Wer Ohren hat zu hören, der höre… Zum pragmatischen Mehrwert der das Zuhören betreffenden Phraseologismen aus Sicht der Axiolinguistik
He who has ears, let him hear… On pragmatic added value in phraseological units about listening from the perspective of axiological linguistics

Summary/Abstract: The article is devoted to the image of language users’ experiences with listening that is set in phraseological units in German. Using the tools of axiological linguistics, the author attempts to answer questions such as: what convictions about the essence of listening are encoded in phraseological units about speech situations, what expectations of the speaker towards their interlocutor(s) are manifested in the examined phrasemes, which criterion is adopted in attributing values to the attitude of listening/not listening, and, finally, what role the phrasemes that encode axiological valuation of both attitudes may perform in interpersonal communication. Special attention is paid to the perlocutionary effects of the axiological potential carried by the examined phraseological units. The conclusion that is drawn is that the phrasemes reflect social valuation and some of them may be used in restrictive communication. Furthermore, it appears that the experience of listening encoded in German phraseological units has three semantic variants: an affective reaction of the listener to the content of the speaker’s utterance; an attitude of not paying sufficient attention to the speaker’s message, which can thus destabilize speaker-hearer relations; and, finally, a communicative attitude of obedience.

• Details
• Contents