The concept or phenomenon od performativity occurs in different forms or terms in many humanity studies, especially in the second half of the 20th century. It interferes with linguistics, philosophy of thought, narratology, gender and cultural studies and even with epistemology and ethics. The notion of performativity appeared in philosophy and linguistics for the first time along with J. L. Austin's speech and perfomative acts. The first one describes the situation, the second one generates the situation. J. Derrida pointed out that the realization of speech acts and communication are not so obvious and depend on performance that maintains their status and identity. J. Derrida furthermore shows that performance does not only appear in the literary field; the law is for example performative in the sense that it sets itself up by a speech act. M. Foucault was interested of the role of performativity within a socially organized body and subjectivity. The performance of language and discourse is also essential in J. Butler's work which follows M. Foucault or J. Derrida and describes mechanisms for establishing gender subjectivity and physicality. She claims that the body is created simultaneously by the linguistic naming which it decribes. Butler writes up the process of gender differentiaton as...

This study aimed to analyse organised interaction and assigned discussions occurring between students in EFL classrooms. It was conducted in order to identify the value-added in terms of learning by using discussion groups. Secondly, this study aimed to analyse how the contribution of models and approaches from pragmatics and discourse analysis can explain what is occurring during such conversations. Lastly, the structural and linguistic similarities and differences between teacher-to-student and student-to-student talk were also discussed. These questions were answered by examining four groups enrolled in English 6 in an upper secondary school located in the south part of Sweden. The qualitative data was collected through recordings from the students' discussions when they participated in a group speaking task as a part of the module of surveillance. The analysis of the data was conducted with the help of some of the aspects of conversation analysis. The results showed that not all of the participants in the group discussions sufficiently benefitted from the speaking task since, in most of the group, the need for the teacher's support was crucial in order for the students to use the target language and develop their speaking skills. In terms of the Speech Act Theory, the illocutionary acts identified in the conversations between students were that of the directive and assertive illocutionary acts used to pass the speaking turn to the other participants or to demonstrate agreement with the views of the previous turn. The conversational exchange was initiated by an opening framing move, followed by a response, but lacked follow-up moves in the form of feedback. Finally, there were some similarities and differences between teacher-to-student and student-to-student talk. The results showed that even if some of the students appeared to adapt to the role of the facilitator, they were not able to do so due to lack of knowledge to sufficiently support all the participants in order to be more active during the conversations and use the target language during the speaking task.

There are not many countries in the world whose relations were as turbulent as in the case of the United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran. Since 1979 the U.S. military, diplomatic and economic assistance towards Iran has been replaced by sanctions and hostilities. Author of the M.A. thesis On the Edge of Dependency: Iran in the Foreign Policy of the United States, 1979 - 2009 assumes that the geopolitical interests of the United States were to make Iran weak, isolated and dependent on the periphery of the world system, thus to enforce a heteronomous structure of domination. To answer the research questions the critical discourse analysis has been performed. Based on the constructivist rule-based approach and speech act theory the U.S. political elites in the process of meeting their foreign policy objectives should have been using a commissive language. The analysis of the U.S. political discourse has shown, however, the United States since 1979 strived for hierarchical structure of domination over Iran. The long-standing lack of stability in the U.S.-Iranian relations can be therefore explained that Iranian political elites reject the rules Washington has been trying to apply.

