59. Classification of speech acts.
It was John Searle, who studied under J.Austin at Oxford, who proposed
a detailed classification of speech acts. His speech act classification has had a great impact on linguistics. It includes five major classes of speech acts: declarations, representatives, expressives, directives and commissives:
situation |
Speech
act type Direction of fit
s – speaker, x -
Declarations words change the world S causes X
E.g. I pronounce you man and wife. You’re fired.
Representatives make words fit the world s believes X
E.g. It was a warm sunny day. John is a liar.
Expressives make words fit the world s feels X
E.g. I’m really sorry. Happy birthday! (statements of pleasure, joy, sorrow, etc.)
Directives make the world fit words S wants X
E.g. Don’t touch that (commands, orders, suggestions)
Commissives make the world fit words s intends X
E.g. I’ll be back (promises, threats, pledges – what we intend to do)
60. Indirect speech acts.
J.Searle can also be merited for introducing a theory of indirect speech acts. Indirect speech acts are cases in which one speech act is performed indirectly, by way of performing another: Can you pass me the salt? Though the sentence is interrogative, it is conventionally used to mark a request – we cannot just answer “yes” or “no”. According to modern point of view such utterances contain two illocutionary forces, with one of them dominating.
Another classification of speech acts was introduced by G.Potcheptsov. It is based on purely linguistic principles. The main criterion for pragmatic classification of utterances is the way of expressing communicative intention. This classification includes six basic speech acts:
constatives, promissives, menacives, performatives, directives and questions
61. The study of language in use. Discourse analysis.
Text as a unit of the highest level manifests itself as discourse in verbal communication. Therefore actual text in use may be defined as discourse. Discourses are formed by sequence of utterances. It is obvious that many utterances taken by themselves are ambiguous. They can become clear only within a discourse. Utterances interpretation, or discourse analysis, involves a variety of processes, grammatical and pragmatic. By pragmatic processes we mean the processes used to bridge up the gap between the semantic representations of sentences and the interpretation of utterances in context. Quite often, the sentence may be ambiguous:
His soup is not hot enough
The hearer must not only recover the semantic representation of the sentence uttered, but decide who the referential expression he refers to, whether the ambiguous word hot means very warm or spicy, whether the vague expression his food refers to the food he cooked, the food he brought, the food he served, the food he is eating, etc.
Besides, utterances have not only propositional content but illocutionary force, and ambiguities may arise at this level:
You’re not leaving
The hearer must not only recover its explicit propositional content, but also decide whether it is a statement, a question or an order. Furthermore, utterances have not only explicit content but also implicit import:
A: Would you like some coffee?
B: Coffee would keep me awake.
The hearer (A) must recover the implication that B does not want any coffee (or, in some circumstances, that he does).