235
CHAPTER
8 Metapragmatics
8.1 Introduction
Language use involves choices. In the previous chapters we have examined
the consequences of such choices for language users. One point that we have
only alluded to so far is that language users are self-aware: we are aware not
only of the choices we make when using language, but also the choices of
others.
Consider the following extract from the column You’ve got male in an
Australian newspaper, where the columnist is reporting on an interaction
between a married couple that he recently witnessed. The columnist begins
by describing relevant contextual details about the incident, which involves
his friend, Jeff, who is hosting, along with his wife, a group of friends for a
barbeque lunch. Jeff has just offered a piece of steak to the dog, but it has
been rejected by the dog, so Jeff has picked it up and turned to walk back to
the kitchen:
[8.1] His wife then emasculated him in front of his guests. “Don’t put
that back with the steak. Put it in the bin.” Jeff froze on the spot, his
face a mask of incredulity. I instantly saw his dilemma.
He could meekly let the comment go through to the keeper and
proceed silently to the bin in the interests of a harmonious lunch,
thereby running the risk that his guests would go away thinking
that he’s someone who regularly scavenges for food the dog has
slobbered over and his wife has to admonish him for it.
Or he could have pointed out to his wife how utterly absurd it was
for her to suggest he would do such a thing, thereby running the
risk of upsetting her in front of the guests, spoiling the mood of the
lunch, or seen to be protesting too much to hide the fact that he is
indeed an eater of rejected dog food.
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Culpeper, Jonathan and Michael Haugh (2014) Pragmatics and the English Language. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Pragmatics and the English Language236
Jeff toughed it out with a bit of banter, but I could see in his eyes
that a little piece of him died that day.
(“How to have a long and happy marriage (part 4)”,
Rory Gibson, U on Sunday,
5 February 2012)
By now we hope you will be able to readily observe that the above passage
interweaves allusions to numerous pragmatic phenomena, including particular
referring expressions, pragmatic meanings and inferences that go beyond
what is said, including not only what is implicated but also assumptions about
presumed common ground, pragmatic acts such as admonishing and ordering,
as well as indications of what others think of Jeff and his relationship with
his wife (i.e. interpersonal relations and attitudes). The columnist is, of course,
not an objective observer of events in making such comments, but rather is
occupying a particular participation footing (namely, that of a side participant
who is friends with one of the actors involved). Moreover, there are allusions to
social discourses about what it means to be a (married) man in contemporary
Australian life, which arise in part through the way in which the columnist
makes reference to the other protagonist alongside Jeff as “his wife”, thereby
identifying her vis-à-vis a particular social category or role, rather than using
her first name (in clear contrast to references to “Jeff”). Underpinning these
social discourses are numerous assumptions about what constitutes an ideal
relationship between married couples, as well as (stereotypical) assumptions
about how such relationships are often assumed to play out in reality. Such
assumptions might be widely accessible to users of English around the world,
but inevitably you, our readers, will have your own “take” on this commentary.
And this is only how it should be. Pragmatics matters for all of us, not just for
the columnist and his mate, a point we have made repeatedly in this book.
An important phenomenon underpinning this anecdote is the way in which
the columnist displays awareness of the ways in which participants at the party
themselves would be aware of a whole raft of pragmatic meanings, pragmatic
acts, interpersonal relations, attitudes and evaluations, as well as social discourses
that go way beyond what the wife was reported to have said. In reporting
on possible interpretations of these, the columnist thus makes a number of
assumptions about what the others might have been thinking, including what
the other guests might have been thinking Jeff’s wife thinks of Jeff, as well as
what Jeff might have been thinking the other guests were thinking about what
Jeff’s wife thinks of Jeff, and so on. It is often difficult to talk about this kind
of reflexive thinking, yet it is something we easily accomplish in the course of
using language. This kind of reflexivity, or recursive awareness (briefly touched
on in section 2.5.3), lies at the heart of what is studied in metapragmatics.
In this chapter, we first introduce in more detail what is encompassed
by metapragmatics, and the notion of reflexive awareness which lies at its
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Metapragmatics 237
core, before outlining the three main dimensions of reflexive awareness that
underpin the pragmatic phenomena we have discussed in the preceding
chapters. In our concluding section we discuss how such reflexivity is drawn
upon in negotiating pragmatic meanings, pragmatic acts and interpersonal
relations and attitudes, and so on, in interaction.
8.2 Metapragmatics and reflexivity
The prefix meta, which comes from the Greek μετά meaning “above”, “beyond”
or “among”, is normally used in English to indicate a concept or term that is
about another concept or term. For example, metadata is data about data, metalanguage
is language about language, while metapragmatics refers to the use of
language about the use of language. In order for participants to talk about their
use of language they must, of course, have some degree of awareness about
how we use language to interact and communicate with others. This type of
awareness is of a very particular type, however, in that it is almost inevitably
reflexive. What this means is that awareness of a particular interpretation
on the part of one participant, for instance, is more often than not interdependently
related to the awareness of interpretations (implicitly) demonstrated
by other participants. In other words, in using language to interact
or communicate with others, participants must inevitably think about what
others are thinking, as well as very often thinking about what others think
they are thinking, and so on. And not only do participants engage in such
reflexive thinking in using language, they are also aware of this reflexivity in
their thinking, albeit to varying degrees. We can thus observe various indicators
of such reflexive awareness in ordinary language use.
Consider, for instance, the following excerpt from an episode of the HBO
comedy, Flight of the Conchords. The two characters, Brett and Jermaine, have
just met a lady in the park who was looking for her lost dog. They start singing
a song about being in love with a girl, at the conclusion of which they realise
they are singing about the very same lady they have just met (hence the title
of the song, We’re both in love with a sexy lady). Much of the song involves a
back and forth between the two characters as they attempt to establish who
they are referring to:
[8.2] Brett: Maybe I’m crazy but when did you temporal deixis
meet this lady?
Jermaine: Just then.
Brett: When?
Jermaine: Then.
Brett: Right then?
Jermaine: Right then.
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Pragmatics and the English Language238
Brett: Where? spatial deixis
Jermaine: Here.
Brett: Over there?
Jermaine: Over there.
Brett: Over there, there?
Jermaine: Over there, there, there!
[...]
Both: Oh, oh, oh, oh, no, oh no, no, no, oh no, no no
Jermaine: What?
Brett: Are you thinking what I’m thinking? metapragmatic
Jermaine: No, I’m thinking what I’m thinking. commentary
Brett: So you’re not thinking what I’m thinking?
Jermaine: No, cause you’re thinking I’m thinking
what you’re thinking!
(“Love is a weapon of choice”, Flight of the Conchords,
Season 2, Episode 6, 22 February 2009, director:
James Bobin, writer: Paul Simms)
In the course of this excerpt Brett and Jermaine attempt to establish the real
world referent of “the lady” each is in love with. They begin by attempting to
establish the time they met the girl (temporal deixis), then move to discussing
where they met her (spatial deixis) (see section 2.5). Eventually, they start
to realise they might be singing about the same girl. This metapragmatic
discussion breaks down, however, when Brett’s suggestion that they might be
referring to the same girl (Are you thinking what I am thinking?) is treated literally
by Jermaine. What happens here is that while Brett implies that they are
talking about the same girl, Jermaine only responds to what is said by Brett
(that Brett is thinking what Jermaine is thinking). In that sense, Jermaine’s
response to the reformulation of the question by Brett is strictly speaking
correct (No, cause you’re thinking I’m thinking what you’re thinking). However,
since it is a very complex utterance – about Jermaine’s belief about Brett’s
belief about Jermaine’s thought in relation to Brett’s thought – it becomes
almost impossible to follow in the context of the song. Nevertheless, while
up until this point in the song they have not yet successfully established the
referent in question, it is clear that they are reflexively aware of the other’s
use of language and, moreover, that this reflexive awareness enters into the
language they use in the form of explicit metapragmatic commentary.
