Ebook: The limits of awareness

A study of the limits of native speakers' awareness
of, and ability to express, the dimensions of his language for the
researcher investigates this hypothesis: that the ease or difficulty
of a native speaker's characterization of the use of the forms of his
own language depends on certain general semiotic properties of the
use in question. Specifically, the study looks at the pragmatic
dimension of meaning in speech forms, or how speech forms are used as
effective action in specifiable cultural contexts, such as when a
proper religious or judiciary functionary pronounces a man and woman
husband and wife. It is concluded that although the linguistic models
applied to cultural phenomena have usually depended on the pure
referential system unique to language among all social codes, this
investigation illustrates that the other functions of language are
always being assimilated to reference in terms of native speaker
awareness. They are subject to conscious metapragmatic tesimony only
to the extent that they ride along on referential structure. Further
research using this approach is suggested in the areas of
understanding the cognitive bases of the many functions of language,
and of the investigation of cultural phenomena in general. (MSE)