الفهرس 
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Abstract
The study at hand attempts a pragmatic approach to the analysis of some extracts from two of Shepard?s family plays; namely, Buried Child (1979) and True West (1980). The study falls into four chapters, with an introduction, a conclusion, and a bibliography. Chapter one is devoted to providing a biographical note about the writer, his personal life and his work. The chapter also discusses the distinctive features of Shepard?s dramatic techniques and structures, his conception of characterization, his interest in language, and his most important themes. Chapter two is divided into two parts. The first part briefly surveys the history, scope and general frameworks of pragmatics, displaying a theoretical background of the pragmatic framework that are relevant to the analysis of the dramatic discourse of the two plays at hand. The second part of this chapter investigates the relationship between pragmatics and drama. Chapter three examines the significance of Grice’s theory of Conversational Implicature (1957; 1975) in the whole theory of meaning. Then, the chapter proceeds to apply Grice’s approach to the analysis of the conversational behavior of the most central characters in Buried Child and True West. Chapter four applies Brown and Levinson’s framework of Politeness Phenomena (1978; 1987) to the analysis of the characters’ verbal interactions in the two plays at hand. In conclusion, we have to mention that each of the pragmatic models employed deals with language use from a different point of view, but they all interact to provide an integrated interpretation of discourse.