From Utterances to Speech Acts

From Utterances to Speech Acts
Author: Mikhail Kissine
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 209
Release: 2013-03-14
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1107328349

Most of the time our utterances are automatically interpreted as speech acts: as assertions, conjectures and testimonies; as orders, requests and pleas; as threats, offers and promises. Surprisingly, the cognitive correlates of this essential component of human communication have received little attention. This book fills the gap by providing a model of the psychological processes involved in interpreting and understanding speech acts. The theory is framed in naturalistic terms and is supported by data on language development and on autism spectrum disorders. Mikhail Kissine does not presuppose any specific background and addresses a crucial pragmatic phenomenon from an interdisciplinary perspective. This is a valuable resource for academic researchers and graduate and undergraduate students in pragmatics, semantics, cognitive linguistics, psycholinguistics and philosophy of language.

The Cambridge Handbook of Pragmatics

The Cambridge Handbook of Pragmatics
Author: Keith Allan
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 967
Release: 2012-01-12
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1139501895

Pragmatics is the study of human communication: the choices speakers make to express their intended meaning and the kinds of inferences that hearers draw from an utterance in the context of its use. This Handbook surveys pragmatics from different perspectives, presenting the main theories in pragmatic research, incorporating seminal research as well as cutting-edge solutions. It addresses questions of rational and empirical research methods, what counts as an adequate and successful pragmatic theory, and how to go about answering problems raised in pragmatic theory. In the fast-developing field of pragmatics, this Handbook fills the gap in the market for a one-stop resource to the wide scope of today's research and the intricacy of the many theoretical debates. It is an authoritative guide for graduate students and researchers with its focus on the areas and theories that will mark progress in pragmatic research in the future.

From Utterances to Speech Acts

From Utterances to Speech Acts
Author: Mikhail Kissine
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 209
Release: 2013-03-14
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1107009766

This is naturalistic theory of when, how and why our utterances are interpreted as speech acts: assertions, orders or promises.

Speech Act Theory and Pragmatics

Speech Act Theory and Pragmatics
Author: John Searle
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 322
Release: 2012-12-06
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9400989644

In the study of language, as in any other systematic study, there is no neutral terminology. Every technical term is an expression of the assumptions and theoretical presuppositions of its users; and in this introduction, we want to clarify some of the issues that have surrounded the assumptions behind the use of the two terms "speech acts" and "pragmatics". The notion of a speech act is fairly well understood. The theory of speech acts starts with the assumption that the minimal unit of human communica tion is not a sentence or other expression, but rather the performance of certain kinds of acts, such as making statements, asking questions, giving orders, describing, explaining, apologizing, thanking, congratulating, etc. Characteristically, a speaker performs one or more of these acts by uttering a sentence or sentences; but the act itself is not to be confused with a sentence or other expression uttered in its performance. Such types of acts as those exemplified above are called, following Austin, illocutionary acts, and they are standardly contrasted in the literature with certain other types of acts such as perlocutionary acts and propositional acts. Perlocutionary acts have to do with those effects which our utterances have on hearers which go beyond the hearer's understanding of the utterance. Such acts as convincing, persuading, annoying, amusing, and frightening are all cases of perlocutionary acts.

Renewing Meaning

Renewing Meaning
Author: Stephen Barker
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 338
Release: 2004
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0199263663

At the birth of analytic philosophy Frege created a paradigm that is centrally important to how meaning has been understood in the twentieth century. Frege invented the now familiar distinctions of sense and force, of sense and reference, of concept and object. He introduced the conception of sentence meaning as residing in truth-conditions and argued that semantics is a normative enterprise distinct from psychology. Most importantly, he created modern quantification theory,engendering the idea that the syntactic and semantic forms of modern logic underpin the meanings of natural-language sentences. Stephen Barker undertakes to overthrow Frege's paradigm, rejecting all the above-mentioned features.The framework he offers is a speech-act-based approach to meaning in which semantics is entirely subsumed by pragmatics. In this framework: meaning resides in syntax and pragmatics; sentence-meanings are not propositions but speech-act types; word-meanings are not objects, functions, or properties, but again speech-act types; pragmatic phenomena one would expect not to figure in semantics, such as pretence, enter into the logical form of sentences; a compositional semantics is provided byshowing how speech-act types combine together to form complex speech-act types; the syntactic structures invoked are not those of quantifiers, open sentences, variables, variable-binding, etc., rather they are structures specific to speech-act forms, which link logical form and surface grammar veryclosely.According to Barker, a natural language - a system of thought - is an emergent entity that arises from the combination of simple intentional structures, and certain non-representational cognitive states. It is embedded in, and part of, a world devoid of normative facts qua extra-linguistic entities. The world, in which the system is embedded, is a totality of particular states of affairs. There is no logical complexity in re; it contains mereological complexity only. Some truths havetruth-makers, but others, logically complex truths, lack them. Nevertheless, the truth-predicate is univocal in meaning.Renewing Meaning is a radical, ambitious work which offers to transform the semantics of natural language.

