What Is Implicatures
Implicature
An implicature is something the speaker suggests or implies with an utterance, even though it is not literally expressed. This phenomenon is part of pragmatics, a subdiscipline of linguistics. The philosopher H. P. Grice coined the term in 1975. Grice distinguished conversational implicatures, which arise because speakers are expected to respect general rules of conversation, and conventional ones, which are tied …
Full Answer
What is the meaning of implicature?
“Implicature” denotes either (i) the act of meaning or implying one thing by saying something else, or (ii) the object of that act. Implicatures can be determined by sentence meaning or by conversational context, and can be conventional (in different senses) or unconventional.
Are semantic implicatures nondetachable?
Semantic implicatures, in contrast, are nondetachable because they are determined by what the sentence means. 3. Sentence Implicature As we observed in §1 , Grice defined implicating as a form of speaker meaning.
What is a conversational implicature in pragmatics?
Since Grice's initial proposal and work, conversational implicatures have become one of the major research areas in pragmatics. Conversational Implicature is also known as Implication: this happens when the speaker says something that requires interpretation and is an indirect way of saying something.
How are sentence implicatures similar to idioms?
Sentence implicatures, both semantic and conversational, resemble idioms and figures of speech in being picked up by native speakers from other speakers in the course of learning the language. Sentence implicatures thus perpetuate themselves from one generation to the next as sentence meanings do.
What is an implicature in semantics?
“Implicature” denotes either (i) the act of meaning or implying one thing by saying something else, or (ii) the object of that act. Implicatures can be determined by sentence meaning or by conversational context, and can be conventional (in different senses) or unconventional.
What is implicature in semantics and pragmatics?
In pragmatics, a subdiscipline of linguistics, an implicature is something the speaker suggests or implies with an utterance, even though it is not literally expressed. Implicatures can aid in communicating more efficiently than by explicitly saying everything we want to communicate.
What is meant by implicature?
implicature. / (ɪmˈplɪkətʃə) / noun logic philosophy. a proposition inferred from the circumstances of utterances of another proposition rather than from its literal meaning, as when an academic referee writes the candidate's handwriting is excellent to convey that he has nothing relevant to commend.
What is implicature and its types?
There are four types of implicature; conventional implicature, conversational implicature, generalized conversational implicature and particularized conversational implicature. Each types has characteristics such as cancellable, calculable, detachable, conventionally, and determinate (Grice, 1975).
What is the theory of implicature?
The theory of conversational implicatures is attributed to Paul Herbert Grice, who observed that in conversations what is meant often goes beyond what is said and that this additional meaning is inferred and predictable.
What is the difference between implicature and inference?
While the word 'inference' is in general use in the English language, 'implicature' is a technical term, introduced by Grice precisely to narrow down the object of investigation to a specific sub-case of meaning NN. In Grice's account of meaning, implicatures are tied to the speaker's intention.
What is standard implicature?
A standard implicature is a conversational implicature based on an addressee's assumption that the speaker is being cooperative by directly observing the conversational maxims. In the following exchange, A assumes that B is being cooperative, truthful, adequately informative, relevant, and clear.
What is the difference between implication and implicature?
Implicature and implication The specialized term implicature was coined by Paul Grice as a technical term in pragmatics for certain kinds of inferences that are drawn from statements without the additional meanings in logic and informal language use of "implication".
What are the characteristics of conversational implicature?
Conversational implicatures typically have a number of interesting properties, including calculability, cancelability, nondetachability, and indeterminacy. These properties can be used to investigate whether a putative implicature is correctly identified as such, although none of them provides a fail-safe test.
Why is conversational implicature important?
Implicature is very useful to be studied by increasing awareness when having conversation with others because people often applied implicit meaning in their daily conversation. Sometimes people used implicit meaning when they are arguing with someone, giving opinion or providing a statement.
How important is conversational implicature in a communication?
An interpretation of an utterance cannot be done independently from its context. Suryadi and Muslim (2019) stated that CI is based on the context of utterance. In other words, the conversational implicature is used to show the difference between what is said and what is meant.
