A PRAGMALIGUISTIC ASPECT OF COMMUNICATION.

Zhanat.S.Kanlybaeva, Associate Professor

Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Almaty, Kazakhstan

Presentation of the language not only as a strict structural system of language units and relationship between them, but as a means of communication has given the foundation to widen borders of linguistics objects as well. This means that an act of communication is a component of communicative act and it depends on other components of intercourse.

Comprising actions or behaviors as a series of interconnected and coordinated events, reflects a particular view of communication – a pragmatic view. The term pragmatics in reference to human communication is defined as reflecting the fact that linguistic signs serve certain purposes in communication among people. It proper deals with various relations, i.e. relations concerning the purposes for which people produce and use linguistic signs on the hand, and relations concerning the effects brought about by certain linguistic signs in their recipients on the other hand.

It is quite necessary to study pragmatic phenomena of language and to integrate the syntactic, semantic and pragmatic components. Such integration can be realized in a linguistic theory which considers speech activity as a part of human behavior and language as an instrument for fulfilling certain aims and intentions motivating human behavior. According to Leontev A.A. pragmatics concentrates among other things, on problems of influencing people through speech. One of the characteristic signs of research on communication is the fact that the main moving force of research has been to obtain means for influencing people, their opinions and attitudes… Influencing remains obviously one of the functions of communication. But the function of communication as a means for mutual understanding is primary. This is necessary prerequisite for the utilization of the influencing function in a positive direction, for the development of man by man. (1, 53)

The model of communication contains three nested elements: individual human beings, a relationship, and context. These three elements can be thought of as intrapersonal, interpersonal, and cultural communication systems. Cultural aspects include such influences on the relationship as social norms, rules, expectations, and even whether the participants are available for interaction.

The process of communication is the realization of a mutual exchange of activities, ideas, attitudes, interests, etc… Communication is a specific autonomous form of a subject’s activity resulting in relations with another subject or subjects. (8,7)

In this sense, communication has three main functions in the subject’s life:

a) the informative function, i.e. “all functions which can be described as emitting and receiving information”;

b) the regulative function, i.e. “the function of regulating behavior (in the broad sense) which people engage in with respect to each other”;

c) the affective function, i.e. “the function of determinating the emotional sphere of man”.

In the real process of communication the three functions can be combined and can have a different sense for particular individuals, i.e., the same message can perform an informative function for one individual and an effective function to another individual.

According to Lomov B.F. the study of communication should be performed on three levels:

1)The macrolevel. Communication is studied as a part of the individual’s life activities and with respect to particular periods of the individual’s life. “Communication on the macrolevel is studied as a complex network of mutual relations, in which it is possible to identify particular lines of communication of the given individual to other individuals and social groups”.

2)The mezolevel. This is the study of particular types of communicative acts such as dialogues, play, work, etc. It is possible to analyze what verbal and non-verbal means are used in particular types of communicative acts. The other problems are related to the exchange of communicative roles, mutual correlation (non-correlation), the control and correlation of communicative behavior, etc.

3)The microlevel. This is study of particular phases of communicative acts such as question as answer, appeal to activity vs. performance of activity, etc. (8, 58)

Communication can be adequately understood only its primary function as an instrument of human cooperation. Linguist Koboseva I.M. has described the pragmatic approach is a direct study of the conditions of speech communication as they are reflected in linguistic expressions and, especially, it is a study of data about the speaker’s and the hearer’s acquaintance with certain aspects of the situation described in an utterance, and about the relevance of the full specification of the described state of objects to the speaker. (5,166)

The main characteristics of verbal communication (речевое общение) which have been mentioned by Leontev A.A. are the following:

a) The basic feature is the “orientation of the communication”. One can distinguish “personality – oriented communication” (i.e. directed at an individual) and “society – oriented communication” (i.e. directed at a social group or, in case of mass communication, at a whole society). Experimental data give some evidence concerning between the two forms of verbal communication.

b) Another characteristic feature is the “dynamism in communication”. This is apparent in physical changes which are brought about in recipients under the influence of verbal communication. These are changes in terms of knowledge, skills and abilities, convictions and attitudes, motives and interests of recipients. These is, unfortunately, a lack of empirical evidence about the “dynamism of communication” with respect to other than purely cognitive (i.e. knowledge - related) changes in recipients; with respect to the effects of mass communication.

c) The semiotic specificity of the communication is a characteristic concerning the kind of semiotic system (verbal or non-verbal, etc.) used in communication.

d) The “degree of mediation” is a characteristic of distance between the communicator and the recipient.

According to commonly accepted interpretations social intercourse constitutes the unity of communication, interaction and perception, processes. The fundamental feature of social intercourse is its inseparable link with human activity: in each case of social intercourse an individual functions as an active social being. This means that each act of communication is included in the system of activity of an individual or a social group.

Pragmatic aspect of verbal communication is commonly accepted as involving the effects brought about by verbal messages in recipients.

As we see researching of language’s functional-pragmatic property puts forward the problem of human factor, i.e. the self (or self-speaker) (языковая личность) to the centre of attention. The self is understood as an aggregate of skills to create and to absorb speech product (texts). He must distinguish levels and structural-linguistic complexity, the exactness and depth of reality reflection, definite purposes as well.

However the model of the self-speaker might have been much richer if this will be taken into account, for example, the self is formed, displayed in intercourse, and, according to the point of social psychology view, he presents “a model of interpersonal relationship”. In order to understand the phenomena of human factor in communication, it is noted to research the language interaction of communicators, i.e. to include the self as a system into the metasystem and to learn him in conditions of social surrounding. (3, 82)

When we communicate with another person, your intrapersonal process contains a minimum of three different levels. Each of these levels is associated with each of the selves present in the interpersonal setting: 1. your view of yourself; 2. your view of the other; 3. your view of the other’s view of you. The only way to improve or develop skills in interpersonal communication is to be both a participant and an observer at the same time. The most significant property of any verbal communication is its intentionality, i.e., the existence of some communicative aim to which the communicative activity is directed. On the other hand, the communicative aim is subordinated to another, higher aim of intercourse. (1,55)

Taking account of all described we agree with Sukhikh S.A., the self should be examined and learnt in communicative acts, especially in dialogue. (3, 82) There is turn-taking of stimuli and reaction in every dialogue. External conditions of communication and subjective inner world of personality are expressed by the texts (reports).

Literature

1.Fisher B.Aubrey. Interpersonal communication. Pragmatics of human relationships. New York: Random House, 1987.

2.Prucha Jan. Pragmalinguistics: East European approaches. Amsterdam, Philadelphia, 1983.

3.Сухих С.А.Языковая личность в диалоге.// Личностные аспекты языкового общения. Калинин, КГУ,1989.