Analyze the following speech event in terms of the related pragmatic theory.
Hamlet: Whose grave’s this, sirrah?
Clown (gravedigger): Mine, sir.
...
Hamlet: What man dost thou dig it for?
Clown: For no man, sir.
Hamlet: What woman then?
Clown: For none, neither.
Hamlet: Who is to be buried in’t?
Clown: One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she’s dead.
(Shakespeare, Hamlet)
This speech event violates the cooperative principle. The content of cooperative principle is to make your conversational contribution as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the exchange in which you are engaged. And it contains the following maxims.
Quality
Try to make your contribution one that is true.
(1) Do not say what you believe to be false.
(2) Do not say that for which you lack adequate evident.
Quantity
(1) Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purpose of the exchange).
(2) Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.
Relation
Be relevant.
Manner
Be perspicuous.
(1) Avoid obscurity of expression.
(2) Avoid ambiguity.
(3) Be brief.
(4) Be orderly
Apparently, in this speech event, the clown violates the maxim of quality as he answers that the grave is not for man or woman. As a result, there comes conversational implicature. Conversational implicature arises from either strictly and directly observing or deliberately and openly flouting the maxims. Conversational implicature is a type of implied meaning, which is deduced on the basis of the conventional meaning of words together with the context, under the guidance of the CP and its maxims. In this speech event, the clown wants to imply that soul is the essence of a person and her soul is dead so she digs the grave to bury herself.