What is implicature in pragmatics PDF?
nature of implicature is temporary and non-conventional directly with utterance. spoken (Levinson, 1991: 117). Implicature is a combination of language with. situation where the same speech in different situations may not produce.
What is implicature and its types Slideshare?
Types Implicature includes two types : • conversational implicature • conventional implicature. Conversational implicature Implications derived on the basis of conversational principles and assumptions, relying on more than the linguistic meaning of words in a sentence.
What is the difference between implication and implicature?
Implicature and implication The specialized term implicature was coined by Paul Grice as a technical term in pragmatics for certain kinds of inferences that are drawn from statements without the additional meanings in logic and informal language use of "implication".
What is standard implicature?
A standard implicature is a conversational implicature based on an addressee's assumption that the speaker is being cooperative by directly observing the conversational maxims. In the following exchange, A assumes that B is being cooperative, truthful, adequately informative, relevant, and clear.
What is implicature in a sentence?
Jump to navigation Jump to search. An implicature is something the speaker suggests or implies with an utterance, even though it is not literally expressed. Implicatures can aid in communicating more efficiently than by explicitly saying everything we want to communicate.
What is implicature in relevance theory?
In the framework known as relevance theory, implicature is defined as a counterpart to explicature. The explicatures of an utterance are the communicated assumptions that are developed from its logical form (intuitively, the literal meaning) by supplying additional information from context: by disambigua ting ambiguous expressions , assigning referents to pronouns and other variables, and so on. All communicated assumptions that cannot be obtained in this way are implicatures. For example, if Peter says
What is a conversational implicature?
Conversational implicature. Grice was primarily concerned with conversational implicatures. Like all implicatures, these are part of what is communicated. In other words, conclusions the addressee draws from an utterance although they were not actively conveyed by the communicator are never implicatures.
Does an utterance have explicatures?
Carston has argued for a more formal approach, namely that an utterance's implicatures cannot entail any of its explicatures. If they did, the resulting redundancies would cause unnecessary effort on part of the addressee, which would run against the principle of relevance. An example of pragmatically derived information that has traditionally been seen as an implicature, but must be an explicature according to Carston's reasoning, has already been mentioned above: "He drank a bottle of vodka and fell into a stupor" → "He drank a bottle of vodka and consequently fell into a stupor". However, there has since been found at least one example of an implicature that does entail an explicature, showing that this test is not infallible:
Which verbs have the same truth conditions but different conventional implicatures?
The verbs "deprive" and "spare" also have the same truth conditions but different conventional implicatures. Compare:
Who coined the term "implicative"?
The philosopher H. P. Grice coined the term in 1975. Grice distinguished conversational implicatures, which arise because speakers are expected to respect general rules of conversation, and conventional ones, which are tied to certain words such as "but" or "therefore". Take for example the following exchange:
Does Carston agree with implicature?
Carston generally agrees with the relevance theoretic concept of implicature, but argues that Sperber and Wilson let implicatures do too much work. The mentioned embedding tests not only categorize utterances on the likes of the vodka bottle example as explicatures, but also loose use and metaphors:
What is conversational implicature?
In pragmatics, conversational implicature is an indirect or implicit speech act: what is meant by a speaker's utterance that is not part of what is explicitly said . The term is also known simply as implicature; it is the antonym (opposite) of explicature, which is an explicitly communicated assumption. "What a speaker intends to communicate is ...
Where did the term "implicative" come from?
Origin. "The term [ implicature] is taken from the philosopher H.P. Grice (1913-88), who developed the theory of the cooperative principle. On the basis that a speaker and listener are cooperating, and aiming to be relevant, a speaker can imply a meaning implicitly, confident that the listener will understand.
What is probabilistic character of conversational implicature?
Inferences. "The probabilistic character of conversational implicature is easier to demonstrate than define. If a stranger at the other end of a phone line has a high-pitched voice, you may infer that the speaker is a woman. The inference may be incorrect. Conversational implicatures are a similar kind of inference: they are based on stereotyped ...
