Between thinking and acting there is speaking. Some reflections on the nature of speech act
Abstract
This article investigates one of the main notions of pragmatic linguistics, namely, the theory of speech acts. Aleksandra Paliczuk analyzes relations between thought, word, and action. The project involves examining the structure of language and of its components through the ideas of different linguistic schools. It aims to answer the question posed in one of John L. Austin’s works, How to Do Things with Words (1955/1962). It endeavors to explain the capability or the possibility of understanding some words, expressions or sentences, even if their literal meaning differs from the intended one. This article defines the concept of the speech act, also in relation to the contemporary possibilities of communicating in the virtual world, and explains why it entails the three components of thought, word, and action. As a result, we find out that there are many complex relations regarding different human abilities and other forms of activity.
Keywords
semantics; pragmatics; cognitive linguistics; speech act; virtual reality
References
Aitchinson Jean (2002): Ziarna mowy. Początki i rozwój języka. Trad. di M. Sykurska-Derwojed. Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, Warszawa.
Austin John Langshaw (1955/1962): How to Do Things with Words. Clarendon Press, Oxford.
Austin John Langshaw (2002): Come fare cose con le parole. Trad. di C. Vilatta. Marietti S.p.A., Genova.
Bartmiński Jerzy (1999): Punkt widzenia, perspektywa, językowy obraz świata. In: Językowy obraz świata. A cura di J. Bartmiński. UMCS, Lublin, pp. 103–120.
Bloomfield Leonard (1974): Il linguaggio. Trad. di F. Antinucci, G. Cardona. Il Saggiatore, Milano.
Chomsky Noam (1957): Syntatic Strustures. Mouton The Gruyter, Berlin–New York.
Dardano Maurizio (2002): Manualetto di linguistica italiana. Zanichelli, Bologna.
De Saussure Ferdinand (1916): Cours de linguistique générale. Payot, Lausanne, Parigi.
Evans Vyvyan (2009): Leksykon językoznawstwa kognitywnego. Trad. di M. Buchta, M. Cierpisz et al. Universitas, Kraków.
Fauconnier Gilles (1985): Mental Spaces. MIT Press, Cambridge (Mass.).
Fauconnier Gilles (1997): Mappings in Thought and Language. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (Mass.).
Fauconnier Gilles, Turner Mark (1998): Conceptual Integration Networks. “Cognitive Science”, Vol. 22 (2), pp. 133–187.
Fillmore Charles (1976): Frame Semantics and the Nature of Language. “Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences”, pp. 20–32.
Fillmore Charles (1982): Frame Semantics. In: Linguistics in the Morning Calm. Selected Papers from SICOL-1981, The Linguistic Society of Korea (ed.), Hanshin Publishing Co., Seoul.
Fisiak Jacek (1975): Wstęp do współczesnych teorii lingwistycznych. WSiP, Warszawa.
Fodor Jerry A., Katz Jerrold J. (eds.) (1964): The Structure of Language. Reading in the Philosophy of Language. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs (NJ).
Grzegorczykowa Renata (2002): Wprowadzenie do semantyki językoznawczej. PWN, Warszawa.
Hjelmslev Louis (1943): I fondamenti della teoria del linguaggio. Trad. e introduzione di G.C. Lepschy (1968). Einaudi, Torino.
Katz Jerrold J., Fodor Jerry. A. (1963): The Structure of a Semantic Theory. “Language 39”, pp. 170–210.
Katz Jerrold J., Postal Paul M. (1964): An Integrated Theory of Linguistic Descriptions. The MIT Press, Cambridge (Mass.).
Langacker Ronald W. (1987): Foundations of Cognitive Grammar. Theoretical Prerequisites. Vol. 1. Standford University Press, Standford.
Langacker Ronald W. (2008): Cognitive Grammar. A Basic Introduction. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Lakoff George, Johnson Mark (1980): Metaphors we live by. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
Lepschy Giulio C. (1996): La linguistica del Novecento. Il Mulino, Bologna.
Sapir Edward (1921): Language. An Introduction to the Study of Speech. Harcourt, Brace & Co., New York.
Searle John R. (1969): Speech Acts: Essay in the Philosophy of Language. University Press, Cambridge (Mass.).
Searle John R. (1992): Atti linguistici. Saggio di filosofia del linguaggio. Trad. di G. R. Cardona. Boringhieri, Torino.
Tabossi Patrizia (2002): Intelligenza naturale e intelligenza artificiale. Il Mulino, Bologna.
Whorf Benjamin (1956): Language, Thought & Reality. MIT Press, Cambridge (Mass.).
Yule George (2002): Introduzione alla linguistica. Trad. di G. Bernini. Il Mulino, Bologna.
Zingarelli Nicola (2007): Vocabolario della lingua italiana. Zanichelli, Bologna.
University of Silesia in Katowice Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9759-4882
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
The Copyright Owners of the submitted texts grant the Reader the right to use the pdf documents under the provisions of the Creative Commons 4.0 International License: Attribution-Share-Alike (CC BY-SA). The user can copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose.
1. License
The University of Silesia Press provides immediate open access to journal’s content under the Creative Commons BY-SA 4.0 license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Authors who publish with this journal retain all copyrights and agree to the terms of the above-mentioned CC BY-SA 4.0 license.
2. Author’s Warranties
The author warrants that the article is original, written by stated author/s, has not been published before, contains no unlawful statements, does not infringe the rights of others, is subject to copyright that is vested exclusively in the author and free of any third party rights, and that any necessary written permissions to quote from other sources have been obtained by the author/s.
If the article contains illustrative material (drawings, photos, graphs, maps), the author declares that the said works are of his authorship, they do not infringe the rights of the third party (including personal rights, i.a. the authorization to reproduce physical likeness) and the author holds exclusive proprietary copyrights. The author publishes the above works as part of the article under the licence "Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International".
ATTENTION! When the legal situation of the illustrative material has not been determined and the necessary consent has not been granted by the proprietary copyrights holders, the submitted material will not be accepted for editorial process. At the same time the author takes full responsibility for providing false data (this also regards covering the costs incurred by the University of Silesia Press and financial claims of the third party).
3. User Rights
Under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license, the users are free to share (copy, distribute and transmit the contribution) and adapt (remix, transform, and build upon the material) the article for any purpose, provided they attribute the contribution in the manner specified by the author or licensor.
4. Co-Authorship
If the article was prepared jointly with other authors, the signatory of this form warrants that he/she has been authorized by all co-authors to sign this agreement on their behalf, and agrees to inform his/her co-authors of the terms of this agreement.
I hereby declare that in the event of withdrawal of the text from the publishing process or submitting it to another publisher without agreement from the editorial office, I agree to cover all costs incurred by the University of Silesia in connection with my application.
