Presupposition

Presupposition concerns the way in which propositions already presumed in a discourse context are usually not stated or questioned, but encoded in a more ‘background’ way. For example, “Has he stopped bothering you?” presupposes the proposition that you and I know that he has been bothering you, and asks whether this has stopped.
The classical test for presupposition is survival under negation: “He hasn’t stopped bothering me” and “He has stopped bothering me” both presuppose that he was bothering me.
Languages have complex systems for foregrounding and backgrounding information in this way. Thus mental attitude verbs, like know or regret, or change of state verbs like start and stop presuppose their complements, definite descriptions (like the king of Buganda) presuppose the existence of the entities referred to, iteratives like again (as in John did it again) presuppose earlier occurrences, and so on.
The phenomena and corresponding explanations are complex, but the relevance to pragmatics is that presupposition clearly implies that natural languages are built to trade on, and signal, the dependency of utterances on propositions already taken for granted. The pragmatic aspects of the phenomena are often underplayed in semantic accounts of the phenomena. For example consider the sentence Sue cried before she finished her thesis – this would normally presume that she finished thesis, this being a presupposition from the before-clause. But the minimally different sentence Sue died before she finished thesis seems to make no such presumption, because of course we happen to know that the dead do not complete theses. This defeasibility, or cancellation of an inference in the context of contrary assumptions, is a hallmark of pragmatic inference.

A PRESUPPOSITION TRIGGER

Definition

A presupposition trigger is a construction or item that signals the existence of a presupposition in an utterance.

Examples (English)

Both positive and negative forms are presented, showing that the presuppositions are constant under negation:

· Definite descriptions
In John saw/didn't see the man with two heads, the definite description the man with two heads triggers the presupposition "There exists a man with two heads." (The unbelievability of the presupposition is what makes the positive utterance unbelievable and the negative one odd.)
· Factive verbs
In John realized/didn't realize that he was in debt, both realize and didn't realize that trigger the presupposition "John was in debt."
Other factives are:

• (it) be odd that
• be sorry/proud/indifferent/glad/sad that
• know that, and
• regret that.

· Implicative verbs
In John managed/didn't manage to open the door, both managed/didn't manage to trigger the presupposition "tried to," as in "John tried to open the door."
Other implicative verbs are :

• avoided (X-ing), which presupposes "was expected to"
• forgot to, which presupposes "ought to have"
• happened to, which presupposes "didn’t plan/intend to," and
• intended to.

. Change of state verbs
In Kissinger continued/didn’t continue to rule the world, both continued/didn’t continue to trigger the presupposition "had been," as in "Kissinger had been ruling the world."
Other change of state verbs are:

• arrive
• begin
• come
• enter
• go
• leave
• stop, and
• take (X from Y), which presupposes "X was at/in/with Y."

· Expressions of repetition
In Carter returned/didn’t return to power, both returned/didn’t return trigger the presupposition "Carter held power before."
Other such expressions are :

• again
• another time
• anymore
• come back
• repeat, and
• restore.

· Expressions of temporal relations
In while Chomsky was revolutionizing linguistics, the rest of social science was/wasn’t asleep, the clause introduced by while triggers the presupposition "Chomsky was revolutionizing linguistics."
Other such conjunctions triggering presuppositions are:

• after
• as
• before
• during
• since, and
• whenever.

· Cleft sentences
In it was/wasn’t Henry that killed Rosie, the cleft structure triggers the presupposition "someone killed Rosie."
The pseudocleft structure in what John lost was his wallet triggers the presupposition "John lost something."
· Stressed constituents
In John did/didn’t compete in the OLYMPICS, the stressed constituent triggers the presupposition "John did compete somewhere."
· Returned actions
In Adolph called Marianne a Valkyrie, and she complimented him back/in return, too, both back/in return, too trigger the presupposition "to call Marianne a Valkyrie is to compliment her."
· Comparisons
In Carol is/isn’t a better linguist than Barbara, the comparison triggers the presupposition "Barbara is a linguist."
· Counterfactual conditions
In if the notice had only said ‘mine-field’ in English as well as Welsh, we would/would never have lost poor Llewellyn, the form of the condition triggers the presupposition "The notice didn’t say mine-field in English."
· Questions
Questions presenting alternatives tend to trigger a presupposition of the truth of one of the alternatives. The utterance is Newcastle in England or in Australia? triggers the presupposition "Newcastle is either in England or in Australia."
Questions containing interrogative pro-forms tend to trigger a corresponding presupposition containing an indefinite pro-form. The utterance who is the professor of linguistics at MIT? triggers the presupposition "someone is the professor of linguistics at MIT."

Source:
Compiled by Karttunen No date and presented by Levinson 1983: 181–184

Reference and Inference

Referring is one of the basic things we do with words, and it would be a good idea to understand what that involves and requires.

Speaker reference

Speaker reference is a four-place relation, between a speaker, an expression, an audience, and a referent: you use an expression to refer someone to something.

· To be in a position to refer to something (or to understand a reference to it) requires being able to have singular thoughts about it, and that requires perceiving it, being informed of it, or (having perceived or been informed of it) remembering it.

· To succeed in referring to something in using a certain expression requires getting them to think of it (and generally to grasp a singular proposition about it) via identifying it as what you intend them to think of by virtue of your using that expression.

· We generally choose the least informative sort of expression whose use will enable the hearer to identify the individual we wish to refer to, but this is not a matter of convention.

Reference – an act by which a speaker (or writer) uses language to enable a listener (or reader) to identify something (Yule, 2006: 115).

• Words that we use to identify things are not in direct relation to these things:

Example:

• Have you seen my Yule?

“Referring is not something an expression does; it is something that someone can use an expression to do.” (Strawson: 1950).

