Article published in:
Interaction Studies
Vol. 18:1 (2017) ► pp. 142–160

A sociobiological account of indirect speech

| University of Genoa | Roma Tre University

Indirect speech is a remarkable trait of human communication. The present paper tackles the sociobiological underpinnings of communicative indirectness discussing both socio-interactional and cognitive rationales behind its manifestation in discourse. From a social perspective, the use of indirect forms in interactions can be regarded as an adaptive response to the epistemic implications of transacted new information in small primary groups, representing – in Givón’s terms – our “bio-cultural” descent. The design features of indirect strategies today may therefore be explained in terms of a form-function mapping in which indirect communicative expressions allowed a “safer” transaction of contents and a more cooperative attitude of speakers in both face-to-face and public contexts of communication. The unchallengeability effects notably induced by underencoded meanings have now received extensive experimental backing, unveiling intriguing underlying cognitive mechanisms such as the well-known cognitive illusions or fallacies.

Keywords: Theory of Mind, exaptation, political discourse, cognitive fallacies
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Societies of intimates
  • 3.Pragmatic foundations and cognitive prerequisites for indirect communication
  • 4.Reasons and linguistic manifestations of indirect communication
  • 5.Indirect communication in political speeches
  • 6.Indirect communication and cognitive fallacies
  • 7.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References


This article is currently available as a sample article.

Published online: 10 August 2017
https://doi.org/10.1075/is.18.1.07mas
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A sociobiological account of indirect speech
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