Pragmatic Failure: A Relevance Theory Perspective
[1]
Du-xin Tsao, School of Foreign Languages, Beihang University, Beijing, China.
Relevance theory is an important theory in the field of cognitive-pramatics. Profound in content, it involves important concepts including cognitive context, optimal relevance and maximal relevance, inferential-ostensive process. Pragmatic failure, an inevitable phenomenon in the interlanguage, arises from the lack of ostentive behavior and the mal-evaluating of the addressee’s cognitive environment on the speakers’ part, and the failure to recognize speakers’ intension and establish assumptive cognitive context on the hearers’ side. This paper will probe into the pragmatic failure under Relevance Theory (RT), and tentatively explore the solutions of avoiding such failures in cross-cultural communication.
Relevance Theory, Cognitive Context, Pragmatic Failure
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