A Pragmatic-Discourse Analysis of Martin Luther King Jr.'s 'I Have a Dream' from the Perspective of Speech Acts

Abstract: This paper studies pragmatic-discourse analysis of a political speech from perspective of speech acts. In this paper, the writer attempted to do the research related to Martin Luther King Jr.’s a famous speech. The Title of doing this research is ‘A Pragmatic-Discourse Analysis of Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘I Have a Dream’ from the Perspective of Speech Acts’. The aim of doing this research is to study the pragmatic-discourse features from the Martin Luther King Jr.’s speech from the perspective of speech acts. This research was conducted with Austin’s Speech Act Model (1962) and John Searle’s Revised Speech Act Model (1969). It took a month. Martin Luther King Jr.’s a famous speech ‘I Have a Dream’ was used as the primary source of data. Data were collected and analyzed by using quantitative and qualitative research methods. Due to findings from the research, the speaker used both illocutionary speech acts and perlocutionary speech acts. The most type of illocutionary speech acts is expressive in 32.65%, the second most type is directive in 22.45%, the third most type is declarative in 20.41% and the least ones are representative and commissive in 12.24% each. Concerning perlocutionary speech acts, it was found that the most type of perlocutionary speech acts is public motivation in 44.64%, the second most types are the arouse and hopefulness in 17.86% each, the third most type is dissatisfaction in 12.5% and the least ones are hopelessness and enthusiasm in 3.57%. Overall, both types of illocutionary speech acts pointed out the relevant pragmatic features of the speech and its discourse features were also found from locutionary speech acts which were used by the speaker in his whole speech. In brief, all findings from this research will be supportive for further research related to pragmatic-discourse study of the speeches.

Keywords: discourse, illocutionary speech acts, locutionary speech acts, perlocutionary speech acts, pragmatics.

Title: A Pragmatic-Discourse Analysis of Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘I Have a Dream’ from the Perspective of Speech Acts

Author: AYE PA PA MYO

International Journal of Recent Research in Thesis and Dissertation (IJRRTD)

Vol. 4, Issue 2, July 2023 - December 2023

Page No: 28-36

Paper Publications

Website: www.paperpublications.org

Published Date: 24-July-2023

DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8177858

Paper Download Link (Source)

https://www.paperpublications.org/upload/book/A%20Pragmatic-Discourse%20Analysis-24072023-7.pdf