Grice and The Sic! Society

Speranza

Grice and the Sic! Society.

Perhaps it _is_ difficult with something like:

i.                   Born in Japan, Ishiguro’s family moved to the UK when he was five.

But not impossible! In any way, I should add a point about the Sic! Society. This is a society whose purpose is to find that type of ‘errors’ in the media. The point of the Sic! Society, however, is NOT to leave things _as that_! The headquarters are at Oxford: Grice’s country.

No, the mission of The Sic! Society is to provide a short comment on the _sic_ passage. And this shows Griceian sophistication. Why? Well, because it takes what must be taken as an _unintentional_ ‘error’ as an _implicature_, i.e. m-intended meaning.

Some contributions are below. I thought the point and mission of The Sic! Society neat.

Sic!

A headline on the Hertfordshire Mercury: —

ii.                 A (reading headline): Tributes paid to Smith Labour councillor who was a ‘real character’ following his death.

B: I wonder what the man was like during his life.

iii.              A (reading from “The Minneapolis Star Tribune”): Smith, 37, was convicted Friday morning of first-degree premeditated murder for fatally shooting a law clerk eight times earlier this year.

B: If you’re going to do something, do it properly.