Presuppositional effects and ostensive-inferential communication

In this paper, we argue that presuppositions fall within the scope of ostensive-inferentialcommunication, and present the benefits of this proposal. On the one hand, by treatingpresuppositions as part of what isostensivelycommunicated by the speaker, we canprovide a unified account of so-called‘informative’presuppositions, and presuppositionsthat are part of the‘common ground’. On the other hand, by treating presuppositions asthe output of aninferentialprocess of pragmatic interpretation, we can explain theircontext-sensitivity as well as the way in which their propositional content is constructedthrough a process of‘mutual parallel adjustment’with the explicit content of the utteranceand its implicatures.