Linguistic anthropology and pragmatics

Abstract

The article critically examines two recent major works in linguistic anthropology: one a dictionary of key terms in Linguistic Anthropology (LA), the other a compendium of articles which further defines the scope of this multidisciplinary field of enquiry. These works serve as a springboard for comparison of the LA agenda with that of a societally-oriented Pragmatics. It is argued that despite differences in their origins, development and theoretical frameworks, LA and Pragmatics share common ground, especially in terms of how they prioritize social issues, if not always in how they approach them. Some of these issues are: the impact of language contact on speech communities and its concomitant outcomes such as language shift and language death; language as contextualised activity and action; gender discrimination through language; intercultural misunderstanding; and the complex relations between power and language. The nature of the relationship between LA and Pragmatics has been discussed in a number of other contexts, but the many issues involved often lack coherent presentation. This paper seeks to address that lack and to present a unified picture of both disciplines and their complimentary roles.