In the framework of the standard theory of speech acts (Searle 1969), enriched with recent models of societal pragmatics (Mey 2002, 2009, 2010; Kecskes 2008, 2010), the dialogic approach to speech acts (Weigand 2009a, b) and cognitive theories of relevance and mental spaces (Sperber and Wilson 1986, Fauconnier 1994), the authors reopen the case of the relationship between syntax, semantics and illocutionary force.

While it is well known that there is not a 1:1 correspondence between a clause/sentence and a speech act (Austin 1962), the interpretation of some structures proves to be problematic, as (a-d) below:

 

               a.            Finish by noon and I’ll pay you double!                  

               b.            Come closer and I’ll shoot!                            

               c.            Catch a cold and you’ll end up with pneumonia!

               d.            Come closer or I’ll shoot!

 

Syntactically, such structures have been interpreted as compound sentences based on the pseudo- coordination of an imperative + a declarative clause; semantically, as pseudo-conjunctions (a-c) or disjunctions (d) yielding reversed conditionals of the form “If you…., I will….”; pragmatically, as directive imperative-like conditionals (a), inverse directive imperative-like conditionals (b), non-directive imperative-like conditionals (c), and imperative-like ultimatums (d), respectively. See, among others, Bolinger (1977), Davies (1986), Clark (1993), Han (2000), Dancygier and Sweetser (2006), Russel (2007), Corminboeuf (2008), von Fintel and Iatridou (2011), Kaufman (2012), Jary and Kissine (2012), Takahashi 2012, Gheorghe (2018 in print). Despite the long research history of the topic, authors have not fully agreed on the complex syntactic-pragma-semantic mechanisms that underlie the contextual meaning of such structures.

The present paper challenges previous accounts and proposes an alternative pragmatic interpretation based on two concepts that will be proposed and developed in the paper: compound (vs. simple) speech acts and pragmatic amalgam (echoing Șerbănescu [Vasilescu] 2000).

Accordingly, structures like (a-d) will be interpreted as compound speech acts which amalgamate two deictic frames hosting a speaker-listener dialogue as mentally accessed from the vantage point of the current speaker at the moment of speech. The deviant syntax and semantics of the pseudo-coordinated pseudo-imperative conjuncts/disjuncts (a-d) are traces of speaker’s sharing with the interlocutor two embedded mental spaces which generate a deliberative speech act. Deliberative speech acts are compound speech acts which face the interlocutor with the necessity of making decisions about his/her future course of actions. Deliberative speech acts will be further checked for their compatibility with the standard theory of speech acts.

At the same time, we will list some other syntactic structures which might be interpreted as compound speech acts of various types, displaying various kinds of pragmatic amalgams.

 

FORMAT: traditional presentation

 

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