Tag question Echo question and Non-echo question

20 believes the truth of the propositional content of the utterance, the representative act is not achieved. This act category makes the words fit the world, which Huang 2006 describes as the “speakers‟ attempt to represent the world the way they believe it ”. Afterward, it makes the words fits the world as the speakers perform the act p. 1004. By saying “Chelsea will win the English Premier League this season.”, the speaker commits to the truth believed about the future or the league result. Plus, he might also have the evidence for his prediction. Another example was when the speaker says, “Boiled food is much healthier than the fried one”. One can be identified as claiming the truth of the utterance without evidence. However, if the speaker is a person with a competence in healthy food like a doctor, it could be an act of asserting. Beside predicting and claiming, other acts included in this category are describing, acknowledging, claiming, hypothesizing, insisting, asserting, concluding, and remarking Verschueren, 1998, p. 24; Alston, 2000, p. 3.

b. Directives

Cutting 2002 states that “this category covers acts in which the words are aimed at making the hearer do something ” p. 17. As the definition suggests, the acts in this category goal is to make the hearer do the predicated act in the utterances. As suggested by Huang 2006, it represents one‟s psychological state which is the desire to get something done p. 1004. In performing this act within the utterance, the speaker attempts to make the world fits the words Huang, 2006, 21 p. 1004. The speaker tries to make his words into reality by asking other to carry it out. Case in point when one is trying to get in to a locked room, sentence “Open the door.” can be used by the speaker to make the hearer inside open the door. In the world or the setting, the door is closed and locked that the speaker orders the hearer to match the door with the words the speaker said. At last, it shows the speaker desires get the door opened. The other acts included in this category are commanding, requesting, inviting, forbidding, suggesting, ordering, and imploring Verschueren, 1998, p. 24; Alston, 2000, p. 3.

c. Commissives

Commisives, according to Levinson 1984, indicates the speaker‟s commitment to do an act in the future time p. 240. This category consists of act which commits the interlocutor to commit in doing an action in the future. It declares speaker ‟s psychological state which is his intention to carry out the predicated action in the utterance Huang, 2006, p. 1004. By saying the utterance, the interlocutor attempts to bring about a change in the world according to the words said earlier. A teacher might say “I will be at the common room if you still have any question ” after the class. It shows teacher‟s intention in offering a help to the students who still has some problem in the topic they learn. The goal of this utterance is to make the speaker commit to an act in the future. This act would be successfully performed if the teacher is really at the room as the students go to the