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H 1 OW TO DO THINGS WITH AUS-
TIN AND SEARLE: SPEECH ACT THEORY
AND LITERARY CRITICISM* ` BY STAN-
LEY E. FISH e
I. I Banish You!
Request
Types Propositional Future actA ofH
Content
of
Preparatory 1. H is able to do A. S believesH
Rule is able to do A.
2. It is not obvious to bothS and H
thatH willdoA in the normal
course of eventsof his own accord.
Sincerity S wantsH to do A
Essential Counts as an attemptto getH to do A.
(SpeechActs,Cambridge, 1969, p. 66)
*1 gratefullyacknowledge the advice and criticismof Rob Cummins,Frank Hub-
bard, Walter Michaels, and David Sachs who will find here not only some of their
ideas but some of their sentences.
'Throughout I have used the edition edited for Signet by Reuben Brower (New
York, 1966).
laAlthoughI deploy the vocabularyof Searle's versionof Speech Act theory,I am
not committedto its precise formulations.
Praise Accepting
Praise
Propositional Someact,property, quality, PastactAdonebyH
content etc.,E relatedtoH
Preparatory E reflects onH and
creditably A benefits
S andS believes
S believesthatitdoes. A benefits
S.
Sincerity S valuesE positively. S feelsgrateful
or
appreciativeforA
Essential Countsas a positivevaluation Countsas an expression
ofE. ofgratitudeor appreci-
ation.
breaker" (Iviii, 1-2). When he is asked to take back his word to the
tribunes("Repent, what you have spoke"), he cries,"I cannot do it
to the Gods, / Must I then do't to them?" (III,ii,38-39). When the
citizenstake back theirs,he asks in contempt,"Have I had chil-
dren's voices?" (III,i,30). The tribunesbase theirentirestrategyon
a pledge theyhave heard him make:
I heardhimswear,
Werehe to standforconsul,neverwouldhe
Appeari' th'marketplace, noron himput
The naplessvestureof humility;
Nor,showing,as themanneris, hiswounds
breaths.
To th' people,beg theirstinking
(IIi,238-42)
"It was his word," says Brutus and Sicinius wishes"no better/Than
to have him hold that purpose and to put it / In execution." They
know theirman (Brutus replies "'Tis most like he will") and as he
goes off to "discharge the custom of request" they predict his be-
havior in the passage withwhich this paper began:
Brutus: You see howhe intendsto use thepeople.
Sicinius:Maytheyperceive'sintent.He willrequirethem,
As if he did contemnwhathe requested
Shouldbe in themto give.
It might seem from this that they are counting on him to be
insincere, to say one thing and mean another; but in fact it is
exactlythe reverse; theyare countingon him to mean exactlywhat
he says and theycount on him to do it by makingvoid the speech
act he purportsto be performing.The surestway to avoid a speech
act is to violate the essentialcondition,to say in the case of promis-
es, "I promise to do x, but I don't intend to" or in the case of
requests, "I am asking you to do this, but I don't want you to."
When Sicinius says, "May theyperceive's intent,"he doesn't mean
"maytheysee throughhis language to the motionof his heart,"but
"may they correctly(by attending to the performance or non-
performanceof stipulatedprocedures) read his language." (In fact,
it is hard to see what it would mean to make an insincererequest if
the specificationwere other than conventional. If I execute the
proper procedures and ask you to do something,and later, after
you've done it, I tell you that I didn't want you to, you have a
perfectresponse in "well,you shouldn't have said that."Notice that
994 STANLEY E. FISH
you will not say, "You shouldn't have intended that" because it is
assumed that intentionis a functionof what is said. Part of Cor-
iolanus' tragedy is that he is forever seeking a level of intention
deeper-more essential or more real-than that stipulatedby the
public conventionsof language.)
The tribunes'laissez-fairestrategyalmost doesn't work,precisely
because for a time the citizens do not "perceive's intent,"even
though,as we have seen, he systematically violateseveryone of the
conditionson the request he is supposedly making.2It is only later
that theyopen their copy of SpeechActs and begin to analyze the
infelicitiesof his performance:
Second Citizen: ... To my poor unworthynotice,
He mockedus whenhe beggedour voices.
ThirdCitizen: Certainly,
He floutedus downright.
FirstCitizen: No, 'tishiskindof speech-he did
notmockus.
SecondCitizen:Not one amongstus, save yourself,
butsays
He used us scornfully.
