Injoke

TRABAJO FIN DE GRADO
Título
The Cooperative, Relevance and Politeness Principles in

jokes: interpretation and complementariness
Autor/es
Isabel Villota Miranda
Director/es
Francisco José Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez

Facultad
Facultad de Letras y de la Educación

Titulación
Grado en Estudios Ingleses
Departamento
Curso Académico
2012-2013
The Cooperative, Relevance and Politeness Principles in jokes: interpretation
and complementariness, trabajo fin de grado
de Isabel Villota Miranda, dirigido por Francisco José Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez (publicado
por la Universidad de La Rioja), se difunde bajo una Licencia
Creative Commons Reconocimiento-NoComercial-SinObraDerivada 3.0 Unported.
Permisos que vayan más allá de lo cubierto por esta licencia pueden solicitarse a los
titulares del copyright.
© El autor
© Universidad de La Rioja, Servicio de Publicaciones, 2013
publicaciones.unirioja.es ᤨ
E-mail: [email protected]
Trabajo de Fin de Grado
The Cooperative,
Relevance and Politeness
Principles in jokes:
interpretation and
complementariness
Autor:
I sabel Villota Miranda
Tutor/es:
Fdo. Francisco José Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez
Titulación:
Grado en Estudios Ingleses [610G]
Facultad de Letras y de la Educación
AÑO ACADÉMICO: 2012/2013

INDEX
1. Introduction 1
2. Approaching verbal communication
2.1. Grice and conversational maxims 3
2.2. Relevance Theory 4
2.3. Politeness accounts 6
2.3.1. Leech’s Politeness Principle and maxims 7
2.3.2. Brown and Levinson’s politeness strategies 10
3. Complementariness of inferential pragmatic accounts
3.1. Relevance Theory (RT) and the Cooperative Principle (CP) 13
3.2. The Politeness Principle (PP) and the Cooperative Prinicple (CP) 14
3.3. The Politeness Principle and Brown and Levinson’s politeness strategies 14
3.4. Relevance Theory and Politeness 15
4. Analysis 17
5. Results 31
6. Conclusion 37
7. References 39
RESUMEN
El humor ha sido un campo ignorado por la lingüística durante mucho tiempo. En tanto,
era estudiado dentro del marco de la retórica. Cuando las teorías lingüísticas empezaron
a surgir, se limitaban al estudio de ciertos usos del lenguaje, entre los cuales no se
encontraba el texto humorístico. Por otra parte, mientras algunas teorías sí apelaban a la
complementariedad con otras ya existentes (Leech y Grice), había otras, como la teoría
de la Relevancia, que reclamaba la exclusividad en la comprensión.
Este trabajo presenta cuatro de las teorías más importantes en pragmática (el Principio
de Cooperación, el Principio de Relevancia y las teorías de Cortesía de Leech y de
Brown and Levinson). El objetivo es ver cómo explican la interpretación y la
comprensión de los chistes y cómo se complementan para ello.
Con este fin se ha procedido al análisis de doce ejemplos de chistes extraídos de la red
tras una serie de búsquedas y una selección basada en la variedad temática. Después se
procedió a la interpretación de los ejemplos, buscando la teoría que mejor explica cada
uno y en qué forma el resto complementan la interpretación inicial.
Tras el análisis, se han distinguido dos elementos comunes a todos los chistes: el
contexto y el uso de estereotipos. También se han descrito las distintas formas en que se
observan o se explotan elementos de los principios lingüísticos mencionados para
producir el efecto humorístico deseado. Por último, ha quedado patente que las distintas
teorías pueden operar de manera conjunta aportando información complementaria.
ABSTRACT
Humour has been ignored in the field of Linguistics for a long time. Meanwhile, it has
been studied within the framework of Rhetoric. When linguistic theories began to
emerge, they were limited to the study of certain uses of language. Humorous texts were
not among these uses, though. Moreover, while some theories were put forward as
complementing existing theories (e.g. Leech’s politeness theory was designed to
complement Grice’s Cooperative Principle), there were others, such as Relevance
Theory, claiming exclusivity.
This paper presents four of the major linguistic theories: the Cooperative Principle,
Relevance Theory and two politeness accounts, Leech’s Politeness Principle and Brown
and Levinson’s politeness strategies. The goal is to see how these theories explain the
interpretation and understanding of jokes and how they can be combined for this
purpose.
To this end, an analysis of twelve jokes has been made. These jokes, which have been
extracted from Internet searches, have been selected on the basis of the variety of topics
they cover. The jokes have been discussed from a pragmatic perspective by making use
of the combination of theories which best explains each example.
After the analysis, two common elements have been distinguished: the context and the
use of stereotypes. Also, a description has been made of the ways in which the different
pragmatic principles and their elements are exploited in order to produce the desired
humorous effects. Finally, it has become clear that different theories can operate
together each of them accounting for different aspects of the humorous effects.
1. Introduction
Traditionally, humour has been studied within the field of Rhetoric. As Graban (2008:
401) points out, the Greeks already used it as a resource to attract the audience’s
attention to specific subjects; she appoints Aristotle as the first to study humour.
According to her, Aristotle especially focused on the different causes of humour
(ambiguity, synonymy or diminutives) and the topics or events (deception, violation of
laws, irrational behaviour and the unexpected). He even differentiated irony, which
required a high type of audience, from humour or comedy, which he said was directed to
a lower type of audience (Aristotle 2010: 157).
Later on, Cicero made a distinction in De Oratore between two types of humour: in
verbo, which arises from witticisms and from puns based on ambiguity and plays on
words; and in re, which has to do with deceiving expectation, uttering absurdities,
making comparisons between what is bad and what is worse, satirizing the tempers of
others, reproving folly, etc. (Graban 2008: 403).
Interestingly enough, the study of humour, which was further developed by rhetoricians
(especially after the post-Enlightenment), has remained largely unexplored for linguists.
Linguists have generally been focused on accounting for either the interaction between
grammar modules (especially syntax, as in Chomskyan linguistics) or for the way
language is used to regulate speaker-hearer interaction in terms of speech acts (e.g.
Austin, Searle) or to cooperate in communication (Gricean pragmatics). However, the
study of how language conveys other meaning effects such as irony, hyperbole and
humour awaits deeper linguistic study. Searle would even state that telling jokes is a
parasitic form of communication (1999: 57).
One of the exceptions, Victor Raskin (1985), developed the SSTH (Semantic-Script
Theory of Humour) and maintained that semantics and pragmatics were nuclear to
humour; humour was considered a violation of Grice’s Cooperative Principle (CP). This
theory would later be extended by Raskin and Attardo (1991) in the form of the GTVH
(the General Theory of Verbal Humour). Nevertheless, this approach to the problem is
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limited to a mere description of the elements of a joke or a humorous text and does not
account for how the linguistic theory explains humour or for how jokes are processed.
This essay will build a bridge between linguistic theory and the understanding of
language-based humour. To illustrate the power of the approach offered herein, I have
collected jokes dealing with different topics (cultures, professions, politics,
relationships…) on the basis of Internet searches. This has allowed me to work with up-
to-date examples. In the analysis, I will first discuss the punch line of every joke in the
selection. This will be followed by a description of how various principles of
pragmatics, such as the CP, already mentioned above, and the so-called Principle of
Relevance (PR) and Politeness Principle (PP), to be discussed later, operate in the
examples; we will study how they complement each other, when they do, and what role
they have in the construction and interpretation of our sample of jokes.
The subsequent sections comprise a brief summary of the theories that will be used in
the analysis, a depiction of the way in which the various pragmatic principles can shed
light on humorous language, followed by the analysis of the examples and a
commentary on the results of the analysis.
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2. Approaching verbal communication
2.1. Grice and conversational maxims

The first theory to be discussed in this essay is Grice’s well-known CP. According to
Grice, this principle, which is observed by every speaker when communicating, takes
the following form: “Make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the
state at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in
which you are engaged” (1975: 26). The most important consequence of this principle
regarding the goal of this essay is that it helps to create expectations about what may
happen next in discourse; as Grice states: “at each stage, some possible conversational
moves would be excluded as conversationally unsuitable” (1975: 26).
Four maxims derive from the CP. The first three maxims, those of Quantity, Quality and
Relation, appertain to the content of the message; the last one, the maxim of Manner,
relates to how the message is constructed .
The maxim of Quantity deals with the amount of information provided by the speaker.
It is divided in two submaxims: “Make your contribution as informative as is required
(for the current purposes of the exchange)” and “Do not make your contribution more
informative than is required” (Grice 1975: 26).
The second maxim has to do with the truthfulness of information: “Try to make your
contribution one that is true”. This notion of truth makes reference both to falsity and to
lack of evidence. Hence the following two submaxims: “Do not say what you believe to
be false” and “Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence” (Grice 1975: 27).
The third maxim is defined quite simply as “Be relevant”. It has to do with the
appropriateness of one’s contribution to the context of communication (Grice 1975: 27).
And finally, the maxim of Manner tells communicators to ‘be perspicuous’. This maxim
is divided into four submaxims: “Avoid obscurity of expression”, “Avoid ambiguity”,
“Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity)” and “Be orderly.” Grice mentions that there
might be more maxims, but does not give any further insight into this issue (1975: 27).
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Grice noticed that the maxims of the CP were not always followed. Failures to fulfil the
maxims can be catalogued as: violation, opting out, clash and flouting. For the purpose
of this essay the notion of flouting requires special attention. Grice defined it as
“blatantly fail to fulfil it [the maxim]” (1975: 30) and recognized it as a typical way to
generate a conversational implicature. In this case, the result would be an ‘exploitation’
of the maxim, regarding the observance of the CP (30).
2.2 Relevance Theory

