4 Chapter 4. What is Pragmatics?
☞ Authorial commentary is italicized.
It is strange to be writing a chapter focused on pragmatics, since every person reading this text is already a seasoned expert in it. In fact, you know more about the pragmatics of your language, culture, and social group far better than any outsider could ever know- and that’s part of what makes you, you.
Why read a chapter about something in which you are already an expert? By learning more about the frameworks we use to categorize, better understand, and study pragmatics, you may build an awareness of how to better navigate the language, culture, and power dynamics that surround every interaction we have with others. That awareness can be helpful, because it’s hard to imagine a future where you won’t have to communicate with someone who’s outside your own language, culture, or social group. Most of us do that on a daily basis, so an awareness of the tenets of pragmatics can help to navigate that communication effectively.
☞ I’ve found writing on pragmatics to sometimes be extraordinarily dense =- to the point that it can be intimidating- at least to me! The subject is fascinating, but where an idea or technical term proves to be challenging, I find it helpful to remember that we are already a pragmatics practitioner. Every human navigates language, culture, society, and power dynamics every day.
When we speak or write, we use the building blocks of language to express meaning. As an example, the following two sentences have very different meanings:
- I wrote this book.
- I am writing this book.
There’s a clear meaning difference between #1 & #2– in #1, the speaker described an action (write) which finished at some point in the past, while in #2, the process is still ongoing. Here, we see a difference in meaning communicated by grammar- past simple (#1) vs. present continuous (#2).
Here are two additional examples:
- I wrote this chapter.
- We wrote this chapter.
#3 & #4 use the same grammar structure- past simple (sentence subject + past participle + predicate) to describe a completed action. However, the difference here involves word choice- specifically, the differences between pronoun use (I vs. We) which indicates the speaker wrote the chapter themselves, or that it was a collaborative venture with one or more co-authors who are present or being referred to.
Examples 1, 2, 3, & 4 are fairly simple and straightforward for example purposes, but they neatly illustrate the building blocks of language- grammar and word choice. In a gross simplification, we might be able to describe that framework as ‘linguistics’.
☞ This is such a ridiculous simplification that it’s like calling becoming a doctor ‘Surgery & Drugs’, but the point here is to show how the foundation of meaning-making boils down- in it’s absolute simplest terms- to grammar & word choice.
Describing linguistics as the basis for expressing meaning doesn’t discount its importance. Grammar and word choice make comprehensible communication possible- but there is more to the story.
The words of a language are like the bricks, mortar, and timber frames needed to build a house. They are essential but not sufficient. The rules of grammar are like the principles that tell builders how to proceed in the construction (first dig, then lay the foundations, etc.) but again, these principles are indispensable but not enough in and of themselves. (Bacchini, 2024, p. 43)
☞ Bacchini’s work is very clear and an excellent resource for accessible information about linguistics & pragmatics- check it out in the reference section.
Bacchini is right- the framework of a language is essential to conveying meaning but it can’t complete the job all on its own. Something is missing. The vocabulary and grammar choices we make when communicating don’t tell the entire story.
Imagine example #1 (I wrote this book!), but being shouted by the speaker in the context of testifying in a copyright infringement trial. What if the speaker gave an incredulous look, a raised eyebrow, and a laugh at the end of the statement? What if the speaker is a freshly graduated mechanical engineer at a major car company talking to the founder’s son, who the engineer ghostwrote a manual for?
☞ These examples are a bit silly, but they are meant to convey the idea that the linguistic message we encode with vocabulary and grammar often doesn’t tell the entire story of how we create meaning.
These examples describe the difference between ‘pragmatics’ and ‘linguistics’- they’re very closely related and both deal with language, but pragmatics is the more socially-situated field. Bacchini’s example concerning bricks and mortar continues on to illustrate the difference- “Builders need to have planning permission and be aware of all the existing legislation pertaining to house building. So, too, we speakers need more than a mastery of the grammar and vocabulary of a particular language to communicate effectively.” (Bacchini, 2024, p. 43)
To state it simply- pragmatics is linguistics in a social, human context that considers the perspectives of both message originator and its audience regarding language, power dynamics, culture, identity, and intended/actual outcomes of a message.
☞ That definition is obviously my own thought, not necessarily a definitive statement of fact accepted universally. Other thinkers and researchers would disagree- but this rings true for me. Granted, my own background is in applied linguistics, which makes me view everything as an outlay of linguistics!
