Pragmatic Concepts in Discourse Analysis

The analysis of discourse is the study of language in communication. Such a study involves contextual considerations and so it necessarily belongs to that area of linguistics called pragmatics. Pragmatics is concerned with the threetermed relation which unites linguistic forms and the communicative functions; these forms are capable of serving with the contexts or settings in which given linguistic forms can have certain functions. In other words, it is the study of the use and meaning of utterances in relation to their situation. Pragmatics, as an integrated approach to language, has lately acquired growing importance as pure formalist approaches to language are proving inadequate, as they fail to account for the whole process of linguistic communication. So any analytic study of the language of any piece of discourse must adopt a pragmatic approach which takes into consideration such notions as the context of situation, cohesion, coherence, text, co-text, presupposition, inference, and other notions relevant to the analysis of discourse. ! " #$ % # $ & '( )* + ,$ + + ,$ .$ ( / ,$ ' ) $ 0 )*1 2 3 2 ) 4 5 6 78 " 9 : ; 4 < = > ')" ? 4 % Pragmatics !7@ A B'$ C$ <D E FG " < H $ # ) 0' I 5 ; J , % , < ; , < 8 % : : C$ ' "G !K) C$ L)" % M N $ 5 @ 7# H * )4 C$ 2 ) 4 ' 7 O 0' < P ) Cohesion E 1 ! N ) Coherence 9 6G .$ )* C " Q ') / 6R ! Presupposition % L G Entailment ! S ' G Inference 4 B C$ P I : 78 CT Q 4 6 Pragmatics U (Q$ J 78 G (Q) )* % @ C: Journal of the College of Arts. University of Basrah No. ( 54) Vol. (2) (A Special Issue on The Second Scientific Conference of The College of Arts /2010 ) ( 25 ) Introduction : This paper focuses on discourse analysis, using pragmatics in a new combined way called pragma-discourse analysis. It can be said that this is a cognitive approach to both pragmatic and discourse analysis. The aim of this paper is to propose pragmatic view in discourse analysis, combining both disciplines in order to explain the intentional phenomena that occur in most communicative intention of persuading. The first section of the paper consists of a few remarks about the different approaches taken in discourse analysis in general in order to situate our own double perspective combining pragmatics and discourse analysis. The second section is devoted to co-text or the surrounding discourse. The third one focuses on text and texture. We end with a few concluding remarks which is the topic of the fourth section. 1.Context of Situation : This concept was formulated by Malinowski in 1933, and elaborated by Firth in 1957, and ever since a number of linguists and philosophers, such as Hymes and Lewis, have worked over this concept. According to Hymes (1964: 34), the context of situation defines the range of possible interpretations on the one hand, and supports the intended interpretation on the other: The use of linguistic form identifies a range of meanings. A context can support a range of meanings. When a form is used in a context ,it eliminates the meanings possible to that context other than those the form can signal; the context eliminates from consideration the meanings possible to that form other than those the context can support. An understanding of the context of situation is essential to identify and predict the nature of discourse: The more specifically we can characterize the context of situation, the more specifically we can predict the properties of a text in that situation (Halliday and Hassan, 1976:22). Hymes (ibid:72) categorizes the features of context as addressor, addressee, audience, topic, channel, code, message-form and event. The addressor is the speaker or writer who produces the utterance or sentence. The addressee is the hearer who receives the utterance or sentence. Journal of the College of Arts. University of Basrah No. ( 54) Vol. (2) (A Special Issue on The Second Scientific Conference of The College of Arts /2010 ) ( 26 ) Audience: This notion is important in specifying the context, as the presence of overhearers may contribute to the speech event. Topic is simply what is being talked about . Here a distinction has to be made between sentential topic and discourse topic. Sentential topic is a grammatical term which identifies a particular constituent of the sentence. Setting: The term setting refers to the time and place in which a communicative event takes place as well as the physical relations of the participants in the communicative act with respect to posture and gesture and facial expressions. Channel The term channel refers to the means by which communicative contacts are maintained. This term has been referred to in the context of language variation categories as mode. Code: This term refers to the language, dialect, or style of language being used in the communication. Message-form: This term refers to the form intended in communication such as chat, fairy-tale, sonnet ,letter, etc.... Event is the nature of the communicative act within which a genre could be embedded