“I was only quoting”: Shifting viewpoint and speaker commitment

De Gruyter eBooks, pp. 113–138

Abstract

When people are accused of having said something objectionable, for instance because it is considered false or inappropriate, various strategies are available for denying or diminishing the speaker’s commitment to the contested utterance (Boogaart, Jansen & van Leeuwen 2021). In this chapter we take a closer look at one of these strategies, i.e. the so-called “viewpoint defence”, in which an arguer denies that the contested words were their own by attributing them to someone else. A typical instance is the claim that one was “just quoting”. Our goal is first, to provide an overview of the different forms the viewpoint defence may take and second, to provide criteria for determining if and when such a defence is a reasonable strategy or may be assessed as untruthful. We show that the very act of quoting triggers implicatures that are not easy to deny. Specifically, we argue in favour of a generalized implicature to the effect that the quoter is accountable for the contents of the quote - unless a convincing alternative purpose for the quote is provided or may be inferred from the context.

Authors 3

1. Ronny Boogaart Aachen

   Leiden University

   Affiliation as printed

   Leiden University,

2. Henrike Jansen Aachen

   Leiden University

   Affiliation as printed

   Leiden University,

3. Maarten van Leeuwen Aachen

   Leiden University

   Affiliation as printed

   Leiden University,