In this chapter, we look at how the field of pragmatics has developed following Grice. We begin with a discussion of some common questions, problems, and objections that arise in relation to Grice’s work on pragmatics. While Grice is without a doubt one of the most influential figures in pragmatics, his work has been criticised on several grounds, and we explore some of these here. We look at general issues relating to the origins and universality of the Gricean framework, as well as asking more specific questions about the operation of individual maxims. A key criticism of Grice has been that his work is rooted in one social and cultural context. We discuss a key study by Keenan which considers how conversations and interactions play out in a community with cultural assumptions, which differ significantly from the world in which Grice developed his ideas. We then move on to consider two influential accounts that have developed out of Grice’s work, but which broadly maintain his overall approach. Such approaches are known as neo-Gricean. We outline work by Horn and Levinson, and we see how their proposed principles explain various types of inference and implicature.

This chapter discusses generalized conversational implicatures, especially quantitative or scalar implicatures, clausal implicatures and informative implicatures. First, the notion of quantitative scale is introduced as well as its relation to the logical square and its role in the computation of scalar implicatures. Then the reduction of Grice’s nine maxims to two general principles, as proposed by neo-Gricean models of pragmatics, is illustrated and critically discussed. Finally, the chapter presents an alternative to the neo-Gricean approach to scalar implicatures, involving a covert exhaustification operator (only) that operates at the syntax-semantics interface.

This chapter focuses on the notion of particularized conversation implicatures. It starts by illustrating these implicatures with the case of metaphors, and shows the different ways in which Grice and relevance theory accounted for them. It goes on to argue that neither framework is equipped to explain why speakers use implicatures to communicate. The chapter presents a possible explanation for the existence of implicatures in terms of plausible deniability. Finally, the chapter introduces the notion of epistemic vigilance, a mechanism that hearers develop to avoid being deceived or manipulated.