Introduction to Pragmatics

Betty J. Birner is Professor of Linguistics in the Department of English at Northern Illinois University. She is the author of several books, including The Discourse Function of Inversion in English (1996), Information Status and Noncanonical Word Order in English (with Gregory Ward, 1998), and Drawing the Boundaries of Meaning: Neo-Gricean Studies in Pragmatics and Semantics in Honor of Laurence R. Horn (with Gregory Ward, 2006).

“Birner has made an impressive attempt at simplifying the field of pragmatics and connecting it with real-life situations, unprecedentedly foregrounding its great potential in coming to terms with social issues. Thus, the value of Introduction to Pragmatics goes beyond the audience-borders set by the author and the publisher. All pragmaticians, applied linguists, stylisticians, sociolinguists and other scholars who are interested in the way language behaves in society should find the book an asset.”  (Discourse Studies, 13 May 2015)“Birner’s Introduction to Pragmatics offers graduate students and upper-level undergraduates an accessible introduction that addresses the traditional range of topics within pragmatics through real-life examples.”  (The Modern Language Journal, 10 November 2014)“...this book achieves success and relevancy in ways where other texts fall short." (The LINGUIST List, 9 July 2013)

• Preface xAcknowledgments xii1 Defining Pragmatics 11.1 Pragmatics and Natural Language 21.2 The Boundary Between Semantics and Pragmatics 91.3 Summary 341.4 Exercises and Discussion Questions 362 Gricean Implicature 402.1 The Cooperative Principle 412.2 Types of Implicature 622.3 Testing for Implicature 682.4 The Gricean Model of Meaning 732.5 Summary 742.6 Exercises and Discussion Questions 753 Later Approaches to Implicature 773.1 Neo-Gricean Theory 773.2 Relevance Theory 913.3 Comparing Neo-Gricean Theory and Relevance Theory 983.4 Summary 1073.5 Exercises and Discussion Questions 1084 Reference 1104.1 Referring Expressions 1104.2 Deixis 1144.3 Definiteness and Indefiniteness 1214.4 Anaphora 1304.5 Referential and Attributive Uses of Definite Descriptions 1384.6 Summary 1424.7 Exercises and Discussion Questions 1435 Presupposition 1465.1 Presupposition, Negation, and Entailment 1465.2 Presupposition Triggers 1525.3 The Projection Problem 1555.4 Defeasibility 1575.5 Presupposition as Common Ground 1635.6 Accommodation 1675.7 Summary 1725.8 Exercises and Discussion Questions 1736 Speech Acts 1756.1 Performative Utterances 1756.2 Felicity Conditions 1836.3 Locutionary Acts 1866.4 Direct and Indirect Speech Acts 1916.5 Face and Politeness 2006.6 Joint Acts 2026.7 Summary 2036.8 Exercises and Discussion Questions 2047 Information Structure 2077.1 Topic and Focus 2107.2 Open Propositions 2157.3 Discourse-Status and Hearer-Status 2177.4 Information Structure and Constituent Order 2197.5 Functional Compositionality 2297.6 Summary 2357.7 Exercises and Discussion Questions 2368 Inferential Relations 2418.1 Inferential Relations at the Constituent Level 2438.2 Inferential Relations at the Propositional Level 2608.3 Summary 2688.4 Exercises and Discussion Questions 2699 Dynamic Semantics and the Representation of Discourse 2719.1 Theoretical Background 2729.2 Static vs. Dynamic Approaches to Meaning 2769.3 Discourse Representation Theory 2789.4 The Scope of DRT and the Domain of Pragmatics 2849.5 Summary 2909.6 Exercises and Discussion Questions 29110 Conclusion 29310.1 The Semantics/Pragmatics Boundary Revisited 29410.2 Pragmatics in the Real World 29610.3 Pragmatics and the Future of Linguistic Theory 30210.4 Summary 30410.5 Exercises and Discussion Questions 304References 306Sources for Examples 314Index 318