Pragmatics / Edition 2

by Yan Huang

Overview

Yan Huang's highly successful textbook on pragmatics - the study of language in use - has been fully revised and updated in this second edition. It includes a brand new chapter on reference, a major topic in both linguistics and the philosophy of language. Chapters have also been updated to include new material on upward and downward entailment, current debates about conversational implicature, impoliteness, emotional deixis, contextualism versus semantic minimalism, and the elimination of binding conditions.

The book draws on data from English and a wide range of the world's languages, and shows how pragmatics is related to the study of semantics, syntax, and sociolinguistics and to such fields as the philosophy of language, linguistic anthropology, and artificial intelligence. Professor Huang includes exercises and essay topics at the end of each chapter, and offers guidance and suggested solutions at the end of the volume. Written by one of the leading scholars in the field, this new edition will continue to be an ideal textbook for students of linguistics, and a valuable resource for scholars and students of language in philosophy, psychology, anthropology, and computer science.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199577767
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	01/27/2015
Series:	Oxford Textbooks in Linguistics
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	492
Product dimensions:	6.70(w) x 9.60(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Yan Huang is Professor of Theoretical Linguistics at the University of Reading. He has a PhD from the University of Cambridge and a DPhil from the University of Oxford, and has taught linguistics at both universities. His published work includes The Syntax and Pragmatics of Anaphora (CUP, 1994) and Anaphora: A Cross-Linguistic Study (OUP, 2000). He has also published a number of articles and reviews in leading international journals of linguistics.

Table of Contents

1. IntroductionCentral topics in pragmatics2. Implicature3. Presupposition4. Speech acts5. Deixis6. ReferencePragmatics and its interfaces7. Pragmatics and cognition: relevance theory8. Pragmatics and semantics9. Pragmatics and syntaxGlossaryReferencesSuggested solutions to exercises

Editorial Reviews

"This book is very thorough in its coverage of topics within the field. Mindful of its student audience, it also has extensive study questions, examples and glossaries. My overall impressions is that it is a valuable textbook to anyone in the field of pragmatics." —Linguist List

"This new publication by Professor Huang ... gives a very thorough introduction to this subdiscipling in linguistics, which is becoming increasinly interwined with psychology and neurolinguistics. ... I would therefore recommend this introductory text to any postgraduates or researchers in psycholinguistics." —The Psychologist

"As for textbooks in pragmatics, there have been some on the market (see e.g., Cummings 2005, Grundy 2000, Levinson 1983, Mey 2001, Verschueren 1999), but the present one under review stands out. ... Students of pragmatics, philosophy of language in general, Gricean pragmatics, relevance theory and anaphora in particular will find this textbook useful and valuable. While all topics are introduced in terms accessible to both undergraduate and postgraduate students, this text, authoritative and up-to-date, can serve as a valuable resource for scholars from pragmatics and neighbouring areas of inquiry who wish to keep abreast of advances in the discipline." —International Cognitive Linguistics Association Book Reviews

"[A]n excellent textbook in pragmatics. ... Huang's achievement is impressive." —Journal of Pragmatics

From the Publisher