This paper offers an analysis of the meaning of although set within the framework of Relevance Theory. In line with Iten (1998b), although is seen as encoding procedural information that constrains the inferential processes involved in the derivation of implicatures. However, the current account differs from Iten (1998b) in several points. First, it suggests that utterances of the form Q althou...

König (1989) argues that there is a relation of duality between concessive and causal constructions. Therefore, he maintains, any account of the meaning of causal connectives like because, via duality, also provides an account of the meaning of concessive connectives such as although. This paper lists a number of problems with König's account. Appealing to notions central to relevance theory, i...

Previous experimental studies on concessive connectives have only looked at their local facilitating or predictive effect on discourse relation comprehension and have often viewed them as a class of discourse markers with similar effects. We look into the effect of two connectives, but and although, for inferring contrastive vs. concessive discourse relations to complement previous experimental...