12 QUESTIONS FOR REVISION

1. What are four areas that pragmatics is concerned with?

2. What is deixis? Talk briefly about person deixis, spatial deixis, and
temporal deixis and give examples for each type.
3. What is the definition of reference? What are referring expressions? Give
examples. Talk briefly about anaphoric reference & cataphoric reference.
Answers:

4. What is the definition of entailment? What are its characteristics? Give an

example for each type.
An entailment is something that logically follows from what is asserted in the
utterance. Sentences, not speakers, have entailments.
(1) Mary’s brother bought three horses.
(1) entails: Mary’s brother bought sth, bought 3 animals, bought 2 horses,
bought 1 horse, & many other logical consequences.
Ordered entailments:
- Entailment is not pragmatic concept (i.e. having to do with the speaker
meaning ).
- But it is considered a purely logical concept, symbolized by ||-
Ex: Rover chased three squirrels. (= p)
Back a. Something chased three squirrels (= q)
ground b. Rover did something to three squirrels (= r)
Entail- c. Rover ate three of something (= s)
ment d. Something happened (= t)
- p ||- q => logical consequence.
5. What is the definition of presupposition? What are its classifications? Give
an example for each.
Definition: Presupposition is “what a speaker or writer assumes that the receiver of message
already knows.”
Classification:
-The existential presupposition
“They haven’t spoken to each other since their last week’s quarrel.” The utterance
presupposes that they had a quarrel last week.
- The factive presupposition, Eg: Nobody realized that Kelly was ill.” The utterance
presupposes that Kelly was ill.
-The non-factive presupposition, Eg: “I imagined that Kelly was ill.” The utterance presupposes
that Kelly was not ill.
- The lexical presupposition, Eg: “You're late again.” The utterance presupposes that you were
late before.
-The structural presupposition, “Where did you buy the bike?" The utterance presupposes
that you bought a bike.
- The counter- factual presupposition, Eg: “If I had enough money, I would buy that house.”
if I had enough money The utterance presupposes that I do not have enough money.

6. How can conversational implicature be defined? What are its

characteristics? Give examples.

Definition: Conversational Implicature promises to bridge “the gap between

what is literally said and what is conveyed”
Characteristics:
1. People may draw somewhat different conversational implicature from a certain
utterance. Eg: A: We went to see The Omen last night but it wasn’t scary at all
B: It would keep me wake all night
-> B’s utterance may implicate that B thinks The Omen is scary.
2. Since conversational implicature is part of what is communicated and not said,
the speaker can explicitly suspend or deny that he/she intended to communicate
such meaning in different way.
Conversational implicatures are “conclusions drawn from utterances on particular
occasions and not from isolated sentences … In this respect the problem of
implicature resembles the problem of how a hearer arrives at the indirect
illocutions of utterances.

7. What is Grice’s theory of cooperative principle? Give examples.

The co-operative principle: Make your conversational contribution such as

required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the
talk exchange in which you are engaged. The maxims
* The maxim of Quality: Try to make your contribution one that is true,
specifically:
+ Do not say what you believe to be false
+ Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence
* The maxim of Quantity: Make your contribution as informative as required for
current purposes of the exchange. Do not make your contribution more informative
than is required
* The maxim of Relevance: Make your contribution relevant
* The maxim of Manner: Be perspicuous, and specifically
+ Avoid obscurity
+ Avoid ambiguity
+ Be brief
+ Be orderly
=> You should speak sincerely, relevantly and clearly, while providing sufficient
information.
Eg:

8. What is the definition of speech acts? What are its classifications? Give an
example for each.

Definition: A speech act is an UTTERANCE as a function unit in communication.

Classification: 6 types
1. The representative describes a state of affairs in the world: asserting, stating,
claiming,….The representative can generally be characterized as being true or
false. Eg:
2. The commissive commits the speaker to a course of action:
promising, vowing, threatening, Eg:
3. The declarative changes the world by bringing about or altering the state of
affairs it names: dismissing, sentencing, naming, Eg:
4. The directive intends to get a listener to carry ot an action: commanding,
requesting, begging, warning, Eg:
5.The expressive indicates the speaker’s psychological state(s) or feeling(s)/
attitude(s) about something: greeting, apologizing, Eg:
6. The rogative refers to a special kind of directives which deals with reqests for
information and which is typically in form of a question. Eg

9. What is the difference between locution, illocution and perlocution? Give

examples.
A locutionary act is the saying of something which is meaningful and can be
understood.
Eg: saying the sentence Shoot the snake is a locutionary act if hearers understand
the words shoot, the, snake and can identifiy the particular snake referred to.
A illocutionary act is using the sentence to perform a function
Eg: ‘Shoot the snake’ may be intended as an order or a piece of advice
A perlocutionary act is the results or effects that are produced by means of saying
something.
Eg: Shooting snake would be a perlocutionary act.
10. Talk about politeness, positive politeness and negative politeness and give
examples.

POLITENESS, in an interaction, can be defined as the means employed to show

awareness of another person’s face. In the sense, politeness can be accomplished in
situations of social distance closeness’ (Yule 1997, p60)
‘POLITENESS is any kind of behavior (verbal and/or nonverbal) that is
intentionally & appropriately meant to make another person/other people feel
better or less bad.
‘POSITIVE POLITENESS is any kind of behavior (verbal and/or nonverbal) that
is intentionally & appropriately meant to show the speaker’s concern to the
addressee, thus, enhancing the sense of solidarity between them’ (Nguyen Quang,
2006)
‘NEGATIVE POLITENESS can be summed up as a concern not to impose on
others or restrict their freedom, but to maintain distance.’ (Bentahila & Davies,
1989)
‘NEGATIVE POLITENESS is any kind of behavior (verbal and/or nonverbal) that
is intentionally & appropriately meant to show that the speaker does not want to
impinge on the addressee’s privacy, thus, enhancing the sense of distance between
them. (N.Q, 2006)

11. Give definition of face wants, negative & positive face. Give examples.

FACE: In communication between 2 or more persons, the positive image or

impression of oneself that one shows or intends to show to the other participants is
called ‘face” (Richards et al. 1999)
E.g. Mr Smith’s face during a particular meeting might be that of ‘a sophisticated,
intelligent, witty, & educated person’.
‘POSITIVE FACE’ is the positive consistent self-image that people have and want
to be appreciated & approved of at least some other people. (Fasold 1990)
‘A PERSON’S NEGATIVE FACE is the need to be independent, to have freedom
of action, and not to be imposed by others’ (Yule, 1997)

12. Talk about ‘Self and other: say nothing’ and ‘Say something: off and on
record”. Give examples.