Slurring in indirect-reporting

Communication in society happens chiefly by means of language However, the users of language, as social beings, communicate and use language on societyʹs premises; society controls their access to the linguistic and communicative means. Pragmatics, as the study of the way humans use their language in communication, bases itself on the study of those premises and determines how they affect, and effectualize, human language use. Hence, Pragmatics studies the use of language in human communication as determined by the conditions of society (Mey, 2001, p. 6). In this paper I shall deal with indirect reporting (the social practice of indirect reporting) and with slurs (and slurring) in indirect reporting, in the spirit of societal considerations by Mey (2001).