Quotation marks and the processing of irony in English: evidence from a reading time study

Abstract Quotation marks are used for different purposes in language, one of which is to signal that something has be interpreted an ironic way, as the utterance What a “nice” day! said on rainy and cold day. The present contribution describes reading time experiment we analyzed processing understanding written sentences with or without quotation asked whether how these affect subjects’ sentences. Native speakers English were exposed two contexts subsequent target sentence. Semantically, context connected either ironically literally entirely unrelated. Each three meaning conditions contained not. Within sentences, identical across conditions, measured before respective (ironic, literal, unrelated) was revealed, at phrase made scenario ironic, unrelated, end Furthermore, having read sentence, subjects rated well this sentence fit preceding context, they needed their judgment recorded well. Results clearly show increase burden first, independently specification but then play crucial beneficial role recognition irony. We reflect upon findings against background semantic pragmatic theories quotation.