Speech Act Theory
An examination of J.L. Austin and John Searle's framework for understanding how utterances function as actions rather than mere descriptions of reality.
Latest Entries
Grice's Maxims & Conversational Implicature
How Paul Grice's Cooperative Principle and four maxims explain what speakers mean beyond the literal words they choose, shaping everyday inference.
Deixis & Contextual Reference
Understanding how words like 'here', 'now', 'I', and 'that' anchor meaning to specific spatial, temporal, and social contexts.
Presupposition & Entailment
The subtle background assumptions that speakers embed in statements, and how they differ from logical entailment in natural language.
Pragmatic Inference in AI & NLP
How modern large language models struggle with, and gradually learn to simulate, contextual pragmatics and conversational implicature.
Cross-Cultural Pragmatics & Politeness Theory
Brown and Levinson's framework for face-threatening acts, and how cultural norms dictate indirectness, honorifics, and conversational repair.