The pragmatics of silence: The case of humanistic Buddhism in the Philippines

• Main Author: Purpura, Jeanne Flores
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2020
• Subjects: Silence; Discourse markers; Humanistic Buddhism; Communities; Applied Linguistics
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etdd_deal/2; https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1002&context=etdd_deal
• Institution: De La Salle University

Silence is a part of people’s daily interaction with others in their community. However, silence is perceived and used differently by speakers in different speech contexts. Some studies on silence discussed that silence is used to show power, authority, and differences among people. While others use it as a form of politeness, submission, weakness, or surrender. It also has diverse meanings depending on its speakers, culture, and context. Thus, this shows that silence has pragmatic functions in social interactions. Centered in pragmatics specifically in Searle and Austin’s speech acts theory and social identity theory (SIT), this paper aimed to identify the communicative functions of silence in the different community events of the Humanistic Buddhist (HB) community, the pragmatics markers used to signal silence and to describe a deeper understanding of the notion of silence. In gathering the data, qualitative research method was used by conducting focus group discussions, interview, participant, and research observations. This study discussed that silence is an important feature and has an important role in the communication process among humanistic Buddhist (HB) community practitioners. It is used as a communicative tool to convey focus, mindfulness, and cultivation. Pragmatic markers are also present to signal silence in daily community events. Moreover, this study also showed that the HB practitioners have a different notion of silence compared to some non- HB language users. Ultimately, this study offers a new notion of silence that has a positive meaning that can be integrated in people’s daily activities, can be used to communicate effectively with others without being misunderstood and can help build relationships.