Categories of Speech Acts and primary variables of each speech act

1. SPEECH ACTS THEORY
Reference: Mann, Steven T. "'You're fired': an application of speech act theory to 2
Samuel 15.23-16.14." Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, vol. 33.3 (2009): 315-334.

2. Categories of Speech Acts
1. Assertives – to tell people how things are.
2. Directives – to try to get people to do things.
3. Commissives – to commit the speaker to doing
things.
4. Expressives – to express feelings and attitudes.
5. Declarations –to bring about changes to the
world through the utterance itself
 [John R. Searle, Expression and Meaning: Studies in the Theory of
Speech Acts (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1979), p. viii.]

3. Primary Variables
Each type of speech act as consisting of three
primary variables that combine with the
propositional content of the act :
1. The illocutionary point – the purpose of the act.
2. The direction of fit – a speech act as either an
attempt to get the words to match the world
(word-to-world) or the world to match the words
(world-to-word).
3. The sincerity condition – the psychological state
of the person making the utterance.
 [John R. Searle, Expression and Meaning, p. 3-5].