Sari Kusumaningrum (NIM 13020211400015)

Yessi Aprilia Waluyo (NIM )

SPEECH ACT

Austin (in Mey, 1993: 110-112) said that in conveying utterance, someone is also doing

an “act”. It means that in expressing what they feel, someone not only produce an utterance that

has grammatical and word structure, but also they create an act by saying that utterance. This act

can be in the form of promising, ordering, apologizing, thanking, and so on.

Austin (in Mey, 1993: 110-112) divided the action performed by producing an utterance

will consists of three related acts that is produced by the speaker. Those \three related acts are

locutionary act, illocutionary act, and perlocutionary act.

1. Locutionary act

Locutionary act can be defined as the act of saying something. It means that the utterance

we produce is the basic act of utterance, or producing a meaningful linguistics

expression.

2. Illocutionary act.

Basically, when we produce an utterance, we don’t just produce well-formed utterance

with no purpose. We form an utterance with some kind of function in our mind. This is

that we call illocutionary act. We might utter something to make statement, to request, or

to apologize.

3. Perlocutionary act

It is an utterance that’s produced by the speaker to arouse an effect to the hearer by

saying something. So we create an utterance simply not only saying something without

intending any effect.

We can see this example to explain more about locutionary act, illocutionary act, and

perlocutionary act.

(1) It is raining outside

The locutionary act is the statement that at that time, there was raining outside.

1

The illocutionary act from that utterance can be varies, for example the speaker at

that time when saying that utterance, he/she denies an invitation, or asks someone

to bring an umbrella.

The perlocutionary act from that utterance will be, someone will bring an

umbrella or someone will cancel the invitation.

Of these three dimension, the most discussed is illocutionary force. Indeed, the term

“speech act” is generally interpreted to mean the illocutionary force of an utterance. The same

locutionary act can count as some different analysis, and it will represent the different

illocutionary force.

(2) I’ll see you later.

The illocutionary act from the utterance number (2) can be a prediction, a warning, or

a promise.

The problem that we face now is that, how can the hearer know which illocutionary act is

represented by the utterance above? That question has been addressed by considering two

things, those are Illocutionary Force Indicating Devices and felicity condition.

IFIDs

IFIDs mean some device to distinguish which illocutionary act which is meant by the speaker. It

is used by the hearer. If the illocutionary act is explicitly shown at the utterance, it can be called

performative verb.

Example: I promise you that….. I warn you…..

The utterance above can be very clear to the hearer., because the verb promise and warn

are explicitly show the illocutionary force. But sometimes, speakers don’t always perform their

speech act so explicitly, but they sometimes describe the speech act being performed., like this

dialog:

A: Can I talk to Marry?

B: No, she’s not here.

A: I am asking you__ can I talk to her?

B: And I am telling you___SHE’S NOT HERE!

2

In the dialogue above, both of the speaker describe the illocutionary act of their utterance. But if

there is no performative mentioned, we can use other IFIDs to identify that utterance. Other

IFIDs which can be identified are word order, stress, and intonation, as shown in the different

versions of the same basic element below.

(3) a. You’re going! (I tell you that you are going)

b. You’re going? (I request confirmation about you are going)

c. Are you going (I ask you if you are going)

Meanwhile, we can use other devices to distinguish the illocutionary act such as lower

the intonation, or maybe use the higher tone of our voice, indicating that we are angry.

Felicity Conditions

Felicity conditions are certain expected or appropriate circumstances, it means that this

condition for the performance of a speech act to be recognized as intended. We can see in this

example below:

I sentence you to six months in prison

The utterance above is appropriate if the speaker has a profession as a judge (when he/she in a

court room). If the speaker isn’t a judge, then it won’t be appropriate.

There are some precondition on speech acts in everyday context among ordinary people,

they are:

1. General condition on the participants

It means that the participant of the conversation can understand the language being used

and they are not playing acting, or being nonsensical.

