At the end of the course, students will be able to :
- understand the relations between the language and the context;
- identify the pragmatic values of language units.
Main themes
The course aims at helping the learners to study language usage in the communication, the inferencial mechanisms in the knowledge, the construction of the concepts, the not literal use of the language, the intentionality in the argumentation, etc.
The course also aims to increase students' awareness of the influence and of the consequences of the language on the context (extralinguistic) on one hand and, on the other hand, of the influence and of the consequences of the context on the language.
We shall approach the following subjects :
- the pragmatics methods ;
- the quizmaster ;
- the speech acts ;
- the implicit meaning ;
- the pragmatics maxims.
Content and teaching methods
The course will alternate lectures and verbal interactions analyses. It includes five units:
- the pragmatics methods (the status of the meaning, the difficulties of semantics, the descriptive illusion);
- the quizmaster (the deixis, the utterance, the person uttering);
- the speech acts (the classification, the argumentation, the performativity);
- the implicit meaning;
- the pragmatics maxims.
Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)
Evaluation: the students will have the choice between drafting a work or presenting a written examination concerning the approached theoretical questions and verbal interactions analyses.
A blended learning approach will be used for UCL's students.