ix, 213 p. / The attacks on the United States of September 11, 2001, prompted scholars in a variety of fields, such as history, philosophy and literature, to re-examine the topic of terrorism, including the emergence of terrorism in West Germany in the 1960s and 1970s. The challenges that arise when dealing with the topic of terrorism derive in part from a lack of consensus on a definition for terrorists and terrorist attacks. One element that I found in my research is that there is a connection between terrorism and communication. This dissertation examines that connection in Volker Schlöndorff's filmDie Stille nach dem Schuss Gregor Schnitzler's film Was tun wenn's brennt Leander Scholz's novel Rosenfestand Ulrike Edschmid's biographical narrativesFrau mit Waffe: Zwei Geschichten aus terroristischen Zeitenin the context of Speech Act Theory. The films and texts show how West German terrorism is represented as a form of communication, through which fictional terrorists are trying to accomplish the impossible statement "I hereby persuade you." The act of persuasion has an element of freedom, because one can either be persuaded or not. However, the terrorists represented in the works mentioned above want to eliminate the element of choice and force the interlocutor to be persuaded. In order to achieve this they introduce violence, which in turn causes them to be labeled as terrorists. The more they try to use violence to achieve their goals, the more they cement their condemnation as terrorists. This dissertation frames its investigation within ideas about performative speech acts, concepts of power, violence, identity and discussions about "terrorist" narratives in German literature and film. / Committee in charge: Susan C. Anderson， Chairperson； Alexander Mathäs， Member； Dorothee Ostmeier， Member； Bonnie Mann， Outside Member

This dissertation examines the dynamics of the oral communication which takes place in the Easter Vigil at St. Augustine's Anglican Church, Thaba 'Nchu. The study uses an analytical framework drawn from Orality Theory and Speech Act Theory, to analyse oral communication in the preaching and singing of the Vigil. Through an approach of Participant Observation, details were obtained of the Easter Vigils of 1994, 1995 and 1996. The historical and cultural background of this All-Night Vigil is traced in European Church History and African Traditional Religion. The roles of the Mothers' Union, the St. Agnes Guild and the Guild of Bernard Mizeki are also highlighted. / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M.Th (Missiology)

This study unites the burgeoning academic field of exhibition histories and the critiques of race-based exhibition practices that crystallised in Britain in the 1980s and 1990s. It concerns recent practices of presenting and contextualising black creativity in British publicly funded art museums and galleries that are part of a broader attempt to increase the diversity of histories and perspectives represented in public art collections and exhibitions. The research focuses on three concurrent 2010 exhibitions that aimed to offer a non-hegemonic reading of black creativity through the use of non-art-historical conceptual and alternative curatorial models: Afro Modern (Tate Liverpool), Action (The Bluecoat), and a retrospective of works by Chris Ofili (Tate Britain). Comparative exhibitions of the past were typically premised on concepts of difference that ultimately resulted in the notional separation of black artists from mainstream discourses on contemporary art and histories of British art. Through a close and critical textual analysis of these three recent exhibitions, which is informed by J.L. Austin’s theory of speech acts (1955), the study considers whether, and to what extent the delimiting curatorial practices of the past have been successfully abandoned by public art museums and galleries, and furthermore, whether it has been possible for British art institutions to reject the entrenched, exclusive conceptions of British culture that negated black contributions to the canon and narratives of British art in the first place. The exhibition case studies are complemented and contextualised by an in-depth history of the Bluecoat’s engagement with black creativity between 1976 and 2012, which provides a particular insight into the ways that debates about representation, difference and separatism have impacted the policies and practices of one culturally significant art gallery that is frequently overlooked in histories of black British art. With reference to the notion of legitimate coercion as defined by Zygmunt Bauman (2000), the study determines that long-standing hegemonic structures continue to inform the modes through which public art museums and galleries in Britain curate and control black creativity.

