Salience and defaultness
pp. 207-213
in: Frank Liedtke, Astrid Tuchen (eds), Handbuch Pragmatik, Stuttgart, Metzler, 2018Abstract
The Graded Salience Hypothesis, introducing the notion of Salience (cf. Giora 1997; 2003), has been recently reviewed and reframed as one of the modules of the Defaultness Hypothesis (cf. Giora/Givoni/Fein 2015a). Whereas the Graded Salience Hypothesis focuses on default, coded and salient meanings, the Defaultness Hypothesis also acknowledges default, even if nonsalient, constructed interpretations. In both cases, however, defaultness is defined in terms of an automatic response to a stimulus. Given their automaticity, default responses will be evoked unconditionally, initially and directly, regardless of degree of nonliteralness (literal vs nonliteral), contextual support (weak vs strong), negation (negation vs affirmation), and, with regards to interpretations, also novelty (high or less-high). As such, default responses are expected to supersede nondefault counterparts.