Performativity: Model and meaning in a post-Austinian frame

Abstract

This article proposes a post-Austinian approach to performativity by drawing from Peircean semeiotics. The argument proceeds on three fronts. First, we establish how the performativity approach of John L. Austin has served as a model case for performativity research, but the problems of this are currently being seen in the fragmentation and nominalism of the field. Second, we argue that the problem with Austin’s ‘doing things with words’ approach to performativity is that it cannot account for performativity on its own terms as sui generis. Third, using Peircean semeiotics, we reconstruct certain post-Austinian tendencies in performativity research and propose a formal model of performativity that draws especially from what Peirce called an Immediate interpretant. We conclude the article by discussing three distinct performativities not related by a model case but as examples of the same objective possibility.