In order to convince, one must know which arguments are most suitable for the specific situation. But even if you think you know how others will react to your arguments, you may be wrong. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to find out a way of examining to what extent informative text take account to the subjective views of their addressees. The theoretical framework is Blitzer's theory of the rhetorical situation, pragmatic theory of speech acts and their presuppositions, Burk´s theory of consubstantiality and phenomenographic theory of subjective perceptions. Methodologically, phenomenography has also been used as a guideline for selecting informants, collecting data and processing the interviews. The material analyzed consists interviews with four persons suffering from psoriasis, a brochure addressed to an unspecified audience with the same problem plus an interview with a spokesperson for the Swedish Psoriasis Association. The analysis reveals a clear difference in certain important respects between the subjective views of the intended reader and the implied addressees of the text, i.e. a lack of consubstantiality between sender and receiver. This points to a rhetorical problem when addressing an unknown audience without exploring their specific perceptions of concepts related to the transmitted information, a problem which may be grasped and perhaps to some extent even solved by applying a method similar to the one used in this study.

The studies of the different forms and structures of language usually take for granted that these refer to non-linguistic entities, i.e., that language reflects the world. In the case of verbal devices, such entities happen to be time, aktionsart or aspect. In view of the proven impossibility of giving an accurate account of the behavior of such devices by means of these categories, disquisitions and further elucidations are perpetuated, what complicates the pro- blem to not very judicious levels. Moreover, because the conclusions reached get equally in conflict with a linguistic reality which resists them, contradicts them. So there is no other choice left than to declare exceptions or special uses, or banish the insubordinate segments to the periphery of the system. Our first goal will therefore be the previous establishment of a theoretical framework, as a cure for the a posteriori theorizing based on what is seen on the surface, which would allow us to assign a possible invariant central value to linguistic elements, for which we will rely on the metaoperational system of H. Adamczewski. In it, such elements are operators defined by their belonging to one of two phases in the process of utterance assembly, namely, by a rhematic character, of proposition of the information, or by a thematic...

本論文研究以｢間接抱怨的反應｣的語言行為為研究方向；一方面以跨文化語用學的探討為主，研究母語為中文的台灣人與母語為美語的美國人語言行為之差異，藉以探討該語言行為的文化普遍性、獨特性；另一方面是以外語語用學的探討為主，研究台灣大專生學習美語的外語行為是否接近母語為英語的美國人，以深究研究對象的語用轉移現象。研究的四組受試人分別為36位以英語為母語的美國大學生、36位以中文為母語且以中文為學習主要媒介的台灣的大學生、36位英語學習程度較佳的台灣大學生、36位英語學習程度中等的台灣大學生。蒐集語言資料的工具是語言言談情境問卷(Discourse Completion Task，簡稱DCT)，依照蒐集到的語料進行量化、質化的資料分析。研究結果顯示：四組研究對象皆傾向以憐憫策略來回應間接抱怨。然而以兩項研究變項(性別與社交關係)來進一步討論時，研究結果呈現不同的策略使用：以中文為母語和英語學習程度較佳的台灣大學生這兩個研究對象趨於以沉默或是轉移話題來回應女性陌生人的間接抱怨，但是英語學習程度較中等的台灣大學生，卻是較常使用建議策略來回覆陌生人。再者，探究研究對象們的語用標記時，英語學習者常轉化中文的發語詞於英語表達中，相較於以英語為母語的美國大學生，他們的語用句型也較為簡化。根據研究結果與探討，英語學習者們的英語學習程度高低並不與其語用表現成正比，這論述可以呼應語用知識是有別於語言知識的概念。故在英語為外語教學上，除了英語能力的提升外，學習者應能有機會體驗不同情境下的語用表現，自覺性的討論出該表現背後的不同文化意涵，進而提升其對母語文化以及目標語文化所該具有的知識與內涵。 / This study investigated response strategies to indirect complaints (IC). On the one hand, it explored the cross-cultural differences in speech behaviors between native Mandarin Chinese speakers and native American English speakers. On the other hand, it examined EFL learners’ IC response behaviors in Taiwan. Four participant groups were invited in this study: 36 native speakers of American English living in the United States, 36 native Mandarin Chinese speakers living in Taiwan, 36 EFL learners with high English proficiency level, and 36 EFL learners with intermediate English proficiency level. Their language data were collected through designed Discourse Completion Test (DCT). Both quantitative and qualitative analyses were conducted to deal with the collected data. The research results indicated that the commiseration strategy was mostly used by all four participant groups. Yet, taking the two independent variables (gender and social-distance relationships) into consideration, informative results were found across different groups. The two groups of native Chinese speakers and EFL learners with high English proficiency level applied off strategy to their female strangers’ indirect complaints. On the contrary, the group of EFL learners with intermediate English proficiency level used more advice strategy to their strangers’ indirect complaints. Furthermore, negative transfer was found in the EFL learners’ linguistic realization to achieve illocutionary forces, including pragmatic markers and simplified sentential expressions. The research findings implied that there was not any positive relationship between language learners’ linguistic abilities and their pragmatic performance. The implicature is correlated with the concept that pragmatic knowledge is distinct from linguistic knowledge. Thus, in EFL courses, language learners should be provided opportunities to consciously explore different cultural meanings behind speech act behaviors.

