English Grammar

A University Course

Third Edition

Chapter 4

Chapter 4 Interaction between Speaker and Hearer (Explanatory material)

The very basic speech acts are the following: making a statement; asking a question; issuing a directive (an order, advice, request, etc.); making an exclamation. See the Summary to Unit 13 and the two diagrams that follow.

  • 4.13.1 ! Brain-Teaser: What do we do with words? J. L. Austin’s book is titled How to Do Things with Words. Make a few guesses.
  • 4.13.1(2) Identify the clause type (declarative, interrogative, imperative, exclamative) in each of the following.
  • 4.13.2 Do the clause types in 1 correspond to their typical basic speech act in each case? If so, they are direct speech acts. What, then, is the ‘force’ of each of the above speech acts? (The force is the speaker’s intended meaning.)
  • 4.13.3 What are speakers doing in the sentences below? Use your imagination and assign an appropriate speech act (such as thanking, apologising, advising, etc.) to each of the following (special punctuation is omitted).
  • 4.14.1 Insert a finite element in each of the following blanks.
  • 4.14.2 Identify each of the following clauses as either a Yes/No interrogative or a wh- interrogative.
  • 4.14.3 Provide suitable yes/no answers to the following questions.
  • 4.14.4 Provide suitable yes/no questions to the following three replies and wh- questions to the last two.
  • 4.14.5 Add a tag to each of the following and a response.
  • 4.14.6 Add a copy tag, and the typical BrE tag as short responses to the following.
  • 4.15.1 Make an exclamative clause from the following statements.
  • 4.15.2 What do the following examples prove regarding the subject of an imperative clause?
  • 4.15.3 Insert Let’s, Let us or Let in the following sentences. Remember also that let (allow) has let as imperative. Decide which is correct.
  • 4.15.4 Adjust the following verbless clauses so that they become complete sentences.
  • 4.16.1 Which of the following utterances are explicit performatives and which are not?
  • 4.16.2 Would you consider each of the following to be ‘performing the act it names’?
  • 4.17.1 One of the commercial airlines used to show a board with the following words: If you’re late, we won’t wait. What kind of speech act is this?
  • 4.17.2 Add an attitudinal marker from the list to each of the following statements so that they are tactful questions (I hear, so, then, of course, surely).
  • 4.17.3 What is the force of each of these utterances? Provide a suitable context.

Chapter 4: Essay Practice

In pairs, or alone, write a role-play using a series of speech acts, both direct and indirect, on one of the subjects below.

Further reading:

  • Grundy, P. (1995) Doing Pragmatics, New York: E. Arnold. Chapter 5.

Subjects:

  • a) You need a testimonial from your tutor in order to apply for a grant at a foreign university. Your tutor’s letter, in English, must reach that university in no more than a fortnight. Approach your tutor, either in writing or face-to-face, and politely ask if he or she will provide the testimonial.
  • b) Someone has repeatedly been scrawling graffiti on the wall of your house. One day you unexpectedly catch him/her in the act. You decide to complain.
  • c) You are at the annual staff party and inadvertently spill black coffee onto the General Manager’s clothes. You have to apologise.