pragmatics (n.)

A term traditionally used to label one of the three major divisions of SEMIOTICS (along with SEMANTICS and SYNTACTICS). In modern LINGUISTICS, it has come to be applied to the study of LANGUAGE from the point of view of the users, especially of the choices they make, the CONSTRAINTS they encounter in using language in social interaction, and the effects their use of language has on the other participants in an act of communication. The field focuses on an ‘area’ between semantics, SOCIOLINGUISTICS and EXTRALINGUISTIC CONTEXT; but the boundaries with these other domains are as yet incapable of precise definition. At present, no coherent pragmatic theory has been achieved, mainly because of the variety of topics it has to account for – including aspects of deixis, conversational IMPLICATURES, PRESUPPOSITIONS, SPEECH ACTS and DISCOURSE structure.

Partly as a consequence of the potentially vast scope of the subject, several conflicting definitions have arisen. In a narrow linguistic view, pragmatics deals only with those aspects of context which are FORMALLY encoded in the STRUCTURE of a language; they would be part of a user’s pragmatic competence. At the opposite extreme, it has been defined as the study of those aspects of meaning not covered by a semantic theory. In this connection, some semanticists see the subject as contrasting with TRUTH-CONDITIONAL SEMANTICS: it is suggested that the difficulties which arise in relation to the latter (e.g. how to handle the notion of presupposition) are more readily explicable with reference to pragmatics. More inclusively, it has been characterized as the study of the principles and practice of conversational PERFORMANCE – this including all aspects of language USAGE, understanding and APPROPRIATENESS. Especial attention has been paid to the range of pragmatic particles which are found in speech (e.g. you know, I mean, sort of, TAG questions) which play an important role in controlling the pragmatic nature of an interaction.

Several derivative terms have been proposed in order to classify the wide range of subject-matter involved. Pragmalinguistics has been used by some to refer to the more linguistic ‘end’ of pragmatics, wherein one studies these matters from the viewpoint of the structural resources available in a language. Sociopragmatics, by contrast, studies the way conditions on language use derive from the social situation. General pragmatics is the study of the principles governing the communicative use of language, especially as encountered in conversations – principles which may be studied as putative UNIVERSALS, or restricted to the study of specific languages. Literary pragmatics applies pragmatic notions (especially to do with NARRATIVE) to the production and reception of literary texts. Applied pragmatics focuses on problems of interaction that arise in contexts where successful communication is critical, such as medical interviews, judicial settings, counselling and foreign-language teaching.

Prague School The name given to the views and methods of the Linguistic Circle of Prague and the scholars it influenced. The circle was founded in 1926 by Vilém Mathesius (1882–1946), a professor of English at Caroline University, and included such LINGUISTS as Roman Jakobson and Nikolai Trubetskoy (1890–1938). The ‘Praguean’ influence has been widespread and long-lasting, as the frequent reference to it throughout this dictionary testifies. Its main emphasis lay on the analysis of LANGUAGE as a SYSTEM of FUNCTIONALLY related UNITS, an emphasis which showed SAUSSUREAN influence. In particular, it led to the distinction between the PHONETIC and the PHONOLOGICAL analysis of sounds, the analysis of the PHONEME into DISTINCTIVE FEATURES, and such associated notions as BINARITY, MARKING and MORPHOPHONEMICS. Since the 1950s, Prague School ideas have been received and developed, particularly with reference to the SYNTAX, SEMANTICS and STYLISTICS of English and Slavonic languages, and illustrated in the work of Josef Vachek (1909–96), Jan Firbas (1921–2000) and others. Of particular note here is the formulation of a theory of FUNCTIONAL SENTENCE PERSPECTIVE, wherein sentence analysis is seen as a complex of functionally contrastive CONSTITUENTS. A representative reader is J. Vachek (ed.), A Prague School Reader in Linguistics (1964), but the early book by Trubetskoy, Grundzüge der Phonologie (1939), translated in 1969 as Principles of Phonology, is seminal.