6 The Message Model of Linguistic Communication
The Message Model of linguistic communication may be described as follows:
A speaker has some message in mind that she wants to communicate to a hearer.
The speaker then produces some expression from the language that encodes the
message as its meaning. Upon hearing the beginning of the expression, the hearer
begins identifying the incoming sounds, syntax, and meanings; then, using her
knowledge of language, she composes these meanings in the form of a successfully
decoded message. (Linguistics, p. 364)
According to the Message Model, then, the question "How does successful
communication work?'can be answered as follows:
Linguistic communication is successful if the hearer receives the speaker's message.
It works because messages have been conventionalized as the meaning of
expressions, and by sharing knowledge of the meaning of an expression, the hearer
can recognize a speaker's message-the speaker's communicative intention.
(Linguistics, p. 369)
See pages 366-370 of Linguistics for a discussion of problems that arise with the
Message Model.