Document Type

Book Section

Publication Date

9-2018

ISBN

978-3-11-047018-5

ISSN

2195-0229

Abstract

In this chapter, I bridge rhetoric and pragmatics, both of which concern themselves with language-in-use and meaning-making beyond formal syntax and semantics. Previous efforts to link these fields have failed, but Sperber and Wilson’s relevance theory (RT), an approach to experimental pragmatics grounded in cognitive science, offers the bridge. I begin by reviewing Gricean pragmatics and its incompatibility with rhetoric and cognitive science. I then sketch RT, but importantly, I identify revisions to RT that make it a powerful tool for rhetorical analysis, a cognitive pragmatic rhetorical (CPR) theory. CPR theory strengthens RT by clarifying what it means to be relevant – and irrelevant – in relevance-theoretic terms. Meanwhile, it provides rhetoric a set of principles for its functioning grounded in cognitive science. I conclude with sample CPR- theoretic analyses.

First Page

69

Last Page

96

Num Pages

37

Series

Age of Access?

Series Number

9

Series Title

Relevance and Irrelevance: Theories, Factors and Challenges

Publisher

De Gruyter

Rights

The final publication is available at www.degruyter.com.

Editor

Jan Strassheim & Hisashi Nasu

Series Editor

André Schüller-Zwierlein, Herbert Burkert, et al.

File Type

PDF

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