Cooperation and

implicature
Members
THAN THI HOAN – 621242
NGUYEN THI ANH - 621253
 Outline
1. The cooperative principle
2. Hedges
3. Conversational implicature
4. Generalized conversational implicatures
5. Scalar implicatures
6. Particularized conversational implicatures
7. Properties of conversational implicatures
8. Conventional implicatures
 Introduction
• When people talk with each other, they try to converse
smoothly and successfully Cooperation is a basis of
successful conversations.
• Conversation: no confusion, no trick, but withhold relevant
information from each other.
• Cooperation: an essential factor when speaker and listener
are interacting (listener’s expectation to the speaker).
• Implicature can be considered as an additional conveyed
meaning. It is attained when a speaker intends to
communicate more than just what the words mean. It is the
speaker who communicates something via implicatures and
the listener -> recognizes those communicated meaning via
inference.
 1. The cooperative principle
• The idea that people cooperate with each other in
conversing is generalized by Grice (1975 ) as the
cooperative principle.
• 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. Specifically,
there are four maxims under this general principle.
 The maxims
• 1. Quantity: give the right amount of information (not
too little, not too much)
• 2. Quality: try to say what is true (don’t say that for
which you lack adequate evidence; don’t say what you
know to be false)
• 3. Relation: make what you say relevant to the topic at
hand.
• 4. Manner: (be clear)
- Avoid obscurity of expression.
- Avoid ambiguity.
- Be brief
- Be orderly
 2. Hedges
• When making a statement certain expressions are used
to indicate the degree of certainty concerning the
information given. These expressions are called
hedges:
E.g: Hedging for quality maxim
• As far as I know, they are getting married.
• So, to cut a long story short, we grabbed our stuff
and ran. Hedging for quantity maxim
• Not to change the subject, but is this related to the
budget? Hedging for relation maxim
• I’m not sure if this makes sense, but the car had no
lights.
Hedging for manner maxim
 3. Conversational implicature
• Conversational implicature: The basic assumption
in conversation is that the participants are
adhering to the cooperative principle and the
maxims.
• Example:
Wife: I hope you brought the bread and the cheese.
Husband: Ah, I brought the bread.
Analysis:
• In this case, the husband did not mention the
cheese. Then he must intend that the wife infers
what is not mentioned was not brought. The
husband has conveyed more than he has said via
a conversational implicature.
• We can represent the structure of what was said, with
b(= bread), and c(= cheese)
• Using the symbol +> for an implicature, we can
represent the additional conveyed meaning:
• Wife: b & c?
• Husband: b ( +> NOT c)
 4. Generalized conversational
implicatures
Generalized conversational implicatures:
• No special knowledge is required in the context
• a/ an X not speaker’s X
Example:
Doobie: Did you invite Bella and Cathy?(b & c?)
b c
Mary: I invited Bella (b +> NOT c)
b
 5. Scalar implicatures
• Scalar implicatures occur when certain
information is communicated by choosing a word
which expresses one value from a scale of values.
Scalar implicatures is greater detail of a particular
sort of implicatures, expressing quantity and terms
are listed from the highest to the lowest value.
• <all, most, many, some, few>
• <always, often, sometimes>
• The basis of scalar implicatures is that when any
form in a scale is asserted, the negative of all forms
higher on the scale is implicated
• Example
Some of the boys went to the party
+>not all of the boys went to the party
The courses are sometimes interesting.
+>The courses are not always/ not often
interesting
 6. Particularized conversational
implicatures
• Particularized conversational implicatures: occur
when a conversation takes place in a very specific
context in which locally recognized inferences are
assumed.
• Example: Rich: Hey, coming to the wild party tonight?
Tom: My parents are visiting.
In order to make Tom's response relevant, Rick has to
draw on some assumed knowledge that one college student
in this setting expects another to have. Tom will be
spending that evening with his parents, and time spent
with parents is quiet (consequently +> Tom not at party)
