TIP OF THE DAY 57: Direct speech: SGNT and vocabulary for labels

MJ. Smith · November 11

link to next post TIP OF THE DAY 58: Sentence types - Logos Forums

Since the forum change has been delayed, I've started adding these posts to the previous tip list. See L/V 10 Tip of the Day Note that this list has been moved to the wiki (which itself is moved to the new forum software).

QUESTION: How do I turn on the addressee and speaker icons?

ANSWER: On an open Bible for which you own the reverse interlinear:

On the dynamic resource toolbar, select Formatting.
Select Markers.
Select addressees and speakers

QUESTION: What behaviors are embedded in the addressee and speaker icons?

ANSWER: On the desktop application, one sees:

On hover, one sees a tooltip card that is a simplified version of the Factbook header containing an icon, the official Logos label, roles/groups, short description.
On click, one is taken to the relevant Factbook page.
On shift+click, the relevant Factbook page opens in a floating window.

QUESTION: What SGNT elements related to direct speech?

ANSWER: There are two elements that related specifically to direct speech:

SGNTSyntacticForce:"infinitive of direct speech"
SGNTSyntacticForce:"participle of (or introducing) direct speech"

QUESTION: What forms does direct speech take in various Biblical genres?

ANSWER: from Perplexity:

Narrative Dialogue

One of the most common uses of direct speech in the Bible is narrative dialogue. This allows readers to "hear" conversations as they unfold, revealing character motivations and advancing the plot. Some examples include:

- Conversations between God and humans (e.g., God speaking to Adam and Eve in Genesis 3)

- Dialogue between biblical figures (e.g., Abraham negotiating with God over Sodom in Genesis 18)

- Exchanges between Jesus and others in the Gospels

Speeches and Sermons

Extended monologues in the form of speeches or sermons are another important use of direct speech:

- Moses' farewell addresses in Deuteronomy

- Speeches by prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah

- Jesus' Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7)

- Peter's sermon at Pentecost (Acts 2)

Prayers and Psalms

Many prayers and psalms are written as direct speech to God:

- Hannah's prayer in 1 Samuel 2

- David's psalms of lament and praise

- Jesus' prayer in John 17

Prophetic Oracles

Prophets often use direct speech to convey messages from God:

- "Thus says the Lord" formulas in books like Isaiah and Jeremiah

- Visions described in first-person in Ezekiel and Revelation

Wisdom Sayings

Books like Proverbs use direct speech for wisdom teachings:

- "My child, if you accept my words..." (Proverbs 2:1)

- Personified Wisdom speaking in Proverbs 8

Legal Pronouncements

Direct speech is used to convey laws and commandments:

- The Ten Commandments (Exodus 20)

- Levitical laws often begin with "The Lord spoke to Moses, saying..."

Parables

Jesus' parables often incorporate direct speech of characters:

- The prodigal son's words to his father (Luke 15)

- Dialogue in the parable of the workers in the vineyard (Matthew 20)

Direct speech in these various forms serves several important functions in biblical narrative. It slows down the tempo of the action to focus on particular scenes where the author wants to stress something. It also allows the reader to come to their own conclusions about characters' actions or words without explicit commentary. Additionally, direct speech often confirms literary or theological themes communicated in the surrounding narrative, allowing readers to hear these themes directly from the characters' lips.

The use of direct speech in biblical narratives also creates a more personal tone, as if the characters were speaking directly to the reader. This technique can be a powerful means of communicating truth and engaging the reader in the text.[1]

STEP TWO: People talk – Logos/Verbum Classifies

TOPIC: Integrated speech act data

QUESTION: What are some of the major linguistic theories of speech act classification?

