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“Mackenzie & Alba Juez's paper” - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Highlight: Some research on children’s pragmatic performance suggests that human pragmatic competence may involve neural structures and have an innate basis.
- - - - Syntacticians were skeptical that meaning could be analyzed with the same rigor as syntactic structure and therefore concentrated on establishing the syntactic (transformational) relations between sentences without attempting to specify their meaning.
        
        On 1995, Noam Chomsky claimed that there is an abstract structure ‘deep structure’ that underlines the ‘surface structure’ of the actual sentences we use. He denied that deep structure was a representation of meaning, others argued that deep structure was a semantic structure and that transformational rules could be used to derive a syntactic structure from that deep semantic structure.
        
        For all their differences, both groups shared a number of theoretical and methodological presuppositions, notably the idea that clauses and sentences could and should be analyzed independently of any context.
    - - The most natural understanding example a is that the reflexive pronoun himself refers back to John. In the example b the only possible interpretation is that himself refers to Bill, since Mary is female and cannot be an antecedent for himself. However, the interpretation of the example b makes one think that the example a may be ambiguous between the two meanings, ‘ John talked to Bill about John’ or ‘John talked to Bill about Bill’. The problem arises as a result of ‘decontextualization’.
      - The pragmatic of speech acts also has an impact on how syntactic constructions are understood.
        a) Since I have a train to catch, I am asking you [to be allowed to leave early].
        b) Since you are annoying me, I am asking you [to leave early].
        
        In syntactic theory the elements in square brackets are both ‘embedded non infinite clauses with an understood subject’.
        In the example a the understood subject is the speaker (I am asking that you leave early) while in the example b the understood subject is the hearer (I am asking that you leave early). If the matter were purely syntactic the determination of the understood subject should be rule-governed, but that is not the case. It is the nature of the speech acts expressed as I am asking you... that is the determining factor. In the example a it means ‘I am requesting’ while in example b it means ‘ I am (politely) oredering’.
  - - - Example b could occur at the beginning of a text. The contextual knowledge that makes it appropriate to begin the sentence with 'the police’ is that police stations are open 24 hours a day and are manned by operators who are waiting for calIs from the public. The information at the beginning of the clause Is thus sald to be 'given', or contextually determined. Every clause will also contain 'new' information, that is not (yet) shared by the speaker and the addressee and which is therefore not part of the context.
        
        Context can also help explain why certain formulations are less ‘acceptable’ than others, a major concern of workers in syntax. From a pragmatic viewpoint, we may say that it is difficult to find a context in which example a would be usable. The problem is that the sentence begins with new information and ends with given information. This can be avoided by using the formulation on example b.
        
        Example c needs a more elaborate context to be appropriate. The speaker has already shared the information with the addressee that ‘someone contacted the police’. What she’d add in example c is the identity of that person.
        
        In example d the context is different again: both speaker and hearer know that someone contacted the police and have other information about him/her as well. Now the speaker is informing the hearer that this person has a bus driving as a profession. In this case, there is more shared knowledge, and the speaker is increasing that stock of knowledge.
  - - - Among the pragmatic aspects are the recognition of the actional nature language use, the grouping of discourse acts into conversational moves, the notion of illocutonary force, the characteristics of the speaker and the hearer, the observation that the communicated content of an utterance is distinct from its propositional content and the contention that reference and predication are throughly actional, pragmatic phenomena.
      - In addition the grammatical component of FDG interact with a contextual component in such way that relevant contextual factors impinge on the workings of the grammar.
- - - - Another purpose is to do language engineering. Their major goal within this line of research being to build artificial agents that are able to carry out a conversation with human beings and to perform speech acts.
        
        The third goal of these models is to develop computational linguistics, defined by Jurafsky as: “ the use of computational techniques to build processing models of human psycholinguistic performance.”
  - - - A complete computational pragmatic system should have an interference engine that is able to reason about beliefs.
  - - - Abduction is formally related to Default Logic, a type of logic proposed by Reiter, which is concerned with drawing conclusions from incomplete evidence.
        
        Some author have used Default Logic to explain how a declarative utterance such as: “He’s dating our friend Marta”, may be interpreted as a question rather than a assertion.
- - - - He explains that the different forms of internet communication exhibit variations related to accessibility to context which has consequences for the quantity and quality of information communicated and interpreted.
        
