Vietnam National University, Hanoi

University of Languages and International Studies

Faculty of post-graduate studies

Discourse Analysis
Week 8: Article review

Group 11: Nguyễn Minh Yến - 19045246

Kiều Thị Khánh Huyền - 19045222
Lý Anh Thư - 19045241
 The article title

Ma, X. (2016). A case study on characters in Pride and

Prejudice: From perspectives of speech act theory and
conversational implicature. International Journal of
English Linguistics, 6(4), 136-143.
 Main content

1. Introduction
Literature review
Method
Findings and discussion
Conclusion
Group’s evaluation
 1. Introduction

• Purpose of the study (p. 137, sec. 2):

- To make an investigation into the 2 characters in Pride and Prejudice
from speech act theory and conversational implicature perspectives.
- To facilitate and increase readers’ understanding and appreciation of
the characters and the literature works.
- To enrich and develop the applications of DA in literature works.
- To examine the enlightenment of effective and creative approaches in
literature college movie English audio-visual-oral course teaching.
 2. Literature review

2.1 Performatives and Speech Acts (p. 137, sec. 3.1)

- Performative indicates all types of utterances can be said to perform
acts which are called speech act.
- Any speech act comprises at least two, and typically three sub-acts:
+ the locutionary
+ the illocutionary
+ the perlocutionary acts
(Austin, 1962; Searle, 1969)
2. Literature review (p. 137, 138 sec. 3.1)

Direct speech act Indirect speech act

we do mean exactly what we say
Explicit performatives
have performative verbs
we intend something which quite
different from the literal meaning
of what we say
Implicit performatives
do not contain an expression
naming the act

(Searle, 1969, 1975)

 2. Literature review

2.2. Classification for Illocutionary Acts (p. 138, sec. 3.2)

Four classificatory criteria Five classes of illocutionary acts

(1) Illocutionary Point (1) Representatives

(2) Direction of Fit (2) Directives
(3) The Expressed Psychological State (3) Commissives
(4) Propositional content (4) Expressives
(5) Declaratives

(Searle, 1975)
 2. Literature review

2.3. Conversational Implicature (p. 138, sec. 3.3)

Discover how speakers know how to generate these implicit meanings,
and how they assume that their addressee will reliably understand their
intended meaning (Grice, 1975).

2.4. Cooperative Principle (Grice, 1975) (p. 138, sec. 3.4)

Quantity Maxim Quality Maxim
Relation Maxim Manner Maxim
 3. Method

3.1 The data (p. 138, sec. 4):

- Pride and Prejudice was the most striking and popular masterpiece,
which was first written in 1796 as First Impressions, and was rewritten
and retitled in 1812 and published in 1813.
- The work uses humorous language, especially in conversation.
- It narrated ironically the love story of Elizabeth - a charming young lady
of middle, and Darcy - a rich but very arrogant young man of upper-
class.
 3. Method

3.1 The data (p. 138, sec. 4):

- The data is collected through documentation technique to analyze the
dialogue between the two main characters of Pride and Prejudice.
- The two main character Darcy and Elizabeth are being observed at the
same priority to achieve the data needed with the focus of using
speech acts and conversational implicature in literature.
 3. Method

3.2. Research design

This study uses qualitative method since the data used were obtained from
the extracted conversations set in Pride and Prejudice.

descriptive qualitative method was employed within the analysis of this

study for it is necessary to describe the analysis (of the extracted
conversation) after doing the prerequisite steps before going with the
conclusion using the theories that have been discussed.
 3. Method