2. Content conditions

In order to count as a particular type of speech act, an utterance must contain certain

features.

3

For example: for both a promise and warning, the content of the utterance must be about

a future event. A further content condition for a promise requires that the future event

will a future act of the speaker.

3. Preparatory conditions

Specific requirement prior to an utterance in order for it to count as a particular speech

acts.

4. Sincerity condition

Requirements on the genuine intention of a speaker in order for an utterance to count as a

particular speech act.

5. Essential condition

In performing speech act, a requirement that the utterance commits the speaker to the act

performed.

Performative Hypothesis

Performative Hypothesis is a proposal that underlying every utterance, there is a clause

with a verb that identifies the speech act.

Explicit performatives: a speech act containing a performative verb.

Implicit performatives: a speech act without a performative verb.

Speech Act Clasiification

Generally, there are five types of functions performed by speech act

1. Declarations

Declarations are those kind of speech acts that change the world via their utterance.

a. Priest: I now pronounce you husband and wife.

b. Referee: you are out!

c. Jury Foreman: we find that the defendant guilty.

In using declarations, the speaker changes the world via words.

4

2. Representatives

Representatives are those kinds od speech acts that state what the speaker believes to

be the case or not.

a. The earth is flat

b. Agatha Christie didn’t write about Evolution.

c. The weather is nice today.

3. Expressives

Expressives are those kinds of speech acts that state what the speaker feels. They

express psychological states and can be statement of pleasure, pain, likes, dislikes, joy

or sorrow.

a. I am really glad to hear that.

b. Sorry for that accident.

c. Well, it’s great idea I think.

4. Directives

Directives are those kinds of speech acts that speaker use to get someone else to do

something. They express what the speaker wants. They can be in the form of

commands, order, request, suggestions.

a. Please pas me the salt.

b. Could you lend me your book?

c. Don’t turn on the lamp.

5. Commissives

Commisives are those kinds of speech acts that the speaker use to commit themselves

to some future action. They express what the speaker intend. They can be in the form

of promises, threats, refusal, pledges.

a. I’ll be back as soon as possible.

b. I am going to go dinner with her.

c. We will not accept that letter.

5

Direct and Indirect Speech Act

When we produce an utterance, there will be two possibilities of the form of the

utterance. It can be in the form of direct speech act and indirect speech act. Whenever there is a

direct relationship between a structure and a function, we call it as a direct speech act. Whenever

there is an indirect relationship between a structure and a function, then we have an indirect

speech act.

So, if we produce a declarative sentence that is used to make statement, that is a direct

speech act. But, if we produce a declarative to make a request, that is an indirect speech act. See

this example below.

a. It’s cold outside.

b. It is hot in here.

c. The music is too loud.

All of the utterance a-c is declarative sentence. When it is used to make a statement, it is

functioning as direct speech act. But when it is used to make a command or request, it is

functioning as indirect speech act.

Different structure can have a same function, like in the example below. The speaker

wants the addressee not to stand in front of television.

a. Move out the way!

b. Do you have to stand in front of the TV?

c. You’re standing in front of the TV.

d. You’d make a better door than a window.

All of the utterance has same function, that is the speaker wants the addressee not to

stand in front of the TV. But, only the sentence in (a) is imperative that represent direct speech

act, while the others is an indirect speech act.

In English, there are some common types of indirect speech act which has the form of

interrogative but it is not typically used to ask a question, it means that when we produce the

interrogative form, we don’t expect only an answer, but we also expect action.

6

a. Could you pass the sugar?

b. Would you open this for me?

c. Do you mind not smoking here?

Indirect speech acts are generally associated with greater politeness in English than direct

speech act.

References

Levinson, S. C. 1994. Pragmatics. London : Cambridge University Press.

Mey, Jacob. L. 1993. Pragmatics : An Introduction. Oxford : Blackwell.

Yule, George. 1996. Pragmatics. Oxford : Oxford University Press.

Searle, John R. 1969. Speech Act. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

7