SPEECH ACT LEVELS IN FLANNERY O’CONNOR’S “A GOOD MAN IS HARD TO FIND”: A PRAGMATIC ANALYSIS
Abstract
This study analyzes the levels of speech acts—locutionary, illocutionary, and perlocutionary—present in selected excerpts from Flannery O’Connor’s short story A Good Man Is Hard to Find. Austin’s (1962) Speech Act Theory provides the analytical framework for understanding how characters in the text use language not merely to convey information but to perform actions embedded within social, emotional, and situational contexts. Ten utterances were examined to determine how surface-level phrasing (locution), underlying speaker intention (illocution), and expected or actual effects on listeners (perlocution) interact to create meaning in narrative discourse. Findings demonstrate that even simple sentences encode multiple illocutionary forces, and perlocutionary outcomes are shaped by the emotional tension and moral complexity characteristic of O’Connor’s writing. This analysis shows that narrative dialogue is a productive site for studying speech acts, revealing the dynamic interplay between linguistic form, social interaction, and character development.
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