Cooperation and Implicature

(A paper)

Lectured by:

Prof. Abbas A. Badib, Ph.D.

Compiled by:

Ni’matul Maulida 147835010

Nur Hayati Ganinda 147835038

(Class A)

Universitas Negeri Surabaya

Post-graduate Program

2014
A. INTRODUCTION

In the several preceding discussions, it is assumed that both the speaker and listener
involved in the conversation are generally cooperating with each other. For instance, for a
reference to be successful, the referee supposed to use it in the same social community so that
the listener can fully cooperate in intrapersonal rhetoric with the speaker (Yule, 1996, p. 35).
In accepting speaker’s presupposition, listeners normally have to assume that the speaker
who says ‘my car’ really does have the car that is mentioned and isn’t trying to mislead the
listener. This sense of cooperation is simply should be obeyed, so that the speaker not trying
to confuse, trick, or withhold relevant information from each other.
Paul Grice (1975) has formulated the Cooperative Principles (CP) which derived from
the assumption that both parties will normally seek to cooperate with each other to establish
the agreed meaning.

B. DISCUSSIONS

1. Implicature
A short conversation between two young ladies, she asked her how she likes the man
She meetS lately. She answered cheerfully.
[1] “He is a tiger”
We can obviously see that her answer is literally false since no human looks like a tiger. But
lady 1 still assumes that the lady 2 is being cooperative and then infers that lady 2 is trying to
say something distinct from the literal meaning. Lady 1 can then work out that probably the
lady 2 meant to say that “he has some awesome characteristics of a tiger, and I like it so
much”
Another cited example here from 2 Indonesian college students in the library.
[2] a. ‘Bro! how is your thesis doing?’
b. ‘Tak senggol bacok kamu nanti!’
Student B answered irrelevantly with this sentence. Despite of clearly answer his intended
meaning, he chooses another catchphrase which is largely know by Indonesian citizen.
Student A may assume that student B emphasizes strongly that he doesn’t accept any
question about his thesis as well as asks students A not to talk about his thesis anymore
otherwise he will be really mad and ‘stab’ him with his temper instead of knife.
 These two responses from the prior examples show the speaker who intend to
communicate more than what they say. When the listener hears the expression in dialogue [1]
and [2], they first have to assume that the speaker is being cooperative and intends to
communicate something. That something must be more than just what the words mean. It is
an additional conveyed meaning called implicature.
Let’s take a look to another example taken from Yule (1996, p. 36), a conversation
between two women in their lunch hour. Woman 1 asks woman 2 how she likes the
hamburger she is eating. Here is the answer:
[3] ‘Hamburger is a hamburger’.
Given the opportunity to evaluate the hamburger, woman 2 has responded without an
evaluation, thus two implicatures are that she has no opinion, either good or bad to express
and woman 2 thinks that all hamburgers are the same.
Implicatures are primary examples of more being communicated than is said. But in
order for them to be interpreted, basic cooperative principles must first be assumed to be in
operation (Yule, 1996, p. 36).

2. Cooperative Principle (CP)

Let’s take a look in the following dialogue.
[4] Husband : Where are the car keys?
Wife : They’re on the table in the hall.
The wife has answered clearly and truthfully, has given just the right amount of information
and has directly addressed her husband’s goal in asking the question. She has said precisely
what she meant, no more and no less. Since the wife intends being cooperative and
informative, the husband for sure will fine the key.
Consider the next dialogue taken from Yule (1996, p. 36) between two strangers in
the park. There is a woman sitting on a park bench and a large dog lying on the ground in
front of the bench. The man comes along and sits down on the bench.
[5] Man : Does your dog bite?
Woman: No
(The man reaches down to pet the dog but it bites the man’s hand)
Man : Ouch! Hey! You said your dog doesn’t bite.
Woman: He doesn’t. But that’s not my dog.
One of the problem here has to do with communication. Specifically the problem caused is
the man’s assumption that his question ‘does your dog bite?’ and the woman’s answer ‘No’
both apply to the dog in front of them. From the man’s perspective, the woman is not being
cooperative since she provides less information that expected. If the woman being
cooperative and stated earlier that indeed she has a dog which doesn’t bite people but she
doesn’t bring it, the lying stray dog will not bite him.
In dialogue [5] we see that the woman not being cooperative since she doesn’t adhere
to the cooperative principles (CP) while the married couple in dialogue 4 successfully
communicated since both of them are being cooperative by sticking to CP; the husband’s
question is clear and his wife answered clearly too.
Philosopher Paul Grice (1975) proposed a theory of conversation namely Cooperative
Principle (CP) and elaborated in four sub-principles called maxims. The cooperative
principle: make your conversational contribution as is required, at the stage at which it
occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged.

