When we communicate, we don’t just string words together following the rules of grammar. We "read between the lines." This ability to infer extra meaning is studied by pragmatics. Traditionally, such extra inferences are treated as flexible and optional: that is, you can't have a "pragmatic error" as you have a "grammatical error" in "He go to store." Recently, some researchers have challenged this view by suggesting that an automatic mechanism in our brains calculates these hidden meanings. This theory predicts that sentences like “Some eagles are birds” feel odd because they violate the rules of this automatic mechanism in a way grammar errors violate grammar rules.
I investigated to what extent such "odd" sentences are truly caused by rigid internal rules. I conducted psycholinguistic experiments on three different cases of “oddness.” The main conclusion is that there is more to why a sentence is “odd” than violations of automatic rules. Factors like common ground (what we think the other person knows) and information structure of a conversation are often overlooked as reasons for “oddness.” In one case, a "pragmatic" error turned out to be rooted in the literal meaning of the words (semantics). By looking into why certain sentences fail to be processed even when there are no grammatical errors, this research adds to our understanding of how the brain processes language and the role context plays in it.
Maria Buyko successfully defended her thesis on 24 April 2026.
Trial lecture
Designated topic: What role does context play in determining different components of utterance meaning?
Evaluation committee
- Dr. Nadine Bade, University of Konstanz (first opponent)
- Dr. Andreea C. Nicolae, Leibniz-Centre General Linguistics (ZAS) (second opponent)
- Senior Lecturer Nicholas Elwyn Allott, University of Oslo (committee administrator)
Chair of the defence
Supervisors
- Professor Kjell Johan Sæbø, University of Oslo
- Jacopo Romoli, Heinrich-Heine Universität