ORAL COMMUNICATION- 2ND QUARTER

MODULE 2

TYPES OF SPEECH STYLE

 Style- is the set of linguistic variants that a person uses and that has specific social meanings. It is the choice of
words that a person can use or apply in different situations. Being able to identify what style you are using when
you communicate is essential in making sure that you are able to achieve your goal of sending your message and
of being understood.
 There are several speech styles as follows:

1. Frozen – also known as the static or flexible. It is most formal communicative style and can be observed during
formal situations and solemn ceremonies. The language is typically unchanged or fixed in all situations. The
sentences are also long, and grammar is virtually perfect. It is also referred as oratorical style.
Example: This style is used in Bible, the Constitution, pledges, marriage vows, and creed.
“I respectfully nominate Mr. Mendoza”

2. Formal—is the communicative style that uses language that conforms to professional or academic standards. In
some cases, it also requires the use of technical terminologies. Slangs are avoided in this style because utmost
respect for the person/s being addressed should be demonstrated at all times. It is commonly used in situations
that involve an audience such as board meetings, speech events, classroom presentations, and court trials.

Example:
 Greetings! – “Hello, Good morning.”
 To show approval or excitement- “That is terrific to hear.”
 Making suggestions/ Giving advice- “Would you please allow me to make suggestions?”

3. Consultative—is less planned that the first two styles. It is spontaneous and has the tendency to use shorter
sentences and slangs. In this style, someone is seeking advice from a person who is knowledgeable about a topic.
It is used in such situations as school conversations, doctor-patient consultations, and group discussions.

Example: Doctor- Patient Situation

Rica: “Good morning, Dr. Garcia.”
Dr. Garcia: “Hi, how have you been feeling?”
Rica: “I have stomachache and LBM since last night.”
Dr. Garcia: “What did you eat yesterday?”

4. Casual—is used by people communicating with someone they have a close relationship with. The language is
informal, and the heavy use of slangs and contractions is also evident. Casual style is typically observed in normal
everyday situations such as conversations with parents, other family members, and friends. Jargon, slang, or the
vernacular language is used. Also, nicknames are used in addressing one another.

Example:
Classmate 1: Hey! What’s up? You seem very busy.
Classmate 2: Yes, I have to finish something up.
Classmate 1: Oh, I see. Wanna come for milktea at the canteen?
Classmate 2: Sure.

5. Intimate—common in communication between and among people in intimate relationship. Strict compliance to
grammar rules is unnecessary, the utterances are short, and slangs are used. The use of personal codes or
endearments and words that only the people in the relationship can understand is also common. A conversation
between husband and wife is an example of this communicative styles. Also defined as total absence of social
interactions.

Example:
Wife: Hon, have you seen my key?
Husband: Uhmm, I think it is on the table.
Wife: Thanks, hon, I’ll check it.
Husband: Okay, hon.

TYPES OF SPEECH ACT

 Speech Acts- It is the tool employed in accomplishing certain kinds of acts. In linguistics, it is utterance defined
in terms of a speaker’s intention and the effect it has on the speaker. Speech acts are different from physical acts
like eating spaghetti, or mental acts like thinking about eating spaghetti.
 Include promising to eat spaghetti, asking for spaghetti, ordering someone to eat spaghetti, requesting someone to
cook spaghetti and so on.
 These are called “communicative acts”, but speech and even language are not strictly required.
 A speech act is an act that speaker performs when making an utterance. Including the following:
1. A general act (illocutionary act) that speaker performs, analyzable as
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 a. The uttering of words (utterance acts)
b. Making reference and predicating (propositional acts)
c. A particular intention in making the utterance (illocutionary force)
2. An act involved in the illocutionary act including utterance acts and propositional acts.
3. The production of a particular effect in the addressee (perlocutionary act)

SPEECH ACT THEORY

 Three levels or components such utterances. To illustrate this, eating spaghetti is an action. Asking someone else
to get you one is also an act. When we speak, our words do not have meaning in and of themselves. What we say
is very much affected by the situation, the speaker and the listener. Thus, words alone do not have a simple fixed
meaning.

LOCUTIONARY ACT
 Locutionary act refers to saying something (the locution) with certain meaning in traditional sense. In other
words, it is “what is said”. This may not constitute a speech act.

TWO TYPES OF LOCUTIONARY ACT

1. Utterance Act- this is where something is said (or a sound is made) and which may not have any meaning.
2. Propositional Act- this is where a particular reference is made.
Example: “Close the window!” the locutionary act is the realization of the speaker’s utterance. The locutionary act
is the recognition of the speaker’s utterance.

ILLOCUTIONARY ACT
 Refers to the performance of an act in saying something (vs. the general act of saying something). The
illocutionary force is the speakers intent, a true speech act. In other words it is “what is done in uttering the
words.”
Example: Ordering, asking, informing, advising or warning.