Within the context of inferential pragmatics, Sperber and Wilson (1986) put forward
Relevance Theory (RT), which, although related to the third of Grice’s maxims –i.e. the
maxim of Relation– actually denies the validity of the CP and of an analysis in terms of
maxims.
Grice (1975) had stated that communication was possible thanks to recognition of
informative intentions. Sperber and Wilson would dig further into how this takes place,
addressing the complex problem of telling the difference between communicative
intention and other types of human intention. According to these scholars, human
intention can only be inferred from the effects it has. However, this is not generally
possible for an audience. They thus claim that the key to the recognition of informative
intentions is to be found in a characteristic of communicative behaviour: “it overtly
claims the audience’s attention” (Sperber and Wilson 1986: 32-33).
Once communication is on its way, there is a major principle ruling interaction: the
principle of relevance. Sperber and Wilson (1990: 41) believe relevance to be
fundamental to human cognition, on which inferential communication is grounded.
Relevance, they claim, “is a matter of degree” (1986: 123) which depends on two
conditions or factors. These factors, which always hold, are independent of individual
conscious assessment. However, they do not usually stay constant from one individual
to another or in different circumstances (1986: 131).
The first factor is contextual effects. Context is not only made up of the information
coming from our perception; as Sperber and Wilson assert,
the choice of a context for inferential processes in general, and for comprehension
in particular, is partly determined at any given time by the contents of the memory
of the deductive device, those of the general-purpose short-term memory store, and
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those of the encyclopaedic, and by the information that can be immediately picked
up from the physical environment. (1986: 141)
Contextual effects arise when the new information interacts with the pre-existent
information. Two different types of effects are distinguished: those that lead to a
strengthening of the old assumptions and those that result in the abandonment of the old
assumptions. But the interpretation of new information also involves calculating the
consequences of the addition of the new assumptions to the pre-existing ones. This
process involves a progressive change of our background knowledge (Sperber and
Wilson 1986: 109, 118).
However, it may be the case that no contextual effects arise from an assumption, thus
becoming irrelevant. Sperber and Wilson (1986: 121) differentiate three different
instances: that the new information has no connections at all with the context, that it is
already present and therefore does not affect any prior assumption, or that the
information is uninformative. Nevertheless, they claim that the importance relies on the
relevance of overall behaviour rather than on the actual assumptions, which might be
irrelevant.
The second factor upon which the degree of relevance varies is processing effort.
Regarding this factor, the fact that an assumption may require a greater processing
effort means that its relevance is lower in contrast with other assumptions that might
require less effort (Sperber and Wilson 1986: 124).
These two factors respond to the principle of relevance, which states that “every act of
ostensive communication communicates a presumption of its own optimal relevance”
(Sperber and Wilson 1986: 158). However, Sperber and Wilson do not say that the
stimuli need to be relevant, but that the addressee has to think that they are.
Relevance can also fail to be achieved; however, this is not to be attributed to a

violation of the principle, but to incapacity of the communicator to fulfil it:
Communicators do not ‘follow’ the principle of relevance; and they could not
violate it even if they wanted to. The principle of relevance applies without
exception: every act of ostensive communication communicates a presumption of
relevance. (Sperber and Wilson 1986: 162)
The main differences between Grice’s CP and the PR were already outlined by Sperber
and Wilson (1986), who claim that their approach is more explicit and less demanding
5
than Grice’s. The PR does not need to be known by the participants in a communication
act, while the CP and its maxims does. Also, RT only requires recognition of the
speaker’s communicative intention for interaction to take place. However, cooperation
needs a common set of goals or “a mutually accepted direction” (Grice 1975: 45).
2.2. Politeness accounts

Leech’s politeness theory adds a number of maxims to the Gricean account. Grice’s
seminal ideas on conversational implicature gave rise to quite a lot of debate in the
linguistic community. Adherents of Grices’s ideas soon realized that the maxims
account had a number of weaknesses, which they tried to solve by postulating further
maxims or attempting to refine the existing ones (e.g. Searle's ‘Speak idiomatically
unless there is some special reason not to’; Searle 1975: 76).
One full-blown example of this trend is found in Leech (1983), who develops a set of
so-called interpersonal rhetoric and textual maxims. Leech argued that the CP maxims
were focused on handling and conveying information: quantity maxims relate to the
amount of information, quality maxims to its veracity, the maxim of relation to its
consistency, and the maxims of manner to the clarity and organization of the
information in a message.
Interestingly enough, these maxims seem to work under the umbrella of the
representational (also called ideational) function of language. But linguists such as
Halliday (1978) had already argued that linguistic description and explanation should be
sensitive to two other functions of language, viz. the interpersonal and the textual
functions. The interpersonal function dealt with how people regulate communicative
interaction. In relation to this function, Leech (1983) proposes the existence of the
Politeness Principle or PP, as already mentioned above, which based on three pragmatic
scales: cost-benefit, indirectness and optionality. The most important of the three is the
cost-benefit scale, which captures the social convention according to which people have
to do their best to act in ways that are beneficial to other people.
From this scale there arises a maxim of the PP called the Tact maxim: “maximize
benefit to others/minimize cost to others” (Leech 1983:132). This maxim provides solid
motivation for cases of violation of the maxims of quantity and quality of the CP. For
example, we may give less information or even false information in order to avoid
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hurting someone’s feelings (so-called ‘white lies'). In its turn, the textual function of
language, that is the function whereby information takes the form of coherent and
cohesive text (cf. Halliday and Hasan 1976), supports the existence of a textual rhetoric.
This is a set of pragmatic principles related to how communicators make their messages
clear, transparent and processible while keeping their ability to supply aesthetic effects.
Another approach to politeness has been provided by Brown and Levinson (1987) (cf.
2.3.2). Although the latter does not postulate any maxims, we can argue that it is
complementary of Leech’s proposal. The difference between the two accounts is simply
a matter of perspective. Brown and Levinson (1987) focus their attention on the
linguistic strategies that speakers follow in order to save or maintain face, i.e. their
public image. Among such strategies we find indirectness, hedges, questions, and in-
group identity. However, Brown and Levinson (1987) do not investigate the nature of
face-threatening acts. In other words, they do not explain why some acts are considered
to be threatening, that is, why they provoke a loss of face.
By contrast, Leech (1983) examines the principles that underlie behaviour; he explains
what is polite and what is not, and how language reflects this. Such principles are
captured by his maxims. However, Leech claims that, although the dimensions on
which the maxims are based are universal, their importance may differ from one culture
to another. The English culture, for instance, pays more attention to the Tact maxim,
while others, such as the Chinese, make emphasis on the Modesty maxim (1983: 150).
2.3.1. Leech’s Politeness Principle and maxims
Politeness and its maxims will now be described in some detail. As mentioned above,
Leech (1983: 109) sets up three pragmatic scales. The cost-benefit scale deals with the
cost or benefit that an action will have for the hearer: the higher the cost to the hearer,
the less polite the illocutionary act is; and the lower the cost (or the higher the benefit)
the more polite it is.
The indirectness scale has to do with the degree of indirectness of an act regarding its
illocutionary goal. Leech asserts that indirectness gives rise to optionality and, at the
same time, minimizes the impositive force of the illocution. Therefore, the more indirect
a stance is, the more polite (1983: 108). However, this is not categorical. That is why
the concept of optionality is needed.
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The optionality scale accounts for the choice given to the hearer to refuse: as “it
becomes progressively easier for h to say no (…) negative politeness (i.e. serving the
avoidance of the cost to h) is increased” (Leech 1983: 109).
The three scales are interrelated, i.e., the higher the cost the more indirect the utterance
will be and the greater the amount of optionality to the addressee. These scales underlie
all the maxims of politeness.
The six maxims that Leech (1983: 83-84) postulates are influenced by the distinction he
draws between negative and positive politeness. Negative politeness consists in
minimizing impoliteness while positive politeness involves maximizing politeness. This
leads to a dual vision of the six maxims. He also asserts that speech acts can be either
‘other-centred’ or ‘self-centred’, and are thus bilateral, which is seen in the Tact and
Generosity maxims as well as in the case of Approbation and Modesty (133).
According to Leech (1983: 107), the Tact maxim is the “most important kind of
politeness in English-speaking society”. Tact can be defined as the “(use of) skill and
understanding shown by somebody who handles people and situations successfully and
without causing offence” (OALDCE 1974: 879). Leech relates it to his cost-benefit
scale, dividing this maxim into two: “Minimize cost to others” and “Maximize benefit
to others” (1983: 132). For the first submaxim the indirectness scale operates
proportionately, that is, the higher the cost the more indirect language will be. For
example, the utterance Close the window! is less indirect and therefore more impolite.
But expressions such as Can/Will you close the window?’, Would/Could you close the
window?’, ‘Would you mind closing the window?’, etc., increase indirectness and the
degree of optionality. This way, the cost that they involve is minimised.
On the contrary, for the second, it operates inversely. In other words, the higher the
benefit the less indirect. As can be seen in the following examples, for an offer
directness is expected rather than indirectness. Would you mind having some more
cake?, Would you have some more cake?, Will you have some more cake?, Have some
more cake!
The maxim of Generosity, as mentioned above, correlates with the Tact maxim. It is
self-centred and so it states: “Minimize benefit to self” and “Maximize cost to self”
(Leech 1983: 132). According to Leech, the Tact and the Generosity maxims can work
together. For instance, in You can take my umbrella, there is both a cost to the speaker
8
and a benefit to the addressee. However, Leech claims there is no need for it to be so.
He uses the example of a request for a second helping. He suggests that a greater degree
of politeness can be achieved if the hearer is not mentioned as the benefactor (Could I
have some more X?) and even more if the speaker does not appear as the beneficiary (Is
there some more X?) (1983: 134).
The next maxim is Approbation. It reads “Minimize dispraise of others” and “Maximize
praise of others” (Leech 1983: 132). Leech explains this maxim as “avoid saying
unpleasant things about others, and more particularly, about h” (135). For example,
after a piano performance, the speaker would praise the artist’s performance (He played
so beautifully!) rather than the opposite (That was a tasteless interpretation of Liszt).
This accounts also for some of the cases where information is given in a reluctant or
obscure manner (135-136). If someone were asked What do you think of my
performance? and he answered Your technique was brilliant! he would probably be
implying that the artist was rather inexpressive and that he did not enjoy it much.
However, he would be following the maxim of Approbation.
The Modesty maxim has to do with boasting, as Leech explains (1983: 136). Observing
this maxim entails minimizing praise of self and maximizing dispraise of self.
Therefore, one is not expected to brag. If, as an answer to the compliment That’s very
smart!, someone said: Oh, indeed it is, that person would be considered impolite. On the
contrary, if that person had said, Oh, not really…, that would be polite and it is what the
audience would expect from him rather than the first answer.
The maxim of Agreement tells communicators to “Minimize disagreement between self

