Alhassanain(p) Network for Heritage and Islamic Thought

[A Pragmatic Analysis of Al-Ashter’s ‘Epistle]

Original Subject:

A Pragmatic Analysis of Illocutionary Speech Acts in Standard Arabic with a Special Reference to Al-Ashter’s ‘Epistle’

By: Firas Abdul-Munim Jawad

Babylon University/College of Education /Safi yil Deen Alhilli

Table of Contents

Abstract 3

Introduction: 4

Analysis: 6

1) Declarations: 7

2) Representative: 8

3) Expressives: 9

4) Commissives: 10

5) Directives 11

1-Command: 12

2-Prohibition: 13

3-Advice: 14

4-Praying: 15

Auxiliary speech acts: 16

1-Explanation: 17

2- Justification: 18

3- Addition: 19

4- Condition: 20

Speech acts indirectness: 21

1- Representative: 22

2- Declaration: 23

3- Expressive: 24

4- Commissive: 25

5- Directive: 26

1-Command: 27

2-Prohibition: 28

3-Advice: 29

4-Warning 30

5-Praying: 31

Findings: 32

References: 34

Appendix(1): 35

Abstract

Illocutionary speech acts in Standard Arabic makes the subject matter of the present study. It has some points of theoretical and cultural significance. Searle’s (1969) model to analyze the major speech acts of the discourse under study, namely, the ‘Epistle’ which is a letter from the Muslim Caliph Ali bin Abi-Talib fourteen centuries ago to one of his governors ,i.e., Malik Al-Ashter, the new ruler of Egypt then. That letter could be claimed to resemble the constitution. Most speech acts were ‘directives’ because of the instructive nature of the ‘Epistle’. Many other speech acts were miner rather than major. Van Dijk (1977b) model is adopted to analyze the miner speech acts. A further point of analysis is considered, i.e., (in) directness where the overwhelming majority of speech acts are used directly rather than indirectly under the influence of the instructive nature of the discourse under study.

Introduction:

This paper is in the field of pragmatics where the speech act theory represents the specific field of this study. Despite the extensive application of this theory in many languages ,the possibility of its application to Standard Arabic (SA, henceforth)  needs some more investigation .As a point of significance for the present study, this application offers some more additional theoretical evidence on the universality of the speech act theory. Another point of significance concerns with the discourse under study itself. The selected discourse is a letter resembling the constitution legislated by the Muslim Caliph Ali bin Abi-Talib fourteen centuries ago. This book is translated by Sayyid Ali Reza. That letter was addressed to the man who was chosen by the Caliph to be the ruler of Egypt, namely, Malik al-Ashter. Because of its exceptional value, the UN has considered this letter as one of its formal documents. This letter, which is called 'The Epistle', offers a good possibility to investigate illocutionary speech acts in general and directive speech acts in specific. The different uses of the directive speech acts will make the basic subject matter of the present study. Concerning limitation, the present study is limited to the illocutionary speech acts in a given discourse in SA , namely, 'The Epistle'.

Objectives: the present study aims at achieving the following objectives put in the form of questions below:

1-Qualitatively and quantatively, how and why are illocutionary speech acts in the present study used?

2-Concerning illocutionary speech acts in general and directive speech acts in specific, is directness or indirectness preferred?

Concerning methodology, certain procedures are followed in this paper. The whole discourse under study is going to be categorized into illocutionary speech acts according to Searle’s (1969) model. The available representations of the model’s parameters or  components will be analyzed. A further need for an additional analytical model will be met by Dijk’s (1977b) model to deal with auxiliary speech acts. Finally, directness and indirectness will be considered and analyzed.

The present study is in the field of speech act theory. The adopted model is Searle’s (1969) in which illocutionary speech acts are put in five classes. These are 1-declaration, 2-representative, 3-expressive, 4-commissive,and 5-directive. Shedding more light on these speech acts will be done through the analysis later on.

Every speech act could be represented differently through several representations. Directive speech acts, for example, could be represented by command, prohibition, advice, warning, etc. as will be shown later on.

Searle’s five class speech acts do not cover all speech acts. There is still a group of speech acts playing different minor roles in supporting the major speech acts. That is why such speech acts are called ‘auxiliary’ ones. Dijk (1977b), as referred to in Al-Khaz’ali (2009:28) ,states that they are eight ,namely, 1-justification,2-explanation, 3-addition, 4-conclusion, 5-contradiction, 6-explication, 7-correction and

8-condition.They will  be highlighted and analyzed later on.

