奥斯汀言语行为理论的学术背景与形成脉络

Academic background and formation of Austin’s speech act theory

奥斯汀言语行为理论是语用学的重要奠基石,对语言学和语言哲学具有开创性贡献。已有研究主要关注奥斯汀言语行为理论的理论贡献、塞尔对奥斯汀言语行为理论的继承和发展等,对奥斯汀前期语言思想未有过深入探究。本文通过解读奥斯汀仅有的三本著作,系统阐述其语言思想的主要内容和发展过程,笔者发现,奥斯汀对言语行为的兴趣几乎贯穿在他全部的语言思想中,言语行为理论的形成与奥斯汀前期语言思想密不可分。从早期对语词意义的探究,到行事性与断定性话语区分说、言语行为三分法和语力概念的提出,他始终关注语言使用的情境、语言的社会规约性、现实性、意向性和言语行为的各种行事功能。

Austin's speech act theory is not only an important cornerstone of pragmatics,but also a pioneering contribution to linguistics and philosophy of language.This paper attempts to discuss the academic background of Austin's speech act theory,review its formation and analyze the main content of his early thoughts by interpreting his three classic works.It is proposed that Austin's interests in speech acts penetrated almost all his language thoughts and his theoretical contributions are inextricably bound up with his early language thoughts.From the start of his early exploration of word meaning,he was highly concerned about the contexts,actuality,intentionality,conventionality of language as well as performative functions of speech acts.