We discuss three constructions which seem to modify the illocutionary force of an utterance: reverse-polarity tag questions [RP-tags] (1a), same-polarity tag questions [SP-tags] (1b), and non-interrogative rising intonation [NI-rise] (1c). Rising intonation is indicated with a question mark (“?”).1 Rising intonation on syntactically declarative sentences (1c) has been discussed in Gunlogson (20...

The roles played in an illocutionary act by models of the means of communication and the communicator are distinguished, and qualitative differences between the models appropriate in the two cases identified. Applied to human-computer interaction, this means that a user must have models of the computer both as a communications device and a communications medium, and of the system author as inte...

A view of human-human interaction is presented and its implications for human-computer interaction discussed. Two propositions are advanced. The first is that interaction with computer systems is properly seen as mediated discourse, more akin to reading books and notices than interpersonal dialogues. The second proposition is a consequence of this, namely that unconstrained natural language is ...

The purpose of this study was to look at headline writers’ intentions from Tanzanian Nipashe newspapers and classify them in accordance with illocutionary speech acts Taxonomy by Searle (1979). employed a qualitative research approach descriptive design. involved the population 1095 front-page newspaper headlines. A sample 130 headlines chosen each classified according taxonomy Speech Act. Out ...

In the philosophical tradition, propositions have a double nature. On one hand, they are units of sense of a fundamental logical type. They are senses of sentences provided with truth conditions. Each proposition is true in a circumstance when it represents a fact which exists in that circumstance. So any analysis of the logical form of propositions requires a theory of truth. On the other hand...