Linguistic expressions as cultural units

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 121-145
Author(s):  
Elke Diedrichsen
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Knowledge Sources ◽  
Communicative Interaction ◽  
Word Meanings ◽  
Cultural Aspects ◽  
Culturally Based ◽  
Linguistic Conventions ◽  
Definition Of

Abstract The paper argues in favor of including cultural aspects in the description of communicative interaction. According to Eco (1976), a linguistic sign is a cultural unit. In order to use it properly, a speaker relies on communicative experience with this unit within a culture (Wittgenstein 1960; Feilke 1996, 1998; Everett 2012). We expand the notion of ‘cultural unit’ by including internet memes found in social media (Shifman 2013, 2014; Diedrichsen 2013a, 2013b, 2019a, 2019b). The term builds on Richard Dawkins’ 1976 definition of a ‘meme’ as a unit that is the cultural equivalent of a biological gene. The paper proposes three knowledge sources for the production and comprehension of these units. The first is semiotic knowledge, the second is common ground knowledge (Clark 1996), and the third knowledge source involves culturally shared cognitive conceptualizations on which word meanings and other linguistic conventions are founded (Sharifian 2003, 2011, 2015, 2017). These three knowledge sources are established through daily interactions and learning processes within a culture (Kecskés and Zhang 2009). The paper characterizes the application of these three knowledge sources for a variety of sign uses. We will also show that a cultural view on pragmatics, as suggested by Sharifian (2017), serves to describe speech acts by identifying their culturally based source. The paper therefore demonstrates that the inclusion of cultural knowledge enables a perspective on communication that goes beyond the analysis of spoken and written words within communities of speakers, as it includes emerging means of communicative interaction in the digital age.

scholarly journals Lying, speech acts, and commitment

Synthese ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neri Marsili
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Good Definition ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Right ◽  
Adequate Analysis

AbstractNot every speech act can be a lie. A good definition of lying should be able to draw the right distinctions between speech acts (like promises, assertions, and oaths) that can be lies and speech acts (like commands, suggestions, or assumptions) that under no circumstances are lies. This paper shows that no extant account of lying is able to draw the required distinctions. It argues that a definition of lying based on the notion of ‘assertoric commitment’ can succeed where other accounts have failed. Assertoric commitment is analysed in terms of two normative components: ‘accountability’ and ‘discursive responsibility’. The resulting definition of lying draws all the desired distinctions, providing an intensionally adequate analysis of the concept of lying.

Lying and Fiction

2018 ◽  
pp. 302-314
Author(s):  
Emar Maier
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Semantic Framework ◽  
Pragmatic Analysis ◽  
Truth Conditional ◽  
The Common ◽  
Maxim Of Quality

Lying and fiction both involve the deliberate production of statements that fail to obey Grice’s first Maxim of Quality (“do not say what you believe to be false”). The question thus arises if we can provide a uniform analysis for fiction and lies. This chapter discusses the similarities, but also some fundamental differences between lying and fiction. It argues that there is little hope for a satisfying account within a traditional truth-conditional semantic framework. Rather than immediately moving to a fully pragmatic analysis involving distinct speech acts of fiction-making and lying, the chapter first explores how far we get with the assumption that both are simply assertions, analyzed in a Stalnakerian framework, i.e., as proposals to update the common ground.

scholarly journals Rater Behaviour When Judging Language Learners’ Pragmatic Appropriateness in Extended Discourse

2015 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 19 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tetyana Sydorenko ◽  
Carson Maynard ◽  
Erin Guntly
Keyword(s):  
Language Learners ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Pragmatic Competence ◽  
Point Scale ◽  
Request Sequence ◽  
Pragmatic Strategies ◽  
Target Speaker