Such reflexive awareness does not, however, always surface so explicitly in
language use. As Niedzielski and Preston (2009) point out, participants may
not always be able to articulate their reflexive understandings of language
use, despite such understandings being inherent in that very same usage.
It is also apparent that such awareness may be more or less salient across
different situated contexts. Thus, while metapragmatics often involves the
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Metapragmatics 239
Reflection: The metalanguage of explicit metapragmatic commentary
In the example above, a number of instances of explicit metapragmatic
commentary have arisen. These explicit metapragmatic comments drew,
in turn, on a folk metalanguage. The term metalanguage was introduced
into academic discourse in the work of Alfred Tarski, a Polish logician.
It refers to language that is used to talk about language, and in the case
of “scientific” metalanguage, to theorise about it. In the instance above,
clearly Brett and Jermaine do not use the term think in any scientific sense.
In order to analyse these explicit metapragmatic comments, then, we must
carefully examine this folk metalanguage. In the case of thinking, there are
at least four (inter-related) senses in which it can be used in English, with
the first sense arguably being basic to the other three:
think1
: cogitate (e.g. Brett is thinking1
about the girl he just met)
think2
: infer/presume (e.g. Brett thinks2
Jermaine is thinking1
about the
same girl)
think3
: believe (e.g. Jermaine thinks3
Brett is thinking1
about a different
girl)
think4
: evaluate/judge (e.g. Brett thinks4
highly of the girl he has just
met)
Such metalanguage, in English at least, directs us towards an account of
Brett and Jermaine’s thinking as distinct and separate from what they might
be feeling, but this is not a distinction that is necessarily as salient across
all languages. It is apparent, then, that metapragmatics not only involves
the study of reflexive awareness on the part of participants in relation to
their use of language in interacting and communicating with others, but it
also involves an analysis of the metalanguage those participants inevitably
draw upon.
study of instances where participants attend to communication, that is, where
language is used to “evoke some kind of communicative disturbance” (Hübler
and Bublitz 2007: 7) or “to intervene in ongoing discourse” (ibid.: 1), it is not
restricted to instances that are explicitly recognised by participants, as we
shall see in the remainder of this chapter.
Thus, what we mean by metapragmatics in this chapter is that it concerns
the use of language on the part of ordinary users or observers, which reflects
awareness on their part about the various ways in which we can use language
to interact and communicate with others. It is worth briefly noting that the
term metapragmatics itself was initially coined by Michael Silverstein (1976,
1993), a linguistic anthropologist, who drew, in turn, from work by the linguist
Roman Jakobson (1971) on the metalingual function of language, which refers
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Pragmatics and the English Language240
to the ways in which we can use language to “explain, gloss, comment on,
predicate about or refer to propositional meaning” (Hübler and Bublitz 2007:
2). However, while Jakobson was focused more narrowly on how language
can be used to help participants to understand what the speaker is meaning
in light of what has been said, Silverstein took a much broader view, as he
defines metapragmatics as awareness that helps users to discern the relationship
between linguistic forms and situated contexts (which is what allows
the use of language in interaction to be an ordered, interpretable event).
Metapragmatics in the broad sense advocated by Silverstein is essentially about
anchoring linguistic (and non-linguistic) forms to contexts, a point we have
largely covered in the preceding chapters.1
Metapragmatics in the narrower,
more focused sense of Jakobson, in contrast, is concerned with the use of
language that reflects reflexive awareness on the part of users about their use of
language. In other words, metapragmatics involves the study of “the language
user’s reflexive awareness of what is involved in a usage event” (Verschueren
[1995] 2010: 1), including choices they have made in producing and interpreting
talk or discourse. It thus generally encompasses the study of pragmatic
indicators of this kind of reflexive awareness, and the communicative purposes
to which these metapragmatic indicators are put. It is this latter, more focused
sense of metapragmatics that we explore further in this chapter.
8.3 Forms of metapragmatic awareness
Metapragmatics, in our view, encompasses the study of language usages that
indicate reflexive awareness on the part of participants about those interactive
or communicative activities they are currently engaged in. A number of
indicators of metapragmatic awareness have been identified in studies thus
far. These range from those that are expressed explicitly when language use
becomes the subject matter of speech, through to those that arise implicitly
insofar as the production of talk “takes account of its own nature and
functioning” (Lucy 2000: 213). The latter involves anchoring linguistic (and
non-linguistic) forms to contexts, an area that we have already discussed in
this book. We have therefore only focused on relatively explicit indicators of
metapragmatic awareness in Table 8.1. The four key types listed are (1) pragmatic
markers, (2) reported language use, (3) metapragmatic commentary, and
1
This contrasts with the very broad definitions of metapragmatics as either metatheory or the
analysis of constraining conditions on language use (such as the Cooperative Principle, conversational
maxims, speech act theory, felicity conditions etc.) (Caffi 1998; Mey 2001). The former
involves debate about what constitutes pragmatics and what the field should properly comprise
(a stance on which is implicitly taken by the contents of this textbook, for instance). The latter
is to some extent what the field of pragmatics itself is all about, namely, the analysis of the units
that are constitutive of language use (and which has been the focus of the preceding chapters).
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Metapragmatics 241
(4) social discourses. Underpinning all of these different forms of metapragmatic
awareness is the folk metalanguage drawn upon by users, in this case,
users of English.
Table 8.1 Explicit indicators of metapragmatic awareness
Type Description Examples
Pragmatic
markers
Expressions that signal how
something should be
understood in relation to:
(a) surrounding talk
(b) epistemic status of
what is meant
(c) evidential status of
what is meant
(d) specificity or precision
of what is said
(a) anyway, okay, even, also, but,
however, so, on the contrary
(b) you know, actually, frankly,
undoubtedly, of course
(c) think, believe, suppose,
guess, according to
(d) sort of, kind of, in a sense, so
far as I know
Reported
language
use
(a) Quotative use of
language
(b) Echoic instances of
language use
(a) John said he can’t go.
He thought he sounded angry.
(b) A: I was a bit surprised.
B: A bit surprised?
Metapragmatic
commentary
Situated comments about or
evaluations of language use,
which often involve the use
of metalinguistic descriptors
such as:
(a) linguistic action verbs
(b) attitudinal categorisers
(c) emotive-cognitive state-
processes
(a) Am I complaining?
What are you saying?
(b) That’s not very polite.
He’s a very courteous young
man.
(c) What are you thinking?
I intend to take a day off
tomorrow.
Social
discourses
Elements of metapragmatic
commentary which form
persistent frames of
interpretation (and are often
treated as no longer open
to doubt or questioning)
Value placed on not taking
oneself too seriously amongst
Australian and British speakers
of English
Value placed on closure
amongst American speakers of
English
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Pragmatics and the English Language242
It is important to note that we have collapsed finer distinctions in some
cases for the sake of simplicity in our presentation of these indicators.
Categories such as pragmatic markers, for instance, can be further sub-divided
by making distinctions between discourse markers, sentence adverbs,
hedges, self-referential expressions, explicit intertextual links and so on (see
Verschueren 2000). Such classifications, and the theoretical debates around
them, are indeed important, at least to a point, but they often neglect the fact
that the same indicator can often be used for a range of quite distinct functions.
Therefore we have chosen to focus instead on exemplifying how these
different indicators can be used by participants to display different forms of
reflexive awareness in language use. It is to these different kinds of reflexivity
that we now turn.