The maxims
1. The maxim of quantity
1.1 Make your contribution as informative as is required.
1.2 Do not make your contribution more informative than is
required.
2. The maxim of quality.
2.1 Do not say what you belief to be false.
2.2 Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.
3. The maxim of relation/relevance.
3.1 Be relevant and stick to the point.
4. The maxim of manner
4.1 Avoid obscurity expression.
4.2 Avoid ambiguity.
4.3 Be brief.
4.4 Be orderly.
The four maxims can be seen in example [4], a dialogue between a married couples.
Husband : Where are the car keys?
Wife : They’re 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 husband’s goal in
asking the question (relevant).
3. Hedges
Yule (1996, p. 37) stated that people are normally going to provide an appropriate
amount of information. But in fact, the speakers often flout even violate the cooperative
principles and are still thought to be cooperative. In this case, what a speaker intends to
communicate is characteristically far richer than what she directly expresses (Horn & Ward,
2005). If a maxim is deliberately broken, it is normally done so to achieve a very specific
effect and communicate a specific meaning, in other words, the special meaning created
when a maxim is flouted. However there are certain kind of expressions speaker use to mark
that they may be in danger of not fully adhering to maxims.
Consider the following dialogue, the initial phrase in [7a-c] and the final phrase in
[7d] are notes to the listener regarding the accuracy of the main statement.

[6]. a. As far as I know, they are married.

b. I may be mistaken, but I saw a wedding ring on her finger.
c. I am not sure if this is right, but I heard it was a secret ceremony in Hawaii.
d. He couldn’t live with her, I guess.

The conversational context for the example in [7] might be recent rumor involving a couple
known to the speaker. Cautious notes, or hedges, of this type can also be used to show that
the speaker is conscious of the quality maxim.
A hedge is a mitigating word or phrase used to lessen the impact of an utterance.
Hedges may intentionally or unintentionally be employed in both spoken and written
language and help speakers and writers indicate more precisely how maxims observed in
assessments. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedge_(linguistics))
Hedges also used when people try to go on to mention some potentially unconnected
information during conversation. The following dialogue happened in the class during recess.
[7]. a. ‘The shirt cost around $15’.
b. ‘I think you have to take me to that store, I want it so much’.
a. ‘Sure. Umm, by the way, have you had the cookies that I made?’
b. ‘Well, I guess those people have finished the entire cookies’
Lady b uses phrase ‘by the way’ which indication she wants to stop the talking about buying
the shirt and drifts the conversation to another topic, the cookies that she made. Lady B also
expected lady A to response relevantly. Another phrase like ‘well, anyway’ or ‘anyway’ also
indicating that speaker may have drifted into a discussion of some possibly non-relevant
material and want to stop talking about the previous topic.
Another scenario taken from an office meeting (Yule, 1996, p. 39)
 [8] a. ‘I don’t know if this this important, but some of the files are missing’.
b. ‘This may sounds like a dumb question, but whose hand writing is this?’
c. ‘Not to change the subject, but is this related to the budget?’

The initial phrases may show that the speaker interrupts in the middle of heated discussion.
These phrases also indicating that the speaker expects a relevant response to his statement.
The awareness of the expectation of manner may also lead speakers to produce
hedges of the type shown in the initial phrases in the following conversation heard during an
account of a crash.

[9] a. ‘This may be a bit confused, but I remember being in a car’.

b. ‘I am not sure if this makes sense, but the car had no light’.
c. ‘I don’t know if this is clear at all, but I think the other car was reversing’.

The speaker tries his best to be cooperative in sharing the information. He aware the maxim
of manner, and avoid being ambiguous.
All off these examples of hedges are good indication that the speakers are not only
aware of the maxims, but that they want to observe them. Perhaps such form also
communicate the speakers concern that their listeners judge them to be cooperative
conversational partners.

4. The ‘opt out speaker’

There are however, even in some conversation speakers indicates unwillingness be
cooperative, they choose to opt out from observing the maxim required. This case may
happen simply when someone asking how much is your salary and you choose to opt out
saying ‘mind your own businesses’ since asking about salary is considered rude. An
interesting aspect of such expression is that, although they are typically not informative as is
required, they are naturally interpreted as communicating more than is said (i.e. the speaker
objects to answer, and tells never ask this question again) and this typical reaction indicating
that there is something really wrong with the salary.
This ‘opt out action’ generally used when a suspect exerts their right to remain silent, or
a witness choose not to impart information that may proof detrimental to the defendant.
[10] Detective: ‘Has the defendant ever told you that she hated her father and wanted him
dead’.
 Psychiatry: ‘Such information is confidential and it will be unethical to share it with
you’.
The other phrases like ‘no comment’, ‘my lips are sealed’ generally use to opt of the maxims
required.

5. Types of Implicature
There are two types of implicatures; conversational implicature and conventional
implicature. Conversational implicature is divided into two; generalized conversational
implicature and particularized conversational implicature.

