Grice's Maxims Theory

This study concerns with review of three undergraduate theses and one international journal related to the topic in order to get further comprehension and vivid understanding in analyzing cooperative principle.
The first undergraduate thesis was, “Maxims and Speech Acts in Oprah Winfrey on May 11th 2010” written by Wiranata (2010) to investigate how and why Grice’s Maxims are flouted and how the component of speech acts in the interview are made by Oprah Winfrey and Justin Bieber in the show. He used three theories, such as: the theory of maxims of conversation proposed by Paul Grice and the theory of Speech Act proposed by Austin. He also used the theory of flouting the maxims proposed by Peter Grundy (1995). It was a complicated undergraduate

The name of the international journal is 2011 International Conference on Languages, Literature and Linguistics. One of the article was written by Khosravizadeh and Sadehvandi, entitled “Some Instances of Violation and Flouting of the Maxim of Quantity by the Main Characters (Barry & Tim) in Dinner for Schmucks” Volume 26, 2011, taken from http://sharif.ir/~khosravizadeh/linkfile/violation.pdf. This journal is about flouting and violation by the main character in the movie and it was occurred because the main character has different character – in this case, the main character was humorists – and that was the reason why he mostly flouted and violated the maxims. This article could give more information related to this study. However, this study analyzed not only the main character but also another

For example, when a teacher enter the classrooms and he or she would like to know their students name by calling them one by one and the student will respond it by raising his or her hand honestly. Grice (1975) expect that the contribution should be genuine and not spurious. In maxim of quality, the speakers are expected to give the evidences. Some speakers like to get hearers’ attention by saying what they believe to be true, even though they lack of evidence. Maxim of quality has function to make sure that every speaker gives the truth information or contribution to their hearers.
2. Maxim of Relevance:
• Be relevant.
It means that when the speaker asks something, the listener should answer it stick to the point and relevance to the context. For example, a mother asked her son why he did not go to school and he answered that he gets sick. Grice (1975) expect that the contribution to be appropriate to immediate needs at each stage of transaction. This maxim has function to prevent random communication or unsustainable communication. If the speaker does not relevant to the topic of on going conversation, the hearer will also get confused of how to reply or how to give a response to the information.
3. Maxim of Quantity:
• Make your contribution as informative as is