Pragmatics
English Language: AQA A Level, topic 1.4.2
Pragmatics
Pragmatics is about looking at the meaning behind things. It takes into account how meaning can be inferred, especially considering the context in which it was produced and is being received.
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Deixis
- If you’ve ever joined in a conversation part way through, you may have experienced deixis.
- For example, someone may say something like ‘I saw him there today’, and without being part of that conversation, you do not know who ‘he’ is and where ‘he’ was ‘today’.
- It is important to note that just because you do not understand something, it does not mean it is deictic. Candidates may label a word they do not understand as deictic, when it is just not a word in their vocabulary.
Deictic reference
- A deictic reference is a comment which is context dependent. In other words, it isolates those who are not part of that group.
- In articles written for specialists, you may find references to events/procedures which the idealised reader (the person who it was written for) would understand, but you do not.
Denotation vs connotation
- When considering a text’s semantical meaning, you will often consider what its denotation is. A denotation is a dictionary definition of a word.
- When you take this further in pragmatics, you will often look at what the emotional attachment with the word is, and what the word implies. This is called a connotation.
- For example, you may look at the denotation of the word ‘baby’ as being an infant, but you can also look at the romantic connotations of calling a partner ‘baby’.
Test yourself on Pragmatics
Which of these are connotations of the head words?
What is the following sentence an example of?
Those are my favourite shoes.Which sentence uses deixis?