Grice's Maxims and Tone Tags
What are Grice's Maxims?
Grice's Maxims are four qualities that people assume speech to have. People aren't explicitly taught these rules, and might not be able to put them into words, but through conversations, many people subconsciously pick up on them. The four maxims are:
The maxim of quantity: everything you say should contain as much information as needed to get your point across—no more, no less.
The maxim of quality: everything you say should, to the best of your knowledge, be true and supportable by evidence.
The maxim of relation: the things you say should be relevant to the topic at hand.
Maxim of manner: you should be clear, brief, and unambiguous in your speech.
Combined, these four maxims make up the Cooperative Principle—the idea that people should communicate with the intention that the other person will understand them.
How do People Use Grice's Maxims?
When people communicate, they usually subconsciously assume that other people are following these four rules of communication. That means that people will assume what someone is saying to them:
Contains the necessary information
Is true
Is related to the situation
And is not meant to be confusing.
These assumptions are what allow some people to understand a meaning in a sentence that was never actually stated. For example, take the following conversation:
A: I'm hungry. B: There's bread and jam in the fridge.
The maxim of relation tells A that B is telling them about the bread and jam because it's relevant to them being hungry, and the maxim of quantity tells A that B believes this to be sufficient information. From this, A can guess that B is inviting them to take some bread and jam and have a snack.
However, sometimes, people don't follow these Maxims. They can do so either by violating them or flouting them.
Violating is when someone doesn't follow the maxims and doesn't expect the other person to realize. If A said "I'm hungry" and B responded "there's no food in the house" when there was, B would just be lying. They're not trying to communicate.
Flouting is when someone doesn't follow the maxims and assumes the other person knows it. If B heard A say "I'm hungry" and responded, "there's no food left in the entire world", they would be flouting the maxim of quality, because that's not true. However, they don't want to lie to A—they're trying to make a joke. Successfully flouting a maxim requires that the other person realizes that you are breaking the maxim on purpose.
What are Tone Tags?
Some people (most commonly autistic people) struggle to pick up on social cues (such as Grice's Maxims and their uses) that others just get instinctively. Tone tags can be thought of as a way of making those maxims explicit, rather than just implied, so everyone can understand the text and subtext of a conversation.
Tone tags are typically written with a / (forward slash) followed by a word or abbreviation that denotes a specific tone. Commonly used tone tags are /j (joking), /hj (half-joking), /s (sarcasm), and /gen (genuine).
Why do Some People have Issues With Tone Tags?
Not all tone tags map clearly to a specific meaning. Some tone tags aren't immediately recognizable as having a specific meaning. For example, a person might interpret /s as serious, rather than sarcastic.
Furthermore, some tone tags might have an ambiguous meaning even if you know what they are short for. "Half-joking" isn't just one tone—it could mean anything from "this is a joke with a grain of truth" to "this is truthful, but I'm giving you leeway to take it as a joke if you don't wanna talk about it" to "this is a joke, but it's not a very good joke".
Some people may feel they are overused. Some people may tag every or nearly every statement they make, which can make people who don't need those tone tags feel like they are being belittled, or make them feel pressured to use tone tags on every sentence, too.
Some people may feel they are underused. Some people may not use tone tags, causing those who can't read tone well to miss out on the meaning of what they are saying.
Not every sentence has one meaning that can be easily summarized. Sometimes, a sentence may have more than one meaning. For example, one clause of a sentence may be sarcastic or joking, while another is sincere. Or, a sentence may be intended to be innocuous to most people, but an in-joke to the writer's friends. Using tone tags can remove that ambiguity, or even destroy one of the interpretations of the sentence.
People can misuse tone tags. In the worst cases, bad actors might write a truly cruel message, but tone tag it in a way that suggests it wasn't meant to hurt. In this case, the tone tag isn't meant to clarify tone, but to obscure it to anyone who might hold them accountable.
Fixing Tone Tags with Grice's Maxims
In my opinion, the best way to use tone tags is to always keep the Cooperative Principle in mind, both when tagging sentences and when interpreting them. Here is what I think would be useful:
Quantity:
Every sentence CAN have infinitely intricate tones. That doesn't mean it should. Use the fewest tone tags possible to communicate the tone of a sentence.
DON'T tag the "default tone" of a message. For example, tagging a request with /nf (not forced) could communicate that you think that the default tone for requests IS to force someone to do something. Because of this, although /nf is a non-aggressive tag, overusing it could actually make a situation seem more hostile.
Likewise, you don't have to tag every non-sarcastic statement with /gen (genuine).
Generally, if you aren't intentionally flouting a maxim, you probably won't need to tag your tone.
When flouting the maxim of quantity by providing too little or too much information for comedic purposes, it can be helpful to add a /j tag. If you're flouting it because there's something you don't want to say, tell your conversation partner to leave you alone.
Quality:
Generally, people try to tell the truth, so I'll skip right to...
When flouting the maxim of quality by lying on purpose, you need to make sure your conversation partner knows that you're lying with a tag like /s (sarcasm) or /lie. In my opinion, a /lie tag makes jokes like these funnier!
Relation:
If you're bringing up something that is related to the topic, but it's not obvious how, you can add a tone tag to clarify how it is related.
When flouting the maxim of relation by bringing up something unrelated, tone tags like /j can help clarify that it isn't supposed to be—or, you can just say that you're changing the topic.
Manner:
When using tone tags, make sure everybody knows what each one means (not just what it stands for, but what tone it communicates).
If a tone tag is ambiguous, consider writing out the entire word, or describing your tone rather than using shorthand.
When flouting the maxim of manner by making a sentence that is ambiguous on purpose, you kind of can't use tone tags. But be ready for people to interpret what you said in a lot of different ways.
Final Remarks
Tone tags aren't your only tool for clear communication. You could always consider rephrasing a sentence to make the connection between things clearer (for example, "there's bread and jam in the fridge" -> "there's bread and jam in the fridge, do you want some?") or writing another sentence to clarify your tone.
If you're communicating with the goal that other people understand you, you need to use the tools that they can understand. Tone tags can be helpful for some people, but they might actually make things worse for others. The most important thing is to accept that no matter how clear you make yourself, some people will misunderstand you anyway. You can always clarify things after the fact, and laugh about it later.