Other definitions certainly exist- they vary in the details, but a unifying thread is that pragmatics goes beyond language and is always social. Fraser and LoCastro’s definitions seem particularly apt:
Simply stated, I take pragmatics to be an account of the process by which the language user takes a sentence representation provided by the grammar and, given the context in which the sentence is uttered, determines what messages and what effects the speaker has conveyed. (Fraser, 1996, p.167)
Pragmatics is primarily and fundamentally interested not only in the meaning of the words of the talk, but also how human beings can get from what is said in words to the communicative purpose beyond the words of any piece of talk. (LoCastro, 2011, p. 4)
☞ Early pragmatics theorists- Brown & Levinson, Grice, etc. came from a philosophy background and often conceived of universal, shared pragmatic themes across cultural and language boundaries. These theories, to me, seem a bit dated and difficult to sustain. After all, “Different cultures conceptualise politeness and face differently” (Bacchini, 2024, p.55). I’d advise viewing claims to cultural or pragmatic universals skeptically. After all, humans are difficult to place into neatly organized boxes!
Because of its muddled margins across multiple disciplines, pragmatics has been described as being situated in philosophy, linguistics, and cognitive science (Allott, 2010, p. 1). Pragmatics involves the study of all of those fields. Ideas related to why people communicate and how they view others are drawn from philosophy. Linguistics, as mentioned before, is a cornerstone of pragmatics- the scaffolding that surrounds the pragmatics skyscraper. Cognitive science contributes an understanding of how cognition and social engagement functions.
While all three fields clearly have shaped pragmatics, this text takes the stance that linguistics is the most appropriate choice as a clear foundation to pragmatics. Linguistics has a direct link to pragmatics- something that’s clear when a speaker of a language faces a linguistic proficiency challenge and consequently cannot engage pragmatically effectively (Taguchi, 2011; Biesenbach-Lucas, 2007; Bardovi-Harlig, 1996).
☞ This is an area which can get rather technical and complicated- sociopragmatics, sociolinguistics, pragmalinguistics, Anglo-American versus European Continental traditions, what feels like an endless series of dense conceptions of how and why we communicate, etc., etc., etc.. I prefer to simplify here- pragmatics is important, we all do it, the technical items are less important than an awareness of pragmatic features, and pragmatics is accurately and easily considered to be ‘linguistics in a human sociocultural context’.
Early in the history of pragmatics, John Austin classified communicative acts into three levels- locutionary, illocutionary, and perlocutionary acts (Sbisà, 2013, p. 25). The locutionary level is essentially the linguistic meaning of the words and grammar in isolation- “… its ‘surface’ or ‘semantic’ meaning. The literal meaning that the words and the grammar convey.” (Bacchini, 2024, p.48) In contrast, illocutionary acts reflect the speaker’s intended outcome of a speech act (which incorporated outcomes beyond the linguistic meaning). It is on the illocutionary level that we can see communicative outcomes that rely increasingly on identity, culture, and social dynamics beyond the meaning encoded linguistically. Examples of this might include flirting by making a joke, insulting by overexplaining a work task to imply incompetence, or to schedule-send an email to a manager to try and demonstrate that an employee is a hard worker- “…what the speaker intends it to mean and achieve.” (Bacchini, 2024, p.48) Finally, perlocution reflects the actual outcome of the communicative effort- “it is the effect the utterance has on the hearer who interprets it” (Bacchini, 2024, p.48). Perlocution is the end result of a communicative effort, even where that outcome is different than the speaker’s intention.
Perlocution has no upper border: any consequential effect of a speech act may be considered as perlocutionary. If breaking news surprises you so that you trip and fall, my announcement has not only been believed true by you (which is already a perlocutionary effect) and thus surprised you, but has also made you trip, fall, and (say) injure your ankle. (Sbisà, 2013, p. 60)
Earlier, I mentioned that everyone reading this (AI data scraping tools aside…) is already an expert in pragmatics. LoCastro certainly agrees- “The average person on the street has what is called a folk linguistic theory of what is polite and what isn’t.” (LoCastro, 2011, p. 9) Pragmatics is driven by linguistics but is explicitly social, directly reflects self-constructed and exhibited identity, and is deeply intertwined with power dynamics and culture. Pragmatics is a very human endeavor- we may not immediately recognize the technical terms used but we all do pragmatics constantly. Language- besides our biological evolution- is what makes us human because it unlocks culture and society- “Language is ever present because so is the human need to interact and socialise.” (Bacchini, 2024, p. 42)
As you read this, think about your surroundings- who do you see? How are they dressed? How are they speaking? What does their body language tell you? What are they trying to accomplish by communicating? All of these questions reflect elements related to pragmatics.