本篇論文目的在探討兒童在同儕對話中所使用的請求言語行為，研究問題如下：1.在同儕對話中，兒童採用哪些請求策略？、2.兒童使用哪些稱呼語(alerter)和修飾語(modification)來調整他們的請求言語行為?。研究語料來自兩人一組的兒童在玩耍時的對話，兒童的年紀在四歲三個月到五歲六個月之間(平均年齡為五歲三個月)。本研究主要採用Blum-Kulka等人的請求言語行為策略分類，包含中心行為策略(head act)、稱呼語(alerter）、修飾語(modification)三個部分。研究結果發現，在中心行為策略的三個策略中—直接請求、規約性間接請求、和非規約性間接請求，兒童使用較多的直接請求策略，特別是祈使語態句(mood derivable)，顯示出兒童在同儕互動中傾向使用直接且有效力的請求策略。研究結果也發現兒童會使用稱呼語和修飾語來調整請求言語行為；在稱呼語方面，兒童使用了呼喚語(vocative)和名字(name)這兩種表親密的稱呼語來吸引同儕的注意，顯示出兒童不只能判斷對話者的注意力，也知道他們與同儕之間的對等、親近關係；在修飾語方面，兒童使用較多的緩和修飾語(mitigating modifiers)，而在所有修飾語中，兒童最常使用的三種分別為語氣弱化詞(downtoner)、 原因解釋(grounder)、強化詞(intensifier)，另外，我們也發現到兒童有時會使用兩種以上的修飾語在單一個請求行為中，從兒童使用的各種修飾語結果顯示，兒童在做請求時，能考量不同情況和跟同儕間的關係來調整請求言語行為。本研究對於漢語兒童在同儕互動中的請求言語行為的使用，不僅顯示出他們的溝通技巧與語用能力，也反映出同儕互動的特性。 / The purpose of this study is to explore preschool children’s performance of requests in peer talk. We aim to investigate what request strategies children employ when interacting with peers and how children adjust their requests with alerters and modifications. The data analyzed were the natural conversations produced by dyads of children aged from 4;3 to 5;6 (mean age: 5;3). The analytical framework adopted in this study is mainly based on the categorization of Blum-Kulka et al. (1989), including the three components of head act, alerter, and modification. The results show that among direct request, conventionally indirect request and non-conventionally indirect request, children employed more direct request strategies, especially mood derivable. It reveals that children’s requests tend to be direct in interactions with peers as the use of direct requests is more effective to attain compliance. In addition, children were found to use alerters and modifications on some occasions to get attention and to lessen or aggravate the request force. There were two types of alerters used by the children, which were name and vocative, and vocative was used more frequently than name. The children’s use of the two intimate alerters indicates that not only can children assess the focus of their interlocutors’ attention, but also that they are aware of their equal and close relationships with their peers. Regarding the use of modifications, it was found that children used more mitigating modifiers than aggravating modifiers, and that the children used downtoner, grounder, and intensifier more frequently among the modifiers. Moreover, although the children commonly used one request with one modifier, there were some cases where the children used more than one modifier in one request. The diversity in the use of modified requests reveals the children’s sensitivity to the situations in which they and their peers are engaged, and their consideration for the maintenance of interpersonal relationships. It is concluded that Mandarin-speaking children’s use of requests not only demonstrates their communicative skills and pragmatic competence, but also reflects the nature of peer interactions.

