Discourse analysis
- 1. DISCOURSE ANALYSIS THE SPEECH ACT THEORY Submitted by : Hamid Mnati Dafir Submitted to : Assis.Prof. Adel Al- Thamery (PH.D) Basrah University /Iraq 2016
- 2. 1. INTRODUCTION speech act theory was developed by the British philosopher J.L Austin .{Baker and Ellec 89} who theorized that “ when people talk they are performing actions with their words . They are doing things such as writing . Promising , marrying , proposing , inviting , and so on.” {Baker and Ellec 39} “ when a priest says “ I pronounce you husband and wife “ to a couple , then he is performing the act of marrying a couple . As long as certain felicity conditions (we’ll discuss later)are met, the performative act creates a new reality. Searle defined a classification system of speech acts as well as introducing the notion of indirect speech by showing that a single utterance may contain more than one type of speech act , a primary one which is indirect and not literally performed, and a secondary one which is direct and is performed in the literal utterance of the sentence”{Baker and Ellec 139} E.G Sami : I wish I was at Toys store. Joe : O.K , I’ll take you.
- 3. INTRODUCTION Speech act theory can explain how speakers and hearers use language , so we have three components of communication ( the speaker ,message and hearer) . Speech act was classified by Austin into three types : 1. Locutionary act. 2. Illocutionary act. 3. Preocutionary act. {baker and Ellec 138} These taxonomy will be discussed by me in this presentation.
- 4. 2. TAXONOMY OF SPEECH ACTS 2.1 Locutionary act The actual utterance and its ostensible meaning . “ “we can recognize the bare fact that a communicative act takes place”{Crystal 276}the act of saying something which is “roughly equivalent to uttering a certain sense and reference ,” 2.2 . Illocutionary speech act . looking at the act that performed a result of the speaker making an utterance – the cases where saying = doing ; such as betting , welcoming , promising and warning “
- 5. 2.2 ILLOCUTIONARY It is the speaker’s purpose or intent Ex. I promise to pay you back . {intend to do or communicate} David Crystal stated that “the illocutionary acts can be grouped into basic types such as the following: 1.Representative (assertive):the speaker is committed , in varying degrees, to the truth of a proposition . E.g affirm , believe, conclude, deny, report. 2. Directive : the speaker tries to get the hearer to do something . Eg ask , challenge , command , insist, request.{Crystal 277}
- 6. 2.2 ILLOCUTIONARY 3. Commisives : the speaker is committed , in varying degrees, to do something in the future. {Baker and Ellec 138) e.g. guarantee , pledge , promise, swear , vow. 4. Expressive : act that expresses the speaker’s feeling towards something . E.g. apologize , deplore , thank , welcome, congratulate. 5. Declarations: acts that change reality ( such as baptizing , pronouncing some one guilty , I resign , you are fired. These classifications are not easy because verb meanings are often difficult to distinguish and in the intentions of the speakers are not always clear.
- 7. 2.3 PRELOCUTIONARY ACTS The effects of the speakers’ utterances on the listeners who can feel amused , warned persuaded ..etc. 3. Felicity conditions The speech act will be successful only if they satisfy several criteria known as felicity conditions. {Crystal 278} For some clear cases the performance will be inappropriate , is not a specific person in a particular context . For example I sentence you with seven months in prison .(here in this case the speaker is a judge in a courtroom){Yule 50}
- 8. FELICITY CONDITIONS Yule proposed five classes for felicity conditions they are: 1. General conditions: presupose the participant ‘s knowledge and understanding to the language “being used and that they are not play-acting or being non-sensical. 2. Content conditions: concern the appropriate content of utterances that must be about a future event . 3. Preparatory conditions: “ For a promise are significantly different from those for warning . When promising to do something there are two preparatory conditions , first , the event will not happen by itself ,the second, the event will have a beneficial effect.
- 9. Felicity conditions 4. sincerity conditions: Count with the speaker’s intention to carry out a certain act . “ certain sincerity also have to be present . The speech act must be performed in a sincere manner. E,g apologize , guarantee and vow.{Crystal 278} 5. Essential conditions :they combine with specification of what must be in the utterance content , the context , and the speaker ‘s intentions , in order for a specific speech acts to be appropriately (feliciously ) performed.{Yule 51}
- 10. DIRECT AND INDIRECT SPEECH ACTS On the basis of structure we have different approach to distinguish kinds of speech acts. Min English , we can divide them into three basic types .in these types we have recognized relationship between their structural form and (declarative , interrogative , imperative) and the communicative functions (statement, question , command/request){Yule 54} Eg. 1. you have a nice car. (declarative) 2. do you have a nice car?(interrogative) 3. get a nice car.(imperative) Those speech acts directly address the listener , but most of acts in every day conversation are indirect. There are many ways of asking someone to do something. The direct
- 11. Way is to use imperative sentence (Turn on the T.V) but that could improper way in many situations that could be rude for some people , so sometimes different ways can be used to accomplish the same function . e.g 1.It is cold today. ( the speaker here hints to the hearer to close the door or the conditioner) 2. Johnny , there is some chalk on the floor, the teacher said . ( pick up the chalk)
- 12. Thank you