Here in this article writer analysed a Sindhi ghazal of Shaikh Ayaz with Speech act theory of J.L Austan and J.R Searle

1. Name SuhailJamali
Topic SpeechactanalysisofSindhi
Ghazal
Class BS-English(III)Linguistics
Institute UniversityofSindh
Jamshoro

2. Outline
1) Abstract
2) Preliminaries of theory
-Introduction
-Austin’s speech acts
-Searle’s speech acts
-Direct speech acts
-Indirect speech acts
3) Introduction to poet
4) Ghazal
5) Analysis of Ghazal with speech act theory
6) References
Abstract
Meaning is an important part of Semantics and
Pragmatics. To understandaddresser’s message, context
is most important of all. But, here question arises that,
how we can come to know that Which is hidden meaning
and which is surface meaning! The answer of this

3. question explained by Sadock (1974)and according to
him “speech act analysis elaborateeither meaning is
hidden or surface.” So, Speech act theory is the solution
of problemand by the analysis of it we can overcome
problems of surface meaning as well as hidden meaning.
Prelaminaries of Theory
When we teach or say anything to anyone, we use
pragmatics. Pragmatics is the study of speaker meaning,
or study of meaning according to context is pragmatics.
Whereas, Speech act theory is belong to pragmatics. This
theory was developed by oxford philosopher J.L Austin
in his series of lectureswhich he gave at Harvard. These
lectures were subsequentlydeveloped in 1962 as “How to
do things with words.” This theory further contributed
by J.R Searle.
This theory states that when we speak, we perform
certain type of actions, or in otherwords, when we utter
words, phrases, clauses or sentenceswe perform actions.
Austin & Searle belive by ‘saying’ we are ‘doing’.
There are two types of speech acts that Austin & Searle
differently defined. We discuss them below as Austin’s
speech acts & Searle speech acts.

4. Austin’s speech acts
According to J.L Austin, there are three types of
speech acts that we are said to perform when we speak.
He named them as: Locutionaryact, Illocutionaryact &
Perlocutionaryacts.
1) Locutionaryacts are the acts of saying something
that make sense in language. In locutionaryacts
words are uttered in grammatical sequence.
2) Illocutionaryacts are performed through the medium
of language. These are acts of stating, warning,
promising and so on.
3) Perlocutionaryacts are the effects of illocutionary
convincing, detering, misleading and so on.
To summarize all these acts we can differentiate them
as, the locutionaryand illocutionaryacts are ‘saying’
& ‘doing’ respectively. Whereas, perlocutionaryis
the effect of ‘doing’.
Searle’s speech acts
J.R Searle is the second philosopherwho joined
hands with Austin to further elaborateSpeech act theory.
According to him there are various types of speech acts.

5. Out of them five important speech acts are: Assertives,
Directives, Comissives, Expressives & Declaratives.
Assertives/Representatives
These are acts of fact & tell us either utteranceis true
or false. Their function is to tell speakers’ intention to
listener.
Directives
Utterances intended to get someone to do something.
Their function is to direct addressee to do something.
Comissives
Utterances that comitting someone to do something in
the future. Or, it makes speaker commit to do something
in the future.
Expressives
These are the utterancesthat express speaker’s
attitude.
Declaratives
These are the utterancesthat effect listeners actual
state of affairs.
Direct speech acts

6. When an interrogative structure is used to ask
question or perform the function of question, that is said
to be direct speech act. Or, in other words, we do not
know something & want to know from someone else &
in that order we ask question from him/her that is said to
be a direct speech act.
Indirect speech act
When we use a syntactic structure associated with
question but perform the function of request, that is
called an indirect speech act. For example: Can you
please pass this chair to me?
Introduction to the poet
“Shaikh Ayaz”
Shaikh Ayaz is one of the major voices of twentieth
century poetry. His literary career spanned almost six
decades & displayed an amazing variety of poetry &
prose, ranging from traditional bait, wa’i, and ghazal, to
play in the verse, prose poems, and even musings, and
extending to fiction, memoirs and journals, polimicl and

