CONVERSATIONAL IMPLICATURE IN JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE

TALK SHOW

Deny Gutawan1, Deftaria Agnatasia Wicaksono2, Salwa Dzalita Sidik3

English Department, Universitas Pamulang

Email : Denygutawan@gmail.com1, Deftariatasya11@gmail.com2,

Salwajalita15@gmail.com3

ABSTRACT

Implicatures are often found in conversations on a talk show. Therefore, the aim of
this study is to analyze the implicature and context of a talk show entitled Jimmy Kimmel
Live. There are 2 concerns that become the main focus of this research. The problems are; (1)
what types of conversational implicatures are used in the selected episodes of Jimmy Kimmel
Live talk show?, (2)what are the implied meaning and context of the utterances found in the
selected episodes of Jimmy Kimmel Live talk show. The data source is taken from the
subtitles in 3 selected episodes on YouTube shows on the Jimmy Kimmel Live channel. This
study uses qualitative research methods. To guide this research, the author uses the theory of
Grice (1975). The result of the study showed that there were 5 particularized conversational
implicatures and 5 generalized conversational implicatures. Moreover, it can be concluded
that each utterance has a different context, and each context affects the implied meaning
spoken by the speaker. The writer of this research expects that this material could be useful
for the reader.

Keywords: Conversational Implicature, Jimmy Kimmel Live, Qualitative

I. INTRODUCTION

Humans use various forms of language to fulfill their life needs. One of the

most important human needs is to be able to communicate with other people, because

humans are social beings who are interconnected to each other. Humans use a tool

called language to communicate with each other. Language is one of the human

cultures that has a very high value because with language humans can communicate

and interact with their surroundings. It is clear that language has a very important role

in social life. In communicating, people often experience misunderstandings, or we

 cannot understand what other people mean. This became the concern of this research

in the field of Linguistics, especially in Pragmatics. In the pragmatic scope, there is a

so-called implicature.

Implicature is a concept that refers to something that is implied by a speech

that is not stated explicitly by the speaker, or for simply an implicit meaning behind a

word, phrase, sentence or utterance. According to Grice (1975) implicature is used by

someone to hide the true meaning directed to the speaker who can still understand the

point. Sometimes it is also used for hiding the true meaning of a certain utterance.

But, it can cause misunderstanding if the talking partner is not familiar with the

context of the Implicature itself. Implicatures have many functions and types. Several

functions of the implicature are material for jokes, satire, criticism, and so on. As for

the type, the first is conventional implicature, which is determined by the sentence’s

meaning via the appositive construction. The second type is conversational

implicature, which depends on features of the conversation context and is not

determined by the conventional definition of the sentences uttered. In this research,

Conversational Implicature will be the main focus.

In this study, the writer chooses Jimmy Kimmel Live as the object of research,

because the words or sentences conveyed by presenters or guests often have implied

meanings. Jimmy Kimmel Live is an American late-night talk show created and

hosted by Jimmy Kimmel and aired on ABC.

II. REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

2.1 Review of Literature

This subchapter focuses on the explanation of the theories that have the

function to support this research and also to avoid misinterpretation and

misunderstanding. These theories consist of some definitions and theories of

Pragmatic, Implicature and Conversational Implicatures.

2.1.1 Pragmatics

Pragmatics is a branch of Linguistics that studies the

relationship between contexts outside of language and the speaker’s

intention. “Pragmatics is the study of language from a functional

perspective” according to Levinson (1983, p. 7). People cannot

perceive language from its form and meaning but must understand the

place and time of speaking, the purpose, the structure of the speech,

the mode of delivery, and the manner of greeting. Pragmatics also

studies speech acts, speech implicatures, conversational interactions,

and informal external factors, such as deixis. “The advantage of

studying language via pragmatics is that one can talk about people’s

intended meaning, their assumptions, their purposes or goals, and the

kind of actions (for example, request) that they perform when they

speak” as stated by Yule (1996, p. 4). Pragmatics is also essential to

comprehend utterances that contain and imply meaning.

2.1.2 Implicature

In everyday conversation, people are not always using language

forms that only contain literal meaning, but also use other forms which

have an indirect meaning. Implicature can be interpreted as something

that is conveyed or addressed by the speaker using the implied words

(Yule, 1996). Figurative words like metaphors are often used in

implicatures. Implicature serves various purposes: communication,

misleading without lying, style, verbal efficiency, and implicatures can

 protect a person’s feeling from harsh words or explicit content. Grice

(1975, pp. 26-30) stated that the implicature is used by someone to hide

the true meaning directed at the interlocutor who can still understand

the point. This statement emerges from rational considerations and can

be formulated as a guide for efficient and effective language usage.

