The Request of Xiangling: A Controversial Case on Silencing

Abstract

Dream of the Red Chamber has been one of the well-known novels in China, which has contributed to an area named “redology.” In the realm of redology, there are a lot of controversies about the silencing of Xiangling’s request for Baochai (one main character of the Red Chamber) to teach her poetry. However, few researchers have tried to analyze this conversation through a linguistic angle. This paper will introduce the Austinian approach to silencing to this controversial case in Dream of the Red Chamber, which could make essential distinctions between important concepts, and provide a coherent explanation for the reason why Xiangling insisted on her specific request to learn poetry and why Baochai had such systematic recognition failures. Through the case study, this paper proves that Xiangling suffers illocutionary silencing in her conversation with Baochai by refuting possible counterarguments. It is significant not only to the explanation of this novel, but also to expansion of application of Austin’s speech act theory.