and other” and to “Maximize agreement between self and other’ (Leech 1983: 132).
Leech notes that “there is a tendency to exaggerate agreement with other people, and to
mitigate disagreement by expressing regret, partial agreement, etc.” (138). For example,
in a birthday party one of the children’s mothers says: I don’t think you should give
Coke to the kids. Some of the possible answers would be (from least to most polite): I
don’t care what you think, I’ll do as I may, or Yeah, but it is just a day, right?, or even
You’re so right, they get so nervous! But I’ll only give them a little sip. In the first case,
disagreement is not minimized and the answer is very impolite. The response in the
second example partially agrees with the first speaker, and in the last one, agreement is
somewhat greater and the example is more polite than the previous one.
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The last maxim is Sympathy. This maxim is divided into two submaxims as well:
“Minimize antipathy between self and other” and “Maximize sympathy between self
and other” (Leech 1983: 132). Within its scope, we find speech acts such as
condolences and congratulations: I’m sorry for your loss or I’m so glad you passed all
your exams!
Although Leech proposed these six maxims, he did not claim that they were the only
existing ones, leaving the list open to include further categories (REFERENCE).
2.3.2. Brown and Levinson’s politeness strategies
As mentioned earlier., Brown and Levinson’s approach is based on Goffman’s study on

the notion of face. Goffman (1967) defines face as “an image of self delineated in terms
of approved social attributes.” The moment a certain face is taken, it will have to be
lived up to. Here he coins the expressions ‘to lose face’ and ‘to save one’s face’.
From these concepts, the following expressions are derived: ‘to have, be in or maintain
face’, which stand for an internally consistent face; to be ‘in the wrong face, which
refers to the situation when information clashes with the face which a person sustains;
and to be ‘out of face’, which means that a participant’s expected line is not yet
prepared for a certain situation (Goffman 1967: 5-8).
Goffman claims that interaction, especially face-to-face talk, is ruled by a mutual

acceptance that participants in an encounter will tend to maintain their own face,
defensive orientation, as well as other participants’ faces, protective orientation. “To
study face-saving”, he states, “is to study the traffic rules of social interaction” (1967:
12). According to him, face-saving actions are usually standardized practises which
differ from one society to another as well as among subcultures and even individuals.
Despite the differences, everyone is expected to have some knowledge and experience
of how face-work is used. Goffman calls this capacity tact (13).
Brown and Levinson borrowed these concepts and re-elaborated them somewhat in
order to define the strategies that speakers follow when constructing messages. They
treat the aspects of face as ‘basic wants’, and they address the universality of the notion
of face. According to them, face has a twofold character: positive face, which stands for
the desire to be approved of, and negative face, which responds to the desire that one’s
actions are not hindered (Brown and Levinson 1987: 62).
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They shape the term face-threatening acts (FTAs), and agree with Goffman that
interlocutors will try to maintain others people’s faces as well as their own. Therefore,
the effect of FTAs will be minimised as much as possible through linguistic strategies
(1987: 68). To measure the intensity of an FTA (Wx), they pay attention to three factors:
the social distance between hearer and speaker (D), the power the hearer has over the
speaker (P) and the rate of imposition (Rx). They propose the equation: W X = D + P +
RX, and they claim that the more threatening an FTA is, the more likely the speaker is to
choose a strategy with a higher number regarding the following outline (Sperber and
Wilson 1987: 76):
Circumstances determining
choice of strategy:
Lesser
1. without redressive action, baldly
2. positive politeness
On record
with redressive action
Estimation of risk
Do the FTA
of face loss
3. negative politeness
4. Off record
5. Don’t do the FTA
Greater (Sperber and Wilson1987: 60)
That an FTA is made on record means it is done unambiguously, that is, with a clear
intention. Within this category, there is a further division. On record FTAs can be
performed either baldly or redressively. If baldly, the utterances are clear, brief and
direct. This would be the case of imperative clauses: Close the window! Redressive acts,
by contrast, counteract the possible damage inflicted on the addressee’s face. Linguistic
mechanisms are used to show that the threat is not intended but that the addressee’s face
wants are recognized and taken into account. These acts can be oriented towards the
positive face (positive politeness) or towards the negative (negative politeness). In the
first case, the speaker shows the hearer that some his wants are shared, and thus
minimizes the threat. Strategies for this case are for example attending the addressee’s
wants (You must be cold next to that open window, what about closing it?), using in-
group identity markers (Shall we close the window?), seeking agreement/avoiding
disagreement… (Brown and Levinson 1987: 68-70))
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In the second case, the speaker recognizes the hearer’s wants and respects them by not
interfering with them, but does not share or fulfil them. Brown and Levinson (1987: 70)
include the following among politeness strategies: be conventionally indirect (Could
you close the window, please?); question or hedge (I wonder if you could close the
window); do not coerce the addressee by being pessimistic (I don’t think you can close
that window, can you?); minimize the imposition; apologize (I’m sorry to bother you,
but would you mind closing the window?); make impersonal sentences (Someone should
close that window).
Finally, off record FTAs display ambiguity on the intention behind them. They make
use of “metaphor and irony, rhetorical questions, understatement, tautologies, all kinds
of hints as to what a speaker wants or means to communicate, without doing so directly,
so that the meaning is to some degree negotiable” (It’s starting to get chilly here!, I
might as well turn into a polar bear!) (Brown and Levinson 1987: 69).
Brown and Levinson (1987) postulate the selection of the strategies to follow an
inferential process. As the speaker wants the addressee to cooperate, he needs to
somehow fulfil his face wants, therefore minimize the FTA in order to ‘meet H’s
expectations’. Then, S is only left to choose “the linguistic means that will satisfy his
strategic end” (90-91).
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3. Complementariness of inferential pragmatics accounts
3. 1. Relevance Theory and the Cooperative Principle

