Jef Verschueren | |
---|---|
Born | 1952 |
Nationality | Belgian |
Other names | (official) Jozef F. Verschueren |
Occupation(s) | Linguist, academic, and author |
Academic background | |
Education | Licentiate in Germanic Languages and Literatures M.A., Linguistics PhD, Linguistics |
Alma mater | University of California, Berkeley |
Academic work | |
Institutions | University of Antwerp International Pragmatics Association |
Jef Verschueren is a Belgian linguist,academic,and author. He is an emeritus professor of Linguistics at the University of Antwerp. [1]
Verschueren is most known for his work on semantics,pragmatics,sociolinguistics,and discourse analysis. Among his authored works are his publications in academic journals,including Journal of Pragmatics ,Journal of Linguistic Anthropology,Pragmatics,and Language in Society [2] as well as books such as Handbook of Pragmatics, [3] Debating Diversity,Analysing the Discourse of Tolerance, [4] Ideology in Language Use [5] and Complicity in discourse and practice. [6]
Verschueren is a member of the Academy of Europe [7] and co-founded the International Pragmatics Association (IPrA) in 1986,where he serves as its Secretary General. [8]
Verschueren obtained a Licentiate in Germanic Languages and Literatures from the University of Antwerp in 1974 followed by an M.A. in Linguistics in 1976 from the University of California at Berkeley. Later in 1980,he obtained a PhD in Linguistics from the same institution. [1]
Verschueren began his academic career in 1974 as a teaching assistant in English and general linguistics at the University of Antwerp. From 1975,he was employed by the Flemish Fund for Scientific Research,first as a doctoral student,then as postdoctoral fellow,research associate and research director. He was based at the University of Antwerp,where he took up a professorship in linguistics in 2000. Throughout his academic career. [1]
At the University of Antwerp,where he has been emeritus professor of linguistics since 2017, [1] Verschueren served as Vice Chairman of the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures (1987 to 1991) Chair of the Linguistics Section at the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures (from 1989 to 1991 and again from 1999 to 2001),and as Dean of the Faculty of Arts from 2001 to 2009. [1]
Verschueren has authored numerous publications spanning linguistics,pragmatics,discourse,and ideology. [2] In a journal article co-authored with Jan Blommaert,he explored the connection between language and nationalist beliefs in Europe. This work provided insights into how language functions as a means to advocate and reinforce nationalist ideologies. [9]
More of Verschueren's theoretical work pertains to metalinguistic and metapragmatic phenomena,revealing them as manifestations of metapragmatic awareness,and it identified the mechanisms through which indicators of metapragmatic awareness operate within language usage. [10] Similarly,an article published in Journal of Linguistic Anthropology underscored the significance of interactional processes and the varying levels of significance in communication,highlighting how these factors can lead to contradictions between implied meanings and explicitly conveyed information. [11] Furthermore,he highlighted the importance of maintaining a clear methodological link between empirical data and conclusions in critical discourse analysis,emphasizing the need to consider all observable aspects and acknowledging the dynamic nature of form-function relationships in language. [12]
Verschueren has also studied intercultural communication in migration contexts,urging a shift from essentialist cultural views and underscoring three dilemmas:communicative intent vs. inference,cultural assumptions vs. actual speech,and legal vs. personal narratives in power imbalances. [13] In a 2013 study,he proposed an ethnography of communication approach for analyzing language use,communication-related ideologies,and historical developments within the international diplomacy community. [14] Additionally,his work examined how different language versions of a text may influence interpretations,highlighted the role of pragmatics in shaping public understanding,and emphasized the need for a science of language usage in grasping global social and political differences in a globalizing public sphere. [15]
Verschueren has edited and authored books covering a range of topics including cross-cultural and global communication,ideological studies,and linguistics. In 1985,he authored a book International News Reporting:Metapragmatic metaphors and the U-2 that examined linguistic approaches to international news reporting,focusing on metapragmatic metaphors in The New York Times' 1960 U-2 incident coverage for insights into global media communication. [16] In his book titled Debating Diversity:Analysing the Discourse of Tolerance,co-authored with Jan Blommaert,he analyzed the language employed by individuals and institutions who embrace the idea of diversity in society and found a striking similarity between the discourse of these open-minded individuals and that of radical racist and nationalist factions. [4] Mary Bucholtz,a professor of linguistics at UC Santa Barbara while reviewing the book said "Debating diversity,a pragmatic analysis of official liberal discourse concerning migration in Flemish Belgium,is a thorough,topical,and relevant treatment of the widespread yet near-invisible forms of racism that pervade public discourse on cultural difference." She also praised the authors for their work in emphasizing the way ideologies are formed,demonstrating their flexibility and potential for change. [17]
