Wait for Me, Roller Skate!

Abstract

This chapter discusses the choice of directives as the focus for an analysis of children's speech acts that is based on several advantages. It presents some adult directives to provide a framework for the discussion of the child's abilities. The major finding of the adult research was that there were relatively consistent differences in the type of directive used, as a function of the social features of the speech situation. The most systematic data were obtained in white collar, task-oriented settings such as offices, laboratories, and hospitals. The chapter presents the evidence on directives at the earliest stages of communication, from the work of Bates, Carter, Dore, and Halliday, all of which mention the onset of verbal directives. Adults realize directive intents through speech acts that take different syntactic forms. So the major differences between adults and young children is not diversity of structure, not diversity of social features but systematic, regular, unmarked requests, which do not refer to what the speaker wants. Wide use of tactful deviousness is a late accomplishment.