2.1.2 GeneralIntroduction to Speech Act
The term“speech act”was originally developed by M.Malinowski，a British anthropologist.It was indicative of an act ofusing language under specific circumstances with some objective to be achieved.Either in writing or spoken communication，speech act is involved.SAT，as a major theory of speech act and as a major part of pragmatics，was proposed for the first time in the 1950s and widely discussed in the 1960s and 1970s.Ever since Austin put forward the notion of speech act，many philosophers and scholars have contributed much to this field.For many years philosophers had assumed that all sentences are“statements”and the only function of a“statement”was to describe things either in a correct or an incorrect way although grammarians had frequently pointed out that sentences included not only statements，but also questions，exclamations，comments，wishes and concessions.However，in the 1950s，after careful studies on what used to be assumed“statements”，philosophers found that many“statements”are not statements in a sense because they are not“verifiable”（being verifiable is considered a prerequisite to a statement，i.e.the quality that a statement can be proved to be either true or false）.It gradually became a common belief that many utterances or sentences，though they look like“statements”，are not intended to“describe”the state of affairs，rather，they are intended to give information，to show one's feelings，to give promises，to ask for a favor，or to order（Austin，1962，p.2）.The following are some examples：
①I do.（uttered in the course of a wedding ceremony）
②I name this ship the Queen Elizabeth.（uttered when smashing the bottle against the stern）
③I give and bequeath my watch to my brother.（in a will）
④I bet you six pence it will rain tomorrow.
（Austin，1962，p.5）
Example A is uttered when asked by a priest whether or not one would like to take a woman or man as one's wife or husband.By the utterance“Ido”，one is making the marriage take place.You actually give the ship a name by saying Example B“I name this ship...”.By saying Example C in a will，one is giving his watch as a legacy to his brother when he dies.And one is actually involved in a bet with somebody when he says Example D to that person.As a result，if it does not rain the next day，he has to give six pence to the person he is making the bet with.
On the basis of the above examples and analyses，one can see that the business of an utterance is not confined to describing the state of affairs.When you utter something，you are doing something.And what you do by what you say is a“speech act”，according to J.L.Austin，who first used this term in his book How to Do Things with Words（1962）.In other words，a speech act is an act that a speaker performs then making an utterance.We can make requests，ask questions，give orders，make promises，give thanks，and offer apologies，and so on by what we say.Moreover，almost all speech acts are actually the performance of several acts at once—there are the act of saying something，the act of doing something in saying it，such as requesting or promising，and the act oftrying to affect the audience.
Though many scholars have made much achievement in this field，one cannot talk about speech act without mentioning its initiator—J.L.Austin and J.R.Searle.They made some systematic study about it and facilitated the shaping of Speech Act Theory，which is the first major theory in pragmatics，initially proposed in the 1950s.J.L.Austin held that language was used not only to“state”，“describe”or“illustrate”，but also to execute a certain speech act.His idea aroused great echoes in the field oflinguistics，becoming a hot topic and one of core pragmatic theories.Searle further developed Austin's theory and presented his theory of speech acts.
Speech acts can be divided into direct and indirect ones.
①Direct Speech Acts：If，in a specific context，the literal meanings of words or utterances totally conform to what the speaker intends to convey，then we call them direct speech acts.For direct speech acts，performative verbs and three sentence patterns are often applied to carry out acts of“order”，“request”，“question”and“statement”.The three sentence patterns include：
Declarative sentence：The speech act of this sentence type is for assertion and its function is to convey information.
Example：Jenny got an A on the test.
Interrogative sentence：The speech act of this sentence type is for question and its function is to elicit information.
Example：Did Jenny get an A on the test？
Imperative sentence：The speech act of this sentence type is for orders and requests and its function is to cause others to behave in certain ways.
Example：Get an A on the test！
②Indirect Speech Acts：Indirect speech acts are cases in which one illocutionary act is performed indirectly by way of performing another.For example，we can make a request or give permission by way of making a statement，by uttering“I am getting thirsty”or“It doesn't matter to me”，and we can make a statement or give an order by way of asking a question，such as“Will the sun rise tomorrow？”or“Can you clean up your room？”When an illocutionary act is performed indirectly，it is performed by way of performing some other one directly.According to Searle，a full understanding of“indirect speech acts”must be preceded by the knowledge of two other concepts：literal force and illocutionary force.Literal force，as a matter of fact，denotes the literal meaning formed by words and syntax of an utterance.Illocutionary force is equal to the function of illocutionary act.The speaker usually performs one speech act indirectly by executing another one.Thus，the listener understands a speech act mainly with the aid of common sense，shared information and his reasoning ability.Through the literal meaning of an utterance，the listener may infer what the speaker really intends to express.
As we all know，indirectness happens when there is a mismatch between the expressed meaning and the implied meaning.Indirectness is a universal phenomenon in all natural languages（Thomas，1995，p.119）.One approach to distinguish types of speech acts can be made on the basis of sentence structure.There is an easily recognized relationship between the three structural forms that we mentioned above in direct speech acts（declarative，interrogative，imperative）and the three general communicative functions（statement，question，command or request）.Whenever there is a direct relationship between a structure and a function，we have a direct speech act.Whenever there is an indirect relationship between a structure and a function，we have an indirect speech act.For example，if a declarative is used to make a statement，it is a direct speech act，but when it is used to make a request，it is an indirect speech act.