Abstract
This paper develops an analysis of a scalar implicature that is induced by the use of reportative evidentials such as the Cuzco Quechua enclitic = si and the German modal sollen. Reportatives, in addition to specifying the speaker’s source of information for a statement as a report by someone else, also usually convey that the speaker does not have direct evidence for the proposition expressed. While this type of implicature can be calculated using the same kind of Gricean reasoning that underlies other scalar implicatures, it requires two departures from standard assumptions. First, evidential scalar implicatures differ from the more familiar scalar implicatures in that they do not turn on the notion of informativeness but on the notion of evidential strength. Second, the implicature arises on the illocutionary level of meaning. It is argued that a version of Grice’s maxim of quantity in terms of illocutionary strength can account for this evidential scalar implicature as well as for the more typical scalar implicatures. The account developed also proposes some revisions to the taxonomy of speech acts and suggests that the sincerity conditions of assertive speech acts contain an evidential sincerity condition in addition to the belief condition standardly assumed.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Atlas J. D. (2005) Logic, meaning, and conversation. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Bach, K. (2006). The top 10 misconceptions about implicature. In B. Birner & G. Ward (Eds.), Drawing the boundaries of meaning, volume 80 of Studies in language companion series (pp. 21–30). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Cole P. (1981) Imbabura Quechua. Croom Helm, London
Cusihuaman, A. (2001). Gramática Quechua: Cuzco-Collao (2nd ed.). Cuzco: Centro de Estudios Regionales Andinos “Bartolomé de las Casas”.
Dancy J. (1985) An introduction to contemporary epistemology. Blackwell, Oxford
de Haan F. (1997) The interaction of modality and negation. Garland, New York
Diewald, G. (1999). Die Modalverben im Deutschen, volume 208 of Germanistische Linguistik. Tübingen: Niemeyer.
Ehrich, V. (2001). Was nicht müssen und nicht können (nicht) bedeuten können: Zum Skopus der Negation bei den Modalverben des Deutschen. In R. Müller & M. Reis (Eds.), Modalität und Modalverben im Deutschen, volume 9 of Linguistische Berichte Sonderhefte (pp. 149–176). Hamburg: Buske.
Fabricius-Hansen C., Sæbø K. J. (2004) In a mediative mood: The semantics of the German reportive subjunctive. Natural Language Semantics 12: 213–257
Faller, M. (2002a). Remarks on evidential hierarchies. In D. Beaver, S. Kaufmann, B. Z. Clark, & L. Casillas (Eds.), The construction of meaning (pp. 89–111). Stanford: CSLI Publications.
Faller, M. (2002b). Semantics and pragmatics of evidentials in Cuzco Quechua. Doctoral Dissertation, Stanford University.
Faller M. (2004) The deictic core of “non-experienced past” in Cuzco Quechua. Journal of Semantics 21: 45–85
Faller, M. (2007). The Cusco Quechua Reportative evidential and rhetorical relations. In A. Simpson & P. Austin (Eds.), Endangered languages, volume 14 of Linguistische Berichte Sonderhefte (pp. 223–251). Hamburg: Buske.
Faller, M. (2011). A possible worlds semantics for Cuzco Quechua evidentials. In D. Lutz & N. Li (Eds.), Proceedings of semantics and linguistic theory 20. Ithaca, NY: CLC Publications.
Floyd, R. (1997). La estructura categorial de los evidenciales en el Quechua Wanka. Lima: Ministerio de Educación. Instituto Lingüístico de Verano.
Fogelin R. J. (1967) Evidence and meaning. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London
Gazdar G. (1979) Pragmatics: Implicature, presupposition, and logical form. Academic, New York
Geurts B. (2010) Quantity implicatures. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Grice P. (1989) Studies in the way of words. Harvard University Press, Cambridge
Halliday M. A. K. (1970) Functional diversity in language as seen from a consideration of modality and mood in English. Foundations of Language 6: 322–361
Harnish R. (1976) Logical form and implicature. In: Bever T., Katz J.J, Langendoen T. (Eds.) An integrated theory of linguistic ability. Crowell, New York, pp 313–392
Hirschberg J. (1991) A theory of scalar implicature. Garland, New York
Horn L. R. (1985) Metalinguistic negation and pragmatic ambiguity. Language 61: 121–174
Horn L. R. (1991) Given as new: When redundant affirmation isn’t. Journal of Pragmatics 15: 313–336
Horn, L. R. (2004). Implicature. In L. Horn & G. Ward (Eds.), Handbook of pragmatics (pp. 3–28). Oxford: Blackwell.
Iatridou, S. (1991). Topics in conditionals. Doctoral dissertation, MIT Press.