We propose that there are three key types of reflexive awareness underpinning
this ability to recognise or talk about pragmatic phenomena: metacognitive
awareness, metarepresentational awareness and metacommunicative
awareness (see also Lucy 2000). Metacognitive awareness refers to reflexive
presentations of the cognitive status of information, such as whether it is
known, new, expected (and so on) information for participants (see especially
Chapter 3). Metarepresentational awareness involves reflexive representations
of the intentional states of self and other (as in their beliefs, thoughts, desires,
attitudes, intentions etc.), or what we have earlier termed pragmatic meaning
representations (see Chapter 4). Finally, metacommunicative awareness refers
to reflexive interpretations and evaluations of talk, which arise as a consequence
of our awareness of self and other as social beings (see Chapters 5–7). There is,
in addition, a specific form of metacommunicative awareness worth drawing
attention to in passing, namely, metadiscursive awareness. The latter refers
to a persistent frame of interpretation and evaluation that has become objectified,
or reified, in ongoing metapragmatic commentary about a particular
pragmatic phenomenon. Metadiscursive awareness underpins particular ideologies
relating to language use, that is to say, ways of thinking about language
and language use that intersect with ways in which language is actually used.
Given the evident influence of such ideologies vis-à-vis language use, metadiscursive
awareness is arguably deserving of analysis in its own right, separate
and distinct from the metacommunicative awareness through which it is ultimately
derived, although space does not permit us to do so here.
We shall now discuss each of these different forms of metapragmatic awareness
in greater detail.
8.3.1 Metacognitive awareness
Metacognitive awareness refers to the reflexive presentations of the cognitive
status of information and understandings of context and common ground
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Metapragmatics 243
amongst participants. It includes reflexive awareness about who knows what
and how certain they are about it (i.e. its epistemic status), and what counts
as new or given information for participants (i.e. its given/new status), as well
as the expectations of participants about what can, may or should happen
(i.e. its deontic status). In other words, it involves reflexive presentations
amongst participants of cognitive-emotive states or processes, such as what
is assumed to be known (or not known), their respective attitudes, expectations
and so on.
This may involve speakers directing the attention of recipients to particular
elements in the context, for instance. We have already discussed one of the
key ways in which this occurs in Chapter 2, namely, through referring expressions.
In section 2.5.1, we introduced the Accessibility Marking Scale and the
Givenness Hierarchy. These both involve the speaker making assumptions
about how accessible the referent is for the recipient. More generally, the use
of referring expressions involves a consideration of the assumed cognitive
status of the referents in question for the recipient. The cognitive status of
a referent can range from being in focus, through being in memory but not
currently active, to being completely unknown. The metapragmatic exchange
between Brett and Jermaine that we discussed in the prior section is, in part,
an example of metacognitive awareness surfacing in interaction. The confusion
arises in this instance because while the referent should have been in
focus for both of them (at least from the perspective of the viewing audience),
they treat the referent as unknown to the other. In other words, the interaction
is driven by both parties assuming the other participant does not know
this contextual information.
Reflexive presentations of information may also involve attempts by
speakers to direct the attention of the recipient to some particular information.
We briefly discussed this in Chapter 3, when we introduced discourse
markers, particles and formulae that speakers use to direct the attention of
recipients to particular information, or more generally, to indicate how recipients
should take or process upcoming information (section 3.3.2). We also
briefly touched upon this issue in Chapter 4, when we discussed the particle
yet, which is analysed by (neo-)Griceans as giving rise to a conventional implicature.
For the sake of simplicity, we did not point out that Relevance theorists
offer a somewhat different account of such phenomena, namely, their claim
that there is another kind of meaning that contrasts with the conceptual or
representational type of pragmatic meaning, which was the primary focus
of Chapter 4. This second type of meaning is termed procedural meaning
(Blakemore 1987, 2002; Wilson and Sperber 1993), and is assumed to encode
“constraints on the inferential phase of comprehension” (Wilson and Sperber
1993: 102) rather than having any conceptual content. Conventional implicatures,
for example, have thus been re-analysed by Relevance theorists as
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Pragmatics and the English Language244
forms of procedural meaning, in part because it is well-known that the meanings
of words such as but, even, and yet are notoriously difficult to be brought
to consciousness. Relevance theorists argue that this difficulty indicates we
are dealing with a fundamentally different kind of meaning. Here, we suggest
that a metapragmatic account allows us to acknowledge that while certain
linguistic units do not necessarily have any conceptual “content” that can
be readily pinned down, they nevertheless do indicate a particular cognitive
state or stance on the part of the speaker vis-à-vis the recipient.
Let us reconsider the example of the use of yet from the novel High Fidelity:
[8.3] (Rob is desperate to find out whether his ex-girlfriend, Laura, has
slept with Ian)
Rob: Is it better?
Laura: Is what better?
Rob: Well. Sex, I guess. Is sex with him better?
Laura: Jesus Christ, Rob. Is that really what’s bothering you?
Rob: Of course it is.
Laura: You really think it would make a difference either way?
Rob: I don’t know.
Laura: Well, the answer is that I don’t know either. We haven’t done
it yet.
(Nick Hornby, High Fidelity, 1995: 95)
The question for Rob is what is meant by yet here? It belongs to the general
class of discourse markers used to indicate contrast. But this begs the question
of just what is being contrasted here. From a metacognitive perspective, Laura
is reflexively presenting her expectations vis-à-vis Rob. In other words, Laura
indicates that what she expects might happen in her relationship with Ian (i.e.
a possibility), contrasts with what Rob might expect should, or to be precise,
should not happen (i.e. an obligation). The upshot is what we have here, a
contrast in their respective expectations in regard to her relationship with Ian
(and by implication, with Rob). This contrast involves a reflexive display of the
cognitive status of particular expectations on the part of those participants.
Another well-known instance of a pragmatic marker that can be analysed as
reflexively displaying awareness of the cognitive status of information for participants
is the use of oh. Heritage (1984a) was the first to demonstrate that when
oh is produced in response to information, it indicates (on the surface at least) a
change of knowledge state on the part of a participant. In other words, it is used
to register this information as new in some way for that user. Take the excerpt
below, which is taken from a recording of a conversation between two friends:
[8.4] 1 J: When d’z Sus’n g[o back.=
2 M: [.hhhh
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Metapragmatics 245
3 J: =[( )
4 M: =[u-She: goes back on Satida:y=
5 J: =O[h:.
6 M: [A:n’ Stev’n w’z here (.) all las’ week...
(adapted from Heritage 1984a: 308)
After hearing the information offered by Mel that Jack sought (i.e. when
Susan is going back), he responds with oh in line 5. Heritage argues that when
oh occurs in this position, and is followed by a shift to a new action (in this
particular example, an assertion of other information by Mel about Steven),
the user reflexively displays the assumption that the information is somehow
new to him or her. In other words, the use of oh in this way involves issues
of epistemics, that is, how certain a participant is about information, and
whether it is taken to be given or new. It thus indexes reflexive awareness of
the cognitive status of information for the participants in a manner analogous
to the example of yet, which we considered above. It is important to
note, however, that the particular cognitive state that such pragmatic markers
reflexively index depends on their sequential environment. Oh may also be
used to register or mark a change of state in orientation or awareness, such
as when noticing something, as well as to foreshadow possible forthcoming
trouble in responding to a question (see Heritage 1998).
Actually is yet another example of a pragmatic marker where the metapragmatic
function of the particle depends on its sequential environment. In early
work it was characterised as marking an assumption as “true at one particular
point in the past time (which the speaker does not further specify) but
not necessarily at any other point in time” (Watts 1988: 254). In subsequent
research, the work that actually does was broadened to include the negotiation
of (often implicit) claims that contradict the recipient’s expectations
(Smith and Jucker 2000). These expectations relate specifically to either (1) a
user’s commitment to a particular claim, (2) an affective evaluation of a fact
or set of facts, or (3) a judgement about the newsworthiness of information.
Consider the following excerpt from a conversation between two undergraduate
students:
[8.5] Ann: do you like psychology?
Betty: er yeah, actually I think it’s really interesting.
