The Cooperative Principle (1) contains four rules: quantity, quality, relation, and manner. He explains that implicature, the ability of a statement to convey meaning without including literal or explicit terms, is possible because acts of language are governed by rules and maxims. In his paper, Grice considers this phenomenon of pragmatics, or language behavior. Question: if sentences and terms refer to things in the world and/or express thoughts, how is it that so many utterances actually convey meaning without using apparently appropriate or specific terminology? In this paper, I explain how Grice’s rules of conversation, besides accounting for implicature, also provide an excellent explanation of the mechanism by which slang originates, develops, and conveys meaning. These interviewees contribute a variety of insights into the nature of slang and its influence on language generally as well as on social thought and attitudes.
In the contemporary F**k, A Documentary, Steve Anderson presents a more informal exposition of a particularly controversial yet ubiquitous slang word, interviewing a host of linguists, politicians, social critics, and entertainers on issues surrounding the use, abuse, and censorship of the term. Dumas and Jonathan Lighter develop a set of criterion for distinguishing slang from other language, through analysis of historical definitions and attitudes and description of its characteristics. In a paper written only three years later in 1978, “Is Slang a Word for Linguists?”, Bethany K. Grice outlines the unspoken but fixed rules of conversation that not only explain the workings of ordinary language, but account for implicature. Grandy and Richard Warner’s excellent bio and exploration of the ideas of this philosopher of language, in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. To learn more about the brilliant Grice, I recommend Richard E. Heads up: this paper features a lot of colorful and crude language, examined philosophically of course, and comedians’ opinions. Grice’s birth on March 13th, 1913, let me share an undergraduate paper I had an especially good time writing.
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