Title: The Cooperative Principle
1The Cooperative Principle
2Key points
- The Cooperative Principle and its maxims
- Conversational implicatures
3Difficulties
- The violations of the cooperation maxims
46.3.2.1 The Cooperative Principle and its maxims
- A principle proposed by the philosopher Paul
Grice whereby those involved in communication
assume that both parties will normally seek to
cooperate with each other to establish agreed
meaning. It is composed of four maxims quality,
quantity, relation, and manner.
5The four cooperative maxims
- 1 The Maxim of Quality
- Try to make your contribution one that is true
- A. Do not say what you believe to be false.
- B. Do not say that for which you lack adequate
evidence (Say what you believe to be true)
6The four cooperative principles
- 2 The Maxim of Quantity
- A. make your contribution as informative as is
required (for the current purpose of the
exchange) - B. Do not make your contribution more informative
than is required
7The four cooperative principles
- 3 The Maxim of Relation
- Be relevant
8The four cooperative principles
- 4 The Maxim of Manner
- A. Be perspicuous.
- B. Avoid obscurity of expression.
- C. Avoid ambiguity.
- D. Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity).
- F. Be orderly
96.3.2.2 Conversational implicatures
- According to Grice, utterance interpretation is
not a matter of decoding messages, but rather
involves - (1) taking the meaning of the sentences together
with contextual information, - (2) using inference rules
- (3) working out what the speaker means on the
basis of the assumption that the utterance
conforms to the maxims. The main advantage of
this approach from Grices point of view is that
it provides a pragmatic explanation for a wide
range of phenomena, especially for conversational
implicautres--- a kind of extra meaning that is
not literally contained in the utterance.
10According to Grice, conversational implicatures
can arise from either strictly and directly
observing or deliberately and openly flouting the
maxims, that is, speakers can produce
implicatures in two ways observance and
non-observance of the maxims.
- Ex. (1) Husband Where are the car keys?
- Wife Theyre on the table in the hall.
- The wife has answered clearly (manner) and
truthfully (Quality), has given just the right
amount of information (Quantity) and has directly
addressed her husbands goal in asking the
question (Relation). She ahs said precisely what
she meant, no more and no less.
11(2) He is a tiger.
- Example (2) is literally false, openly against
the maxim of quality, for no human is a tiger.
But the hearer still assumes that the speaker is
being cooperative and then infers that he is
trying to say something distinct from the literal
meaning. He can then work out that probably the
speaker meant to say that he has some
characteristics of a tiger.
12 (3) Tom has wooden ears.
- Sentence (3) is obviously false most natural
contexts and the speaker in uttering it flouts
the first maxim of quality.
13Conversational implicatures
- Meaning semantic meaning
- intended meaning
conventional meaning -
unconventional meaning - (conversational
- implicatures)
14Conversational implicatures
- Unconventional meaning generalized
- scalar
-
particularized
15The flouting of cooperative principles
- It is important to note that it is speakers who
communicate meaning via implicatures and it is
listeners who recognize those communicated
meanings via inference. The inferences selected
are those which will preserve the assumption of
cooperation. But in fact, the speakers often
flout the cooperative principles and are still
thought to be cooperative. What they convey is
the conversational implicatures.
16The flouting of the maxim of quality
- Ex. (4) Tom does not appreciate classical music
so we should not invite him to the concert. - Ex. When we moved here, the room is 5x4, now it
is 3x4.
17The flouting of maxim of quantity
- Ex. (5) A Where does C live?
- B Somewhere in the South of France.
- Ex. Dear Sir,
- Mr. Xs command of English is excellent and
his attendance at tutorials has been regular,
yours, etc.
18The flouting of the maxim of relation
- Ex. (6) A Im out of petrol.
- B There is a garage round the corner.
- Ex. A. Wheres Bill?
- B. Theres a yellow VW outside Sues house.
- Ex. A. What time is it?
- B. The mail has already come.
- Ex. A. The hostess is an awful bore, dont you
think? - B. The roses are lovely, arent they?
19The flouting of the maxim of manner
- Ex. (7) A Shall we get something for the kids?
- B But I veto I-C-E-C-R-E-A-M.
- Ex. Miss X produced a series of sounds that
corresponded closely with the score of Home,
Sweet Home.
20Tautology it is uninformative by virtue of its
semantic content
- Ex. (8) If he comes, he comes.
- (9) Girls are girls.
- (10) War is war.
21assignments
- I. Define the following terms briefly
- (1) the Cooperative Principle
- (2) conversational implicature
- II. What are the four maxims of the Cooperative
Principle? - III. Which maxim does this speaker seem to be
particularly careful about - Well, to be quite honest, I dont think she is
ill today.
22(No Transcript)