Conversational implicature in interrogation, therapy, and family gathering scenes in the Netflix Series adolescence
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.58881/jlps.v5i3.170Keywords:
Conversational implicatures, cooperative principle, Gricean maximsAbstract
The study examined conversational implicature generated through non-observance of Gricean maxims in interrogation, therapy, and family gathering scenes, as portrayed in the Netflix series Adolescence (2025). Using Thomas’s (1995) classification of non-observance, a qualitative content analysis of characters' utterances was used to identify the types of non-observance and the conversational implicatures that occur across these three scenes. The study found four types of non-observance, which are flouting (69.71%), violating (21.63%), opting out (8.17%), and infringing (0.48%). Therapy scenes produced the most non-observance of maxims, interrogation showed almost an equal ratio of flouting and violating, and family gathering scenes yielded the fewest. The maxim of relation was the most flouted and violated across three scenes. Regarding implicature, particularized conversational implicature dominated all three settings with 195 occurrences. Generalized conversational implicature appeared only in interrogation and therapy scenes, with a total of 10 occurrences, indicating that all three scenes are highly context-dependent. These findings demonstrate that the cooperative principle is only partially applicable in institutional and strategic settings, where non-observance functions strategically. With interrogation scenes being the least cooperative, therapy is partially cooperative, while family gathering scenes serve non-strategic, relational purposes, making them the most cooperative setting.
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