ANSWER: From Perplexity:

Based on the search results, there are a few key linguistic theories on the classification of speech acts:

1. J.L. Austin's Theory:

Austin originally proposed a distinction between constative utterances (which describe or report something) and performative utterances (which perform an action). However, he later abandoned this distinction and instead proposed three components of speech acts:

- Locutionary act: The actual utterance and its ostensible meaning

- Illocutionary act: The intended meaning of the utterance

- Perlocutionary act: The actual effect of the utterance, whether intended or not

2. John Searle's Classification:

Searle, who was Austin's student, further developed speech act theory and proposed five main categories of speech acts:

- Assertives: Statements that can be true or false

- Directives: Attempts to get the hearer to do something

- Commissives: Commitments by the speaker to do something

- Expressives: Expressions of psychological states

- Declarations: Speech acts that change reality in accord with the proposition of the declaration

3. Kent Bach's View:

Bach argued that "almost any speech act is really the performance of several acts at once, distinguished by different aspects of the speaker's intention: there is the act of saying something, what one does in saying it, such as requesting or promising, and how one is trying to affect one's audience".

4. Other Approaches:

Some researchers have attempted to extend or modify Searle's classification. For example, Ballmer & Brennenstuhl (1981) tried to expand on Searle's categories.

5. Pragmatic Approaches:

Some linguists argue that speech acts need to be analyzed within their full discourse context, rather than as isolated sentences. This approach emphasizes the interactional aspects of speech acts and how they function within broader conversations.

The main points of contention or differences between these approaches seem to be:

- The number and types of categories used to classify speech acts

- Whether speech acts should be analyzed as isolated utterances or within broader discourse contexts

- The degree to which non-linguistic factors (like gestures) should be considered

- How to handle indirect speech acts or cases where the literal meaning differs from the intended meaning

Overall, while Searle's five-category system remains influential, there is ongoing debate and refinement in how best to classify and analyze speech acts in linguistics and philosophy of language.[2]

BIBLIOGRAPHY for Logos/Verbum classifications.

Speech Acts (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Husser, Lydia. Reported Speech: Dataset Documentation. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2017.
Parks, James. Sentence Types Dataset Documentation. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016. The Speech Acts of the Bible Dataset is complementary to the Sentence Types of the Bible Dataset. One (Sentence Types) involves formal criteria, the other (Speech Acts) involves pragmatic criteria focused on the volition or intent of the speaker/writer.^{^[3]}
Parks, James. Speech Acts Dataset Documentation. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016.
Thompson, Jeremy. Commands in the Bible Dataset Documentation. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2017. The Commands in the Bible dataset is an extension of the Sentence Types of the Old Testament, Speech Acts of the Old Testament, Sentence Types of the New Testament, and Speech Acts of the New Testament datasets. Given the importance of commands for Christian practice, this dataset attempts to further examine command types to provide users with more information about commands.^{^[4]}
Thompson, Jeremy. Promises in the Bible Dataset Documentation. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2018. The Promises in the Bible dataset is an extension of the Sentence Types of the Old Testament, Speech Acts of the Old Testament, Sentence Types of the New Testament, and Speech Acts of the New Testament datasets. Given the importance of promises for Christian devotional life, this dataset attempts to further examine promise types to provide users with more information.^{^[5]}
Thompson, Jeremy. Questions in the Bible Dataset Documentation. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2017. The Questions in the Bible dataset is an extension of the Sentence Types of the Old Testament, Speech Acts of the Old Testament, Sentence Types of the New Testament, and Speech Acts of the New Testament datasets. Given the importance of questions for theological reflection, this dataset attempts to further examine question types to provide users with more information about questions.

VOCABULARY basic

Addressee - An addressee is any of the immediate intended recipients of the speaker ’s communication, as grammaticalized in second person morphemes .^{^[7]}

Assertive - An assertive speech act is one where a speaker makes an assertion or a statement, gives a description. The speaker thus provides (asserts) information to the hearer or audience.

