Pragmatic Asymmetry in Multilingual Academic Communication

Abstract

This paper examines the problem of pragmatic asymmetry in multilingual academic communication. The study focuses on academic interaction in which English, Uzbek and Russian are used as significant languages of educational, institutional and intercultural communication. The increasing internationalization of higher education, academic mobility, joint educational programmes, English-medium instruction and international project cooperation has intensified the need for pragmatically appropriate communication among participants belonging to different linguistic and cultural traditions. The article argues that academic communication is not limited to the transmission of information. It also reflects social distance, institutional hierarchy, politeness norms, cultural expectations and communicative responsibility. Pragmatic asymmetry appears when interlocutors understand the literal meaning of an utterance but interpret its social and cultural meaning differently. The paper analyzes forms of address, requests, refusals, apologies, gratitude and disagreement as key speech acts in multilingual academic settings. It concludes that successful academic communication requires not only linguistic competence but also pragmatic competence, including the ability to adapt politeness strategies to English, Uzbek and Russian academic contexts.