Grice's principles of conversation

Gricean Theory Of Communication

Let us focus first on the model of Grice (1975), which is the pragmatic approach which is most often referred by psychologists. According to Grice, any conversational exchange between a speaker and a recipient requires a minimum of agreement, a minimum of cooperative effort. The exchange between the two participants do not follow any route, it implies respect for common rules. Grice (1975) argues that participants engaged in an exchange are expected to observe a principle of cooperation. This principle enjoins the participants that their contribution at the time of the exchange, is consistent with the direction and purpose required by the exchange. (Searle, 1969)

Maxims Of Quantity

1. What is your contribution as informative as necessary.

2. That your contribution is not more informative than necessary.

Maxims Of Quality

1. Do not say what you believe to be false.

2. Do not say things for which you lack evidence.

Maxim Of Relation

Be relevant.

Maxims Of Manner

1. Do not express yourself obscure.

2. Avoid ambiguity.

3. Be brief.

4. Be orderly.

Compliance with these maxims will guide the interpretation of statements in the verbal exchange. The recipient, assuming that the speaker is cooperative, will add information to the literal content of a statement to understand what the speaker is communicating. Grice called these additional information of "implicit" (in English "implicatures"). (Brandom, 1994) They typically occur when the speaker seems flagrantly violating one of the maxims:

X: (1) The item you have submitted the Psychological year he was accepted?

Y: (2) I did not write the conclusion. (Searle, 1969)

According to the literal meaning of the statement (2), there appears to violate the speaker's maxim of relation and does not comply with the principle of cooperation. But the recipient has no reason to think that his interlocutor, who is engaged in a conversational exchange, does not respect the principle of cooperation. The recipient can assume that the transgression of the maxim is only apparent and that the statement (2) communicate (by inferring implicatures:

"A paper without finding an article is not over," "an article which is not completed can be submitted to any journal," an article submitted cannot be accepted ") information (3) "No, my article was not accepted!" common sense, consistent with the intent required by the exchange, is different from the literal sense. To eliminate violation of the maxim, the recipient must develop a number of implicatures that lead to the statement (3). (Brandom, 1994)

Pragmatics

The discipline of linguistics is classically divided according to three distinct fields of inquiry. First, there is syntax: the study of grammar, or the rules of proper sentence construction. Second, there is semantics: the study of meaning, or conceptual content. Third, there is pragmatics: the study of language use, or the relationship between speakers and words in social contexts. Both syntax and semantics seek to explicate their respective subject matter without reference to social, cultural, and historical circumstances. Thus, a syntactic or semantic analysis seeks in principle to study the ...