- Title
- Pragmatic necessity for breaching Gricean maxims in fiction: Towards a literary plot theory
- Creator
- Tserayi, Jonathan https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6200-8177
- Subject
- Indic fiction (English)
- Subject
- Maxims in literature
- Date
- 2023-08
- Type
- Doctoral theses
- Type
- text
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10353/28705
- Identifier
- vital:74555
- Description
- Unlike in most literary studies involving the analysis of the Gricean Cooperative Principle, where the main thrust has been to expose where and how the Gricean maxims were violated, the focus in this study was to investigate the utility or functionality of breached maxims in fictional works. This novel approach, issuing from the presupposition that breached maxims add value to literature, warranted the speculation that it is necessary to breach Gricean maxims for the success of the literary plot. To prove such necessity, the researcher sampled three texts consisting of two novels and a play for in depth analysis. Using two theories (Relevance Theory (RT) and Pragma-crafting theory (PC), and methodologically applying Discourse Analysis (DA) and Conversation Analysis (CA), the researcher sought to establish the effect of breached maxims in the sampled texts. Furthermore, the researcher utilised both quantitative and qualitative methods, even though the former was minimally applied. As expected for a study of this nature, the analysis was largely qualitative. Findings confirmed that breached maxims have the effect of generating literary content and hence are purposefully used to achieve literary creativity and convenience. This affirms the necessity of expediently breaching the maxims in the interest of the literary plot. In this regard, literary works have traditionally thrived on breached Gricean maxims, but the act of violating maxims has hardly been viewed in a positive light. Thus, this research partly fills the gap of articulating the efficacy of breached maxims in literary works, and ultimately proposes a literary plot theory premised on the efficacy of breached maxims.
- Description
- Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, 2023
- Format
- computer
- Format
- online resource
- Format
- application/pdf
- Format
- 1 online resource (348 leaves)
- Format
- Publisher
- University of Fort Hare
- Publisher
- Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities
- Language
- English
- Rights
- University of Fort Hare
- Rights
- All Rights Reserved
- Rights
- Open Access
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| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details | SOURCE1 | tserayi.pdf | 2 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details |