretation of a speech act. What are Felicity Conditions? There are certain expected or appropriate circumstances known as felicity conditions for the performance of a speech act to be recognized as intended. When these conditions are not met the utterances are called improper, unsuccessful, infelicitous and not failed. It has four stages: 1. The sender believes the action should be done. 2. The receiver has the ability to do the action. 3. The receiver has the obligation to do the action. 4. The sender has the right to tell the receiver to do the action. If an utterance is pragmatically well-formed, it is felicitous. If it is self-contradictory, trivial, irrelevant or inappropriate for the context of utterance, it is infelicitous. There are five conditions for felicitous: 1. General Conditions: the language is understandable and the speaker is not play- acting or being nonsensical. 2. Content Conditions: the content of the utterance must be about a future event. 3. Preparatory Conditions: the authority of the speaker and the circumstances of the speech act are appropriate to its being performed successfully. 4. Sincerity Conditions: the speaker genuinely intends to carry out the future action. 5. Essential Conditions: utterance changes the speakers state from non-obligation to obligation What is Performative Hypothesis? Underlying every utterance there is a clause containing a performative verb which makes the illocutionary force explicit. What is Explicit and Implicit Performatives? Explicit Performatives are performative utterances that contain a performative verb that makes explicit what kind of act is being performed. a. I promise to come to your talk tomorrow. Implicit Performatives are performative utterances in which there is no such verb. The only way to understand that this is a performative utterance is by considering the real intention behind that utterance. a. I’ll come to your talk tomorrow. (A promise, a threat?) What is Reference? An act a speaker uses to enable the hearer to identify something. Textual ties and connections within a text. References are realized through the use of pronouns. Antecedent: The initial expressions Anaphor: The second or subsequent expressions- referring back Cataphora: Referring forward What is Deixis? It is the act of pointing via language. Physical context is needed to understand these utterances. Any linguistic form used to accomplish this pointing is called deictic expression. There are three types of deictic expressions: 1. Temporal/Time: now, then 2. Spatial/Place: here, there 3. Person: me, you What is Presupposition? The relationship between two propositions/sentences. It is also what the speaker assumes is known by the hearer. b. Your brother is waiting outside. > You have a brother. c. Mary’s dog is cute. > Mary has a dog. What is Implicatures? When an utterance must be more than just what the words mean, has an additional conveyed meaning, it is called an implicature. It is expected be used by speakers to obey the maxims of conversation. The quantity principle. What is Co-Operative Principle? The idea that people involved in a conversation will cooperate with each other. This assumption is so pervasive that it can be stated as a cooperative principle of conversation and has four sub-principles called maxims. 1. Quantity: Making your part of the conversation as informative as is required. Not too many or too less of an info. > Avoid obscurity of expression. 2. Quality: Your part should be one that is true. > Avoid ambiguity. 3. Relation: Be relevant. > Be brief. 4. Manner: Be perspicuous. > Be orderly. If not used accordingly, there can be communication breakdowns. This can cause implicatures to be not understood and the need for presuppositions to understand the interpretation. What is Macro Pragmatics? The pragmatics of discourse-based concepts such as speech events, global intentionality or macro speech acts. What is Micro Pragmatics? The pragmatics of utterance-based concepts such as deixis, implicatures, presupposition, speech acts. Both micro and macro pragmatics complement and complete each other. What is Politeness? The idea of polite social behaviour or etiquette within a culture. It is also the means employed by to show awareness of another person’s face. Linguistic politeness is the way how speaker choose to speak and how the hearers react to their speech. What is Politeness Theory? Politeness as an interaction across cultures is determined based on several notions: 1. Face: the public self-image of a person 2. Social Distance or Closeness 3. Respect and Deference 4. Solidarity and Friendliness What is Face? The public self-image of a person. It has two dimensions: 1. Self – other face: Self, the person in need, says nothing but puts an effort to be recognized. If it works, other offers help without “self” asking. 2. Say something off and on record: a. Not directly addressed to the other, giving hints, off record. b. Directly addressed to the other, on record. c. Using imperatives while addressing directly, bold on record. 