The criteria by which raters judge pragmatic appropriateness of language learners’ speech acts are underexamined, especially when raters evaluate extended discourse. To shed more light on this process, the present study investigated what factors are salient to raters when scoring pragmatic appropriateness of extended request sequences, and which specific aspects of performance they attend to as appropriate or inappropriate. Three judges evaluated request sequences using a 6-point scale, marked appropriate and inappropriate elements of each request, and explained how they approached the rating of each response. It was found that all raters oriented to the appropriateness of a request sequence as a whole, paying attention not only to the request proper but also to all follow-up moves, including appreciation and closing. Additionally, raters oriented to the surrounding context: the same expressions, such as a specific appreciation statement, were rated as appropriate in some contexts and inappropriate in others. Raters also oriented to pragmatic competence broadly, paying attention not only to appropriate pragmatic strategies and expressions in a particular context, but also to such aspects as intonation and cultural knowledge. Finally, while native and near-native speaker tendencies were observed, target speaker norms were not. Implications for pragmatics teaching and assessment are discussed.Les critères selon lesquels les évaluateurs jugent la pertinence pragmatique des actes de langage d’apprenants de langue n’ont pas suffisamment fait l’objet d’études, notamment lors de l’évaluation de longues conversations. Pour éclairer davantage le processus, la présente étude a cherché à déterminer quels facteurs les évaluateurs jugent importants dans la pertinence pragmatique de séquences de requête étendues, et quels aspects spécifiques de la performance ils estiment appropriés ou pas. Trois juges ont évalué des séquences de requête selon une échelle de 6 points, ont indiqué les éléments appropriés et inappropriés de chaque requête et ont expliqué comment ils avaient abordé l’évaluation de chaque réponse. Les résultats indiquent que tous les évaluateurs jugeaient de la pertinence d’une séquence de requête dans son intégralité, portant attention non seulement à la requête comme telle mais aussi à toutes les démarches qui la suivaient, y compris le remerciement et la clôture. De plus, les évaluateurs tenaient compte du contexte : ils jugeaient qu’une même expression, une déclaration spécifique d’appréciation par exemple, était appropriée dans un contexte donné alors qu’elle ne l’était pas dans un autre. Ils ont également considéré la compétence pragmatique globale, notant, au delà des stratégies et des expressions pragmatiques appropriées dans un contexte donné, des aspects comme l’intonation et les connaissances culturelles. Finalement, si les évaluateurs ont observé des tendances de locuteurs natifs ou quasi-natifs, on ne peut en dire autant des normes de la langue cible. On discute des incidences de l’étude sur l’enseignement et l’évaluation des compétences pragmatiques.

scholarly journals The Discourse of Friday Sermon in Indonesia: A Socio-Cultural Aspects and Language Function Studies

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 217-238
Author(s):  
Kundharu Saddhono ◽  
Ani Rakhmawati
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Code Switching ◽  
Specific Structure ◽  
Language Function ◽  
Oral Discourse ◽  
Cultural Aspects ◽  
Local Languages

This research attempted to explain the Friday sermon by analyzing the structure of its discourse, the selection and composing of its topics, the functions of its codes and code-switching, the function of its speech acts, and the characteristics of its language and specific terms. By using descriptive and qualitative, this study found that the Friday sermon contained oral discourse which has a regular and specific structure. The strategies of the composition of the topics consisted of quotation, storytelling, usage of popular expressions. Whilst the forms of the codes and code-switching involve Arabic, Indonesian, local languages [Javanese], and English languages. In addition, the utterances of the sermon contain all forms of speech acts and various terms appeared in the sermons indicating that the Friday sermon functions as a register or usage of language in a particular field.

scholarly journals Reconstructing the Contours of the Copyright Originality and Idea- Expression Doctrines Regarding the Right to Deny Access to Works

2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 921-940
Author(s):  
Michael D. Murray
Keyword(s):  
First Amendment ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Fair Use ◽  
Digital Revolution ◽  
Content Development ◽  
Proper Definition ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Access To Knowledge ◽  
The Right

ccess to innovative scientific, literary, and artistic content has never been more important to the public than now, in the digital age. Thanks to the digital revolution carried out through such means as super-computational power at super-affordable prices, the Internet, broadband penetration, and contemporary computer science and technology, the global, national, and local public finds itself at the convergence of unprecedented scientific and cultural knowledge and content development, along with unprecedented means to distribute, communicate, and access that knowledge. This Article joins the conversation on the Access-to-Knowledge, Access-to- Medicine, and Access-to-Art movements by asserting that the copyright restrictions affecting knowledge, innovation, and original thought implicate copyright’s originality and idea-expression doctrines first and fair use doctrine second. The parallel conversation in copyright law that focuses on the proper definition of the contours of copyright as described in the U.S. Supreme Court’s most recent constitutional law cases on copyright—Feist, Eldred, Golan, and Kirtsaeng—interprets the originality and idea-expression doctrines as being necessary for the proper balance between copyright protection and First Amendment freedom of expression. This Article seeks to join together the two conversations by focusing attention on the right to access published works under both copyright and First Amendment law. Access to works is part and parcel of the copyright contours debate. It is a “first principles” question to be answered before the question of manipulation, appropriation, or fair use is contemplated. The original intent of the Copyright Clause and its need to accommodate the First Amendment freedom of expression support the construction of the contours of copyright to include a right to access knowledge and information. Therefore, the originality and idea-expression doctrines should be reconstructed to recognize that the right to deny access to published works is extremely limited if not non-existent within the properly constructed contours of copyright.

