TYPES OF ADDRESSEES IN THE SPEECH ACT OF TEASING IN MODERN ENGLISH DISCOURSE

Abstract

Introduction. The article is devoted to the study of the types of addressees in the speech act of teasing in modern English discourse.Purpose. The paper aims to indentify the types of addressees according to the contribution and role they play in the communication where teasing occurs.Methods. In the differentiation of the types of addressees, a discourse and speech act analyses have been used from a pragmalinguistic perspective.Results. This study shows that in multiparty discourse the participants may acquire different roles – those of a target addressee (addressee-victim), direct (real addressee), quasiaddressee, and metaaddressee. Taking into account the number of participants of the communicative process the conversation can take shape of a dialogue or polylogue. Proceeding from this fact the addressee can be of four types: a) a direct addressee (who is the target and to whom the addresser speaks explicitly). The direct addressee can be either a true recipient of a speech act of teasing or quasiaddressee); b) a quasiaddressee (a false addressee) to whom a speech act of teasing is directed only formally, however the true recipient is not he, but the one who is termed a meta-addressee); c) a meta-addressee is a target addressee, a true recipient to whom the messageis intended but is sent indirectly via others, d) a listener (an indirect addressee who acoustically perceives a speech act of teasing along with the meta-addressee). The listener is a recipient of a speech act of informative. The illocutionary force of an informative is to make the listenerconscious of the fact that teasing is taking place here and now.Conclusion. The presence of a third party has an intensifying effect on the illocutionary force of friendly teasing. If a target addressee fails to understand teasing as a friendly one, he may be offended and as a consequence ‘lose his face’ The mechanism of the reception and properinterpretation of the speech act of teasing needs further investigation.