How to interpret the utterance in sentence 9?
To interpret the utterance in Sentence 9, the husband must go through a series of inferences based on principles that he knows the other speaker is using...The conventional response to the husband's question would be a direct answer where the wife indicated some time frame in which she would be ready.
What Is Implicature And Example?
In technical terms, implied is a term that refers to what is suggested in an utterance, even if it is not explicitly stated. The following example shows John meeting a woman this evening. John’s mother, sister, and wife are not with him this evening.
What Are Different Types Of Implicatures?
In the world of implicature, there are four types; conventional implicature, conversational implicature, generalized conversational implicature, and particularized conversational implicature.
What Is Conversational Implicature In Linguistics?
conversational implicature is an indirect or implicit speech act: what is meant by a speaker’s utterance that is not part of what is explicitly said . It is also known simply as implicature; it is antonym (opposite) of explicature.
What Is Implicature According To Grice?
In his influential theory, Grice describes how conversational implicatures arise and are understood, and explains how they are predicted.
What is a conversational implicature?
A conversational implicature is said to be non-detachable when, after the replacement of what is said with another expression with the same literal meaning, the same conversational implicature remains. This distinguishes them from conventional implicatures. In a 2006 experiment with Greek-speaking five-year-olds' interpretation ...
What is scalar implicature?
In pragmatics, scalar implicature, or quantity implicature, is an implicature that attributes an implicit meaning beyond the explicit or literal meaning of an utterance, and which suggests that the utterer had a reason for not using a more informative or stronger term on the same scale.
Is a conversational implicature detachable?
This distinguishes such inferences from entailment. They are also non-detachable. A conversational implicature is said to be non-detachable when, after the replacement of what is said with another expression with the same literal meaning, the same conversational implicature remains. This distinguishes them from conventional implicatures.
Can a 5-year-old learn scalar implicatures?
In a 2006 experiment with Greek-speaking five-year-olds' interpretation of aspectual expressions, the results revealed that children have limited success in deriving scalar implicatures from the use of aspectual verbs such as "start" (which implicates non-completion). However, the tested children succeed in deriving scalar implicatures with discrete degree modifiers such as "half" as in half finished. Their ability to spontaneously compute scalar implicatures was greater than their ability to judge the pragmatic appropriateness of scalar statements. In addition, the tested children were able to suspend scalar implicatures in environments where they were not supported.
Speaker Implicature
- H. P. Grice (1913–1988) was the first to systematically studycases in which what a speaker means differs from what thesentenceused by the speaker means. Consider (1). 1. (1)Alan: Areyou going to Paul’s party? Barb: I have to work. If this was a typical exchange, Barb meant that she i…
Conversational and Conventional Implicature
- The implicatures in (1) and (2) are conversational. They depend on features of theconversational context, and are not determined by the conventionalmeaning of the sentences uttered. A key feature in (1) wasAlan’s question. Had he asked “What are you going to dotoday?”, Barb could have implicated something completelydifferent (that she is going to work) by saying the same th…
Sentence Implicature
- As we observed in §1, Grice defined implicating as a form of speaker meaning. But Grice andothers nevertheless began applying “implicate” tosentences, analogous to the way “imply”,“presuppose”, and “mean” apply to sentences aswell as people. [18] If an implicature is conventional in either sense (that is, eithersemantic or generalized), we may say that the senten…
Common Forms of Conversational Implicature
- Many forms of conversational implicature occur frequently in everydayspeech and literature, with a wide variety of sentences and in allknown languages. They are common ways of both using and understandinglanguage. The forms are differentiated in part by the relationshipbetween what is said and what is implicated. Knowledge of them is animportant component of our linguistic com…
Gricean Theory
