Startseite Communication as commitment sharing: speech acts, implicatures, common ground
Artikel
Lizenziert
Nicht lizenziert Erfordert eine Authentifizierung

Communication as commitment sharing: speech acts, implicatures, common ground

  • Bart Geurts EMAIL logo
Veröffentlicht/Copyright: 21. Juni 2019
Veröffentlichen auch Sie bei De Gruyter Brill

Abstract

The main tenet of this paper is that human communication is first and foremost a matter of negotiating commitments, rather than one of conveying intentions, beliefs, and other mental states. Every speech act causes the speaker to become committed to the hearer to act on a propositional content. Hence, commitments are relations between speakers, hearers, and propositions. Their purpose is to enable speakers and hearers to coordinate their actions: communication is coordinated action for action coordination. To illustrate the potential of the approach, commitment-based analyses are offered for a representative sample of speech act types, conversational implicatures, as well as for common ground.

Acknowledgements

I’ve had a lot of help with this one. Thanks to Philippe De Brabanter, Vitaliy Dolgorukov, Hans-Martin Gärtner, Mark Jary, Mikhail Kissine, John Michael, Tim Reuten, Marat Shardimgaliev, Mandy Simons, Martina Valković, Till Vierkant, Huub Vromen, and an anonymous reviewer for Theoretical linguistics. Research for this paper was supported by the Russian Academic Excellence Project 5-100.

References

Anscombe, G. 1957. Intention. Oxford: Blackwell.Suche in Google Scholar

Apperly, I. A. 2011. Mindreaders: The cognitive basis of “theory of mind”. Hove: Psychology Press.10.4324/9780203833926Suche in Google Scholar

Austin, J. L. 1962. How to do things with words. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Bach, K. & R. M. Harnish. 1979. Linguistic communication and speech acts. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Beyssade, C. & J.-M. Marandin. 2009. Commitment: Une attitude dialogique. Langue Française 162. 89–107.10.3917/lf.162.0089Suche in Google Scholar

Brandom, R. 1994. Making it explicit. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Brandom, R. 1997. Replies. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 57. 189–204.10.1515/9783110326246.163Suche in Google Scholar

Bratman, M. E. 1987. Intention, plans, and practical reason. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Clark, H. H. 1992. Arenas of language use. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Clark, H. H. 1996. Using language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511620539Suche in Google Scholar

Clark, H. H. 2006. Social actions, social commitments. In N. Enfield & S. C. Levinson (eds.), Roots of human sociality: Culture, cognition and interaction, pp. 126–150. Oxford: Berg.10.4324/9781003135517-6Suche in Google Scholar

Clark, H. H. & C. Marshall. 1981. Definite reference and mutual knowledge. In A. Joshi, B. L. Webber & I. Sag (eds.), Elements of discourse understanding, pp. 10–63. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Suche in Google Scholar

De Brabanter, P. & P. Dendale. 2008. Commitment: the term and the notions. In P. De Brabanter & P. Dendale (eds.), Commitment, pp. 1–14. Amsterdam: Benjamins.10.1075/bjl.22.01deSuche in Google Scholar

Dennett, D. C. 1987. The intentional stance. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Falkenberg, G. 1997. Searle on sincerity. In A. Burkhardt (ed.), Speech acts, meaning and intentions: critical approaches to the philosophy of John R. Searle, pp. 129–146. Berlin: De Gruyter.Suche in Google Scholar

Frankish, K. 2004. Mind and supermind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511487507Suche in Google Scholar

Frege, G. 1918. Der Gedanke. Beiträge zur Philosophie des deutschen Idealismus 1. 58–77.Suche in Google Scholar

Gazdar, G. 1981. Speech act assignment. In A. Joshi, B. L. Webber & I. Sag (eds.), Elements of discourse understanding, pp. 64–83. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Geurts, B. 2010. Quantity implicatures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511975158Suche in Google Scholar

Geurts, B. 2017. Fictional commitments. Theoretical Linguistics 43. 53–60.10.1515/tl-2017-0003Suche in Google Scholar

Geurts, B. 2018a. Convention and common ground. Mind and Language 33. 115–129.10.1111/mila.12171Suche in Google Scholar

Geurts, B. 2018b. Making sense of self talk. Review of Philosophy and Psychology 9. 271–285.10.1007/s13164-017-0375-ySuche in Google Scholar

Goldberg, S. C. 2015. Assertion: The philosophical significance of assertoric speech. New York: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198732488.001.0001Suche in Google Scholar

Green, M. S. 2007. Self-expression. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199283781.001.0001Suche in Google Scholar

Grice, H. P. 1957. Meaning. Philosophical Review 66. 377–388. Reprinted in Grice (1989).10.2307/2182440Suche in Google Scholar

Grice, P. 1975. Logic and conversation. In P. Cole & J. Morgan (eds.), Speech acts (Syntax and semantics 3), pp. 41–58. New York: Academic Press. Reprinted in Grice (1989).10.1163/9789004368811_003Suche in Google Scholar