        The following are the hypotheses the “make up the foundation of cyberpragmatics” :
        
        1) On the internet , the “addreser users” have communicative : intentions and devise their utterances with the expectation that these intentions will end up being relevant to the other users and that their utterances will be interpreted correctly. There are multiple ways in which their utterances can be coded, they type with the expectation that these coded utterances will be adequate evidence to lead the “addressee users” towards the intended interpretation.
        
        2) Internet users use interferential strategies when they interpret messages on the Net, these do not differ from the ones used for the comprehension of utterances in oral conversations shaped by physical co-presence. We are equipped with a biological tendency to maximize the relevance of the utterance that we process, but we do not apply different interferential procedures for our interpretation of stimuli verbal and non verbal in physical or virtual contexts.
        
        3) Internet users expect their interlocutors to be able to access the necessary amount of contextual information that will allow them to arrive at a correct interpretation of their utterances. Their interlocutors will also invariably access contextual information as a necessary stage in a relevance-oriented interpretation of these utterances.
        
        4) The attributes of the different cyber-media influences the quality of the user’s access to contextual information, the amount of information obtained, the interpretation selected, the cognitive effect derived and the mental effort involved.
  - - - Strenghtening of community-related assumptions, in order to compensate for this extra mental effort.
      - This social orientation of internet communication may be detrimental to the estimation of relevance in terms of a reduction of both credibility of the source and willingness to process it.
        
        Francisco Yus argues that it is very possible that multi-tasking on the the web is altering the way human beings process and store information, which eventually will affect the organization and functioning of their brains.
        
        They may feel reluctant to invest cognitive resources in stimuli that involve deferred relevance.
        Example: reading a novel
- - - - Pragmatic enrichment: Metonymy
        Sometimes, instead of using an exact description, we cut corners and mention something that is merely connected with what we mean, leaving it up to pragmatic enrichment to ensure successful communication.
        a) I love to listen to Baroque composers.
        b) The entire school came out to greet the mayor.
        c) The Caesar salad left without paying.
        In example a the Baroque composers are long dead, so the speaker can only suggest she is fond of their music.
        In example b the school cannot, so the speaker must mean all the teachers and students came out.
        In example c a dish of food cannot move, so the speaker must mean the person who ordered ate a Caesar salad.
  - - - Another aspect of componential analysis that has run into difficulties is the
        assumption that each word has one meaning.
        Consider the adjective red.
        It would be possible to define red as corresponding to a wavelength of 670 nanorneters on the visible spectrum, but the actual hue that is associated with red differs enormously according to which item it is associated with syntactically.
        
        The meaning of red is very much dependent upon getting what it combines with. One solution to this problem is to specify that the lexicon contains a large amount of entries with the phonemic form /red/ and the word class Adjective.
        
        Underdeterminacy:
        Our knowledge of the world is much richer that the lexicon of words we use to describe it.
        
        Prototype: The meaning of words are defined by prototypes. If red is defined in the lexicon as ‘having the color of blood’, however then this clearly underdetermines how the word is used. Consider the examples:
        a) We took the bus back to the zoo.
        b) We took the escaped camel back to the zoo.
        Syntactically both are parallel.
        Our natural inclination is to understand example a as meaning that we went back to the zoo by bus and example b as meaning that we captured the camel and returned it to its enclosure in the zoo.
        In other contexts, it would be possible to understand both examples differently: if the zoo’s bus had been stolen and abandoned at another location, we could have taken the bus back to its rightful location, the zoo; and if we found an escaped camel that was tame enough, we could have mounted it and returned it to the zoo.
        
        The conclusion is that the two understandings of take in both examples are not represented in the lexicon but are dependent upon the context for enrichment.
- - - - The data for this one are written or spoken text types: conversations, monologues, etc. viewed in the context of their legal, pedagogical, etc. norms of production and reproduction.
    - - The data for this type come from textual evidence of the development of the pragmatic elements under analysis.
  - - - Fanego (2010) tracks the evolution of the DM de hecho in Spanish and finds that it is analogous to that of in fact, indeed or actually in English.
        
        Traugott & Dasher (2002) assume the following correlated paths of directionality in semantic change, viewing pragmatic implicatures as playing a crucial bridging role in semantic change:
        
        Truth conditional———> non-truth conditional
        
        Content———> content/procedural———> procedural
        
        Scope with proposition ———> scope over proposition ———> scope over discourse
        
        Non-subjective———> subjective ———> intersubjective
        
        1 more item...
        