Strawson exploited the fact that almost any referring expression, whether an indexical, demonstrative, proper name, or definite description, can be used to refer to different things in different contexts. This fact, he argued, is enough to show that what refers are speakers, not expressions.

Inference – any additional information use by the listener to connect what is said to what must be meant (Yule, 2006: 116).

Anaphora

• Anaphora – is a subsequent reference to an already introduced entity. Speakers (writers) use anaphora in texts to maintain reference.

Example:

A: Have you seen my Yule?

B: Yeah, it is on the desk.

• “Yule” and “it”: “it” – anaphora, Yule – antecedent.

A referring expression, in linguistics, is any noun phrase, or substitute for a noun phrase, whose function in a text (spoken, signed or written on a particular occasion) is to "pick out" an individual person, place, object, or a set of persons, places, objects, etc. The technical terminology for "pick out" differs a great deal from one school of linguistics to another. The most widespread term is probably refer, and a thing "picked out" is a referent, as for example in the work of John Lyons. In linguistics, the study of reference belongs to pragmatics, , the study of language use, though it is also a matter of great interest to philosophers, especially those wishing to understand the nature of knowledge, perception, and cognition more generally. (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

The kinds of expressions which can refer (as so defined) are:

(1) a noun phrase of any structure, such as: the taxi in The taxi's waiting outside; the apple on the table in Bring me the apple on the table; and those five boys in Those five boys were off school last week. In those languages which, like English, encode definiteness, referring expressions are typically marked for definiteness. In the examples given, this is done by the definite article the or the demonstrative adjective, here those.

(2) a noun-phrase substitute i.e. a pronoun, such as it in It's waiting outside and Bring me it; and they in They were off school last week. The referent of such a pronoun may vary according to context - e.g. the referent of me depends on who the speaker is - and this property is technically an instance of deixis.

(3) a proper noun, like Sarah, London, The Eiffel Tower, or The Beatles. The intimate link between proper names and type (1) referring expressions is shown by the definite article that appears in many of them. In many languages this happens far more consistently than in English. Proper names are often taken to refer, in principle, to the same referent independently of the context in which the name is used and in all possible worlds, i.e. they are in Saul Kripke's terminology rigid designators.

Referring can take place in a number of ways. Typically, in the case of (1), the referring expression is likely to succeed in picking out the referent because the words in the expression and the way they are combined together give an true, accurate, description of the referent, in such a way that the hearer of the expression can recognize the speaker's intention. In the first example, if the hearer knows what an apple and a table are, and understands the relation expressed by on, and is aware that the is a signal that an individual thing/person is intended, s/he can build up the meaning of the expression from the words and grammar and use it to identify an intended object (often within sight, or at any rate easily recoverable, but not necessarily). Of course, the speaker may use a mistaken description and still manage to refer successfully. If I ask you to "Take this plate to the woman with the glass of soda", you may take it to the intended person even if, unbeknown to me, her soda is really water. On the other hand I may be accurate in calling it soda, but you may believe wrongly that it is water, and therefore not deliver the plate. So accurate reference is not a guarantee of successful reference, and successful reference does not wholly depend on accurate reference. But naturally there is a strong positive correlation between them.

Proper names, on the other hand, generally achieve reference irrespective of the meaning of the words which constitute them (if any are recognizable). If my local café is called The Anchor, this is simply a label which functions conversationally with no appeal to the meaning of the words. If I say, I'm going to the Anchor, I do not mean I'm going to the device for halting and securing a ship, and you will not necessarily call such a device to mind when I say this. The Anchor just serves to identify a particular building. This point is more obvious still with those names like Sarah and London which have no lexical meaning of their own.

In addition to the (in many languages) grammatically obvious singular and plural reference, linguists typically distinguish individual or specific reference, exemplified by each case presented so far, from generic reference, where a singular expression picks out a type of object (etc.) rather than an individual one, as in The bear is a dangerous animal. Plural expressions can, of course, be interpreted in the same way, as in Bears are dangerous animals.

Definite reference to single individuals is usually taken to be the prototypical type of reference.

Other types of reference recognized by linguists include indefinite as opposed to definite reference, and collective and distributive reference. Definite referring expressions refer to an identifiable individual or class (The Dalai Lama; The Coldstream Guards; the student with the highest marks), whilst indefinite referring expressions allow latitude in identifying the referent (a corrupt Member of Parliament; a cat with black ears - where a is to be interpreted as 'any' or 'some actual but unspecified'). Collective reference is the picking out of the members of a set as a set, whilst distributive reference is the picking out of the members of a set individually. The difference may not be marked linguistically, but arrived at by interpretation in context. Compare Manchester United won again today (where the reference of Manchester United is to members of the team as a unit), with Manchester United wear red shirts and black shorts (where the reference of Manchester United is to the team members as individuals). English allows such expressions to be ambiguous: compare Manchester United are rich beyond my wildest dreams.

Referring as a Collaborative Process

Clark and Wilkes-Gibbs (1986) investigated how participants in a conversation collaborate in making a referring action successful. They conducted experiments in which participants had to refer to objects--tangram patterns--that are difficult to describe.

They found that typically the participant trying to describe a tangram pattern would present an initial referring expression. The other participant would then pass judgment on it, either accepting it, rejecting it, or postponing his decision. If it was rejected or the decision postponed, then one participant or the other would refashion the referring expression. This would take the form of either repairing the expression by correcting speech errors, expanding it by adding further qualifications, or replacing the original expression with a new expression. The referring expression that results from this is then judged, and the process continues until the referring expression is acceptable enough to the participants for current purposes. This final expression is contributed to the participants' common ground.

Below are two exampless from Clark and Wilkes-Gibbs's experiments that illustrate the acceptance process.