(II,iii, 163-168)
The tribunes need only guide the discussion which ends in the
determinationthat he "did not ask, but mock" (II,iii,213). Again,
the findingis a procedural, not a moral one. It is not that Cor-
iolanus did not keep his word, but ratherthathe did, and in a way
altogethertypical,by botchinga procedure which,if properlyexe-
cuted, would have tied him to the word of another.
It becomes possible to writea Speech Act historyof Coriolanus,
the play and the man: he cannot make requests or receive praise;
he is mosthimselfwhen he is eitherputtingthingsby or promising.
In slightlydifferentways requesting and accepting praise are acts
whichplace theirperformerin a positionof dependence (hence the
force of "I wouldn't ask you for the time of day" as a way of
assertingthat you don't want or need my help); promising and
rejecting,on the other hand, are transactionsthat leave the self
inviolate. Coriolanus' every illocutionarygesture is one that de-
clares his disinclinationto implicatehimselfin the reciprocalweb of
obligationsthatis the contentof the systemof conventionalspeech
2Whytheydon't see this is a question beyond the scope of the present analysis,
although two explanations suggest themselves:eithertheyare stupid,or theydon't
want to see. These are Sicinius' explanations (II, iii, 180-182).
M L N 995
Greet
content
Propositional None
Preparatory S hasjustencountered (orbeen
introduced to,etc.)H.
Sincerity None
Essential Countsas courteousrecognition of
H byS.
What happens next, however, does not take place within the
precinctsof speech act conventions; rather,it subvertsthem and
along withthem the institutionswithwhichtheyexistin reciprocal
support. Coriolanus turns around and says, "I banish you":
You common cry of curs, whose breath I hate
As reek o' the rottenfens,whose loves I prize
As the dead carcasses of unburied men
That do corrupt my air, I banish you.
(III,iii,120-23)
tive utterance would have no force (as when a fan yells "strike
three").
What Coriolanus' counter-banishingsuggests is that this can be
turnedon its head. It is not thatwords are in forceonly so long as
the institutionsare, but thatinstitutionsare in forceonly so long as
the words are, so long as when theyare utteredhearers performin
the stipulated way (the batter returns to the dugout, the armed
forcesmobilize,the defendant is released fromcustody).If, on the
other hand, hearers simplydisregard a declarativeutterance,it is
not thattheyhave ceased to pay attentionto the words (which still
bear the perfectlyordinary and understood meanings of com-
mands that are not being obeyed), but that they have ceased to
recognize-and assist in the constitutionof-the institution.The
moral of this is chastening, even disturbing: institutionsare no
more than the (temporary)effectsof speech act agreements,and
theyare thereforeas fragileas the decision,alwayscapable of being
revoked, to abide by them. This becomes obvious if one reflectsa
biton the ontological statusof declaratives(a reflectionnot usually
encouraged because so much hangs on the implicitclaim of author-
ityto be eternal): if declarative utterances,when they have their
intended force,alter statesof affairs,what bringsabout the stateof
affairsin which a declarative utterance is endowed with its in-
tended force?The answer is, another declarativeutteranceand it
is an answer one would have to give no matterhow far back the
inquirywas pushed. The conclusionis inescapable: declarative(and
other)utterancesdo not merelymirroror reflectthe state; theyare
the state,which increases and wanes as they are or are not taken
seriously.
It mightbe objected thatto reason in thiswayis to implythatone
can constitutea state simplyby declaring it to exist.That of course
is exactly what happens: a single man plants a flag on a barren
shore and claims everythinghis eye can see in the name of a distant
monarch or for himself;another man, hunted by police and sol-
diers,seeks refugein a cave, where,alone or in the companyof one
or two fellows,he proclaims the birth of a revolutionarygovern-
ment.In the case of Coriolanus, the declarationof independence is
more public,but it has the same content.We can see thisby imagin-
ing him doing somethingelse: had he said, "you can't banish me
because I herebyrenounce my citizenship"(on the model of "you
can't fireme; I resign"),his act would be a recognitionof the state
and of his position in it; but by saying "I banish you," he reduces
998 STANLEY E. FISH
3IV,iv,6-11.
