Pragmatics Lecture 4 PDF

Lecture 4 J.L. Austin  The 'father of pragmatics'  Austin is the person who is usually credited with  generating interest in what has since come to be known as pragmatics. Austin was not a linguist at all but a language  philosopher, working at Oxford University in the 1940s and 1...

Lecture 4 J.L. Austin  The 'father of pragmatics'  Austin is the person who is usually credited with  generating interest in what has since come to be known as pragmatics. Austin was not a linguist at all but a language  philosopher, working at Oxford University in the 1940s and 1950s. Austin's ideas on language were set out in a  series of lectures which he gave at Oxford University. After Austin's sudden death in 1960, the  lectures were brought together in book entitled ―How to do things with words‖. The book had a great impact on pragmatics.  1) Austin and his group observed that ordinary  people manage to communicate extremely effectively and unproblematically with language just the way it is. 2) Austin was interested in the way ordinary  people use language in everyday life.  3) Austin was convinced that we do not just use language to say things (to make statements), but to do things (perform actions). 4) It was this conviction which eventually led  him to a theory of what he called illocutionary acts , a theory which examines a)what kinds of things we do when we speak,  b)how we do them and c) how our acts may 'succeed‗ or 'fail‗.  Austin‘s Speech Act Theory involves three  main notions: 1) Distinction between constatives and  performatives 2) abandoning the distinction (all utterances  are performatives--- (distinguish between explicit & implicit performatives) 3) utterances can perform 3 kinds of acts:  a) locutionary  b) illocutionary  c) perlocutionary   DISTINCTION BETWEEN CONSTATIVES AND PERFORMATIVES To utter something – either orally or in writing –  is to do something. The act of speaking , is first and foremost , an act. Speech act is the type of act the S intended to  perform by means of an utterance. Example  I’m cold  a) could be an observation about the weather  b) a request to bring a blanket  c) a question about the thermostat setting  Austin was interested to  know how we interpret the sort of act the S intended to perform by means of his utterance. Austin's first step in How to do things with words  was to show that some utterances have no truth conditions. He observed that some utterances are amenable to analysis in terms of truth conditions while others are not. Examples  1) She walked out of the room  2) I have pets at home  1 & 2 can be evaluated in terms of their truth  conditions. 1 is only true if she did walk out of the room in question. 2 is true if the speaker has pets at home. Other utterances are not statements or questions  but actions, a conclusion he reached through an analysis of what he termed 'performative verbs. Examples  1)Thank you, Emma  Such utterances cannot be assigned truth  conditions or truth value. They are not truth- evaluable utterances. The utterance‘ thank you’ itself performs the act of thanking. It cannot be said that the utterance is true if and only if Emma is thanked. 2) I promise to come  In 2, we cannot say that the utterance is  untrue. In uttering 2, the speaker performed the act of promising. Nevertheless, we can respond to this speaker saying ― I don‘t believe you‖ , which questions the speakers good intentions but not the truthfulness of his utterance. 3) I bet you a pound that Harry will fall off the  ladder. In 3, the utterance is a bet not a statement  about betting. It is no sooner said than done. The saying and doing are inseparable. The saying is the doing. To understand what is meant by a performative  verb, compare these four sentences: (i) I drive a white car.  (ii) I apologize  (iii) I name this ship The Albatross.  (iv) I bet you £5 it will rain  Syntactically the four sentences are similar:  1) all are in the first person,  2) declarative (rather than, say, interrogative),  3) indicative (as opposed to the subjunctive, for  example), 4) active (rather than passive)  5) in the simple present tense.   Pragmatically, the first sentence (I drive a white car) is  very different from the other three. Sentence (i) is a statement (what Austin called 'constative') and it is a simple matter to establish empirically whether or not the statement is true. In fact my car is a metallic grey colour, and if you  discovered this fact and heard me utter sentence (i), you could contradict me by saying: 'That is not true, your car is silver'.  (ii) I apologize  (iii) I name this ship The Albatross.  (iv) I bet you £5 it will rain.  In the case of the sentences (ii)-(iv) it makes no  sense at all to respond to them by saying: That is not true'. This is because the verbs in sentences (ii)-(iv) do not  make statements (which can be judged true or false) but belong instead to a class o f utterances called 'performatives', which cannot be judged true or false, but are best understood as performing an action. The utterance performs the very act that the sentence describes. In uttering the words I apologize, I do not make a  statement, I perform an act, the act of apologizing. The apology can be appropriate or  inappropriate (felicitous/infelicitous) if the person who is apologizing is not in fact sorry and that the apology is not sincere but rather is being performed sarcastically. We could not say the apology is false. Example  'I apologize,' said Angus, unapologetically  One useful (but not infallible) test for a  performative verb is to see whether you can meaningfully insert the adverb hereby between subject and verb: Hereby means ― by means of this‖, ―by virtue  of this‖. In the context of an utterance , it means by virtue of this utterance.    