Although RT is explicitly formulated as superseding the CP, it is not unreasonable to
emphasize the practical analytical compatibility of some of the postulates in both. Thus,
both seek to explain what principles regulate the derivation of implicated meaning. RT
argues that maxims are not necessary: speakers only need to find in what way what is
said is assessed against a context of world-knowledge expectations. However, it is also
true that the Gricean maxims are based on social convention (tell the truth, do not hide
relevant information, etc.), which is part of our world knowledge. So, an analysis of
maxims should be part of RT’s exploration of pragmatic implications on the basis of
premise-conclusion reasoning schemas. The premise contains world knowledge; what is
said activates part of the premise and the rest is taken as a conclusion. Take the
following example:
(1) That was a sad situation for me (meaning ‘I felt sad when I became aware of the
situation’).
A situation cannot be sad but it can cause people to be sad. So ‘sad situation’ is
metonymic for ‘situation that caused me to be sad’. RT proponents would argue that the
expression “sad situation” does not follow or break any conversational maxim, since the
speaker in (1) wants to be relevant, informative, and to tell the truth. However, the
speaker is not telling the literal truth. A sentence like That was a situation that made me
sad would be literally true. This means that the Gricean account does reveal a
communicative strategy. But it does not explain why it has the meaning impact that it
has. This is where RT comes into the picture: first of all, "a sad situation" is more
economical than its paraphrase "a situation that made me sad" and, second, this non-
literal expression conveys an extra meaning implication that is not present in its
paraphrase, i.e. the idea that the situation itself is undesirable. Note that it is possible to
say That was a situation that made me feel sad, but I must acknowledge that the
situation was not bad, but not #That was a sad situation but I must acknowledge that it
was not bad.
13
3. 2. The Politeness Principle and the Cooperative Principle
Leech (1983) designs both his textual rhetoric and the PP in terms of maxims, i.e. social
conventions about how to make messages clear and processable, on the one hand, and
polite, on the other. The new maxims, which are complementary of the ones proposed
by Grice, fill in some analytical gaps. For example, a white lie (one told to avoid hurting
someone's feelings) breaks the first submaxim of quality ("do not say that which you
believe to be false"), but it does so not with the intention of misleading but with the
desire to be tactful. The PP is thus complementary of the CP.
3. 3. The Politeness Principle and Brown and Levinson’s politeness strategies
The PP is in fact the maxim-based counterpart of Brown and Levinson's (1987)

politeness strategies. Brown and Levinson take the ethnomethodological concept of face
or public image and argue that politeness results from speaker's attempts to save other
people's face in conversational encounters. When a speaker places demands on the
addressee (e.g. through a directive speech act), there is a breach of politeness that results
in a face-threatening strategy. This can be done either on-record or off-record, that is, in
an open way or in an indirect way.
Evidently, there is a clear correspondence between two of Leech's so-called pragmatic

scales of politeness and these strategies. Leech proposes the existence of a cost-benefit
scale according to which we are expected to maximize benefit and minimize cost to
others. This scale underlies the inherent impoliteness of directive speech acts and the
politeness of commissives (the former are costly and the latter are beneficial to the
addressee). The cost-benefit scale is based on cultural convention. In terms of the notion
of face, it can be reformulated as follows: do not act in such a way that you threaten the
addressee's face since this would be costly to him; act in such a way that the addressee's
face is preserved since this will be beneficial to him. The scale of indirectness regulates
the length of the inferential path the addressee has to follow to derive the impositiveness
of a speech act. Obviously, contrived formulations like Do you think you could X are
more indirect than straightforward imparatives: Do X. The indirect formulation is an off-
record strategy used to threaten the addressee's face, while the direct formulation is on
record.
14
3.4. Relevance theory and Politeness
In principle, RT was formulated with the intention to exclude other inferentialist

accounts based on pragmatic principles and their associated maxims. Nevertheless, it
can be argued that relevance conditions are actually affected by politeness (cf. Jary
1998). As mentioned above, relevance has to do not only with linguistic realizations,
but also with overall behaviour. Considering that there are conventionalized patterns of
polite behaviour that every speaker knows and follows, abiding or not by norms is itself
relevant. Even if the social conventions are followed, such aspects of communication as
tone or mimics can transform a polite utterance into an impolite one thus affecting its
interpretation. Consider (2) below:
(2) You didn’t need to come!
This utterance can mean either that the addressee’s presence is desired but there is no
imposition on him or that his presence is not desired. The context might not be useful in
order to disambiguate the interpretation of this utterance. However, politeness can be.
Leech’s Tact maxim is observed, since the cost to the addressee is minimized, and it is
apparently face-saving in both cases. Nevertheless, there will probably be a shift of tone
between the first interpretation, where a soft tone will be used in order to get the
addressee to do as the speaker desires, and the second, where a rude tone is more likely.
Therefore, politeness is complementary of RT since politeness provokes shifts in the

