An Introduction to

Pragmatics and Discourse

Lecture 8
 Topic of previous lecture
 Part 1
 Speech acts: locution, illocution,
perlocution
 Felicity conditions

 Part 2
 Searle’s typology of speech acts
 Direct and indirect speech acts
 Categories of speech acts
 Declarations: the words change the world; an
appropriate speaker is required;
 Representatives: the words fit the external
world; the speaker is responsible for their truth;
 Expressives: the words fit the internal world;
the speaker is responsible;
 Directives: the world will have to fit the words;
the hearer is responsible for the act;
 Commissives: the world will have to fit the
words; the speaker is responsible for the act;
 Legal English
 The enacting formula of British
statutes:
 BE IT ENACTED by the Queen’s most
Excellent Majesty, by and with the
advice and consent of the Lords
Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons,
in this present Parliament assembled,
and by the authority of the same, as
follows:
Can you identify the speech acts
in this dialogue (1)?

Stanley: What’s it like out today?

Petey: Very nice.
Stanley: Warm?
Petey: Well, there’s a good breeze blowing.
Meg: What are the cornflakes like, Stan?
Stanley: Horrible.
Meg: You’re a liar, a little liar.
Stanley: The milk’s off.
Meg: It’s not. Petey ate his, didn’t you, Petey?
 Can you identify the speech acts
in this dialogue (2)?
Petey: That’s right.
Meg: There you are then.
Stanley: All right, I’ll go on to the second
course.
Meg: He hasn’t finished the first course and
he wants to go on to the second course!
Stanley: I feel like something cooked.
Meg: Well, I’m not going to give it to you.
Petey: Give it to him
 Topic of this lecture
 Some weaknesses in Searle’s theory
 The co-operative principle
Problems with Searle’s theory
 Indirectness (in varying degrees) is a
pervasive feature of speech acts
 Sometimes we can’t distinguish fully
between one speech act and another
 Felicity conditions cannot cover all the
subtleties of a speech act
 Pragmatics is better handled by means
of principles rather than rules
 Indirectness
 Janice: Ohhh, are you a puppy! (opens
it) Contact paper! I never really know
what to say when someone you're
sleeping with gives you contact paper.
 Chandler: Well, wait there's, there's
more. See the contact paper is to go
into your brand new drawer. (gives her
a drawer) See, the drawer actually
goes in my dresser.
Distinguishing between speech acts

 What’s the difference between an

order and a request?
 Would the speaker’s authority over the
hearer be a sufficient criterion?
 What about those situations in which
the position of authority is contested?
 Felicity conditions
 Felicity conditions can account for
prototypical cases, but if we try to
cover everyday speech acts they
become too complex or vague
 Ex. apologizing:
 What if you apologize for the bad weather?
 Can you apologize for a future event?

 Can you apologize without uttering the

words that you’re sorry?
 Rules v. principles
 Rules tell us what is possible (e.g.
grammatically accurate) in a language,
are mutually exclusive and
conventional.
 Pragmatics is concerned with how we
make choices (among the language
resources), by using one/more
principles, to achieve goals.
 Communication is a rational
activity
 Meaningful communication is a
rational activity which takes place
when the participants are cooperating
in the verbal exchange.
 If someone says something pointless,
we assume (on the basis of the co-
operative principle) that more is
communicated than what the words
actually say.
Two levels of communication
 What is said (the semantic level)
 What is meant (the pragmatic level)
 The addressee must go through a mental
process to get from the literal meaning of
what is said to what the speaker intended
to communicate
 This process is
 Context-dependent
 Text specific
 Located in the individual addressee
 From what is said to what is
meant
 This deductive process is carried out by
the addressee on the basis of the
context of utterance (i.e. its co-text,
the situational context, the background
knowledge shared between the
participants) with respect to some
guiding principle.
 Inference v. implicature
(Thomas)
 Inference = the mental process by
means of which we can deduce
something from evidence (either
linguistic or non-linguistic)
 Implicature = some meaning which is
hinted at, conveyed or suggested
indirectly by means of language
 Examples
1. A: Did you get the milk and the eggs?
B: I got the milk.
2. A: Did you manage to fix the leak?
B: I tried to.
3. A: What happened to your garden?
B: There was a dog yesterday.
 The co-operative principle
 Make your conversational contribution
such 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
 In sum, be cooperative
 4 maxims (1)
 Relation = be relevant;
 Quantity = deliver the appropriate
amount of information, i.e.
 Don’t say less than is required
 Don’t say more than is required;

 Quality = be truthful, i.e.

