chapter 3: pragmatics commentary on activities
Chapter 3: Pragmatics COMMENTARY ON ACTIVITIES Activity 3.1 You might have come up with interpretations such as these: (16b) We saw her bob down. (e.g. to avoid hitting her head on a low doorway) (16c) We observed her playing cricket and getting out without having scored any runs. (16d) We habitually cut up her waterfowl with a metal tool with jagged teeth. (the additional meanings don’t have to be pleasant!) In English each of (16), (16b), (16c) and (16d) also has the added ambiguity of not being able to tell whether ‘We’ includes or excludes the hearer. This wouldn’t be the case in Mandarin Chinese as it has two separate words for we: za.men, meaning ‘us including the hearer(s)’, and wo.men, meaning ‘us excluding the hearer(s)’. (17b) ‘Hey – Damien! Paint only the walls which have the fluffy white lambs on!’ (17c) ‘Hey – Damien! When you paint the walls, use fluffy white lambs instead of brushes!’ (the additional meanings are allowed to be bizarre)
(18b) The scientist caught sight of the monkey which had run away with the telescope.
(18c)
The monkey with the telescope got painted with spots by the scientist.
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Chapter 3: Pragmatics COMMENTARY ON ACTIVITIES
(18d) The scientist dipped the telescope in some paint and marked the monkey with spots.
(18e) The scientist attended the monkey with the telescope while it was doing weight training.
(18f)
The scientist attended the monkey while it was doing weight training using the telescope.
Some of the above ambiguities are lexically ambiguous – they are caused by certain words having multiple meanings (➔ 8 homophones) and some are syntactically ambiguous – they are caused by the words having different functions within the sentence (➔ 7).You might like to see if you can work out which of the ambiguities above are which. Activity 3.2 Among many others, you may have thought of some of the following sorts of possible acts that each of the utterances might, in the right context, be doing: (25)
York City Football Club beat Manchester Utd 4–3 on aggregate in the Coca-Cola Cup.
Context 1:
Speaker = Manchester Utd fan Hearer = Manchester Utd fan
Chapter 3: Pragmatics COMMENTARY ON ACTIVITIES
Act 1:
Context 2: Act 2:
complaining/doubting Speaker = York City fan Hearer = Manchester Utd fan boasting/gloating/jibing/insulting
(26)
Theeree’s someething eextreemeely wrong with thee <EE> keey on my computeer keeyboard.
Context 1: Act 1:
Context 2: Writing to your lecturer to explain why your assignment is poorly presented Act 2: explaining/excusing/apologizing
Context 3: Act 3:
Writing to a customer services department complaining
On a lecturer’s Powerpoint lecture slide Speaker = Lecturer; Hearer = Student explaining/excusing/apologizing
(27)
If you don’t understand this chapter you might find Grundy (2008) useful.
Context 1: Act 1:
Speaker = Student; Hearer = Student suggesting/advising/recommending
Context 2: Act 2:
Speaker = Lecturer; Hearer = Student suggesting/advising/recommending/demanding/ordering
Context 3: Speaker = Student; Hearer = Lecturer Act 3: querying/mocking (doing the right intonation is important for mocking – as so often wonderfully illustrated by Eric Cartman in the cartoon series ‘South Park’)
(28)
There’s a wasp in your ear.
Context 1: Act 1:
Context 2: Hearer didn’t hear the Speaker’s utterance the first time (presumably because there was a wasp in their ear) Act 2: clarifying
(29)
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There’s a wasp in your ear warning
There’s a piece of fish on the table. Act 1: complaining that the table hasn’t been properly cleaned Act 2: warning someone not to let the cat into the kitchen Act 3: reassuring someone that dinner has not been forgotten Act 4: recriminating a child for raiding the refrigerator Act 5: offering of food Act 6: accusing someone of feeding the cat Act 7: mocking a whinging child (again, doing the right intonation) Act 8: consoling a friend who has just split up with his wife (some people are consoled by chocolate, some by alcohol, so there could be someone out there who might be ever so fond of fish!) Act 9+: and so on …
Here is an example of using plural their for singular non- gender specific singular referent Speaker (➔ 7).
(18b) The scientist caught sight of the monkey which had run away with the telescope.
(18c)
The monkey with the telescope got painted with spots by the scientist.
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Chapter 3: Pragmatics COMMENTARY ON ACTIVITIES
(18d) The scientist dipped the telescope in some paint and marked the monkey with spots.
(18e) The scientist attended the monkey with the telescope while it was doing weight training.
(18f)
The scientist attended the monkey while it was doing weight training using the telescope.
Some of the above ambiguities are lexically ambiguous – they are caused by certain words having multiple meanings (➔ 8 homophones) and some are syntactically ambiguous – they are caused by the words having different functions within the sentence (➔ 7).You might like to see if you can work out which of the ambiguities above are which. Activity 3.2 Among many others, you may have thought of some of the following sorts of possible acts that each of the utterances might, in the right context, be doing: (25)
York City Football Club beat Manchester Utd 4–3 on aggregate in the Coca-Cola Cup.
Context 1:
Speaker = Manchester Utd fan Hearer = Manchester Utd fan
Chapter 3: Pragmatics COMMENTARY ON ACTIVITIES
Act 1:
Context 2: Act 2:
complaining/doubting Speaker = York City fan Hearer = Manchester Utd fan boasting/gloating/jibing/insulting
(26)
Theeree’s someething eextreemeely wrong with thee <EE> keey on my computeer keeyboard.
Context 1: Act 1:
Context 2: Writing to your lecturer to explain why your assignment is poorly presented Act 2: explaining/excusing/apologizing
Context 3: Act 3:
Writing to a customer services department complaining
On a lecturer’s Powerpoint lecture slide Speaker = Lecturer; Hearer = Student explaining/excusing/apologizing
(27)
If you don’t understand this chapter you might find Grundy (2008) useful.
Context 1: Act 1:
Speaker = Student; Hearer = Student suggesting/advising/recommending
Context 2: Act 2:
Speaker = Lecturer; Hearer = Student suggesting/advising/recommending/demanding/ordering
Context 3: Speaker = Student; Hearer = Lecturer Act 3: querying/mocking (doing the right intonation is important for mocking – as so often wonderfully illustrated by Eric Cartman in the cartoon series ‘South Park’)
(28)
There’s a wasp in your ear.
Context 1: Act 1:
Context 2: Hearer didn’t hear the Speaker’s utterance the first time (presumably because there was a wasp in their ear) Act 2: clarifying
(29)
3
There’s a wasp in your ear warning
There’s a piece of fish on the table. Act 1: complaining that the table hasn’t been properly cleaned Act 2: warning someone not to let the cat into the kitchen Act 3: reassuring someone that dinner has not been forgotten Act 4: recriminating a child for raiding the refrigerator Act 5: offering of food Act 6: accusing someone of feeding the cat Act 7: mocking a whinging child (again, doing the right intonation) Act 8: consoling a friend who has just split up with his wife (some people are consoled by chocolate, some by alcohol, so there could be someone out there who might be ever so fond of fish!) Act 9+: and so on …
Here is an example of using plural their for singular non- gender specific singular referent Speaker (➔ 7).
