Epistemics in Action: Action Formation and Territories of Knowledge

Abstract

This article considers the role of grammatical form in the construction of social action, focusing on turns that either assert or request information. It is argued that the epistemic status of a speaker consistently takes precedence over a turn's morphosyntactically displayed epistemic stance in the constitution of the action a turn is implementing. Insofar as asserting or requesting information is a fundamental underlying feature of many classes of social action, consideration of the (relative) epistemic statuses of the speaker and hearer are a fundamental and unavoidable element in the construction of social action. A range of examples illustrate patterns of convergence and divergence in the relation between epistemic status and epistemic stance.