Verschueren's 1999 publication Understanding Pragmatics is his most-cited publication. [18] In her review of the book,Lynne Murphy said "That this volume is quite different from any other introduction to pragmatics is clear from the first chapter,which does within thirty pages what other books might spend several chapters doing –describing the pragmatic phenomena of deixis,speech acts,conversational maxims,and politeness. Instead of writing a taxonomy of pragmatic phenomena,Jef Verschueren has provided a handbook for thinking about language in use. As he says in the final chapter,the entire book can be taken to be an extended definition of pragmatics. His definition treats pragmatics not as a subdiscipline of linguistics or a subfield of linguistic competence (on a par with semantics or syntax),but as a perspective for the study of language. [19]
Verschueren's book titled Ideology in Language Use:Pragmatic Guidelines for Empirical Research presented an approach to examining ideology in written language,utilizing the techniques,methodologies,and concepts of pragmatics and discourse analysis. [5] In 2022,he authored the book titled Complicity in Discourse and Practice,that provided an analysis of contemporary challenges. [6]
In linguistics and related fields,pragmatics is the study of how context contributes to meaning. The field of study evaluates how human language is utilized in social interactions,as well as the relationship between the interpreter and the interpreted. Linguists who specialize in pragmatics are called pragmaticians. The field has been represented since 1986 by the International Pragmatics Association (IPrA).
Critical discourse analysis (CDA) is an interdisciplinary approach to the study of discourse that views language as a form of social practice. CDA combines critique of discourse and explanation of how it figures within and contributes to the existing social reality,as a basis for action to change that existing reality in particular respects. Scholars working in the tradition of CDA generally argue that (non-linguistic) social practice and linguistic practice constitute one another and focus on investigating how societal power relations are established and reinforced through language use. In this sense,it differs from discourse analysis in that it highlights issues of power asymmetries,manipulation,exploitation,and structural inequities in domains such as education,media,and politics.
Discourse analysis (DA),or discourse studies,is an approach to the analysis of written,vocal,or sign language use,or any significant semiotic event.
In the Japanese language,aizuchi are interjections during a conversation that indicate the listener is paying attention or understands the speaker (backchanneling). In linguistic terms,these are a form of phatic expression. Aizuchi are considered reassuring to the speaker,indicating that the listener is active and involved in the discussion.
Stephen C. Levinson FBA is a British social scientist,known for his studies of the relations between culture,language and cognition,and former scientific director of the Language and Cognition department at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in Nijmegen,the Netherlands.
Language ideology is,within anthropology,sociolinguistics,and cross-cultural studies,any set of beliefs about languages as they are used in their social worlds. Language ideologies are conceptualizations about languages,speakers,and discursive practices. Like other kinds of ideologies,language ideologies are influenced by political and moral interests,and they are shaped in a cultural setting. When recognized and explored,language ideologies expose how the speakers' linguistic beliefs are linked to the broader social and cultural systems to which they belong,illustrating how the systems beget such beliefs. By doing so,language ideologies link implicit and explicit assumptions about a language or language in general to their social experience as well as their political and economic interests.
In linguistics,metapragmatics is the study of how the effects and conditions of language use themselves become objects of discourse. The term is commonly associated with the semiotically-informed linguistic anthropology of Michael Silverstein.
Michael Silverstein was an American linguist. He was the Charles F. Grey Distinguished Service Professor of anthropology,linguistics,and psychology at the University of Chicago. He was a theoretician of semiotics and linguistic anthropology. Over the course of his career he created an original synthesis of research on the semiotics of communication,the sociology of interaction,Russian formalist literary theory,linguistic pragmatics,sociolinguistics,early anthropological linguistics and structuralist grammatical theory,together with his own theoretical contributions,yielding a comprehensive account of the semiotics of human communication and its relation to culture. He presented the developing results of this project annually from 1970 until his death in a course entitled "Language in Culture." Among other achievements,he was instrumental in introducing the semiotic terminology of Charles Sanders Peirce,including especially the notion of indexicality,into the linguistic and anthropological literature;with coining the terms metapragmatics and metasemantics in drawing attention to the central importance of metasemiotic phenomena for any understanding of language or social life;and with introducing language ideology as a field of study. His works are noted for their terminological complexity and technical difficulty.