 Don’t say what is false
 Don’t say what lacks evidence
 4 maxims (2)
 Manner = be perspicuous, i.e.
 Avoid obscurity
 Avoid ambiguity

 Be brief

 Be orderly
Relationship between the
speaker and the maxims
 The speaker can
 Observe the CP and the maxims
 Violate the CP and the maxims

 Infringe the CP and the maxims

 Opt out of the CP and the maxims

 Exploit the CP and the maxims

 Awareness of the maxims
 There are expressions which indicate that
the speaker is aware of the CP and the
maxims, esp. when he/she wants to opt out
of or underline that he/she is observing the
maxims
1. Quality: as far as I know; I guess;
2. Quantity: as you probably know;
3. Relation: by the way; I hope this is important;
4. Manner: is this clear?; in other words;
Infringing and opting out of the
maxims

A speaker may infringe a maxim

unwillingly;
1. A: What’s the time please?
B: No English. Sorry.
A speaker may decide not to co-operate
and signal it willingly;
2. A: What is your government going to do
about Guantanamo?
B: I can’t comment on that.
Exercise 1
 Which maxim has been violated in
the example below?
Adult: So you like ice-cream. What
are your favourite flavours?
Child: Hamburger … fish and chips.
 Exercise 2
Which maxims does the speaker intend to opt out?
1. I don’t think I have sufficient evidence for
this, but …
2. I’m not at liberty to say any more, …
3. I know this is irrelevant, but
4. This is a bit confused, but …
5. So, to cut a long story short, …
6. Not to change the topic, but…
7. I’m sure you already know this, but…
8. People say …
Exploiting or flouting the maxims
 Sometimes one of the maxims is
deliberately not observed by the
speaker. If the hearer has reason to
think that the speaker is still being co-
operative, he/she may assume that
more is being communicated than
what has been said.
Examples
1. A: Did you invite Mark and Bill?
B: I invited Bill.
2. A: How are you?
B: I’m dead.
3. A: Coffee?
B: It would keep me awake all
night.
 Exercise (1)
1. A: What do you think about my new suit?
B: I like your tie.
2. A: What do you think of the match?
B: Messi was a lion.
3. A: What do you think of the course?
B: It’s easy to say I understood something
because what I understoood was actually
easy to understand.
4. A: What do you think of the course?
B: I need to go now …
Exercise (2)
Professor Poinar added: "This fossil
may help us understand when
wasps, which were mostly just meat-
eating carnivores, turned into bees
that could pollinate plants and serve
a completely different biological
function."
CP maxims at work

 Professor Poinar added: maxim of quality;

 may help us: scalar implicature of likelihood;
 which were mostly just meat-eating carnivores:
maxim of quantity;
Exercise (3)
They coded for 100 neuropeptides -
organic molecules that control brain
activity in both bees and humans, the
researchers report in Science. In the
bee brain, which is not much larger
than a full stop, they help to regulate
around one million neurons.
CP maxims at work
 neuropeptides - organic molecules that control
brain activity: maxim of manner;
 the researchers report in Science: maxim of
quality;
 which is not much larger than a full stop: maxim
of quantity.
 Exercise (4)
Petey is reading his newspaper in the kitchen. Meg
enters and sits at the table near him.
Meg: You got your paper?
Petey: Yes.
Meg: Is it good?
Petey: Not bad.
Meg: What does it say?
Petey: Nothing much.
Meg: You read me out some nice bits yesterday.
Petey: Yes, well, I haven’t finished this one yet.