Grice, P. 1989. Studies in the way of words. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Hamblin, C. L. 1971. Mathematical models of dialogue. Theoria 37. 130–155.10.1111/j.1755-2567.1971.tb00065.xSuche in Google Scholar

Jacquette, D. 2013. Belief state intensity. In N. Nottelmann (ed.), New essays on belief: Constitution, content, and structure, pp. 209–229. Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.10.1057/9781137026521_11Suche in Google Scholar

Kibble, R. 2006a. Reasoning about propositional commitments in dialogue. Research on Language and Computation 4. 179–202.10.1007/s11168-006-9003-1Suche in Google Scholar

Kibble, R. 2006b. Speech acts, commitment and multi-agent communication. Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory 12. 127–145.10.1007/s10588-006-9540-zSuche in Google Scholar

Kissine, M. 2013a. From utterances to speech acts. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511842191Suche in Google Scholar

Kissine, M. 2013b. Speech act classifications. In M. Sbisà & K. Turner (eds.), Pragmatics of speech actions, pp. 173–202. Berlin, Germany: De Gruyter.10.1515/9783110214383.173Suche in Google Scholar

Krifka, M. 2015. Bias in commitment space semantics: declarative questions, negated questions, and question tags. In S. D’Antonio, M. Moroney & C. R. Little (eds.), Proceedings of SALT 25, Washington, pp. 328–345. LSA Open Journal Systems.10.3765/salt.v25i0.3078Suche in Google Scholar

Lauer, S. 2013. Towards a dynamic pragmatics. Ph.D. thesis, University of Stanford.Suche in Google Scholar

Lewis, D. K. 1969. Convention. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Lewis, D. K. 1979. Scorekeeping in a language game. Journal of Philosophical Logic 8. 339–359.10.1007/BF00258436Suche in Google Scholar

MacFarlane, J. 2011. What is assertion? In J. Brown and H. Cappelen (eds.), Assertion, pp. 79–96. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199573004.003.0004Suche in Google Scholar

Pagin, P. 2014. Assertion. Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy.Suche in Google Scholar

Ridge, M. 2006. Sincerity and expressivism. Philosophical Studies 131. 487–510.10.1007/s11098-005-2218-4Suche in Google Scholar

Searle, J. R. 1969. Speech acts: An essay in the philosophy of language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9781139173438Suche in Google Scholar

Searle, J. R. 1975. A taxonomy of illocutionary acts. In K. Gunderson (ed.), Language, mind, and knowledge. Minnesota studies in the philosophy of science, vol. 7, pp. 344–369. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Searle, J. R. & D. Vanderveken 1985. Foundations of illocutionary logic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1007/1-4020-3167-X_5Suche in Google Scholar

Segerberg, K. 1984. Towards an exact philosophy of action. Topoi 3. 75–83.10.1007/BF00136122Suche in Google Scholar

Singh, M. P. 2000. A social semantics for agent communication languages. In F. Dignum & M. Greaves (eds.), Agent communication, Lecture notes in computer science 1916, pp. 31–45. Berlin: Springer.10.1007/10722777_3Suche in Google Scholar

Soames, S. 1982. How presuppositions are inherited: a solution to the projection problem. Linguistic Inquiry 13. 483–545.Suche in Google Scholar

Sperber, D. & D. Wilson. 1986. Relevance. Oxford: Blackwell.Suche in Google Scholar

Stalnaker, R. C. 1973. Presuppositions. Journal of Philosophical Logic 2. 447–457.10.1007/978-94-010-1756-5_2Suche in Google Scholar

Stalnaker, R. C. (1978). Assertion. In P. Cole (ed.), Radical pragmatics. New York: Academic Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Stalnaker, R. C. 2002. Common ground. Linguistics and Philosophy 25. 701–721.10.1023/A:1020867916902Suche in Google Scholar

Strawson, P. F. 1964. Intention and convention in speech acts. Philosophical Review 73. 439–460.10.2307/2183301Suche in Google Scholar

Vicente, A. & F. Martinez Manrique. 2011. Inner speech: Nature and functions. Philosophy Compass 6. 209–219.10.1111/j.1747-9991.2010.00369.xSuche in Google Scholar

Walker, R. C. S. 1975. Conversational implicatures. In S. Blackburn (ed.), Meaning, reference and necessity, pp. 133–181. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Walton, D. N. & E. C. Krabbe. 1995. Commitment in dialogue: Basic concepts of interpersonal reasoning. Albany: State University of New York Press.Suche in Google Scholar

Winsler, A. 2009. Still talking to ourselves after all these years: A review of current research on private speech. In A. Winsler, C. Fernyhough & I. Montero (eds.), Private speech, executive functioning, and the development of verbal self-regulation, pp. 3–41. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511581533.003Suche in Google Scholar

Zawidzki, T. W. 2013. Mindshaping: A new framework for understanding human social cognition. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.10.7551/mitpress/8441.001.0001Suche in Google Scholar

Published Online: 2019-06-21
Published in Print: 2019-06-26

© 2019 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Heruntergeladen am 16.10.2025 von https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/tl-2019-0001/html
Button zum nach oben scrollen