How does our knowledge of the language on the one hand, and of the context on the other, permit us to understand what we are told, to resolve ambiguities, to grasp both explicit and implicit content, to appreciate metaphor and irony? These issues have been studied in two disciplines: linguistic pragmatics and psycholinguistics, with only limited interactions between the two. This volume lays down the foundation for a new field: "Experimental Pragmatics." Contributions review pioneering work and present novel ways of articulating theories and experimental methods in the area.

How does our knowledge of the language on the one hand, and of the context on the other, permit us to understand what we are told, to resolve ambiguities, to grasp both explicit and implicit content, to appreciate metaphor and irony? These issues have been studied in two disciplines: linguistic pragmatics and psycholinguistics, with only limited interactions between the two. This volume lays down the basis for a new field: "Experimental Pragmatics." Contributions review pioneering work and present novel ways of articulating theories and experimental methods in the area.

"Relevance, " first published in 1986, was named as one of the most important and influential books of the decade in the "Times Higher Educational Supplement." This revised edition includes a new Preface outlining developments in Relevance Theory since 1986, discussing the more serious criticisms of the theory, and envisaging possible revisions or extensions.

The book sets out to lay the foundation for a unified theory of cognitive science. The authors argue than human cognition has a goal: we pay attention only to information which seems to us relevant. To communicate is to claim someone's attention, and hence to imply that the information communicated is relevant. Thus, a single property - relevance is seen as the key to human communication and cognition.

A second important feature of the book is its approach to the study of reasoning. It elucidates the role of background or contextual information in spontaneous inference, and shows that non-demonstrative inference processes can be fruitfully analysed as a form of suitably constrained guesswork. It directly challenges recent claims that human central thought processes are likely to remain a mystery for some time to come.

Thirdly, the authors offer new insight into language and literature, radically revising current view on the nature and goals of verbal comprehension, and in particular on metaphor, irony, style, speech acts, presupposition and implicature.

'Explaining Culture' is a contribution to both evolutionary and cultural psychology. It provides a framework for thinking about how the human mind evolved and how the resulting 'mental modules' can serve as the basis not only for universal aspects of human culture but also for cultural diversity. The book is full of novel and thought provoking ideas and is a pleasure to read.' --Richard Nisbett, University of Michigan