Pragmatic Theory: Grices Theory of Implicature - Assignment Example

Pragmatic Theory Section On Grice’s Theory of Implicature Consider a the these two ments; a. Clinton is wealthy but dull. b. Clinton is wealthy and dull. Comparing the two statements (a) seems to have a deeper meaning than (b). Although the two sentences convey that Clinton is wealthy as well as dull, this as portrayed by the second sentence unlike the first one. The utterance (a) conveys more meaning than (b), for instance, there is a contrast to being rich and dull then it is right to argue that the two statements have different meaning. These two sentences can also mean the same if thought of, as all wealthy people are dull. Grice states that, since being dull and wealthy contrast, the meaning of (a) is different and has a deeper meaning compared to (b). Consider the conversation below: 1. I need gasoline. 2. There is a petrol station around the corner. Grice’s observation on these statements is that, (1) infers that (2) knows of a station nearby but not sure whether there is gasoline. This implication is not in the utterance rather derived from the speaker’s words. Statement (2) could just be, “I know of a station nearby where you can get some gasoline”. Person asking for gasoline assumes that the other one is trying to be of help but not sure, whether there is gasoline in the petrol station (2) is talking about. Grice’s theory of implicature is that, unless (2) wants to be cooperative, then it does not make any sense uttering the statement unless (2) is sure and believes that there is gasoline in the petrol station (Davis, 2007). For instance, a) Harrison took some apples. According to Grice, Harrison took some of the apples and this implicates that he did not take all the apples. The implication is in the sense that the listener has reasoning capacity and might have some questions. Why did (a) not say Harrison took all the apples? Therefore, according to the listener’s believes, Harrison did not take all the apples. This kind of implication is from the speaker’s thinking and not the words said (Potts, 2005). Section 2: The Relevance Problem 1. John ate a salad. 2. John did not eat pasta. From utterance (1), the speaker could just have said, “John only ate a salad”. This implicates (2) since if he ate only salad then John did not eat pasta. The utterance can also implicate, John ate salad amongst other foodstuffs but not pasta. This can also implicate that the listener believes that John did not take pasta. The (2) utterance that John did not eat pasta has a deeper meaning that even though he took several other foods, he did not eat pasta or John does not take pasta. According to Grice’s relevance of the problem theory, (2) could be more relevant than statement (1) assuming that the listener wanted to know what John took. With the statement, giving what John did not eat means that he ate all other edibles available or in question. The (1) statement is not as relevant as the second one in that, John ate a salad amongst other things. Section 3: The Maxim Prioritization Problem 3. He fed on poisoned food and died shortly after. The conjunction connects the first event with the later. It is because of feeding on the poisoned food that he died. It is obvious and possible that feeding on poisonous food causes death and the listener can get the intention of the speaker clearly. The maxim of prioritization reveals that, the cause of death is poison unlike a statement that, “he died and fed on poisoned food”. This is a false and impossible statement and its does not implicate the cause of death. Such statements can have some other different meanings and not necessarily, what the speaker said. Statement (3) prioritizes poison as the cause of his death. Meaning if he had not taken the poison, he could not be dead (Potts, 2005). Section 4: Neo-Gricean Solutions The innovation with inclusion of restriction on alternatives using fixed or pre-defined scales. Since the relevant alternatives are pre-defined, then this serves as a solution to the relevance problem. In addition, neo-Griceans changed the main clause in the maxim of quantity, which asks for as much information as one can which makes the quantity maxim rely on the relevance maxim. This regulation of the quantity maxim clears many problems related to the maxim, which asks for as much information as you can. This can mean that the information is unrelated to the problem in question but it is an additional content in the main meaning. The Horn’s scale used in the neo-Gricean solution claiming that, Grice’s theory sort to explore the speaker’s meaning or characterize implicalture as part of the speaker’s meanings. Horn’s view of pragmatics is much different from Grice and has promising advancements in the relevance problem with Grice’s theory. Neo-Gricean which is also the Hornian theory and the Gricean theory, which has a different approach as Grice, focuses on philosophical analysis unlike Horn who is much into linguistics and thus pragmatic gets another view of the prioritization problem (Carston, 2004). Section 5: Free Discussion The view of Horn on what the speaker says is different from what Grice views and some of speaker’s words do not need to be in implication or considered in the meaning. Unlike in Grice’s thinking that whatever is said is in the meaning of speaker’s sentence; horn in the neo-Gricean theory which he favors the minimal linguistic notion of speaker’s sayings rather than what is meant. The neo-Gricean, which uses Horn’s scales, has many improvements mainly in the implication of what the speaker says and what their meanings are. These restrict the use of words to explicate or illustrated and give more information about an object, which sees wordiness and meaningless use of words within another meaning. Relevance in any statement is very important as it helps the listener to understand what the speaker meant without having to think or apply any rule to get the strong meaning from a week statement. Being relevant avoids many words, which can add other meanings in the statement or completely change the aim of the speaker to listeners (Horn, 2005). References Carston, R. (2004). Relevance theory and the saying/implicating distinction. In Horn, Laurence and Gregory Ward (eds.), Handbook of Pragmatics. Oxford: Blackwell. Davis, W. A. (2007). Implicature: Intention, convention, and principle in the failure of Gricean theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Horn, L. (2005). Current issues in neo-Gricean pragmatics. Intercultural Pragmatics 2 .London: Elsevier. Potts, C. (2005). ‘‘The Logic of Conventional Implicature’’. Oxford University Press. Read More