Ling 140a: Discourse and Pragmatics
Language Use and Meaning


**The Tenniel Illustrations for Alice In Wonderland** Created by Geof Pawlicki and Jim Chamings
"Take some more tea," the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly.
"I've had nothing yet," Alice replied in an offended tone: "so I can't take more."
"You mean you can't take less," said the Hatter: "it's very easy to take more than nothing."

Introduction:

What's wrong with the Mad Hatter?

This and other crucial questions will be raised (and some even answered!) in this course on language meaning in context.

We'll be exploring how sentences are put together into texts and conversations, how speakers and hearers exploit each other's expectations and cooperate (or fail to cooperate) in the process of communication, and how speakers of different languages manage their conversations.


The course has no pre-requisites and satisfies the Oral Communication requirement. This is an Experiential Learning course, so we will analyse actual language data as special homework assignments, to prepare for similar analysis that you will do as a part of your term project.

Readings:

There is one required textbook for the course:
Stephen C. Levinson. 1983. Pragmatics. Cambridge University Press.
There is also a required reader, available from me or the Computer Science Department shortly.

Instructor Information

Sophia A. Malamud
Office: Volen 137
Office hours: Monday 2:30pm - 4pm or email me for appointment

Requirements:

  • Students will be required to do the assigned readings, and to present two of the assigned papers in class.
  • They are also required to prepare questions about the readings for the class discussion, as homework.
  • In the course of the semester, they will complete a few small quizzes and problem sets, covering the concepts so far.
  • In addition, there will be a term research project, culminating in a presentation at a mini-conference at the end of the term, and in a term paper. The paper should be about 7, and no more than 10 pages long. The term project will involve collection (and for some of you, automatic processing) of naturally-occurring linguistic data, or conducting an experiment to explore a topic in linguistic pragmatics. Communication with me about the presentations and the project is part of your grade.

    • Grading:

    Class participation

    10% - obligatory to qualify for a grade

    In-class presentation of assigned readings

    30% (15% each)

    Homework Q&A and Data Sets

    10% - obligatory to qualify for a grade

    Quizzes/Problem sets

    10%

    Presentation at the mini-conference

    10%

    Communication with me & Project planning (intermediate deadlines, meetings, e-mail etc.)

    10%

    Final paper

    20%

    Tentative schedule of classes:

    ling140-schedule.pdf