Riassunto esame lingua inglese, prof. Heaney, libro consigliato The language of Speech and writing, Cornbleet, Carter

THE LANGUAGE OF WRITING

the relationship between supporting features and the language is very close, the visual image sets up

expectations in the reader of what language to expect and the features are part of the language, they renforce

the message. (ex advertisement).

Writing a letter:

• Informal: Context- reply, introductory; Purpose- chat, invite, express sympathy; Receiver: friend,

relative.

• Formal: C-office report; P-complain, request, inform; R-customer, company, employer.

THE LANGUAGE OF SPEAKING

We often save time by cutting down on language where possible, by using contractions, and ellipsis: all this

(is) just for you.

Lexis: English tend so use simple words based on anglosaxon origins rather than latin origin (start-

commence), we use core vocabulary (small,happy) rather than extreme words (minuscule, ecstatic), we use

more grammar words and verb phrases than noun phrases. st

Indirectness: ex: I wondered if you had any free tourist literature=please send me some free tourist… the 1

expression is indirect because it elicits the response ‘yes’. The indirect utterance risks of not being

understood, sometimes we need to be more direct in order to achieve our purposes but there’s a compromise

in order to give offence unintentionally (politeness principle!).

Directness and indir. are limited to the spoken language.

The real time nature of conversation produces:

• Pauses

• Flase starts

• Hesitation

• Fillers

The lexis tends to be:

• Simple

• Verb-based

• General

• vague

(slides) SPEECH ACTS

Speech Events may also include Speech Acts. J.L Austin observed that ‘many utterances do not

communicate information, but are equivalent to actions, e.g.

• I apologise…’

• I promise….’

• ‘I will….’ (at a wedding)

• ‘I name this ship….’

Austin called such utterances performatives, which he saw as distinct from statements that convey

information (constatives).

• I christen/name this ship The Queen Elisabeth (performative).

• Maurice Garin won the Tour de France in 1903 (constative)

Performatives cannot be true or false.

• Explicit performatives are performative utterances that contain a performative verb that makes

explicit what kind of act is being performed.

I promise to come to your talk tomorrow afternoon.

• implicit performatives are performative utterances in which there is no such verb.

I’ll come to your talk tomorrow afternoon.

Other common Speech Acts are: apology, promise, agreement, acceptance, advice, suggestion, warning,

requests, betting ,to second, to vote, to abstain.

Searle’s Five Categories of Speech Acts:

• Representatives: the speaker is committed in varying degrees to the truth of a proposition:

e.g. ‘affirm’, ‘believe,’ ‘conclude’, ‘report’;

I think the Berlin Wall came down in 1989

• Directives: the speaker tries to do something

e.g. ‘ask’, ‘challenge’, ‘command’, ‘request’.

Pass me the towel, will you?

• Commissives: the speaker is committed in varying degrees, to a certain course of action,

e.g. ‘bet’, ‘guarantee,’ ‘pledge’, ‘promise’ ‘swear’.

That’s the last time I’ll waste my money on so- called bargains

• Expressives: the speaker expresses an attitude about a state of affairs,

e.g., ‘apologise’, ‘deplore’, ‘thank’, ‘welcome’-

Well done, Elisabeth!

• Declarations: the speaker alters the status quo by making the utterance,

e.g., I resign, you’re offside’, ‘I name this child’, ‘you’re nicked’, ‘you’re busted, punk.’

The three stages of a (successful) speech act

• the locutionary act or the locution: the act of communication by the production of an utterance;

• the illocutionary act or illocution: in other words, that is the message that is transmitted, which

may not always correspond to the literal meaning of the words;

• the perlocutionary act: that is the particular effect of the utterance, which does not necessarily

correspond to the locutionary act.

Ex:

• Locutionary act ê (and that is enough for today)

• Illocutionary act éê ( students make preparations to quit the room)

• Perloctionary act êé(you realise that a change has occurred)

The person performing the speech act has to have authority to do so – only certain people are authorised to

perform certain speech acts;

the speech act has to be performed in the appropriate manner (sometimes this involves respecting precise

wording), this can also include the demeanour

sincerity conditions have to be present: the speech act must be performed in a sincere manner: verbs such as

promise, vow, or guarantee are only valid if they are uttered sincerely.

So a speech act like ‘and that is enough for today’ can only be taken as a declaration that the lesson has

ended if:

• I have the authority to perform the speech act;

• If the hearers are in a position to perform the required action;

• And if there is sincerity.

If any of these conditions is lacking, then the hearers will deduce that they have to make a different

interpretation of the speech act.

