This new landmark series provides a comprehensive overview of the entire field of pragmatics. It is based on a wide conception of pragmatics as the study of intentional human interaction in social and cultural contexts. In-depth articles discuss the foundations, major theories and most recent developments of pragmatics including philosophical, sociocultural and cognitive as well as methodological, contrastive and diachronic perspectives.

• Preface to the handbook series
• Preface
• Table of contents
• 1. Pragmatic competence: Development and impairment
• I. Pragmatic development in a first language
• 2. Pragmatic development in a first language: An overview
• 3. Communicative act development
• 4. Acquisition of epistemic and evidential expressions
• 5. Acquiring implicatures
• 6. Acquiring irony
• 7. Acquiring prosody
• 8. Pragmatic development in the (middle and) later stages of life
• II. Pragmatic development in a second language
• 9. Pragmatic development in L2: An overview
• 10. Teaching speech acts in a second language
• 11. Learning how to interpret indirectness in an L2
• 12. Comprehension of implicatures and humor in a second language
• 13. Pragmatic transfer
• 14. Developing pragmatic awareness
• 15. Developing pragmatic competence in a study abroad context
• 16. Testing pragmatic competence in a second language
• III. Pragmatic disorders
• 17. Pragmatic disorders: An overview
• 18. Pragmatic competence in autism spectrum disorders
• 19. Pragmatic competence in Down syndrome
• 20. Pragmatic competence in aphasia
• 21. Pragmatics and dementia
• 22. Assessing pragmatic competence in developmental disorders
• Contributors
• Name Index
• Subject Index