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A Comprehensive Definition of Illocutionary Silencing

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Abstract

A recurring concern within contemporary philosophy of language has been with the ways in which speakers can be illocutionarily silenced, i.e. hindered in their capacity to do things with words. Moving beyond the traditional conception of silencing as uptake failure, Mary Kate McGowan has recently claimed that silencing may also involve other forms of recognition failure. In this paper I first offer a supportive elaboration of McGowan’s claims by developing a social account of speech act performance, according to which the success of an illocutionary act is not only a function of the intentions of and the conventions deployed by the speaker, but partly depends on how the act is recognized or taken up by the hearer. I then provide a comprehensive definition of illocutionary silencing and spell out what it means for it to occur in a systematic manner.

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Notes

  1. Cf. Hornsby (1993, 2011), Hornsby & Langton (1998), Langton (1993, 1998, 2009), MacKinnon (1987, 1993).

  2. If not otherwise specified, ‘silencing’ is used as a shorthand for ‘illocutionary silencing’.

  3. Cf., esp., McGowan (2009, 2014, 2017).

  4. In addition to the works already cited, see, e.g., Bird (2002), Hesni (2018), Jacobson (1995), Langton and West (1999), Maitra (2004, 2009, 2017), Maitra and McGowan (2010), McGlynn (2019), Mikkola (2011, 2019), Sbisà (2009b) and Wieland (2007).

  5. The example is adapted from Austin (1975 [1962], p. 101).

  6. Most of the silencing literature adopts this intentional reading of uptake. Cf., e.g., Hornsby and Langton (1998, p. 31): “A speaker’s illocutionary acts depend on the fulfillment of her intentions, and such fulfillment is uptake”; Maitra (2009, p. 313, fn. 7): “Uptake requires … recognition of the speaker’s illocutionary intention(s)”; Mikkola (2019, p. 26): “Illocutionary force hinges on … whether the speaker achieves uptake: the hearer recognizes the particular intended illocution being performed”.

  7. The received view of Austin’s speech act theory leans towards considering uptake as an illocutionary effect, but this is disputable. Quite ambiguously, Austin (1975 [1962]) writes that uptake is one way “in which illocutionary acts are bound up with effects” (p. 118) or are “connected with the production of effects” (p. 116). This might suggest that Austinian uptake is not an illocutionary effect itself. I am indebted to an anonymous reviewer for bringing this to my attention.

  8. I will not tackle the question about whether uptake is necessary for illocuting at all or, more cautiously, for illocuting in a successful and non-defective way. Note that, if the latter is right, then an illocutionary act that does not receive the right uptake may still be (partially) felicitous.

  9. I thank an anonymous reviewer for pressing me to clarify this point.

  10. Such a conception is inspired by Marina Sbisà’s deontic approach to speech acts. Cf., esp., Sbisà (1984, 2007, 2009a).

  11. Of course, you will still have a prudential reason to quit smoking, and you may also have some petitionary reasons to do so. (Suppose your doctor has diagnosed you with a lung condition and strongly recommended that you quit smoking; such a recommendation will have imputed a petitionary reason upon you not to smoke anymore.) That said, in saying to me that you will quit smoking while I am sleeping or patently not listening, you will not have made any commitment to me to quit smoking, for such a commitment springs into existence only insofar as I recognize that you are taking it on. For an analysis of the normative profile of petitionary reasons, see Lance and Kukla (2013).

  12. Bach and Harnish argue, for instance, that no communicative intention is to be involved in institutional (or ‘conventional’) acts, whose success rests on the utterance complying with certain conventions. Cf. Bach and Harnish (1979, Chap. 6). For the role of intention and convention in different speech act performances, see also Strawson (1964).

  13. Marchiano’s case is discussed in Langton (1993, p. 321f). For more on the illocutionary nature of protests, see Austin (1975 [1962], pp. 64, 119, 157, 161). Austin’s analysis of protests is developed in Gasaway Hill (2018, Chap. 2).

  14. McGowan (2017, p. 49) treats this ‘true feeling silencing’ as genuinely distinct from the other types of silencing. As I have claimed, I am not entirely convinced that this is the case.