KINDS OF ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS

1. Command
Here are two senses for command:
a. A command is an illocutionary act that has the directive illocutionary point of getting another to do or not to
do something.
b. A command is syntactic sentence type in a language that is used primarily to express such illocutionary acts,
and is described as having imperative form.
Examples: Open the window, please.
Would you open the window please?

2. Complex Illocutionary Act

 This kind has neglected illocutionary force, is performed conditionally or is conjoined with another illocutionary
act.
 There are three types of complex illocutionary act:
a. Conjunctive Illocutionary Act- consists of the performance of two or more illocutionary acts in one utterance.
Example: Cherie will go to his dormitory tomorrow, but will he be there?
b. Illocutionary Conditional- consist of an illocutionary act and a stated condition for the performance of that
act.
Example: If Ramon will be the next candidate for Treasurer, I bet your Php 100 that he will win.
c. Illocutionary Denegation- consists of the negation of its illocutionary force. It expresses that the speaker is not
performing a particular illocutionary act.
Example: I do not promise to see him.

3. Defective Illocutionary Act

 Act whether successful or unsuccessful, in which one or more of the prepatory or sincerity conditions for the
act are not met.
Example: “Pass the pepper”, preparatory condition, the addressee’s ability to comply, is not met because there is
no pepper on the table.

4. Direct Illocution
 A direct illocution is an illocutionary act in which only the illocutionary force and propositional content
literally expressed by the lexical items and syntactic form of the utterance are communicated.

5. Elementary Illocution
 This kind of illocutionary act does not have a negated illocutionary force, is not performed unconditionally,
and is not conjoined to another illocutionary act.

6. Exclamation
 Here are some two senses for exclamation:
a. An exclamation, broadly defined, is any utterance made with strong emotion.
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 b. An exclamation, narrowly defined, is a sentence type that is used to express a strong emotional state.
Example: What a cold night it was!

7. Indirect Illocution
 This is an illocutionary act in which the speaker expresses another illocutionary force other than literally
expresses in utterance, by relying on shared background knowledge, principles of conversation such as
cooperative principle, convention and the ability of the addressee to make inferences.

8. Nondefective Illocutionary Act
 In this type of act, all the presuppositions of the propositional content conditions, preparatory conditions and
sincerity conditions are satisfied.

9. Questions
 Here are two senses of questions:
a. A question is an illocutionary act that has a directive illocutionary point of attempting to get the addressee
to supply information.
Example: Tell me your birthday.
b. A question is a sentence type that has a form( labeled interrogative) typically used to express illocutionary
act with the directive illocutionary point mentioned above. It may be actually so used (as direct
illocution), or used rhetorically.
Example: When is your birthday?

 Some kinds of questions:

1. Alternative Question- presents two or more possible answers and presupposes that only one is true.
Example: Would you like yellow, pink, or orange shirt?
2. Tag Question- constituent that is added after a statement in order to request confirmation or
disconfirmation of the statement from the addressee. Often expresses the bias of the speakaer toward one
answer. A tag question often includes a be verb, predicate meaning ‘true’, and negative.
Example: aren’t they, isn’t she
3. Wh- Question- contains an interrogative pro-form. It is also known as content question, question word
question and information question.
Example: What, When, Why, Where, Who and How
4. Yes--- No Question- for which an answer of yes or no is acceptable. It can be distinguished with the
following features: rising sentence- final intonation, a sentence- initial or a sentence- final participle, verb
morphology and a difference of word order.
Example: Are the young boys enjoying the movie?

10. Statement
 Here are two senses of a statement:
a. A statement is an illocutionary act that has an assertive illocutionary point of saying that some affairs
is true.
b. A statement is a sentence having a form that is typically used to express such illocutionary acts.
A tag statement is a kind of statement. It is elliptical statement that follows and echoes a main clause
statement. It is a subject noun or pronoun followed or preceded by an auxiliary verb.
Example: She wrote an inspirational poem, did Mercie.

PERLOCUTIONARY ACTS
 Acts to refer to speech acts that have effect on the feelings, thoughts or actions of either the speaker or the
listener. They seek to change or transform mind! In contrast to locutionary acts, perlocutionary acts are
external to the performance. For examples, persuading, inspiring, encouraging, convincing, scaring, insulting
or deterring.
 Intuitively, a perlocutionary act is an act performed by saying something, and not in saying something.
Persuading, angering, acting, comforting and inspiring are often perlocutionary acts; but they would never
begin an answer to the question ‘What did he say?’.
 In speech theory, a perlocutionary act is an action or state of mind brought about by, or as a consequence of,
saying something which is also known as perlocutionary effect.
Example: negotiation between the teacher and her students about coming up with a drama presentation
 The perlocutionary act is the consequent effort on the hearer which the speaker intends should follow from his
utterance.
 Kempson offers this summary of the three inter related speech acts originally presented by John L. Austin in
How to Do Things With Words (1962): “ a speaker utters sentences with a particular meaning (locutionary
act), and with particular force (illocutionary act), in order to achieve a certain effect on the hearer
(perlocutionary act).”

