INTERCULTURAL PRAGMATICS Istvan Kecskes State University of New York, Albany

What is language? Language is a system of signs resting upon a conceptual structure that is unique to each culture. Distinction between conventions of language and conventions of usage. This division was made by several researchers including Searle (1979) and Morgan (1978).

Conventions of language How is language organized? I am going to see John tomorrow. Mary has not been back yet.

Conventions of usage and culture Morgan: “In sum, then, I am proposing that there are at least two distinct kinds of convention involved in speech acts: conventions of language …and conventions in a culture of usage of language in certain cases…The former, conventions of language, are what make up the language, at least in part. The latter, conventions of usage, are a matter of culture (manners, religion, law….). (Morgan 1978: 269).”

WHITE IS THE NEW BLACK

ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK

Example (Movie: “Angel Eyes”) Situation: A policewoman in uniform is driving the car, and the man sitting beside her is starring at her. PW: - What? M: - I was trying to picture you without your clothes on. PW: - Excuse me? M: - Oh no, I did not mean like that. I am trying to picture you without your uniform. PW: - Okaay? M: - I mean, on your day off, you know, in regular clothes.

Human languages: we do not say what we mean and we do not mean what we say Evelyn: - So Lidia, what do you do? I mean besides doing my son…… Xxx - Mary, look. I think that guy is hitting on me. - Don’t hold your breath, honey.

We do not mean what we say Amy: Don’t you think Jim drinks a bit too much? Billy: Is the Pope Catholic? Russian student (2 years in US, female, age 23): “Catholics drink too much” Spanish student (6 months in US, female, age 27): “Billy thinks that Catholic people drink too much” Spanish student (8 months in US, male, age 22): “Billy confused Catholic with alcoholic.”

We do not say what we mean Roy: - Is there something wrong, Susie? Susie: - I am fine, Roy. Roy: - I would have believed you if you hadn’t said “Roy”. Susie: - Ok, Ok, just stop……

We are careless with our words Allen: - Morning. Berta: - What’s so good about it? Allen: - I did not say “good”.

We sound rude when we do not want to be rude Emi: - Karen, I have received the travel grant. Karen: - Nooou, get out of here! E: - You should not be rude. I did get it. K: - OK, I was not rude, just happy for you.

We are nice while we sound rude “She is a pretty girl,” said Poirot. “Is she, you old dog? So you were not asleep all the time, eh? said Japp. (Agatha Christie. Death in the clouds. Fontana/Collins: London)

We play with words - Listen, I am looking for me daughter. Have you seen her? - Drunk, blonde? - Well, she is not always blonde.

Definitions of pragmatics Morris (1938): “the study of the relationship between signs and their interpreters.” Leech, G.: “Pragmatics is a systematic way of explaining language use in context. It seeks to explain aspects of meaning which cannot be found in the plain sense of words or structures, as explained by semantics.” Kecskes: “Pragmatics is about how the language system is put to use in social encounters between human beings.” Signs (previous examples), users, contexts

What do interlocutors do? Speakers explicate/imply Hearers implicate

Speaker’s problem How is it possible for the speaker to say one thing and mean that but also to mean something else? - Honey, the phone is ringing. - I am in the bathroom.

Hearer’s problem How is it possible for the hearer to understand the indirect speech act when the sentence he hears and understands means something else? Bill: - John, I need to ask you a question. John: - OK, shoot. –

Speaker Control Speaker can fully control what s/he wants the audience to believe/understand but s/he cannot control what the audience will actually believe/understand. Bud: - Ann, would you like to have dinner with me tonight? Ann: - I’d love to, but I’ll have to pick up my sister at the airport.

How to explain speakers’ behavior? The cooperative principle of Paul Grice (1957): "Make your contribution such as it is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged.“ Though phrased as a prescriptive command, the principle is intended as a description of how people normally behave in conversation.