3. Positive – negative face a. Positive Face: need to be accepted, liked, to be treated as a member of a group, and to know that their wants are shared by others. > the need to be connected i. Positive Politeness: showing solidarity having a common goal > I’d appreciate it if you’d let me use your pen. b. Negative Face: need to be independent, to have freedom of action, and not being imposed by others i. Negative Politeness: deference, importance of others’ time and concerns, apology for imposition or interruption. > I am sorry for bothering you but can I ask for your pen? What is Face Wants? A person’s expectations that their public self-image will be respected. If a speaker says something that represents a threat to another person’s expectations regarding self-image, it is described as a face threatening act. If a speaker says something that lessens the possible threat, it is a face-saving act. What are Solidarity and Deference Strategies? The tendency to use positive politeness forms, emphasizing closeness between speaker and hearer, can be seen as a solidarity strategy. The tendency to use negative politeness forms, emphasizing the hearer’s right to freedom, can be seen as a deference strategy. What is Conversation Analysis? An approach to the study of social interaction and talk-in-interaction. It attempts to describe the orderliness, structure, and sequential patterns of interaction. It has five parts: 1. Floor: The right to speak. 2. Turn: Having control of this scarce commodity. 3. Turn-taking: Control is not fixed; anyone can attempt to get control. Depending on cultures local management systems, different strategies are observed in turn-taking. 4. Local Management System: A set of conventions for getting turns, keeping them, or giving them away. 5. Transition Relevance Place/Completion Points: Any possible change-of-turn point. What is Conversational Style? It has two types: 1. High Involvement: Participators are active, speaking rate is fast, no pausing between turns, some overlap and even completion. 2. High Considerateness: Speaking rate is slow, longer pauses between turns, do not overlap, avoid interrupting or completion. Non-interrupting, non-imposing. What is Adjacency Pairs? Automatic patterns/sequences in the structure of conversation. An adjacency pair is an example of conversational turn-taking. It is composed of two utterances by two speakers. A first part and a second part. There might be a second question between these two parts. That question is called insertion sequence. It goes as Q1-Q2-A2-A1. It is basically one adjacency pair within another. Examples: Question – Answer Offer – Acceptance/Refusal Command – Compliance/Incompliance Greeting – Greeting What is Preference Structure? Adjacency pairs represent social actions such as request –answer. In this exchange the second part, the answer, is expected to be an acceptance. This expectance or likelihood is called preference. It is used to indicate a socially determined structural pattern, acceptance, and does not refer to individual’s desires. It is divided in two parts: 1. Preferred: structurally expected > acceptance, agree 2. Dispreferred: structurally unexpected > refuse, disagree What is the Connection Between Conversation Analysis and Second Language Acquisition? The language learning process is largely a social one, in which it is very difficult to distinguish language use from language acquisition. Research on CA indicated “significantly enhanced awareness of the contextual and interactional dimensions of language us” when used in SLA. CA helped us understanding detailed unfolding of the learner’s communicative practices and learning activities and therefore breaking the division between the cognitive and social between language and action, language learning and use of it. CA contributed to a better understanding of how the details of interactional practice may shape learning processes. CA treats grammar and lexical choices as resources which participants deploy, monitor, interpret, and manipulate. What is Discourse Analysis? Discourse itself means any stretch of language use, spoken or written. It is the communication that goes back and forth. Focuses on the record, spoken or written, of the process by which language is used in some context to express intention. It also analyse beyond the sentence boundary but also the naturally occurring language use. DA deals with interpreting large units of language like conversations, dialogues, debates and texts where language is used beyond sentence boundary. How we arrive at an interpretation and we can get the message of the text beyond the meaning of each word and the linguistic structure. Examples: How speakers combine sentences into broader speech units. How can we interpret the following? o No shoes No service o Trains collide. Two die. o Garage Sale vs Book Sale It is multilayered: Sounds, intonations Gestures Syntax o Context o Power o Interaction o Cognition and Memory, coherence and ideology Lexicon Style Rhetoric Meanings Speech Acts Moves Strategies Turns Genres, politics, media, education, science, business Structures of Discourse: Local: relation between sentences, propositions, turns Global: overall topics, schematic organization of discourse/conversation Discourse Characteristics There are certain qualifications for discourse: Cohesion: grammatical link between the elements of a text. References. o Lexical cohesion is the connection between words ▪ Friends, companionship, mutual, understanding > friendship ▪ Cause and effect Coherence: the meaningful link in a discourse. It is generally realized on the semantic basis. > having common cultural knowledge >> pragmatic interpretation When a discourse has no cohesion but communication is still achieved, there are some aspects that enable us to understand