Eloquent Silence, a Pragmatic Concept in Persian Language

Eloquent Silence, either lacking or having form, has meaning and function and serves the communication. Its functions and meanings vary according to the culture, setting, topic and interlocutors in communication. The purpose of this study is to investigate the pragmatic dimension of silence in Persian. In so doing, silence cases were derived from Zoya Pirzad's (contemporary Persian novelist) works, as a sample of Persian language. Jacobson's model of communication (1960) was used as the theoretical framework to identify the functions of cases of silence. The results showed two criteria, which strongly support the fact that silence is a pragmatic concept in Persian language. The two criteria are: 1) cultural dependency of realization and interpretation of silence and 2) contextual dependency of realization and interpretation of silence. As context and culture's effect is focused and studied in pragmatics, the dependent nature of realization and interpretation of silence in the aimed language confirms pragmatic nature of silence in Persian language.