H. PAUL GRICES MAXIMS OF CONVERSATION PRESENTED BY MUHAMMAD Imran M.

PHIL S-13-3301
Slides upgraded by: Zubair Ahmad Chishti

H. PAUL GRICES MAXIMS OF CONVERSATION

Definition of Grices Maxim of Conversation 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 (adopted from Grice, 1975). What Is Cooperative Principle? While communicating to each other we focus upon cooperative effort to understand each other otherwise it would not be understandable. But at each stage, some possible conversational moves would be excluded as conversationally unsuitable (purpose--which participants will be expected). Different Categories of Maxims in Accordance with the Cooperative Principle. Maxim of Quantity Maxim of Quality Maxim of Relation Maxim of Manner
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H. PAUL GRICES MAXIMS OF CONVERSATION

Maxim of Quantity It relates to the quantity of information to be provided, and under it fall the following maxims. a. Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purposes of the exchanges). b. Make the strongest statement you can. Maxim of Quality Under the category of quality falls a supermaxim Try to make your contribution one that is true and two more specific maxims: a. Do not say what you believe to be false. b. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence. Maxim of Relation Be relevant. Though the maxim itself is terse, its formulation 3 conceals a number of problems.

H. PAUL GRICES MAXIMS OF CONVERSATION Maxim of Manner How what is said is to be said, It includes the super maxim Beperspicuous and various maxims such as: a. b. c. d. Avoid obscurity of expression Avoid ambiguity Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity) Be orderly

There are, of course, all sorts of other maxims (aesthetic, social, or moral in character), such as Be polite, that are also normally observed by participants in talk exchanges, and these may also generate non-conventional implicature.
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MAXIM VIOLATION
Violating the Cooperative Principle Signaling a Violation
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)

Maxim Clash (between quantity and quality).

A speaker might violate one maxim in order to preserve another. 1. Imran is driving Waris to Qadeers house. 2. Imran: Where does Qadeer live? 3. Waris: Multan.

Flouting a maxim in order to explore it.

One can imply something beyond what you say. A: Tehran's in Turkey, isn't it? B: Bombay in Afghanistan. (Quality violation)

MAXIM VIOLATION
Flouting the first Maxim of Manner (obscurity):
Tabinda: What are you baking? Farina: I are tea aitch de eay wye see ay ka yee.

Flouting the third Maxim of Manner (prolixity):

Yaqoob: I hear you went to the opera last night; how was the lead singer? Zubair: The singer produced a series of sounds corresponding closely to the score of an aria from Rigoletto.

Flouting the second Maxim of Quantity:

Saria: What can you tell me about Maryams ability to concentrate on a task? Shafq: Maryam is a butterfly flitting from flower to flower. (invites a metaphorical interpretation).

Flouting the Maxim of Relation (be relevant):

Naveed: What on earth has happened to the roast beef? Aashir: The cow is looking very happy.

CONCLUSION
Conversational implicatures are not tied to linguistic form. To make a conversational implicature, a listener must have already parsed the sentence, assigned it its literal interpretation, realized that additional inferences must be added to make it conform to the Grecian maxim, and determined what these inferences are. Such activity could not reasonably affect the initial steps of parsing. (Clifton & Ferreira, 1989). REFERENCE Grice, P. H. (1975). "Logic and conversation". In Cole, P.; Morgan, J. Syntax and semantics. 3: Speech acts. New York: Academic Press. Thanks MUHAMMAD imran M.Phil S-13-3301
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