it other than linguistic knowledge. DA focuses on finding these different aspects. Knowing familiarities to the topic and hearers’ expectations, Establishing relevance between what is expected and what is being talked Language users’ background knowledge, cultural schemata and frame, help us understand discourse. What is Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis? Shows the bond between language and culture, proposes that there is a systematic relationship between the grammatical categories of the language a person speaks and how that person both understands the world and behaves in it. What is Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis? Languages determine thought and therefore culture. What is Cross Cultural Awareness Because of this connection, teaching a foreign or a second language naturally requires teaching target culture and appreciating its culture. Knutson proposes a curricular module on cross cultural awareness to integrate culture into curriculum. This module has several steps: 1. Recognizing self as cultural subject: reflecting upon the cultural dimension of their identity. 2. Elaborating subcultures within the home culture 3. Exploring insider and outsider views of the foreign culture: interviews with natives 4. Familiarizing culture specific behaviour: how certain speech acts are accomplished 5. Deciphering cross cultural misunderstandings What is Intercultural Pragmatics? The new study field that is concerned with how language system is used in social encounters and interaction between the people who have different first languages, communicate in a common language, and represent different cultures. In IP meaning is constructed and negotiated using a mixture of pragmatic norms of each speaker participating in communication. Their former language experience and the actual situational experience are merged to produce meaning. Has for foci: 1. Interaction: between native and non-native 2. Lingua franca communication 3. Multilingual discourse 4. Language use and development of individuals What is Intercultural Competence? Byram, someone who has the willingness about the knowledge of the others’ culture and in return makes the other understand his own culture. Deardorff, the ability to acquire and evaluate critical knowledge of cultures, and attitude towards those cultures. Embraces three fundamental characteristics: 1. Knowledge: cultural self-awareness, cultural-specific insights, awareness of global issues 2. Skills: ability to see the world from a different angle 3. Attitudes: positive reactions such as openness, respect, and curiosity towards other cultures What is Communicative Competence? Dell Hymes defined communicative competence as the establishment of meaningful communication in socially effective practices of interaction. What is Linguistic/Grammatical Competence? Refers to the knowledge of the grammar, syntax, morphology, punctuation and spelling in the language. It is the mastery of the language code itself; that is to say, the knowledge of the linguistic signs needed in order to communicate through language. What is Sociolinguistic/Pragmatic Competence? Refers to the knowledge of appropriate use of language. It covers knowing what to say in what sociolinguistic context. The ability to use language in socially appropriate ways. What is Illocutionary Competence? The ability to produce and recognize utterances with an indirect force or function such as asserting, arguing, advising, or promising something. a. Ideational Function: expressing ideas b. Manipulative Function: get someone to do what you would like them to do c. Heuristic Function: solving problems especially by trial and error d. Imaginative Function: expressing imaginary ideas What is Strategic Competence? Refers to the ability to keep a conversation going and ways to compensate for weaknesses in other competencies. It is the mastery of verbal and non-verbal communicative strategies to solve problems during communication. What is Discourse Competence? Refers to the knowledge of cohesion and coherence and the ability to combine the sentences in either written form or spoken form to produce meaning beyond the sentence level. It is defined as the mastery of how to combine grammatical forms and meanings to achieve a unified spoken or written text in different genres or types of text. What is the Intercultural Communication Competence? Byram, the ability to interact with people from another country and culture in a foreign language. Deardorff, the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately in intercultural situations based on one’s intercultural knowledge, skills, and attitudes. Intercultural communicative competence embraces all language related skills and the knowledge of cultural norms. What are Intercultural Competence Models? 1. Bennett’s Model: Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity Intercultural Competence is set of cognitive, affective, and behavioural skills and characteristics that support effective and appropriate interaction in a variety of cultural contexts. It is developmental. There are six stages of cultural difference: Denial Defence Minimization Acceptance Adaptation Integration This model is criticized as it was not developed for foreign language education. Role of language is not mentioned. 