Understanding and Misunderstanding

According to the classical view on language, language is a code and speakers encode meanings and listeners decode meanings using the same rules of grammar. This view is contrasted with an alternative view of language as a signaling system. This alternative language-as-signal view posits a distinction between the perspective of the speaker and the perspective of the listener, which aligns well with observed differences between language production and comprehension. A linguistic framework that formalizes the distinction between the speaker’s perspective and the listener’s perspective is Optimality Theory. It is shown how this constraint-based framework can account for mismatches between production and comprehension.