A further consideration adopted in the present study is (in)directness. The illocutionary speech acts under study are examined whether they are direct or indirect.

A final point to be covered before moving to the analytical phase is concerned with the felicity conditions which make an obligatory element in doing any analysis of speech acts. Felicity conditions are defined by Crystal (2003:178) as “a term used in the theory of speech acts to refer to the criteria which must be satisfied if the speech act is to achieve its purpose.” Four kinds of felicity conditions are suggested by Searle (1969). The first one is the propositional content conditions. They, as Al-Sulaiman (2010:289) states, “specify what can be expressed by the utterance uttered to perform the illocutionary act.” For example, commissive illocutionary speech acts indicate future action of the speaker whereas directives indicate the addresser’s attempt to make the addressee(s) do or not to do a given thing.

The second kind of felicity conditions is the preparatory conditions in which, as stated by Verschueren (1999:23) “the speaker/writer has adequate information to form a ‘valid’ opinion about the future state of affairs.”

       Sincerity conditions, the third kind of felicity conditions , “require the speaker to be sincere” (Cruse:2006:62). These conditions assure that the speaker’s intention of his speech is what is expressed. The fourth kind of felicity conditions is the essential conditions which “ relate to the way the speaker is committed to a certain kind belief or behavior ,having performed a speech act (e.g. accepting an object that one has just requested” (Crystal:2003:179).

     The presence of this set of conditions is obligatory to make a given discourse valid.

Analysis:

      The discourse under study is going to be classified according to the five categories of speech acts adopted by Searle (1969).The frequencies of occurrence of these categories are shown below in table (1) and illustrated in figure (1):

Table (1): Frequency of occurrence of speech acts according to Searle (1969)

Figure (1): Frequency of occurrence of speech acts according to Searle (1969)

1) Declarations:

  It is a kind of illocutionary speech acts. Searle (1979:16-17) states that “the successful performance of one of its members brings about the correspondence between the propositional contents and reality, successful performance guarantees that the propositional content corresponds to the world.” Only three out of (169) speech acts functions as declarations making (%1.77) frequency of occurrence .This low percentage is explained when the relationship between the nature of the text under study on the one hand and the function of declarations on the other hand is highlighted. The text under study is in fact a letter which includes a list  of instructions from the chief Ruler (Caliph) to one of his state rulers. It is supposed to be full of instructions and the like. Declaration is defined by Yule (1996:128) as “ a speech act that brings about a change by being uttered, e.g. a judge pronouncing a sentence.”The communicative message indicated in a declaration speech act as defined by the self-explanatory definition above has almost nothing to do with the instructive communicative message of the text under study. That’s why the percentage of the frequency of utterance of declaration speech acts is too low, being (%1.77).However, there is still a few number of declaration speech acts available in the text.

Thus, suitable justifications should be offered  to justify the existence as well as low frequency of occurrence of the speech acts of declaration. In order to do that ,it seems that analyzing a given declaration speech act is expected to be expressive. The first speech act in the discourse under study is a declaration which is :

  “IN THE NAME OF ALLAH, THE BENEFICENT, THE MERCIFUL”

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

This part of the discourse functions as a declaration of starting or beginning something, a letter in our case. By beginning with this sentence, the letter writer i.e., addresser, intends to say ,i.e. DECLARE that the letter with all its communicative requirements has just begun. Another speech act of declaration is the following one:

Peace be on the Messenger of Allah-may Allah shower His blessings and plentiful salutation on him and his pure and chaste descendants

والسلام على رسول الله- صلى الله عليه واله وسلم- واله الطيبين الطاهرين وسلم تسليما كثيرا

The addresser intends to express or DECLARE finalization at the end of the message.

2) Representative:

  Five speech acts out of (169) making (2.95%) frequency of occurrence are labeled as ‘representative.’ A representative speech act ,as defined by Crystal (2003:397) is a “term used in the theory of SPEECH ACTs to refer to a type of UTTERANCE where speakers convey their belief about the truth of a PROPOSITION.”     