        Another question that this and other researchers have posed is whether this ultimate procedural meaning becomes grammaticalized or conventionalized in the corresponding language at some point of its historical development.
        
        The processes of grammaticalization and lexicalization are, and will continue to be, two of the main concerns of historical pragmatics.
  - - - 2) Does Grice’s distinction between particularized and generalized conversational implicatures help account for how semantic change occurs?
        
        3) Are there additional important factors that need to be considered in accounting for frequently observed types of semantics change?
- - - - Various hypotheses have been put forward about the role of prosody in
        "pollteness and these are now being examined So far, the results have suggested that some of the generalizations proposed In earller work were too hasty.
      - "Another feature that has also been identified as a signal of topic shift is amplitude. According to some scholars (Lehiste 1979, Hirschberg & Nakatani 1996, Swerts 1997, Van Donzel 1999) prosodic phenomena such pitch range, rate, loudness, and duration of inter-phrase pause can have discourse-pragmatic effects related to the topic structure of a text. In this respect, Hirschberg observes that:
        
        "...phrases beginning new topics are begun in a wider pitch range, are preceded by a longer pause, are louder and are slower, than other phrases; narrower range, longer subsequent pause, and faster rate characterize topic-final phrases. Subsequent variation intense features then tends to be associated with a topilc shift."
- - - - Within Cognitive Linguistics, Langacker has confirmed this general perception by statin that every instance of language use “has conceptual import involving four dimensions: descriptive, expressive/emotive, interactive, and discursive.”
    - - Lucy: Ouch!!!
        
        In this option, Lucy’s pain after having hammered her finger is conveyed and expressed but not described.
        
        Lucy: My finger hurts! It’s a terrible, acute pain!
        
        In here, Lucy shows that she has conceptualized the feeling of pain and is describing it by making use of grammar and vocabulary.
        
        These two options, the direct expression and the conceptualization of emotion, are in fact two of the ways in which the relationship among cognition, language and emotion can be seen.
        Foolen explains that there are four ways to see this relationship:
        
        1) There is no direct connection between language and emotion.
        EMOTION > COGNITION > LANGUAGE >
        2) Language and emotion are directly connected.
        EMOTION> LANGUAGE
        3) Language has both a direct and an indirect link to emotion.
        EMOTION> COGNITION > LANGUAGE> EMOTION > LANGUAGE
        4) A final hypothesis would state that the relation between language and emotion varies depending on types of emotion.
- - - - ⬇️
        
        "l. Attitude: the subsystem concerned with our feelings, including emotional reaction,judgements of behavior, and evaluation of things. lt is divided into three further subsystems:
        Affect
        Judgement Appreciation
        Affect is concemed with registering positive and negative emotions or feelings.
        Judgement deals with attitudes towards people's behavior which we praise or criticize.
        Appreciation lnvolves evaluations or things (semiotic and natural phenomena).
        
        Engagement: the subsystent dealing with the source or attltudes and the play of voices in discourse.
        
        Graduation: the subsystem concerned with adjusting the gradability of an evaluation.
      - All the systems and subsystems of Appraisal interact and interrelate in various and intricate ways, which is evidence of the fact that linguistic evaluation is a complex, context-dependent phenomenon, as other authors have also argued. In a more recent publication, Alba Juez & Thompson define evaluation as:
        
        "... a dynamical sub-system of language, permeating all linguistic levels and involving the expression of the speaker's or writer’s attitude towards, viewpoint on, or feelings about the entities or propositions that she is talking about, which entails relational work including the (possible and prototypically expected and subsequent) response of the hearer or (potential) audience. This relational work is generally related to the speaker’s or hearer’s personal, group, or cultural set of values."
        
        These authors also point out that interview,stance and evaluation are not exactly the same thing.
        Stance is an abstract concept, a position a speaker may hold for herself without expressing it, whereas evaluation is the actual verbal realliation or manifestation of the stance.
        
        Evaluation is characterized as a complex, pragmatic, dynamical phenomenon that had many faces.
        
        At the morphological level, evaluation can be encoded in some orefixes and suffixe, such as suffixes ie in sweetie, or the prefix pro in pro-life
        
        Evaluation at the lexical level is normally the easiest to recognize, given that many words or expressions (good, bad, pretty, ugly...) include positive or negative evaluative content ingrained within thei semantic features.
        
        At the syntactic level, evaluation can be made manifest, for instance by resorting to the lexico-grammatical system modality or by changing the expected order of constituents in a clause.