ABSTRACT
Pragmatics may be defined as the study of the rules and principles which govern language in use, as opposed to the abstract, idealized rules of, for instance, grammar, and of the relationships between the abstract systems of language on the one hand, and language in use on the other (but see Levinson, 1983, ch. 1.2, who discusses and dismisses a large number of definitions more or less similar to that just given; see also Leech, 1983).
