Speech act is a part of pragmatics where there are certain aims beyond the words or phrases when a speaker says something. Speech acts are acts that refer to the action performed by produced utterances. Through speech acts, the speaker can convey physical action merely through words and phrases.

1. SPEECH ACTS
AND EVENTS
DIYAH ISTIQAMAH
1852142009
ENGLISH LITERATURE “B”

2. SPEECH ACTS
“A speech act is an utterance that serv
es a function in communication.”
We perform speech acts in everyday li
fe by:
• Greeting
• Apologizing
• Requesting
• Complaining and so on…
The cultural differences are also
important while performing a speech
act.
http://www.carla.umn.edu/speechacts/definition.html

3. THE NATURE OF SPEECH ACTS
APOLOGY COMPLAINT COMPLIMENT REQUEST
PROMISE
INVITATION

4. LOCUTION / ILLOCUTION / PERLOCUTION
Distinction between the following:
The words that are uttered or written.
Locution
01
The speaker’s or writer’s intention.
Illocution
02
The intended effect.
Perlocution
03
Archer, D. and Grundy: p.12

5. ILLOCUTIONARY FORCE INDICATING DEVICE (IFID)
“An expression from an utterance which contains a slot to put a verb that explicitly named the
illocutionary act being performed.”
The verb called performative verb (Vp)
(Vp) you that…
“I’ll see you later.”
• I warn you that I’ll see you later.
• I promise you that I’ll see you later.

6. FELICITY CONDITIONS IN SPEECH ACTS THEORY
In speech act theory, felicity conditions are the conditions which must be fulfilled for a speech act to be
satisfactory performed or realized. In other words, in order for an utterance to achieve its illocutionary force,
certain conditions must be met. These conditions relate to the conversational and situational context and roles,
abilities and beliefs of the speaker and listener.

7. PERFORMATIVE
HYPOTHESIS
“The performative hypothesis is the
hypothesis (proposed in Ross 1970), that
every sentence is associated with an
explicit illocutionary act, i.e. is derived
from a deep structure containing a
performative verb.”
www.glottopedia.org

8. THE DIFFERENCES
BETWEEN DIRECT
SPEECH ACTS AND
INDIRECTS SPEECH
ACTS
Yule (1996) state that Direct
Speech Act will
happen if there is direct
relationship between the
structure and the function of
the utterance. Meanwhile,
Indirect Speech Acts will
happen if there is indirect
relationship between the
structure and the function of
the utterance.

9. SPEECH EVENT
“Speech Event”
A Speech Event can
be defined by a
unified set of
components through
out: same purpose of
communication same
topic same
participants same
language variety
(generally).
For example:
exchanging greetings,
telling jokes, giving
speeches.
“How does it differ
from speech act?”
Actions performed via
speaking are called
speech acts. ...
Concerning this, both
speaker and hearer are
usually helped in this
process by the context or
circumstances (speech
events), which surround
the utterance. Changing
the context, the same
utterance can be
Interpreted as two or more
kinds of Speech acts.

10. THE LEADING PROPONENTS OF SPEECH ACT THEORY
AND HOW DO THEY DEFINE AND CLASSIFY SPEECH ACT
• The speech act theory was introduced by Oxford
philosopher J.L. Austin in “How to Do Things with Words
and further developed by American philosopher J.R.
Searle. It considers the degree to which utterances are
said to perform locutionary acts, illocutionary acts,
and/or perlocutionary acts. (www.thoughtco.com)
• Speech acts can be classified into five categories as
Searle in Levinson (1983: 240) states that the
classification are representatives, directives,
commissives, expressive, and declarations.
(https://media.neliti.com)
Speech Act Theory

11. Thank you