interpretation of utterances and events and, at the same time, relevance conditions allow
the speaker to create, strengthen or cancel out assumptions on the basis of politeness
criteria, such as preserving or not their interlocutor’s face. This enables the participants
in a conversation to predict to some extent the conversational moves others might make
from there on.
Owing to the high degree of complementariness between these theories, the present
dissertation will borrow insights from them to suit analytical requirements.
15
16
4. Analysis
This section will use insights from the theories discussed above to analyse the humorous
impact of a selection of jokes. The first example is especially useful to see how Grice’s
maxims operate:
(3) A fifteen year old Amish boy and his father were in a mall. They were
amazed by almost everything they saw, but especially by two shiny, silver walls
that could move apart and then slide back together again.
The boy asked, “What is this Father?”
The father (never having seen an elevator) responded, “Son, I have never seen
anything like this in my life, I don’t know what it is.”
While the boy and his father were watching with amazement, a fat old lady in a
wheel chair moved up to the moving walls and pressed a button. The walls opened,
and the lady rolled between them into a small room. The walls closed, and the boy
and his father watched the small numbers above the walls light up sequentially.
They continued to watch until it reached the last number, and then the numbers
began to light in the reverse order.
Finally the walls opened up again and a gorgeous 24-year-old blond stepped out.
The father, not taking his eyes off the young woman, said quietly to his son…
“Go get your Mother.”1
To understand this joke it is necessary to have some background knowledge about the
Amish. It is necessary to know that their lifestyle is based on eighteenth century
customs. For example, they do not use motor vehicles or electricity and all the
inventions deriving from it. That is why they are frequently stunned about modern-day
living.
What provokes laughter is that they misunderstand the functioning of the lift. After
seeing how a fat woman disappears behind the doors and then a gorgeous one appears,
they seem to think that it is a machine that turns women beautiful. Consequently, the
father orders his son to bring his mother. What we deduce is that he wants his wife to
1
Jokes-Best.Com: Best collection of short funny jokes http://www.jokes-best.com/ (Accessed 18 April
2013)
17
enter that small room and see if it works with her too. The implications are that he
thinks his wife is ugly and that he would prefer her to be more attractive, even if that
means giving up on his beliefs.
The father’s order (Go get your mother) gives rise to all the implications explained
above. The two plausible interpretations are that either he wants to show his wife those
amazing doors, or that he wants to try to turn his wife beautiful. Given the context
provided, we deduce that the second interpretation is the correct one.
Regarding Grice’s approach, what the father says fulfils the maxims of quality when the
son asks him about what the elevator is, but this lack of knowledge causes him to
violate one of the two the quantity submaxims: he can say no more. His last utterance
apparently keeps no relation with the context; it breaks the maxim of Relation, unless
the mother knows what those doors are and can solve their doubts. However, what he
really means is “Let’s get you mother inside.” He is not saying it directly though, but
rather obscurely. Therefore there is a violation of one of the submaxims of manner as
well.
The indirectness of his order can be explained in terms of politeness. Leech’s maxim of
Approbation states that dispraise of others should be minimized. In consequence, saying
or suggesting that his wife is ugly is impolite. A “face-based” analysis would also say
that making a public statement about his wife’s defects is face-threatening. In addition,
it is more threatening if the remark is made before their son than before a stranger. For
this reason, there is a need to minimise the threat and the way the order is uttered is
slightly softened, so that the boy cannot see the intention behind the order.
The next example deals with one of the major problems of language: the interpretation
of ambiguous utterances:
(4) Caller: "Can you give me the telephone number for Jack?"
Operator: "I'm sorry, sir, I don't understand who you are talking about."
Caller: "On page 1, section 5, of the user guide it clearly states that I need to
unplug the fax machine from the AC wall socket and telephone Jack before
cleaning. Now, can you give me the number for Jack?"
Operator: "I think it means the telephone plug on the wall."2
2
Winquerque, C. (ed). 2009. The Great Big Book of Hilarious Jokes To Share With Your Friends!
18
There are two moments of ambiguity in this joke, both in the caller’s turns. First of all,
it is common knowledge that when calling an operator for a telephone number, specific
data have to be given: name and family name or even address. The caller in this joke
does not have this information, though, and he simply asks for Jack. Faced with this
lack of information the operator is disoriented. This leads to the second moment. The
caller, trying to explain himself, reports what the guide says. The expression of the
guide is obscure and creates ambiguity in “telephone Jack” which can be analysed in
two ways:
[You] telephone Jack Unplug … telephone Jack
V DO V mod N
In the context given by the caller, it is obvious that the correct interpretation is the
second one, as later explained by the operator. This last sentence could even be omitted,
because most hearers should be able to determine the real meaning of the sentence. The
real pun resides not only in the misinterpretation of ambiguity, but in the irony that
someone can actually come up with an erroneous interpretation in such a clear context.
In the first line, there is a violation of the second submaxim of Manner. The caller is not
being as informative as the situation requires, and this leads to ambiguity. The same
problem takes place in the caller’s second turn. However, this occurs in the instructions
and the caller is not the producer, but the reproducer.
The Textual Rhetoric (Leech 1983: 15, 66) is also involved (the Clarity Principle).
Leech (1983), in his Interpersonal Rhetoric, proposes four textual principles. The
second principle refers to Clarity, which is divided into the Transparency and the
Ambiguity maxims. Although it can be considered as overlapping with Grice’s maxim
of Manner, Leech’s textual principles are about how to develop messages formally,
while the maxims of manner are about how to structure information (conceptually)
(Leech 1983: 100). Here there is syntactic ambiguity (textual rhetoric) but there is also a
mishandling of the information.
From the perspective of RT, disambiguation is clear. In the context of a fax machine
user guide, specifying that the user should unplug the telephone jack before cleaning is
totally relevant. On the contrary, saying that you have to call an unknown Jack makes
no sense at all. Therefore, it can be said that what moves to laughter here is the caller’s
inability to perform linguistic tasks correctly.
19
The following example is also related to ambiguity, although in this case it is sought
premeditatedly. In other words, it does not arise from a lack of information or
misinterpretation.
(5) A plumber went to the attorney’s house to unstop the sink. When he finished
he said to the attorney "that will be $400.00." The attorney became irate "What do
you mean $400.00, you were only here 20 minutes, that's ridiculous!!" The
plumber replied, "I thought the same thing when I was an attorney".3
The social stereotype about plumbers is that they charge a lot for working little;
attorneys are also characterized as having exorbitant fees. When the plumber in the joke
asks for the money, the attorney gets angry and bursts out in a rather accusatory tone.
The plumber’s reply does not satisfy any of the attorney’s problems: he does not
provide a reason for his rate and he does not try to appease his client. The plumber’s
response can be regarded as unrelated to the situation. The pun lies in the fact that the
plumber used to be an attorney but, as he realized he would make more money as a
plumber, he changed his job.
The way the plumber answers brings with it a series of implications: first, that he used
to be an attorney as well and now he is a plumber; second, that plumbers earn more than
attorneys (which is a lot, for attorneys, as mentioned above, stereotypically have pricey
fees); and third, he is not explaining why his rate is so high, which can mean that there
really is no reason for that price.
From the point of view of Grice’s maxims, the plumber is violating the maxim of
Relation. The attorney is expecting an explanation of why he has to pay $400,.
However, the plumber does not provide a proper answer. In a complementary way, RT
explains why the plumber chooses to give that answer, instead of a different one. His
utterance produces several contextual effects, as noted above. This could not have been
possible had he said anything else.
Regarding politeness, there is a threat towards the plumber performed by the attorney;
the latter questions the former’s work and his economic compensation. However, this
threat is not minimized, but rather intensified (for instance with the use of “that’s
ridiculous”), which suggests that he might find the situation quite outrageous. His action
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also involves a violation of Leech’s maxim of Agreement. According to this maxim,
disagreement should be lessened, but there is no intention in the attorney to do so.
The subsequent examples deal with contextual effects, one of the key concepts of RT.
In the prior joke, one single utterance yielded several implications. Here the opposite is
the case:
(6) A wife was making a breakfast of fried eggs for her husband. Suddenly, her
husband burst into the kitchen. 'Careful,' he said, 'CAREFUL! Put in some more
butter! Oh my gosh! You're cooking too many at once. TOO MANY! Turn them!
TURN THEM NOW! We need more butter. Oh my gosh! WHERE are we going to
get MORE BUTTER? They're going to STICK! Careful. CAREFUL! I said be
CAREFUL! You NEVER listen to me when you're cooking! Never! Turn them!
Hurry up! Are you CRAZY? Have you LOST your mind? Don't forget to salt them.
You know you always forget to salt them. Use the! Salt. USE THE SALT! THE
SALT!' The wife stared at him. 'What in the world is wrong with you? You think I
don't know how to fry a couple of eggs?' The husband calmly replied, 'I just wanted
to show you what it feels like when I'm driving.'4
The man in this joke is giving a series of indications and orders to his wife regarding
how to fry an egg. The woman surely knows how to fry eggs; she even assures him that
she knows at the end of the joke. The explanation for this absurd behaviour resides on a
simile he wants to draw between that behaviour and the one she has when he is driving
in order to show her how bothering it is.
Grice’s maxims would only note that the man violates the second Quantity submaxim:
he gives unnecessary information. From the perspective of RT, this joke presents a lot
of information which seems to have no contextual effects at all. However, there is an
overall goal which makes the man’s act relevant.
According to Leech’s theory, the husband is breaking the Tact maxim; he does not
minimize the cost to her. Furthermore, through the massive repetition of instructions, he
also implies that she is not frying the eggs correctly and that she does not know how to
do it. This can be considered as a violation of the Approbation maxim as well.
Therefore, the exploitation of Grice’s second maxim of Quantity is at the service of the
exploitation of Leech’s maxim of Approbation.
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Brown and Levinson’s approach to politeness also adds a shade of meaning to the
interpretation of the joke. All the husband’s orders and instructions are face-threatening
for the woman. Nevertheless, the man is doing so blatantly; he is not interested on
saving her face. This can be noticed also thanks to the absence of any face-saving
strategy. The manifest intention of threatening her face might help decipher the overall
meaning of his behaviour.
In the following joke, there is also a trade-off between the absence and the presence of
contextual effects. However, this does not take place within the joke, but between the
joke and the listener:
(7) A lady went to see a tarot reader woman who'll predict her future:
- Lady, I'm sorry to inform you that your husband will die in the near future.
- Don't tell me things that I already know, tell me if there would be an
investigation!!5
Tarot readers are supposed to give breaking news to their clients, to show them their
unknown future. However, the answer has no contextual effects for the woman in the
joke and the tarot reader’s assumption that she is being informative is cancelled out.
One expects that a loving wife would be scandalized by the upcoming death of her
husband. Her coldness and her pre-existent knowledge could lead the listener to think
that either he is ill or she knows a fatal end is near and she wants her husband dead.
Then she adds her interest on a likely investigation. Having in mind the prior idea, that
fact that she wants to know if there is going to be an investigation suggests that she is
not only indifferent to her husband’s death, but that she is going to kill him herself.
Therefore, from the absence of contextual effects within the joke, implications are
derived by the listeners of the joke, that is, outside the joke.
The politeness accounts again add some extra meaning to the interpretation of the joke.
The tarot reader is observing Leech’s maxim of Sympathy: she apologizes for the
husband’s death in advance to show her condolences. On the contrary, the woman
breaks two of the maxims: Agreement and Tact. Regarding the Agreement maxim,
although she says she knows about the truth of the news, she does not maximize
agreement. She could have said for example: Oh, ok. Now tell me if there would be an
investigation. Instead, she replies rudely thus giving rise to a feeling of urgency. This
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rudeness is also related to the violation of the maxim of Tact. She uses the imperative
for the request and, probably, a harsh tone (suggested by the exclamation signs),
although that is costly to the other; cost is not minimized.
In a “face-based” analysis, it should be noted that the woman seems not to care about
her face, about saving or losing it. Two self-face-threatening acts are performed by her:
first the suggestion that she is going to kill her husband; second, the rude request to the
tarot reader. No face-saving strategies are applied, and this suggests that she has no
concern for her face.
The next jokes are related with the balance between processing effort and contextual
implications;
(8) Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson go on a camping trip, set up their tent, and
fall asleep. Some hours later, Holmes wakes his faithful friend. “Watson, look up at
the sky and tell me what you see.” Watson replies, “I see millions of stars.” “What
does that tell you?” Watson ponders for a minute. “Astronomically speaking, it
tells me that there are millions of galaxies and potentially billions of planets.
Astrologically, it tells me that Saturn is in Leo. Time wise, it appears to be
approximately a quarter past three. Theologically, it's evident the Lord is all-
powerful and we are small and insignificant. Meteorologically, it seems we will
have a beautiful day tomorrow. What does it tell you?” Holmes is silent for a
moment, then speaks. “Watson, you idiot, someone has stolen our tent.”6
For the correct interpretation of this joke, it is important to have some background
knowledge on Doyle’s famous characters Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson. It adds
a shadow of meaning, since Holmes as a detective is supposed to be observant of every
single detail. However, this extra meaning is not strictly necessary to understand the
joke.
One of the Quantity submaxims is obviously violated, the one that says: “Do not make
your contribution more informative than is required” (Grice: 1975, 45). Watson gives an
extremely long answer to Holmes’ question What does that tell you?, surely because, as
an apprentice to detective, he is expected to consider every possible explanation to facts.
Yet, nothing in the content of his response is relevant to Holmes or to their situation.
Consequently, he is violating the maxim of Relation too.
6
23
Regarding RT, the explanation runs along complementary lines. What Watson does is
provide us with too much information that has few or no contextual effects and that
requires a large amount of processing effort. Therefore, he is not being relevant at all.
There is not much to say regarding the politeness accounts in this example. However,
there is a deliberate violation of the Approbation maxim, which occurs when Holmes
insults Watson. This can be interpreted as a way to intensify Watson’s failure to make
the correct deduction.
What is sought in this joke is the connection between seeing the stars and not having a
tent. The pun resides in the fact that Watson fails to draw such an obvious deduction
and is at a loss as to what to say thus giving an absurd answer.
In the next case, a great processing effort is required as well, but it has compensatory
contextual implications. Moreover, there is a politeness-related goal behind the joke:
(9) A pianist and singer are rehearsing "Autumn Leaves" for a concert and the
pianist says: "OK. We will start in G minor and then on the third bar, modulate to
B major and go into 5/4. When you get to the bridge, modulate back down to F#
minor and alternate a 4/4 bar with a 7/4 bar. On the last A section go into double
time and slowly modulate back to G minor."
The singer says: "Wow, I don't think I can remember all of that."
The pianist says: "Well, that's what you did last time."7
This joke is related to a specific field, and people who are not acquainted with it might
find it difficult to understand. However, it is not necessary to know what all the terms
referring to tonality, measure, structural analysis, modulation, etc., mean. What it is
necessary to know is that singers in the music world are known by their “free”
interpretations: stereotypically, they sing out of tune, they are unable to measure
correctly and, worst of all, they are not conscious about it; the accompanist always has
to follow the singer the best he can. In this joke the pianist appears as giving a series of
instructions to the singer regarding the execution of the piece they are rehearsing.
These instructions require much processing effort. The singer even has difficulties in
processing them and says he will not remember. The gag is that the instructions make
reference to his previous interpretation, which he had done unconsciously. The pianist’s
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goal is both to show the singer the effort which he is forced to make when
accompanying him and how badly he sings.
This last purpose is nothing but a violation of Leech’s maxim of Approbation. However,
as telling the singer that he does not sing well is face-threatening, the pianist chooses a
different strategy: he indirectly shows the singer up. It should be noted that showing up
somebody in front of an audience is as threatening as insulting them directly.
Nevertheless, when done privately, it softens any negative impact.
From this example on, the jokes will be better explained by the PP. Several puns arise
from the violation of Leech’s maxim of Approbation. The following joke exemplifies
this case.
(10) "If there are any idiots in the room, will they please stand up" said the
sarcastic teacher. After a long silence, one freshman rose to his feet. "Now then,
mister, why do you consider yourself an idiot?" enquired the teacher with a sneer.
"Well, actually I don't," said the student, "but I hate to see you standing up there all
by yourself."8
This joke reflects a politeness game. Using Brown and Levinson’s (1987) terminology,
the teacher uses politeness in order to minimise the threat of insulting his students. The
threat is double, since he is both making a request and insulting his audience, but he is
doing so in a very polite way. The student’s answer is not uttered in an impolite way,
though the content is inappropriate; a student should not respond in such a way to his
superior.
Considering Leech’s maxims, the teacher is violating the maxim of Approbation. He is