3.3 Data analysis (pp. 138-140, sec. 4.1)

- The data is categorized into types of indirect/ direct speech act,
implicit/ explicit performatives, four types of illocutionary act and the
flouting of maxims.
- The researcher uses manual coding method to calculate the ratio of
main categories.
- The researcher interprets data by giving comment on the results of the
main categories.
4. Findings and discussion
 4. Findings and discussion
Darcy made more indirect speech Elizabeth’s utterances are more direct
acts than Elizabeth, especially kind ⇒ express her disagreement, denial,
directives: refusal and hostile aggression towards
⇒ to express his courtesy towards Darcy.
Elizabeth and maintain his good
manners in embarrassing
situations
⇒ it is impossible to make a direct
request towards a young lady who
had not good feelings to him
 4. Findings and discussion
Darcy uses direct speech acts more
in the later part:
⇒ defend his dignity after suffering
constant ironical criticism and
hostile reaction
Most of Elizabeth’s direct utterances
are ironical representatives:
⇒ show her stubborn and narrow-
minded personalities.
⇒ demonstrate her sarcastic,
unfriendly, aggressive and hostile
attitude towards Darcy
⇒ make the listener accept the
implicit prepositional content and
believe it is true
 4. Findings and discussion

Implicit performatives account for the

major ratio in both characters’ utterances

reveals both of them are well-educated, implicit and

expert at making veiled remarks in the conversation.
 4. Findings and discussion
Overall discussion

• irony makes the conversation go on smoothly

• hedges are used to adhere to the cooperative principles
• Elizabeth’s flouting of maxim brings about the conversational implicature

implicature illocutionary force is actually fully fulfilled

conversational implicatures are conveyed successfully
 5. Conclusion
- The image of the characters in a particular context in this literary work
has been demonstrated successfully in terms of these two approaches
in DA.
- Further research:
+ facilitate and increase reader’s knowledge and appreciation of the
literature work
+ invoke inspiration to improve literature and college movie English
audio-visual-oral course teaching methods to motivate the learning
initiative of the students and cultivate learners’ communicative
competence in practice.
 6. Group’s evaluation

6.1 Replicability
a case study

in-depth study

no replicability

the results cannot be generalized in other literature works

 6. Group’s evaluation

6.2 Reliability
Internal reliability
HIGH
The analyses of the data is
consistent within the concepts of
speech acts and conversational
implicature.
External reliability
LOW
The researcher is the only coder in
the coding data process. Other
coders may give different evaluation
for the same extracted conversation.
 6. Group’s evaluation

6.3 Possible biases and errors

- Researcher bias: The researcher may give bias evaluation on the data
basing on his personal perspective and understanding.
- Data processing error: It may happen in the manual coding process.
- Sample selection error: author’s bias, no explanation → extracted
conversation may not be a representative for the whole novel.
 6. Group’s evaluation

6.4 Limitations
It is difficult to control the quality of the analyses because:
- Most of the conversational implicature is elicited by the researcher’s
understanding.
- The results of the study is drawn mostly from the researcher’s personal
coding.
- The researcher did not interpret any analyses of flouting maxims in the
results.
 6. Group’s evaluation

6.4 Limitations
Method:
- It takes time to code the data manually and it is hard to analyze 31
utterances. Moreover, 31 utterances in the conversation cannot fully
demonstrate the characteristics of the two main figures.
- The researcher’s personal coding may not have high accuracy.
 6. Group’s evaluation

6.5 References and Appendix

- All the references are fully cited with the appendix which extracts the
conversation analyzed.
- There is only appendix A and no appendix B.
 References

1. Ma, X. (2016). A Case Study on Characters in Pride and Prejudice: From

Perspectives of Speech Act Theory and Conversational Implicature. International
Journal of English Linguistics, 6 (4), 136. doi: 10.5539/ijel.v6n4p136
2. Brown, G., & Yule, G. (1983). Discourse analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
3. Schiffrin, D. (1994). Approaches to Discourse. Blackwell Textbooks in Linguistics,
Oxford: Blackwell.
4. Fairclough, N. (1989). Language and power. London: Longman.
5. Grice, H. P. Logic and conversation in (eds.) P. Cole & J. Morgan Syntax and
semantics 3: Speech acts. New York: Academic Press, 1975
 Thank you
for listening!