(adapted from Smith and Jucker 2000: 223)
Here, Betty marks the information in her response as unexpected in that she
is making a stronger claim (i.e. she really likes it) than the candidate answer
offered in the initial question (i.e. she likes it). Through the formulation of
her question, then, Ann indicates, in the form of an implicated premise (see
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Pragmatics and the English Language246
section 4.3.2), that Betty wouldn’t be expected to “really like” psychology. It is
towards this expectation that Betty orients through her use of actually.2
Pragmatic markers are very complex. As we have seen, they are not restricted
to reflexive presentations or displays of the cognitive status of information
or understandings of context/common ground amongst participants (i.e.
markers of metacognitive awareness). They may also involve other kinds of
reflexivity, both metarepresentational and metacognitive awareness (which
we will discuss in further detail in the following subsections), and so they can
evidently indicate various different types of metapragmatic awareness. It is for
this reason that pragmatic markers are so difficult to define categorically. It is
also for this reason that we propose that they are analysed more productively
from the perspective of different types of reflexive awareness. In the case of
metacognitive awareness, we are dealing with the reflexive presentation of the
cognitive status of information.
This cognitive status can encompass a number of different dimensions, as
summarised in Figure 8.1. There are arguably three key loci for the cognitive
status of information. The first is the so-called epistemic gradient between
participants (Heritage 2012; Heritage and Raymond 2012). This involves the
degree to which participants are aware (or, more accurately, display awareness
of) who knows what, and to what degree of certainty. This degree of certainty
lies on a gradient from “definitively knowing” (K+
) through to “not knowing”
(K–
). A second related dimension is that between given and new information.
The former is treated as lying within the common ground of participants,
while the latter is treated as lying outside of it. Third, we can also talk of
reflexive awareness in relation to expectations. The expectations be may be
deontic (i.e. what participants think should or ought to be the case), probabilistic
(i.e. what participants think is likely to be the case), or volitional (i.e. what
participants want to be the case) in nature.
2
Note that in example (8.5), B’s response can be divided into two distinct analytical units: “er
yeah” and “I think it’s really interesting”. The pragmatic marker “actually” is thus in utterancefinal
position here on this analysis (although not in turn-final position).
epistemic gradient
given/new
K+
K– COGNITIVE STATUS
expectations
deontic probabilistic volitional
Figure 8.1 Loci of metacognitive awareness
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Metapragmatics 247
Pragmatic markers can be used to index reflexive awareness of all these
different forms of cognitive status amongst participants, as we have discussed.
Most importantly, the same linguistic form, as we have seen, can be used to
present different cognitive states depending on its sequential environment.
Accounts that treat pragmatic markers as either encoding constraints on the
inferential phase of comprehension (i.e. as forms of procedural meaning), or as
conventionally implicating non-truth-conditional meaning (i.e. as instances
of conventional implicature), are arguably not able to do sufficient justice to
such interactional nuances, although, to be fair, such accounts were not originally
designed to do so.
8.3.2 Metarepresentational awareness
Metarepresentational awareness, as we noted earlier, involves reflexive representations
of the intentional states of self and other (as in their beliefs, thoughts,
desires, attitudes, intentions etc.). It is thus most salient when we come to
consider pragmatic meaning representations (see Chapter 4). This is because a
particular meaning representation, for instance, what is (literally) said, can be
embedded within another meaning representation, for instance, an attitude.
Instances where there is a lower-order representation (e.g. what is literally said)
embedded within a higher-order representation (e.g. an attitude) are termed
metarepresentations, that is, a “representation of a representation” (Wilson
2000: 411). Irony, for example, arguably constitutes a case of metarepresentation
where a meaning representation attributed to a particular speaker (or set
of speakers) is further embedded within “a wry, or sceptical, or mocking attitude”
towards that attributed meaning representation (Wilson 2000: 433).
Consider the following example from a segment broadcast throughout
the US, where comedian Steven Colbert spoke at the 2006 White House
Correspondents’ Dinner for then US President George W. Bush:
[8.6] Mr. President, my name is Stephen Colbert, and tonight it is my
privilege to celebrate this president, ‘cause we’re not so different,
he and I. We both get it. Guys like us, we’re not some brainiacs on
the nerd patrol. We’re not members of the factinista. We go straight
from the gut. Right, sir? That’s where the truth lies, right down here
in the gut. Do you know you have more nerve endings in your gut
than you have in your head? You can look it up. Now, I know some
of you are going to say, “I did look it up, and that’s not true.” That’s
‘cause you looked it up in a book. Next time, look it up in your gut.
I did. My gut tells me that’s how our nervous system works.
(“Colbert Bush Roast”, White House Correspondent’s’ Dinner,
Washington DC, 29 April 2006, C-SPAN Cable television;
cf. Gibbs 2012: 110–111)
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Pragmatics and the English Language248
Colbert is alluding to the way former US President George W. Bush frequently
made references in the media to “trusting his gut” when making decisions.
Whether the ironic attitude (higher-order representation) Colbert expresses
towards this kind of decision-making (lower-order representation) is wry,
sceptical or even mocking is open to debate (LaMarre et al. 2009) (see reflection
box in section 5.2.1 for further discussion). But the point stands that
we are dealing here with a meaning representation being embedded within
another meaning representation, and thus metarepresentational awareness
on the part of users.
Relevance theorists have argued that irony, reporting talk (including quotations
of others’ talk), echoing questions and interrogatives can be productively
analysed as involving higher-order representations within which
lower-order representations are embedded. Quotations, for instance, involve
a higher-order utterance that attributes a lower-order utterance to someone
other than the speaker. Wilson (2000) suggests that metarepresentations inevitably
involve resemblances, which are either metalinguistic (i.e. involve a
resemblance in form) or interpretive (i.e. involve a resemblance in semantic
or logical properties). Direct quotations – where the speaker claims the words
being reported match exactly what the prior speaker literally said – involve
metalinguistic resemblances, while indirect quotations – where the speaker
claims the words being reported match what the prior speaker was taken to
mean – involve interpretive resemblances. Irony, on the other hand, involves
only interpretive resemblances, through which the speaker echoes a tacitly
attributed thought or utterance with a tacitly dissociative attitude (Wilson
and Sperber 1992). This thought or utterance may be attributed to someone
specifically or may simply be attributed to the participants’ common ground
(e.g. cultural stereotypes), while the dissociative attitude may be wry, sceptical
or mocking, as we noted in relation to the example from Colbert (see also the
example of sarcasm [4.27] we discussed near the end of section 4.3.2).
Reflection: “He-Said-She-Said” in African-American Vernacular
English (AAVE) and recursivity in reporting talk
While at their most basic level metarepresentations involve embedding
a meaning representation relative to another meaning representation,
these initial metarepresentations can be further embedded within other
metarepresentations. This embedding is termed recursivity. The potential
for recursive embedding of representations means that instances of reported
talk, for example, can involve multiple levels of representations.
Consider, for instance, the practice termed “He-Said-She-Said” that is
claimed to occur in AAVE (Goodwin 1990), particularly in disputes about
gossip amongst pre-adolescent, working class African-American girls. The
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Metapragmatics 249
One challenge facing the Relevance theoretic account of irony as echoic,
however, is the relationship between the examples of utterance-based verbal
irony that they generally analyse, and instances of situational irony. The
latter is generally understood to involve some kind of incongruity between
what might be expected and what actually occurs. Littman and Mey (1991)
and Clift (1999) have both argued that any account of irony should be able
to deal with all kinds of irony, not just verbal irony à la relevance theory. Let
us consider for a moment the rather savage situational irony that arises in
practice involves one participant accusing another participant of talking
“behind her back”. More specifically, the accuser uses “a series of embedded
clauses to report a series of encounters in which two girls were talking
about a third” (Goodwin and Goodwin 2004: 232). In the example below,
taken from recordings of conversations between some African-American
girls, Annette is accusing Benita of talking behind her back:
[8.7] Annette (to Benita): And Tanya said
that you said
that I was showin’ off
just because I had that bl:ouse on.
