Embedded implicatures and optimality theoretic pragmatics

Abstract

In a recent paper, Chierchia (2004) distinguishes global and local approaches to conversational implicatures and claims that several puzzles concerning implicatures in complex sentences can best be explained by a local approach. This conflicts with the Neo-Gricean view which is global in nature. I will argue that both approaches can coexist in optimality theoretic pragmatics where the proper place is assigned to the two approaches: a global theory describes the principal forces that direct communication – it has a diachronic dimension and allows a rational foundation of conversational implicatures; a local theory describes the actual, synchronic dimension – it explains how online, incremental interpretation of complex sentences is possible. The connection between the two views results from assuming that the results of global optimization fossilize into a local mechanism of utterance processing.