2. Deardorff’s Model of Intercultural Competence He has 2 alternative representations; pyramid and process versions of IC. Both models emphasize the attitudes as the starting point. In the pyramid model, the development of IC is sequential and linear. The process model describes more complex and cyclical movement. Constituent Elements of intercultural competence are knowledge, skills, and attitudes. Attitudes in this model consist of respect, openness, curiosity, and discovery. Knowledge and comprehension refer to cultural self-awareness, deep understanding and knowledge about other cultures, and sociolinguistic awareness. This model targets external visible outcomes: appropriate behaviours and effective communication. For this target to be achieved individuals have to be internally ready to display adaptability, flexibility, and empathy to other cultures.  3. Fantini’s ICC Model ICC is a combination of abilities that are required to perform effectively and appropriately when interacting with other people. Effective means, one’s view of one’s own performance in the second language. Appropriate means, how one’s performance is viewed by natives of the target language. To become interculturally competent, one needs to develop the ability to behave, communicate, and interact in the style of people from the target culture. This model requires individuals to have flexibility and show openness, curiosity, empathy, tolerance towards other cultures. Four dimensions of ICC is: intercultural knowledge, intercultural attitude, intercultural skill, and intercultural awareness. Awareness is stronger than knowledge because it cannot be forgotten. ICC is a long and continuous process in which regression may also be observed. 4. Byram’s Model of ICC This model extends the scope of communicative competence so as to include: linguistic, sociolinguistic, discourse, and intercultural. Linguistic competence is crucial. IC is the combination of five components/saviours: attitude, knowledge, skill of interpreting and relating, skills of discovery and interaction, critical cultural awareness. 5. Perry and Southwell ICC consists of positive attitudes, knowledge of one’s own and other cultures, and an appreciation of differences How ICC is used in Language Teaching? Basically, this question is still not fully answered. The scarcity of exposure to naturally occurring linguistic input and inadequate chances for interaction make pragmatic competence difficult to teach in artificial learning contexts. Other factors are: Positive/negative attitudes towards the target culture Perceived ethnic identity and strong identification with their native culture and seeing other cultures remote and unnatural Pragmatic language use reflected only through artificial materials Limited or no interaction with the speakers of the target cultures which does not necessitate a communicative need. Conclusion Interculturally sensitive language teaching needs to be practiced and taught through real life situations, tasks, activities. Since each component of ICC is measurable and improvable they can be fostered. Teachers can build intercultural communicative competence in learners by: Helping the students to grow positive attitudes towards other cultures but primarily: respect, openness, and curiosity Getting students familiar with their culture first to enhance self-awareness Cultivating students’ abilities to observe, analyse, interpret, evaluate other cultures to see differences and similarities to relate Encouraging and monitoring learners’ external social, pragmatic, and linguistic behaviour change Because of globalization other factors we are forced to interact and work with other cultures. Thus, the need to develop intercultural communicative competence becomes a must in the process of becoming global citizen. Explicit and Implicit Pragmatic Instruction in EFL Classes Explicit Pragmatic Instruction focuses on intentionally teaching pragmatic feature. It helps directing learners’ attention/focus toward the target speech forms and confirms Schmidt’s noticing hypothesis. Some pragmatic aspects cannot be acquired naturally until learners’ focuses are drawn. Politeness in request is an example for it. Learners both learn about the forms and also get some explanation. Adult learners prefer explicit knowledge. Explicit instruction gained advanced EFL learners’ awareness of input pragmatic features and also enhanced their performance to produce the speech acts appropriately. It also helps with students’ negative transfer mistakes. Implicit Pragmatic Instruction involves exposing learners to language use without direct explanations, through recasts or situational modelling. It also relies on enhanced input and enhanced interaction. Both of them are effective. Implicit is good to draw attention to pragmatic futures, explicit is effective in raising pragmatic awareness and developing pragmatic performance. How to Assess Pragmatic Competence? It is limited because of: Construct coverage: what to cover, measure, dimensions Practicality of test administration and scoring: face-to-face vs written Generalizability: reliability > consistency and validity issues > degree of correctness Some example ways: Multiple-choice questions Oral interviews Roleplays Picture and video prompts What is Discourse Completion Tests It is a tool used in linguistic and pragmatics to elicit particular speech acts. Consists of one- sided roleplay involving situational prompts which are described and respondents are required to decide what to say in the given situation