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Journal ArticleDOI

Indirect Speech Acts

Nicholas Asher, +1 more
- 01 Jul 2001 - 
- Vol. 128, Iss: 1, pp 183-228
TLDR
It is shown how a formal semantictheory of discourse interpretation can be used to define speech acts and to avoid murky issues concerning the metaphysics of action.
Abstract
In this paper, we address several puzzles concerning speech acts,particularly indirect speech acts. We show how a formal semantictheory of discourse interpretation can be used to define speech actsand to avoid murky issues concerning the metaphysics of action. Weprovide a formally precise definition of indirect speech acts, includingthe subclass of so-called conventionalized indirect speech acts. Thisanalysis draws heavily on parallels between phenomena at the speechact level and the lexical level. First, we argue that, just as co-predicationshows that some words can behave linguistically as if they're `simultaneously'of incompatible semantic types, certain speech acts behave this way too.Secondly, as Horn and Bayer (1984) and others have suggested, both thelexicon and speech acts are subject to a principle of blocking or ``preemptionby synonymy'': Conventionalized indirect speech acts can block their`paraphrases' from being interpreted as indirect speech acts, even ifthis interpretation is calculable from Gricean-style principles. Weprovide a formal model of this blocking, and compare it withexisting accounts of lexical blocking.

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Citations
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Dissertation

A Case Study of Requests in English Emails of Iraqi Arab University Students in North Cyprus

TL;DR: In this article, the authors present a list of tables and list of attributes for each of them, in order of the number of columns in the leaflet, and the list of labels.
Journal ArticleDOI

Of Robots and Believing

TL;DR: Thy topic; it questions the entire knowledge foundation upon which strong AI/Robotics is positioned and thus favours implementing weaker techniques.
Book ChapterDOI

Speech acts. Observing antisemitism and holocaust education in the Netherlands

TL;DR: The authors found that students make casual anti-Jewish remarks that indicate a more lasting attitude toward Jews and their position in present-day society, but also indicate that insinuations, sarcasm and types of non-verbal communication complicate straightforward interpretations of the practice of speech.
Journal Article

Evaluating Speech acts in ELT Textbooks: The Case of Compliments and Complaints in the Touchstone Series

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors evaluate the Touchstone series in terms of compliment and complaint speech acts and find that the frequency of the complaint speech act was higher in Touchstone, Book 4 than the other three textbooks.
References
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Book

How to do things with words

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors presented a series of lectures with the following topics: Lecture I * Lecture II* Lecture III * Lectures IV* Lectures V * LectURE VI * LectURES VI * LII * LIII * LIV * LVI * LIX
Book ChapterDOI

Logic and conversation

H. P. Grice
- 12 Dec 1975 - 
Book ChapterDOI

Logic and Conversation

TL;DR: For instance, Grice was interested in Quine's logical approach to language, although he differed from Quine over certain specific specific questions, such as the viability of the distinction between analytic and synthetic statements.
Book

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TL;DR: This book presents the most complete exposition of the theory of head-driven phrase structure grammar, introduced in the authors' "Information-Based Syntax and Semantics," and demonstrates the applicability of the HPSG approach to a wide range of empirical problems.
Journal ArticleDOI

The Generative Lexicon

Christiane Fellbaum, +1 more
- 01 Sep 1997 -