Classes of Illocutionary Acts
Searle (1975) set up the following classification of illocutionary speech acts:
- assertives = speech acts that commit a speaker to the truth of the expressed proposition
- directives = speech acts that are to cause the hearer to take a particular action, e.g. requests, commands and advice
- commissives = speech acts that commit a speaker to some future action, e.g. promises and oaths
- expressives = speech acts that express on the speaker's attitudes and emotions towards the proposition, e.g. congratulations, excuses and thanks
- declarations = speech acts that change the reality in accord with the proposition of the declaration, e.g. baptisms, pronouncing someone guilty or pronouncing someone husband and wife
Read more about this topic: Illocutionary Act
Famous quotes containing the words classes of, classes and/or acts:
“There are two classes of men called poets. The one cultivates life, the other art,... one satisfies hunger, the other gratifies the palate.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“I have no doubt but that the misery of the lower classes will be found to abate whenever the Government assumes a freer aspect and the laws favor a subdivision of Property.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)
“Love and work are viewed and experienced as totally separate activities motivated by separate needs. Yet, when we think about it, our common sense tells us that our most inspired, creative acts are deeply tied to our need to love and that, when we lack love, we find it difficult to work creatively; that work without love is dead, mechanical, sheer competence without vitality, that love without work grows boring, monotonous, lacks depth and passion.”
—Marta Zahaykevich, Ucranian born-U.S. psychitrist. “Critical Perspectives on Adult Women’s Development,” (1980)