2.2.3　Irony and Illocutionary Force

As mentioned，irony can be regarded as a special kind ofindirect speech act.Then how can we infer the implied meaning of an utterance or the illocutionary force？Here is an example to show how to get the ironic implications from a seemingly praising utterance.

Example：From your mouth flowed speech sweeter than honey.

This utterance may have the illocutionary force of“admiration”or“irony”.The hearer may have realized the speaker is ironizing him or her，and the hearer probably experiences ten steps in the process of inference.The speaker has expressed praise for the hearer's speech.（semantic meaning）The hearer assumes that the speaker is cooperating in the conversation and that therefore the speaker's utterance has some aim or point.（principle of conversational cooperation）The conversational setting is not such as to indicate a theoretical interest in the hearer's virtue of consideration.（factual background information）Furthermore，the hearer is clear that he has done nothing deserving praise.（factual background information）Therefore，the utterance probably has some ulterior illocutionary point.A preparatory condition for any ironic illocutionary act is the insincerity psychological state of the speaker when uttering the act predicted in the propositional content condition.Therefore，the speaker has produced praise and the negation of its sincerity would entail that the preparatory condition for irony is satisfied.The hearer has therefore alluded to the satisfaction of a preparatory condition for an ironic expression whose obedience conditions that it is quite likely the speaker wants to ironize the hearer.