being disrespectful to his students by suggesting they are idiots instead of minimizing
his dispraise. Furthermore, his request represents a cost to the students, which goes
against the Tact maxim. However, this request is obviously a rhetorical one, that is, a
response is not needed; the sarcastic tone helps elucidate that it is rhetorical. That the
freshman responds (stands up) may be because of innocence or impudence. The teacher
is generally up; it is a physical way to display its superiority; he is clearly not in the
group of students he is making reference to. The fact that the freshman includes him and
insults him in such an indirect way is what provokes laughter.
8
25
The student is violating Leech’s maxims of Agreement, Modesty and Approbation. He
faces his teacher instead of minimizing disagreement; he does not dispraise himself but
he dispraises his teacher. Despite all these violations of different maxims, linguistic
politeness is realized correctly. This contributes to hilarity and supports the initial idea
that the joke is based on playing with politeness conventions.
Another maxim which is usually violated in jokes is Modesty. This is shown in the
following example:
(11) Four Catholic men and a Catholic woman were having coffee in St. Peters
Square.
The first Catholic man tells his friends, "My son is a priest, when he walks into a
room, everyone calls him 'Father'."
The second Catholic man chirps, "My son is a Bishop. When he walks into a room
people call him 'Your Grace'."
The third Catholic gent says, "My son is a Cardinal. When he enters a room
everyone bows their head and says 'Your Eminence'."
The fourth Catholic man says very proudly, "My son is the Pope. When he walks
into a room people call him 'Your Holiness'."
Since the lone Catholic woman was sipping her coffee in silence, the four men give
her a subtle, "Well .........?"
She proudly replies, "I have a daughter, slim, tall, 38" DD bust, 24" waist and 34"
hips.
When she walks into a room, everybody says, "Oh My God."9
In this joke, four men boast about their sons. Each of the sons represents a higher level
on the Catholic Church hierarchy: priest, bishop, cardinal and the Pope. Above the Pope
there is nothing but God. This creates an expectation regarding what the woman is
going to say next. The woman’s reply seems to be irrelevant at first: why would she talk
about her daughter, when they are talking about religious representatives? The
description and the final, Oh my God clarify it. The pun lies in the use of the linguistic
expression Oh my God! as a reaction to the perception of something amazing, in this
case, a very attractive woman.
From the perspective of Leech’s approach, there is a violation of the maxim of

Modesty, which states that praise of self should be minimized. All the participants in the
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joke violate it. However, the listener might perceive it differently: may be that the men
are not fulfilling it but that the woman has no choice. Brown and Levinson’s theory
comes in handy to explain this.
All the men would be threatening their own faces by talking so proudly of their sons. In
addition, they threaten the woman’s face with their subtle “well…?’”. This forces the
woman to participate unless she wants to remain in an inferior position. Her options to
maintain her face are scarce, but she uses the witty answer as a face-saving strategy.
The following joke also goes against the maxim of Modesty, but a new element is
introduced: the use of metaphor.
(12) This guy comes back from the toilet, when a woman says to him, "Hey,
you have left your GARAGE door open"!"
As the man is zipping his fly up, he says with a big smile, "Did you see my big
black hummer?"
The woman replies, "Nope just a MINI COOPER with two flat t[y]res."10
In this joke a woman warns a man that his fly is open. He replies boastingly and as a
result she humiliates him. It is funny how metaphor is used for this purpose: The garage
door corresponds to the zip; a big black hummer is a strong car, robust and potent; and
the mini cooper is a small car which seems not to be in too good a state, since it has got
“two flat tyres”.
From the perspective of the PP, it should be noted that she is first observing the Tact
maxim; she is maximizing the benefit to the man. As mentioned earlier, Leech states
that the higher the benefit the greater the directness. In this case, the woman addresses
the man quite straightforwardly. Nevertheless, the highest level of directness would
have probably taken the form of Zip your fly! But she uses metaphor in order to get her
message across.
Her choice of using metaphor might be better explained in terms of linguistic taboos
and euphemisms rather than politeness maxims. Wardhaugh (1998) argues that taboos
are used in order to prevent the members of a certain society from behaving in a way
that could be embarrassing, shameful, etc. He also explains that breaking linguistic
taboos is even considered a crime in several regions. In other words, the function of
taboos is to save a society members’ face, using Brown and Levinson’s terminology.
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Taking as example the case in this joke, there are pages on the Internet where indirect
expressions to tell someone to zip their fly are listed.11
Going back to Leech’s maxims, the Modesty maxim is violated. The man is blatantly
boasting; he is not minimizing the praise of self. In fact, there was no need for him to
minimize it, since he could have avoided it. In such a context, one would expect him to
thank the woman and walk away, not to answer in a boastful manner. The woman
answers him by violating the Approbation maxim. She humiliates him; she maximizes
dispraise of the other as a way to respond to his violation of modesty.
RT is also important for this joke to work. In RT, metaphor would be a way to convey
more meaning than literal language would do for little processing effort. The
communicative effects are explored by the hearer in connection with the context, which
will constrain their amount and nature. This can be seen in the use of the metaphor of
cars, which is used to avoid explicit reference to sexual attributes but also to add the
shade of qualities.
The CP explains metaphor as a blatant violation, a flouting, of Quality and Relation;