English as a lingua franca (ELF) is the use of the English language "as a global means of inter-community communication" and can be understood as "any use of English among speakers of different first languages for whom English is the communicative medium of choice and often the only option". ELF is "defined functionally by its use in intercultural communication rather than formally by its reference to native-speaker norms" whereas English as a second or foreign language aims at meeting native speaker norms and gives prominence to native-speaker cultural aspects. While lingua francas have been used for centuries,what makes ELF a novel phenomenon is the extent to which it is used in spoken,written and in computer-mediated communication. ELF research focuses on the pragmatics of variation which is manifest in the variable use of the resources of English for a wide range of globalized purposes,in important formal encounters such as business transactions,international diplomacy and conflict resolution,as well as in informal exchanges between international friends.
Haruai is one of two languages of the Piawi family of New Guinea. The language has borrowings from Kalam. Young men are likely to know Kobon and Tok Pisin,but many Haruai are monolingual. Haruai is also commonly known as Waibuk,also Wiyaw,Wovan,Taman.
Cliff Goddard is a professor of linguistics at Griffith University,Queensland,Australia. He is,with Anna Wierzbicka,a leading proponent of the Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach to linguistic analysis. Goddard's research has explored cognitive and cultural aspects of everyday language and language use. He is considered a leading scholar in the fields of semantics and cross-cultural pragmatics. His work spans English,indigenous Australian languages,and South East Asian languages.
Linguistics is the scientific study of language. Linguistics is based on a theoretical as well as a descriptive study of language and is also interlinked with the applied fields of language studies and language learning,which entails the study of specific languages. Before the 20th century,linguistics evolved in conjunction with literary study and did not exclusively employ scientific methods.
Ellen Contini-Morava is an anthropological linguist,interested in the meanings of linguistic forms,discourse analysis,functional linguistics and (noun) classification;in particular,in the relationship between lexicon and grammar. She specializes in Bantu languages in general,and Swahili in particular.
Farzad Sharifian was a pioneer of cultural linguistics and held the Chair in Cultural Linguistics at Monash University. He developed a theoretical and an analytical framework of cultural cognition,cultural conceptualisations,and language,which draw on and expands the analytical tools and theoretical advancements in several disciplines and sub-disciplines,including cognitive psychology,anthropology,distributed cognition,and complexity science. The theoretical/analytical frameworks and their applications in several areas of applied linguistics including intercultural communication,cross-cultural/intercultural pragmatics,World Englishes,Teaching English as an International Language (TEIL),and political discourse analysis are the subject of Sharifian’s monographs entitled Cultural Conceptualisations and Language and Cultural Linguistics. These books have widely been recognised as laying "solid theoretical and analytical grounds for what can be recognised as Cultural Linguistics"..
Jan Blommaert was a Belgian sociolinguist and linguistic anthropologist,Professor of Language,Culture and Globalization and Director of the Babylon Center at Tilburg University,the Netherlands. He also held appointments at Ghent University (Belgium) and University of the Western Cape. He was considered to be one of the world's most prominent sociolinguists and linguistic anthropologists,who had contributed substantially to sociolinguistic globalization theory that focuses on historical as well as contemporary patterns of the spread of languages and forms of literacy,and on lasting and new forms of inequality emerging from globalization processes.
Media linguistics is the linguistic study of language use in the media. The fundamental aspect of media linguistics as a new systematic approach to the study of media language is that media text is one of the most common forms of language existence today. It studies the functioning of language in the media sphere,or modern mass communication presented by print,audiovisual,digital,and networked media. Media linguistics investigates the relationship between language use,which is regarded as an interface between social and cognitive communication practice,and public discourse conveyed through media.
Akin Odebunmi is a Yoruba Nigerian Professor of Pragmatics and Discourse Analysis in the Department of English,University of Ibadan. Born on December 21,1967,he is a widely traveled scholar in pragmatics and intercultural studies.
Laura Miller is an American anthropologist and the Ei'ichi Shibusawa-Seigo Arai Endowed Professor of Japanese Studies and Professor of History at the University of Missouri–St. Louis. She held various academic positions and jobs in both the United States and Japan before accepting this named chair in 2010.
Culinary linguistics,a sub-branch of applied linguistics,is the study of food and language across various interdisciplinary fields such as linguistic,anthropology,sociolinguistics,and consumption politics and globalisation.
The International Pragmatics Association (IPrA) is a scientific organization that focuses on the study of language use. It was established as a non-profit organization in 1986.