5.1. Conversational Implicature

In a conversation, the participants, both the speaker or the listener, must be
cooperative and follow the maxims that have already mentioned in the previous section. It is
supported by Yule (1996, p. 40), the basic assumption in conversation is that, unless
otherwise indicated, the participants are adhering to the cooperative principle and the
maxims. However, a speaker may violate the maxims, but totally unaware of the maxims
violation.
For instance, the speaker violates the maxim of quantity, but he implicates something
more than he said, it is called implicature. Then the listener must recognize the speaker’s
intended meaning, it is called inference. This kind of situation is called a conversational
implicature since it happens in a conversation. Yule (1996, p. 40) stated that 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.
There are two types of conversational implicatures; generalized conversational
implicature and particularized conversational implicature.

5.1.1 Generalized Conversational Implicature

The first types of conversational implicature is generalized conversational
implicature. In generalized conversationaal implicature, the listener does not need special
knowledge to recognize what the speaker implicates. As stated by Yule (1996, p. 41), when
no special knowledge is required in the context to calculate the additional conveyed meaning,
it is called a generalized conversational implicature. In this type of conversational
implicature, the speaker uses the general process which is easily inferred by the listener. For
instance, look at [11].
[11] A: Did you invite Bella and Cathy?
 B: I invited Bella.
In the conversation above, A asked whether B invited Bella and Cathy. Then the speaker A
answered that he invited Bella. In this case, the speaker A violates the maxim of quantity
Because he does not mention whether he invited cathy or not. However, B has to assume that
the speaker A is cooperating and unaware of violating the maxim of quantity. B must infer
that who is not mentioned was not invited. The speaker A has conveyed more than he said.
Yule also represent the structure of implicatures. From the example above, we can
represent it with b (= Bella) and c (= Cathy), and the symbol +> for an implicature. So the
structure will be;
A: b & c?
B: b (+> not c)
We can see that in this conversation, the listener does not need special knowledge to
know what the speaker intended to say via implicature. Besides that, there is one example of
generalized conversational implicature in English. It involves any phrase with an indefinite
article. For instance:
[12] I was excited seeing a child playing a guitar.
By using an indefinite article, it is clear that the child is not the speaker’s child. The speaker
is assumed to violate the maxim of quantity since the speaker could not be more specific or
more informative.
In generalized conversational implicature, there is a basis of a scale of values which is
known as scalar implicature.

Scalar Implicature
Yule (1996, p. 41) stated that certain information is always communicated by
choosing a word which expresses one value from a scale of values. Scalar implicature is a
greater detail of a particular sort of implicatures, expressing a quantity and terms are listed
from the highest to the lowest value. As stated by Yule (1996, p. 41), the basic of scalar
implicature is that, when any form in a scale is asserted, the negative of all forms higher on
the scale is implicated. Some of the scale of values, from the highest to the lowest, can be
seen below:
<all, most, many, some, few>
<always, often, sometimes>
<certain, possible>
<must, should>
 And many others.
In this case, a speaker uses the one word from the scale which is considered to be the
most informative and truthful in the circumtances, as in the example below:
[13] I took some of the flowers.
This example indicates an implicature. The speaker implicates that he did not take all of the
flowers by using the word ‘some’. Because there are several words in this scale of values,
there must be several implicatures created, such as +> not most and +> not many. Another
example of scalar implicatures is:
[14] They are sometimes reading some books in the library.
By using the word ‘sometimes’, the speaker implicates the negative of forms higher on the
scale of frequency, such as +> not always and +> not often. There are so many scalar
implicatures which is produced by using expressions that are not immediately consider to be
part of any scale, as mentioned above; <certain, possible> and <must, should>. For instance:
[15] It is possible that we will have an exam tomorrow.
The word ‘possible’ indicates that the exam will not certainly occur (+> not certain). The
word ‘certain’ is the higher value than the word ‘possible’, so it can be included in the scalar
implicatures.
In scalar implicature and/or conversational implicature, a speaker may cancel what
they have said by correcting themselves on some details. For example:
[16] I bought some of this cloths in the traditional market. Ah actually I bought
most of them there.
In the example above, the speaker implicates not most (+> not most) by using ‘some’ in the
first assertion, but then the speaker corrects himself by cancelling the word ‘some’ and
asserting the word ‘most’. However, the final assertion is still implicating not all (+> not all)
with a scalar implicature.