metaphors are technically not true and, literally, they do not make sense in context. This
violation is a means to the production of a meaning implication.
Therefore, in this joke all the theories operate together: Relevance and Grice’s theory
can explain how the metaphor can be understood, but politeness is necessary to account
for the reason underlying the choice of a metaphor over literal language.
In this example there is a violation of two politeness maxims: Modesty and Generosity.
There is a reinforcement of the idea that when someone boasts, he ends up being
humiliated.
(13) Hilary Clinton, George Bush, Sarkozy, a boy and a monk were stuck on a
plane that is falling fast. They are 5 but there are only 4 parachutes. Hilary said
"I'm a woman, you can’t leave a woman on a plane to die" so she took one and
jumped. Bush said "I'm the smartest in the world, everyone needs me” he took one
and jumped. Sarkozy blabbed something in French that no one understood, he took
one and jumped. The monk tells the boy "You take the last parachute, let me die"
the boy said "Why? We can both jump." "How is that?" said the monk. The boy
11
http://www.majorwager.com/forums/mess-hall/32880-top-ten-most-polite-ways-say-your-zipper-
down.html (accessed 2 June 2013)
28
replies, "Because the so called smartest man Bush took my school bag and
jumped!!!"12
We are presented with three important politicians, a boy and a monk in a difficult
situation: they need to jump out of the plane but there are not enough parachutes. What
would be expected of them is to try to save the rest first; that is what politeness
stipulates. Yet, the three politicians try to save themselves as soon as they can. When
they say why they should live and not the others, Clinton appeals to a social convention
regarding gender, i.e. that women go first. Bush claims to be the smartest in the world.
However, he takes a school bag instead of a parachute. This action shows precisely the
opposite of what he had said seconds before, and again the person who violates the
maxim of Modesty is humiliated.
Following with Leech’s PP, there is a violation of the maxims of Generosity and Tact
by Hilary Clinton, George Bush and Sarkozy. Instead of minimizing the benefit to the
self and maximizing it to the others, they put themselves first and take the parachutes.
There is also a violation of the maxim of Modesty, which occurs when Bush says to be
smartest. The cause for this violation is that saving oneself leaving others to die is a
face-threatening act (in Brown and Levinson’s terminology). In consequence, there is a
need to convince the others somehow that it should be them who should live.
To finish with this example, it should be observed that the negative vision of the
politicians is reinforced by an exemplary figure, which is embodied by the monk. He
allows the boy to have the last parachute, thereby maximizing the cost to self.
In the last joke, the politeness maxims seem to be fulfilled. However, there is
inappropriate behaviour which suggests there is some kind of violation:
(14) A man sitting through the first quarter of the Super Bowl can't help but
notice the conspicuously vacant seat next to the man to the right of him. Wanting to
make polite conversation he leans over to the man and says "Can you believe
someone paid all that money for a seat to the Super Bowl and then doesn't show
up?" The man turns to him and says "That's my wife's seat she recently passed
away." "Oh I am so sorry to hear that," the first man said, "didn't anyone else in
12
2013)
29
your family want the Ticket?" The second man never took his eyes from the
football game, "Sure, they did, but they're all at the funeral."13
This example shows two men having a polite conversation during a football game.
What the listener finds funny is the widower’s behaviour: the indifference and lack of
affection towards his wife, and that while his family are at the funeral (supposedly the
wife’s) he is at the game.
There is a peculiarity in this joke: the text makes explicit reference to polite
conversation. There is a distinction though that should be drawn, a distinction between
polite behaviour and linguistic politeness.
The first man obeys all the politeness rules: he starts his conversation with the person
next to him and he shows sympathy when he learns the wife died little ago, fulfilling
Leech’s maxim of sympathy. The second man answers relatively politely as well; he is
not rude linguistically, but he does not stare back to his interlocutor, keeping his eyes
fixed on the game.
His behaviour is inappropriate not only because one should look back at the person he is
talking to, but mainly because, if his wife’s funeral is taking place, the social
conventions say that he must attend it instead of the game. Moreover, funerals are
celebrated as a way to praise the dead person, and dispraise towards the celebration can
be considered as dispraise of the person. Therefore, there is an underlying violation of
the maxim of approbation.
RT asserts that speakers will choose the words that comprise more meaning for the least
processing effort. In this case, the last sentence, Sure, they did, but they’re all at the
funeral, suggests not only that he is indifferent towards his wife’s death, but also that he
does not care about what other people think (otherwise he would not be there or he
would have lied) but about his own interests. His overall behaviour is relevant, he is
premeditatedly not being polite and suggests that he does not want to keep talking but
watching the game.
13
2013)
30
5. Results
In an overall analysis of the jokes presented here, there is a common feature that should
be pointed out. The first common characteristic of all jokes is context. Context is
essential for the correct interpretation of ambiguity and it is always given at the
beginning of the joke when necessary. This context, together with the listeners’
background knowledge, creates an expectation on the listener.
As noted above, the CP helps predict the following moves in a conversation or in a

communicative situation. Thus, it also contributes to the creation of expectations, which
is crucial in joke-telling. This is so for, generally, what jokes do is play with
expectations and ultimately break or strengthen them.
In addition, there is one more factor enabling the creation of expectation: stereotypes.
Stereotypes are part of culture and humorous texts often make use of them. Every
culture has defined labels for other cultures or nations (for example that the Americans
spend a lot of money on technology to compensate for their lack of shrewdness), for the
different professions (deceiving attorneys, pricey plumbers, bad-tempered bus
drivers…), for aspects of life (relationships, life in couple, friends…), for public people
(politicians, journalists…), etc.
These factors are present independently of the theme or the form of the jokes. They can
deal with unlimited topics such as nationality, professions, couples, drunkards, insane
people, aliens, etc. The form in which they are usually presented is that of a dialog or
the narration of an anecdote of varying extension. Generally, the longer the joke is, the
more context is provided; and the shorter, the more background knowledge is required
for processing and interpreting the joke adequately.
Also, the correct amount of subtlety and blatancy is necessary so that the joke makes the
right impact. If the relations between the context and the punch line are too obvious, the
expectations will be low and the listener may figure out the outcome of the joke easily.
The humorous impact will then be small. On the contrary, if the relations are too
obscure there is a risk that the joke may not be understood. In this case the joke would
not be fun at all, but just an anecdote.
31
Focusing now on the analysis, the jokes have been analysed in terms of the theories that
can better account for them. From this an observation is derived. The effect of most of
them can be described to some extent by all of the theories. Nevertheless, the
predominance of a theory varies from one joke to another. In other words, though there
might be an outstanding principle explaining the joke, the rest are somehow underlying
its interpretation too. This results in jokes which are principally explained by Grice’s
maxims (3), Sperber and Wilson’s RT (3 and from 5 to 8), or the politeness accounts
(from 9 to 14)
The first have to do with the violation of the conversational maxims. The second group
often plays with the optimal use of the PR (producing witty connections between two
elements [5 and 11] or several contextual effects [3, 5, 7, 12, and 14]), or with the
exaggeration of the factors of the PR, that is, comprising messages which require
excessive processing effort (6, 8, and 9), and/or which have little contextual effects at
all (6 and 8). Therefore, some cases of humour break linguistic principles, but others use
them in order to produce clever implicatures.
The second group of jokes can be analysed in terms of both of the politeness theories,
that is, Brown and Levinson’s and Leech’s. People are supposed to know the social
conventions of different situations and to stick to them. This is used to create
expectations regarding behaviour in the contexts which are used in every joke.
Inappropriateness is what causes hilarity for several reasons: first, it is unexpected;
second, it is not socially accepted and thus not considered normal behaviour; and third
and last, it is something the listener would not consider to do or even dare to do
although he might be longing to.
The analysis of the jokes shows how the different principles can complement each
other. Regarding the complementariness of RT and CP (examples 5, 6, and 8), although
they both try to explain how implicated meaning is derived, Grice’s theory accounts for
the communicative strategy: a violation of a maxim. However, it cannot explain the
meaning impact it has. Sperber and Wilson’s approach does. Taking (6) for example,
Grice, on the one hand, would describe the excessive amount of information provided as
a violation of the second Quantity submaxim. The succession of orders would be
considered as the husband trying to be cooperative with his wife. On the other hand, RT
would maintain that too much (and unnecessary) processing effort is required. Thus, a
different intention must be hiding behind the message.
32
It has already been mentioned that Leech designed his politeness maxims so that they
complemented Grice’s conversational maxims. In other words, Leech intended his
theory to account for the cases where Grice’s theory failed. Example number 3, for
instance, shows clearly how, in order to fulfil Leech’s Approbation maxim, the maxims
of Relation and Manner have to be violated.
In what concerns Brown and Levinson’s face-based theory, this focuses on the
communicative strategies used by speakers not to lose face. Leech’s theory, deals with
cultural conventions. Aristotle already mentioned that the source of hilarity is the
feeling of superiority regarding others. In terms of Leech’s theory, this is translated into
a direct violation of the Approbation maxim, among others. Frequently, the violation of
the Approbation maxim is preceded by a violation of the maxim of Modesty (11, 12,
and 13).
This explains partly why sexist, feminist, and nationalist jokes are considered funny.
Furthermore, it means that politeness will often underlie the interpretation of jokes (of
the examples presented here, politeness is relevant for all of them except 4).
A significant example of how Brown and Levinson’s theory affects the PP is (11). In
this case, a lady’s face was threatened by four men by means of an inquiring
“Well….?”. This provokes the listener to be milder in his judgment towards her than
towards the men, although they all violate the same principle: the Modesty maxim.
Therefore, the face-based approach to politeness can modify our perception by
positioning people under a more positive or more negative bias.
Finally, the analysis offered in this dissertation shows that complementariness also
exists between the two politeness accounts and RT. In (7) for example, the lack of face-
saving strategies highlights the direction that the interpretation of implications arising
from an utterance should follow. This example creates a presumption of rudeness and
selfishness which leads to the humorous interpretation that the woman is going to kill
her husband. Otherwise, other possible non-humorous interpretations could interfere
and the joke would lose its impact. In contrast, in (8), it is one of Leech’s maxims that
strengthens the effect of the joke. In this case, the Approbation maxim is violated to
intensify the failure to fulfil the maxim of Relation.
33
34
6. Conclusion
This essay has been focused on how the main inferential-pragmatics theories can
complement each other to explain the communicative impact of jokes and how they
work. From the analysis of a wide-ranging collection of examples, we have seen how
these complementariness works.
First, although RT proponents claimed that the PR is independent from any maxims, we
have been able to show that this principle can actually work in combination with
Grice’s CP. The conversational maxims are based on social convention and deal with
communicative strategies. RT explains the use of any given strategy in order to cause
the maximum amount of communicative impact for the least processing effort.
Second, as Leech asserted, the politeness maxims complement Grice’s conversational

