Pragmatic Inference: Misunderstandings, Accountability, Deniability

The concept of inference is foundational to the study of pragmatics; however, the way it is theoretically conceptualised and methodologically operationalised is far from uniform. This Element investigates the role that inference plays in pragmatic models of communication, bringing together a range of scholarship that characterises inference in different ways for different purposes. It addresses the nature of 'faulty inferences', promoting the study of misunderstandings as crucial for unders...