A Cognitive Analysis Of Indirect Directives

This thesis adopts a cognitive approach in the interpretation of indirect directives, the language phenomenon that always attracts a lot of attention in the researches of indirect speech acts. Indirect directives have been interpreted by a variety of theories, including idiom theory, inference theory and politeness principle.How do people produce and comprehend indirect directives? Understanding what is going on in human mind when they produce and comprehend special language phenomena such as indirect directives can give us insight not only into language, but also into the human cognitive state of thinking, reasoning and communicating with each other. However, so far there is no systematic analysis of the production and comprehension of indirect directives from a cognitive prospective in China.The thesis demonstrates that the inadequacies of previous researches on indirect directives may be overcome by taking a cognitive approach to the problem. The prototype category theory argues that the earliest cognition of a certain category starts from the prototype, and then an expansion is reached around the prototype. Indirect directive is a graded category with fuzzy boundaries. The prototypical and marginal members are comprehended in different ways in which the former requires relatively the least inferential efforts while the latter the most inferential efforts. As for metonymic models, scenario must be first mentioned which consists of three parts: the BEFORE, the CORE, and the AFTER. By focusing on the specific components of the scenario, the indirect directive seems to be capable of evoking the whole of it and hereby conveys its intended meaning to the addressee. Because scenario is not enough to explain certain aspects of indirect directives, social variables such as cost-benefit, optionality and power shall be included in the metonymic model of indirect directives. The image schema theory uses background knowledge to enhance the language comprehension process. There are several subtypes of the schemata like compulsion, removal of restraint, blockage, iteration, counterforce and diversion, which are used to explain indirect orders, requests, threats, begging and suggestions respectively. Towards the end of the thesis, the author makes an evaluation of the cognitive approach to indirect directives in terms of its merits and demerits.In the present research, it is concluded that prototypical category theory, metonymic model theory and image schema theory play an important role in interpreting the cognitive mechanisms of indirect directives. Moreover, apart from accounting for indirect directives, these theories may also contribute to the study of other indirect speech acts. Thus investigating indirect directives from the cognitive point of view can enrich pragmatic theories and pragmatic researches related.