With performative verbs  1)I hereby apologize  2)I hereby name this ship The Albatross  3) I hereby bet you £5   With constatives  4) *I hereby drive a white car  The utterances in ( 1,2&3) sound a bit formal  and are acceptable. However, if we insert hereby into (4) a constative, it makes no sense for constatives , whose utterance does not bring about the act they describe.  Although (1,2,& 3) are all instances of  performatives, yet they are not quite the same in nature. Example 1  It is probably the least problematic: once I  have uttered the words I apologize no one can deny that I did apologize (even though you may suspect that my apology is insincere). Example 2  2)I hereby name this ship The Albatross  If I sneak up on the cruise ship The Queen  Elizabeth II at dead of night as it lies in dry dock and, smash a bottle of Guinness against the hull and re-name it The Albatross'? Must it henceforward be known by everyone  as The Albatross? Constatives Performatives Descriptive statements Perform actions Analyzed in terms of truth- not analyzed in terms of truth-values values/ truth conditions But in terms of felicity conditions( appropriateness & adequacy) can be true or false Can be successful or unsuccessful Felicitous/ infelicitous Declarative utterances Do not express a state of affairs expressing some state of affairs Ex: she walked out Ex: I apologize to Mr. Baker It does not describe an act of apologizing but rather performs the act of apologizing Metalinguistic performatives  These are the most straightforward examples of  performatives. Like all performatives 1)they are self-referential (the verb refers to what  the speaker of the utterance is doing), 2) self-verifying (they contain their own truth  conditions) 3) and non-falsifiable (they can never be untrue).  In any language there is probably a fairly small  and certainly finite set of metalinguistic  performatives. I say I withdraw (my complaint)  I protest I declare (the meeting open)  I object I plead (not guilty)  I apologize I vote (to abolish vivisection)  I deny I move (that exams be abolished)  I promise I thank (the audience for their  attention) Compare the following pairs of sentences (the  performatives appear in boldface)  (iv) a: I object to the licensing hours being  extended (iv) b I do not want the licensing hours to be  extended (v)a I apologize for deceiving the auditors  (v) b I'm sorry I deceived the auditors  All the a sentences are self-verifying, all the b  sentences are subject to truth conditions.  We would expect (iv) b to be produced by  speakers who are opposed to the extension of licensing hours. All we can say for sure about the speakers of  (iv)a is that they have formally opposed something. In a similar way people seem intuitively to respond differently to  (v)a I apologize... and to (v) b I’m sorry Example ... During the miners' strike in Britain (1984/5), the miners' leader,  Arthur Scargill, was ordered to apologize to the court or face sequestration of union funds. He was interviewed afterwards and asked whether he regretted his  actions (in refusing to tell the auditors where his Union's funds were located). With a smile he replied: 'I said I apologize, I didn't say I was sorry!‗  I have shown this response to a number of native speakers of  English and most seem to agree that I apologize often sounds like something one says for form's sake, that it is less sincere than I‘m sorry. But by the end of the meal Angus is  genuinely sorry for his rudeness and says: 'You must forgive me, Miss Green.'  Although all performatives are self-verifying,  there is a difference between metalinguistic performatives and the rest. 1) Metalinguistic performatives as well as  always being true, are, in addition, always felicitous or successful. 2)They do not appear to depend on any  external conditions for their success. :  The following example illustrates beautifully the  unfalsifiability of metalinguistic performatives : Norman Tebbit, Conservative Secretary of State  for Employment, made the following utterance: 'I predict that unemployment figures will fall by  one million within a year.' Roy Hattersley, deputy leader of the Labour  Party, commented later on BBC Radio: 'Notice he said "I predict they will fall" and not  "they will fall". That means when next year comes and they haven't fallen, he will have a let out!' The same automatic guarantee of  successfulness does not apply to 'ritual' performatives, nor to my third category, 'collaborative performatives. Example : renaming a ship  Austin observed that it would make no sense to  respond to such an act of renaming the QE II, The Albatross, by saying: 'That is not true!‗, yet it would be perfectly reasonable to say: You have no right to do that!' Austin observed that although performatives  are not subject to truth conditions, yet they can 'go wrong'. If the 'felicity conditions' are not observed (as  in the case of my renaming the ship), the performative may be infelicitous (or they may 'fail' or be'unsuccessful'). Felicity conditions apply particularly to  performatives associated with various rituals or very formal events. Unlike metalinguistic performatives (which have  no felicity conditions) 'ritual performatives' are highly culturally dependent. Examples of such ritual performatives  (i) I sentence you to ten years'...  (ii) I absolve you from your sins  (iii) I baptize you...  (iv) I name this ship  Each of these can only appropriately and  successfully be uttered by a specified person in a specified situation (e.g. (i) by a judge in a court of law, (ii) by a priest, etc.) Austin stated his felicity conditions as follows (1962: 14-  15): A : (i) there must be a conventional procedure having  a conventional effect, (ii) the circumstances and persons must be  appropriate. B: The procedure must be executed (i) correctly, (ii)  completely.  C: Often  (i) the persons must have the requisite thoughts,  feelings and intentions and  (ii) i f consequent conduct is specified, then the  relevant parties must do it.   Let us take each felicity condition in order.  Condition A  (i) In a given culture (or sub-culture) there will  probably be a conventional procedure for a couple to get married. In Britain this involves a man and a woman,  who are not debarred from marrying for any reason, presenting themselves before an authorized person (minister of religion or registrar), in an authorized place (place of  worship or registry office), at an approved time (certain days or times of  day are excluded) accompanied by a minimum of two witnesses. There they must go through a specified form of marriage: the marriage is not legal unless certain declarations are made and unless certain words have been spoken. ii) The condition that 'the circumstances and  persons must be appropriate' explains why my naming of The Albatross was unsuccessful or infelicitous — I was not the person mandated by the shipping company to perform the launching ceremony, nor were the time and place appropriate. Condition B  (i) The procedure must be executed correctly.  At a marriage ceremony (in Britain), for example, (at least in theory) the words have to be the precise ones laid down — a rough approximation will not do: Example 8  Vicar: Will you take this woman...?  Groom: Absolutely! I mean, I will.  Note that something which means the  same as I will, will not do. Those precise words have to be used. (ii) The procedure must be executed  completely. Part of the procedure under English law is that  the person conducting the wedding and the couple getting married must sign the register before witnesses. At a wedding I attended when I was at University, the priest (who was very distracted) and the couple somehow forgot this part. Hours later (in fact, when the couple had already left ,the priest came banging on their door, telling them their marriage wasn't legal! 2.4.3  Some performatives do not have felicity  conditions in the sense that a specified person must utter the words in particular circumstances, but nevertheless their success is not guaranteed. They require, for their success, the  'collaboration‖ or particular uptake of another person, as in the following example: Example 10  Menzies Campbell, an opposition M.P., had  challenged the Minister of Defence using the performative 'I bet you Mr. Riftkind declined to take up the bet  As the report makes clear, a bet or wager is  only successfully made when the other person accepts it Examples:  I bet/wager you five pounds...  I challenge you to pistols at dawn  As with a bet, a challenge is only successfully  made when the other person accepts the challenge. And, in English law (it might well be different under other legal systems). Some performatives are either commonly or  necessarily produced by more than one person, e.g. 1) a communique from a summit conference,  2)a report from a committee  3) a verdict from a jury (in the high court the  judge responds to the statement by the foreman or forewoman of the jury by asking: 'And is that the verdict of you all?').  Group performatives may fall into any of the  three preceding categories. Example 11  *We three Fossils... vow to try and put our name  in history books because it's our very own and nobody can say it's because of our grandfathers. Example 12  This example is taken from the findings of the  General Medical Council Disciplinary Committee: We do not judge you to be guilty of professional  misconduct. Note that the performative in example 12  is only successful when performed on behalf of the entire committee — the views of one member of the committee would carry no weight; unlike example 11, example 12 can only be successfully performed by the group. we can find crosscultural differences in the range  and the use of performatives. This is particularly so in the case of performatives  relating to culturally-specific rituals. Obviously, if you live in a country/culture which does not have baptism, there will be no performative form I baptize you... Or the verb may exist, but cannot be used performatively. This is the case with the verb to divorce: in Britain  divorce exists, and we have a verb to divorce, but(no matter what your religion) you cannot felicitously use the utterance I divorce you to separate yourself legally and permanently from your spouse. And even in countries where Sharia law operates, its interpretation may vary.  This example also illustrates the fact that a  performative which in one language/culture is subject to felicity conditions (e.g. the requirement that the performative be  uttered with serious intent) in another language/culture may be subject to no such conditions   THE END THANK YOU