  Investigating the function of a ‘representative’ helps in studying its relationship with the text under study since it is basically instructive. A  representative speech act deals with the past and present. It could come as an ‘evaluation’. A self-explanatory example of ‘representative’ as an ‘evaluation’ is the following:

“and this is heavy on the officers”

وذلك على الولاة ثقيل

Here, there is an evaluation to something that took place in the past and its results are still valid to the present time. Whereas ‘evaluation’ ,as a representative speech act, issuing  judgments on things or (people’s) actions took place in the past, directive speech acts deal with the present and future.

The lack of correspondence between the representative speech acts on the one hand and the overwhelming majority of the directive speech acts of the present study explains the low percentage of the representative speech acts, as shown in table (1) above.

3) Expressives:

  They are explained by Verschueren (1999:24) as “expressing a variety of psychological states, having no direction of fit between words and world, and simply counting as expressions of psychological states.” This self explanatory definition could be seen when expressing psychological states like ‘thanks’ or ‘apologies’ (ibid.).However, an additional kind of psychological states has been shown in the discourse under study which could be called ‘sorrow showing’. The addresser says:

“Surely, we have to return to Him”.

وإنا لله وإنا إليه راجعون

He refers to his as well as the addressee’s expected martyrdom. Expressing this kind of ideas or psychological states does not reflect the controlling atmosphere of the discourse under study. Obviously, there is no correspondence between the discourse under study, being directive in nature, and the expressiveness of the expressive speech act above. That is why there is no more than one speech act of the expressive kind out of (169) ones making ( 0.59%) frequency of occurrences shown and illustrated in table (1) and figure  (1) above.

4) Commissives:

This kind of speech acts refers to “a type of UTTERANCE where the speaker makes a commitment to a future course of action”(Crystal:2003:84).Commissive speech acts are performed through a relatively small class of verbs like ‘offer, promise, swear, volunteer, vow, etc. (Leech:1983:206).While commissives function to convey the addresser’s intention(Verschueren:1999:132),conveying intention as well as instructing i.e., commissives and directives respectively are related to the future. However, they are not required equally in the discourse under study. As a matter of fact, commissives prove not to be required at all since there is no single speech act of this kind in the discourse under study making the frequency of utterance (0%). The reason behind that is that there is no correspondence between the communicative function of commissives with the discourse under study which is ment for giving instructions.

5) Directives

A directive is “a speech act used to get someone else to do something” (Yule:1996:129).The frequency of occurrence of directives makes (%95.26) frequency of occurrence since there are (160) out of (169) of this kind of speech acts. The reason behind this high percentage  is the correspondence between the communicative goal of the discourse under study and the directive nature of the overwhelming majority of the speech acts used. However, directives are of various kinds whose frequencies of occurrence are different. These kinds are: command, prohibition, advice, warning and praying. This  availability could be justified when correspondence between the communicative functions of the available directives with the communicative purpose of the discourse under study is established.  Below, the available directives are investigated. Table (2) and figure (2) offer some explanation and illustration as given below:

Table (2):Frequency of occurrence of the available directive speech acts

Figure(2):Frequency of occurrence of the available directive speech acts

The frequencies of occurrence of the available directive speech acts are discussed below:

1-Command:

  Directives of ‘command’ ,as shown in table (2) and illustrated in figure (2) are (106) out of (160) making (%66,25) frequency of occurrence which is the highest one. The instructive nature of the ‘Epistle’ justifies this high frequency of occurrence of ‘command’. Directive speech acts of ‘command’ could be of two kinds: positive and negative. The ‘positive command’ on the one hand, indicates ordering someone to do something as shown below:l

“Habituate your heart to mercy for the subject and to affection and kindness  for them.”

وأشعر قلبك الرحمة والمحبة لهم واللطف بهم

  On the other hand, the ‘negative order’ indicates ordering someone NOT to do a given thing. The ‘negative command’ which could be called ‘prohibition’ is explained below.

2-Prohibition:

  Prohibition directives , as shown in table (2) and illustrated in figure (2), are (46) out of (160) making (%28.75) frequency of occurrence. It is relatively high since ‘prohibition’ is a negative command ;however, ‘prohibition’ speech acts occur less frequently than ‘commands’.  This  frequency of occurrence could be related to the fact that the addresser i.e., the Caliph has concentrated on providing the addressee i.e., the new ruler what is urgently and specifically needed. This concentration has been shown obviously through issuing a good number of positive instructions i.e., commands to do things which have not been made before by the preceding rulers. Obviously ,there is a preference of the addresser to issue positive commands to do things rather than issuing negative commands, i.e., prohibitions, not to do things. That is why both commands and prohibitions are used in high frequencies of occurrence with a preference to use commands being positive rather than negative as that of prohibitions. The following example illustrates prohibition:

“Do not stand over them like greedy beasts who feel it is enough to devour them.”

