Grice’s Maxims LO: to understand the co-operative principle and how we can use it within our own analysis.

Grice’s Maxims The philosopher Paul Grice proposed four conversational maxims that arise from the pragmatics of natural language. These maxims are: RELEVANCE QUALITY GRICE’S MAXIMS MANNER QUANTITY

Grice’s Maxims Maxim of Quality: Truth Do not say what you believe to be false. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence. Maxim of Quantity: Information Make your contribution as informative as is required for the current purposes of the exchange. Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.

Grice’s Maxim Maxim of Relation: Relevance Be relevant. Maxim of Manner: Clarity Avoid obscurity of expression. Avoid ambiguity. Be brief Be orderly.

Grice’s Maxims Philosopher Kent Bach writes: ‘We need first to get clear on the character of Grice’s maxims. They are not sociological generalizations about speech, nor they are moral prescriptions or proscriptions on what to say or communicate. Although Grice presented them in the form of guidelines for how to communicate successfully, I think they are better construed as presumptions about utterances, presumptions that we as listeners rely on and as speakers exploit.’ (Bach 2005).

Grice’s Maxims Grice did not, however, assume that all people should constantly follow these maxims. He found it interesting when the maxims were broken.

Grice’s Maxims Broken Maxims To unintentionally break a maxim The speaker goes off on a tangent. Broken Maxims VIOLATE FLOUT To deliberately avoid a response The listener infers Some meaning.

Act 2 scene 2 Hamlet flouts all 4 of Grice’s Maxims. Primary purpose to avoid giving a true answer, (quality,) that may lead to his own death. Taunting (relevance,) reduces the status of power. Hamlet gives misleading short responses then long convoluted responses which are obscure. (quantity.) Hamlet’s language choices about Polonius are indirectly rude, (Manner.)