7. literary essays, newspaper article and editorials. To each
genre he brought his unique vision and transforming
power of language.
Mubarak Ali Shaikh well known as ‘Shaikh Ayaz’ was
born in March 1923 at Shikarpur, Sindh, Pakistan. He
was one of the prominent poet of Sindh. He wrote
several Books on poetry. But, his translation of ‘Shah jo
Risalo’ from Sindhi to Urdu language is considered as his
best of work of all.
Introduction to Ghazal
Ghazal is a poetic form which has its origin in
Arabic. General but unconnected observations or
descriptions were made to get the audience to
concentrate on the main theme of an ode or Qasida
which meant either praise or satire of a person, tribe or
place.
In these introductory lines acquired a status of
indepedent of the ode & came to be called Ghazal,
derived from ghizal or Arabian deer.
Ghazal

8. They have died without their death, thousands of men
not me alone
In this world, O my country, thousands have turned to
silly not me alone
All night long eyes did not close and dew fell drop by
drop
If the morning cups its hand, then o prison,
there will be thousands, not me alone.
Why does the moon fill the world with poison
When will it be the last hour of the night,
Thousands wonder, not me alone.
If you say so, I will neither tremble nor cry
But let me ask you: how many will you silence
Proclamations are thousands, not me alone.
This period too, Ayaz, will pas and our luck will turn
This fire will rage all the more,
Possibilities are thousands, not me alone.

9. Analysis
Table: 01
Speech act detection
No Snetence Act
1 They have died without their death Declarative
2 Thousands of men, not me alone Assertive
3 In this world, O my country, thousands
have turned to silly, not me alone
Declarative
4 All night long eyes did not close & dew
fell drop by drop
Expressive
5 If the morning cuos its hand, then O
prison
Exprssive
6 There will be thousands, not me alone Assertive
7 Why does the moon fill the world with
poison
Expressive
8 When will it be the last hour of the Declarative

10. night, thousands wonder, not me
alone
9 If you say so, I will neither tremble nor
cry
Commissive
10 But let me ask you: how many will you
silence
Direct
speech act
11 Proclamations are thousands, not me
alone.
Assertive
12 This period to, Ayaz, will pass & our
luck will turn
Declarative
13 This fire will rage all the more Expressive
14 Possibilities are thousands, not me
alone.
Expressive
1) First line of ghazal is ‘declarative’ because poet
conveys that their death is declared. But in real they
are not died, instead due to sadness their actual
state of affair is changed.
2) Second is an ‘assertive’ because poet is aware about
fact of those of thousands of men.
3) Third line of ghazal is again ‘declarative’because
their actual state of affairs changed from normal
men to silly.

11. 4) This line is expressive because it expresses situation
of poet at that time.
5) Again it is an expressive act because poet expresses
that their will be more rebels then me.
6) This sentence is ‘Assertive’ because Poet know the
fact of thousands.
7) This is an ‘Expressive’ because Poet expresses
concern about moon.
8) Act is an ‘Assertive’ because Poet tell readers about
a fact that will happen.
9) This act is a ‘Commissive’ because here poet commit
to be silent.
10) This is a ‘direct speech act’ because poet ask
from opressor about the number of people whom he
will silent. But poet do not know the exact number.
11) This is an ‘Assertive act’ because Poet is aware
about fact of proclamations.

12. 12) This act is ‘declarative’ because change of luck
can change the actual state of affairs.
13) This sentence is also ‘declarative act’ because
fire will change the actual state of affair of opressor.
14) This is an ‘expressive act’ because writer
expresses his thoughts about possibilities.
Table: 02
Result of Ghazal Analysis
No Speech acts Count Total Percent
1 Expressive 5 14 35.71%
2 Declarative 4 --- 28.57%
3 Expressive 3 --- 21.42%
4 Directive 0 --- ---
5 Commissive 1 7.1%
6 Direct speech
act
1 --- 7.1%
7 Indirect Spech
act
0 --- ---

13. Total 14 Percentage 99.9%
Conclusion
It has been concluded that Ghazal can be analyzed
pragmatically similarly to other texts of drama and novel.
That the distribution of speech acts is random, there is
no significant pattern that embraces the selected ghazal.
References
[1] A Pragmatic Analysis of Implied meaning in Selected
Poems by T.S. Eliot and Al-Sayya.
[2] A Speech act analysis of Short stories by Sahar
Altikriti.
[3] Speech act theory from Handouts by Sir Mubarak Ali
Lashari.
[4] English for undergraduate by D.H. Howe, T.A.
Kirkpatrick & D.L. Kirkpatrick.

14. [5] Speech act theory from ‘The study of Language’
George Yule (4th
edition)
[6] www.wikipedia.org
[7] www.thoughtco.com