Skip to main content
Log in

Review of The Logic of Conventional Implicatures by Chris Potts

  • Review Article
  • Published:
Linguistics and Philosophy Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

We review Potts’ influential book on the semantics of conventional implicature (CI), offering an explication of his technical apparatus and drawing out the proposal’s implications, focusing on the class of CIs he calls supplements. While we applaud many facets of this work, we argue that careful considerations of the pragmatics of CIs will be required in order to yield an empirically and explanatorily adequate account.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Abbott B. (2000). Presuppositions as non-assertions. Journal of Pragmatics 32(10): 1419–1437

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Asudeh A. and Crouch R. (2002). Derivational parallelism and ellipsis parallelism. In: Mikkelsen, L. and Potts, C. (eds) Proceedings of the 21st West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics, pp 1–14. Cascadilla Press, Somerville, MA

    Google Scholar 

  • Austin J.L. (1962). How to do things with words. Clarendon Press, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Bach K. (1999). The myth of conventional implicature. Linguistics and Philosophy 22: 327–366

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Banfield A. (1982). Unspeakable sentences: Narration and representation in the language of fiction. Routledge & Kegan Paul, Boston

    Google Scholar 

  • Bar-Hillel Y. (1971). Pragmatics of natural language. Reidel, Dordrecht

    Google Scholar 

  • Barker C. and Jacobson P. (2007). Direct compositionality. Oxford University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Bellert I. (1977). On semantic and distributional properties of sentential adverbs. Linguistic Inquiry 8: 227–251

    Google Scholar 

  • Boër S.E. and Lycan W.G. (1980). A performadox in truth-conditional semantics. Linguistics and Philosophy 4.1: 71–100

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bonami O. and Godard D. (2005). Evaluative adverbs and underspecified semantic representations. In: Richter, F. and Sailer, M. (eds) Proceedings of the ESSLLI Workshop on Empirical Challenges and Analytical Alternatives to Strict Compositionality. Heriok Waitl University, Scotland

    Google Scholar 

  • Bonami O., Godard D. and Kampers-Mahne R. (2004). Adverb classification. In: Corblin, F., de Swart H. (eds) Handbook of French semantics. CSLI Publications, Stanford

    Google Scholar 

  • Chierchia G. (1988). Reference to kinds across languages. Natural Language Semantics 6: 339–405

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chomsky, N. (2000). New horizons in the study of language and mind. Cambridge University Press.

  • Gazdar G. (1979). Pragmatics: Implicature, presupposition and logical form. Academic Press, NY

    Google Scholar 

  • Geurts B. (1996). Local satisfaction guaranteed: A presupposition theory and its problems. Linguistics and Philosophy 19(3): 211–257

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Geurts B. (1998). The mechanisms of denial. Language 74: 274–307

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Geurts B. (1999). Presuppositions and pronouns. Elsevier, Amsterdam

    Google Scholar 

  • Geurts B. and Maier E. (2005). Quotation in Context. In: de Brabanter P. (eds) Hybrid quotations, pp 109–128. Benjamins, Amsterdam

    Google Scholar 

  • Grice H.P. (1961). The causal theory of perception. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volume 35: 121–152

    Google Scholar 

  • Grice, H. P. (1967). Logic and Conversation. William James Lectures, Harvard University. Reprinted in P. Cole & J. Morgan (Eds.) (1975). Syntax and Semantics 3. Academic Press, New York, and in Grice (1989), Studies in the way of words (pp. 22–40). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

  • Groenendijk J. and Stokhof M. (1990). Dynamic Montague grammar. In: Kálman, L. and Pólos, L. (eds) Papers from the Second Symposium on Logic and Language, pp 3–48. Budapest, Adakémiai Kiadó

    Google Scholar 

  • Heim, I. (1982). The semantics of definite and indefinite noun phrases. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

  • Heim, I. (1983). On the projection problem for presuppositions (pp. 114–126). WCCFL 2, Stanford University.

