A Pragmatic Approach to Rhetorical Technique of "Exaggeration" Based on Grice’s "Cooperative Principle"

Exaggeration is among the most prominent rhetorical techniques that has long been of significant interest to linguists and scholars, specifically under the discipline of Badi (rhetorical embellishment). What is important about this rhetorical technique, like any other rhetorical technique, is the process by which it was created and how it is received and read. This study adopts a descriptive-analytical approach to answer this fundamental question and utilizes Grice's "Cooperative Principle" from pragmatic theory to analyze the structural-semantic process of this rhetorical technique. The results indicate that the creation of the rhetorical technique of exaggeration is fundamentally based on the non-observance of what Grice calls the Maxim of "Quality" because, in the process of creating this technique, the person refuses to provide correct and arguable information to the audience, thus refusing to comply with The Maxim of "Quality". Of course, it should be noted that the failure to comply with the Maxim of Quality in this process was intentional and in some way obvious and recognizable [= Flouting the Quality Maxim] and not with the purpose of deceiving or misleading the audience [= violation the Quality Maxim]. Rather, he does this with the aim of guiding him to "Conversational Implicature".This study can be considered an accurate criterion for distinguishing exaggeration from lying.