Do discourse markers exist? On the treatment of discourse markers in Relevance Theory

This paper critically reviews three Relevance Theory (RT) ideas on connectives: the distinction between conceptual and procedural meaning, connectives as strictly procedural elements, and monosemy as the best explanation of multifunctional connectives. These three ideas underlie the description of connectives and related sets of markers within RT.Data from colloquial conversations, however, provide evidence which calls these ideas into question. Therefore, it is argued that conceptual and procedural features can coexist within a single marker, that the concept of apposition markers should be reconsidered, that conceptual expressions can connect two utterances, and that polysemy provides generalizations which are lost in a monosemic approach.