How to be cooperative? Follow the Gricean Maxims. Listeners and speakers must speak cooperatively and mutually accept one another to be understood in a particular way. The cooperative principle describes how effective communication in conversation is achieved in common social situations. The cooperative principle can be divided into four maxims, describing specific rational principles observed by people who obey the cooperative principle. The Gricean Maxims are a way to explain the link between utterances and what is understood from them.

Sentence versus utterance Visiting women can be dangerous. The duck is ready to eat. Utterance meaning and sentence meaning can be the same: John received his PhD in history.

Gricean Maxims Maxim of Quality 1. Do not say what you believe to be false. 2. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence. evidence Maxim of Quantity 1. Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purposes of the exchange). 2. Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.

Relation and Manner Maxim of Relation Be relevant. Grice writes, "Though the maxim itself is terse, its formulation conceals a number of problems that exercise me a good deal: questions about what different kinds and focuses of relevance there may be, how these shift in the course of a talk exchange, how to allow for the fact that subjects of conversations are legitimately changed, and so on." Maxim of Manner 1. Avoid obscurity of expression. 2. Avoid ambiguity. 3. Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity).prolixity 4. Be orderly

Overlaps There may be an overlap, as regards the length of what one says, between the maxims of quantity and manner. If the listener needs, let us say, five units of information from the speaker, but gets less, or more than the expected number, then the speaker is breaking the maxim of quantity. However, if the speaker gives the five required units of information, but is either too curt or long-winded in conveying them to the listener, then the maxim of manner is broken. The dividing line however, may be rather thin or unclear, and there are times when we may say that both the maxims of quantity and quality are broken by the same factors.

Criticism of Maxims Grice's maxims are not sufficiently worked out. The Gricean Maxims and the Cooperative Principle cannot be universally applied due to intercultural differences.

IMPLICATURE Implicature is defined as "the implied meaning generated intentionally by the speaker.” These meanings are often made covertly. Example: John: Fred, will you come to the pub with me? Fred: I'm meeting Jane tonight.

Conventional implicatures The conventional implicature has the same implication no matter what the context is. – This head-ache is killing me. - Welcome to the club. Why don’t you sit down?

Conversational implicature ‘Conversational implicature’, on the other hand, is generated directly by the speaker depending on the context. This implicature may or may not be understood (Thomas 1995:58). The same expressed meaning can have different implications on different occasions. To illustrate this I have taken an example from Cruse’s Meaning in Language (Cruse 2000:349): A: Have you cleared the table and washed the dishes? B: I’ve cleared the table. A: Am I in time for supper? B: I’ve cleared the table.

Breaking the maxims: violating and flouting VIOLATING means that we break the maxims covertly, so that other people do not know. If we violate the maxim of quality, we lie. If we violate the maxim of quantity by not giving enough information, if someone finds out we can be accused of 'being economical with the truth', another deceit. Violating the maxims amounts to breaking them 'illegally', just as people who steal are guilty of laws concerning theft. As with laws, some maxim violations can be more heinous than others. Lying in a court of law is disapproved, but 'white lies', small lies to keep the social peace, are often thought as acceptable.

Violating the Maxims Quality - Jack, what are you doing again? - Nothing. - Please stop it. Relevance: A: Where is Professor Fowler's office? B. I think I'll go to Mick's for lunch today. - I have not seen you all afternoon. Have you done your homework? - Sure. I did it all.

Flouting the Maxims If we FLOUT a maxim, we break it in a FLAGRANT (and often foregrounded) way, so that it is obvious to all concerned that it has been broken. If this happens, then it is clear that the speaker is intending the hearer to infer some extra meaning over and above what is said (evidence for this is that people of say things like Grice distinguishes 'sentence meaning' from 'utterer's meaning' and he refers to an utterer's meaning indicated through a flout as an IMPLICATURE.

Flouting the Maxims -What do you think of Professor Brown? - Well, he is always well-dressed. A: Do you like John and Kate? B: Kate is fun.

Answer the questions Two married university lecturers are talking about who is going to get the children from school. What maxim does B flout and what implicature follows from it? A: Who is picking up the children today? B: I've got a meeting at 3.30.

