ABSTRACT
Speaking is itself an act, but the act of speaking can perform other acts as well, such as acts of promising, threatening, thanking, asking, etc. We also frequently perform indirect speech acts, such as using a question to make an indirect request (Would you mind passing the salt?). This chapter covers all of the various ways in which we use language to perform acts, and how the Cooperative Principle helps the hearer to infer the speaker’s intended speech act. It discusses the conditions required for a felicitous speech act, and the types of speech act failure that can result when those conditions aren’t met. It ends with a discussion of Politeness theory and honorifics.
