The Linguistics of Lying

This review deals with the communicative act of lying from a linguistic point of view, linguistics comprising both grammar and pragmatics. Integrating findings from the philosophy of language and from psychology, I show that the potential for lying is rooted in the language system. The tasks of providing an adequate definition of lying and of distinguishing lying from other concepts of deception (such as bald-faced lying and bullshitting) can be solved when interfaces between grammar and pragmatics are taken into account and when experimental results are used to narrow down theoretical approaches. Assuming a broadly neo-Gricean background, this review focuses on four theoretical topics: the role of the truth in lying, the scalarity and imprecision of lying, the speaker's intent to deceive, and the possibility of producing deceptive implicatures. I also briefly discuss questions of lying and neuroscience, the acquisition of lying, and prosocial and cross-cultural contexts of lying.