Grice (1975) mentions and discusses that there are two types of

implicatures. The first is conventional implicature, which is determined

by the sentence’s meaning via the appositive construction. The second

type is conversational implicature that depends on features of the

conversation context and is not determined by the conventional

definition of the sentences uttered. In this research, the writer focuses

only on conversational implicature.

2.1.3 Conversational Implicature

Conversational implicature will be logical if it occurs in the

right situation, time, and person and does not cause misunderstanding

between both sides of speakers. The role of the conversational

implicature is crucial for a speaker and listener. The forms are

distinguished by the relationship between what is said and what is

implied, and in some cases by the purpose or mode of implication

(Davis, 2019). The use of conversational implicature can indeed benefit

people who find it challenging to say the goals and intentions they

want. However, it is no longer useful if we say it in inappropriate

circumstances. According to Grice (as cited in Levinson, 1983),

conversational implicature is divided into two types, namely

generalized conversational implicature and particularized

 conversational implicature. Generalized Conversational Implicatures in

conversation are those that occur without any special context. These

types of implicatures can occur in any conversation without having a

specific place and time. Particularized Conversational Implicature

needs a particular context or a unique scenario for specific

conversations that do require a specific context. The conversation must

have a particular place and timing. In contrast to the general

conversational implicature, particularized conversational implicature

can occur in conversations with a particular context.

2.2 Theoretical Framework

Several theories related to this research are explained in this subpart. In

this study, the writer uses Levinson’s (1983) theory to explain the meaning of

pragmatics and the meaning of conversational implicature. The writer also

uses Grice’s (1975) theory to take a more detailed meaning and types of

conversational implicature which is divided into two types, those are

particularized conversational implicature and generalized conversational

implicature.

III. METHOD

3.1 Approach of the Study

This research uses a qualitative approach. Creswell (2013) stated that, a

qualitative approach is defined as a process of investigation to understand a

social or humanitarian problem, using the approach of data collection,

analysis, and writing reports in the form of essays. In addition, Bogdan and

Biklen (1982) states qualitative research is where the data is collected in the
 form of words or pictures, not a number. Moreover, the data will be presented

in the form of words, sentences, and utterances; the data are also focused on

the process. The author will analyze the types of conversational implicature in

the talk show dialogue in the form of utterances. This means that the data is

collected by describing the utterances uttered by the speakers in the talk show

which are collected by watching the talk show, and the data is part of

qualitative data because it is in the form of words, not numeric.

3.2 Data Sources

The primary research data were taken from the utterance on selected

videos on Jimmy Kimmel Live talk show on the Jimmy Kimmel Live

YouTube Channel. Jimmy Kimmel Live is an American late-night talk show

hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, broadcast on ABC, and re-uploaded on YouTube.

This show was produced by Kimmel in collaboration with ABC Signature.

This study selected 3 existing episodes to be studied. The selected video has a

duration of no more than 20 minutes. The 3 selected episodes have the same

topic, namely the Avengers movie, a Movie from a big franchise which is

recognized by the majority of people across the globe.

3.3 Data Collection

The steps that the writer did in collecting the data were, The writer

watched Jimmy Kimmel Live . multiple times by pausing the videos to get the

utterances that have implied meaning. The writer read down the video

transcript. The writer identifies the utterances that have been transcribed.The

writer marks the utterances that have implied meaning. The writer listed the

utterances.
 3.4 Data Analysis

The data were taken from the selected videos from the Jimmy Kimmel

Live YouTube channel. The writer did some steps to analyze the types of

conversational implicature, the implied meaning, and the context of the

utterances spoken by Kimmel on the Jimmy Kimmel Live based on Linson’s

(1983) and Grice’s (1975) theory. The first step is to identify utterances based

on their types. In identifying, the writer cuts the utterance, if it cannot be

understood, by just listening to one line of the utterance; it is included in the

particularized type of implicature. However, if it is easy to understand in one

line of utterance, it is included in the generalized implicature. The second step

is analyzing the context and implied meaning of the utterances. The writer

uses the theory from Grice (1975) to analyze data that has implied meaning

and divides the data according to the conversational implicature type

following the theory and tries to explain the true meaning. In this process, the

writer presented the results in essay form. Finally, the writer concludes the

results of the study.

