Ain't pragmatics grand?
May. 25th, 2019 12:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
conulyMommy: When are we fixing the fence?
Me: Jenn's having a party next month.
Due to the power of pragmatics, everybody involved in that exchange understands that the first sentence answers the second, even though it doesn't sound like it ought to.
You just gotta love those Gricean maxims. Way back in Lives of Christopher Chant our main character finds himself asked why he's buying girl books. He can't explain that they're to give to a girl goddess who lives in another world, so he says "I have a cousin", telling himself that it's okay because he does have a cousin. Well, it's pretty minor as lies go, and harmless, but he knows and the reader knows that he certainly isn't telling the truth, because what he said isn't relevant and he's given his friend no reason to suspect that. It doesn't matter how many cousins he has, the books aren't for any of them.
Me: Jenn's having a party next month.
Due to the power of pragmatics, everybody involved in that exchange understands that the first sentence answers the second, even though it doesn't sound like it ought to.
You just gotta love those Gricean maxims. Way back in Lives of Christopher Chant our main character finds himself asked why he's buying girl books. He can't explain that they're to give to a girl goddess who lives in another world, so he says "I have a cousin", telling himself that it's okay because he does have a cousin. Well, it's pretty minor as lies go, and harmless, but he knows and the reader knows that he certainly isn't telling the truth, because what he said isn't relevant and he's given his friend no reason to suspect that. It doesn't matter how many cousins he has, the books aren't for any of them.
