Grice’s Cooperative Principles in News Reports of Tehran Times- A Descriptive-Analytical Study

Abstract

Since in modern day most of the information is conveyed through written communication, and media play a significant role in the conveyance of hot issues of the day, the language of the news has attracted the attention of both media researchers and linguists for decades. This descriptive-analytical study aimed to compare the adoption and violation of Grice‟s (1975) cooperative principles (CPs) in news reports published in Tehran Times and identify which of these four CPs (quality, quantity, manner, and relation) has been violated most and which of them has been violated least. In this regard, 120 news stories were selected randomly from the newspaper Tehran Times, in which the adoption and violation of these CPs were studied by two independent raters. Ten reports were selected from whatever published in the 12 months. Results revealed that maxim of quality was violated most, and its highest amount among five news categories was related to social news. Also, findings showed that maxim of relation was violated least, and the lowest amount among five news categories was related to cultural news, that the second highest violated maxim was the maxim of quality, and that in total maxims in the economic and social news were profoundly violated compared to the other three news categories. Findings of this study can be used by EFL learners and teachers as well as report writers in multimedia.

Keywords

• Grice’s Cooperative Principles
• Tehran Times
• Media Research
• News Reports
• Maxims