A: 1 Um, third one is the guy reading with, holding his book to the left.

B- 2 Okay, kind of standing up?

A: 3 Yeah.

B" 4 Okay.

In this dialog, person A makes an initial presentation in line 1. Person B postpones his decision in line 2 by voicing a tentative "okay," and then proceeds to refashion the referring expression, the result being "the guy reading, holding his book to the left, kind of standing up." A accepts the new expression in line 3, and B signals his acceptance in line 4.

A: 1 Okay, and the next one is the person that looks like they're carrying something and it's sticking out to the left. It looks like a hat that's upside down.

B: 2 The guy that's pointing to the left again?

A" 3 Yeah, pointing to the left, that's it! (laughs)

B: 4 Okay.

In the second dialog, B implicitly rejects A's initial presentation by replacing it with a new referring expression in line 2, "the guy that's pointing to the left again." A then accepts the refashioned referring expression in line 3.

Sources

• Cann, Ronnie (1993) Formal semantics. Cambridge University Press.
• Clark, Herbert H., and Wilkes-Gibbs, Deanna (1986). "Referring as a collaborative process." Cognition, 22, 1-39. Reprinted in Arenas of Language Use, edited by Herbert H. Clark, 107-143.
• University of Chicago Press and CSLI.
• Kripke, Saul (1980) Naming and necessity, second edition. Basil Blackwell.
• Lyons, John (1977) Semantics. Cambridge University Press.
• Saeed, John (1997) Semantics. Blackwell.
• Strawson, P. F. (1950), “On Referring,” Mind 59: 320-44.
• Yule, G. (2006). The Study of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (p. 112 – 117).

Deixis

Personal deixis Spatial deixis Temporal deixis

The term 'Deixis' comes from the Greek deiktikos (=“able to show”). This is related to Greek dèiknymi (dyke-nimmy) meaning “explain” or “prove”. The standard pronunciation has two syllables (dyke-sis) while the adjective form is deictic (dyke-tik).
According to Stephen Levinson:
“Deixis concerns the ways in which languages encode...features of the context of utterance ... and thus also concerns ways in which the interpretation of utterances depends on the analysis of that context of utterance.”
Deixis is an important field of language study in its own right - and very important for learners of second languages. But it has some relevance to analysis of conversation and pragmatics. It is often and best described as “verbal pointing”, that is to say pointing by means of language. The linguistic forms of this pointing are called deictic expressions, deictic markers or deictic words; they are also sometimes called indexicals.
Deictic expressions include such lexemes as:
• Personal or possessive pronouns (I/you/mine/yours),
• Demonstrative pronouns (this/that),
• (Spatial/temporal) adverbs (here/there/now),
• Other pro-forms (so/do),
• Personal or possessive adjectives (my/your),
• Demonstrative adjectives (this/that),
• Articles (the).
Deixis refers to the world outside a text. Reference to the context surrounding an utterance is often referred to as primary deixis, exophoric deixis or simply deixis alone. Primary deixis is used to point to a situation outside a text (situational deixis) or to the speaker's and hearer's (shared) knowledge of the world (knowledge deixis).
Contextual use of deictic expressions is known as secondary deixis, textual deixis or endophoric deixis. Such expressions can refer either backwards or forwards to other elements in a text:
• Anaphoric deixis is backward pointing, and is the norm in English texts. Examples include demonstrative pronouns: such, said, similar, (the) same.
• Cataphoric deixis is forward pointing. Examples include: the following, certain, some (“the speaker raised some objections...”), this (“Let me say this...”), these, several.
Deictic expressions fall into three categories:
• Personal deixis (you, us),
• Spatial deixis (here, there) and
• Temporal deixis (now, then).
Deixis is clearly tied to the speaker's context, the most basic distinction being between near the speaker (proximal) and away from the speaker (distal).
• Proximal deictic expressions include this, here and now.
• Distal deictic expressions include that, there and then.
Proximal expressions are generally interpreted in relation to the speaker's location or deictic centre. For example now is taken to mean some point or period in time that matches the time of the speaker's utterance. When we read, “Now Barabbas was a thief” (John 18.40) we do not take the statement to mean the same as “Barabbas was now a thief” (i.e. he had become a thief, having not been so before). Rather we read it as St. John's writing, “I'm telling you now, that Barabbas was (not now but at the time in the past when these events happened) a thief”.
Personal deixis
English does not use personal deixis to indicate relative social status in the same way that other languages do (such as those with TV pronoun systems). But the pronoun we has a potential for ambiguity, i.e. between exclusive we (excludes the hearer) and the hearer-including (inclusive) we.
Spatial deixis
The use of proximal and distal expressions in spatial deixis is confused by deictic projection. This is the speaker's ability to project himself or herself into a location at which he or she is not yet present. A familiar example is the use of here on telephone answering machines (“I'm not here at the moment...”).
It is likely that the basis of spatial deixis is psychological distance (rather than physical distance). Usually physical and (metaphorical) psychological distance will appear the same. But a speaker may wish to mark something physically close as psychologically distant, as when you indicate an item of food on your plate with “I don't like that”.
Temporal deixis
Psychological distance can apply to temporal deixis as well. We can treat temporal events as things that move towards us (into view) or away from us (out of view). For instance, we speak of the coming year or the approaching year. This may stem from our perception of things (like weather storms) which we see approaching both spatially and in time. We treat the near or immediate future as being close to utterance time by using the proximal deictic expression this alone, as in “this (that is the next) weekend” or “this evening” (said earlier in the day).