The three basic sentence types (declarative, interrogative, imperative) are typically associated with the three

basic illocutionary forces:

• Declarative: asserting/ stating;

• Interrogative: asking/questioning;

• imperative: ordering/requesting

Difference between direct and indirect speech acts

• A direct match between a sentence type and an illocutionary force, equals a direct speech act.

• In addition, explicit performatives, which happen to be in the declarative form, are also taken to be

direct speech acts, because they have their illocutionary force explicitly named by the performative

verb in the main part of the sentence.

• If there is no direct relationship between a sentence type and an illocutionary force, it indicates an

indirect speech act.

• When an explicit performative is used to make a request it functions as a direct speech act; the same

is the case when an imperative is employed. By comparison, when an interrogative is used to make a

request, we have an indirect speech act.

(slides) COOPERATIVE PRINCIPLE:

4 Maxims of the cooperative Principle :

These ‘rules ‘ of conversation were first formulated by the Paul Grice (1975) as the Co-operative

Principle. This states that we interpret the language on the assumption that a speaker is obeying the four

maxims (known as Grice’s Maxims) of:

• 1 QUALITY (BEING TRUE)

• 2 QUANTITY (BEING BRIEF)

• 3 RELATION (BEING RELEVANT)

• 4 MANNER (BEING CLEAR)

3. Relation. Key to the maxim of relation is the notion of coherence. Coherence is not something that

exists in language, but something that exists in people. It is people who ‘make sense’ of what they read

and hear. They try to arrive at an interpretation that is line with their experience of the way the world is.

Ex:

Her: That’s the telephone

• Him: I’m in the bath

• Her: OK

• He expects her to understand that his present location makes it impossible for him to act on her

speech act (directive)

• There are no cohesive ties in this fragment nevertheless both interactants make sense of what the

other says. Certainly a knowledge of Speech Acts is involved:

• She makes a request of him to perform an action

• He states the reasons why he cannot comply with the request

• She undertakes to perform the action

Grice argues that although speakers, usually choose to co-operate, they can also refuse to abide by that

principle, or, in other words, flout it.

If a maxim is deliberately broken, it is normally done so to achieve a very specific effect and communicate a

specific meaning, known as a conversational implicature, in other words, the special meaning created when

a maxim is flouted.

Listeners can deduce not only the literal meaning, but the pragmatic meaning, namely, what the producer is

doing or intending with the words, even when their literal meaning may be quite different. Understanding

how people communicate is actually a process of interpreting not just what speakers say, but what they

‘intend to mean’.

Grice argues that when speakers appear not to follow the maxims they expect hearers to appreciate implied

meanings. We call this flouting the maxims. (flouting=farsi beffe)

Flouting means that the speaker implies a different function from the literal meaning of the words used.

• Flouting quantity: Flouting quantity involves giving either too much or too little information. A

Well, how do I look? –B Your shoes are nice… (XD)

• Flouting quality: Flouting quality can be done in a variety of ways; some of the most common are:

Exaggeration, I’m starving, I could eat a horse Metaphor: My house is a refrigerator in winter.

Irony violates quality by saying the opposite of what we mean, i.e. the words are the opposite of

intended meaning. Irony is often used in a friendly fashion Sarcasm is a less friendly and frequently

used to make criticisms. It is normally obvious because of the gap between what is said and what is

meant, ex:Ah, undercooked potatoes again. Yummy! Banter: expresses a negative sentiment and

implies a positive one. The Linguist Leech called it ‘ an offensive way of being friendly. It is

common between friends, longstanding colleagues and teammates and partners. It can often be used

to tease and flirt. It can often take the form of abusive or offensive language. Naturally it can

backfire if the hearer of banter doesn’t recover the conversational implicature.

• Flouting relation: If speakers flout the maxim of relation, the expect hearers to infer or imagine

what the utterance did not say.

A: So what do you think of Mark?

B: His flatmate’s a wonderful cook.

In this case, the speaker, by not mentioning Mark in the reply, and hence by being irrelevant, she implies

that she didn’t think very much of him.

• Flouting manner: this very frequently takes the form of obscurity or ambiguity; quite often it

can be used to exclude another interactant.

A Where are you off to?

B I was thinking of going to get some of that funny white stuff for someone.

A Ok, but don’t be long – dinner’s nearly ready.

Unlike flouting, violating maxims means that the speaker knows that the hearer will not recover the

implicature and will only see the surface truth. In other words the hearer will take the words at face value and

act accordingly.

• Violating the maxim of quantity means deliberately providing insufficient informa