☞ Sociolinguistics may be another field of interest if pragmatics is something you’re interested in!
As an example of pragmatics in action, Eslami provides an interesting example that blends identity, culture, and language:
…in Persian, when you make offers, the more forceful and direct you are, the more polite it is. In English, offers are made indirectly. In Iranian culture, offering and refusals of food and drink may be ritual (taarof), and, therefore, the host/hostess feels obliged to insist further, telling their guest not to do taarof, as is shown in the extract. It is explained that in English there is not nearly as much ritual formality, and this can create cross-cultural misunderstanding. (Eslami, 2005, p. 203)
Pragmatics is something very human- it doesn’t have the neat boundaries of grammar, reflects the identities we assume and present to the world, shifts based on culture, and is something that rapidly changes alongside language, society, and culture. Pragmatics is something that can only be ‘done’ with an intended outcome of a communicative act, via a multitude of identity-signalling methods, and deeply rooted in a cultural context- “Pragmatics concerns speaker meaning, specifically deriving the intended communicative message from what is said in a particular context” (LoCastro, 2011, p. 7).
☞ This is why generative AI tools struggle so heavily with pragmatics related tasks. No matter how advanced they may become or how closely they can mimic human awareness of pragmatics, they cannot engage with culture or identity because they have none.
Pragmatics reflects us exactly because it has messy boundaries and because it reflects core elements of us as social beings-
Our speech has more or less precise goals, achieves or fails to achieve them, may express intentions or other mental states, may produce consequences of various kinds (sometimes unintended), and so on. It may be said that we ‘use’ language to communicate, for strategic purposes, to express emotional or other psychological states, to persuade, and even to carry out such peculiar activities as joking or play-acting. (Sbisà, 2013, p. 25)
Identity is a core construct of pragmatics. Identity doesn’t just mean the literal name of a person, or their job, or a surface-level understanding of who they are in society.
There is no such thing as language (e.g., English) or literacy (e.g., reading or writing) in general. People do not learn English. Rather, they learn a specific “social language” (variety or register of English) fit to certain social purposes and not to others. They don’t learn to read or write, they learn to read or write something (some type of text) written in a specific social language used in specific ways by specific groups of people for specific purposes. Everyone is a native speaker of a number of different social languages and a nonnative speaker of lots of other social languages. And nearly everyone is literate in respect to some sorts of texts and related social practices and illiterate in regard to lots of others. (Gee, 2002, p. 162)
References:
Allott, N. (2010). Key terms in Pragmatics. Continuum International Publishing Group. 21-39.
Bacchini, S. (2024). An introduction to language and communication for allied health and social care professionals. Routledge.
Bardovi-Harlig, K. (1996). Pragmatics and language teaching: Bringing pragmatics and pedagogy together. In L. Bouton (Eds.), Pragmatics and language learning: Vol. 7. (pp. 21-39). ERIC. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ed400702
Brown, P. & Levinson, S. (1987). Politeness: Some universals in language usage. Cambridge University Press. (Original work published 1978)
Fraser, B. (1996). Pragmatic markers. Pragmatics, 6(2). 167-190. 10.1075/prag.6.2.03fra
Gee, J. (2002). Literacies, identities, and discourses. In M.J. Schleppegrell & M.C. Colombi (Eds.), Developing advanced literacy in first and second languages: Meaning with power (pp. 115–129). Taylor & Francis Group.
LoCastro, V. (2011). Defining the territory. In V. LoCastro (Ed.), Pragmatics for language educators: A sociolinguistics perspective (pp. 3-17). Routledge.
McAndrew, F. & De Jonge, C.. (2011). Electronic person perception: What do we infer about people from the style of their e-mail messages? Social Psychological and Personality Science, 2(4). 403-407, DOI:10.1177/1948550610393988
Sbisà, M. (2013). Locution, illocution, perlocution. In M. Sbisà & K. Turner (Eds.), Handbooks of Pragmatics Volume 2, Pragmatics of Speech Actions. De Gruyter Mouton.
Taguchi, N. (2011). Teaching pragmatics: Trends and issues. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 31, 289-310. 10.1017/S0267190511000018