________________________________________

Pragmatics waste-basket

Mey( 2001) gives us a full account of how pragmatics developed from the “waste-basket of semantics” into an independent and important domain of the linguistic research.
At the beginning, the semantics was called the “waste-basket of syntax”. In the late fifties and early sixties, linguists tried to make linguistics a science. Thus they applied many mathematical methods to the linguistic study. Linguistics was ideally considered as an algebra of language. In the mid-fifties, Chomsky developed his famous theory of generative-transformational grammar. Although he knew the domain of his research is somewhat limited, he concentrated his attention on grammar and pay no attention to the study of meaning. In this way, semantics came to be called the “waste-basket of syntax”. In the early seventies, some linguists began to try to turn the study of meaning into the foundation of the linguistic study instead of syntax. Semantics mainly concerns about the conditions under which a sentence could be true or false. In the semantic research, linguists found that many language phenomena could be explained by semantic theory, but these phenomena didn’t attract much attention at that time. All their unsolved questions were thrown into a new basket, pragmatic basket. Some natural language does make sense, but we can’t prove it to be true. These problems kept bothering the linguists, but were left to be unnoticed. Later these unsolved questions became the main items of the pragmatic study. In this sense, pragmatics became the waste basket of semantics.  
“In the Chomskyan linguistic tradition, well-formedness plays the role of the decision-maker in questions of linguistic ‘belonging’: a language consists of a set of well-formed sentences, and it is these that ‘belong’ in the language; no others do.”(Mey, 2001:25). In 1968, Lakoff published an article, entitled “Presupposition and relative well-formedness”. Lakoff , for the first time, publicly rejects in writing the formal-logic criterion of syntactic “well-formedness”. Chomsky considers this criterion as the ultimate standard to judge a linguistic production. However, what we perceive as correct in the real communication often collides with the correctness as prescribed by some grammarians. For example, according to English grammar we should us who when we are dealing with a noun which is human (and naturally animate), whereas we use which for a noun-human (possibly also non-animate) referent (Mey, 2001:25). But sometimes we don’t obey the rule in the ordinary language. For example, we usually use who to refer to our motherland or our pet. If not, it would be unacceptable.
The semantics and pragmatics may be somewhat alike in terms of the subject of the research. Both of them deal with the meaning, but what the semantists only concern about is whether the sentence is true or false. Then some problems arise. Some sentences don’t have true value, but it does make sense in the natural language in a certain situation. Some sentences have the same ‘true conditions’(that’s to say they are logically equivalent), but these sentences clearly don’t have the same meaning. Some semantists noticed these problems, but they just left them unsolved. Only when we take the language user and the context into consideration, can we find the answers to these questions. Later, these unsolved questions became the main issues of the pragmatic study.
Concerning the relationship between syntax, semantics and pragmatics, semantics was once regarded as the waster-basket of syntax, while pragmatics was once called the waster-basket of semantics. From syntax to pragmatics, the domain of the linguistic research is enlarged step by step and the study becomes more and more practical. In fact, syntax is the foundation of syntax, and pragmatics is based on the research of syntax and semantics. And linguistics gradually develops into a versatile subject covering almost every aspect of knowledge concerning language. 

Lecture Notes:Introduction to Pragmatics

Introduction to Pragmatics

1) Pragmatics:

Pragmatics is a branch of general linguistics like other branches that include: Phonetics, Phonology, Morphology, Syntax and Semantics. There are a lot of philosopher and linguists who have tried to define Pragmatics such as Charles Morris’s famous definition of pragmatics as “the study of the relation of signs to interpreters-”, Levinson’s consideration of pragmatics as being “the study of those relations between language and context that is gammaticalized, or encoded in the structure of a language.”, and Mey’s definition as “Pragmatics studies the use of language in human communication as determined by the conditions of society.”. Ran Yongping expressed his idea in his book A Survey of Pragmatics : “Pragmatics is a discipline not only concerning the sense, but also concerning the derivation of sense and the understanding of underlying meaning as its objects. It aims to decipher the negotiation and derivation of meaning in communication. So pragmatics studies, aiming at the derivation of sense during intercommunication, are by-directional dynamic studies.” (Yongping:1998). He put emphasis on dynamic studies, based on the idea of British scholar Thomas, the founder of dynamic pragmatics, who argued that the studies of pragmatics should aim at interactive sense. Language is alive not dead, and it is for using, so only the dynamic studies are significant.

2) Background of Pragmatics:

On mentioning the origin of pragmatics, we can go back to ancient Greek and Roman academic works. At that time some great philosophers had discussed something related to pragmatics. And we can say pragmatics develops from philosophy. Why? First, The term “pragmatics” first appeared in linguistic philosophy in 1930s, for then western philosophers began to shift their focus onto the studies of language symbols, which developed into semiology later. And the early pragmatics was just a branch of semiology that was under the philosophers’ studies, which means that pragmatics originates from the philosophers’studies on language. Second, the theoretic basis for pragmatics is from philosophy. To be more specific, pragmatics originates from the following aspects: the studies of semiology; the studies of linguistical philosophy in the 20th century and the studies of function linguistics on language forms. Third, the main studies of pragmatics such as indecicals and presupposition also have philosophical background. Here we should mention some philosophers who have played very important role in the development of pragmatics. Such as Wittgenstein, Morris, Austin, Searle, Levinson, Leech, Pierce, Carnap and so on. Wittgenstein and Austin once had discussed the origin of pragmatics in England, France and German in 1930s. Morris, who played the most important role in the first stage of the development of pragmatics, held an opinion that the studies of pragmatics must involve the aspects of society, of psychology, of nerve, of culture and of other things that affected the symbols and their meanings. And the most influent thing that he did on pragmatics was that in 1938 he had divided semiology into three parts: syntactics, semantics and pragmatics. The famous philosopher Carnap had very similar ideas with Morris, and he made some supplement, he thought that the studies of pragmatics should on the relationship between users and words as well as the reference of words. And he divided studies into pure theoretic ones and descriptive ones. And he made the aims of pragmatics studies more specific, that is the relationship between language users and words and the reference relationship. Bar-Hiller, the student of Carnap, suggested the studies of pragmatics should have definite aims and he claimed that the definite aims should be decitics such as “I”, “Here”, “Now”. Austin and Searle put forward the Speech Act Theory, which was the most influent topic in the studies of pragmatics during the second stage.

