Jary and Kissine examine the meaning of imperative sentences, taking the existing relevance-theoretic semantic analysis, in terms of the desirability and potentiality of the described state of affairs, as their point of departure. In their view, a complete account of the interpretation of imperatives has to explain how they can result in the addressee forming an intention to perform an action, and this requires the theory to make room for ‘action representations’ (in addition to factual representations, such as assumptions). They claim that the imperative form is uniquely specified to interface with such action representations.

Ingrid Lossius Falkum uses data from young children’s communicative development to argue that metaphor and metonymy rely on different pragmatic mechanisms. Metaphor and metonymy do have certain characteristics in common: they both target individual words or phrases, they both contribute content to the proposition explicitly expressed, and they both lie on a continuum of literal and figurative uses. However, developmental data suggests that early metonymic uses may be the result of a more basic process than metaphorical uses, one in which the child exploits salient associative relations to compensate for gaps in vocabulary.

Eleni Gregoromichelaki and Ruth Kempson present a range of arguments and data, including cases of split utterances, in support of their position that even syntax should be construed in terms of the linguistic underspecification of utterance content and incremental context-relative processing. This approach to language (which they call ‘Dynamic Syntax’) is fundamentally different from orthodox generative grammar and conceptualises syntax as procedures for interaction.

Tomoko Matsui takes a developmental perspective on ironical language use and considers the role of epistemic vigilance and mind-reading mechanisms in children’s understanding of irony. She discusses evidence that indicates that children as old as 9 years may misinterpret instances of irony as deliberate lies and suggests that this is a result of their developing epistemic vigilance mechanisms (specifically, a sensitivity to the truth or falsity of information) together with a not yet fully mature appreciation of how information can achieve relevance.