Authorized speaker - An authorized speaker is a speaker that belongs to a socially defined group for whom the use of a distinctive class of linguistic forms is reserved.^{^[9]}

Commissive - A commissive speech act is one where the speaker commits themself to some action.^{^[10]}

Constitutive Speech Acts - Constitutive speech acts are divided into two types: Expressive and Declarative. These speech acts all constitute a social reality. A speech act is Constitutive only if it is uttered by the appropriate person at the appropriate time in the appropriate location.^{^[11]}

Declarative - A declarative speech act is one which brings about the correspondence between the content of the utterance and reality.^{^[12]}

Declarative Sentence - A declarative sentence is usually seen as an assertion of fact. And it usually uses the indicative mood and the most prototypical word order. The subjunctive mood is also used for declarative sentences. The purpose of declarative sentences is usually to express statements of fact.^{^[13]}

Directive - A directive speech act is one where the speaker attempts to get the hearer to do something.^{^[14]}

Expressive - An expressive speech act is one that expresses a psychological state about a state of affairs specified in the utterance.^{^[15]}

Imperative Sentence - An imperative sentence is usually seen as a command. And it usually uses the imperative mood and the most prototypical word order, like the declarative type. However, the subject of the command is usually left unexpressed, and is referenced only through the agreement features of the verbal morphology. The purpose of an imperative sentence is usually to issue some directive to another person or group of people.^{^[16]}

Information Question - An information question is a specific speech act which directly states that the speaker lack a piece of information.^{^[17]}

Informative Speech Acts - Informative speech acts are divided into two types: Assertive and Information Question. All Informative speech acts involve the exchange of information as the principle purpose of the communicative act.^{^[18]}

Interrogative Sentence - An interrogative sentence is usually seen as an information question, though rhetorical questions also utilize the interrogative type. An interrogative sentence usually uses the indicative mood, like declarative, but it uses a different word order in most cases. Where the prototypical word order is verb initial, an interrogative sentence places the questioned constituent in the initial position. The purpose of interrogative sentences is usually to request information from another person.^{^[19]}

Obligative Speech Acts - Obligative speech acts are divided into two types: Directive and Commissive. All Obligative speech acts impose an obligation on either the hearer or the speaker themself.^{^[20]}

Speaker - A speaker is the utterer of a message.A speaker is typically the deictic center of his or her own deictic references. These are grammaticalized in first person morphemes.^{^[21]}

[1] https://bibletolife.com/resources/articles/the-significance-of-direct-speech-in-scripture/ and https://tidings.org/excerpt-exploring-bible-language-drama-in-scripture/ and https://rsc.byu.edu/how-new-testament-came-be/bread-life-discourse-dialogue and https://www.academia.edu/27768754/Forms_of_Talk_in_Biblical_Narrative and https://www.researchgate.net/publication/331875560_In_the_beginning_there_was_conversation_Fictive_direct_speech_in_the_Hebrew_Bible

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_act and https://www.thecollector.com/speech-act-theory-austin-and-searle/ and https://www.communicationtheory.org/speech-act-theory/ and https://study.com/academy/lesson/speech-act-theory-definition-pragmatics.html and https://www.thoughtco.com/speech-act-theory-1691986 and https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/speech-acts/ and https://discourseanalyzer.com/speech-act-theory-in-discourse-analysis/ and https://library.fiveable.me/introduction-semantics-pragmatics/unit-9/searles-classification-speech-acts/study-guide/Nb4Cr5SmxOXRXlfI and https://semantics.uchicago.edu/kennedy/classes/f09/semprag1/sadock.pdf

^{^[3]} James Parks, Sentence Types Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[4]} Jeremy Thompson, Commands in the Bible Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2017).

^{^[5]} Jeremy Thompson, Promises in the Bible Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2018).

Jeremy Thompson, Questions in the Bible Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2017).

^{^[7]} International Linguistics Department, Glossary of Linguistic Terms (SIL International, 1996–).

James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[9]} International Linguistics Department, Glossary of Linguistic Terms (SIL International, 1996–).

^{^[10]} James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[11]} James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[12]} James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[13]} James Parks, Sentence Types Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[14]} James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[15]} James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[16]} James Parks, Sentence Types Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[17]} James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[18]} James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[19]} James Parks, Sentence Types Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[20]} James Parks, Speech Acts Dataset Documentation (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2016).

^{^[21]} International Linguistics Department, Glossary of Linguistic Terms (SIL International, 1996–).