(Goodwin and Goodwin 2004: 233)
Annette implicates this accusation by reporting on what Tanya has said
Benita had previously said. It involves a complex form of recursive quotation
where Annette is speaking to Benita about what Tanya told Annette (and
Tanya said) that Benita said to Tanya (that you said) about Annette (that I
was showing off just because I had that blouse on). Hence the term “He-SaidShe-Said”
or, to be more precise in this case, “SheTanya
-Said-SheBenita
-Said”.
This involves, from a metapragmatic perspective, a metarepresentation
embedded within a higher-order metarepresentation. That is:
[a higher-order utterance]3
about [an attributed higher-order utterance]2
about [an attributed lower-order utterance]1
The use of recursive quotation is not, of course, unique to pre-adolescent,
working class African-American girls. But it is used here in a specific way,
namely, as a response to situations where an “instigator” (here Tanya) tells
someone (Annette) that another girl (Benita) has been talking about her
behind her back. The He-Said-She-Said practice is thus not only a way for
someone to hold another person to account for gossiping behind her back
about her (or him), but also to implicate yet another person as the source
of this accusation. It therefore becomes a way of establishing schisms and
alliances within what is ostensibly a group of friends.
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Pragmatics and the English Language250
the following news report that originated from an international news agency
based in the US:
[8.8] A man ended up in hospital after ordering a Triple Bypass burger
at the Heart Attack Grill, a Las Vegas restaurant that jokingly warns
customers “this establishment is bad for your health.”
Laughing tourists were either cynical or confused about whether
the man was really suffering a medical episode amid the “doctor,”
“nurses” and health warnings at the Heart Attack Grill, restaurant
owner Jon Basso said yesterday.
“It was no joke,” said Basso
[section omitted]
Giggles can be heard on the soundtrack of amateur video showing
the man on a stretcher being wheeled out of the restaurant where
patrons pass an antique ambulance at the door and a sign: “Caution!
This establishment is bad for your health.”
Eaters are given surgical gowns as they choose from a calorically
extravagant [cf. calorie-extravagant] menu offering “Bypass”
burgers, “Flatliner” fries, buttermilk shakes and free meals to folks
over 350 pounds [cf. 159kg]. Another sign on the door reads, “Cash
only because you might die before the check clears.”
(“Bypass burger lives up to its name”, Associated Press,
17 February 2012)
Multiple layers of irony arise in the above excerpt from the news report. First
of all, we have the ironic status of the place in question. The name of the
restaurant (the Heart Attack Grill), its menu (Triple Bypass burger, Flatliner fries,
etc.), the explicit warnings (this establishment is bad for your health), and the
associated surroundings (e.g. having workers dressed as health care workers) all
constitute potential instances of irony. They all echo in various ways general
warnings that we have all heard about the negative impact that excessive
consumption of fast food, such as the burgers and fries served at that restaurant,
can have on our health. In echoing these warnings with exaggerated
formulations, the restaurant management is echoing these warnings (which
are attributable to the medical establishment and government bodies) with
a dissociative attitude, more specifically, a kind of defiant scepticism or even
mockery, and encouraging their customers to take a similar stance.
The second layer of irony arises from the primary focus of the news report,
namely, that a customer at the restaurant fell ill and was taken to hospital after
ordering a Triple Bypass burger. Notably, it is implicated through the formulation
of the leading sentence that the man might have ended up in hospital
because of ordering that burger (i.e. “A after B” implicates “A because of B”). It
is, of course, moving into the realm of the ludicrous to even suggest this, but
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Metapragmatics 251
therein lies the situational irony: a man was taken ill in a place that ironically
mocks health warnings about fast food. The incongruity arises from a man
falling ill (what actually occurred) in a restaurant that appeared confident
enough to take an ironic stance on such a possibility (i.e. what appeared to
be expected is that no one would ever really fall ill from the food, at least not
there in the actual restaurant). The headline of the report plays on this situational
irony (Bypass burger lives up to its name), by wryly echoing the ironic
stance of the restaurant.
The third, and perhaps most savage, layer of irony arises from the report
about the response of other customers to the man falling ill, namely, that
some of them treated it as a laughing matter. Once again we have an instance
of situational irony as there is a clear incongruity between what might be
expected in such a situation (i.e. that no one would treat someone falling ill
as a joke) and what actually occurred (i.e. some customers treated it as a joke).
As a reader of the news report, we are, of course, privy to all these multiple
instantiations of irony. What is significant here is that echoic irony, of the
kind described by Relevance theorists, is interwoven with situational irony,
for which they do not offer an explicit account. However, it is worth noting
that their general claim nevertheless stands, namely, that metarepresentations
lie at the heart of irony, and that irony inevitably involves some kind of
dissociative attitude.
In summary, then, metarepresentational awareness involves reflexive representations
of the intentional states and utterances of participants, as illustrated
in Figure 8.2. Reported talk involves, at minimum, a first-order metapresentation
(e.g. an utterance about another attributed utterance), while irony
involves, at minimum, a second-order metarepresentation (e.g. an attitude
expressed about an utterance about an attributed intentional state). However,
these metarepresentations can be further embedded in other metarepresentations
as we saw in the case of He-Said-She-Said or in the report on the incident
at the Heart Attack Grill. In the latter case, for instance, the name of the
restaurant is assumed to echo general health warnings (first-order metarepresentation),
about which customers are assumed to have a wry or dismissive
reported talk
meaning representation
irony
1st
2nd
nth
Figure 8.2 Orders of metarepresentational awareness
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Pragmatics and the English Language252
attitude (second-order metarepresentation), but which is then quoted in a
news report in light of their confused response to a person who was reported
as falling seriously ill in that restaurant (third-order metapresentation), and
towards which the writer presumably has a mocking, or at least wry, attitude
(fourth-order metarepresentation), which we the readers attribute to that
publisher, and may or may not entertain ourselves (fifth-order metarepresentation).
In other words, both instances of echoic and situational irony, as well
as reported talk/conduct, arise in the course of we, the readers, attributing to
the publisher or writer of the report an attitude towards the customer’s allegedly
confused response in light of their presumed attitude towards the warnings
and name of the restaurant that (ironically) echo general health warnings.
In theory, metarepresentations can be extended to the nth order. In practice,
they normally become to become too complex for users to process, or at least
to talk about, at around the fifth or sixth order of metarepresentation (cf. the
research mentioned in section 2.5.3).
8.3.3 Metacommunicative awareness
At the beginning of Chapter 7 we noted the importance of the “environment
of mutual monitoring possibilities” that underlies all social situations
(Goffman [1964] 1972: 63). Critical to these “mutual monitoring possibilities”
is our awareness of self and other as socially constituted persons. This
means that not only do we interpret and evaluate what we ourselves say and
do and what others say and do, but we also reflexively interpret and evaluate
these pragmatic meanings, acts and the like through the eyes of others. In
other words, we include the perspective of others in our interpretations and
evaluations of pragmatic phenomena. This kind of perspective-taking is what
underpins the two forms of metacommunicative awareness that are critical to
social interaction: interactional awareness and interpersonal awareness.
A key manifestation of metacommunicative interactional awareness is
what is commonly termed recipient design, that is, where meanings and
actions are reflexively designed with particular recipients in mind (a point
we briefly discussed in section 6.6.1). The fine-tuned specificity of recipient
design becomes evident in the incremental production of utterances, that
is, in cases where speakers add further segments to utterances in order to
adapt to changes in the participation footing of recipients. Goodwin (1979),
for instance, examines in very close detail an excerpt from a conversation
where the speaker, John transforms his utterance in line 3 from a discovery or
noticing of an anniversary (i.e. having given up smoking for one week), about
which the direct addressee, Beth (whose recipiency is signalled through John’s
gaze), already knows, into a report about having given up smoking which is
deemed to be newsworthy for another direct addressee, Ann (whose recipiency
is signalled through a subsequent shift in gaze by John).