The Most Important Three Issues of Pragmatics and Three Stages in the Development of Pragmatics:

In 1983 Levinson and Leech published their respective works Pragmatics and Principle of Pragmatics, which set up the theoretic system of pragmatics. In 1977 Mey and Haberland started the Journal of Pragmatics in Holand. The start publication of the Journal of Pragmatics, the publishing of Pragmatics and the International Pragmatics Association that was set up in 1988 are considered the most important three issues for the development of pragmatics and indicate that pragmatics has become an independent discipline in linguistics. Generally speaking, the establishment of pragmatics as an independent discipline experiences three stages: the first stage is from the late 1930s to late 1940s, during this period, some philosophers such as Pierce, Morris and Carnap considered pragmatics to be a branch of semiology and all the studies were within the domain of philosophy; The second stage is from the beginning of 1950s to late 1960s. During this period, three famous philosophers called Austin, Searle and Grice made studied on speech act and implicature theory, and their achievements sustained the basic theory of pragmatics. The studies were still within the domain of philosophy then; The third stage is after 1970s, the biggest three issues happened and pragmatics became an independent discipline.

3) Schools of Pragmatics:

The studies of Pragmatics are divided into two big schools------British & American School and European School which can be subdivided into France School, Prague School and Copenhagen School. British & American School is traditionally centering on studying the sentence structure and grammar, and their studies of pragmatics is also restricted to several definite topics such as deictic expressions, conversational implicature, presupposition, speech and conversation structure. Their studies belong to Micro-pragmatics. European School has a wide visual and understanding, and their studies even include conversation analysis, cultural anthropology, social linguistics and psycholinguistics during intercommunication. Their studies belong to Macro-pragmatics.

4) Types of Pragmatics:

There are three divisions of Pragmatics:

• Micro-pragmatics,
• Macro-pragmatics and
• Meta-pragmatics.

When we talk about Micro-pragmatics and Macro-pragmatics, we may ask what are micropragmatics and macropragmatics. Mey have talked about them in details in his book Pragmatics: An Introduction. The studies of Micro-pragmatics are, on the level of language using, centering upon the discussion of pragmatic tasks aroused by the understanding of language symbols’ reference and implicature during conversation, including Context, Conversational implicature, Reference, Pragmatic Principles, speech Acts and Conversation Analysis. While the studies of Macro-pragmatics are, on the level of society & culture, focus on the problems of how to use language for language user during the process of communication, including Pragmatic Acts, Literary Pragmatics, Pragmatics Across Cultures and the Social Aspects of Pragmatics Metapragmatics which can be considered as a review, a survey or a reflection of pragmatics itself, including making statements about itself, questioning itself, improving itself, quoting itself and rethinking the methodologies and theoretic system during the process of its studies. If you want me to say more about Metapragmatics, I can consult what Caffi said: there are three ways of dealing with metapragmatics: one, as a theoretical discussion on what pragmatics is, and what it should comprise; two, as a discussion of the conditions and possibilities that enable people to act by using words, to ’do’ pragmatics by acting pragmatically; and finally, three, as the pragmatic pendant to the metapragmatic level, which is often captured under the label of ‘reflexive language’ .

5) New Development:

Since the 1980s Pragmatics, as an independent discipline, has been developing very quickly and soundly, so far, it has got delightful achievements and attracted more and more students and scholars to conduct researches on it. And now, pragmatics has new development, many scholars begin to do cross studies. Such as interactional sociolinguistics, interlanguage pragmatics, cross-cultural pragmatics, pragmatics and translation, pragmatics and language teaching which contains two: pragmalinguistics and sociopragmatics, cognitive pragmatics and clinical pragmatics.

Reference:

Mey. 2001. Pragmatics: An Introduction.

Pragmatics: Course Description

Pragmatics: Textbook & References

Reflexive and Intensive Pronouns

A pronoun that ends in self or selves is either a reflexive or an intensive pronoun.


Reflexive Pronouns:

A reflexive pronoun refers to the subject and directs the action of the verb back to the subject. Reflexive pronouns are necessary to the meaning of a sentence

Notice: that if you drop the reflexive pronoun, the sentence no longer makes sense. (Ben Carson dedicated to becoming a doctor.)

Intensive Pronouns
An intensive pronoun emphasizes a noun or another pronoun within the same sentence. Intensive pronouns are not necessary to the meaning of the sentence.

• You yourself have overcome many hardships.
• Dr. Carson himself has survived great poverty.
  

Notice:that when you drop the intensive pronoun, the sentence still makes sense. (Dr. Carson has survived great poverty.)
Avoid the use of hisself and theirselves, which are grammatically incorrect. Use himself and themselves instead.

Lecture Notes: PRONOUNS

Pronouns: A pronoun is a word that takes the place of a noun or other pronoun.

Pronoun Function in the Sentence:

Correct pronoun usage is determined by the function of the pronoun within the sentence. Is the pronoun the subject or the object of a verb or preposition?

Object forms: me, us, you, him, her, them.

• Those flowers were given in honor of Andrew and I. [Incorrect]


• Those flowers were given in honor of Andrew and me. [Correct]

To complete this sentence, “of” must have an object; therefore, “Andrew and I” must become “Andrew and me.”