Indeterminacy as Indecision, Lecture II: Seeing through the Clouds

2020 ◽  
Vol 117 (11) ◽  
pp. 617-642
Author(s):  
John MacFarlane ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Satisfactory Account ◽  
General Response ◽  
The Way

One approach to the problem is to keep the orthodox notion of a proposition but innovate in the theory of speech acts. A number of philosophers and linguists have suggested that, in cases of felicitous underspecification, a speaker asserts a “cloud” of propositions rather than just one. This picture raises a number of questions: what norms constrain a “cloudy assertion,” what counts as uptake, and how is the conversational common ground revised if it is accepted? I explore three different ways of answering these questions, due to Braun and Sider, Buchanan, and von Fintel and Gillies. I argue that none of them provide a good general response to the problem posed by felicitous underspecification. However, the problems they face point the way to a more satisfactory account, which innovates in the theory of content rather than the theory of speech acts.

Etiquette Speech Acts in the Aspect of Linguo-Didactics

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
O Trumko ◽  
◽  
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Educational Process ◽  
Communicative Interaction ◽  
Sunday Schools ◽  
Grammatical Categories ◽  
Initial Stage ◽  
Children Of Migrant Workers

Abstract. The works of M. Kurushina, I. Linchak, I. Lysenko, M. Shevchenko, H. Sokolova, T. Plotnikovа, D. Polyakov, I. Valchenko and І. Zozula are devoted to the issue of teaching methods in a foreign language audience at the beginner level in Ukrainian linguistics. They study special features of the formation of reading and speaking skills in the Ukrainian language. They examine the types of lexical units, grammatical categories, multi-genre texts that are appropriate for studying at the initial stage. Modern methods of teaching Ukrainian as a foreign language are based on the communicative approach, which resulted in a paradigm shift from the study of vocabulary and grammar to language acquisition through speech acts as ways of communicative interaction in specific communication situations. At the beginner level of learning the Ukrainian as a foreign language, speakers (foreigners studying in Ukraine, students of Ukrainian Studies in the world, the Ukrainian diaspora, children of migrant workers studying at Saturday and Sunday schools abroad) should master the skills of realizing the following etiquette speech acts: apologies, greetings, wishes, thanks, congratulations and farewells. In this regard, the present paper considers features of realization of etiquette speech acts to successfully introduce them into the educational process of Ukrainian as a foreign language at the beginner level (A1). The paper outlines a set of etiquette speech acts, which are studied in a foreign language audience at the beginner level and describes the socio-cultural context of their realization, communicative situation, an addresser / addressee status, communicative goal. It also identifies lexical and grammatical means for the verbalization of etiquette speech acts, which will be studied by foreign language speakers at the beginner level. These are utterances and lexemes that form the content of the relevant speech acts to meet the communicative needs at the beginner level (phrases of greetings and farewells, names of the holidays, names of abstract concepts, etc.). A set of grammatical categories is specified for making correct utterances: indirect cases of nouns and personal pronouns, exclamatory case of nouns; for correct naming of the addressee: conjugation of verbs (to greet / to wish) in the present tense, noun-adjective agreement, examples of verb government, etc. The object of the analysis is also language means of forms of address to the interlocutor, which belong to the global rules of communication, determine its tone, and the violation of which often causes communicative deviations in the Ukrainian language. A system of exercises and tasks for reading, listening, developing monologue and dialogic speech provides effective learning of the etiquette speech acts.

