The Pragmatics of Fiction

Drawing on a wide range of fictional texts from Shakespeare and Austen to Game of Thrones and the lyrics of 'We Shall Overcome', this textbook shows how pragmatic analyses can uncover the performative elements that create and shape characters for an audience. By exploring fictional language, the book investigates different forms of interpersonal communication, such as politeness and impoliteness, as well as the nature of poetic language and the language of emotion. With exercises, discussion topics, suggestions for small-scale research projects and further reading, it shows just how fascinating a challenge fictional language can pose to pragmatics, and it illustrates the richness of fictional language as a source of data for pragmatic research. Key Features. Draws on a range of fictional genres including novels, plays, fan fiction, poems, song lyrics, movies and TV series. Includes exercises, lists of key concepts, discussion topics, small-scale research projects and suggestions for further reading. Presents pragmatics as a comprehensive framework to analyse fiction. Offers up-to-date discussion on a wide range of pragmatic topics in fiction from the participation structure and character creation to emotions and the creation of strong and weak implicatures Miriam A. Locher is Professor of the Linguistics of English at the University of Basel in Switzerland Andreas H. Jucker is Professor of English Linguistics at the University of Zurich