COD 2009 - D043

Pragmatics: "How to Do Things with Words"

Teachers of language and literature, preferably at secondary and tertiary level. It is aimed at those who are interested in enlarging their knowledge of how we communicate and make sense of texts. It is also aimed at those who would like to exploit this knowledge to analyze plays or oral conversations.

4 sessions, start: 02-Jun

Course detail

Year: 2009
Level: Distance
Language: English
Status: Ended
Lugar: A distancia
Facilitator/s: Martha Patricia De Cunto
Print course
ESSARP Schools
ARS
Exams Schools
ARS
Non affiliate
ARS 220.00

Sessions

Sessions Dates Schedule
1 02 June 2009 Online session
2 12 June 2009 Online session
3 22 June 2009 Online session
4 02 July 2009 Online session

Facilitator/s

Martha Patricia De Cunto

She holds a Master of Arts in Literary Linguistics from the University of Nottingham, UK and is currently doing a PhD in Literature at the University of Buenos Aires. She is also pursuing a Master's Degree in Cultural Studies at UNR. She has been a lecturer in American Literature, Children's Literature, YAL Literature and Introduction to Literary Studies at I.E.S. Lenguas Vivas "Juan Ramón Fernández". She has also taught Creative Writing at ISP “Joaquín V. González”. She has been a teacher of Language and Literature in several schools in Buenos Aires for more than 30 years.
Teachers of language and literature, preferably at secondary and tertiary level. It is aimed at those who are interested in enlarging their knowledge of how we communicate and make sense of texts. It is also aimed at those who would like to exploit this knowledge to analyze plays or oral conversations.

- Handling implicit meaning.
- Applying main pragmatic theoretical frameworks to literary texts and sitcoms.
- Explore the language of drama.
Note: This is a theoretical course with practical implications, therefore participants are expected to do theoretical reading and become acquainted with some technical terms.
Session 1: 1st week
Unit I: Pragmatics: Definitions; Context; Inference.
Unit II: Indexicality: Working with time and place deixis. Deitic centre and centre shift.

Session 2: 2nd week
Unit III: Implicit meaning: Entailments. Implicature. Explicature. Presuppositions.
Unit IV: Grice's Cooperative Principle: Maxims of quantity, quality, manner and relation. Flouting maxims.

Session 3: 3rd week
Unit V: Austin's Speech Act Theory. Felicity Conditions. Locutionary, Illocutionary and Perlocutionary Force.

Session 4: 4th week
Unit VI: Brown and Levinson's Politeness Theory: Positive and Negative Face. Politeness Strategies.
Each unit contains discussions of some pragmatic elements. Participants will read material on Pragmatic elements, see how they work in oral conversations and written texts, perform some tasks and post their answers in the forums. They will also watch scenes from sitcoms and read extracts from plays to apply the Pragmatic models.
Participants are expected to participare actively in the discussion forum and keep up with the tasks.
- Austin, J.L. (1962) How to do things with words. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
- Bennison, N. (1998) "Accessing character through conversation in Professional Foul". In Culpeper, J., Short, M. and Verdonk, P. (eds) (1998) Exploring the Language of Drama: From Text to Context, London and New York: Routledge.
- Brown, P. & Levinson, S. (1978) Politeness. Some universals in language usage. New York: Cambridge University Press.
- Buck,R. A. & Austin,T. R. (1995) "Dialogue and power in E.M.Foster's Howards End". In Verdonk, P. and Weber, J. J. (eds) (1995) Twentieth-Century Fiction. From Text to Context, London and New York: Routledge.
Frank, J. (1989) "You call that a rhetorical question? Forms and Functions of Rhetorical Questions in Conversation" In Journal of Pragmatics 14 (1990)
- Grice, H. P. (1981) "Presuppostion and Conversation Implicature" in P.Cole (ed.) Radical Pragmatics, New York: Academic Press., 183-198
- Grundy, P. (1995) Doing Pragmatics, Great Britain: Arnold.
- Giora, R. (1991) "On the cognitive aspects of the joke", Journal of Pragmatics 16: 465-485.
- Herman, V. (1998) Chapter 3. "Turn management in drama". In Culpeper, J. Short, M. and Verdonk, P. (eds) (1998) Exploring the Language of Drama: From Text to Context, London and New York: Routledge.
- Leech, G. N. (1983) Principles of Pragmatics, London: Longman.
- Levinson, S. (1983) Pragmatics. London: Cambridge University Press.
- Webber, J. J. (1998) Chapter 9. "Three models of power in David Mamet's Oleanna" In Culpeper, J. Short, M. and Verdonk, P. (eds) (1998) Exploring the Language of Drama: From Text to Context, London: Routledge.
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