Redressing Socio-Cultural Insensitivity

2010 ◽  
pp. 66-85
Author(s):  
Karim A. Remtulla
Keyword(s):  
Adult Education ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
Cultural Sensitivity ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Global Workforce ◽  
Diverse Field ◽  
Culturally Based ◽  
E Learning ◽  
Learning Scenarios ◽  
Learning Research

This chapter concerns many of the challenges facing socio-cultural researchers of workplace e-learning when attempting a social critique of workplace elearning. These obstacles include finding a common ground to begin a socio-culturally based research and study of workplace e-learning as well as using an approach that authentically balances ‘distance’ and ‘education’ so that distance education does not become a ‘distant education’. The overwhelming emphasis on the technological artefacts of workplace e-learning are not having the expected impacts on workplace adult education and training to the degree so profoundly anticipated by so many. The research and study of workplace e-learning as a socio-culturally negotiated ‘idea’ may be one such way. To do this, notions of social theory, taxonomy, and the researcher, as they relate to the field of adult education, and for a global workforce of adult learners, now become necessary. The complexity of approaching the diverse field of adult education with respect to social theory is explained, as are some of the challenges of applying the socio-cultural sensitivity taxonomy by using adult education as a backdrop for understanding workplace e-learning. ‘Socio-cultural Sensitivity Taxonomy for Workplace E-learning’ is presented and comprises four basic elements: (a) a context (social change) and an impetus (social responsibility) for a socio-culturally based research and study of workplace e-learning; (b) two outcomes (normalization and universalization) of technological artefactual approaches to workplace e-learning research and study; (c) two dominant cultural paradigms (commodified knowledges and innovative artefact) shaping workplace e-learning historicity in organizations; and, (d) four workplace e-learning scenarios (instrumental instruction, rational training, dehumanizing ideologies, and social integration), that all present socio-cultural impacts for the workforce from socio-culturally insensitive, technological artefactual approaches to workplace e-learning research and study. Figure 1 and Figure 2, originally from the Preface, are re-presented here, more formally.

Cross-cultural indigenous training: The South African experience

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 605-621
Author(s):  
Zana Marovic
Keyword(s):  
Indigenous Knowledge ◽  
South African ◽  
Traditional Healers ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Cultural Perspective ◽  
The South ◽  
Cultural Aspects ◽  
Western Psychology ◽  
Indigenous Paradigm

In this paper, the author explores the relevance of indigenous training from a cross-cultural perspective. We start by examining the broader context of traditional Western psychology and its relevance in a multicultural society. A brief description of the indigenous paradigm is followed by a discussion of differences between Western and indigenous psychology, and a proposal of cultural eclecticism as a potential frame for their integration. Next, we discuss the South African context in relation to comparative-cultural aspects of medical and psychological services.  The author’s clinical experience informs her increased awareness of culturally inadequate service at the state hospital, developing curiosity about African indigenous healing, and subsequent encounters and collaboration with African traditional healers. Ultimately, the author develops culturally sensitive training that explores cultural biases and generates cross-cultural knowledge and competence.  In conclusion, the author advocates that in the area of globalisation and multicultural societies, psychological training and clinical practice, should include dialogue and facilitate collaboration between Western and indigenous knowledge, hopefully leading to a more holistic and culturally inclusive service to a population of different backgrounds. Such collaboration and integration of Western and indigenous knowledge may be a source of professional stimulation as well as a benefit to health-care consumers.

Trust in Virtual Communities

2008 ◽  
pp. 2500-2504
Author(s):  
Eun G. Park
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Communities ◽  
Virtual Community ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Trust Building ◽  
Web Based ◽  
Trust Establishment ◽  
Cultural Aspects ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Technical Solutions

Trust is one of the key factors that emerged as a significant concept in virtual communities. Trust is so complicated that it is hard to define in one standardized way. Trust issues have evolved into two major ways in the fields of virtual community and security. Among a huge literature concerning trust in virtual communities, a majority of literature addresses technical solutions on trust-building by providing new Web-based applications. They range from human users authorization, semantic Web, agent technologies and access control of network to W3C standardization for content trust and security. Some examples include AT&T’s Policymaker or IBM’s Trust Establishment Module (Blaze, Feigenbaum, & Lacy, 1996; Herzberg, 2000). Only a minority deals with understanding the concept of trust and sources of trust-building from social and cultural aspects. It appears to miss the essence of trust in virtual communities, although an integrated approach is needed for building trust in communication and the use of virtual communities. This article aims to present the definition of trust and relevant concepts for recognizing sources of trust-building in virtual communities. This article also presents future research implications for further development on trust and trust-building in virtual communities.

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