Clinical Pragmatics
Speech act forces
Austin stresses that all speech acts have in common the force of enunciation, and refers to terms such as 'illocutionary act', 'locutionary act' or 'perlocutionary act' (and at the same time, within these he makes a distinction between 'phonetic, factual and rhetic locutionary acts'). On the other hand, he mentions 'illocutionary force' as the doctrine of the different types of language function (Austin, 1962) 8th, 9th and 10th Conferences (Austin, 1971, 8th Conference).
Concept of speech act forces within ICRA Method
The authors have found it useful to follow Austin's line, but also to adapt the way of expressing it in order to better implement the speech act in the speech-language pathology clinic. It was carried out as follows:
• Speak of speech act, on the one hand, and of three forces that always shape each speech act, on the other (Abraham & Brenca, 2013, 2016): the illocutionary force (the communicative intention), the locutionary force (the verbal manifestation of that intentionality) and the perlocutionary force (related to what the listener decodes).
• Change the order in which Austin mentions them to emphasize the order in which the authors consider the three forces manifest themselves in the child’s development of communicative competence, appearing in the following progression:
1) Forces of enunciation in preverbal communication: ILLOCUTIONARY and PERLOCUTIONARY FORCES
2) Forces of speech acts in verbal communication: LOCUTIONARY FORCE
Speech act forces
The locutionary force consists of combining a series of words to produce a certain meaning; the illocutionary force is the speaker’s intent translated into action: we give information, we ask, we beg, we order, etc.. Finally, the perlocutionary force is the effect the speaker intends to produce on the hearer, such as persuading, informing, saddening, questioning, etc.
When a speech act is performed, the three forces are present, which is relevant for child language development: if a child can show his/her communicative intent but cannot express it verbally and the adult understands it, he/she has not achieved the speech act yet but is expressing two of the three forces.
If adults do not perceive that the child recognizes the illocutionary and perlocutionary forces of speech acts they direct to him/her (that is, the intention and understanding of what type of speech act is expected of them), adults may be discouraged and gradually stop interacting with them, with the subsequent deterioration of the child’s communicative development.
Speech act forces
Speech act, communicative circuit and concept of phase: “the minimum part represents the whole”
Here we can use the concept of “phase” related to embryonic development, applied by Argentine epistemologist Juan Samaja (1997) in the development of research works: “Functions developing in the most advanced and complex phases are already present in the initial phases, although the organs and structures with which they are fulfilled are not recognizable.”
In our work, this concept is related to language development by considering changes not as stages but as “successive reconfigurations and distinctions from the same entirety.”.
In a communicative system, structure is a logical principle; it conveys meaning. Nothing is by chance. In this principle of logical order, the minimum part represents the whole. The smallest part keeps or contains the logic of the whole. We see that this principle is clearly accomplished in the speech act. Its three forces (illocutionary, locutionary and perlocutionary) are displayed in the smallest speech act (i.e. the rejection expressed with the adverb of negation “no”) as well as in the whole discourse.
Therefore we affirm that it is necessary to work on the basic speech acts of language development in order to open or recover the minimum communication circuit, and from there to pass on to the narrative level.