Illocutionary Force Illocutionary Act
The examples above are the representations of the speaker’s beliefs to be the case in the world. The speaker in the first example expresses his or her belief by asserting
that the earth is flat. On the other hand, the speaker in the second example expresses his or her belief that the day was a warm sunny day by uttering the assertive
illocutionary act. Assertive forces can be present in many forms, such as informing, stating,
arguing, clarifying, convincing, agreeing, describing, protesting, reminding, and reporting. The language features that indicate representative acts are verbs such as
assert, claim, argue, assure, predict, report, inform, admit, remind, testify, confess, conjecture, guess, state, hypothesize, swear, and insist.
3 Expressive
Yule 1996: 53 states that expressive act is a kind of speech act that states what the speaker feels. They express psychological states and can be statement of pleasure,
pain, likes, dislikes, joy or sorrow. Expressive act refers to a speech act in which the speaker expresses his or her feeling and attitude about something. They can be caused
by something the speaker does or the hearer does, but they are about the speaker’s experience. The examples of expressive act are shown below.
a I’m really sorry
b Congratulations
Yule, 1996: 53 Searle in Wardaugh 2006: 287 states that expressive act is used to express the
sincerity conditions of the speech act. The utterance “I’m really sorry” and
“Congratulations” in the conversation above are the examples of expressive illocutionary act which have the illocutionary forces of apologizing to someone and
congratulating someone. Expressive forces can be present in many forms, such as thanking, apologizing,
complimenting, congratulating, hoping, greeting, or joking. The language features that indicate expressive acts are verbs such as apologize, congratulate, thank,
compliment, deplore, condole, and welcome.
4 Directive
Mey 1993: 164 asserts that directive act embodies an effort on the part of the speaker to ‘direct’ the hearer towards some goal of the speaker, mostly. According
to Yule 1996: 53, directive act is the type of speech act that the speakers use to get someone else to do something. They express the speaker’s desire or wish for the
addressee to do something. Directive act contains what the speaker wants. By using directive act, the speaker attempts to adapt the world into the uttered words. The
examples of directive illocutionary act are presented below. a
Give me a cup of coffee. Make it black. b
Could you lend me a pen, please? Yule, 1996: 54
The examples above are the utterances which involve the performance of directive illocutionary acts. The first example is a directive illocutionary act in the
form of ordering while the second example is a directive illocutionary act in the form