A Study On The Pragmatic Presupposition In TED Speech Based On Communicative Context Adaptation Theory

Presupposition,as an important linguistic subject,refers to the speaker’s assumption for the utterance in conversation.Generally speaking,it can be further divided into pragmatic presupposition and semantic presupposition.Semantic presupposition is related to the relationship of true-value,while the study of pragmatic presupposition takes the context into consideration.The subject of pragmatic presupposition was firstly put forward by Stalnaker in 1970.He thought that presupposition is not only a logical proposition,but also related to context,utterer and interpreter.Previous studies of pragmatic presupposition have made it clear that it is too context-sensitive to be studied independently of its actual use in communication.Pragmatic presupposition is not only a linguistic phenomenon concerning only the language structure,but also a basic link in the construction where the communicators exerts their subjectivity to achieve their intention in the actual communication.Therefore,the application and understanding of pragmatic presuppositions can be related to contextual factors.Many scholars have conducted researches on the pragmatic presupposition in various types of discourses,such as,advertisement,literature,translation,and public speeches.To the public speeches,there are various studies on pragmatic presupposition in political speeches,presidential addresses.However,study on pragmatic presupposition about TED speech is rare,especially applying Verschueren’s Adaptation Theory to analyze this phenomenon.Therefore,this thesis attempts to choose 30 TED social discourses from 2013 to 2019 to study the application of pragmatic presupposition in TED speech from the communicative contextual correlates(the mental world,social world and physical world).Through a tentative analysis,the result shows that pragmatic presuppositions in TED speech aim to achieve expressing intentions and conscious adaptation to communicative context elements,that is,the mental world,social world and physical world.First of all,pragmatic presupposition can be realized by presupposition triggers that is the result of language choosing.In addition,pragmatic presupposition is adopted by the speaker to make the spoken language concise,conceal,and persuasive.Secondly,the adaptation to the mental world is mainly analyzed from the perspective of mental motivation,emotional factors,beliefs and wishes.The adaptation to the social world consists of three aspects,that is,social conventions,cultural backgrounds,religious beliefs.The social and cultural factors are the main consideration to the speaker.The adaptation to the physical world is mainly based on the temporal reference and the spatial reference.The significance of this thesis are as follows:1)It attempts to extend the study of pragmatic presupposition to the mental,social and physical factors and enhance the comprehension of pragmatic presupposition,which provides an case study on probing into the adaptability of pragmatic presupposition from the perspective of communicative context;2)It provides references for studying the communicative contextual adaptation of pragmatic presupposition in TED speech,which helps to stimulate English learners’ interest in the analysis of the pragmatic presupposition in a speech and the application of the pragmatic presupposition in communication;3)It enhances speakers’ acquaintance with pragmatic presupposition in TED speech and helps have a deeper understanding of the pragmatic presupposition and its adaptive properties in TED speech,so that speakers take appropriate and flexible strategies to conduct speeches powerfully.