Philosophy and the Lyric

2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Lamarque
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Language ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Lyric Poetry ◽  
Full Range ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
Truth Conditions ◽  
Analytical Philosophy ◽  
Basic Assumptions ◽  
Theories Of Meaning ◽  
Linguistic Usage

AbstractThe paper surveys and comments on some of the issues that arise about the lyric in philosophical, principally analytical, aesthetics. In brief these are: definition, expression, paraphrase, form-content unity, experience, and truth and profundity. The paper shows in each case why these issues are important from the perspective of analytical philosophy but also why lyric poetry is not always an easy subject matter to accommodate to standard analytical presuppositions. It might be thought that theories of meaning within philosophy of language (be it semantics, speech act theory or truth-conditions) should be applicable to a full range of linguistic usage. But lyric poetry confounds that expectation and yields a context where familiar models of meaning and communication can seem inadequate. Yet analytical philosophers should not simply dismiss poetry as somehow exceptional or aberrant but would gain from looking afresh at basic assumptions to see how their views about language might be broadened and modified.

Politeness theory and Shakespeare's four major tragedies

1989 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 159-212 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Brown ◽  
Albert Gilman
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Full Range ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
King Lear ◽  
Politeness Theory ◽  
Inner Life ◽  
Period 2 ◽  
Colloquial Speech ◽  
Theory Of Literature

ABSTRACTPenelope Brown and Stephen Levinson (1987) have proposed that power (P), distance (D), and the ranked extremity (R) of a face-threatening act are the universal determinants of politeness levels in dyadic discourse. This claim is tested here for Shakespeare's use of Early Modern English in Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, and Othello. The tragedies are used because: (1) dramatic texts provide the best information on colloquial speech of the period; (2) the psychological soliloquies in the tragedies provide the access to inner life that is necessary for a proper test of politeness theory; and (3) the tragedies represent the full range of society in a period of high relevance to politeness theory. The four plays are systematically searched for pairs of minimally contrasting dyads where the dimensions of contrast are power (P), distance (D), and intrinsic extremity (R). Whenever such a pair is found, there are two speeches to be scored for politeness and a prediction from theory as to which should be more polite. The results for P and for R are those predicted by theory, but the results for D are not. The two components of D, interactive closeness and affect, are not closely associated in the plays. Affect strongly influences politeness (increased liking increases politeness and decreased liking decreases politeness); interactive closeness has little or no effect on politeness. The uses of politeness for the delineation of character in the tragedies are illustrated. (Politeness theory, speech act theory, pragmatics, sociolinguistics, theory of literature, Shakespeare studies)

scholarly journals The Performativity of Literature

2010 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Chitanu
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Language ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
John Searle ◽  
Per Se

Performativity in the philosophy of language means that certain deeds may be done using language, strictly speaking in speech, and the theory has become known as “speech-act theory,” its first theoreticians being J. L. Austin and John Searle. This article investigates the performativity of the text per se, how literature can “perform” for the reader, while also interpreting some related concepts: performance, drama, script, and intermediality through the analysis of three highly popular plays: Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest and G. B. Shaw’s Pygmalion.

Searle, John (1932–)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ernie Lepore
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Language ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
Action Theory ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
University Of California ◽  
John Searle ◽  
Intentional States ◽  
Comprehensive Theory ◽  
The University

John Searle was a pupil of J.L. Austin at Oxford in the 1950s. He is the Mills Professor of Mind and Language at the University of California, Berkeley, where he has taught philosophy since 1959. According to Searle, the primary objects of analysis in the philosophy of language are not expressions but the production of expressions, speech acts, in accordance with rules. Learning a language involves (often unconsciously) internalizing rules that govern the performance of speech acts in that language. Speech-act theory aims to discover these rules and is itself a part of action theory, which concerns intentional states directed at or about something. It follows that speech-act theory is part of a more comprehensive theory of intentionality.