تكونن عليهم سبعا ضاريا تغتنم اكلهم ولا

3-Advice:

Directive speech acts of ‘advice’ are used with a very low frequency of occurrence ,being (%1.87) since there are only three speech acts of this kind. Advice is negotiatiable since the addresser has the capacity not to consider it. That is how it differs from command and prohibition. The discourse under study is basically instructive since it includes a big number of commands issued by the superior to the inferior. However, the matter is different concerning the directive speech act of ‘advice’ since it is used between equals. That is why the frequencies of occurrence of the positive commands and negative ones ,i.e., ‘prohibitions’ on the one hand are high whereas ‘advice’ directive speech acts ,on the other hand ,is low. Authority does not restrict equality or inequality in ‘advice’ because the addressee has the capacity not to accept the advice since it is a subjective rather than an objective matter. The following example is illustrative:

“Therefore, the best collection with you should be the collection of good deeds.”

فليكن أحب الذخائر إليك ذخيرة العمل الصالح

4-Praying:

This kind of speech acts is directive since it implies the process of asking the addressee by the addresser to do something. Two speech acts out of (160) of ‘praying’ making (%1.25) frequency of occurrence are available in the discourse under study. Concerning authority, as a felicity condition, the addresser is inferior to the addressee and the speech acts indicate futurity. The special case here is that of ‘response’ whether negotiatiable or no. Negotiatiable directive speech acts, like an ‘invitation’ or ‘offer’ take place between equal sides where the addressee is authorized to refuse what is directed to him. Non-negotiatiable speech acts like ‘command’ or ‘prohibition’ etc. take place between sides of unequal authorities in which the addresser is usually superior to the addressee. However, the directive speech act of ‘praying’ is negotiatable i.e., the addressee has the authority to accept or refuse since the addressee i.e., ‘Allah’ is superior to the addresser. The following example illustrates the ‘praying’ directive speech act:

“I ask my Allah through the extent of His mercy and the greatness of His power of giving a good inclination that He may prompt me and you to advance a clear plea before Him and His creatures.”

وأنا أسأل الله بسعة رحمته وعظيم قدرته على إعطاء كل رغبة أن يوفقني وإياك لما فيه رضاه من الإقامة على العذر الواضح إليه والى خلقه

The two speech acts of ‘praying’ are positioned at the end of the Epistle. The end of a given discourse usually includes some hints telling the addressee(s) that the discourse has arrived at the last stage. One of such hints is wishing the good to the addressee according to the addresser’s belief. That is why the two ‘praying’ speech acts are positioned finally.

Auxiliary speech acts:

Although Searle’s model (1969) classifies speech acts into five classes , some speech acts could be classified under non. However, this kind of speech acts are not completely independent. There are some forms of relationships between these speech acts on the one hand and speech acts in Searle’s model (1969) on the other hand. This kind of relationship makes this incompletely independent speech acts be called ‘auxiliary.’ These speech acts are considered auxiliary since their role is not to convey the major communicative massages, as the major SAs in Searle’s model (1969) do. They rather take parts in conveying miner parts of the communicative message of the major SA. This difference in function will be highlighted in the analysis below.

Van Dijk (1977,b), as put in Al-Khaza’li (2009), investigates eight auxiliary speech acts. They are as follows: justification, explanation, addition, conclusion, contradiction, explication, correction and condition. Only some of these auxiliary speech acts are found in the discourse under study. The total number of speech acts is (298) consisting of (169) main speech acts making, directives, (56.71%) and (129) auxiliary speech acts making (%43.28).The distribution of auxiliary speech acts is illustrated in table (3):

Table (3): The frequency of occurrence of the auxiliary speech acts

Figure (3): The frequency of occurrence of the auxiliary speech acts

1-Explanation:

There are various speech act relations between speech acts of various natures. These natures are based on “the function achieved by a certain speech act in relation to another speech act” (Al-Khaza’li:2009:28). This function basically, comes with the authority speech act and one of the main component acts in compound (related) speech acts consisting of a main speech act followed by another main one.(ibid.) The function of the ‘explanation’ auxiliary speech act is to offer some clarification to the previous speech act as in the example below:

“Control your passions and check your heart from doing what is not lawful for you, because checking the heart means detaining it just half way between what it likes and dislikes.”

