Pragmatics: Introduction

1. http://www.kau.edu.sa/SBANJER
http://wwwdrshadiabanjar.blogspot.com
DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 1
By:
Dr. ShadiaY. Banjar
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

2. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 2
Textbook
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

3. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 3
References
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

4. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 4
Meaning
Semantics
Situation and context
Pragmatics
Sounds and letters
Phonology, Phonetics, Graphology.
Sentences, clauses, phrases, words
Grammar (Morphology & Syntax)
Text
Discourse Analysis
Text Linguistics
Linguistics
The Levels of Language and
Linguistics
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

5. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 5
Background of “Pragmatics ”
•Charles Morris (1903 –1979)
•Was concerned with the study of
the science of signs, which he called
semiotic ;
•Distinguished 3 branches of
semiotics: syntactics (or syntax) ,
which studies the formal relation
among different signs; semantics,
the study of the relation between
the signs and the objects they
denote; and pragmatics, the study
of the relation of signs to their
interpreters, i.e. people.
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

6. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 6
Thewordpragmaticsderivesfrom
theGreekword‘pragma’,which
means'matter','thing',butalso
'action'(cf.Linke,Nussbaumer&
Portmann(1996)).
Pragmatics
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

7. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 7
1: “Pragmatics is the study of speaker meaning .”
2: “Pragmatics is the study of contextual
meaning ”
3:“ Pragmatics is the study of how more gets
communicated than is said ”
4:“ Pragmatics is the study of the expression of
relative distance .” ( Yule:2008).
Definitions
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

8. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 8
When a diplomat says yes, he means ‘perhaps’;
When he says perhaps , he means ‘no’;
When he says no, he is not a diplomat.
When a lady says no, she means ‘perhaps’;
When she says perhaps , she means ‘yes’;
When she says yes, she is not a lady.
Voltaire (Quoted, in Spanish, in Escandell
1993.)
Pragmatics
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

9. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 9
The essence of pragmatics
•syntaxaddressestheformalrelations
ofsignstooneanother,
•semantics therelationofsignstowhat
theydenote,
•andpragmatics therelationofsignsto
theirusersandinterpreters
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

10. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 10
•The central rationale for pragmatics:
sentence meaning (semantics) in natural
languages vastly underdetermines
speaker’s meaning (intentions).
•Thegoalofpragmaticsistoexplainhow
thegapbetweensentencemeaningand
speaker’smeaningisbridged
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

11. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 11
•Semiotics triestoseparate “objective”
definitionsofthestructureandmeaningof
words andsentences insyntax and
semantics fromsubjective andcontext-
dependent senses (often: requests or
demandsofactions)inpragmatics.
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

12. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 12
Pragmatics - the study of meaning as it relates
to speaker’s and addressee’s background
attitudes and beliefs, their understanding of the
context in which a sentence is uttered, and their
knowledge of how language can be used to
inform, persuade, mislead, etc.
Focuses on utterances -sentences that are
spoken within a given context (the same
sentence spoken 2 different times is 2 different
utterances -why?)
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

13. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 13
•Pragmatics is the study of the relationships
between linguistic forms and the users of
those forms. In this three-part distinction,
only pragmatics allows humans into the
analysis.
•The natural realization is that grammatical
analysis alone is not enough.
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

14. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 14
The difference between grammatical analysis
and pragmatic analysis
•First, grammatical studies look for rules while pragmatic studies look for
principles. Rules are black and white, i.e. you are either right or wrong. For
instance, you have to say “He studies linguistics ”; the –s is required by a
rule. Principles are not black and white; you can obey them to some
extent and violate them to some extent. For example, one principle says
we should tell the truth and another says we should be polite in our
speech.
•Secondly, in grammar studies, we end up with products while in
pragmatics we always deal with processes. In other words, after we have
analyzed a sentence grammatically, our job is done; in a pragmatic inquiry,
we deal with an ever-unfolding process-as the discourse goes on and on,
the extra meaning of some words become clearer and clearer.
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com

15. DR. Shadia Y. Banjar 15
PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com