Definition
A potential implicature is an implicature that would arise from any of the components of a givenutterance if that component were uttered in some linguistic or extralinguistic context, whether or not the implicature is an actual implicature of the given utterance.
Examples
English
The sentence I think that some went has two potential implicatures:
- The matrix sentence I think … has the potential clausal implicature ‘I don’t know [that some went]’.
- The complement clause … some went has the potential scalar implicature ‘Not all went’.
Sources 2
- Levinson 1983, 133-134
- Gazdar 1979, 55