THE PRAGMATIC ASPECTS OF LINGUISTIC NEGATION

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to give a general explanation of pragmatics of linguistic negation. After a brief survey of classical accounts of negation pragmatic theories (as speech act theory, argumentation theory and polyphony) the main pragmatic uses of negation (illocutionary negation, external negation and majoring negation) are discussed within relevance theory. The question of relevance of negative utterances is raised, and a general inferential schema (based on so-called invited interference) is proposed and tested for the main uses which are discussed in the paper. The analysis proposed in the framework of relevance theory has thus been verified by the main uses of negation. It has the advantage of not making any morphologic or semantic distinctions between the different types of negation and the different uses are explained from different pragmatic processes depending either on the linguistic environment, or on the context, or on both.

The analysis is both simple and realistic. Simple because no complexification of the linguistic system is necessary. Linguistic negation treatment allows, on that count, interesting confrontations from one language to another. Realistic too, because it comes from the principle, admitted by psycholinguists, that positive information is more quickly treated than negative information. It follows from this principle that pragmatic inferences on negative utterances resort to positive premises.