Select an extract from any literary text and analyse it using the performative text approach KISAKYE BARBRAH TRACE

Performative text approach derives from the term performativity which works hand in hand with terms such as performative and performance. The three words derive from the verb to perform. They denote the capacity to execute an action, carry something out actually and thoroughly and according to the prescribed ritual. An example is the act of saying “ I pronounce you husband and wife” by a priest, a judge pronouncing a verdict among others. The theory is sued in various disciplines and has been used and still used in a number of discussion. Scholars such as Jacques Derrida, Shoshan Felman Judith Butler have handled the concept in their fields such as feminism (Judith B), queer theory, deconstruction and psychoanalysis. In literary works, J.L Austin is acknowledged for the use of the theory. It derives from his founding work in speech act theory. He did not use the word performativity but did beginning in the 1950s give the performative utterances. According to him, saying something meant doing something. In his work “How to do things with words”, he states that a performative utterance can’t be said to be true or false as a “constative utterance” can be judged as either happy or inflictions” depending upon whether the conditions of required for its success have been met. In this sense, performativity is then a function of the pragmatics of language. Having shown that all utterances perform actions the constative inclusive, Austin famously discarded the distinction between performative and constative utterances. These resulted into the formation of a book which was later on replaced with three-level framework. These levels are;- Location, these are the actual words spoken which the linguists and linguistic philosophers of the day were mostly interested n analyzing. Illocutionary force. This is what the speaker is attempting to do in uttering the location. Perlocutionary effect:- It is the actual effect the speaker actually ahs a on the interlocutor by uttering the location. A poem titled “a poem” by Nichita Stannescu. It can aid in the illustration of the performative text approach using it’s 3 framework levels. Under the locution the words carry with them the dictionary meaning that is literary, they do not imply anything, they are not symbols nor images of anything they are plain. Under the illocutionary force, the words now carry with them what the speaker is saying and his intension, in the poem title “A poem the speakers says what will the person who could be the loved one do in case he kissed the arch of the loved ones’ foot, will he or she treasure it or not, the speakers’ intension is to know his or her stand in this person’s love life, does t she or he treasure him or her? So much that when he kissed the arch of his or her foot he would not want to step or it or he or her does not? Under the perlucutionary effect, the speaker’s actual effect on the interlocutor by uttering the locution is portrayed for the poem title a poem. The actual effect the speaker has on the interlocutor is the power to make the interlocutor recognize what the speaker’s thinks of him or her, the courage to make the interlocutor think of how to handle the kiss in case it came. The interlocutor realizes that he speakers context treasure his kisses. In conclusion, performative text approaches limits interpretation of a text to meaning in context. This becomes biased and thus deprives off the right of a work to be interpreted fully.   References Austin JL (1962). How to do things with words, P.5 John Searle (1979). Expression and meaning: Studies in the theory of speech acts, Cambridge University Press.