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2. Aspects of Pragmatics
This part elaborates three sub-points namely utterances, situational context, and aspects of speech situation. Each is explained as follows.
a. Utterances
When people have a conversation, they produce an utterance. Utterance is a unit of analysis of speech which has been defined in various ways but most
commonly as a sequence of words within a single person’s turn at talk that falls under a single intonation counter Schmidt and Richards 2002. They add that
utterances may sometimes consist of stretches of speech shorter than sentences. Moreover, Hudson and Metham 1969 state that utterances are accredited
statement, irrespective of the ‘characters’ and ‘language used’. They add that an utterance is a text which is preceded and followed by pauses and is therefore to be
complete and self-contained. It is a text, which is long enough to be relatable directly to be a context of situation.
The meaning of an utterance is also influenced by the context. With regard to this, Finnegan 1997 states that an utterance as the use of a sentence on a
particular occasion or in a particular context. He adds that the meaning of utterance includes the descriptive meaning of the sentence, along with social
and affective meaning contributed by contextual factors.
b. Situational Context
Context is an important factor in all of pragmatics. Mey 1993 says that pragmatic thinking is context-bound in contrast to strictly grammatical or
syntactic thinking. No matter how natural the language facilities or how PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
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convention-bound their use, as language users one always operates in contexts. With regard to this, context has to be taken into account whenever one formulates
his thoughts about language as rules and principles. Linguists have become increasingly aware of the importance of context in
the interpretation of utterance since the beginning of the 1970s. The implications of taking context into account are presented by Sadock in Brown and Yule 1983
who states: There is, then, a serious, methodological problem that confronts the
advocate of linguistic pragmatics. Given some aspects of what a sentence conveys in a particular context, is that aspect part of what the
sentence conveys in virtue of its meaning… or should it be worked out on the basis of Gricean principles for the head of meaning of the
sentence are relevant facts of the context of utterance.
Another expert has provided a definition of context. Cutting 2002 defines context as the physical and social world and assumptions of knowledge that the
speaker and hearer share. Moreover, context can be classified into three types namely situational, background knowledge, and co-textual context. Situational
context refers to what speakers know about what they can see around them. Background knowledge context is what speakers know about each other and the
world. Meanwhile, Co-textual context is related to what speakers know about what they have been saying.
Situational context is the immediate physical co-presence, the situation where the interaction is taking place at the moment of speaking Cutting, 2002. In
addition, Cook 1989 says that context is the social and physical world which interacts with text to create discourse. He states that people are also influenced by
the situation in which they receive messages, by their cultural and social PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
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relationship with the participants, by what they know and they assume the sender knows.
The example of the situational context is presented by Cutting 2002 as follows. The conversation in the example occurs in the classroom situation. A
male lecturer from London is explaining a mathematical problem to a male pupil from London whose name is Berkam:
Lecturer : Forty-nine? Why you say forty-nine?
Pupil :
Cos there’s another one here. Lecturer
: Right, we’ve got forty-nine there, haven’t we? But here there’s two.
Okay? Now, what is it that we’ve two of? Well, let me give you a clue. Erm, this here is forty, that’s four tens, four ten are forty.
In reference to the conversation above, the situational context is obviously the classroom. Moreover, the lecturer and the pupil are presumably pointing to
either the blackboard or an exercise book. The word ‘here’ and ‘there’ are
demonstrative adverbs indicating a figure in an equation. Meanwhile, ‘this here’ is
a demonstrative pronoun and adverb indicating what is being puzzled over. Without the surrounding situation, the exchange makes little sense.
In reference to the explanation above, it is obviously known that context is an important concept in discourse and pragmatics. Context is the decisive factor
influencing a deeper meaning of an utterance.
c. Aspects of Speech Situation
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