Meaning merger: Pragmatic inference, defaults, and compositionality
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Katarzyna M Jaszczolt
Katarzyna M. Jaszczolt is Reader in Linguistics and Philosophy of Language at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge. She is the author ofDiscourse, Beliefs and Intentions: Semantic Defaults and Propositional Attitude Ascription (Elsevier, 1999),Semantics and Pragmatics: Meaning in Language and Discourse (Longman, 1999) andDefault Semantics: Foundations of a Compositional Theory of Acts of Communication (OUP, 2005). She has published numerous articles on theoretical issues in the semantics/pragmatics interface. She edited and co-authoredContrastive Semantics and Pragmatics (Elsevier, 1996),The Pragmatics of Propositional Attitude Reports (Elsevier, 2000), andMeaning through Language Contrast (Benjamins, 2003). She is also Managing Editor of the book seriesCurrent Research in the Semantics/ Pragmatics Interface (CRiSPI, Elsevier).
Abstract
Kecskes: Linguistic underspecification of utterance content is widely accepted across different frameworks, including the neo-Gricean approaches (cf. Horn 2005; Levinson 2000) and relevance theory (Carston 2002, 2005; Sperber & Wilson 1986, 1995). There is also an agreement that if linguistic underdeterminacy is given, pragmatic inference is required if a hearer is to recover a speaker's meaning successfully. In your Default Semantics, you reject the idea of underdetermined semantic representation, and offer an alternative approach in which semantic representation is established with the help of intentions in communication. This means that intentions “intrude” into the semantic representation, and the semantic and pragmatic components are interwoven. What are the advantages of this one-level semantics as opposed to the modular view? It can be argued that, in a way, Default Semantics is also a modular approach because intentions can be considered preverbal thoughts generated in the “conceptualizer” and linguistically shaped in the “formulator” using Levelt's terminology (Levelt 1989, 1999). Do you agree with this line of thinking?
About the author
Katarzyna M. Jaszczolt is Reader in Linguistics and Philosophy of Language at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge. She is the author of Discourse, Beliefs and Intentions: Semantic Defaults and Propositional Attitude Ascription (Elsevier, 1999), Semantics and Pragmatics: Meaning in Language and Discourse (Longman, 1999) and Default Semantics: Foundations of a Compositional Theory of Acts of Communication (OUP, 2005). She has published numerous articles on theoretical issues in the semantics/pragmatics interface. She edited and co-authored Contrastive Semantics and Pragmatics (Elsevier, 1996), The Pragmatics of Propositional Attitude Reports (Elsevier, 2000), and Meaning through Language Contrast (Benjamins, 2003). She is also Managing Editor of the book series Current Research in the Semantics/ Pragmatics Interface (CRiSPI, Elsevier).
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Articles in the same Issue
- Contextual enrichment of lexical units in utterance interpretation: Evidence from Chinese and English
- A pragmatic reading of Ahmed Yerima's proverbs in Yemoja, Attahiru, and Dry Leaves on Ukan Trees
- A pragmatic analysis of children's interlanguage in EFL preschool contexts
- Meaning merger: Pragmatic inference, defaults, and compositionality
- Interlanguage pragmatics: A response to Andrew Cohen's “Strategies for learning and performing L2 speech acts” published in Vol. 2, No. 3, of Intercultural Pragmatics
- Book reviews
Articles in the same Issue
- Contextual enrichment of lexical units in utterance interpretation: Evidence from Chinese and English
- A pragmatic reading of Ahmed Yerima's proverbs in Yemoja, Attahiru, and Dry Leaves on Ukan Trees
- A pragmatic analysis of children's interlanguage in EFL preschool contexts
- Meaning merger: Pragmatic inference, defaults, and compositionality
- Interlanguage pragmatics: A response to Andrew Cohen's “Strategies for learning and performing L2 speech acts” published in Vol. 2, No. 3, of Intercultural Pragmatics
- Book reviews