Subject forms: I, we, you, he, she, it, they

• Me and her went to the game [Incorrect]
• She and I went to the game [Correct]

Because “me and her” are object forms, they cannot function as the subjects of this sentence; they must be changed to “she and I.”

Types of Pronouns:
Personal Pronouns
Personal pronouns refer to a person or a thing.

1st person – I, we, me, us
2nd person – You
3rd person – He, she, it, they, him, her, them

Indefinite Pronouns:

Indefinite pronouns function as nouns in a sentence, but do not take the place of a specific person or thing.

Singular:
Anybody, No one ,Anyone, Nothing, Anything, One
Each, Somebody Everybody, Someone
Everyone, Something
Plural : A couple, A few,Many,Several,Both

There are also some indefinite pronouns which function as both singular and plural: all, some, none. If these pronouns refer to a noun measured by amount, they are singular. If they refer to a noun measured by number, they are plural.

• All of the students are going to the principal’s office. (Plural)
  [Students can be individually counted; therefore “all” is a plural pronoun]
• All of the work we have done is pointless. (Singular)

[Work cannot be counted individually; therefore, “all” is a singular pronoun]

Relative Pronouns

Like personal pronouns, relative pronouns refer back to a person or thing and must function as either an object or subject in the sentence. Object forms include whom and whomever. Subject forms include who and whoever.

Difficulty arises when there is uncertainty about how these pronouns are functioning in the sentence. Ask yourself, “Is the pronoun a subject or an object?”

If the pronoun is following a preposition or verb, treat it as an object.

• At whom did you throw the bouquet?
  [“Whom” is the object of the preposition “at”]
• The professor picked whomever he wanted.
  [“Whomever” is the object of the verb “picked”]

If the pronoun is the subject, use the subject form.

• Who is the speaker at the banquet? (Who is the subject of the sentence)
• I will choose whoever speaks up first. (Whoever is the subject of the noun clause)

Agreement in Person and Number:

A common error occurs when pronouns do not agree in person and number. To avoid these errors, remember that the word that a pronoun is replacing is called the antecedent. As such, pronouns must agree with their antecedents in number:

• The students went to his or her rooms. [Incorrect: Students is a plural antecedent]
• The students went to their rooms. [Correct: The plural pronoun agrees with the plural antecedent]

The most common pronoun agreement error in number occurs when the antecedent is an indefinite pronoun:

Incorrect:
1. Each of the fans cheered as they watched the team sprint onto the field.
2. Everyone brought their pencil for the evaluation.
3. Both women in the portrait balanced her jars.
4. Several of the men raised his hand to volunteer.

Correct:
1. Each of the fans cheered as he or she watched the team sprint onto the field.
2. Everyone brought his or her pencil for the evaluation.
3. Both women in the portrait balanced their jars.
4. Several of the men raised their hands to volunteer

Ambiguous Pronoun Reference

Another common error is ambiguous pronoun reference. This occurs when the user uses multiple or ambiguous antecedents. If a personal pronoun is used following multiple antecedents, the reader may be unsure to which antecedent the pronoun is referring:

• The captain told his first officer that he could take leave next week. [Does “he” refer to the captain or the first officer?]

To avoid these errors, either make sure that pronouns clearly refer back to their appropriate antecedents or rephrase the sentence so that there is no confusion:

• The captain told his first officer that the officer could take leave next week.
• The captain granted the officer’s request to take leave next week.

Also, demonstrative pronouns (this, that, these, those) are often used in an ambiguous manner:

• This may be contributing to the increase in crime. [What does “this” refer to?]

“This” is a demonstrative pronoun that might be referring to any number of causes. To avoid errors, specify the causes, or, if they have been specified in a previous sentence, find a key word to repeat:

• Negligence may be contributing to the increase in crime.
• This negligence may be contributing to the increase in crime.

Pronouns are a useful tool in avoiding repetition and monotony in writing. However, if you are using pronouns, be sure to keep these rules in mind so as to avoid misinterpretation and confusion.

Lecture Notes: Pronouns

A pronoun is a word that is used in place of a noun or another pronoun. Like a noun, a pronoun can refer to a person, place, thing, or idea. The word that a pronoun refers to is called its antecedent.

Personal Pronouns

Pronouns such as we, I, she, them, and it are called personal pronouns. Personal pronouns have a variety of forms to indicate different persons, numbers, and cases.

Person and Number

There are first-person, second-person, and third-person personal pronouns, each having both singular and plural forms.

Case

Each personal pronoun forms has three cases: subject, object, and possessive. Which form to use depends on the pronoun’s function in a sentence.

The following chart shows all the forms of the personal pronouns:

Subject Pronouns

A subject pronoun is used as the subject of a sentence or as a predicate pronoun after a linking verb.

Pronouns as Subjects

Use a subject pronoun when the pronoun is a subject or part of a compound subject.

• The Apollo program was a great success. It got us to the moon. (It, referring to The
  Apollo program, is the subject of the sentence.)

A pronoun can be part of a compound subject.

• You and I both think we should go on to Mars.
  

Predicate Pronouns

A predicate pronoun follows a linking verb and identifies the subject. Use the subject case for predicate pronouns.

Remember, the most common linking verbs are forms of the verb be, including is, am, are, was, were, has been, have been, can be, will be, could be, and should be.

Object Pronouns

An object pronoun is used as a direct object, an indirect object, or an object of a preposition.

Direct Object The pronoun receives the action of a verb and answers the question whom or what.

Indirect Object The pronoun tells to whom or what or for whom or what an action is performed.

Object of a Preposition The pronoun follows a preposition (such as to, from, for, against, by, or about).
Always use object pronouns after the preposition between.