• Bert: Do vegetarians eat hamburger?
Ernie: Do chickens have lips?
In the above example, Ernie's response does not
provide a 'yes' or 'no' answer. Bert must assume
that Ernie's response means 'of course not!'
 7. Properties of conversational
implicatures
• Properties of conversational implicatures: All
implicatures taken into consideration are part of what is
communicated and not said.
• Speakers can always deny that they intended to
communicate such meanings.
• Conversational implicatures are deniable. They can be
explicitly denied (or alternatively, reinforced) in
different ways.
The example below can illustrate this idea:
You have won only five dollars! (+> ONLY five)
It is quite easy for a speaker:
1. to suspend the implicature (only) using the
expression 'at least’
E.g You've won at least five dollars!)
2. to cancel the implicature by adding further
information, often following the expression 'in fact'
E.g You've won five dollars, in fact, you've won
ten!
3. to reinforce the implicature with additional
information, as in:
E.g You've won five dollars, that's four more
than one!
• We have already noted with many of the previous
examples that implicatures can be calculated by the
listeners via inference.
• In terms of their defining properties, then,
conversational implicatures can be calculated,
suspended, cancelled, and reinforced.
• However, in conventional implicatures, these
properties are NOT applied.
 8. Conventional implicatures
• Conventional implicatures not based on the cooperative
principle or the maxims. They don’t have to occur in
conversation, and they don’t depend on special contexts for
their interpretation.
• Conventional implicatures are associated with specific words
and result in additional conveyed meanings when those words
are used.
• The English conjunction ‘BUT’, ‘EVEN’ , ‘YET’ is one of
these words.
EXAMPLE:
• She was happy and ready to work ,
p q
+> She was both happy and ready to work.
+> p plus q
• John is poor but happy.
p q
+> In contrast to what John should feel as a poor person, he
is happy.
p but q +> p is in contrast to q
- Denis isn’t here yet.
not p
+> Denis is expected to be here later.
Not p yet +> p is expected to be true later
- Even Mary came to the party.
p
+> contrary to what was expected, Mary came to the party.
Even p +> contrary to what is expected, p
 EXERCISE
EX1: Which of the four maxims are
violated the four dialogues below?
1. Mom: What did you think of Junior’s childish
behavior last night?
Dad: Well, boys will be boys
Relation (The father's reply is seemingly unrelated
to the question).
2. Student A: Do you like Linguistics?
Student B: Well, let’s just say I don’t jump for joy
before class.
Manner (The reply is inadequately lengthy.)
3. Student: I was absent on Monday - did I miss anything
important?
Teacher: Oh no, of course not, we never do anything
important in class.
Quality (The teacher says something she (hopefully!)
does not believe to be true.)
4. Student A: Can you tell me where the lecture is?
Student B: It is in room 254, the room in which I had
my first university class ever.
Quantity
B's answer is correct but gives more information than is
required.
→ If you indicated that it is (also) a violation of
Relation, that's fine, too. (The additional information is
not relevant to answer the question).
EX2: This exercise deals with Scalar Implicatures. A linguistic scale
consists of a set of linguistic alternates, or contrastive expressions of
the same grammatical category, which can be arranged in a linear
order by degree of informativeness or semantic strength.
1. Put the following sentences in the right order. Start with the
sentence which contains the strongest quantifier.
Strongest ---> ---> Weakest
All of the boys went to the party
X
Many of the boys went to the part
X
Some of the boys went to the party
X
Most of the boys went to the party.
X
 2. Indicate the relative strength of the connectives.
strongest -> -> weakest

Alex likes books and movies.

X

Alex likes books or movies.

X

3.Indicate the relative strength of the matrix predicates with respect to the subject's
commitment to the truth of the complement clause.

strongest Indicate the relative strength of the matrix predicates with respect to the subject's
commitment to the truth of the complement clause.
Strongest  weakest

Pat believes that Chris loves semantics.

X
Pat doubts that Chris loves semantics.
X.