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This master thesis asks the question “Why are confessions so convincing?”. To provide an answer, I use Austin’s speech act theory to investigate how confessions work within the context of Swedish law. This model was fit for purpose; however, the theory lacks a temporal dimension necessary to understand the mechanisms in play when confessions convince someone. To account for this discrepancy, I use Derek Beach’s process tracing. Given the sometimes-strained relation between law and rhetoric I completed extensive reviews of literature on judicial rhetoric, both historically and contemporary. The current literature suggests that Swedish scholars of law use rhetorical theories more often than expected, however, Swedish scholars of rhetoric seem to interact with law a lot less. One of the findings of this thesis is that a rhetorical perspective, and the perspective from someone outside the field of law, may add significantly to understandings of confessions. Confessions are culturally important and often misunderstood, initially perceived as an unavoidable part of human nature. However, as discussed in this text, confessions are not rooted in human nature, but in cultural conventions, with a historical tradition dating back to the Middle Ages. When researching confessions in general, this paper identifies tensions between three kinds of confessions: religious confessions, juridical confessions, and psychotherapeutic confessions. Ten Swedish judges were interviewed, and 1599 court decisions were analyzed for this paper. Through this material an agreed upon ritual in which confessions become convincing appears. This ritual is however not the only reason why confession become convincing. Confessions can be detailed, coherent, and nuanced, which makes them more believable. The power to convince through confession consists of a complex net of different mechanisms, some based in the law system, and some based in rhetoric.

This study examines explicitness and implicitness in the instructions of eight English baking recipes and their translations into Swedish. The aim is to investigate whether the degree of explicitness changes in the translation. Additionally, the translation of reader address is examined to determine if it leads to an increase or decrease of the recipe explicitness. Illocution and speech act theory provide a theoretical framework for the analysis. In the examination of translated instructions, the study presents five analyzed verb constructions: the imperative, the passive, the modal auxiliary, the finite verb and the adverbial -ing-clause. In the examination of reader address, the study analyzes the translation of the English subject pronoun you. The results show that the translation keeps close to the ST structure and often renders the instructions with the same verb construction. However, there are instances for each analyzed feature where the translation provides more explicit instructions than the ST. Further, the results indicate that the translation of reader address is closely linked to the translation of the instructions; if the ST verb construction is altered in the TT, the ST reader address may either be translated or omitted in the TT. Additionally, the translator needs to interpret whether the address is aimed at a specific reader or a group of readers, as Swedish can translate the English pronoun you into either du, man, ni or det. The translation of the recipes was performed by the author of this paper, a beginner translator, which may have affected the results.

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. / Missiology / M.Th (Missiology)

本研究旨在探討中美文化差異對於建議語行為的影響，並且進一步探究文化差異以及社會地位、人際熟悉度等情境因素如何影響台灣英語學習者的建議語行為。本研究的三組受試者分別為35位英語母語人士、35位中文母語人士、35位英文程度佳的台灣英語學習者。語料蒐集工具為言談情境填充問卷(DCT)。所蒐集的語料針對受試者的建議語策略使用來進行量化以及質化的分析。 研究結果顯示，中文組的建議語行為比英語組來的直接。而學習者組在建議語的策略使用上則近似於中文組，也表現出比英語組直接的建議語行為。這樣的結果很可能由中美文化的差異所導致。此外，台灣英語學習者的建議語行為受到了文化差異的影響，表現出來自於母語的語用移轉(pragmatic transfer)，除了語用移轉所造成的語用失敗(pragmatic failure)之外，研究者還發現兩項學習者在建議語使用上的語用失敗，分別是：教學引起的誘發性錯誤(teaching-induced errors)，以及使用過多文字(waffle phenomenon)。有鑑於這些語用失敗，本研究提出兩點教學上的啟示。一、語言教師必須引導學生瞭解文化差異對於跨文化溝通的影響。二、語言教師以及教材編者必須提供充足的語境訊息(contextual information)以教導英語學習者如何適宜地的表達。 / The present study aimed to explore the cross-cultural differences between the suggestion behaviors by Chinese and Americans, and further investigated how the differences affect Taiwanese EFL learners’ interlanguage suggestion under two social variables. Three groups of participants were concerned in this study. They were 35 native speakers of American English, 35 native speakers of Mandarin Chinese and 35 Taiwanese EFL learners. The data were collected by written DCT elicitation questionnaire. Participants’ responses were analyzed both quantitatively and qualitatively to see how the three groups of participants employed the suggestion head act strategy, hedging devices, supportive moves and suggestion patterns. The results showed that the Chinese group was more direct than the American group. Besides, the learner group approximated the Chinese group and thus also employed more direct suggestion patterns and strategies than the American group did. This may be possibly due to the cultural differences between the Chinese and the American culture. This study also found that the EFL learners transferred both their native socio-cultural norms and pragmalinguistic conventions into their suggestion behaviors. In addition to pragmatic transfer, two more pragmatic failures were found; they were teaching-induced errors and the waffle phenomenon. With regard to these failures, this study suggested that language teachers should make learners aware of the importance of cultural differences in cross-cultural communication. Besides, teachers and language materials designers should provide as much contextual information as possible so that learners can learn the appropriate form or structure for its corresponding function.

