What is Pragmatics?
A person who understands pragmatics is able to politely dodge the issue, cleverly read between the lines, or even negotiate the rules of turn-taking in conversation. Pragmatics is a way of assessing cultural, social and contextual factors when using language.
Consider this example In the news report, it is stated that a stolen image was discovered "by an unidentified branch." Our understanding of pragmatics can help us to disambiguate the situation and improve our communication in everyday life.
Definition
Pragmatic is an adjective that refers to people who are sensible and practical. People who are pragmatic are focused on what actually works in the real world, and aren't entangled in unrealistic theories that may not be practical in the real world.
The word pragmatic comes from the Latin praegere, meaning "to grasp hold of." Pragmatism is an ancient philosophical tradition that holds that understanding the world and agency are interdependent. It also sees knowledge as a result of experience, and focuses on how knowledge is applied.
William James described pragmatism in 1907 as a new name for a variety of old ways of thinking. His lecture series, "Pragmatism - A New Name for Old Ways of Thinking" was an attempt to address this. He began by defining the 'The Present Dilemma in Philosophy'--a fundamental and seemingly unsolvable conflict between two approaches to thinking: the hard-headed empiricist belief in the experience of things and going by the facts, versus the tender-minded preference for a priori principles that appeal to rationalization. He said that pragmatism could help bridge this gap.
He also defined 'praxy' as a notion of truth that is rooted in the real world and not in an abstract, idealized theory or philosophy. He argued that the pragmatic approach was the most natural and true method of solving human issues. All other philosophical approaches, he said were ineffective.
Other philosophers who formulated pragmatist views in the early 1900s were George Herbert Mead and W.E.B Du Bois, who formulated pragmatic perspectives on social science and the study of race relations