maxims. He realised that Grice’s maxims failed to explain common communicative
situations (such as the socially accepted abundance of what we call ‘white lies’ in
everyday communication). The PP was created to solve those problems.
Third, the two politeness theories (Leech’s and Brown and Levinson’s) are also
complementary of each other. The face-based account studied mostly the linguistic
strategies that are used to convey politeness or impoliteness. However, Leech went
further and explained the principles behind polite (or impolite) behaviour.
And last, RT and the politeness approaches also work well together. As seen in the
examples, the use or the omission of certain politeness strategies is itself relevant to the
overall meaning of utterances.
To conclude, we have noted that rather than conceiving the different principles as
exclusive of one another they are to be seen as complementary, each of them accounting
for different shades of meaning and use conditions of utterances.
35
36
7. References
Aristotle. 2010 (1919-1931). Rhetoric. New York: Cosimo. Trans. W. Rhys Roberts.
Attardo, S. and V. Raskin. 1991. “Script theory revis(it)ed: Joke similarity and joke
representation model”. HUMOR: International Journal of Humor Research. 4 (3): 293-
347.
Brown, P. and S.C. Levinson. 1992 (1987). Politeness: Some universals in language
usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Goffman, E. 1972 (1967). Interaction Ritual: Essays on Face-to-Face Behaviour.

London: The Penguin Press.
Graban. T. S. 2008. "Beyond ‘Wit and Persuasion’: Rhetoric, Composition, and Humor
Studies". The Primer of Humor Research . Ed. V. Raskin. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
399-448
Grice, H. P. 1975. “Logic and Conversation”. Syntax and Semantics, vol.3. Eds. P. Cole
and J. L. Morgan. New York: Academic Press. 22-40
Halliday, M. A. K. 1978. Language as a Social Semiotic: The Social Interpretation of

Language and Meaning. Baltimore: University Park Press
Halliday, M. A. K., and R. Hasan. 1976. Cohesion in English. London: Longman.
Jary. M. 1998. “Relevance theory and the communication of politeness”. Journal of

Pragmatics 30: 1-19.
Leech, G. N. 1986 (1983). Principles of Pragmatics. New York: Longman.
Raskin, V. 1985. Semantic Mechanisms of Humour. Dordrecht: Reidel Publishing

Company.
Searle J R. 1975. “Indirect speech acts”. Speech Acts. Eds. P. Cole and J. L. Morgan.
New York: Academic Press. 59-82.
Searle, J.R. 1999 (1969). Speech acts. An Essay in the Philosophy of Language. New
York: Cambridge University Press
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Sperber, D. and D. Wilson. 1995. (1986) Relevance: Communication and cognition,
Cornwall: Blackwell Publishers
Sperber D. and D. Wilson. 1990. "Outline of relevance theory." Hermes 5: 35-56.
Wardhaugh, R. 1998. An Introduction to Sociolinguistics. 3rd ed. Cornwall: Blackwell

Publishers Ltd. pp. 234-236. (Accessed online http://goo.gl/PSaqy 25 May 2013)
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8. Sources
OALDCE (Oxford Advanced Dictionary of Current English). 1974. Eds. A. S. Hornby
and A. P. Cowie. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Winquerque, C. (ed). 2009. The Great Big Book of Hilarious Jokes To Share With Your
Friends! (Accesed online http://www.allfreejokeebooks.com/Hilarious-Jokes-Ebook.pdf
18 April 2013)
Jokes-Best.Com: Best collection of short funny jokes http://www.jokes-best.com/

(Accessed 18 April 2013)
MajorWager.com: Top Ten most Polite Ways to Say Your Zipper Is Down.........
http://www.majorwager.com/forums/mess-hall/32880-top-ten-most-polite-ways-say-
your-zipper-down.html (Accessed 2 June 2013)
39

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TRABAJO FIN DE GRADO

The Cooperative, Relevance and Politeness Principles in

Isabel Villota Miranda

Francisco José Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez

Facultad de Letras y de la Educación

Grado en Estudios Ingleses

I sabel Villota Miranda

Fdo. Francisco José Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez

Facultad de Letras y de la Educación

AÑO ACADÉMICO: 2012/2013

2. Approaching verbal communication

2.1. Grice and conversational maxims 3

2.2. Relevance Theory 4

2.3. Politeness accounts 6

2.3.1. Leech’s Politeness Principle and maxims 7

2.3.2. Brown and Levinson’s politeness strategies 10

3. Complementariness of inferential pragmatic accounts

3.1. Relevance Theory (RT) and the Cooperative Principle (CP) 13

3.4. Relevance Theory and Politeness 15

2.1. Grice and conversational maxims

2.2 Relevance Theory

Relevance can also fail to be achieved; however, this is not to be attributed to a

2.2. Politeness accounts

2.3.1. Leech’s Politeness Principle and maxims

The maxim of Agreement tells communicators to “Minimize disagreement between self

2.3.2. Brown and Levinson’s politeness strategies

As mentioned earlier., Brown and Levinson’s approach is based on Goffman’s study on

Goffman claims that interaction, especially face-to-face talk, is ruled by a mutual

5. Don’t do the FTA

Greater (Sperber and Wilson1987: 60)

3. 1. Relevance Theory and the Cooperative Principle

3. 3. The Politeness Principle and Brown and Levinson’s politeness strategies

The PP is in fact the maxim-based counterpart of Brown and Levinson's (1987)

Evidently, there is a clear correspondence between two of Leech's so-called pragmatic

In principle, RT was formulated with the intention to exclude other inferentialist

(2) You didn’t need to come!

Therefore, politeness is complementary of RT since politeness provokes shifts in the

[You] telephone Jack Unplug … telephone Jack

Considering Leech’s maxims, the teacher is violating the maxim of Approbation. He is

From the perspective of Leech’s approach, there is a violation of the maxim of

The CP explains metaphor as a blatant violation, a flouting, of Quality and Relation;

As noted above, the CP helps predict the following moves in a conversation or in a

Second, as Leech asserted, the politeness maxims complement Grice’s conversational

Goffman, E. 1972 (1967). Interaction Ritual: Essays on Face-to-Face Behaviour.

Halliday, M. A. K. 1978. Language as a Social Semiotic: The Social Interpretation of

Halliday, M. A. K., and R. Hasan. 1976. Cohesion in English. London: Longman.

Jary. M. 1998. “Relevance theory and the communication of politeness”. Journal of

Leech, G. N. 1986 (1983). Principles of Pragmatics. New York: Longman.

Raskin, V. 1985. Semantic Mechanisms of Humour. Dordrecht: Reidel Publishing

Sperber D. and D. Wilson. 1990. "Outline of relevance theory." Hermes 5: 35-56.

Wardhaugh, R. 1998. An Introduction to Sociolinguistics. 3rd ed. Cornwall: Blackwell

Jokes-Best.Com: Best collection of short funny jokes http://www.jokes-best.com/

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