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  Searle (1969) identified five illocutionary/ perlocutionary points:
1. Assertive/ Representatives. These are statements that may be judged true or false because they aim to
describe a state of affairs in the world, e.g. affirming, believing, concluding, denying, reporting,
describing, etc.
2. Directives. These are statements that attempt to make the other person’s actions fir the propositional
content. The speakers try to get their listeners to do something, e.g. begging, commanding, requesting,
ordering, questioning, etc.
3. Commissives. These are statements which commit the speaker to a course of action as described by the
propositional content. The speakers commit themselves to a future course of action, e.g. promising,
guaranteeing, offering, etc.
4. Expressives. These are statements that express the “sincerity condition of the speech act”. The speakers
express their feelings, e.g. apologizing, welcoming, sympathizing, thanking, etc.
5. Declaratives. These are statements that attempt to change the world by “representing it as having
changed”. The speakers utterance brings about a new external situation, e.g. christening, marrying,
resigning, declaring war, etc.
CONSTATIVES
 Affirming, alleging, announcing, answering, attributing, claiming, classifying, concurring, confirming,
conjecturing, denying, disagreeing, disclosing, disputing, identifying, informing, insisting, predicting, ranking,
reporting, stating, stipulating
DIRECTIVES
 Advising, admonishing, asking, begging, dismissing, excusing, forbidding, instructing, ordering, permitting,
requesting, requiring, suggesting, urging, warning
COMMISSIVES
 Agreeing, guaranteeing, inviting, offering, promising, swearing, accepting
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
 Apologizing, condoling, congratulating, greeting, thanking, accepting

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 MODULE 2- ORAL COMMUNICATION

Name:__________________________________________________ Date:_____________________
Section:__________________________________ Score:____________________

Activity 1: Read the sentence carefully and identify the intention of the following speech acts.

a. Request d. Command g. Offer

b. Apology e. Rebuke
c. Suggestion f. Invitation

Speaker- Listener Speech Act

_______________1. Mother to son Your room is very untidy!
_______________2. A tourist to a hotel clerk Can I have a suite room in the second floor?
_______________3. A friend to a friend I’m so sorry for what happened yesterday the canteen.
_______________4. A teacher to her student Why don’t you attend the remedial class reading?
_______________5. Father to his son Come home early today!
_______________6. A stranger to a lady Miss, it seems that your bag is heavy. May I carry it for you?
_______________7. A neighbor to another neighbor It’s my birthday tomorrow. Your presence will certainly make
my celebration special.
_______________8. Mother to daughter Never tell a lie!
_______________9.

Activity 2: Decide which type of speech act is represented by each of these statements:
A. Propositional Act ( Locutionary Act)
B. Illocutionary Act
C. Perlocutionary Act
________1. Your professor says, ”For our class on Wednesday, please read pages ten to fifteen and answer Activity 1.”
________2. While talking with your classmates, you mention that you watched the famous musical stage play at PICC.
________3. The two friends are talking about a television show that both of you watched. You say, “What did you think
about John’s reaction to Annie’s news of her accepting the marriage proposal of the old man?”
________4. When you learned that your friend will no longer stop from schooling, you let out a sigh of relief.
________5. Your sister says, “Let us start cleaning the house,”
________6. While having a conversation with your cousin, you tell her that you listened to the latest song of your favorite
singer.

Activity 3: Read the sentences carefully and pick out from the pool of words the correct answer.

Speech Act Illocutionary Act

Locutionary Act Perlocutionary Act
Utterance Act Direct Illocution

1._________________________is an illocutionary act in which only the illocutionary force and propositional content
literally expressed by the lexical items and syntactic form of the utterance are communicated.
2. _________________________ is an act that the speaker performs when making an utterance.
3._________________________ is “what is said”
4._________________________ is where something is dais ( or sound is made) and which may not have any meaning.
5. ________________________ is an act performed by saying something.
6. ________________________ is the performance of an act in saying something.

Activity 4: Label each sentence as intimate, formal, casual , or frozen based on its diction.
_________________1. Let’s go get something to eat.
_________________2. You sure do not wanna join tonight’s event?
_________________3. It is essential to learn the different speech styles.
_________________4. I second the motion.
_________________5. The Mona Lisa looks weird from up close.
_________________6. Are you serious? That is the best news I have ever heard so far.
_________________7. Right.
_________________8. Pickett’s charge at the Battle of Gettysburg was surely an awe-inspiring sight.
_________________9. A friend frowns and says, “fine”.
_________________10. Those who are in favor of the suggestion, please say “aye”.

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Activity 5: Answer the following questions.

1. Differentiate locutionary act, illocutionary act and perlocutionary act.

Locutionary Act Illocutionary Act Perlocutionary Act

2. What is Speech- Act Theory?

3. How many kinds of illocutionary acts are there. Enumerate them.