Abstract

It is not unusual to consider linguistic communication as a type of action performed by an individual —the speaker— intended to influence the mental state of another individual —the addressee. It seems more unusual to reach an agreement on what should be the effect of such influence for the communication to be successful. According to the well-known Gricean view, the success of a communicative action depends precisely on the recognition by the addressee of the mental state of the speaker. In this essay, we want to analyse these mental states; however our main concern is not with the mental states of the agents in an isolated communicative action, but the mental states of the agents in a broader linguistic action, namely, conversation.