Speech Act Theory and Communication

Speech Act Theory and Communication
Author: Phyllis Kaburise
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 195
Release: 2011-05-25
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 1443831263

Speech Act Theory: A Univen Study was undertaken to investigate the pragmatic value of the utterances of selected students at the University of Venda, South Africa. Utterances of second-language users of a language reflect the wealth of their language experiences and hence caution has to be exercised when conducting an investigation into such utterances. It is within this background that this investigation was conducted into the meaning-creation strategies and abilities of the participants in this study. The very idiocyncratic utterances investigated demonstrated vividly the multi-dimensional thought process exploited by the creators of these samples. Also demonstrated by the analyses is the nature of communication and the amount of linguistic interaction necessary for interlocutors to create meaning.

Meaning and Speech Acts: Volume 1, Principles of Language Use

Meaning and Speech Acts: Volume 1, Principles of Language Use
Author: Daniel Vanderveken
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 266
Release: 1990-09-28
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9780521374156

In Meaning and Speech Acts Daniel Vanderveken further develops the logic of speech acts and the logic of propositions to construct a general semantic theory of natural languages.

Expression and Meaning

Expression and Meaning
Author: John R. Searle
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 206
Release: 1979
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9780521313933

A direct successor to Searle's Speech Acts (C.U.P. 1969), Expression and Meaning refines earlier analyses and extends speech-act theory to new areas including indirect and figurative discourse, metaphor and fiction.

Speech Acts Across Cultures

Speech Acts Across Cultures
Author: Susan Gass
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
Total Pages: 357
Release: 2009-09-24
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 311021928X

This book investigates the notion of Speech Act from a cross-cultural perspective. The starting point for this book is the assumption that speech acts are realized from culture to culture in different ways and that these differences may result in communication difficulties that range from the humorous to the serious. Importantly, a recurring theme in this volume has to do with the need to verify the form, the function and the constraining variables of speech acts as a prerequisite for dealing with them in the classroom. The book deals with three major areas of Speech Act research: 1) Methodological Issues, 2) Speech Acts in a second language, and 3) Applications. In the first section authors discuss general issues of methodology and present data in an effort to detail the efficacy of different methodologies. Research clearly shows the effect of methodology on the results. This section is followed by a discussion of specific speech acts, including speech acts and strategy use that have as their goal the creation and maintenace of solidarity (i.e. greetings, compliments, apologies) and speech acts that involve face-threatening acts (i.e.complaints, favor-asking, suggestions). In the final section, authors consider applications of speech act research within the context of advertising and business relationships.

Essays in Speech Act Theory

Essays in Speech Act Theory
Author: Daniel Vanderveken
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 360
Release: 2002
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9789027250940

Any study of communication must take into account the nature and role of speech acts in a broad context. This book addresses questions such as: - What do we mean? - How do we say it? and - How is it understood? in the broad context of universal, socio-cultural and psychological issues that bear on human communication. It presents an overview of current issues in speech act theory that are at the center of human and social sciences dealing with language, thought and action, building on John Searle's famous article 'How Performatives Work' (included in this book). The contributions by linguists, psychologists, computer scientists, and philosophers thus address issues of communication that are crucial in conversation analysis, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, psychology and philosophy, and a general understanding of how we communicate. The book is suitable for courses with an extensive bibliography for further reading and an Index.