What Is Pragmatic?
In some
cases, we commonly find so many different utterances that someone says to us.
Usually, someone talks to us to avoid violent meaning, or to be polite speaker.
For this kind of reasons, we usually use pragmatic to speak indirectly even
directly. The definition of pragmatic is still ambiguous because there are many
definitions of pragmatic, but we can take look at some definitions of
pragmatic. Pragmatics are meaning in use, meaning in context, speaker’s
meaning, or utterance interpretation. That was what I said that pragmatic is so
identic with speaker’s interpretation when saying something to someone. Let’s
take a ook at this simple example, a. do
you know what is progressive metal?
b. no,
I do not like music at all.
In this dialogue, we can know that the speaker B did not
know about progressive metal. Thus, speaker did not answer what the speaker A
meant. From that example we also know that there is a problen in understanding
the abstract meaning instead of the contextual meaning. Commonly, pragmatic
meaning is also ambiguous. Ambiguous means that the speaker says something that
we know, but we do not really know about it, for example,
a.
Have you ever gone
to the theatre to see that movie?
b.
Not yet, but I have
ever watched it in my room.
The hearer meant he/she knew the movie, but she/he give
the ambiguous meaning when he/she said but
I have ever watched it in my room. When we talk about pragmatic meaning, we
know the utterance first, we must know what the speaker means to us. If we do
not know about the speaker’s meaning, we speak unrelevant with the meaning of
the first speaker.
Pragmatic usually speak indirectly because the speaker
should see the level of utterance of
speaking. However, the speaker speaks directly to the hearer to reach their
purpose spontanously. You speak to the point only.
When we
speak to someone, there is a rule of saying something that called as Maxims.
The theory of maxim came from Grice that divided it into four maxims :
a.
Quantity – give
clear information when you speak or you ask, or you answer someone. Do not make
your contribution more informative that is required.
b.
Quality – do not
say what you think/believe to be false.
c.
Relation – be
relevant. Say something that relevant to the speaker’s meaning.
d.
Manner – avoid
ambiguity, be orderly, avoid obsecurity of expression.
The first example of Quantity, let see:
a.
Would you like to
hang out, Maria?
b.
Not now. I am so
busy. (from movie : Harold and Kumar)
In this case, Maria give clear information and answer to
refuse the invitation. Maria does not give an ambiguous answer, she tried to
speak directly, refusing the speaker’s invitation.
Another example:
Harold : what are you doing?
Kumar : I am so high. (Harold and Kumar movie “Go To
White Castle”
In this case, there is a failure in observing the maxims.
Kumar did not give clear information about Harold’s question, whereas Kumar
meant He is cheerful at the moment he was speaking. However, Kumar fail to
observe the maxim, but Harold, in this case, knew what Kumar said to him. It
observe as not being relevant, and flouts exploiting the maxim of quantity
because as I said Kumar did not give clear information. The information was not
informative for Harold.
This is
called as violating the pragmatic meaning. When you,as a speaker, talks to
someone, and you expect to get informative answer, but you do not get it. As
the example above. There are several ways of observing the maxims. It can help
us to choose what language we use to speak, to whom we talk, and to what
purpose we speak.
In
pragmatic also, we can find some indirect speech between the speaker and the
hearer. There are some discussion of indirectness, but I just take an example
and explain what aspect of indirectness we can discuss on. The first one is
indirectness is risky and costly. Let’s take a look at this example:
R : would you like to get a cup of coffee tonight?
V : no thanks.
In order to avoid making a direct speech and it could
hurt the his feeling, so this time to speak indirectness as unrisky. In this
case, R tried to say indirectly that he want to hang out, but V response it
directly. She does not mean to hurt him, but that is it. Indirectness will be
risky if the hearer response it directly, not indirectly. How do we know how
indirect is? There are four factor to know indirectness, they are:
a.
The relative power
of the speaker over the hearer
It means that there is a power of the speaker can say
what they want to say. They have power to speak. For example, Partner Chieftain
: Rold, this work be your responsibility.
I need it tomorrow at 9.00. If we look at this example, we know that
Partner Chieftain has a power to ask him to do that job, and it can not be
refused.
b.
The Social Distance
Between The Speaker and The Hearer.
It means that when we speak to someone that you think
close to you in age, sex, or culture, you do not need to speak indirectly, but
when you speak to someone you think you need to be more polite, you use
indirectness. For example, R is V’s friend: come
on, finish you work quickly, I need it.
c.
The Degree To Which
X Is Rated An Imposition In Culture Y
Sometime we speake to someone that has different
background of culture. When we find this moment, we should speak indirectly
about something we want to talk about.
d.
Relative Rights and
Obligations Between The Speaker and The Hearer.
When you try to say something indirectly, you can measure
you indirectness. To measuring indirectness, we need to see from different
perspective in which it is spoken. There are several ways to measuring
indirectness. As you tell someone about refusing the request or offering the
request, we do not know about it. Let see...
Let’s go
with this example, the short conversation between Harold and Kumar, talking
about Maria whom Harold pretend not to love Maria. (Movie – Harold and Kumar)
Kumar : why do not you talk to her, I think, she interest
in you, Roldy.