وشح بنفسك عما لا يحل لك فان الشح بالنفس  الإنصاف منها فيما أحبت أو كرهت

         Table (3) shows that (70) out of (129) auxiliary speech acts of explanation are used making (%54.26) frequency of occurrence .This is the highest, and then the most important, kind of auxiliary speech acts used in the discourse under study.

2- Justification:

Another related kind of auxiliary speech acts is that one of ‘justification’. Dijk (1977b:101),as referred to in Al-Khaza’ali (2009:29 ), points out that some speakers use speech acts as a motivation or a reason for making another speech act more felicitous.

  The auxiliary speech act of ‘justification’ precedes the following main speech act. Al-Hindawi (1999) claims that the difference between ‘explanation’ and ‘justification’ is in position. He (ibid.) argues that ‘explanation’ is a variant of ‘justification’ whereas ‘justification’ is the subordinate act that justifies the issuance of the following act ‘explanation’ which  justifies the initiation of the preceding act.

  A compound directive speech act actually consists of two constituents, one concerns the addresser and the other one concerns the  addressee. What concerns the addresser is how to send the intended communicative message, directive in this case, clearly. What concerns the addressee is how to receive the message accurately in order to respond appropriately. Since the addresser in a directive speech act is in most cases superior all what is related to him is focused on to all what is related to the addressee. Focus is considered here through applying the strategy of ‘Fronting’. What concerns the addresser is to explain, i.e., make his intention clear whereas what concerns the addressee is to comprehend the message through making use of the addresser’s ‘justification’. That is why the frequency of occurrence of ‘explanation’ is high ,being (%54.26) whereas it is low, being (%0.77) for ‘justification’. Thus, position is critically important in deciding the frequency of occurrence. The following example is illustrative:

“The worst minister for you is he who has been a minister for mischievous persons before you and who joined them in sin(justification).  Therefore, he should not be your chief man.(main speech act of command)”

إن شر وزرائك من كان للأشرار قبلك وزيرا ومن شركهم في الآثام فلا يكونن لك بطانة

3- Addition:

The ‘addition’ auxiliary speech acts are (52) out of(126) making a relatively high frequency of occurrence of (%41.26). Van Dijk (1977a:211) ,as referred to in Al-Khaz’ali (2009:32), points out that some speech acts indicat that the speaker wants to add something to the preceding speech act where an assertion is added to previous assertions. The process of addition is often done by using ‘and’ and ‘moreover.’ This strategy of joining speech acts via subsequent utterances  within the discourse is adopted in SA. Adding a given assertion to a previous one is made syntactically through subordination which is adopted strongly in SA. Kaplan (1980:41), Ostler (1987:173) and Sa’adedeen (1989:36).Subordination in SA is used to join subsequent assertions. This strong preference in SA explains the relatively high frequency of occurrence of ‘addition’ auxiliary speech acts. The following  example clarifies this speech act:

“You are over them (people) and your responsible Commander (Imam) is over you.”

فانك فوقهم ووالي الامر عليك  فوقك

4- Condition:

The frequency of occurrence of the ‘condition’ auxiliary speech acts is low, being (%3.17)since there are no more than four out of (126) speech acts of this kind. Below is some illustrative examples:

(auxiliary-condition) “If the authority in which you are placed produces pride or vanity in you  then  (main –command) look at the greatness of the realm of Allah over you and His might the like of which might you do not even possess over yourself.”

وإذا أحدث لك ما أنت فيه من سلطانك أبهة أو مخيلة فأنظر إلى عظم ملك الله فوقك وقدرته منك على ما لا تقدر عليه من نفسك

 “If you are involved in it be error  and you exceed in the use of your whip or sword, or are hard in inflicting punishment, as sometimes even a blow by the fist or a smaller stroke causes death ,then the haughtiness of your authority should not prevent you from paying the blood price to the successors of the killed person.”

