Think of an occasion when someone has said something and it has gone wrong or not had the effect that they intended. Explain what was said, and what happened in terms of the locutionary, illocutionary, and perlocutionary acts involved.
jpikle
comu1010-2013-performatives-and-maxims.pdf
Performatives and Maxims!
Dr. Sean Rintel! School of Journalism and Communication!
COMU1010 2013! The Art of Communication!
A “red herring” is a colloquial reference to a distraction!
When you see the “red herring”, I am asking you to question an assumption!
Assumptions about messages!
A: Hello! B: Hello!
How can we explain this talk?!
• Communication is the transmission and reception of information! – But what ‘information’ is contained in “Hello”?!
• Statements describe information with a true or false valence! – What does “Hello” describe and can it be ‘true’ or
‘false’?!
• Statements make sense in terms of grammar! – “Hello” can be a ‘sentence’, but who cares?!
Assumptions about messages!
We! do!
things! with words!
Speech Acts (“Performatives”)!
• Greeting: Hello! • Commanding: Make the bed!! • Marrying: I do • I now pronounce you…!
• Promising: I’ll never drink again!! • Naming: I name this ship the HMAS Rambo Amadeus!!
• Betting: Wanna bet? • You’re on!!
Words that change the world!
Speech Act: “Commanding”!
• Performatives are not just verbs!
• They have three layers:! – Layer 1: The locutionary act!
– Layer 2: The illocutionary act!
– Layer 3: The perlocutionary act!
Three layers of Speech Acts!
• Layer 1: The locutionary act! – The words used to express the action! • I bet you… versus Ten to one…!
– provide the base sense and strength of the action! • E.g. Suggesting versus ordering!
• Make the bed!! – Make the bed! – Intonation and volume can provide strength, but
so can added words (e.g. I order you to…) !
Three layers of Speech Acts!
• Layer 2: The illocutionary act! – The direct and intentionally proposed action! • E.g. Assertives; directives; commissives; expressives;
declarations (From Searle, 1979)!
– Have conventional or expected force! – Have a scale of failure to success!
• Make the bed!! – Illocution: A directive (a command or order)! – Conventional force: Directive will be followed!
Three layers of Speech Acts!
• Layer 3: The perlocutionary act! – The indirect psychological or social expectations
or effects of the action! • E.g. Persuading; impressing; antagonising!
– May be intentional or unintentional! • Make the bed!! – Perlocution: Intimidation! – Intentional (Establishes the chain of command)!
Three layers of Speech Acts!
• Explicit performatives (some talk)! – Action named in the utterance, felicity is assumed! • I order you… or I bet you…! • Military talk (from The Hurt Locker): Beginning a
question with Interrogative…!
Explicitness and Implicitness !
The Value of Explicitness!
• Implicit performatives (most talk)! – Action and felicity circumstantially determined.! • There’s a bull in the field (Could be an
order not to go in or a report about the field)!
• I’ll be there (You or I might take it as a promise)!
Explicitness and Implicitness !
• Felicities! – What needs to be/occur for a performative to
work/count!
• Infelicities! – The things that can be wrong and/or do go wrong
with performatives, so that they don’t work/count!
Making Speech Acts Work!
• Misfires (Act not achievable or achieved)! – Not accepted conventional procedure! – Not appropriate persons and circumstances! – Not executed correctly! – Not executed completely!
• Abuses (Act botched or void)! – Not executed faithfully (‘not believed in’)! – Post-act conditions do not persist!
Austin: Six problems of infelicity!
Meaning! is!
cooperative!
Grice: Implicature and Cooperation!
A: What’s the time?! B: Sorry, I don’t ! have a watch!
How can we explain this talk?!
• Understanding goes beyond language.! – What a speaker says may be distinct from what
they meant! – What is said is rarely all that is meant! – Literal meaning may be/seem irrelevant! – Some utterances may have more than one
meaning! – Meaning is not always the same!
Grice: Implicature!
• Conventional implicature! – Meaning that is in the language itself, without
considering the context! • Even KEN knows it’s unethical!
– Entails (‘Base meaning’): Ken knows it’s unethical !
– Conventionally implicates: Ken is the least likely to know that it’s unethical!
– You do not need to know Ken, or anyone else, to understand the meaning!
Grice: Implicature!
• Conversational implicature! – Meaning can be contextually dependent! • A: What’s the time? B: I don’t have a watch!
– Entails: Person B does not have a watch available!
– Conversational implicature: Lacking a watch means that I can not tell you the time!
– But how do we get from A to B?!
Grice: Implicature!
• Conversational implicatures arise because we tend to be cooperative and expect cooperation in meaning! – A: What’s the time? B: I don’t have a watch!
• Cooperation in this case: ! – I am not fulfilling your request! – BUT! – I am explaining why I can not do so!
Grice: The cooperative principle!
• Conversational implicatures arise because we tend to be cooperative and expect cooperation in meaning!
• Cooperation does not mean getting along with the other person or having shared goals!
• An argument requires cooperation of meaning but not cooperation of goals!
Grice: The cooperative principle!
• Supermaxim: Make your contribution true.! 1. Do not lie. So, NOT! – A: What’s the time?
B: Five o’clock (at seven o’clock)!
2. Do not respond without evidence. So, NOT! – A: What’s the time?
B: Five thirty-five, twenty-seven seconds (when you have an analogue watch)!
Grice: Four maxims: Quality!
1. Give enough information!
2. Do not give too much information! – A: What’s the time?
B: Five fifteen!
– NOT!
– A: What’s the time? B: Five 35 and 27 seconds on April 28 2010, Year of the Tiger, Age of Aquarius.!
Grice: Four maxims: Quantity!
1. Fit utterances to the situation! – A: What’s the time?
B: Five (May be no need to specify AM or PM)!
– NOT!
– A: What’s the time? B: In what language?!
Grice: Four maxims: Relevance!
• Sub-supermaxim: Be clear! 1. Avoid obscurity! 2. Avoid ambiguity! 3. Be brief! 4. Be orderly!
Grice: Four maxims: Manner!
Grice: Four maxims: Manner!
• A response can follow (“observe”) all maxims!
• A: Where can I get petrol? B: There’s a garage just around the corner.! – Cooperative: Quality: Assume truth! – Cooperative: Quantity: Informative but not
overdone! – Cooperative: Relevance: Garages have petrol,
around the corner is close! – Cooperative: Manner: Clear, short, orderly!
Three kinds of cooperation!
A response can violate one or more maxims, troubling the meaning! • A: Where can I get petrol?
B: From a dinosaur?! – Violating Relevance: Response does not deal
with the practical issue and thus is not helpful! – Not cooperating still has meaning: Humour
(the light side); lying (the dark side). Can be deliberate/non-deliberate, known/unknown by hearer!
Three kinds of cooperation!
A response can flout one or more maxims, requiring inference to find meaning! • A: Can we play on the Wii?
M: Is your homework done?! – Flouting of Relevance: Response does not
respond to the proposal to play! – But assume cooperation: “Read between the
lines” to find a meaning that shows the response to be cooperative. In this case, the proposal to play is being made contingent upon completion of homework!
Three kinds of cooperation!
We! do!
things! with words!
Speech Acts (“Performatives”)!
Meaning! is!
co-operative!
Grice: Implicature and Cooperation!