  15. Cf. West (2003, p. 400), Sbisà (2009b, p. 353), Hesni (2018, p. 951) and Mikkola (2019, p. 75).

  16. Plenty of evidence shows that skepticism of rape accusers is endemic. See Tuerkheimer (2017) for discussion. Sincerity silencing, as well as what I label below as ‘epistemic authority silencing’, are closely related to testimonial injustice (Fricker 2007), at least when they stem from a negative identity prejudice in the hearer. I do not do justice to the connections between silencing and testimonial injustice here.

  17. Cf., e.g., Searle (1969, p. 57), Austin (1975 [1962], p. 22) and Alston (2000, p. 22).

  18. See Caponetto (2016).

  19. Cf. Searle (1975).

  20. The distinction between practical and epistemic (or ‘theoretical’) authority dates back to Joseph Raz. Clearly, epistemic and practical authority may interact. A doctor who diagnoses a patient’s condition and then prescribes medication exercises both her epistemic and practical authority. Doctors are practical authorities whose authority to tell people what to do is based on their being epistemic authorities on health-related matters. Cf. Raz (2009 [1979], p. 8). On the interplay between practical and epistemic authority, see also Langton (2015, 2018) and McGowan (2019, p. 65f).

  21. See Kukla (2014) for an interpretation of this sort of cases in terms of a distortion of the path from speaking to uptake. I take her reading to be compatible with mine: there may be circumstances where, because women’s epistemic authority is not recognized, their expert speech acts receive a distorted uptake (e.g. women may be taken to be asking for their male interlocutor’s confirmation rather than asserting that things are in a certain way).

  22. It is more difficult to assess whether a void act can be silenced. Consider a revised version of the politician example. Lois is a politician with no training whatsoever in nuclear physics. Lois publicly asserts that nuclear energy is dangerous and should be abandoned. She does so sincerely, but—one might argue—her (expert) speech act is void, for she lacks the requisite epistemic authority. Now suppose that Jim, her interlocutor, takes her to be insincere: Lois is a politician and politicians, Jim thinks, are always insincere! I’m not sure about whether Lois here is silenced. After all, her act misfires regardless of what Jim (erroneously) believes. One who takes it that cases like this should not count as instances of silencing would add a fifth condition to my definition: (v) had no recognition failure on H’s part occurred, S’s attempt at A-ing would not have misfired.

  23. Cf. Searle (1969, p. 57).

  24. I agree with Maitra’s suggestion that to say that silencing is systematic is to say, at least, that it is hard to overcome when it occurs. Cf. Maitra (2009, p. 315, fn. 12).

  25. I do not deny that illocutionary acts can be performed via non-linguistic devices. I can turn down an offer by shaking my head; and in the appropriate setting, I can ask permission to speak by raising my hand. Such non-linguistic devices by convention do the same illocutionary job as words (such as ‘No’) and phrases (such as ‘May I speak, please?’). In arguing that silencing erodes speakers’ capacity to do things with words, I use the term ‘words’ in a widened sense to include both linguistic and non-linguistic devices conventionally suited for the performance of a given act. The point I make below is that physical resistance is not a conventional device to perform an illocution of refusal. I thank Claudia Bianchi for suggesting that I clarify this point.

  26. This responds to Jacobson’s misguided objection that women are not silenced in sexual contexts because they can ‘refuse’ by physically resisting. As I argued, resisting is not an alternative way of performing the illocutionary act of refusing. Cf. Jacobson (1995, p. 75).

  27. Cf. McGowan (2014, p. 470, fn. 7); McGowan et al. (2016, p. 76); Mikkola (2019, p. 55). For an alternate conception of systematicity based on the hearer’s adherence to context-specific interpretive rules, see Maitra (2004).

  28. I am grateful to Mary Kate McGowan for pushing me to discuss this possibility.

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    Laura Caponetto

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Caponetto, L. A Comprehensive Definition of Illocutionary Silencing. Topoi 40, 191–202 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11245-020-09705-2

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