Pragmatic evidence, context, and story design: an essay on recent developments in experimental pragmatics

What is pragmatic evidence? In this contribution, I argue that pragmatic evidence basically is connected with pragmatic intuitions related to a context. The context usually is either given as a story, or is left to the imagination of a judge (a linguist, a reader, a test participant). It is shown that stories not only play an important role in pragmatic argumentation and analysis, but also with regard to story design in experimental settings.

► Pragmatic evidence is about interpretations of utterances in contexts. ► In experimental pragmatics, contexts are often represented as stories. ► Story design influences judgments of test participants.