A Study Of Pragmatic Inference Strategies In English Reading

So far, a remarkable achievement has been made in the studies of pragmatics. Nevertheless, the research of the application of pragmatics in English language teaching is still relatively insufficient. Inference is an important strategy in English reading, but the traditional strategy researches tend to focus on researches of the semantic meaning (the literal meaning). Researches on more profound pragmatic meaning (the implied meaning) inference strategies is still relatively inadequate. To promote the competence of pragmatic inference in English reading for senior year undergraduates majoring in English, this research, designed to introduce the theory and practice of pragmatics into English reading teaching, studies pragmatic meaning inference strategies for these senior year undergraduates. Based on the Conversational Implicature Theory, the Relevance Theory and the Adaptation Theory, the thesis studies the reading pragmatic inference strategies for senior undergraduates majoring in English,verifies the effectiveness of these strategies and the necessity of the strategies training and makes some comments and suggestions on the related English reading teaching.The study mainly applies the combination of theoretical and empirical approach, employing data studies, logic inference, experience summarization and other research methods. The research, drawing on the merits from and making up for the deficiencies in the above-mentioned three pragmatic theories, sums up three fundamental strategies: Identification Strategies, Inference Strategies and Verification Strategies. Each Strategy includes two subclasses: Language Form Identification Strategy and Language meaning Identification Strategy in Identification Strategies, Meaning-Orientation Strategy and Meaning-Acquisition Strategy in Inference Strategies, and Process-Checking Strategy and Abduction Inference Strategy in Verification Strategies. The study finds that the competence of reading pragmatic inference of the subjects does not parallel their linguistic competence and the following conclusion is reached at the end of research:(1) Senior undergraduates majoring in English have not yet mastered adequately the pragmatic inference strategies for their advanced English reading.(2) The competence of reading pragmatic inference of the senior undergraduates majoring in English does not necessarily develop along with their linguistic competence.(3) The training of English reading pragmatic inference strategies helps to improve the competence of reading pragmatic inference on the part of the senior undergraduates majoring in English.