Language

1
Language Communication

• SI 502
• Fall 1997
• November 11 13

2
Study of Language

• Phonology -- the rule system governing how
  language sounds
• Syntax -- the rule system governing how sentences
  are put together
• Semantics -- the rule system governing how words
  and sentences convey meaning
• Pragmatics -- the social conventions governing
  the use of language

3
Study of Language

• competence -- the idealized system of knowledge
  that underlies language capabilities (what
  linguistics is about)
• performance -- the actual use of language
  (including a wide range of dysfluencies such as
  hesitations, restarts, errors, etc. -- what
  psycholinguistics is about)

4
Anderson on Language

• Lots of details about
• linguistics
• structure of language
• language and thought
• language acquisition
• language comprehension
• I will focus on social aspects of language
  communication

5
Pragmatics

• How language is used
• Examples
• Could you please pass the salt? is a request,
  not an inquiry about capabilities
• conventions of formality, politeness, intimacy,
  shared knowledge
• same request made differently to president,
  classmate, good friend, sibling

6
Scenario

• CTIS is exploring what is involved in conducting
  reference interviews at a distance
• What technologies are needed to do this?
• asynchronous -- fax, e-mail, chat window
• synchronous -- phone call, video connection (wide
  variety of options)
• Cost/benefit analysis -- what benefit is gained
  for what cost?

7
Analysis of Scenario

• What functional capabilities are needed for an
  effective remote interview?
• Starting point an analysis of how communication
  works

8
Language Use as Collaboration

• A communicates to B
• B provides some kind of feedback that has
  understood A, and then continues the
  communication
• if communication has failed its noticed, need
  some kind of repair
• A provides some kind of feedback that has
  understood B, and then continues the
  communication
• etc.

9
Grices Conversation Maxims

• quantity -- make contribution as informative as
  required, but no more
• quality -- make contribution true
• relevance -- make contribution relevant to
  ongoing conversation
• manner -- be clear, avoid obscurity, ambiguity

10
Examples

• Steven Wilfred is meeting a woman for dinner
  tonight.
• Susan Does his wife know about it?
• Steven Of course she does. The woman he is
  meeting is his wife.
• violation of maxim of quantity
• Barbara I am out of gas.
• Peter There is a gas station around the corner.
• by maxim of relevance, draw in inference
• a conversational implicature

11
How Do We Know What To Say?

• need to know
• with whom we are communicating
• what we assume they know
• what we assume they know about us
• what they have derived from what we have
  communicated (feedback)

12
Common Ground

• common, mutual or joint knowledge
• what is assumed to be shared between people who
  are communicating
• establishing common ground is required for
  effective communication

13
Common Ground Examples

• Alan Now, um, do you and your husband have a j-
  car?
• Barbara - have a car?
• Alan Yeah
• Barbara No
• Miss Dimple Where can I get a hold of you?
• Chico I dont know, lady. You see, Im very
  ticklish.
• Miss Dimple I mean, where do you live?
• Chico I live with my brother.
• B How would you describe the color of this
  flower?
• S You mean this one pointing?
• B Yes
• S Its off yellow.

14
Bases of Sharing

• kinds of shared knowledge see handout
• cues for establishing shared knowledge see
  handout

15
Constraints on Establishing Common Ground

• copresence -- same physical environment
• visibility -- visible to each other
• audibility -- speech
• contemporality -- message received immediately
• simultaneity -- both speakers can send/receive
• sequentiality -- turns cannot get out of sequence
• reviewability -- able to review others messages
• revisability -- can revise messages before sent

16
Examples of Constraints
17
Costs

• formulation -- simple vs complex utterances
• production -- effort involved in utterances
• reception -- listening, reading
• understanding -- comprehension
• start-up -- getting going
• delay -- delays have meaning
• asynchrony -- precision of turns
• speaker change -- one speaker at a time
• display -- common objects
• fault -- mistakes
• repair -- fixing mistakes

18
Homework Example

• How does CTIS figure out what would work for
  remote reference interviews?
• Some options
• telephone, desktop video conferencing, two-person
  chat, shared workspace, e-mail
• communication analysis using principle of
  common ground
• economic analysis how should costs benefits
  be analyzed?