5.1.2. Particularized Conversational Implicature

It has been explained in the previous section that in generalized conversational
implicatures, the implicatures are recognized without special background knowledge in any
particular context. However, most conversations take place in very particular or very specific
context in which locally recognized inferences are needed to work out the implicated
meanings. It is called as particularized conversational implicature. Since they are by far the
most common, particularized conversational implicatures are typically just called
implicatures.
 Yule (1996, p. 42) stated most of the time, our conversations take place in very
specific contexts in which locally recognized inferences are assumed. Such inferences are
required to work out the conveyed meanings which result from particularized conversational
implicatures.
For instance, look at the conversation below (taken fromYule, 1996, p. 43):
[17] Rick: Hey, coming to the wild party tonight?
Tom: My parents are visiting.
In this conversation, Tom seemed violating the maxim of relevant because his response is not
related to Rick’s question. However, to make it relevant, rick has to draw on some assumed
knowledge that one college student in this setting expects another to have. Tom will spend
the evening with his parents and time spent with parents is quite, in contrast with the wild
party as well. Therefore, Rick has to understand, via inference, that Tom’s response
implicates he will not come to the wild party. It is clear that in particularized conversational
implicature, particular knowledge is needed.
A further example in which the speaker appears not to flout the maxim of manner is
represented below (taken fromYule, 1996, p. 43):
[18] Ann: Where are you going with the dog?
Sam: To the V-E-T.
In the local context of these speakers,the dog is known to recognize the word ‘vet’ and also
hate of being there, so Sam tried to spelled out the word to expect that the dog would not
recognize the spelling word. In other words, Sam implicates that he does not want his dog to
know the answer to the question asked by Ann.
There are many examples that represent the particularized conversational
implicatures. Most of them, as conversational implicature in general, based on the
cooperative principles and the maxims. There must be some properties of conversational
implicatures.

5.1.3. Properties of Conversational Implicature

There are some criteria in distinguishing conversational implicatures from aspects of
conventional meaning:
a. Cancellability (deniability)
Implicatures can be denied without self-contradiction. Yule (1996, p. 44) stated that
implicatures are part of what is communicated and not said, then speakers can always deny
that they intended to communicate such meanings. Conversational implicatures are deniable.
b. Calculability
We can trace a line of reasoning leading from the utterance to the implicature, and
including at some point the assumption that the speaker was obeying the rules of conversation
to the best of their ability.
To take a simple example, there is a standard implicature associated with stating a
number, that the speaker means only that number, it can be seen below:
[19] You have won five dollars!
It is very easy for a speaker to suspend the implicature (+> only) or to cancel the implicature
by adding further information or to reinforce the implicature with additional information.
Therefore, implicatures can be calculated by listeners via inference. In terms of their defining
properties, then, conversational implicatures can be calculated, suspended, cancelled and
reinforced. None of these properties apply to conventional implicatures (Yule, 1996, pp. 44-
45).

5.2. Conventional Implicature

Conventional implicature is quite different from conversational implicature.
Conventional implicatures are not based on the cooperative principle and the maxims. They
do not have to occur in conversation, they do not depend on special contexts for their
interpretation. Conventional implicatures are associated with specific words and result in
additional conveyed meanings when those words are used (Yule, 1996, p. 45).
For example, the English conjunction ‘but’implicates a contrast of two things. The
interpretation of any utterance of the type p but q will be based on the conjunction p & q plus
an implicature of ‘contrsat’ between the information in p and the information in q.
a. Mary suggested black, but I chose white.
b. p but q (+> p is in contrast to q)
Other English words such as ‘even’ and ‘yet’ also may indicate conventional
implicatures. When the word ‘even’ is used in a sentence or statement to describe an event,
there is an implicature of contrary to expectation. For example:
[20] Even her mother came to the party.
The word ‘even’ implicates that ‘her mother’ is not expected to come to the party.
Then, the conventional implicature of ‘yet’ is that the present situation is expected to
be different, or perhaps the opposite, at the later time. For example:
[21] I do not read the book yet.
In the example, the speaker produces an implicature that she expects the statement to be true
later. She implicates that she will read the book later.

C. CONCLUSIONS
In conclusion, in a conversation, the speaker and the listener are cooperating with
each other, it is called cooperation. In most circumtances, the cooperation is so pervasive that
it can be stated as cooperative principle of conversation and elaborated in four sub-principles,
called maxims. They are the maxim of quantity, quality, relation and manner.
If the speaker intends to communicate more than is said or to convey meaning, it is
called an implicature. There are two types of implicatures; conversational and conventional
implicatures. In conversational implicature, there are generalized conversational implicature
in which special knowledge is not required and particularized implicature in which speacial
knowledge is required.
 REFERENCES
Grice, H.P. (1975). "Logic and Conversation," Syntax and Semantic, vol.3 edited by P. Cole
and J. Morgan, Academic Press. Reprinted as ch.2 of Grice 1989, 22–40
Horn, L. R., & Ward, G. (Eds.). (2005). The Handbook of Pragmatics. Oxford: Backwell
Publishing.
Yule, G. (1996). Pragmatics (Third ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.