• It’s a contest between him and me. (NOT between he and I.)
  

Possessive Pronouns
A possessive pronoun is a personal pronoun used to show ownership or relationship.

The possessive pronouns my, your, her, his, its, our, and their come before nouns.

The possessive pronouns mine, ours, yours, his, hers, its, and theirs can stand alone in a sentence.

• This cat is mine. That cat is his.


• Is the striped cat yours? No, mine is all black.


• What color is his? Hers hasn’t come home yet.

Possessive Pronouns and Contractions
Some possessive pronouns sound like contractions (its/it’s, your/you’re, their/they’re). Because these pairs sound alike, writers often confuse possessive pronouns and contractions.
Remember, a possessive pronoun never has an apostrophe. A contraction, however, always has an apostrophe. The apostrophe shows where a letter or letters have been left out in a combination of two words.

LECTURE NOTES:POSSESSIVE NOUNS

POSSESSIVE NOUNS:


When creating possessive form nouns there are 8 simple rules:

1. If a singular noun does not end in s, add 's.

• The delivery boy's truck was blocking the driveway.
• Bob Dole's concession speech was stoic and dignified.
• The student's attempts to solve the problem were rewarded

2. If a singular common noun ends in s, add 's- unless the next word begins with s. If the next word begins with s, add an apostrophe only. (This includes words with s and sh sounds.)

• The boss's temper was legendary among his employees.
• The boss' sister was even meaner.
• The witness's version of the story has several inconsistencies.
• The witness' story did not match the events recorded on tape.

3. If a singular proper noun ends in s, add an apostrophe.

• Chris' exam scores were higher than any other students.

4. If a noun is plural in form and ends in an s, add an apostrophe only, even if the intended meaning of the word is singular (such as mathematics and measles.)

• The instructor asked us to analyze ten poems' meanings.
• The dog catcher had to check all of the dogs' tags.
• It is hard to endure the Marine Corps' style of discipline.

5. If a plural noun does not end in s, add 's.

• Many activists in Oregon are concerned with children's rights.
• Everyone was disappointed with the American media's coverage of the Olympics in Atlanta.

6. If there is joint possession, use the correct possessive for only the possessive closest to the noun.

• Clinton and Gore's campaign was successful.
• She was worried about her mother and father's marriage.
• Beavis and Butthead's appeal is absolutely lost on me.

7. If there is a separate possession of the same noun, use the correct possessive form for each word.

• The owner's and the boss's excuses were equally false.
• The dog's and the cats' owners were in school when the fire broke out.

8. In a compound construction, use the correct possessive form for the word closest to the noun. Avoid possessives with compound plurals.

• My father-in-law's BMW is really fun to drive.
• The forest ranger's truck is painted an ugly shade of green.
• Your neighborhood letter carrier's job is more difficult than you imagine.

LECTURE NOTES: THE USE OF CAPITAL LETTERS WITH NOUNS

Capital letters are used with:

1. Names and titles of people

• Winston Churchillb.
• Marilyn Monroec.
• the Queen of Englandd.
• the President of the United Statese.
• the Headmaster of Etonf.
• Doctor Mathewsg.
• Professor Samuels.

Note: The personal pronoun 'I' is always written with a capital letter.

2. Titles of works, books etc.

• War and Peaceb.
• The Merchant of Venicec.
• Crime and Punishment
• Tristan and Isolde

3. Months of the year

• January
• February
• March
• April
• May
• June
• July
• August
• September
• October
• November
• December

4. Days of the week

• Saturday
• Sunday
• Monday
• Tuesday
• Wednesday
• Thursday
• Friday

5. Seasons

• Spring
• Summer
• Autumn
• Winter

6. Holidays

• National Day
• Eid Al Fitr
• Eid Al Adha
• New Year's Day
  

7. Geographical names...

• names of countries and continents
  America
  England
  Scotland
  China
  Peru
  Albania
  Africa
  Europe
  Asia
• names of regions, states, districts etc.
  Sussex
  California
  Queensland
  Provence
  Tuscany
  Vaud
  Florida
  Costa Brava
  Tyrol
• names of cities, towns, villages etc.
  London
  Cape Town
  Rome
  Florence
  Bath
  Wagga Wagga
  Vancouver
  Wellington
  Peking
• names of rivers, oceans, seas, lakes etc.
  the Atlantic
  the Dead Sea
  the Pacific
  Lake Leman
  Lake Victoria
  Lake Michigan
  the Rhine
  the Thames
  the Nile
• names of geographical formations
  the Himalayas
  the Alps
  the Sahara
• Adjectives relating to nationality nouns
  France - French music
  Australia - Australian animals
  Germany - German literature
  Arabia - Arabic writing
  Indonesia - Indonesian poetry
  China - Chinese food
• Names of streets, buildings, parks etc.
  Park Lane
  Central Avenue
  Pall Mall
  George Street
  Sydney Opera House
  Central Park
  Hyde Park
  the Empire State Building

Lecture Notes: Nouns

Definition:

A noun is a name given to an object or idea.

Classes of Nouns:

1. A common noun is a name given to any one of a class of objects (tulip, city, face, movie, girl, clue, lake, cookie).Common nouns can be classified into the following sub-classes:

• A concrete noun is the name of a perceivable object (spoon).
• An abstract noun is the name of a quality or idea (truth, ethics).
• A collective noun is the name of a group of things (mob, herd).
• A mass noun is the name of a non-countable collection (time).

2. A proper noun is the official title of a specific object; it is therefore always capitalized (Dionysus, Bela Lugosi, Atlantic Ocean, Mother Goose).A proper noun can always be put into its common noun class: Texas -> state; Atlantic -> ocean; Bela Lugosi -> man (or actor).


