Co czynią wypowiedzi pełniące funkcję sprawczą?

• Authors: Kępa-Figura Danuta

Title variants

EN

What do the causative utterances do?

• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

EN

The starting point is Austin’s remark that ‘’causation pertains not only to the listener’s physical actions but also to their reaction in the sphere of emotions and intellect’’. Performativity is a dimension that can be used to characterize any speech act, regardless of the formal shape of the latter . The article contains a proposal of describing performativity in various types of illocution. Therefore, it can be said that any illocution is causative because all utterances reveal a certain relationship between the speaker and the listener as well as cause a certain mental state in the latter. Consequences of illocution thus understood are identified with assumptions one must make for an utterance to be effective. The causativity of individual types if illocution (expressed by informative, expressive or suasive utterances) in this context is seen as the capacity to change internal or external reality. The difference between the causative convention is relevant or not. The causative force is strictly linked to the presence of convention. The conventional approach is employed with regard to utterances of a specific type (statements, inducements, expressive remarks, creations of parallel words) or to those that we perceive as such. This pertains not to one illocutionary utterance but also to each of them: each has a force that is peculiar to it. The article also contains a proposal to describe performativity in various types of illocution. In the case of suasion, the performativity (i) (when non-manipulatory) is connected with the “creation” of the conviction that the case is such as the speaker wants the listener to believe, adding that the “creation” of the conviction must perform what is contained in the suasive expression; or (ii) (when manipulatory) it is connected with the “creation” of a certain attitude or of the feeling of the necessity to perform a particular action, even without recognizing the reasons for a change in the listener’s mental state or the motivation for his/her actions. In the case of expressive intention – carried by utterances that implement the speaker’s will or judgment – performativity is linked to the consequences of the acceptance of the speaker’s opinion or will, the emergence of a certain outlook of the speaker and the “transfer” of emotion from the speaker onto the listener. The informative intention is connected with the creation (the listener) of the conviction that the utterance is true and has an emotional attitude towards the subject matter or the utterance and its author. Utterances with a creative function have a peculiar causative force because, to say that they create Something, obviates the need for the word to create to be included in inverted commas.

Keywords

PL

pragmatyka; akty mowy; intencje wypowiedzi; funkcja sprawcza

EN

pragmatics; speech acts; speaker’s intension; causative function

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Warmińsko-Mazurski w Olsztynie
• Journal: Prace Językoznawcze
• Year: 2012
• Issue: 14
• Pages: 119-134

Contributors

author

Kępa-Figura Danuta

• Lublin