- In addition to identifying the phenomenon of implicature, andclassifying its types, Grice developed a theory designed to explainand predict conversational implicatures and to describe how they areunderstood. Grice (1975: 26–30) postulated a generalCooperative Principle and four maximsspecifying howto be cooperative. It is common knowledge, he asserted, that peoplegene…
Theoretical Difficulties
- While Grice viewed his ideas as tentative and exploratory, followershave taken the theory to be well established. Indeed, it has served asa paradigm for research in pragmatics. Serious difficulties haveemerged. According to Grice’s Theoretical Definition (§6), conversational implicatures depend on a presumption that the speakeris observing the Cooperative Principle. W…
Overgeneration
- Many have observed that for every implicature that appears to becorrectly predicted by Gricean theory, others appear to be falsely predicted.[34] The schema used to “work out” observed implicatures canusually be used just as well to work out nonexistent implicatures. Sothe schema as formulated is invalid—an unreliablemethod of inferring implicatures. By a simple application …
Failures of Determinacy
- Grice’s Determinacy condition states that Sconversationally implicates p only if S has tobelieve (and implicate) p if S’s utterance isto be consistent with the Cooperative Principle. Determinacy is a keypremise in the working-out schema, so Calculability depends on it. As §8illustrated, however, there are normally many alternative ways to becooperative, and contribute what is required by th…
Conflicting Principles
- Grice (1975: 30) recognized that his maxims may “clash”.When they do, there is no way to determine what is required forconformity to the Cooperative Principle. In the case of irony, forexample, Manner clashes with Quality. When Don said “Theweather’s lovely”, we cannot interpret him as meaning whathe said because on that interpretation he would be violating Quali…
Overview
In pragmatics, a subdiscipline of linguistics, an implicature is something the speaker suggests or implies with an utterance, even though it is not literally expressed. Implicatures can aid in communicating more efficiently than by explicitly saying everything we want to communicate. The philosopher H. P. Grice coined the term in 1975. Grice distinguished conversational implicatures, which arise because speakers are expected to respect general rules of conversation, and conve…
General and cited references
• Bach, Kent (1999). "The Myth of Conventional Implicature". Linguistics and Philosophy. 22 (4): 327–366. doi:10.1023/A:1005466020243. S2CID 17992433.
• Bach, Kent (2006). "The top 10 misconceptions about implicature". In Birner, Betty J.; Ward, Gregory L. (eds.). Drawing the Boundaries of Meaning: Neo-Gricean Studies in Pragmatics and Semantics in Honor of Laurence R. Horn. John Benjamins Publishing. pp. 21–30. ISBN 90-272-3090-0.
Conversational implicature
Grice was primarily concerned with conversational implicatures. Like all implicatures, these are part of what is communicated. In other words, conclusions the addressee draws from an utterance although they were not actively conveyed by the communicator are never implicatures. According to Grice, conversational implicatures arise because communicating people are expected by their addressees to obey the maxims of conversation and the overarching cooperati…
Implicature in relevance theory
In the framework known as relevance theory, implicature is defined as a counterpart to explicature. The explicatures of an utterance are the communicated assumptions that are developed from its logical form (intuitively, the literal meaning) by supplying additional information from context: by disambiguating ambiguous expressions, assigning referents to pronouns and o…
Conventional implicature
Conventional implicatures, briefly introduced but never elaborated on by Grice, are independent of the cooperative principle and the four maxims. They are instead tied to the conventional meaning of certain particles and phrases such as "but, although, however, nevertheless, moreover, anyway, whereas, after all, even, yet, still, besides", verbs such as "deprive, spare", and possibly also to grammat…
See also
• Entailment, or implication, in logic
• Free choice inference
• Indirect speech act
• Presupposition
Citations
1. ^ Davis (2019, section 14)
2. ^ Grice (1975:24–26)
3. ^ Grice (1975:32)
4. ^ Blackburn (1996:189)
5. ^ Blome-Tillmann (2013:1, 3)
Further reading
• Brown, Benjamin (2014). "'But Me No Buts': The Theological Debate Between the Hasidim and the Mitnagdim in Light of the Discourse-Markers Theory". Numen. 61 (5–6): 525–551. doi:10.1163/15685276-12341341.
• Brown, Benjamin (2014). "'Some Say This, Some Say That': Pragmatics and Discourse Markers in Yad Malachi's Interpretation Rules". Language and Law. 3: 1–20.