This study focuses on contrasting responses to two highly provocative acts from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: Ariel Sharon's controversial visit to the Temple Mount in February 2000, and a Palestinian terrorist cell's suicide bombing of a nightclub in Tel Aviv in 2005. Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount in 2000 led to the second intifada, the bloodiest outbreak of violence in the conflict's recent history. However, what followed the suicide attack in Tel Aviv in 2005 were several weeks of restraint from both sides. This study positions media texts as antecedents and consequents to these two key focal points in history and examines their content. The central method for the study is quantitative content analysis. Three newspapers were selected primarily for their ability to set the public agenda: English editions of the Israeli Haaretz and Jerusalem Post, and the Palestinian Al-Quds, translated into English from its original Arabic. The corpus for the study comprised 820 news and opinion articles about Arab-Israeli relations from one week of articles from each side of Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount and one week of articles from each side of the suicide bombing. Media texts were coded for two operationally defined constructs: inflammatory words and conciliatory words. Inflammatory words were fighting words symptomatic of violent and aggressive behavior. Conciliatory words were related to pacification, symptomatic of appeasing, and passive behavior. Built-in dictionaries of Diction, Version 6.14.5, a software program, were used to confirm the validity of the two principal constructs. Results confirmed the newspapers' propensity to focus on violent news and also suggested that media content is likely to be shaped and influenced by acts of violence on the ground. Results also supported speech-act theory and indicated that inflammatory or violent texts in the media perform the functions of agenda-setting or news-framing and potentially cultivate violent behavior among readers. The constructs of inflammatory and conciliatory words and their application in constructing a practical Threat Index are among the key contributions of this study.

abstract: The current landscape of political speech is ripe for deep philosophical analysis yet has not been thoroughly investigated through the lens of speech-act theory. In this space, I believe I contribute something novel to the area, namely a notion of campaign promises that differs from standard promises that enables a new way of interpreting this kind of speech. Over the course of this paper, it is argued that Campaign Promises (CP) are non-trivially and philosophically distinct from the notion of Standard Promises (SP). There are many philosophical distinctions to draw, including moral, political and logical, but my focus is largely in philosophy of language. I engage the work of Searle, Austin and Wittgenstein among others to investigate what I take to be the following important differences from CP and SP: First, that CP and SP differ in the “best interest” condition, of the condition that a promise must be in the best interest of the promisee in order for that promise to obtain, which in turn, produces the effect of threatening those who do not want the promise to come about. Secondly, that CP serve to reinforce world views in a way that is non-trivially different from SP. To do this, I employ Wittgensteinian language game theory to bridge the gap between traditional Searlian speech act theory to more modern McGowan-style oppressive language models. Through this process I develop and defend this alternative way of understanding and evaluating CP and political speech. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Philosophy 2019

This dissertation offers an interdisciplinary analysis of some features of the Speech- Act Theory in biblical hermeneutics. It highlights some of the probable aspects of the studied analysis regarding hermeneutic issues within biblical and theological analysis. The paper shall describe the philosophical interpretation of the examination of the Speech-Act Theory. It will focus on the principles and standards of demarcating the Speech-Acts and allocating the written texts theory. The paper shall also describe the difference between ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ speech acts. The dissertation shall commence by analysing the main concerns about the speech act theory. It will concentrate on the works of Thiselton and Vanhoozer’s works and modifies their works with the aim of highlighting some of the key elements of their hermeneutics. Therefore, the dissertation shall offer the views of Thiselton and Vanhoozer and differentiate their two different views of the Speech-Act Theory in the field of the hermeneutics in search for a third option. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2017. / Dogmatics and Christian Ethics / MA / Unrestricted

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語用能力是語言習得成功重要的一環，但在臺灣高中的英語教學中卻未受到重視。教師的語言行為對於學生在語用和文化價值觀方面有很大的影響，所以檢視英語教師和外籍教師在語言行為是否有相似的策略有其必要性。本文著重在高中英語教師和外籍教師祈令語使用之比較，以瞭解臺灣英語教師的語言行為策略之使用和外籍教師有何異同，並進一步探討文化對語言行為之影響。 本研究利用語文完成測驗問卷(Discourse Completion Task Questionnaire)收集受試者之語料，共有50位本國籍及30位外籍高中英語教師參與研究。問卷資料主要以卡方檢定(Chi-square)，並輔以質性分析兩組受試者之回答。 研究結果指出兩組受試者均使用最多非傳統間接策略(non-conventionally indirect strategies)；但是，本國籍英語教師比外籍教師採用更多直接策略(direct strategies)，外籍教師則比本國籍教師常使用其他策略(other strategies)，例如接受學生的行為或私下約談處理。本研究證實文化的確在語言行為中扮演重要角色，更建議中外籍英語教師均有責任教導學生正確的語用知識，以協助他們在不同情境中和他人成功地溝通。