Harold : The only girl who are interested in me are girls
I have no interest in.
If we see from this conversation, there are implied
meaning that Harold give to Kumar.
a.
Harold try to
forget Maria because he think maria does not love him
b.
Harold is just lie
on Kumar
c.
Harold does not
want Kumar to know his relationship with Maria.
Another way in interpreting indirectness is from
background knowledge the speaker and the hearer. Let see this example from the
movie “BORAT”,
Borat : may I ask you about a man put his pube to my
anus? ( in Borat’s background, he did not know about gay or homosexual).
If you talk to him about homosexual, according to his
background, he does not know about it, and he will ask you back about what you
have asked him before.
In conclusion of using indirectness in common
conversation, we often use indirect speech in some language people use in the
world, but sometime we must use indirectness for some reasons :
1.
We do not want our
hearer get hurt because of our words.
2.
We try to be polite
3.
We want to show
polite speech to the hearer with an implied meaning we put on it
4.
Sometime
indirectness can be directness if we want to get a clear information
5.
Indirectness is
usefull fro us when we speak with someone from other culture we do not know at
all
Thus, from those five reasons, we can decide to choose
indirect or direct to talk to one’s because talking indirectly can make us
comfortable in conversation, but in some ways instead.
In everyday life, we usually hear someone talk to their
friend is different when they talk to someone older than them. we also hear they
talk to their close people is different with they talk to stranger. That is the
discussion we have to observe. I got several example to observe the language
they use, and pragmatic meaning they use also, and the flouting maxim they have
done.
1.
Harold : what are
you doing, man?
Kumar : Daddy needs to urinate. (Harold and Kumar movie
“Go To White Castle).
In this example, we observe that there is a flout
exploiting the maxim of quantity because Kumar eventually not answering Harold
question, right? If he said, “I need to urinate”. It can be clear enough.
2.
Josh : so, Carl
says you’re a climber.
W : I have done a little. (From movie “SANCTUM”).
Another example of flouting maxims in common conversation
between friend. It was actually not relevant to the question that Josh gave to
W. Why do not she just asnwer yes or not .
however, I think, W use indirect speech to show that she has just became a climber.
Because of that reason, she said “I have
done a little”. And Josh understood she meant to him because they have the
same background knowledge as climber. That is lucky conversation.
3.
Kumar : dude, we
can stay here, get arrested, and end our hopes of ever going to White Castle,
or we can take that hang-glider and make our lead towards freedom?
Harold : I hate you, Kumar. (Harold and Kumar “Go To
White Castle”).
From this example, Harold has failed the maxims of
quality, quantity, and relation because Kumar ask him about his decisio, but
Harold just said “I hate you, Kumar”. From his reply, we can conclude that
Harold was simply answering Kumar’s question and Kumar got his decision. Also,
Kumar in this conversaton used indirect request to Harold, but Harold answered
it directly. It was risky to speak directly when someone speake to us
indrectly.
Hence
from those kind of example, we have observed several failure when using the
maxims in daily conversation, using indirectness speech with direct answer, and
we can see there were many flouting the maxims, it can be quantity, quality,
relation, and manner.
Everything
about pragmatic we have discussed above is a small part of pragmatic learning.
We can learn many things about language because language is always change in
the world. As long as the world is move over, language will become so
complicated. After we learned about pragmatic meaning, in other way, what the
speaker said is what we answer and what the speaker said is what we have in
different way of express our answer.
We can indirectly speech to someone or we become so
direct when we talk to someone although he or she is older than us.
Nevertheless, there are some reason to talk to someone according to pragmatic
rules:
a.
We speak to be more
polite.
b.
We speak no to hurt
someone.
c.
We speak to say
something we should not say spontanously.
d.
We can use
indirectness when we speak, but we need the hearer who understand about what we
said and the answer also necessary.
e.
If we have power
that others, we can ask him to do something.
f.
Social distance
also influence our conversation because talking to close friend with old man is
very different.
g.
Background
knnowledge is also important because it can be unrelevant when you speak
something that people do not know about what are you talking about.
In conclusion, pragmatic can be use to understand what
the speaker says to the hearer. It means pragmatic determine the speaker’s
meaning. Then when you speak to someone, you need to look at the situation with
whom you talk to because it can cause unrelevant conversation between you as
the speaker and the hearer. Also when you speak to someone, you can use
indirectness to become more polite to say something that you do not like or if
you want to refuse somone’s invitation, you need to use indirectness, so that
the hearer does not get hurt with your words.
“ Language is complicated
problem amongst other problems in the world because Language can change
spontanously, Language is different from side to side of the world, people in the
world have their own Language, world has its International Language that is
English Language, Language is Global, Language can relates you to others, and
Language can make your life unique”.
Daftar Pustaka
Shapiro, Greg. (Producer) 2004. Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle. New Line Cinema. United
States. 136 Minutes.
Jay Roach Cohen, Sacha Baron. (Producer) 2006. BORAT.
20th Century Fox. United Kingdom. 84 Minutes.
Wight, Andrew. (Producer) 2011. SANCTUM. Universal
Pictures. Australia. 109 Minutes.
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