Pragmatics is the subfield of linguistics that studies how context contributes to meaning. A linguist who focuses on pragmatics is called a pragmatician. Pragmatics is sometimes contrasted with semantics, the branch of linguistics that studies sentences and the meanings that they express.
A pragmatic approach to problems is often considered more successful than an idealistic one. For example, it may make more sense to settle a lawsuit rather than trying to fight it in court.
The philosophical movement known as pragmatism emphasizes practical consequences in the determination of meaning, truth, or value. The adjective form of the word pragmatic means practical, and the noun form refers to a person who acts in a practical way.
Pragmatism is a type of philosophical skepticism that rejects the idea that any concept can be fully understood, and instead suggests that we should embrace uncertainty. This view has been criticized by many philosophers, particularly for its implications in bioethics, where it has been used to justify the designer baby debate.
In linguistics, the study of pragmatics includes a variety of subfields. These include formal and computational pragmatics; theoretical and applied pragmatics; intercultural, cross-cultural, and clinical pragmatics; neuropragmatics and psycholinguistics; conversational pragmatics and interactional pragmatics; and historical pragmatics.
A key problem is the boundary between semantics and pragmatics. It is common to think of pragmatics as a field that studies the context-dependence of utterance interpretation, but a number of different formalizations have been attempted to connect semantics with pragmatics. These include the theory of ambiguity and indexicals, speech act theory, and the theory of conversational implicature.
Another key issue in contemporary pragmatics is how to define the relevant factors for determining the meaning of an utterance. Theorists have generally divided their approach into two broad categories: near-side pragmatics and far-side pragmatics. Near-side pragmatics focuses on the nature of certain facts that are relevant in determining what is meant by an utterance, while far-side pragmatics focuses on what is conveyed beyond what is said and on the implicational force of an utterance.
The philosophy of pragmatism has had many followers, including the American philosophers William James, John Dewey, and Charles Peirce, and the British philosopher G. E. Moore. It is also influenced by the philosophy of existentialism and by the science fiction writer Kurt Vonnegut.
In the late 1900s, American pragmatism gained popularity in bioethics, with a particular focus on the debate over genetic engineering and designer babies. Its supporters include Micah Hester and Glenn McGee, who developed a pragmatic approach to bioethics that rejected the principalism theory then in vogue. The concept of pragmatism is now being adopted by many bioethicists, although this has been controversial. In addition to bioethics, pragmatism has found a home in the fields of psychology and sociology. For example, it has been adapted to help manage the stress of workplace discrimination. Also, psychologists have applied the philosophy to their study of emotion and behavior. This has led to a pragmatic approach to treatment and a pragmatic definition of psychological well-being.