Preliminaries

Just Words ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 8-26
Author(s):  
Mary Kate McGowan
Keyword(s):  
Social Norms ◽  
Philosophy Of Language ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
General Information ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
Important Distinction ◽  
Additional Information ◽  
Key Concepts

This chapter presents the material in the philosophy of language that is required to follow the arguments in the book. A general introduction to an intentionalist neo-Gricean framework for understanding language use is presented. General information about speech act theory and the felicity conditions for successful speech acts is covered. Since the book focuses on exercitive speech, that is, speech that enacts permissibility facts, additional information is given about exercitives and their felicity conditions. This chapter also clarifies some of the key concepts used throughout the book. The nature of enactment, different kinds of enactment, the important distinction between constituting and merely causing harm, and the nature of social norms are all presented.

Types of Speech Acts

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Hanks
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
Propositional Content ◽  
Truth Conditions ◽  
Sharp Distinction ◽  
The World

Classical speech act theory, in the tradition of Austin and Searle, is based on a picture of propositional content due to Frege. This picture takes propositions to be the primary bearers of truth conditions, and it incorporates a sharp distinction between content and force. In this paper I defend an alternative picture of propositional content, on which the primary bearers of truth conditions are the actions we perform in thinking and speaking about the world. Propositions are types of these actions, and they inherit their truth conditions from them. This picture abandons the distinction between content and force and it leads to a three-way distinction between different kinds of propositions. Here I explore the consequences of this alternative picture for the nature and taxonomy of speech acts.

Aboutness

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Yablo
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
Philosophy Of Language ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Library Science ◽  
Philosophical Methodology ◽  
Major Advance ◽  
Truth Conditions ◽  
Ways Of Being ◽  
Made In

Aboutness has been studied from any number of angles. Brentano made it the defining feature of the mental. Phenomenologists try to pin down the aboutness features of particular mental states. Materialists sometimes claim to have grounded aboutness in natural regularities. Attempts have even been made, in library science and information theory, to operationalize the notion. However, it has played no real role in philosophical semantics, which is surprising. This is the first book to examine through a philosophical lens the role of subject matter in meaning. A long-standing tradition sees meaning as truth conditions, to be specified by listing the scenarios in which a sentence is true. Nothing is said about the principle of selection—about what in a scenario gets it onto the list. Subject matter is the missing link here. A sentence is true because of how matters stand where its subject matter is concerned. This book maintains that this is not just a feature of subject matter, but its essence. One indicates what a sentence is about by mapping out logical space according to its changing ways of being true or false. The notion of content that results—directed content—is brought to bear on a range of philosophical topics, including ontology, verisimilitude, knowledge, loose talk, assertive content, and philosophical methodology. The book represents a major advance in semantics and the philosophy of language.

Communication And Speech Act Theory : A Contextual Study Of Language

2016 ◽  
pp. 16
Author(s):  
Makhlouf Abdelkader ◽  
Driss Mohamed Amine
Keyword(s):  
Speech Act ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
Contextual Study

New Work on Speech Acts

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Speech Act Theory ◽  
New Work ◽  
Half Century ◽  
Recent Advances ◽  
Current Thinking ◽  
Semantics And Pragmatics ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
The Relationship

The essays collected in this book represent recent advances in our understanding of speech acts-actions like asserting, asking, and commanding that speakers perform when producing an utterance. The study of speech acts spans disciplines, and embraces both the theoretical and scientific concerns proper to linguistics and philosophy as well as the normative questions that speech acts raise for our politics, our societies, and our ethical lives generally. It is the goal of this book to reflect the diversity of current thinking on speech acts as well as to bring these conversations together, so that they may better inform one another. Topics explored in this book include the relationship between sentence grammar and speech act potential; the fate of traditional frameworks in speech act theory, such as the content-force distinction and the taxonomy of speech acts; and the ways in which speech act theory can illuminate the dynamics of hostile and harmful speech. The book takes stock of well over a half century of thinking about speech acts, bringing this classicwork in linewith recent developments in semantics and pragmatics, and pointing the way forward to further debate and research.

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