1000 STANLEY E. FISH
Again, this blurs the distinction (which gives the theory whatever
force it has) between two different kinds of felicity. Undershaft's
promise is complete as soon as his intentionto make it is recog-
nized. That is what distinguishes conventional acts from others;
they are performed by invoking procedures that are agreed on in
advance to count as their proper execution. Barbara does not need
to accept the giftin order to complete the promise; it is complete as
soon as it is understood to be one. The word forthisunderstanding
is "uptake" ("ah, so that's what he's doing"); what Ohmann is talk-
ing about is reaction and it is a reaction to an act already, and
felicitously, performed. Were it otherwise, then the reaction would
be impossible. The strongest evidence for the completeness of Un-
dershaft's promise is Barbara's recoiling from it. (Similarly, a
breach of promise suit is possible only if a promise has been suc-
cessfully made; if the promise could be shown to be infelicitous the
suit would fail.)
In both instances Ohmann is doing the same thing: he is sliding
over from illocutionary acts to perlocutionary effects and trying to
1006 STANLEY E. FISH
You may not accept myapology and you maybe waryof regarding
it as a guarantee of my futurebehavior, but you will be able to do
these and other thingsonly because I have in fact made it. (You
don't say, I failed to apologize because he didn't accept it, but,
rather,I apologized, and he didn't accept it.)
What is importantabout Ohmann's errorsis thattheyare always
honorable and attractive;that is, they are made in an effortto
stretchthe theoryso thatitwilldo thingswe would like it to do: talk
about the trainsof events that illocutionary(and other) acts set in
motion,distinguishin dramatic situationsthe differenteffectsthe
performanceof a particularact will have, speculate as to the rea-
sons whya request or an order or a warning hasn't done what the
speaker had hoped it would. Speech Act theorycan point to these
matters-they are perlocutionaryeffects-but it cannot explicate
thembecause theylie outside the area of its declared competence.
Elocutionaryeffectsare conventional; theyoccur simplyby virtue
of speakers and hearers being members of the same community
and thereforepartiesto the same agreementsabout what finiteand
ordered procedures "count as" the performanceof what acts. Per-
locutionaryeffects,on the other hand, are contingent;theycannot
be predictedbecause thereis no way of knowingwhatwillcertainly
bringthemoff.This is not to say thatone can't calculate themwith
probability;but that probabilitywill be natural, not conventional.
Austin puts it this way: "for clearlyany or almost any perlocutio-
nary act is liable to be brought off,in sufficiently special circum-
stances, by the issuing, withor without calculation,of any utterance
whatsoever"(How To Do ThingsWithWords,p. 109).
Obviously this doesn't mean that perlocutionaryeffectsdon't
occur or thatwe shouldn't be interestedin them when doing liter-
ary criticism,but that Speech Act theory can offerus no special
help in dealing withthem,apart fromtellingus thattheyare what
itcannot handle. And if we insiston askingthe theoryto do what it
cannot,we willend up bytakingfromitthe abilityto do whatitcan.
What it can do is tell us what is conventionaland what is not and
provide analyses of conventional performances.But if we ignore
the distinctionbetween the conventional and the contingentand
call everythingwe meet an illocutionaryact or its consequences,
then the termswe are using will have no cuttingforce; they will
tellus nothing,or, whatis the same thing,theywilltellus anything.
Ohmann courts this danger when he assumes that almost any
verb thatappears in a sentence is the name of an illocutionaryact.
1008 STANLEY E. FISH
70f course one could argue thatthisis coherence of a kind,but thatwould merely
show that,like unity,coherence is an emptyterm,an attributewe alwaysmanage to
"discover"in any work we happen to like.
