Le rôle de l’Environnement Cognitif Mutuel dans l’interprétation de l’énoncé métaphorique
The Role of the Mutual Cognitive Background against the Interpretation of the Metaphoric Proposition

Summary/Abstract: The paper aims to examine the role and the responsabilities of the participants in the communicative act. Unlike the classical pragmatic theories which focus on the fundamental role of the speaker, this study shows that both the participants are equally responsabile for the succes or failure of the commnunicative act. According to the pertinence principle proposed by Sperber and Wilso, the speaker builds up his proposition in order to produce a maximum of contextual effects which are able to require a minimum of the cognitive effort from the receiver. He is certain that the receiver will be able to catch up with the most subtle effects because his aim is to have a receiver with whom he can share the same cognitive background: a cognitive background shared by interlocutors is a mutual one. The existence of a mutual cognitive background allows the speaker to deliver the most subtle hypotheses while the receiver is able to catch them up. With each and every metaphorical proposition, not only the cognitive background is widened, but also the mutual cognitive background of its participants. A widened mutual cognitive background represents the pledge of the transmission / reception of the most subtle contextual implications.

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