CHIN 428 - Politeness in Chinese Speaking Societies: Introduction to Chinese Pragmatics

Pragmatics studies the ways in which context contributes to meaning. It encompasses speech act theory, conversational implicature, talk in interaction and other approaches to language behavior in philosophy, sociology, linguistics and anthropology. This course introduces students to speech acts (e.g. requests, refusals, apologies, invitations, offers, compliments) and conversational implicature in everyday (e.g. service encounters, daily routines) and professional settings (e.g. business, law, and political settings) in Mandarin Chinese. It discusses realization of Chinese speech acts and conversational implicature as related to Grice’s Cooperative Principle and Maxims of Conversation as well as the Chinese concept of politeness. The course is offered in English.