[幼儿读物]08Chapter 8_pragmatics.ppt

Chapter Eight Language in Use 1. Definition of Pragmatics The study of language in use. The study of meaning in context. The study of speakers’ meaning, utterance meaning, contextual meaning. Speaker’s meaning (A father is trying to get his 3-year-old daughter to stop lifting up her dress to display her new underwear to the assemble.) Father: We don’t DO that. Daughter: I KNOW, Daddy. You don’t WEAR dresses. Utterance Meaning vs. Sentence Meaning Utterance vs. Sentence Sentence: abstract units of the language system. Utterance: units of language in use. Sentence meaning: What does X mean? Utterance meaning: What do you mean by X? Dog! My bag is heavy. “Janet! Donkeys!” (David Copperfield) It’s cold in here. Contextual Meaning: meaning in context The meaning of the sentence depends on who the speaker is , who the hearer is, when and where it is used. It was a hot Christmas day so we went down to the beach in the afternoon and had a good time swimming and surfing. Semantic meaning: the more constant, inherent side of meaning Pragmatic meaning: the more indeterminate, the more closely related to context 1. A: Are you going to the seminar? B: It’s on linguistics. 2. A: Would you like some coffee? B: Coffee would keep me awake. 3. A: 我带的钱不够，今天买不了。 B: 那就下次再买吧。 2. Speech Act Theory John Austin (1911-1960) How to Do Things with Words (1962) speech acts: actions performed via utterances Constatives vs. performatives Constatives: utterances which roughly serves to state a fact, report that something is the case, or describe what something is, eg: I go to the park every Sunday. I teach English. Performatives: utterances which are used to perform acts, do not describe or report anything at all; the uttering of the sentence is the doing of an action; they cannot be said to be true or false. Performative verbs: name, bet, etc. I do. I name this ship Q