IV. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

4.1 Findings

This part consists of data that are found from analyzing the video. The

writer carefully identified all the occurrences of both Generalized and

Particularized in conversational implicatures spoken by Kimmel on Jimmy

Kimmel Live talk show in three selected episodes. After analyzing the data,

the writer found 10 conversational implicatures in the selected episodes. 4 of

the data are Generalized Implicature and 6 of them are Particularized

Implicature. The data are listed below:

 Data 1

“Will you wait for the signal or do you Avengers just walk right across the

street?”

Eps. Who leads the Avengers in real life? (00:15)

Particularized

 Data 2

“What was the last time you use the actual hammer for home repair or et

cetera”

Eps. Who leads the Avengers in real life? (00:30)

Particularized

 Data 3

“You know, there is a lot of excitement.”

Eps. Avengers: Infinity war cast on Premiere of the movie. (00:38)

Generalized

 Data 4

“You’re lucky you didn’t knock the house down”

Eps. Who leads the Avengers in real life? (00.42)

Particularized

 Data 5

“I will say, I was driving into work this morning. And thank you guys for

being here. I don’t think we’ve ever had most of Hollywood boulevard

closed off for a premiere.”

Eps. Avengers: Infinity war cast on Premiere of the movie. (00:49)

 Generalized

 Data 6

“You all look fantastic. Ugh. They can't get enough. And in a way—

Wow.”

Eps. Avengers Cast on Premiere, Favorites Lines, Matching Tattoos &

Birthday Gifts. (00:54)

Generalized

 Data 7

“A team? Okay. All right, all right. Who is the social director for the

group? Who’s in charge to make of fun?”

Eps. Avengers: Infinity war cast on Premiere of the movie. (00:54)

Generalized

 Data 8

“This could be it.”

Eps. Avengers Cast on Premiere, Favorites Lines, Matching Tattoos &

Birthday Gifts. (01:15)

Particularized

 Data 9

“I feel like this is the last gathering of the Avengers on the show.”

Eps. Avengers Cast on Premiere, Favorites Lines, Matching Tattoos &

Birthday Gifts. (01:28)

Particularized

 Data 10

“Why did you prefer Jeremy as the Lord of the Underworld?”

Eps. Who leads the Avengers in real life? (01:32)

 Particularized

Based on the data above, the writer concludes that there are 10

utterances uttered by Kimmel that contain implicatures. It can be

concluded that each utterance has a special context. This context refers to

any topic of conversation that is always changing.

4.2 Discussion

After finding and classifying the utterances in the video, the writer

presents the data with a discussion by focusing on Grice’s theory of the types

of conversational implicatures and the context of the utterances in this part.

 Generalized Implicatures

Kimmel: “You know, there is a lot of excitement.” (Generalized)

The utterance above is included as generalized implicature. The

context of the utterance is referring to the audience being louder than

usual and not stopping their claps because of the excitement for the guests.

Kimmel gave a sign by saying that utterance to the audience, because the

audience needed to stop clapping and shouting because he should start the

show.

Kimmel: “I will say, I was driving into work this morning. And thank

you guys for being here. I don’t think we’ve ever had more of

Hollywood boulevard closed off for a premiere.” (Generalized)

The utterance above is included as generalized implicature. The

context of the utterance refers to how big the phenomenon of Avengers:

Infinity War is; there is no other movie premiere that closed off
 Hollywood Boulevard just for a premiere. With that utterance, Kimmel

was praising how big the premier film had become.

Kimmel: “You all look fantastic. Ugh. They can’t get enough. And in a

way— Wow.” (Generalized)

The utterance above is included in generalized implicature. The

context of the utterance refers to how the audiences are not having enough

clapping for the guests even after Kimmel starts talking. The implied

meaning of the utterance by Kimmel is to mention that because he

should’ve started with the show, but he had to stop the applause without

offending the audience.

Kimmel: “A team? Okay. All right, all right. Who is the social director

for the group? Who’s in charge to make of fun?” (Generalized)

The utterance above is included as generalized implicature. The

context of the utterance refers to how the original casts of avengers rolls

out in real life. The implicit meaning in Kimmel’s utterance is wanting to

know the role of each in their daily lives as a team. Kimmel asked the

question because he was curious about the roles of each of them and

wanted to know more about it.

