Perlocutive act
Perlocutive act or perlocutionary act , also perlocutive speech act and perlocution , is a term from the speech act theory according to Austin , which refers to the aspects of the effect of the speech act . In his speech act theory , John Langshaw Austin differentiates, among other things, between illocutive , locutive and perlocutive act.
Illocution - perlocution
In contrast to illocutions , which are the result of a linguistic act and thus coincide with its execution, perlocutions are consequences of a speech act that follow the execution. Usually, speech act theory speaks of performing illocutionary acts by expressing oneself and perlocutionary acts by expressing oneself.
Conventional versus causal perlocutionary aspect
A distinction must be made between conventional and causal perlocutionary aspects.
On the conventional aspect:
Here perlocutions are the specific ones, i.e. H. Effects assigned to illocutionary purposes. In fact:
- everyone who z. B. makes a message (= assertive illocution), expect to be believed,
- everyone who z. B. makes a promise (= commissive illocution), expect that it will now be expected that he will keep it,
- everyone who z. B. praises (= expressive illocution), expect that the promised will be happy about it,
- everyone who z. B. christening a ship (= declarative illegality), expect to accept the name and call it that from now on,
- everyone who wants another z. B. requests (= directive illocution) to do something, expect that the requested person wants to do what he was asked to do and ultimately does it.
Such aspects of effectiveness are conventionally covered by the illocutionary purposes.
On the causal aspect:
The question here is which perlocutionary act S (= speaker) performed and which perlocutionary effect S achieved for H (= listener). In German there are a number of verbs that can be used to refer to this aspect (for example, convince, surprise, persuade).
Perlocutionary effects can be divided into three classes: epistemic (with H a belief or the like is triggered), motivational (with H an intention is triggered) and emotional (with H an emotion is triggered). In any case, this is the result of the classification work by Staffeldt (2007).
criticism
Not all conventional utterances or speech acts can be properly assigned to certain illocutionary classes. So z. For example, there has been a debate in the literature about an assignment of “allowing”. On the one hand, allowing is an explicitly performative statement with which the addressee z. B. is legitimized to use a utensil. Pragmatically, the addressee is guaranteed greater room for maneuver, whereas this can be interpreted as commissiva. Rolf takes this view in his work Illocutionary Forces .
On the other hand, allowing is also a restriction of the speaker's action. By giving permission (e.g. to use a utensil), the speaker waives a right to sanction or undertakes to provide the utensil. This could be interpreted as a directive. Searle takes this view.
It can thus be seen that the speech act of allowing is neither prototypically commissive nor directive. The only logical conclusion from this would be the inclusion of a new speech act class, e.g. B. a legation in which, sorted according to degree of strength, (on) demand, legality, any rights of use are staggered and collected.
The so-called illocutive indicators are also problematic. While those indicators clearly indicate a speech act class, they do not clearly prove it.
literature
- Austin, John Langshaw: On the theory of speech acts (How to do things with words). Reclam, Stuttgart 1972, ISBN 3-15-009396-1 .
- Cohen, Ted (1973): Illocutions and Perlocutions. In: Foundations of Language 9 , pp. 492-503.
- Davis, Steven (1979): Perlocutions. In: Linguistics and Philosophy 3. pp. 225-243.
- Doerge, Friedrich Christoph (2001): Grice's communication and perlocutions. In: Linguistic Reports 188 (2001), pp. 441–458.
- Eyer, Peter: Perlocutions. Niemeyer, Tübingen 1987.
- Holly, W. (1979): On the concept of perlocution. In: German Language 7, pp. 1–27.
- Lee, Patricia (1974): Perlocution and Illocution. In: Journal of English Linguistics 8, pp. 32-40.
- Luge, Elisabeth (1991): Perlocutionary Effects. In: Journal for Germanistic Linguistics 19 (1), pp. 71–86.
- Rolf, Eckard (1982): Perlocutionary Acts and Perlocutionary Effects. In: Klaus Detering (ed.): Language and Understanding. Tübingen: Niemeyer, pp. 262-271.
- Sauer, Nicole (1998): Advertising - when words work. A concept of perlocution developed on advertisements. Münster, New York: Waxmann.
- Schlieben-Lange, B. (1974): Perlocution. In: Language in the Technical Age 52, pp. 319–333.
- Schlieben-Lange, B. (1976): Perlocution and Convention. In: Klaus Gloy, Gunter Presch (eds.): Sprachnormen III. Communication-oriented linguistics - language didactics. Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog, pp. 58-66.
- Staffeldt, Sven (2007): Perlocutionary Forces. Lexicalized effects of linguistic utterances in German. Frankfurt a. M .: Long.
- Sornig, Karl (1982): Persuasive Language Structures. In: Grazer Linguistic Studies 17/18, pp. 238–271.
- Zillig, Werner (1982): Emotions as perlocutionary effects. In: Grazer Linguistische Studien 17/18, pp. 317–349.