Pour exprimer ou définir une idée nouvelle, Derrida détourne souvent le sens d’un mot en se l’appropriant. La relation de Derrida avec les idées est telle que leur transmission passe par un vocabulaire spécifique, notamment l’analyse de l’étymologie (vraie et fausse). Mais quelle est sa conception du mot ? Quelles en sont les implications et les conséquences ? Pour répondre à ces questions, l’approche la plus féconde consiste à suivre au plus près celle que Derrida utilise en abordant la langue par rapport à la grammaire au sens large (c’est-à-dire tout ce qui fait événement dans la langue). En effet, la relation entre le mot et l’idée prend tout son sens dans l’analyse de certaines scènes bibliques, telles celles de la Genèse ou encore du mythe de Babel. Le fameux énoncé inaugural de l’Évangile de Jean, « Au commencement était la parole... », fait retour dans l’œuvre de Derrida, où il connaît plusieurs variations : il mérite examen, dans la perspective d’une déconstruction du logos et des origines de la langue. Le corpus de notre étude porte principalement sur trois textes de Jacques Derrida : « Des tours de Babel » (L’art des confins, PUF, 1979), Schibboleth – Pour Paul Celan (Galilée, 1986) et Donner la mort (Galilée, 1999), ces textes permettant tous une interrogation de l’« intention » divine dans le langage. Notre visée, en privilégiant dans l’œuvre derridienne ces « exemples » bibliques, est d’étudier la démarche de Derrida dans la « création » d’une langue, aspect qui a toujours été inséparable de l’élaboration de sa philosophie et auquel il a accordé la plus grande attention. À terme, ce travail se veut une contribution à la pensée du philosophe, portant sur un aspect capital de son travail et battant en brèche l’idée que son écriture est « absconse » ou « hermétique », alors qu’il y va pour lui de la mise en œuvre de sa manière même de concevoir la langue. / In order to express or define a new idea, Derrida often alters the meaning of a word in order to make it his own. Derrida’s relationship with ideas mostly expresses itself through a specific vocabulary which finds its roots in an etymological analysis (whether true or false). How does Derrida conceive the word? What are its implications and consequences? In order to answer these questions, one ought to follow closely Derrida’s approach of language through grammar in its broader sense (meaning anything which produces an event in language). It is by the examination of biblical episodes such as Genesis or Babel’s myth that the relationship between a word and the idea it represents is better conceived. The inaugural sentence in the gospel of John, “In the beginning was the Word…”, is often present in Derrida’s work, where its numerous occurrences undergo various transformations: this requires a closer inspection, especially in retrospect of logos’s deconstruction and the origin of language. This analysis will be based upon, amongst other texts, Shibboleth: for Paul Celan, The Gift of Death and “Des Tours de Babel” since they allow the possibility of a “divine intention” within language. Our objective, through a preferential study of those biblical “examples” in Derrida’s work, is to study his creation process pertaining to language. This aspect has always been intertwined with the elaboration of his philosophy and he has given it the utmost attention. In the end, this analysis presents itself as a contribution to the philosopher’s thinking, addressing a paramount aspect of his work while disproving the idea that his writing is “unreachable”, whereas it is, in fact, a question of how Derrida conceives language.

