National open university of nigeria school of arts and social sciences
Maxims of the Cooperative Principle
Download 0.49 Mb. View original pdf
|
- Navigate this page:
- 3.3 Maxim of Quantity
- 3.4 Maxim of Quality
- 3.5 Maxim of Relevance
| 3.2 Maxims of the Cooperative Principle Grice came up with four general maxims that speakers and listeners obey in conversations. The maxims are like a rule of thumb. They are not hard and fast rules, but speakers try to observe them inmost conversations. The observance of Cooperative Principle allows for the possibility of implicatures. Implicatures as treated earlier are meanings that are not explicitly conveyed in what is said, but they can still be arrived at through inference 3.3 Maxim of Quantity • Make your contributions as informative as required. • Do not make your contribution more informative than is required This is what language users do in conversations when they make sure that they go straight to the point by providing only the necessary information. People who provide too much detail than necessary in conversation end up discouraging other speakers because they would have taken too much time saying what they would have said in a short period. Most people will frown at such things in conversation. This shows that we are always conscious of this maxim. 3.4 Maxim of Quality • Do not say what you believe to be false. • Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence. People who always provide false and unsubstantiated information in conversation are not usually liked. This is why lying is not an acceptable speech behaviour in any human culture. In any normal conversation, people try to provide truthful information to maintain their integrity. Once a person is known to be a liar by people around him/her, people will not always believe his/her utterances. 99 3.5 Maxim of Relevance • Be relevant Every utterance in any conversation is meaningful only in relation to other utterances made earlier before it. Those who make statements that are not relevant to the conversation are either seen as not following the conversation well enough to make meaningful contributions or they are, in extreme cases, seen as people who need to have their head examined. It is generally believed inmost human cultures that it is better to keep quiet and follow a conversation than to make irrelevant utterances. Download 0.49 Mb. Share with your friends:
|