A Speech Act Analysis of Editorial Comments of TELL Magazine

Abstract

In this research paper, there is an argument based on Searle’s Speech acts as used by Mey (2006) in the Editorial Comments of TELL Magazine in Nigeria. The various speech acts the manifest in the editorial comments of have linguistic and pragmatic implications in the interpretation of meaning in the Magazine. Four consecutive and recent editions of the TELL Magazines that covered January and February 2014 were selected for the pragmatic analysis. The findings revealed that apart from the cover page, the editorial comments are rich in meaning which can be appropriately explored through speech acts. Thus the of the analysis proves further that the editorial comments go a long way to influence the perception of readers about news items through the perlocutionary effects such illocutionary acts will have on them. The study concludes that editorial comments are important and readers are encouraged to always read so that the purpose of it in the constructed of meaning will not be defeated. 

Keywords: Media, Pragmatics, Speech Acts, Editor, Magazines.