Vagueness Markers in Italian : : Age variation and pragmatic change / / Chiara Ghezzi.

• Superior document: Metodi e prospettive
• VerfasserIn: Ghezzi, Chiara,
• Place / Publishing House: [Place of publication not identified] : : FrancoAngeli,, 2022.; ©2022
• Year of Publication: 2022
• Language: English
• Series: Metodi e prospettive.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (24 pages).

Moving from a broad socio-pragmatic perspective, this study analyses how speakers of different ages use a class of items and constructions that codify intentional vagueness in Italian. Items as un po' 'a bit', tipo 'kind', diciamo 'let us say', così 'so', e cose del genere 'and things like that', or cosa 'thing' constitute a class of linguistically heterogeneous means that often function in conversation as vagueness markers, i.e. elements by which speakers signal that their knowledge or communication are somehow only tentative, approximate, and vague. Their use does not depend on language systemic factors, but is the result of a, more or less conscious, choice of speakers to enhance conversation for different reasons, which include facilitating the flow of conversation, signifying a vague categorization, and, eventually, being polite. Operating at the pragmatic level, vagueness markers represent elements that are readily available to speakers' choices and contribute to characterise individual and generational discourse styles. Through a corpus-based analysis of listeners' phone-ins to a radio station based in Milan, this study investigates how vagueness markers are used by speakers of different ages in 1976 and in 2010, and how Italian discourse styles have evolved in the last forty years.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements -- List of figures and tables -- Transcription conventions -- Introduction -- 1. Intentional vagueness and vagueness markers as strategic use of language -- 1.1. Vagueness, intentional vagueness, and vagueness markers -- 1.2. Vagueness markers between semantic approximation -- and pragmatic hedging -- 1.3. Vagueness markers and functional heterogeneity -- 1.4. Vagueness markers and formal heterogeneity -- 1.5. Semantic sources of vagueness markers -- 1.5.1. Smallness: un po' -- 1.5.2. Approximation, hyponymous or comparative -- reference: come, tipo -- 1.5.3. Manner deixis: così -- 1.5.4. Demurring: insomma -- 1.5.5. Adversativeness and concession: comunque -- 1.5.6. Addition: anche -- 1.5.7. Discussion -- 1.6. Vagueness markers and strategical heterogeneity -- 1.6.1. Approximation -- 1.6.1.1. General extenders -- 1.6.2. Metadiscourse relativisation -- 1.6.3. Reference to deixis -- 1.6.4. General nouns -- 1.7. Vagueness markers as strategically polite use of language -- 1.8. Discussion -- 2. Vagueness markers between pragmatic variation and change -- 2.1. Vagueness markers as discourse-pragmatic variables -- 2.2. Style and discourse-pragmatic variation -- 2.3. The social embedding of discourse-pragmatic variation -- 2.4. Age of speakers as a factor of variation -- 2.5. Discourse pragmatic features between variation and change -- 2.6. Discussion -- 3. Corpora and methodologies of analysis -- 3.1. The analysis of vagueness markers: an onomasiologic -- and socio-pragmatic approach -- 3.2. Discourse-pragmatic features and radio phone-in shows -- 3.3. Constraining the variables, managing corpora representativeness, balance and sampling -- 3.4. Corpora transcription and the annotation tool -- 3.5. The theoretical model of discourse segmentation -- 4. The use of vagueness markers between age variation and pragmatic change -- 4.1. Vagueness markers: functions, forms, and contexts of use in different age cohorts -- 4.2. Approximation -- 4.2.1. General extenders -- 4.2.2. Exemplification strategies -- 4.2.3. Addition strategies -- 4.3. Metadiscourse relativization -- 4.3.1. Hypothetical strategies -- 4.4. Reference to deixis -- 4.5. General nouns -- 4.6. Discussion -- 5. Case studies -- 5.1. Vagueness markers from discourse and pragmatic markers -- 5.1.1. Exemplification markers -- 5.1.2. Metadiscourse markers -- 5.1.3. Discussion -- 5.2. Forms and trajectories -- 5.2.1. Un po' -- 5.2.2. Così -- 5.2.3. Cioè -- 5.3. Discussion -- 6. Concluding remarks -- References.