M L N 1017
assume you run into someone who has never seen an encyc-
lopedia...." In short,fictionaldiscourseand workof fictionare not
co-extensivecategoriesbecause fictionaldiscourse is a rigorous no-
tion in a way that work of fictionis not. Therefore one can make
and hold on to a distinctionbetween fictionaldiscourse and serious
discourse withoutin any way helping us to answer questions like
whatis a novel or a storyand how do we tellit froma laundrylist?8
Yet, even if the distinctionisn'tmuch help to the literarycritic,it
stillstands.There is, I thinkwe would all be willingto say,a kind of
discourse that is characterized by the suspension of the rules to
whichspeech acts are normallyheld accountable. The real question
is the statusof those rules when theyare not suspended. What do
they enforce? The answer implicit in Searle's work is that they
enforcea responsibilityto the facts.As far as it goes, thisis unex-
ceptionable and true,but it stillleaves room for another question:
responsibility to what facts?Insofar as he is committedto the prior-
ityof "serious" discourse Searle would have to say to the factsas
theyreally are, but I would say to the factsas the conventionsof
serious discourse stipulatethem to be. I am not claimingthatthere
are no facts,I am merelyraising a question as to their status: do
theyexistoutside conventionsof discourse (whichare then more or
less faithfulto them) or do they follow from the assumptions
embodied in those same conventions? "If there never did exist
a Nixon," says Searle, "Miss Shanahan (and the rest of us) are
mistaken."But suppose someone witha philosophicalturnof mind
were to declare that Nixon as a free and independent agent whose
actionscan be reported and assessed did not exist; that"in fact"the
notionof his agency was a bourgeois myth(one mightsay a fiction)
by means of which a repressivesocietyevaded responsibilityforits
own crimes and tyrannies.It would follow from such a view that
any sentence in which the name Nixon were attached to a finite
preteritetransitiveverb (Nixon said, Nixon rejected, Nixon con-
demned) would be false to the way things really are, would be
mistaken; and any evidence brought forward to substantiateNi-
xon's existence (birthcertificate,photographs,witnessesto his ac-
The identification
is withina certainstorytoldbya certainspeaker.It is
identification
withinhisstory;butnotidentification withinhistory.
(Individuals,
New York,1963,p. 5)
What I have been suggestingis thatidentification(or specification
of facts)is always withina story.Some stories,however,are more
prestigiousthan others; and one storyis always the standard one,
the one that presents itselfas uniquely true and is, in general, so
accepted. Other, non-standard,storieswillof course continueto be
told, but theywill be regarded as non-factual,when, in fact,they
will only be non-authorized.
Searle is right,then,to distinguishbetween serious and fictional
discourseon the basis of internalcanons of criticism,but it does not
follow I think that this is a distinctionbetween the real and the
not-so-real;rather,it is one between two systemsof discourse con-
ventions(two stories)whichcertainlycan be differentiated, but not
on a scale of reality.Of course the conventionsof "serious" dis-
course include a claim to be in touch withthe real (thatis whatbeing
the standard storymeans), and thereforeit comes equipped with
evidentiaryprocedures (routinesfor checkingthingsout) to which
membersof itsclass mustbe ready to submit.But these procedures
(whichfictionaldiscourse lacks,makingit different,not less "true")
inhere in the genre and thereforetheycannot be broughtforward
to prove its fidelityto some supraconventionalreality.The point
may be obscured by the fact (I do not shrinkfromthe word) that
the fictionof thisgenre's statusas somethingnatural (not made) is
one to which we "normally"subscribe; but this only means that of
the realitiesconstitutedby a varietyof discourse conventionsit is
the most popular. That is why we give it the names we do-"real
workaday world," "normal circumstances," "ordinary usage,"
etc.-and whySearle's argumentsare so persuasive: he speaks to us
fromwithinit. But these names are attemptsto fix(or reify)some-
thing,not proof thatitis fixed,and indeed the notionof normal or
ordinarycircumstancesis continuallybeing challenged by anyone
(Freud, Marx, Levi-Strauss)who says,to us, "Now the real factsof
the matterare...." Even in the real-workaday(as opposed to the
philosopher's) world, where the operative assumption is that the
factsare stable and once-and-for-allspecifiable,we veryoftensub-
scribeto differentversionsof what those factsare. "Ordinarily"we
hold a man responsibleforwhat he does, "does" being defined bya
rathercrude standard of "eyeballing,"but in the law, whichis dedi-
1020 STANLEY E. FISH
IV. Conclusion
or can happen after they have been met and invoked. It follows
thatwhilea Speech Act analysisof such textswillalwaysbe possible,
itwillalso be trivial,(a mere listof the occurrenceor distributionof
kindsof acts),because while it is the conditionsof intelligibility
that
make all texts possible, not all texts are about those conditions.
Coriolanusis about those conditions, and it goes the theory one
betterby also being about their fragility.It does not hide fromus
the factthat its own intelligibility rests on nothingfirmerthan an
agreement (foreverbeing renewed) to say "Good Morrow."9
TheJohnsHopkinsUniversity
9An earlierand shorterversionof thispaper was givenat the 1974 meetingof the
Midwest Modern Language Association in Chicago. The occasion was a panel de-
voted to the subject SpeechAct Theoryand LiteraryCriticism,headed by Michael
Hancher. The proceedings, including a discussion between the panelists and the
audience, will be published in a forthcomingissue of Centrum,edited by Michael
Hancher, English Department,Universityof Minnesota.