 Particularized Implicatures

Kimmel: “Welcome. Thank you for coming. I know you have the big

premier right across the street from us here, just after the show. Will you

wait for the signal or do you Avengers just walk right across the street?”

(Particularized)
 The utterance above is included in particularized implicature. The

context of the utterance refers to that after the event is over, they have to

go to the premiere of their film across the street. The implied meaning of

Kimmel’s utterance is to know whether they will walk leisurely after the

show is over or wait for the staff to call them and lead them to the

premiere of the film.

Kimmel: “What was the last time you use the actual hammer for home

repair or et cetera” (Particularized)

The utterance above is included in particularized implicature. The

context of the utterance is sarcastically referring to Hemsworth spending

most of his time with Thor’s Hammer Mjolnir than an actual Hammer.

The implied meaning of this utterance is that Kimmel intended to invite

Hemsworth to joke about hammers, because usually Hemsworth uses a

hammer as a weapon, not as a household utensil. To know the direction of

this conversation, the audience must understand the role played by

Hemsworth and also the weapons he uses.

Kimmel: “You’re lucky you didn’t knock the house down”

(Particularized)

The utterance above is included in particularized implicature. The

context of the utterance above refers to Kimmel who asked if Hemsworth

had ever used a hammer at home to fix anything. Kimmel said that

because he was referring to the role played by Hemsworth, namely Thor,

where Thor uses a hammer as his main weapon, and the hammer can

destroy things and can summon lightning. The implied meaning in

Jimmy’s utterance is Hemsworth is lucky he did not destroy his house

with the superpowers he has in the movie and lucky that he does not have

those powers. To understand the implicature the audience should know the

role played by Hemsworth in the film so as not to cause

misunderstandings.

Kimmel: “This might be it, right. I mean this could be it”

(Particularized)

The utterance above is included in particularized implicature. The

context of the utterance above refers to the arrival of Robert and Scarlet as

actors from the film Avenger who was given a standing ovation by the

audience because this will be their last arrival as actors from the film

Avenger. The implied meaning of the utterance “this could be it” refers to

the end of Robert & Scarlet’s journey in the Marvel film series, after this

there is no longer a contract, it is the end of their role in the film series.

Kimmel: “No. I feel like this is the last gathering of the Avengers on the

show.” (Particularized)

The utterance above is included in particularized implicature. The

context of the utterance above refers to the possibility of not coming back

in the future reprising their roles because of the contract for RDJ and

Scarlett. The implied meaning of this statement is that Kimmel expresses

his sad feelings considering that this might be the last Avenger cast to

appear on his talk show.

Kimmel: “Why did you prefer Jeremy as the Lord of the Underworld?”

(Particularized)

The utterance above is included in particularized implicature. The

context of the utterance above refers to how RDJ mentions Jeremy as

 Pluto, Roman’s Lord of The Underworld. The implied meaning is that

Kimmel wants to know why Downey finally chose Jeremy to play the

role.

V. CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION

5.1 Conclusion

Through the several utterances in the three selected videos taken as

data, it can be concluded that particularized implicature appears more often

than generalized implicature. This is because some of the conversations that

occur have specific things that cannot be understood or will cause

misunderstandings by some people if that person does not have an

understanding of the conversation that is taking place at that time.

However, even though there are more utterances that require

knowledge of the context of the ongoing conversation, this does not become a

barrier for the audience; in fact, it makes the shows more interesting. The

implicatures found in the analysis showed indirect answers, unclear responses,

jokes, and sarcasm. After analyzing the data, it can be concluded that each

utterance has a different context, and each context affects the implied meaning

spoken by the speaker.

REFERENCES
Davis, W. (2016). Implicature. Perspective in Pragmatics, Philosophy, and
Psychology, 51-84.
Creswell, J. W. (2013). Qualitative inquiry and research design (3rd ed.). Amerika:
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Kimmel, J. [Jimmy Kimmel Live]. (2019, April 09). Avengers Cast on Premiere,
Favorite Lines, Matching Tattoos, & Birthday Gifts.[Video]. YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ljluGA4dQU&t=285s
Kimmel, J. [Jimmy Kimmel Live]. (2018, April 24). Avengers War Cast on Premiere
of the Movie.[Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoTbH16PVMQ
Kimmel, J. [Jimmy Kimmel Live]. (2015, April 14). Who Leads the Avengers in Real
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