This dissertation is basically a reading the book of Lamentation as a literary whole in a sense of a text-centred approach, which aims to interpret the Scripture as divine communicative action. The major philosophical resources that I employ in this study are the Speech-Act theory developed by J. Austin and J. Searle, and the concepts particularly exemplified in the work of K. Vanhoozer. I look at repetition and literary techniques in Lamentations as a clue to its structural unity. In the body of the dissertation, Instead of historical-critical approaches, I claim that the meaning exists not ‘behind the text,’ but ‘in the text itself as a whole.’ One of the most important literary approaches to understanding the book of Lamentations is to note the poetic voices, which interweave in the text. The poetic voices are my main focus of understanding the book of Lamentations. I explain the literary meaning reading the text and demonstrate that we must find the canonical level of the meaning which supervenes on the literary level. The meaning of a text at a literary level must be carefully studied and modified by the ‘fuller sense (or meaning)’ derived from the canonical context. The ‘fuller sense’ of Scripture associated with divine authorship emerges only at the level of the whole canon. Here for the canonical meaning of the text, I focus on Vanhoozer’s assertion, having proposed the suitability of speech act theory for the various tasks of biblical interpretation and theological hermeneutics. When we read the text, there is no utterance from God in Lamentations. It is the missing voice. The main theme of Lamentations is "Where is the true comfort?". The text presents no comfort. In the literary context, God keeps silent (non-speaking). Canonically, however, Christian readers as God’s people read the Bible, connecting it to Jesus Christ. Within the canonical context, we can indeed find an answer and God’s answering speech (that is, His act), because Jesus is their true comforter acting as God’s response. We can find this response in his teaching (e.g. Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount) and in his mission (e.g. presenting his body as the temple, being Immanuel, God-with-us). / Dissertation (MA(Theology))--University of Pretoria, 2009. / Old Testament Studies / unrestricted

In this thesis we deal with pragmatic aspects of language, specifically studying the classification of speech acts and conversational implicature. The theoretical part is concerned with the work of J. L. Austin, J. R. Searle and M. Grepl with an emphasis on differences in the classification of illocutionary acts. Then we deal with the maxim of politeness and pleasantries types according to P. Brown and S. C. Lewinson. In the practical part using analysis of advertising headlines and slogans we are trying to demonstrate the functionality of the classification of speech acts by individual authors. We try to also confirm the performative nature of these statements also implicitly expressed performative verbs. We are interested in the presence of the maxims of politeness in these texts and the consequent shift between different types of courtesy. The aim is to highlight the issue of classification of illocutionary acts and try to outline improvements to this shift. The assumption is that, although the classification struggling with inaccuracies, we thereunder able to distinguish different types of repetitive speeches. To complement these findings, we want to prove performative character of advertising texts, even assuming that there will be implicitly expressed performative verb and the presence of...

Politeness is viewed as an admirable trait by most people, yet what it means to be polite is arguably a controversial issue when it comes to using English, as people of different ages, education levels, and proficiency levels use English daily, and may have different views on politeness. These observations raise questions about whether there are certain universal pragmatic rules, or if pragmatic rules are primarily language- and/or culture-specific. The current study situates itself within the fields of cross-cultural pragmatics and English as a lingua franca and is intended to explicitly address how social distance impacts English users’ views of politeness and appropriateness in English today. The study addresses this issue by investigating how speakers of English perceive appropriateness in certain speech acts, specifically requests and compliment responses, and how they justify or explain their reasoning concerning this. The study employs a mixed-method approach to data collection, where data was collected through two steps: first, a questionnaire distributed online and, second, a set of follow-up interviews with questionnaire respondents. In total, 79 respondents contributed to the questionnaire and, out of these, eight participated in follow-up interviews. Through this dual method of data collection, the intention of the study was to provide some insight into societal perceptions on politeness today from two different perspectives. To that end, the analysis of data takes a two-fold approach: by using T-tests, the statistical relevance of the questionnaire findings is analyzed, and through an inductive analysis of the interview findings, a more in-depth view of the issue at hand is offered as a complement to the initial survey results. By providing insight to the societal perceptions of the pragmatics of English through two different perspectives, the findings of the study could inform and inspire further studies concerning pragmatic norms and, by extension, research focused on the teaching of English.