Explanation B flouts the maxim of relation by not giving the identity of the person asked about in A's question. The implicature is that B can't pick up the children because of the work commitment, and is therefore suggesting, by extension, that A should.

Answer the question Which Maxim does B flout? A: - How is John doing at his job at the bank? B: - Oh, quite well. He likes his colleagues and he has not been sent to prison yet.

Answer the question Which Maxim does B flout? Bill: - When did you arrive yesterday? Jane: - I flew in at 5:00. Then I went to do some shopping. So I arrived home only after 7:00.

Which Maxim is violated? Joan: I’ve been dating this new guy for a while now, but I think I need to break up with him. He’s always late, he never has any money, and I think he was hitting on my roommate last night. Ivan: (Uttered in a sarcastic tone) Well, he’s a real keeper.

Is any Maxim flouted here? Speaker B is in the store to buy chips the day after a big night out. When she reaches the counter the salesperson, speaker A, says: A: “Peckish?” B: “Hung-over”

Which of these responses does not flout any maxim? - ARE YOU HUNGRY? - I could eat. - I have not had anything since the morning. - I think I am. - What do you have? - Have you been to the supermarket?

Context Context refers to any factor — linguistic, epistemic, physical, social — that affects the actual interpretation of signs and expressions. “The set of premises used in interpreting an utterance … constitutes what is generally known as the context. A context is a psychological construct, a subset of the hearer's assumptions about the world.” (Sperber and Wilson 1986: 15)

Context principle Frege (1884): “..never to ask for the meaning of a word in isolation, but only in the context of a proposition.” Wittgenstein (1921): “An expression has meaning only in a proposition. Every variable can be conceived as a compositional variable.”

Compositionality Meanings of words or expressions can be determined prior to, and independently of, the meanings of the propositions in which they occur. Leibniz (1697):”..si nihil per se concipitur, nihil omnino concipietur” (“…if nothing can be understood by itself nothing at all can ever be understood”)

Externalist perspective The externalist perspective on context holds that context determines, modifies and/or specifies word meanings in one way or another. Context is seen as a selector of lexical features because it activates some of these features while leaving others in the background.

Selector - Sorry, I need glasses to see these small letters. - Welcome to the club.

Internalist perspective Lexical units are creators of context. Our experience is developed through a regularity of recurrent and similar situations that we tend to identify with given contexts (Gee 1999; Violi 2000, Kecskes 2008). “Let me tell you something.” “Do you want to talk about it?” “Ladies and gentlemen”

Utterances carry with them their own context Gumperz (1982) says that utterances somehow carry with them their own context or project a context. Referring to Gumperz’s work, Levinson (2003) claims that the message versus context opposition is misleading because the message can carry with it or forecast the context.

Example Allen and Sherry (of the sitcom Two and a Half Men) are sitting in a restaurant. Allan’s right eye is covered with a bandage so he does not see Sherry very well. Allen:-You know, Sherry, I would really like to see more of you. Sherry:- Maybe, we should wait and see how the night goes. Allen: - Oh, no. I mean I have only got one good eye. Can we change places? Sherry:- Sure.

The externalist and internalist views The problem with the externalist and internalist views is that they emphasize either the selective or the constitutive role of context. The dynamic nature of human communication requires emphasis on both. Key: world knowledge

World knowledge: prior context and actual situational context World knowledge is available to human beings in two forms: 1) as tied to lexical items and images based on prior encounters and experience, (why do words mean what they mean), and 2) as provided by the actual situational context framed by the given situation (Kecskes 2008; 2010).

Prior context and actual situational context Context represents two sides of world knowledge: prior context and actual situational context, which are intertwined and unseparable. Actual situational context is viewed through prior context. Meaning is, in this view, seen as the outcome of the interrelation and interaction of prior and current experience.

Why is it important to emphasize the two sides of context? In intracultural communication: actual situational context In intercultural communication: prior context