LINGUIST 2E03 Study Guide - Final Guide: Pope Leo X, J. L. Austin, Personal Bankruptcy
15 Sep 2016
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
When you say certain things you are doing things. Example: when you are apologizing, you are expressing your regret: often people don"t feel you have apologized until you say the words. By saying something you are performing an act eg. i"m sorry as an apology. Performative speech acts: by saying things you"re performing an action. Taught oxford students a rigorous style of philosophizing based on language analysis. Presented his speech act theory in his 1955 lectures at harvard. Austin"s ideas were further developed by john searle. Austin"s work can be seen as a reaction to some traditional attitudes to language: That the basic sentence type in language is declarative (ie. a statement or assertion) That the principal use of language is to describe states of affairs (by using statements) That the meaning of utterances can be described in terms of their truth or falsity. Often we say sorry not because we feel responsible but it"s such a typical response.