  • Heim I. (1992). Presupposition projection and the semantics of attitude verbs. Journal of Semantics 9: 183–221

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Horn L.R. (1989). A natural history of negation. University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Reissued 2001 by CSLI

    Google Scholar 

  • Horn L.R. (1991). Given as new: When redundant affirmation isn’t. Journal of Pragmatics 15: 313–336

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Horn, L. R. (2002). Assertoric inertia and NPI licensing. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, Vol. 38, Part Two: The Panels. University of Chicago.

  • Jackendoff R.S. (1972). Semantic interpretation in generative grammar. MITPress, Cambridge, MA

    Google Scholar 

  • Kadmon, N. (2000). Some theories of the interpretation of accent placement. Ms., Tel Aviv University (talk at Colloque de Syntax et Sémantique, Paris 2000).

  • Kadmon N. (2001). Formal pragmatics. Blackwell, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Kamp, H. (1981). A theory of truth and semantic representation. In J. Groenendijk, T. M. V. Janssen, & M. Stokhof (Eds.), Formal methods in the study of language, Vol. I. Amsterdam: Mathematische Centrum. Reprinted in J. Groenendijk & M. Stokhof (Eds.) (1984), Truth, interpretation and information. Dordrecht: Foris.

  • Kamp H. and Reyle U. (1993). From discourse to logic: Introduction to model theoretic semantics of natural language, formal logic and discourse representation theory. Kluwer, Dordrecht

    Google Scholar 

  • Karttunen L. and Peters S. (1979). Conventional implicature. In: Oh, C.-K. and Dineen, D.A. (eds) Syntax and Semantics (Vol. 11). Academic Press, NY

    Google Scholar 

  • Kay P. (1990). Even. Linguistics and Philosophy 13: 59–111

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kipins A. (1999). Angry young men. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, p 90

    Google Scholar 

  • Kratzer A. (1998). Scope or Pseudoscope? Are there wide-scope indefinites?. In: Rothstein, S. (eds) Events and grammar, pp 163–196. Kluwer, Dordrecht

    Google Scholar 

  • Kratzer, A. (1999). Beyond Ouch and Oops. How descriptive and expressive meaning interact. Comments on a paper by Kaplan, Cornell Conference on Theories of Context Dependency, March, 1999.

  • Lakoff G. (1972). Linguistics and natural logic. In: Davidson, D. and Harmon, G. (eds) Semantics of natural language, pp 545–665. Reidel, Dordrecht

    Google Scholar 

  • Lakoff, G. (1975). Pragmatics in natural logic. In E. L. Keenan (Ed.), Formal semantics of natural language (pp. 253–286). Cambridge University Press.

  • Levinson S.C. (1985). Pragmatics. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, D. (1969). Convention. Harvard University Press.

  • Lewis, D. (1970). General semantics. Synthese, 22, 18–67. Reprinted in D. Davidson & G. Harman (Eds.) (1972), Semantics of natural language (pp. 169–218). Dordrecht: Reidel.

  • McCready E.S. (2004). Two Japanese adverbials and expressive content. In: Watanabe, K. and Young, R. (eds) Proceedings of SALT 14, pp 163–178. CLC, Ithaca

    Google Scholar 

  • Partee B.H. (1987). Noun phrase interpretation and type-shifting principles. In: Groenendijk, J., de Jong D. and Stokhof, M. (eds) Studies in discourse representation theory and the theory of generalized quantifiers, pp 115–143. Foris Publications, Dordrecht

    Google Scholar 

  • Percus O., Sauerland U. (2002). Pronoun movement in dream reports. In: Kadowaki M., Kawahara S. (eds) (2003), Proceedings of the 33rd North East Linguistics Society Meeting (pp. 265–283). Amherst, MA.

  • Pollard C., Sag I. (1994). Head-driven phrase structure grammar. CSLI Press.

  • Portner, P. (2005). Instructions for interpretation as separate performatives. Ms., Georgetown University. Available on his website: http://www9.georgetown.edu/faculty/portnerp/.

  • Potts C. (2005). The logic of conventional implicatures. Oxford University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Potts, C. (2006). The expressive dimension. To appear with invited commentaries in Theoretical Linguistics.

  • Potts, C. (2007). The dimensions of quotation. In C. Barker & P. Jacobson (Eds.), Direct compositionality (pp. 405–431). Oxford University Press.