在台灣，由於中學英語課程的設計大都是考試導向，教學過程中幾乎完全著重於語言形式的教導，而忽略語言使用功能的重要性，所以台灣的英語學習者在中學階段很少有機會接受語言功能教學。本研究主要是要調查間接性以及禮貌性這兩個語用功能對於邀請句式選擇的適當性是否有所影響，進而調查語言功能教學對於本國的中學生學習英語的可行性與成效性。 本研究先分析了20位美國人在間接性與禮貌性的考量之下，對邀請句式的選擇為何，以便建立美國文化在這方面的規範。然後，再以此規範，設計一套四個單元的語言功能教學課程。有135位來自台灣北部兩所高中的高一學生接受了這項課程。這兩所學校的基測成績高低不同；每間學校各有兩班學生分別接受以功能為主的教學和以結構為主的教學。 前測及後測的結果顯示語言功能教學有效地改善了台灣學生的語言功能表現。再者，語言形式選擇的適當性的確受制於間接性及禮貌性的宰制。此外，情態策略也被驗証比直接策略及暗示策略要來得困難及複雜許多。又，基測成績較高的學校的學生比基測成績較低的學校的學生在學習語言功能的過程中表現較好。整體而言，實驗結果顯示，對於以英語為外國語的學生而言，語言功能教學是有效的、可行的，也是必須的。 另外，雖然台灣學生較偏好結構為主的教學法，但是本研究發現功能為主的教學法比結構為主的教學法成效較佳。最後，從學生對於本課程的評量得知，雖然學生們覺得語言功能學習法不是很有趣，但是他們大多認為這樣的教學方法對學習英語是有幫助的，而且是重要的。 / EFL learners in Taiwan are hardly taught language functions in high schools since most of the English courses are designed in accordance with the examination-oriented goal, which is far more focused on teaching language form than on teaching language use. The purpose of the present study is to investigate whether indirectness and politeness would influence appropriate linguistic choice for invitation, and to investigate the effectiveness of teaching language functions to high school students in EFL classrooms. In this study, 20 American subjects’ ratings of eight linguistic forms for invitation by indirectness and politeness were analyzed to obtain the American norm, based on which a four-unit program of teaching language functions was designed. 138 senior high school students from two senior high schools in northern Taiwan took a pre-test before receiving the instruction and a post-test afterwards. Two classes from each school received function-based teaching method and structure-based teaching method respectively. The results of the pre-test and the post-test, in comparison with the American norm, indicate that teaching language functions is effective in improving Chinese students’ competence of the functional aspect of English. Next, the test results verify that the appropriate choice of linguistic forms is indeed influenced by politeness and indirectness, although these two functional factors are not in a systematic relationship. Moreover, Modality strategy is found to be more difficult and more complex than Direct strategy and Hinting strategy. In addition, although the students from the school of high BCT scores tend to perform better than those from the school of low BCT scores, students of both schools made significant improvement in learning the concepts of indirectness and politeness. The findings given above imply that teaching language functions to high school students in EFL classrooms is feasible, necessary, and effective. In addition, according to the results of the general evaluations to this teaching program offered by the students and the English teachers involved, although the Taiwanese students showed preference to structure-based method, function-based method is verified to be more effective. In conclusion, the students’ and the teachers’ evaluations of this program indicate that learning language functions may not be interesting, but it is helpful and important to the students.