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Pragmatics and Speech Act Theory
1972 classes), for example, expositives N; V that p, conveyed using a declarative clause; but interrogatives such as state, contend, insist, deny, remind, guess typically indicate invitationals, imperatives auth-
versus, say, commissives N( V to V, such aspromise, guarantee, refuse, decline; exercitives 'exercising of powers, rights, or influences' (N; V Nj to V), for exam- ple, order, request, beg, dare; or behabitives (Ns V Nj P nom (past (V))), for example, thank, congratulate, criticize), or Balhner and Brennenstuhl's (1981) for- mula N V ((addressee) by saying)p.
Searle (1975a) used four criteria—illocutionary point, direction of fit, S's psychological state, and propositional content—to establish five classes of speech acts. 'Representatives' have a truth value, show words-to-world fit, and express S's belief that p. 'Directives' are attempts to get H to do something, therefore they show world-to-words fit, and express S's wish or desire that H do A. 'Commissives' commit S to some future course of action, so they showworld- to-words fit, and S expresses the intention that S do A. 'Expressives' express S's attitude to a certain state of affairs specified (if at all) in the propositional con- tent (e.g., the underlined portion of / apologize for stepping on your toe). There is no direction of fit; a variety of different psychological states; and prop- ositional content 'must ... be related to S or H' (1975a:357f.). 'Declarations' bring about cor- respondence between the propositional content and the world, thus direction of fit is both words-to-world
and world-to-words. Searle recognizes no psycho- logical state for declarations. Searle's classification has been widely adopted.
Using H's evaluations as criteria, it is possible to establish links between classes of illocution and major clause types. 'Statements' (including denials, reports, predictions, promises, and offers) are principally expressions of S's belief about the way the world was, is, or will be, and are most typically formulated with a declarative clause. They can be judged in terms of the question 'Is p credible?' 'Invitationals' are a proper subset of Searle's directives, and include requests, exhortations, suggestions, warnings, etc. which prin- cipally invite H's participation. Many are formulated in an interrogative clause and prompt the question 'Does S really want A to be done, and if so is H both able and willing to do it?' 'Authoritatives' include the rest of Searle's 'directives' and his 'declarations' (commands, permissions, legal judgments, baptisms, etc.) which have S 'laying down the law.' Many of them are formulated in an imperative clause, the rest in a declarative. For these, H must consider the ques- tion 'Does S have the authority to utter U in the given context?' 'Expressives' (greetings, thanks, apologies, congratulations, etc.) have social-interactive-appro- priateness values: 'Has something occurred which warrants S expressing such a reaction to it?' These principally express social interaction with H; many are idiomatic, the rest are in the default declarative clause format. All four classes of speech acts can be
oritatives, and idioms expressives. See: Speech Act Classification.
8. Definitions of niocutions
Definitions of illocutions are an extension of the sem- antics of the key verb naming the illocution, for exam- ple, assert, deny, boast, suggest, promise, threaten, offer, command, baptize, etc. Such a verb is just one kind of illocutionary force-indicating device or IFID. Another kind of lexical IFID is please: compare the information-seeking question Are you leaving? with the request that H leave in Are you leaving, please? The hyperbole in Your bedroom's a pigsty! implies not only condemnation but also often the command to clear it up. Idioms like Would you mind... minimize an impending imposition. There are morphological IFIDS marking clause-type and politeness levels in Japanese and other oriental languages. There are syn- tactic IFIDS like word order and clause-type (mood), cf. You can do A versus Can you do A? versus Would that you could do A. Last, there is prosody or punc- tuation; contrast Out? with Out! In most utterances, the recognition of an illocution requires reference to cooperative conditions and/or the context of utterance (see Sects. 9, 10, 11below).
Austin cleared the ground and laid the foundations for speech act theory, and to him goes the credit for distinguishing locution, illocution, and perlocution. But it was Searle (1969:ch. 3) who first established criteria for the definitions of illocutions, using prom- ising as his example, (a) 'Normal input and output conditions obtain.' That is, the situation of utterance (including participants) is favorable to successful com- munication, (b) 'S expresses the proposition that p in [U].' (c) 'In expressing that p, S predicates a future act A of S.' Conditions (b) and (c) constitute the 'propositional content' referred to in specific defi- nitions of illocutionary acts (in this instance, prom- ising); scholars since Searle have usually extended this componentofadefinitiontoadescription ofutterance content that names the illocution, thereby including the IFID that Searle expressly omits (Vanderveken 1990-91 is an exception). Rules (d) and (e) identify 'preparatory conditions' on the illocution; (d) being specific to promising, and (e) being 'to the effect that the act must have a point.' Rule (e) should be enshrined within general statements of cooperative conditions on language use because it is normally rel- evant to all illocutionary acts and does not need to be stated within any particular definition, (f) is a sincerity
condition (see Sect. 5 above), (g) 'S intends [U] will place him under an obligation to do A' is to be taken together with (h), which identifies S's reflexive-inten- tion, 'S intends (i-i) to produce in H the knowledge (K) that [U] is to count as placing S under an obligation to
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