  • Potts C. and Kawahara S. (2004). Japanese honorifics as emotive definite descriptions. In: Watanabe, K. and Young, R.B. (eds) Proceedings of Semantics and Linguistic Theory (Vol. 14), pp 235–254. CLC Publications, Ithaca NY

    Google Scholar 

  • Recanati F. (2001). Open quotation. Mind 110: 637–687

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Roberts C. (1989). Modal subordination and pronominal anaphora in discourse. Linguistics and Philosophy 12(6): 683–721

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Roberts, C. (1996a). Anaphora in intensional contexts. In S. Lappin (Ed.), The handbook of contemporary semantic theory. Basil Blackwell.

  • Roberts, C. (1996b) Information structure: Towards an integrated formal theory of pragmatics. In J. H. Yoon & A. Kathol (Eds.), OSUWPL Volume 49: Papers in Semantics, 1996. The Ohio State University Department of Linguistics. Available in updated form on the Semantics Archive.

  • Roberts, C. (2004). Pronouns as definites. In M. Reimer & A. Bezuidenhout (Eds.), Descriptions and beyond. Oxford University Press.

  • Roberts C. (2007). Uniqueness in definite noun phrases. Linguistics and Philosophy 26: 287–350

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Roberts, C. (to appear). Only: Presupposition and implicature. Accepted with revisions by the Journal of Semantics.

  • Roberts, C. (in progress). Resolving focus. Ms., presented at Sinn und Bedeutung XI, Barcelona, September, 2006.

  • Rooth, M. (1985). Association with focus. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

  • Rooth M. (1992). A theory of focus interpretation. Natural Language Semantics 1(1): 75–116

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ross J.R. (1970). On declarative sentences. In: Jacobs, R.A. and Rosenbaum, P.S. (eds) Readings in English transformational grammar, pp 222–272. Ginn, Waltham

    Google Scholar 

  • Sadock J.M. (1974). Toward a linguistic theory of speech acts. Academic Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Sauerland, U., & Heck, F. (2002). LF-intervention effects in Pied-Piping. Handout, NELS 33, MIT.

  • Schwarzschild R. (1999). GIvenNess, AvoidF and other constraints on the placement of accent. Natural Language Semantics 7(2): 141–177

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shannon B. (1976). On the two kinds of presuppositions in natural language. Foundations of Language 14: 247–249

    Google Scholar 

  • Simons M. (2001). On the conversational basis of some presuppositions. Proceedings from Semantics and Linguistic Theory 11: 431–448

    Google Scholar 

  • Stalnaker R.C. (1979). Assertion. In: Cole, P. (eds) Syntax and semantics 9: Pragmatics, pp 315–332. Academic Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Stump G. (1985). The semantic variability of absolute constructions. Kluwer, Dordrecht

    Google Scholar 

  • van der Sandt R. (1992). Presupposition projection as anaphora resolution. Journal of Semantics 9: 333–377

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van Rooij R. (2005). A modal analysis of presupposition and modal subordination. Journal of Semantics 22(3): 281–305

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • von Fintel, K. (2000). What is presupposition accommodation? Retrieved November 10, 2007, from http://web.mit.edu/fintel/www/accomm.pdf.

  • von Fintel, K. (2004). Would you believe it? The king of France is back! Presuppositions and truthvalue intuitions. In M. Reimer & A. Bezuidenhout (Eds.), Descriptions and beyond. Oxford University Press.

  • von Stechow A. (2003). Binding by verbs: Tense, person andmoodunder attitudes. In: Kadowaki, M. and Kawahara, S. (eds) Proceedings of the 33rd North East Linguistics Society Meeting, pp 1–2. GLSA, Amherst, MA

    Google Scholar 

  • Wang L., Reese B. and McCready E. (2005). The projection problem of nominal appositives. Snippets 10: 13–14

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Craige Roberts.

Additional information

The authors’ names are listed alphabetically; all work was fully joint.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Amaral, P., Roberts, C. & Smith, E.A. Review of The Logic of Conventional Implicatures by Chris Potts. Linguist and Philos 30, 707–749 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10988-008-9025-2

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10988-008-9025-2

Keywords

Navigation