本研究旨在探討台灣以英文為外語的國中生在拒絕時所採取的策略。資料收集由每組40位的青少年，共三組所組成。分為：以中文為母語的受試者 (NC)，以英文為外語的學習者 (EFL)，和以英文為母語的受試者 (NA)。實驗經由設計好的8個不同情境 ( 2個請求，2個建議，2個邀請，2個提供 )，分別為4種不同的拒絕的「完成對話問卷」(DCT) 來達成。距離和性別是二個控制的變項。120 位受試者的回答根據直接拒絕、間接拒絕、不拒絕、沒有回應四種拒絕策略分類。卡方檢定用來分析三組間是否有統計上的顯著差異。 結論顯示，以中文為母語的，以英文為外語的，和以英文為母語的這三組在表達拒絕時，確實有顯著差異。以中文為母語的 (NC) 和以英文為外語的 (EFL) 二組比較喜愛使用間接拒絕策略；而以英文為母語的 (NA) 這一組傾向選擇直接拒絕策略。此外，以英文為外語的 (EFL) 這組的表現常出現遵循他們母語 (L1) 的模式，雖然他們有些行為表現顯示出受到外語文化 (L2) 的影響。此外，或許由於缺乏足夠的語言能力，以英文為外語 (EFL) 的一組，在拒絕時，傾向表達過多的道歉。因此本研究建議，教師在教學上應幫助學生學習多使用綜合的拒絕策略來取代過多或不必要的道歉。根據以上的發現，本研究也提出一些在英語教學上的啟示和應用，以及對未來研究的建議。 / The purpose of the study was to investigate what strategies were employed when EFL junior high school students in Taiwan performed a refusal. The data collected from three groups of forty teenagers in each group: native Chinese speakers (NC), EFL learners (EFL), and native American English speakers (NA). The experiment was carried out through the Discourse Completion Task (DCT), which was designed to eight situations: 2 requests, 2 suggestions, 2 invitations, and 2 offers to elicit four types of refusal. Two social variables, distance and gender, were controlled. Responses from 120 participants were categorized according to refusal strategies including direct refusal, indirect refusal, non-refusal, and no response. The chi-square was employed to test the presence of statistically significant difference existing across the three groups. Results revealed that the Chinese, the EFL, and the American groups were virtually different in expressing refusals. The Chinese and EFL groups preferred to employ indirect refusal strategies, while the American group tended to select direct ones. Moreover, the performance of the EFL group frequently followed their L1's norms, although some of their behaviors were influenced by the L2's culture. Besides, perhaps due to a lack of sufficient pragmatic knowledge and vocabulary, the EFL group tended to express more regret when performing a refusal. Therefore, the present study suggests that the instructors may help learners acquire the usage of combination strategies to decline rather than utilizing verbose or unnecessary regret. Based on the findings, the study also proposed some pedagogical implications and suggestions for future research.

The diploma thesis examines the role of convention in J. L. Austin's speech act theory. It describes the possibility of "how to do things with words": such an analysis of language will be suggested that does not focus on the category of truth when dealing with particular utterances but rather replaces it with the category of felicity of a speech act in the social context. After having offered the explication including the central points of the given theory, there starts the investigation of which parts of the speech act theory are conventionally based and what role do conventions play in the speech act theory as a whole.

Master of Arts / Department of Modern Languages / Li Yang / This study investigates and compares politeness strategies of Turkish learners of English (TLE) and American English speakers (AE) when they produce the speech act of refusal in English. A total of 24 participants took part in this study and each of them completed a background survey, an open role play and a semi-structured interview. The role-play asked all of the participants to refuse a party invitation offered by a classmate/colleague and was audio-recorded. The refusal interactions were coded according to the classification proposed by Beebe et al. (1990), and the sequence of the refusal interactions (i.e., head act, pre- and post-refusals) was also examined. The results showed that providing excuse/reason/explanation was the most preferred strategy by both groups overall, but closer examination of the strategy revealed that the TLE group was more specific in their explanations compared to the AE group. In addition, when the conductor of the role play insisted on the invitation, the AE group continued to refuse without giving specific reasons, whereas the TLE group chose to provide elaborate reasons upon insistence. During the interview session after the role play, the TLE group commented on cultural factors that influenced their choice of refusal strategies. Based on the findings, this study also proposed implications of the teaching of pragmatics in the English as a second language (ESL) context.

I argue that one cannot hold a Meinongian ontology of fictional characters and have a causal theory of reference for fictional names. The main argument presented refutes Edward Zalta's claim that storytelling should be considered an extended baptism for fictional characters. This amounts to the claim that storytelling fixes the reference of fictional names in the same way that baptism fixes the reference of ordinary names, and this is just a claim about the illocutionary force of these two types of utterance. To evaluate this argument, therefore, we need both a common understanding of the Meinongian ontology and a common taxonomy of speech acts. I briefly sketch the Meinongian ontology as it is laid out by Zalta in order to meet the former condition. Then I present an interpretation of the taxonomy of illocutionary acts given by John Searle in the late 1970s and mid 1980s, within which we can evaluate Zalta's claims. With an ontology of fictional characters and a taxonomy of speech acts in place, I go on to examine the ways in which the Meinongian might argue that storytelling is an extended baptism. None of these arguments are tenable-there is no way for the act of storytelling to serve as an extended baptism. Therefore, the act of storytelling does not constitute a baptism of fictional characters; that is, storytelling fails to ground a causal chain of reference to fictional characters.