The act of generating a statement orally or in writing is called a locutionary act. Include sounds, words, and sentences that make clear sense and respond to the rules of grammar.

In linguistics and philosophy, a locutionary act is the realization of a statement; therefore it is an act of speech.

This term was introduced by the British philosopher John L. Austin in his work How to do things with words (1962).

Later, the American philosopher John Searle replaced Austin's definition of a locutionary act with that of a propositional action; that is, the act of expressing a proposition.

Main features

In speech act theory, a locutionary act is the act of making a meaningful expression.

Also known as locution or act of expression, it is an act in which something is said; refers to the act of speaking carried out by the human being.

The locutionary act is also called locutionary act. It is what is said. It refers to the concept of the phrase. It is the pronunciation of the phonemes or sounds of the sentence.

There are other acts that are also involved in the act of speech. One of these is the illocutionary act, which refers to the specific intention of the speech act. It is the action that is done with the locutionary act.

On the other hand is the perlocutionary act, which refers to the effect that the statement produces on the interlocutor in certain circumstances.

These three acts are part of the speech act and are what give meaning to sentences.

Subactivities

The locutionary act is divided into subactivities that are part of it and give it meaning. These sub-activities are the phonetic, phatic and rhetic acts.

Phonetic act

It consists of the emission of certain sounds that are considered part of the linguistic sounds. For example, "Maria is sick."

Phatic act

It consists of the emission of certain terms or words that require intention and intonation. For example: "Is Maria sick?"

Rhaetian act

It consists of using the terms or words with a certain sense and reference more or less defined; that is, a statement full of meaning.

To say something is always to perform the phonetic act of uttering certain sounds, the phatic act of uttering grammatical expressions, and the rhaetic act of using such expressions with a certain meaning.