Volume 3, Issue 2

The goal of this study is twofold. First, it will focus on the contextual enrichment of lexical units in utterance interpretation and discuss how the semantic multiplicity or underdeteminacy of lexical units is specified in context. It is argued here that relevance theory (Sperber & Wilson 1986/1995; 1998) serves as the most suitable theoretical framework to explain the interplay of lexical units and context. Narrowing and broadening, the two main processes of contextual enrichment, are demonstrated through numerous examples from English and Chinese. Second, the study investigates the role of language and/or culture-specificity in contextual enrichment. Kecskes (2003) has suggested that language and/or culture-specificity is involved as a constraint both in salience and contextual processes. I will argue that cultural knowledge constrains various forms of contextual enrichment, and use Chinese examples to support this hypothesis.

Unlike earlier studies that have examined proverbs from the point of view of speech acts, the present article draws on the more recent perspective of pragmatic acts or pragmatic acting. It examines three recent dramas by Ahmed Yerima, the prominent Nigerian playwright and director of the Nigerian National Theatre. In these plays— Attahiru (1999), Dry Leaves on Ukan Trees (2001), and Yemoja (2002), African proverbs display all of the conventional structures and types as defined in the previous literature on proverbs. As Yerima uses proverbs primarily as communication tools within culturally defined contexts, a function-based, rather than a structurebased, approach must be taken to properly understand their role in the dramas. To this end, a modified model of pragmatics for understanding the role of the proverbs, based on Mey's 2001 model of a pragmeme, is offered. It is demonstrated that Yerima's plays employ proverbs with topiccomment, fixed/non-fixed, and poetic/non-poetic structures, and that they include all three types of proverbs—weather, flora/fauna, and cultural—as identified in the literature. Most importantly, it is shown that the proverbs are sensitive to contexts of interaction. Through proverbs, the speakers in the dramas use pragmatic acts, or practs, to use Mey's (2001) term, which counsel, accuse, pronounce, and/or assure. The proverbial propositions are reformulated by the speaker to unveil their meanings, allowing readers, whether or not they are members of the culture, to fully access the dramas. This study on Yerima's plays aims to shift the literature on pragmatics forward while simultaneously providing new insights into contemporary African drama.

This paper presents an analysis of very young EFL (English as a Foreign Language) learners' speech in both high- and low-immersion classroom contexts. The purpose of the study is twofold: to develop a taxonomy of the communicative functions used in the L2 (second language) by fiveyear-old learners of English; and to analyze the distribution of these functions in the different contexts. The taxonomy is based on the functions identified by Halliday (1975) and Painter (1999) in the L1 (first language) of the child. These authors' research is based on their observation of how children learn the mother tongue because they have the need to communicate (give personal information, ask other people to perform actions, and so forth). The present analysis reveals the extent to which the different functions are used by children, both in the L2 and the L1, in different immersion contexts, and concludes by emphasizing the importance of developing classroom tasks that encourage children to use the L2 for purposes similar to those found in mother-tongue interaction.

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?

Andrew Cohen's contribution to the field of interlanguage pragmatics has been significant and fruitful. My aim here is not so much to evaluate his work critically as it is to point out weaknesses in the field of interlanguage pragmatics that are also present in his production. In view of the theoretical developments in the field of pragmatics, it would seem essential that interlanguage pragmaticians should review some of the theoretical foundations on which the field squarely rests.

Douglas Robinson. 2006. Introducing Performative Pragmatics. New York and London: Routledge. 268 pp. (Angela Downing) Roger W. Shuy. 2005. Creating Language Crimes: How Law Enforcement Uses (and Misuses) Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 208 pp. (Sandra Harris)