Page 490 - Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Language

Pragmatics and Speech Act Theory
sive-exclamative, prohibitive, imprecative. English has not only the (optative-)subjunctive in (4) and (5), but also expressive(-exclamative) in mostly mono- lexical nonverb idioms of two kinds: those not necess- arily addressed to anyone, e.g., Goodness gracious! Shit! Wow!, and those addressed to H: Thanks. Please. Sorry. Pardon. Hi. Bye. Congratulations. Asshole! (note that some are imprecatives). Some of the latter have idiomatic counterparts with verbs: Thank you. How do you do? Screw you! Often these expressives have similarly idiomatic counterparts in other lang- uages. Imprecations of third persons appear to be expressives:
X: Suzie found Tom in her own bed with another woman! (6)
Bearing in mind that many imperative clauses are not at all imperious, cf. Forgive me intruding. Excuse me. Let me help you with that. Have a beer. Take the
first turning on your left and the third on the right. Have a good day! the primary illocution of an imperative clause is:
(form) JO,e.g.(3).
(description) S proposes to H that H do A.
preparatory S believes that H can do A. condition)
(illocutionary S reflexively intends H to take the intention) utterance as a reason to do A.
The primary illocution of an expressive is:
Y: Asshole!
Fuck him!
[Tom is an asshole']
[ ^ 'You coputale with him'] (7)
(form) (description)
Anexpressiveidiom,
S is reacting to Q, i.e. something that has occurred.
S believes it appropriate to express a
But the following are imperative: Apologize to him for me. Congratulate her. Thank him.
Because the form of the utterance must be the star- ting point for H's interpretation of the utterance's meaning, it is reasonable to assume that mood ident- ifies the primary illocution of a clause, providing the base from which H can determine the illocutionary pointoftheutteranceinwhichthatclauseoccurs.So we shall consider the five moods of English, which have close parallels in other languages.
The generalized form of the primary illocution of a declarative clause is as follows:
<form> hO,orsimplyO,anassertoricsentence (fragment) such as (1) or Jack is bald. Frank loathes Harry. [Q: Who called? A:] Jack.
indicates
<description> S says that <I>. We refer to this as a
feeling).
(illocutionary S (reflexively?) intends the utterance
intention) to be taken as expressing a particular (sometimes perfunctory, sometimes
strongly felt) attitude toward Q. The primary illocution of a subjunctive is:
(form) j<I>(Visnonstandard,thereisnostan- dard symbol for the subjunctive), e.g., (4), or / wish I were rich. I wish I was rich. Would that I were rich. If Harry should call, tell him I'll be back this evening. Simaginesaworldinwhich4>.
statement.
S has reason to believe that 4>.
S reflexively intends the utterance to intention) be recognized as a reason for H to believe that S has reason to believe
that <D.
The generalized form of the primary illocution of an interrogative clause is:
<form> ?<D, e.g. (2), (5), or Will you mail this? What's the time? Would you pass me thesalt?(thelatter isalsosubjunctive,
indicates preparatory
condition)
indicates (illocutionary
The subjunctive environment is the complement of a verb or wishing or wanting, invoking the hypothetical world. In / wish I were rich the past tense form 'were' is also the subjunctive form, but the past tense itself is used to make the subjunctive in / wish I was rich— the tense of all (subjunctive) examples given above is semantically nonpast. A past tense subjunctive would be had been. Conditional i/marks a subjunctive clause when the proposition invokes a hypothetical world, so that should can be utilized in a paraphrase—e.g., If Harry should call, is a paraphrase of If Harry calls.
English interrogative subjunctives are restricted to requests with only four backshifted modals, cf. Would you mail thisfor me? Could you do me afavour? Might he be there by now? Should I write to him? They are all notably tentative which accounts for their use in polite contexts. They have the following properties:
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<description)
preparatory condition)
see below).
S asks H something. We refer to this as a request.
S has reason to believe that H can or might be able to respond appro- priately to what is asked in the utter- ance.
S reflexively intends the utterance to
<illocutionary
intention) be taken as asking H something.
(preparatory
condition) reactiontoJi(showingsomedegreeof
(description) (preparatory
condition)
(illocutionary intention)
S has no reason to believe that it is the casethatO;indeed,Smayknowitis NOTthe case that <t>.
S reflexively intends the utterance to be taken as a reason for H to believe that S does not believe that 4> and S reflexively intends H to consider the implications of $ in a world inwhich it is the case that <t.