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Cooperative 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. (Grice, 1975)
The maxims supporting this principle are defined by
Grice as:

Quantity: make your contribution as informative as
required. Do not make it more informative than
required.

Quality: do not say what you believe to be false. Do
not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.

Relation: be relevant

Manner: be perspicuous; avoid obscurity of
expression; avoid ambiguity; be brief; be orderly.

Flouting and violating the maxims

A person is flouting a maxim if he/she does not observe it

but has no intention of deceiving or misleading the other

person.

By flouting, at least one of these maxims, the speaker can
convey, in addition to the literal meaning of his utterance,
an additional meaning, which is a conversational
implicature:

E.g.: A: Im out of petrol.
B: There is a garage round the corner.

Implicatures are partially derived from the literal
meaning of the utterance produced in the specific context
shared between the speaker and the hearer.

Maxim clash. A speaker might violate one maxim

in order to preserve another.
Example:

Carson is driving John to Merediths house.

CARSON: Where does Meredith live?

JOHN: Nevada.

Major violation - to create a conversational

implicature: By clearly and obviously violating a
maxim, you can imply something beyond what you
say.
Examples:

JOHN: Wheres Meredith?

ELIZABETH: The control room or the science lab.

Violating the Cooperative Principle. One

instance in which a speaker might break the maxim
of quality is if they are really trying to deceive the
listener.

Signaling a violation (minor violation). A
person might essentially come out and tell you they
are violating a maxim and why.
Examples.

I dont know if this is relevant, but... (relation)

Im not sure how to say this, but... (manner)

I cant tell you; Im sworn to secrecy. (quantity)

This is just the word on the street; I cant vouch for
this information. (quality)

Criticisms of the Maxims

Its not clear whether the maxims work in other languages

and cultures (e.g. silence in English and Japanese culture or

recommendation letter in English and Japanese)
Cross-cultural pragmatics: cross-cultural use of speech acts.
The failure to convey or understand a pragmatic intention in
another language and culture is cross-cultural pragmatic
failure (Thomas, 1983)
Some key concepts are undefined. A lot of intuition must be
used to figure out when a speaker is being irrelevant.
Theyre not a complete listing of the rules we follow in
conversation; for example, there are also rules about
politeness, which are not addressed.
There is some overlap, so its not always clear-cut which
maxim is being violated. For example:

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JOHN: Are you done yet?

MEREDITH: Well, lets see, Ive had to deal with seven

near-catastrophic systems failures in the last four hours,

Elizabeth dragged me to four different useless meetings,
and someone replaced my regular coffee with decaf, so Im
only just getting caffeine in my system and I still have to
track down whoever did it and slowly eviscerate them,
which is a little higher on my to-do list at the moment
than fixing your stupid computer, so no, no, Im not done
yet, actually.

JOHN: Jeez, a simple no would have sufficed.

Politeness and face

Saving face and losing face

Implicatures

The term is used by Grice to account for what the

speaker can imply, suggest or mean, as distinct from

what he literally says.

Conventional implicatures determined by the
conventional meaning of the words used, e.g.
- He is an Englishman, he is, therefore, brave.

Conversational implicature is derived from a general
principle of a conversation plus a number of maxims
which a speaker will normally obey.

Implicature is generated intentionally by a speaker

Inference is produced by a hearers on the basis of
certain evidence.

Exercises

Each problem presents a short dialogue. You must

identify which maxim is being used or violated. Figure

out the implication:

Politeness principles (Lakoff, 1973): dont impose, give

options, make your hearer feel good, e.g. Im sorry to

bother you, but...

How to choose a politeness strategy (in different
cultures)

Politeness and gender (cross-cultural aspect, e.g. Hello
gorgeous! two friends; in the street/construction site)

2. CARSON: What happened?

MEREDITH: He got attacked by a giant bug, and
he passed out.

Implication: He passed out because he was first
attacked (in other words, the order in which the
events occurred is: (1) he got attacked; (2) he
passed out.)

What maxim creates that implication, and
why?

1. LAURA: Come on, Im taking you to the gym.

MEREDITH: Yeah, and pigs can fly.

What is Meredith implying?

What maxim creates that implication, and why?

3. JOHN: We just have to fly real close to the

corona of the sun!
MEREDITH: Youre lucky youre pretty.

What is Meredith implying?

What maxim creates that implication, and

why?

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4. LAURA: Do you have any pets?

CARSON: I have two wee baby turtles.

5. MEREDITH: Tell them what happened!

JOHN: Meredith saw an object or entity strongly
resembling a giant bug.

Implication: Carson doesnt have any other pets

besides the two turtles.

What maxim creates that implication, and

why?

What is John implying?

What maxim creates that implication, and

why?