Speech Acts

Speech acts are common in everyday communication. When people speak, they perform certain acts. Speech act theory, which concerns the actions performed by means of language, is one of the key aspects of pragmatics. It was first introduced by the philosopher John L. Austin in How to Do Things With Words and further developed by John R. Searle, also a philosopher. Austin suggested that language can be used not just to say things but also to do things. In different social and cultural contexts, people use their native language and/or other languages to communicate with one another to achieve specific purposes. The concept of speech act plays a crucial role in language studies. Studies on speech acts are important to the understanding of communication among ...