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3rd YEAR PRAGMATICS (2)

AUSTINS DISTINCTION PERFORMATIVE vs CONSTATIVE

He found linguistics a fascinating subject how could one ever lose interest in it? As he
used to tell the first-year students in his introductory lecture of welcome, Language is
what makes us human, what distinguishes us from animals on the one hand and
machines on the other, what makes us self-conscious beings, capable of art, science, the
whole of civilization. It is the key to understanding everything. His own field was,
broadly speaking, discourse: language above the level of the sentence, language in use,
langue approached via parole rather than the other way round. It was probably the most
fertile and productive area of the discipline I recent times: historical philology was out
of fashion and structural and transformational linguistics had lost their allure since
people had come to realize the futility of trying to reduce the living and always changing
phenomenon of language to a set of rules illustrated by contextless model sentences
often invented for the purpose. Every utterance or written sentence always has a
context, is always in some sense referring to something already said and inviting a
response, is always designed to do something to somebody, a reader or a listener.
Studying this phenomenon is sometimes called pragmatics, sometimes stylistics.
Computers enable us to do it with unprecedented rigour, analyzing digitized databases
of actual speech and writing generating a whole new sub-discipline, corpus linguistics.
A comprehensive term for all this work is discourse analysis. We live in discourse as fish
live in water. Systems of law consist of discourse. Diplomacy consists of discourse. The
beliefs of the great world religions consist of discourse. And in a world of increasing
literacy and multiplying media of verbal communication radio, television, the Internet,
advertising, packaging, as well as books, magazines and newspapers discourse has
come more and more to dominate even the non-verbal aspects of our lives.[. ..]. To
understand culture and society you have to be able to analyse their discourses.
(David Lodge - Deaf Sentence)

2 types of Speech Acts (Austin: How To Do Things with Words: 1962):

1) CONSTATIVES state propositions about the world, describe existing states-of affairs
2) PERFORMATIVES- instate new realities by means of uttering certain propositions, create new
states-of-affairs

CONSTATIVES:

a. Its chilly today

b. Cabbage is rich in potassium
c. Valentines Day is celebrated on February 14 th

PERFORMATIVES:

a. I baptize this child John

b. I pronounce you husband and wife
c. I sentence you to life imprisonment
d. You are dismissed!

If speech is regarded as social action, utterances can be seen as significant acts on a social level, e.g.
accusations, confessions, denials, greetings, etc.
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The question arises: by what system do speakers know when such social moves are appropriate? A
further technical notion, that of felicity conditions, needs to be introduced in order to give a plausible
answer to this question.

Austin: 3 types of felicity conditions:

(i) There must be a conventional procedure having a conventional effect.

(ii) The circumstances and persons must be appropriate, as specified in the procedure.
iii) The procedure must be executed correctly and completely.

The FELICITY CONDITIONS of an illocutionary act are conditions that must be fulfilled in the
situation in which the act is carried out properly/appropriately/successfully.

e.g.: One of the felicity conditions for the illocutionary act of ordering is that the speaker must be
superior to, or in authority over, the hearer. Thus, if a servant says to the Queen Open the window,
there is a certain incongruity, or anomalousness, or infelicity in the act (of ordering) carried out, but if
the Queen says Open the window to the servant, there is no infelicity.
A felicity condition for the illocutionary act of accusing is that the deed attributed to the accused is
wrong in some way. Thus one can felicitously accuse someone of theft or murder, but normally only
infelicitously of being a nice guy or of helping an old lady to cross the road.

A SINCERITY CONDITION on an illocutionary act is a condition that must be fulfilled if the act is
said to be carried out SINCERELY, but failure to meet such a condition does not prevent the carrying
out of the act altogether.
e.g.
A sincerity condition on apologizing is that the apologizer believes that the thing apologized for is
wrong in some way. Thus, if John enters a room at a certain time, believing that to do so is wrong in
some way (e.g. impolite, tactless, sacrilegious) and he says Im sorry to come in here at this moment,
then he has apologized, and apologized sincerely. But if he says the same thing in the same
circumstances, except that he does not believe that what he has done is wrong in any way, then he has
still apologized, yet insincerely.

a sincerity condition the persons must have the requisite thoughts, feelings and intentions, as
specified in the procedure.

Violation of any of the felicity conditions unhappy or infelicitous performative or misfire.

e.g., a registrar or a priest conducting a marriage ceremony in an unauthorized place

a judge uttering I sentence you to life imprisonment not in court but in the shower

a president declaring war to another country otherwise than via the official procedures (e.g. during a
family picnic)

A command cannot be issued by a particular person of lower status or power to another particular
person of higher status or power.
A promise is usually issued in relation to some future act, while an apology indicates regret for a past
action Speaker feels responsible for.
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If the sincerity condition is violated, there is a case of abuse.

I promise to lend you all the money you need (when I dont have the slightest intention to do so or
when Im penniless)
I warn you that youll pay through the nose (when I know I am not in any position to sanction you
legally or otherwise)
I congratulate you for this s breath-taking performance (when I am not in the least pleased with the
performance in question)

Performatives usually contain a performative V

e.g.:a.I promise to take a taxi home.//b. I bet you 5 $ that hell be breathalysed.//I declare the meeting
open.//d. I warn you that legal action will ensue.//e. I name this ship The Flying Dutchman. // I
hereby bequeath you my estate.
UNLIKE *I hereby cook this cake.(cook is NOT a performative V, the cake is not cooked simply
because I say I cook it)
Explicit performatives vs implicit performatives:
1. begin with V in the 1st p. sing : I bet, I warn
2. the V belongs to a special class indicating the type of SA being performed : promise, invite, bet,
warn, pronounce, appoint, declare.
3. the performativity can be emphasised by inserting the Adv. hereby btw, I and the V.