Itier, C. (1995). El teatro Quechua en el Cuzco. Cuzco and Lima: Centro de Estudios Regionales Andinos “Bartolomé de las Casas” and Institut Français D’études Andines.
Karttunen L. (1973) Presupposition and linguistic context. Theoretical Linguistics 1: 182–194
Krifka M. (2001) Quantifying into question acts. Natural Language Semantics 9: 1–40
Krifka, M. (2004). Semantics below and above speech acts. Handout of talk presented at Stanford University.
LaPolla R.J. (2003) A grammar of Qiang, volume 31 of Mouton grammar library. Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin
Levinson S. C. (2000) Presumptive meanings: The theory of generalized conversational implicature. MIT Press, Cambridge MA
Mackenzie J. (1987) I guess. Australasian Journal of Philosophy 65: 290–300
Matsumoto Y. (1995) The conversational condition on Horn scales. Linguistics and Philosophy 18: 21–60
Matthewson L., Davis H., Rullmann H. (2007) Evidentials as epistemic modals: Evidence from St’át’imcets. Linguistic Variation Yearbook 7: 201–254
Mortelmans, T. (2000). On the ‘evidential’ nature of the ‘epistemic’ use of the German modals müssen and sollen. In J. van der Auwera & P. Dendale (Eds.), Modal verbs in Germanic and Romance languages, volume 14 of Belgian Journal of Linguistics (pp. 131–148). Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.
Papafragou A., Li P., Choi Y., Han C. (2007) Evidentiality in language and cognition. Cognition 103: 253–299
Peterson, T. (2009). Pragmatic blocking in Gitksan evidential expressions. In Proceedings of the 38th meeting of the North East Linguistic Society (Vol. 2, pp. 219–232). Amherst: GLSA Publications.
Pouscoulous, N. (2006). Processing scalar inferences. Doctoral dissertation, EHESS, Paris.
Roberts, C. (1996). Information structure: Towards an integrated formal theory of pragmatics. In J. H. Yoon and A. Kathol (Eds.), OSU Working Papers in Linguistics 49: Papers in Semantics. Colombus, OH: Ohio State University.
Sadock, J. M. (1998). On testing for conversational implicature. In A. Kasher (Ed.), Pragmatics—critical concepts (Vol. IV, pp. 315–331). London: Routledge.
Sauerland U. (2004) Scalar implicatures in complex sentences. Linguistics and Philosophy 27: 362–391
Schenner, M. (2009). Semantics of evidentials: German reportative modals. In S. Blaho, C. Constantinescu, & B. Le Bruyn (Eds.), Proceedings of ConSOLE XVI (pp. 179–198). Leiden: Universiteit Leiden.
Searle J. R. (1969) Speech acts. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Searle J. R., Vanderveken D. (1985) Foundations of illocutionary logic. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Siebel M. (2003) Illocutionary acts and attitude expression. Linguistics and Philosophy 26: 351–366
Tenny, C., & Speas, P. (2003). Configurational properties of point of view roles. In A. M. Di Scuillo (Ed.), Asymmetry in grammar (pp. 315–343). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Traugott E. C. (1989) On the rise of epistemic meanings in English: An example of subjectification in semantic change. Language 65: 31–55
van Rooij R., Schulz K. (2004) Exhaustive interpretation of complex sentences. Journal of Logic, Language, and Information 13: 491–519
Vanderveken D. (1990) Meaning and speech acts, vol. 1. Principles of language use. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Vanderveken, D. (1997). Formal pragmatics of non literal meaning. In E. Rolf (Ed.), Linguistische Berichte Sonderheft (Vol. 8, pp. 324–341). Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag.
von Fintel K., Gillies A. S. (2010) Must stay strong!. Natural Language Semantics 18: 351–383
Weber, D. J. (1986). Information perspective, profile, and patterns in Quechua. In W. Chafe & J. Nichols (Eds.), Evidentiality: The linguistic coding of epistemology (pp. 137–155). Norwood: Ablex Publishing Corporation.
Wiemer, B. (2010). Hearsay in European languages: Toward an integrative account of grammatical and lexical marking. In G. Diewald & E. Smirnova (Eds.), Linguistic realization of evidentiality in European languages, volume 49 of Empirical approaches to language typology (pp. 59–129). Berlin: de Gruyter.
Zeevat, H. (2003). The syntax semantics interface of speech act markers. In Proceedings Diabruck, 7th workshop on the semantics and the pragmatics of dialogue, Wallerfangen.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Faller, M. Evidential scalar implicatures. Linguist and Philos 35, 285–312 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10988-012-9119-8
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10988-012-9119-8