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Metapragmatics 253
[8.9] 1 John: I gave, I gave u[p smoking cigarettes::.=
[((gazes at Don))
2 Don: =Ye:ah,
3 John: I-uh: [one- one week ago t’da:[y acshilly
[((gazes at Beth)) [((gazes at Ann))
4 Ann: Rilly? en y’quit fer good?
(adapted from Goodwin 1979: 111–112)
Notably, the utterance-final actually here marks this news as perhaps contrary
to Ann’s expectations (see section 8.3.1), and thus as reporting something
that is likely previously unknown to her. In this way, he transforms the utterance
from its previous design, when it was being constructed as a “noticing”
directed at Beth of it already having been one week since he had given up
smoking, into an utterance designed to function as reporting news to Ann. In
interpreting talk or discourse, then, participants are inevitably aware of this
finely-grained recipient design.
Metacommunicative interpersonal awareness involves reflexive evaluations
of relations with and attitudes towards others, an area which was largely
covered in Chapter 7. Here we focus on how manifestations of reflexive awareness
of interpersonal relations (such as face, status and so on), attitudes (such
as like/dislike, disgust and so on), and evaluations (such as politeness, impoliteness
and so on) are critically dependent on a reflexive awareness of self
vis-à-vis other. In the following example from the TV series, Everybody Hates
Chris, we can see how Chris manipulates his mother’s (over-)concern about
how others evaluate their family. Prior to the excerpt below, Chris has been
complaining to his mother about having to wear his younger brother’s old
clothes for picture day at school, but to no avail. He concludes (in the voice of
the narrator) that the only way he can get his mother to buy him new clothes
is through invoking the idea of what others might think of their family if he
wears old clothes:
[8.10] Chris: Mom, I’m the only black kid in the whole school. They
already think I’m a crack baby. Wearing this sweater
they’ll probably think we’re on welfare.
Rochelle: Who said we were on welfare? Be home from school on
time tomorrow. We’re gonna go shopping.
Julius: I thought you said we didn’t have the money?
Rochelle: Oh, I’ll get it. Not havin’ people think we on welfare.
(“Everybody hates picture day”, Everybody Hates Chris,
Season 1, Episode 13, 2 February 2006, director:
Linda Mendoza, writer: Kevin A. Garnett)
What Rochelle, Chris’s mother, is most concerned about here is that other
people might think they are on welfare, or in other words, poor. This motivates
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Pragmatics and the English Language254
her to go out and buy new clothes for Chris, even though they can’t really
afford them. Once again irony arises here, as Rochelle seems much less
concerned about people thinking they have a drug problem (they already think
I’m a crack baby) than their being seen as poor. There is also epistemic slippage
in this excerpt from others potentially “thinking” something (Chris’s claim),
to people actually “saying” these things (Rochelle’s assumption).
Reflection: “Yeah-no” as an emergent pragmatic marker
According to Burridge and Florey (2002), the pragmatic marker yeah-no
is increasingly used by speakers of Australian English, although it is
clearly not restricted to Australian English, as it can also be found in
talk amongst speakers of other varieties of English. The basic function of
yeah-no is to indicate reflexive awareness that there is more than one line
of interpretation of current talk at play in the interaction (i.e. it is reflective
of metacommunicative awareness on the part of users).
In the following excerpt from a conversation, two Australian friends are
discussing football (specifically, rugby league), and who they are tipping
(i.e. putting their bet on) for the upcoming game:
[8.11] Clive: Yeah so who ya tipping this weekend? You got ah?
Bruce: Yeah-no I, have a look here. I made some bold
statements actually¿
Clive: Broncos definitely¿
Bruce: Yeah Broncos I- did I pick the Broncos?
No. [No
Clive: [gone against them¿
Bruce: I’ve gone against them¿
Clive You’re kidding.
(Burridge and Florey 2002: 163)
In this example, yeah-no is used by Bruce to indicate reflexive awareness
of two possible lines of interpretation here. The first involves a “yeah-no”
response to Clive’s trailing-off question (You got ah?) about whether Bruce
has a team in mind to tip. Through responding yeah, Bruce indicates that he
does have a tip in mind. At the same time Bruce also projects that his tip this
time will not be in line with Clive’s expectations, by subsequently uttering
no. This latter interpretation becomes clear when Bruce says that he is not
going to tip for the Broncos (the name of a rugby league team in Brisbane).
That this is counter to Clive’s expectations is apparent from his expression
of surprise (You’re kidding). In other words, yeah-no is used here by Bruce to
introduce a “surprise departure from his usual tipping practices” (Burridge
and Florey 2002: 163), and so constitutes an example of an orientation to the
metacognitive status of particular information that is assumed to lie in the
common ground of Bruce and Clive, namely, Bruce’s usual tipping practices.
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Metapragmatics 255
This pragmatic marker has been ironically adopted most infamously by
Vicky Pollard, a satirical character on the British television series, Little
Britain. She uses the catch phrase yeah but no but yeah but, and variants of it,
to launch long rants where her breakneck speed of talk and the irrelevant
information or gossip she offers is intended to confuse or annoy the
recipient. Yeah-no is apparently being used by the comedian Matt Lucas,
in the guise of Vicky, to invoke or comment on social discourses about
“declining standards” of spoken English amongst younger generation
speakers in Britain.
Such evaluations inevitably involve appeals to normative ways of thinking,
speaking and doing things. Verschueren, for instance, argues that such normativity
necessarily involves a “metalevel of awareness”, and it is at this level that
“the norms involved are constantly negotiated and manipulated” (2000: 445).
Silverstein (2003) goes further in proposing that these norms form what he
terms orders of indexicality. This refers to the idea that normative notions
about “how language works, and what it is usually like, what certain ways of
speaking connote and imply” are reflexively layered. At the first layer (or firstorder)
of norms we find probabilistic conventions for language use. These are
formed for individuals through their own history of interactions with others,
and so while they may be similar, they are never exactly the same across individuals.
At the second layer (or second-order) we find localised ideologies and
evaluations of language use. In other words, normative ideas about language
use that are shared across particular social groups. Finally, at the third layer (or
third-order) we find language conventions as they are represented in supra-local
(i.e. societal) ideologies and evaluations of language use. In being ordered, it
is not necessarily assumed that third-order norms will always take precedence
over second-order ones and so on (although they often do), but rather that
in invoking first-order norms we inevitably invoke second- and third-order
ones as well. In pragmatics our specific concern is evaluative norms relating to
language use, namely, assumptions “about what is ‘correct’, ‘normal’, ‘appropriate’,
‘well-formed’, ‘worth saying’, ‘permissable’, and so on” (Coupland
and Jaworski 2004: 36), and how these cut across all three orders.
These ordered layers of normativity can be represented as in Figure 8.3.
There it is suggested that the localised norms which develop for individuals
or localised relationships are necessarily embedded (and thus interpreted)
relative to communities of practice, organisational or other group-based
norms, which are themselves necessarily embedded relative to broader
societal or “cultural” norms. While all three layers of normativity can be
studied, we would argue that they are most productively analysed at the
second-order level, namely, localised ideologies shared across identifiable
communities of practice, organisations or other recognisable groups (see also
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Pragmatics and the English Language256
Culpeper 2010, which argues for the middle, as in second-order, level with
respect to historical sociopragmatics).
Consider, for instance, the following excerpt from a radio interview with
the singer, Justin Bieber, which went horribly wrong when the interviewer,
Mojo, made a joke about Harry Styles and Bieber’s mother:
[8.12] Mojo: do you worry about Harry, uh, you know when he’s
around your mom, since it seems he likes older women?
Bieber: do I wonder (.) what?
Mojo: do you worry Harry around your mum, since he (.) u:h (.)
he likes older women?
Bieber: I think you should worry about yo- your mom bro.
Mojo: .hhhHahhh I should worry about my mum?
Bieber: ye:a(hh)h
Mojo: Justin, my mum’s d[ead so unfortunately (.) that wouldn’t
work.
