Pragmatic is the study of how meaning is conveyed and used in communication and interaction. The study looks beyond the literal meaning of a word or sentence to consider its implied meaning and how the context and situation may affect its interpretation. It is a key aspect of how we communicate with one another and how we are understood. Pragmatics is a major part of the theory of language, and it encompasses many different aspects of how we use words and phrases.
A person who is pragmatic is someone who focuses on practical approaches and solutions–ones that will work in practice, not just in theory. Pragmatic people are often described as being “realistic” and able to understand that they can’t always get exactly what they want, so they are willing to compromise.
The term pragmatic is also used to describe a particular style of philosophical thought, called pragmatism. Pragmatism is an approach to philosophy that stresses the importance of achieving real-world results and understanding the limitations of ideas. Pragmatism can be seen in a variety of different areas, from business and politics to the arts and sciences.
Philosophers who are considered pragmatists include William James, Charles Sanders Peirce and John Dewey. They believe that our experience and the world around us are important sources of knowledge and understanding, and they advocate using a combination of logical reasoning and experimentation to discover the truth. They also emphasize the need to be flexible and adaptable as our understanding of the world changes.
The most important development in pragmatics since the classical period is probably Richard Rorty’s “critical pragmatism.” This is a school of thought that has incorporated elements of analytic philosophy, phenomenology, and hermeneutics, while being critical of both neo-Marxianism and existentialism. The school has also developed a concept of communicative action and a notion of discourse that is influential in both the philosophy of language and the philosophy of society.
While the pragmatist school has lost some of its original momentum, the philosophy of pragmatics remains an active area of philosophical inquiry. Some contemporary philosophers in fields such as feminism, ecology, and Native American philosophy still look to the pragmatist tradition for inspiration.
In the last few decades, there has been a revival of pragmatist thinking in philosophy of language and other areas. The main symptom of this revival is the prominence of the work of Jurgen Habermas, who manages to combine analytic philosophers’ desire for systematically theorising language with a neo-Marxian and hermeneutic approach to the human ‘lifeworld’, and draws on Mead’s pragmatist analysis of the self as irremediably social. His central concept of communicative action is an important tool for analysing the social structures of modern society.