وان ابتليت بخطأ وأفرط عليك سوطك أو سيفك أو يدك بعقوبة فان في الوكزة فما فوقها مقتلة فلا تطمحن بك نخوة السلطان عن أن تؤدي إلى أولياء المقتول حقهم

The directive speech acts are conditioned since they are restricted to a condition. The low frequency of occurrence of the conditioned directives , as compared to unconditioned directives, reveals that conditioning is not preferable by the addresser in the discourse under study. The reason behind that is that conditioned directives are commonly used in specific and limited cases. Although such directives ,i.e., conditional one are needed in the discourse under study, unconditional directives are used more heavily. It is because that the general nature of the discourse under study which is in fact a constitution is intended basically to deal with general rather than specific cases. However, there is still some need for specification. That is why conditioned directives, though specific, are also needed, though slightly.

Speech acts indirectness:

Basically, there is a direct relationship between a structure of a given speech act and its function ,e.g., an interrogative form to express a question. Yule (1996:129) defines a direct speech act as “a speech act where a direct relationship exists between the structure and communicative function of an utterance.”

An indirect speech act is defined by Cruse(2006:87) as “an utterance that has the typical form of one kind of speech act, but which functions either typically or in specific contexts, as a different type of speech act.”For example, an interrogative form, e.g., ’Could you help me?’ is used not to function as a question asking the addressee about his capacity to help the addresser but it is a directive speech act of ‘request’.

The choice of (in)directness is governed by the addresser’s communicative message. The comprehending of the communicative message between the addresser and addressee is based on “their mutually shared background information both linguistic and nonlinguistic”(Alan,K :2001:203)  Below, there is some discussion of using (in)direct speech acts in the discourse under study. The five categories of speech acts according to Searle’s (1969) model are used concerning (in)directness ,as shown in tables (4) and (5):

Table (4):Frequencies of occurrences of direct and indirect speech acts

The frequencies of occurrence of direct as well as indirect speech acts of representation, declaration, expressive, and commissive in table (4)  are very low. The reason behind that is that the instructive nature of the discourse under study does not correspond with the communicative message of these kinds of speech acts. The results shown in table (4) above are discussed below:

1- Representative:

The frequency of occurrence of direct speech act of representative is (%2.95) since there are only five speech acts of this kind. Indirect speech acts of representative make (%0) since there is no single speech acts of this kind See the following example:

"and this is heavy on the officers"

وذلك على الولاة ثقيل

The direct representative speech act in this example is represented through ‘evaluation’. The representative speech acts are preferred to be put directly rather than indirectly by the addressee.

2- Declaration:

  One single speech act making (%0.59) frequency of occurrence is used in the discourse under study functioning as a starting speech act. Muslims always begin their discourse by a specific utterance called ‘basmala’ meaning “In the Name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful” .This utterance includes an implicit part. That part is implied since it is commonly understood. If we paraphrase this utterance we will have : “In the Name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful I (declare that I) begin my speech (discourse / letter , etc. ). Thus, ‘basmala’ is a direct declaration though it has an implicit part but the structure is still of a declaration.

  The two other speech acts of declaration are used to declare finalization by saying a special leave-taking greeting

"Peace be on the Messenger of Allah-may Allah shower His blessings and plentiful salutation on him and his pure and chaste descendants; and that is an end to the matter.

والسلام على رسول الله- صلى الله عليه واله وسلم- واله الطيبين الطاهرين, وسلم تسليما كثيرا والسلام.

  Finalizing a discourse or letter in this way does not imply using a direct verb for declaration. But, it is socially adopted to declare finalization by ending a discourse with a fixed greeting. That is why these two speech acts are considered indirect.

3- Expressive:

One expressive speech act making (%0.59) frequency of occurrence is used in the discourse under study. It could be labeled as ‘sorrow showing’ since it is expressed by using a well-known Islamic utterance:

“Surely, we have to return to Him"

“ إنا لله وإنا إليه راجعون ”

This speech act is indirect since there is no need to make it direct. The social use of this speech act in this sense i.e., ‘sorrow showing’ is extensively accepted.

4- Commissive:

The results shown in table (4) reveal that commissive speech acts are used neither directly nor indirectly since the frequencies of occurrences make (%0) for both of them. The reason behind that is the lack of correspondence between the communicative message of commissive speech acts on the one hand and the instructive nature of the discourse under study.