Departing from Schneider and Barron (2008), representing the emerging field of Variational Pragmatics, this volume examines pragmatic variation focusing on methods utilized to collect and analyze data in a variety of first (L1) and second (L2) language contexts. The objectives are to: (1) examine variation in such areas of pragmatics as speech acts, conventional expressions, metapragmatics, stance, frames, mitigation, communicative action, (im)politeness, and implicature; and (2) critically review central methodological concerns relevant for research in pragmatic variation, such as coding, ethical issues, qualitative and quantitative methods, and individual variation. Theoretical frameworks vary from variationist and interactional sociolinguistics, to variational pragmatics. This collection contains eleven chapters by leading scholars, including two state-of-the art chapters on key methodological issues of pragmatic variation study. Given the theoretical perspectives, methodological focus, and analyses, the book will be of interest to those who study pragmatics, discourse analysis, second language acquisition, sociolinguistics, corpus linguistics, and language variation.

Departing from Schneider and Barron (2008), representing the emerging field of Variational Pragmatics, this volume examines pragmatic variation focusing on methods utilized to collect and analyze data in a variety of first (L1) and second (L2) language contexts. The objectives are to: (1) examine variation in such areas of pragmatics as speech acts, conventional expressions, metapragmatics, stance, frames, mitigation, communicative action, (im)politeness, and implicature; and (2) critically review central methodological concerns relevant for research in pragmatic variation, such as coding, ethical issues, qualitative and quantitative methods, and individual variation. Theoretical frameworks vary from variationist and interactional sociolinguistics, to variational pragmatics. This collection contains eleven chapters by leading scholars, including two state-of-the art chapters on key methodological issues of pragmatic variation study. Given the theoretical perspectives, methodological focus, and analyses, the book will be of interest to those who study pragmatics, discourse analysis, second language acquisition, sociolinguistics, corpus linguistics, and language variation.

Developmental research has long focused on regularities in language acquisition, minimizing factors that might be responsible for variation. Although researchers are now increasingly concerned with one or another of these factors, this volume brings together research on three different sources of variation: language-specific properties, the nature of the input to children across contexts, and several aspects of the learners themselves. Chapters explore these sources of variation within an interdisciplinary and comparative approach allying theories and methodologies stemming from linguistics, psycholinguistics, developmental psychology, and neuroscience. The comparative perspective involves different languages, contexts of use, types of learners (first/second language acquisition, monolingual/bilingual learners, autism, language impairment), as well as vocal and visuo-gestural communicative modalities (co-verbal gestures, sign language acquisition). The volume points to the need to enhance interdisciplinary research using complementary methodologies to further examine sources of variation and to integrate variation into a more general developmental theory.

This collection showcases cutting-edge developments in co-construction in discourse. Drawing on the pioneering work of Dale A. Koike, the volume contributes new understandings of how speakers jointly negotiate meanings, contexts, identities, and social positions in interaction. The volume is organized around three key themes in co-construction—co-constructed discourse, pragmatics in discourse, and teaching and assessment of discourse—and builds on the introductory chapter that situates the discussion on context and co-construction as fundamental to understanding meaning-making in interaction. Drawing on interdisciplinary perspectives across strands of linguistics and education, chapters explore both the contextual elements that frame co-construction processes and the distinct dynamics between action and language use across a wide range of interactional contexts, including sports commentary, interviews, everyday conversation, classroom discourse, and digitally mediated settings. Taken together, the book highlights the impact of Koike’s contributions on existing research in pragmatics and discourse and exhibits the potential for her work to frame scholarship on emerging interactional contexts. This volume will be of particular interest to students and researchers in discourse studies, pragmatics, applied linguistics, second language studies, and language education, as well as those interested in interaction across diverse contexts.

The volume Learning second language pragmatics beyond traditional contexts is a collection of studies dealing with the acquisition of second language pragmatic competence in different learning contexts. Such contexts brought together include technology-mediated contexts (e.g. computer-mediated communication, emails), emerging institutional settings in the European context (e.g. CLIL, English-medium instruction, the multilingual classroom), study abroad settings, and natural contexts (e.g. au-pairing, media contact). Altogether, the contributions attempt to move forward the field of second language pragmatics by accounting for learning settings that have gained importance in the current era of globalization and multiculturalism.

Service encounters are ubiquitous in social interaction. We buy food and everyday items in supermarkets, convenience stores, or markets; we purchase merchandise in department stores; or we request information at a visitor information center. This book offers a comprehensive account of service encounters in commercial and non-commercial settings. Grounded in naturally occurring face-to-face interactions and drawing on a pragmatic-discursive approach, J. César Félix-Brasdefer sets out a framework for the analysis of transactional and relational talk in various contexts in the United States and Mexico. This book investigates cross-cultural and intra-lingual pragmatic variation during the negotiation of service. The author provides a broad review of research on service encounters to date, and analyzes characteristics of sales transactions, such as participants' roles, pragmatic and discourse functions of relational talk and address forms, the realization of politeness, and changes in alignment from transactional to relational talk.

This book contributes to the literature of interlanguage pragmatics by building an interface between researching and teaching speech acts in the Chinese context. It is written for researchers, language educators, classroom teachers and readers who are interested in interlanguage pragmatics research, acquisition and teaching, with particular reference to speech acts performed by Chinese learners of English, and their relationships with the learners’ first language and cultural concepts. It provides a more advanced understanding of the production and development of speech acts of Chinese learners of English from the cross-linguistic, cross-cultural, L1 and L2 developmental perspectives, drawing on relevant second language acquisition theoretical frameworks. It also recommends research-informed pedagogies that are applicable to other learners of English.