Properties of Nouns

There are four basic properties for English nouns:

1. Gender - a property that indicates the sex of the referent. These include:

• Masculine - king, uncle, boy, etc.
• Feminine - queen, aunt, girl, witch, etc.
• Common - parent, singer, table, etc.

2. Person - property indicating the relationship between the noun and the speaker. These include:

• First person - object(s) speaking (I, John, am here.)
• Second person - object(s) spoken to (John, come here.)
• Third person - object(s) spoken of (John is here.)

3. Number - An indication of one or more than one object. This includes:

• Singular - denotes one object (cat)
• Plural - denotes more than one object (cats)

4. Case - Indicates the grammatical function of the object. These include:

a. Nominative - The noun is the doer of the action (or the subject)

• The sun shines. (subj)
• Grant was a general. (subj complement)
• The chief, an old man, rose. (appositive)
• Charles, please come here. (direct address)

b. Objective - The noun is acted upon

• Bob repelled the intruder. (d/o)
• Mom gave Ellen a hug. (i/o)
• Tom hit Bill, the new boy. (appositive of d/o)
• Mom gave Ellen, her daughter, a hug. (appositve of i/o)
• The man under the tree smiled. (obj prep)

c. Possessive - Denotes ownership or agency

• The boy’s kite... (one boy)
• The boys’ kite... (more than one boy)
• John and Bill’s kite... (joint ownership)
• John’s and Bill’s kites... (indiv. ownership)
  
  Plural Forms
  
  In English, plural nouns are formed in different ways:
  1. Regular plurals - Formed by adding -s or -es to singular noun forms (cars, boxes, etc.)
  2. Irregular plurals - Formed by spelling change (foot -> feet; mouse -> mice; child -> children)
  3. Double plurals - A noun that can have both a regular and irregular plural form (brother -> brothers or brethren; bandit -> bandits or banditti)
  4. Plurals treated as singular - Some nouns have a plural form but a singular meaning(news; means; physics, dollars)
  
  
  Role of Nouns
  
  A noun can have a variety of functions in English, including:
  1. Subject of a verb - who/what does the action.
• The water ripples.
• Sparks flew.

2. Object of a verb - who/what receives the action; for whom/what?

• I scratched my nose. (d/o)
• I gave the lady the case. (i/o)

3. Object of a preposition - the “what?” of the preposition.

• The pendulum swings over the pit.

4. Complement - completes the meaning of another noun or pronoun.

• I am a student. (sub. complement)
• I saw Joe, the new hire. (obj complement)

5. Appositive - A noun used to explain or identify another nounal.

• I waved at my guest, a strange fellow.
• The story, a tale of fabulous imagination.
• I called Bob, my professor.
  

Lecture Notes: Subject-Verb Agreement

Every clause in English has a subject and a verb, and these must agree in person and number.

Rules:


A. In simple present tense :When the subject is third person singular, the verb must have the [-s] form, i.e. end with - s or -es.

• My friend lives in Boston. ('friend' is third person singular)
• The sun rises from the east. ('sun' is third person singular)
• The dress looks like a brand new. ('dress' is third person singular)

It is easier to remember to make the subject and the verb to agree when the verb comes immediately after the subject. However, many English learners fail to make the subject and the verb agree when they are separated by a prepositional phrase, a relative clause or an adverbial phrase:

wrong

• The mother of these boys work as a computer programmer.

(The verb 'work' is agreeing with 'boys', but 'boys' is the object of the prepositional phrase 'of these boys'. It should agree with the subject, 'mother', which is singular.)

right

• The mother of these boys works as a computer programmer.

wrong

• The clothes that I gave to my sister was too small for me.

(The verb 'was' is agreeing with 'sister', but 'sister' is part of the relative clause 'that I gave to my sister'. The subject of this sentence is 'clothes', which is plural.)

right

• The clothes that I have to my sister were too small for me.

wrong

• President George Bush, like most previous presidents, come from a wealthy family.

(The verb 'come' is agreeing with 'presidents', which is part of the adverbial phrase 'like most previous presidents'. In this sentence 'President George Bush' is the subject, with which the verb must agree.)

right

• President George Bush, like most previous presidents, comes from a wealthy family.

B. A gerund subject is always considered singular.

• Jogging is good for your health.
• Smiling causes people to be nicer.

C. With most phrases of quantity, the verb agrees with the noun in the phrase.

Note:

When the quantity is singular such as 'one of', 'each of', 'every one of', or 'a group of'', the verb is singular but the noun of that phrase must be plural.

wrong

• Each of the book costs $1.

right

• Each of the books costs $1.

wrong

• One of the room is very messy.

right

• One of the rooms is very messy.

wrong

• A group of student is touring the campus.

right

• A group of students is touring the campus.

D. With some nouns, it is not obvious that they are singular or plural.

1. Names of places or things are singular.

e.g. countries (the United States, the Netherlands), organizations (the United Nations).

2. 'News' is singular.

3. Fields of studies are singular.

e.g. economics, physics, mathematics, statistics.

4. Diseases or medical conditions are singular.

e.g. diabetes, measles, mumps, rabies, rickets, shingles.

5. Expressions of measurements (time, money, distance, weight) are singular.

e.g. three days, one hundred dollars, two miles, fifty pounds.

6. Arithmetic expressions use singular verbs.

7. Some nouns are plural even though they do not end with -s or -es.

e.g police, cattle, people, sheep, fish, staff, faculty.

8. Languages are singular, but a noun that means the people of a country takes a plural verb.

9. When an adjective is preceded by 'the', it means the people with that quality or characteristic (the poor = the poor peole, the rich = the rich people, the disabled = the disabled people) and it requires a plural noun.