Bieber: [jeez
(10.0)
((line goes dead))
(Mojo in the Morning, Radio Channel 95.5, Detroit,
broadcast 28 June 2012)
Here the interactional trouble begins when the interviewer, Thomas “ Mojo”
Carballot, teases Bieber about Harry Styles, who was reported in the news at
the time to be dating older women, having an interest in Bieber’s mother.
Bieber initially responds with a request for a repeat of the question, which
is indicative of a possible challenge to the askability of that question, but
when the question is essentially repeated by Mojo, Bieber then responds with
a tease of his own about Mojo’s mother. After Mojo deflates Bieber’s tease in
3rd
order
societal/cultural norms
2nd
order
community of practice/
organisational or other
group-based norms
1st
order
localised norms
Sources: Kádár and Haugh 2013: 95; cf. Culpeper 2008: 29–31; Holmes et al. 2012: 1065.
Figure 8.3 Orders of normativity
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Metapragmatics 257
countering that his mother is already dead (and thus not someone with whom
Harry Styles could be trying to date), there is a long ten-second silence, and
then Bieber (apparently) hangs up. It was subsequently reported that when
the technician tried to get Bieber back on the line to continue the interview
that “He [Bieber] got a little upset with the question”.
The following day Mojo discussed what went wrong in the interview with
two other announcers, Rachael and Spike:
[8.13] Rachael: but even (.) even the way he said it back to you
↓”you got watch out for yer m- uhm yer mum”
Mojo: mm
Rachael: like you could tell, at that point he was pissed already
Mojo: ye:ah
Spike: here’s the thing I’m kinda getting bummed out because,
you know (0.2) I don’t listen to his music but I always
thought Justin was pretty cool but
Rachael: he i:s.
Spike: he[‘s
Rachael: [he usually [is
Spike: [he- he’s starting to take himself way too
seriously.
(Mojo in the Morning, Radio Channel 95.5, Detroit,
broadcast 29 June 2012)
Here it is claimed by Rachael that Bieber’s initial tease (before hanging up) was
indicative of him taking offence. The way Bieber dealt with the interview is
then characterised by Spike as him taking himself too seriously, thereby casting
the offence as not warranted.
We can analyse the metapragmatic comments by these two other observers
in relation to the three different orders of normativity that we introduced
above. At the first-order, or localised level, we can see in [8.12], about which
they are commenting, how Mojo is evidently trying to establish a “joking”
relationship with Bieber where this kind of “ribbing” or teasing is allowable.
This reflects, in turn, second-order norms associated with the practices of
radio “shock jocks”, such as Mojo, where guests are subject to joking, teasing,
mocking and the like, and how celebrities, in particular, are expected to deal
with that by not taking themselves “too seriously”. Finally, the negative
assessment accomplished through casting Bieber as “starting to take himself
way too seriously” in [8.13] invokes, in turn, third-order norms, namely, the
social sanctions directed at those who take themselves “too seriously”, and
the positive value placed on not taking oneself too seriously amongst Anglo
speakers of English (see Fox 2004; Goddard 2009).
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Pragmatics and the English Language258
However, just because particular participants invoke these kinds of thirdorder
norms, this does not mean to say that what counts as offensive or sanctionable
behaviour is not open to dispute by others. In the following post,
after a report about the incident was published in the online version of the
Daily Mirror, one user claimed that Mojo was being “rude”:
[8.14] That was rude for him to say if he worries about Harry around his
mom he is just a kid not an adult. Mojo was wrong with the question.
U all r adults expecting kids to act like adults. Inappropriate
question! Grow up Mojo.
(http://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/justin-bieber-
hangs-up-on-radio-946516)
Here a different set of third-order norms are invoked, namely, what counts
as (in)appropriate around adults versus kids, thereby challenging the secondorder
normative practices of radio jocks such as Mojo.
Investigating localised, as well as second-order, ideologies is a useful way to
better understanding the normative features of interaction that are so often
treated as simply “commonsensical” and thus rarely questioned by users
(Blommaert and Verschueren 1998). And it is this line of work that leads
us into the analysis of metadiscursive awareness at the third-order level of
normativity on the part of users (see Verschueren 2012 for a useful introduction
to such work). This is not to say, however, that the pragmatic meanings
and interpersonal relations and attitudes which arise in discourse through
invoking such norms are not open to negotiation or dispute, as we saw above.
Indeed, metapragmatic commentary can be strategically deployed for that
very purpose, as we shall now discuss.
8.4 Metapragmatics in use
Metapragmatic awareness lies at the core of a number of important pragmatic
phenomena. In many instances, this reflexive awareness is not always
accessible or highly salient to participants. It may be inherent to their use
of language, but it is not necessarily something they can articulate. There
are, however, cases where metapragmatic awareness itself may become highly
salient in discourse. The most obvious example of this is the use of metapragmatic
commentary to “influence and negotiate how an utterance is or should
have been heard, or [to] try to modify the values attributed to it” (Jaworskiń
et al. 2004: 4); in other words, the strategic deployment of comments about
language use in order to (re-)negotiate interpretations of pragmatic meanings,
pragmatic acts, and interpersonal relations, attitudes and evaluations. Hübler
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Metapragmatics 259
and Bublitz (2007) term such phenomena “metapragmatics in use”. They list
some of the functions of metapragmatic commentary, including:
evaluating self and others•
doing conflict•
doing affiliation•
constructing identity•
reinforcing or challenging communicative norms•
negotiating meaning•
discourse organisation•
(adapted from Hübler and Bublitz 2007: 18)
Given this list is not by any means exhaustive, it is clear that metapragmatic
commentary (or, more broadly, acts) can be used to accomplish all sorts of
different pragmatic work.
In a study of metapragmatic utterances that arise in computer-mediated
interactions in a number of different mailing lists, for instance, Tanskanen
(2007) illustrates how participants can use metapragmatic utterances to
accomplish assessments of the degree of appropriateness of either their own
or others’ posts, or to clarify their own contributions where some misunderstanding
is perceived. Such comments were thus found to be designed to (1)
accomplish judgements of appropriateness (see example [8.15]), (2) control
and plan subsequent interaction (example [8.16]), or (3) give feedback on
ongoing interaction (example [8.17]):
[8.15] I am loathe to add yet another message to what has been an
extremely long thread, but...
(WMST-L) (Tanskanen 2007: 92)
[8.16] Well, you’ve certainly ended this discussion effectively. All that’s
left to say is “I rest my case.”
(YAHOO) (ibid.: 100)
[8.17] Such a wonderful discussion is being held here!!!
(DBB) (ibid.: 101)
Such metapragmatic comments thus illustrate how users display reflexive
awareness in making posts to such lists, as through them we can see how
they “adopt the perspective of their fellow communicators” in “anticipating
potential problems” in such forums (Tanskanen 2007: 88). More generally,
we can observe how metapragmatic comments are designed to avoid both
misinterpretation and unwanted relational or attitudinal implications, by
other participants.
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Pragmatics and the English Language260
In some cases, however, metapragmatic comments are deployed in order
to negotiate or even dispute particular pragmatic meanings, pragmatic acts,
interpersonal relations and attitudes, and so on. Consider the following
extract from a documentary where four Indians have been touring to get a
first-hand understanding of race relations. Preceding this particular excerpt,
Gurmeet has suggested to an Aboriginal elder that indigenous Australians
should have “specific educational institutions for Aboriginals”, to which the
elder responds that such institutions already exist. The excerpt itself begins
when Gurmeet subsequently asks why the elder has “complaints” about the
past and current situation of indigenous Australians:
[8.18] 14 Gurmeet: then what are the complaints.
15 Elder: ((cocks her head)) uh uh, beg your pardon?
16 Gurmeet: why are you complaining then.
17 Elder: ((steps back)) am I ↑complaining?= ←
18 Radhika: =no::
19 Gurmeet: ((smiles)) heh [heh]
20 Elder: [I’m] answering questions that they ←
21 asked. I’m not complain-
22 Gurmeet: but but [you are ] saying ←
23 Elder: [you don’t]
24 you don’t live in my country, you don’t- this is my ←
25 country, ((points her finger at Gurmeet)) Kamilaroi is
26 my country. I see what happens here, whatever
27 happens in your country.
