Pragmatics in the History of English: The State of the Art

Historical pragmatics, the convergence of historical linguistics (the study of language variation and change) and pragmatics (the study of language in use), is a field of study that arose in the mid-1990s. Much research here has focused on the English language. After examining the subfields of historical pragmatics, the approaches encompassed by historical pragmatics, and the problems posed by the apparent lack of suitable data, this talk will sample some of the recent work that has been done in a number of areas of study. These include changes in the expression of speech acts over time; the different linguistic means used for representing speech and thought and their pragmatic effects; innovations in both the types of politeness expressed and the forms of politeness used; variation in terms of address, importantly the pronominal thou/you switch but also nominal forms of address; alterations in the inventory of pragmatic (discourse) markers over time and the processes which account for their development; and pragmatic factors operating on the discourse level accounting for changes in registers and genres. The talk will end with suggestions for future research.

Zoom link: https://uu-se.zoom.us/j/61900668883