Pragmatics from intercultural perspectives
Instructor: Dr. Istvan Kecskes, Distinguished Professor of SUNY
TA: Hanh Dinh
The goal of this class is to discuss the main tenets of pragmatics with special attention to the intercultural aspect. Pragmatics explores how the language system is put to use in social encounters between human beings. The central concern of the course is the crucial role that context, common ground and salience play in communicative behavior, and the ways in which more is communicated than what is said.
RECOMMENDED BOOK:
Kecskes, I. 2014. Intercultural Pragmatics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Weekly Class readings
Click the PDF file image to download the paper(s)
February 2nd
Introduction to pragmatics. Basic terms. Role of speaker and hearer. The cooperative principle. Gricean maxims.
February 9th
Current pragmatic theories. The linguistic-philosophical line and the sociocultural-interactional line, Issues with current theories.
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Reading: Kecskes, I. 2014. Intercultural Pragmatics. Oxford: OUP. Chapter 1: Current pragmatic theories. The linguistic-philosophical line and the sociocultural-interactional line, Issues with current theories.
Presentation 1: DUAN YUGE
Jacques Moeschler: Relevance Theory. In Kecskes, I. (ed.) 2021. Cambridge Handbook of Intercultural Pragmatics. (paper will be provided).
February 16th
The socio-cognitive approach. What is different in SCA?
Reading: Kecskes, I. 2021. The socio-cognitive approach. Chapter 28. In Haugh, M., D. Kadar and M. Terkourafi (eds.) Cambridge Handbook of Sociopragmatics.
STB 1: Elaine Friedman
February 23rd
Role of context
Reading: Kecskes, I. 2008. Dueling context: A dynamic model of meaning. Journal of Pragmatics. Vol. 40. Issue 3: 385-406.
Presentation 2: DIANNE BENNETT
Kent Bach. 2003. Context ex Machina in Semantics vs. Pragmatics, Zoltán Szabó (ed.), Oxford University Press.
STB 2: Julia Bonoan
March 2nd
Common Ground
Reading: Kecskes, I. & F. Zhang. 2009. Activating, seeking, and creating common ground: A socio-cognitive approach. Pragmatics & Cognition. Vol. 17. No. 2: 331-355.
Presentation 3: KATIE PEARL
Elke Diedrichsen. 2020. On the interaction of core and emergent common ground in Internet memes. Internet Pragmatics, Volume 3, Issue 2, Nov 2020, p. 223 - 259
STB 3: Eunhee Kim
March 9th
Literal versus non-literal meaning. Figurative language.
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Reading:
Michael Israel. 2005. Common sense and literal meaning. In The Literal and Nonliteral in Language and Thought, Seana Coulson and Barbara Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk (eds.),pp. 147-177. Frankfurt a. Main: Peter Lang
Presentation 4: ABRAYSHKA ORTIZ
Amelia Bedelia books. Why are they excellent tools to teach figurative language?
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You can see some of her books here: https://www.ameliabedeliabooks.com/
A helpful resource is here: https://www.readinga-z.com/book.php?id=3169
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You can borrow her books from the Ualbany library as well. This presentation is more like book reviews when you examine the books and answer the question, "Why are they excellent tools to teach figurative language?" You can take photos from the real books or have screenshots for demonstrations. This is a presentation of the book series and explanation with concrete examples why it helps the understanding of figurative language and how it can be related to the literature we have discussed so far in class.
Presentation 5: ANDY CLARK
Raymond W. Gibbs Jr. 2001. Evaluating Contemporary Models of Figurative Language Understanding. Metaphor and Symbol, Volume 16, Issue 3-4 Pages: 317-333
March 16th
Salience
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Reading: Orna Peleg, Rachel Giora & Ofer Fein. 2001. Salience and Context Effects: Two Are Better Than One.
Presentation 6: JULIA BONOAN
Kecskes, I. 2006. On My Mind: Thoughts about Salience, Context, and Figurative Language from a Second Language Perspective. Second Language Research. Vol. 22. No. 2: 219-237.
STB 4: Deanne Bennett
March 23rd
Formulaic language and creativity
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Reading: Nancy Bell. 2012. Formulaic Language, Creativity, and Language Play in a Second Language. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 32, 189-205.
Presentation 7: ELAINE FRIEDMAN
Marie-Luise Pitzl. 2012. Creativity meets convention: Idiom variation and remetaphorization in ELF. Journal of English as a Lingua Franca, 1(1)
STB 5: Katie Pearl
March 30th
Implicatures
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Reading:Kecskes, I. (2021). Processing implicatures in English as a Lingua Franca communication. Lingua, 103067.
Presentation 8: TIM COMFORT
Antoniou, K., & Katsos, N. 2017. The effect of childhood multilingualism and bilectalism on implicature understanding. Applied Psycholinguistics, 38, 787-833.
STB 6: Duan Yuge
April 6th
NO CLASS
April 13th
English as a Lingua Franca
Reading: Kecskes, Istvan. 2019. The Nature of ELF. Chapter 1. In Kecskes, I. English as a Lingua Franca: The pragmatic perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Presentation 9: ASLIHAN AVCI
Widdowson, H. G. 2017. The cultural and creative use of English as a Lingua Franca. Lingue e Linguaggi, 21, 275-281.
STB 7: Abrayska Ortiz
April 20th
Pragmatic competence
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Reading: Kecskes, I. 2015. How does pragmatic competence develop in bilinguals? International Journal of Multilingualism. Vol. 12. No. 4: 419-434.
Presentation 10: EUNHEE KIM
Elly Ifantidou. 2021. Pragmatic competence. In Kecskes, I. Cambridge Handbook of Intercultural Pragmatics.
STB 8: Andy Clark
April 27th
Semantics and pragmatics interface
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Reading: Kecskes, I. 2019. Impoverished pragmatics? The semantics-pragmatics interface from an intercultural perspective. Intercultural Pragmatics. Vol. 16. No. 5: 489-517.
Presentation 11: If needed
Bach, Kent. 2004. Minding the gap. In C. Bianchi (Ed.), The semantics/pragmatics distinction (pp. 27-43). Stanford: CSLI Publications.
STB 9: Tim Comfort
May 4th
Politeness and impoliteness
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Reading: Kecskes, I. 2017. Context-dependency and impoliteness in
intercultural communication. Journal of Politeness Research. Vol. 13. No. 1: 7-33.
STB 10: Aslihan Avci
STB 11: If needed
May 11th
Summary of class content.
Questions about term paper.