(Dumb, Drunk and Racist, Episode 4, 11 July 2012,
ABC2 and Cordell Jigsaw Productions)
While the elder’s initial response in line 15 is indicative not only of possible
forthcoming disagreement with what is supposed through Gurmeet’s question
(i.e. that the elder has been complaining), but also that there is some
issue in regards to the propriety of Gurmeet’s question. Gurmeet nevertheless
repeats essentially the same question in line 16. This time the elder’s offence
at the terms of the question becomes more evident in her rising pitch, stepping
backwards and formulation of a “rhetorical question” in line 17. She
then attempts to reformulate her prior turns as simply answering questions
rather than complaining (lines 20–21), and then finally makes explicit what
appears to be the source of the offence she is taking at Gurmeet’s line of questioning,
namely, his implicit assumption that he has the right to judge the
situation of “her” country (lines 24–27).3
3
See Haugh (in press 2014) and Kádár and Haugh (2013: 119–122, 127–131) for further analysis of
this particular example.
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Metapragmatics 261
We can observe a number of metapragmatic comments in the above extract,
which are indicated by the arrows, in relation to the construal of pragmatic
acts (lines 17, 20–21), pragmatic meaning and accountability (line 22), and
relational entitlements (lines 23–27). In lines 17 and 20–21, the elder disputes
the way in which Gurmeet has framed her prior talk as complaining, and offers
an alternative formulation of her actions as simply answering questions. In this
case, it is the way in which her prior talk is being construed as a particular
pragmatic act, namely “complaining”, that is at issue (see Chapter 6). Studies
of complaints in English have shown that complaining is regarded as an
inherently moral act, and thus to characterise some talk as “complaining”,
involves the question of whether there are sufficient grounds for launching
the complaint, and thus whether the person complaining has the right to
make such a complaint (see Drew 1998). Such research has also shown that
participants will often engage in considerable interactional work to avoid
what they are meaning being construed as complaining (Edwards 2005).
In line 22, Gurmeet moves to hold the elder accountable for complaining
rather than answering questions by invoking the sense of saying2
as meaning
something (see sections 4.2.1 and 5.4.1). In other words, Gurmeet construes
the elder as previously implying that the situation of indigenous Australians
has not been very good because of the actions of others (in particular, the
Australian government). He thus attempts to hold her accountable for this
particular reflexively intended assumption.
Finally, in lines 23–27, we can see the elder disputing Gurmeet’s right
to evaluate and comment on the situation of indigenous Australians by
construing herself as an “insider” and Gurmeet as an “outsider” to “Kamilaroi
country” (where the Indians are currently visiting). In other words, she is
explicitly referring to her entitlement to comment on the circumstances of
“her people”, as opposed to the lack of such an entitlement on Gurmeet’s
part, thereby alluding to issues of interpersonal relations and their respective
“sociality rights” (see section 7.4.2). It is also evident throughout that the
elder is treating Gurmeet’s line of questioning as “inapposite”, if not outright
offensive, thereby indicating an implicit orientation to a particular interpersonal
attitude on the part of Gurmeet, namely, that he is being “impolite” or
“offensive” (see section 7.5).
In order to understand the above excerpt, however, it is evident that we
also need to have a clear understanding of what these participants mean by
such terms as complaint/complaining, asking questions, saying, and impolite/
offensive, as well as what these words mean for English speakers more generally,
given the interaction was broadcast on television to an “overhearing”
audience. Thus, while “technical” meanings can be ascribed to such terms, it
is important to remember that this metalanguage means something to ordinary
participants too.
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Pragmatics and the English Language262
Reflection: Inter-ethnic metapragmatic discourse in
New Zealand English
Metapragmatic commentary may, in some cases, be directed not only at
pragmatic meanings or acts, but also at the norms that are assumed to
underlie them. In an extensive program of research about discourse in New
Zealand workplaces, the Language in the Workplace project has uncovered
ethnic variation amongst speakers of New Zealand English. Holmes et al.
(2012) report on the explicit negotiation of politeness norms between
European (termed Pākehā) and Māori ethnolects of New Zealand English.
The former has traditionally been considered dominant or mainstream,
but in workplaces where Maori predominate, such assumptions can be
challenged. In the following excerpt, we can observe a clash between Pākehā
and Māori interactional norms that surfaces in the form of metapragmatic
commentary. The exchange occurs in one of the regular meetings of
Kiwi Consultations, where only three out of the sixteen participants are
Pākehā:
[8.19] 1 Steve: we have capability development um
2 the g m oversight here
3 ((overlapped by a quiet conversation involving Frank
4 and Daniel))
5 is from Frank with Caleb
6 the manager in charge budget of a hundred and
7 eighty seven k ((pause)) obviously key area we
8 want to ensure that um one of the important
9 things in communication is not to talk when
10 others are talking:
11 ((loud laughter))
12 Steve: I hope that the cameras picked up (that)
13 ((loud laughter))
14 Frank: Steve this indicates a need for you to be out in hui
15 ((laughter))
16 Frank: one of the things that you learn very quickly
17 is that a sign of respect is that other people are talking
18 about what [you’re saying while you’re saying it]
19 [((laughter)) ]
20 ((laughter))
21 Steve: I see I see
(adapted from Holmes et al. 2012: 1070–1071)
Holmes, Marra and Vine claim that while Steve asserts a (Pākehā New
Zealand English) interactional norm, namely, that one should not speak
while others are speaking (lines 8–10), this is treated as an inappropriate
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Metapragmatics 263
8.5 Conclusion
In this chapter, we have suggested that reflexive awareness underpins all
language use. We have alluded to our preceding discussions of referring expressions
(Chapter 2), informational pragmatics (Chapter 3), pragmatic meaning
(Chapters 4 and 5), pragmatic acts (Chapter 6) and interpersonal pragmatics
(Chapter 7), in describing how metarepresentational, metacognitive and
metacommunicative awareness lie at the core of such pragmatic phenomena.
We have also suggested that some pragmatic phenomena, such as irony,
reported talk, pragmatic markers, metapragmatic descriptors and commentary,
and social discourses cannot be explained without making recourse
to these different forms of reflexive awareness. It is for this reason that we
have intentionally concluded this volume with an explicitly metapragmatic
perspective on pragmatic phenomena.
A metapragmatic perspective takes pragmatic phenomena to be consequential
for people in the real world. What people are taken to be referring to or
meaning, for instance, has real-world implications for those people involved.
People talk about language use and such discussions matter. In analysing
metapragmatics in use it is clear that an analysis of the metalanguage that
is both explicitly and implicitly invoked by participants (and observers) is
necessary. It is important to remember, however, that this metalanguage is
unlikely to be completely synonymous across languages, or even across groups
of users of that language. Metapragmatics is thus ultimately a language- and
culture-specific enterprise, a point we have tried to emphasise through using
examples that not only highlight the ways in which English speakers display
reflexive awareness of their use of English, but also touch upon the variation
in such awareness across speakers of English.
assertion by Frank, another Pākehā. Frank implies in line 14 that Steve
is not sufficiently acquainted with Māori New Zealand English ways of
speaking by suggesting that he needs to attend more hui (i.e. traditional
Māori meetings). By doing so it is suggested that Steve would gain an
appreciation of the Māori English interpretive norm that a sign of respect is
that other people are talking about what you’re saying while you’re saying it (lines
17–18). By asserting a Māori interactional norm, Frank reframes Steve’s
metapragmatic comment as inappropriate for that workplace because it
involves the assertion of a Pākehā interactional norm. Speaking English
thus inevitably raises questions about just whose norms are assumed to
be at play. Such issues can be approached at various orders of indexicality,
including through the lens of ethnic varieties of English.
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