Kris' Dissertation Chapter 4 Methodology and Data Collection

Chapter 4 Methodology and Data Collection

Chapter 4 comprises the methodology and data collection of verbal irony in Pride

and Prejudice. In Chapter 4 we will discuss the methodology of the data analysis,

including the classification of all data and the methods utilized for the quantitative tests

and qualitative analysis. Although the main focus is on qualitative analysis seen in

Chapter 5, the quantitative aspect of the data is complementary to support the hypotheses.

Specifically, the quantitative approach vindicates our approach that performative speech

acts are important to understanding characterization. The section for the data collection

includes a description of all ironical speech acts found between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth

in their conversations within the novel. In the final section, the Pearson’s Chi-squared test

results on which the data analysis is based are presented.

Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice was chosen for this study because the novel has

gathered much attention with regard to irony (e.g. Babb, 1958; Morini, 2010). The study

focuses on the verbal irony seen in the conversations between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth;

however Mr. Bingley’s, Caroline’s, and Colonel Fitzwilliam’s utterances may be included

in the analysis when they are found necessary within the conversation. Although these

minor characters might have been present as a third party within Mr. Darcy and

Elizabeth’s conversations, they are often observed as uninitiated H(s) that do not

comprehend either Mr. Darcy’s or Elizabeth’s verbal ironies. At the same time, these

minor characters rarely produce significant amounts of verbal irony to support the

analysis. Therefore, the utterances from third parties will be included in the data analysis

when relevant to understanding the conversations of Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth but will not

be analyzed as ironical utterances.

4.1 Methodology

The methodology section consists of the data collection, including the classification

of the ironical speech acts, and the quantitative test and qualitative analysis methods.

Data collection for this study was based on assembling conversations between Mr. Darcy

and Elizabeth for analyzing their verbal ironies. It is important to note that qualitative

data collection is subject to some unavoidable bias (Richards, 2003), and an account of

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how we arrived at the dataset will be provided in section 4.2 on data. The data collection

begins by utilizing the modified speech act taxonomy to locate verbal irony within Mr.

Darcy and Elizabeth’s conversations by revealing S intent as infelicitous. Echoic allusions

are to verify the S’s purpose for H uptake within each utterance. Each utterance includes

an illocutionary act, the S’s intent, and a perlocutionary act, the H’s uptake (the effect

upon the H from the S). Modified speech act theory and echoic allusions in amalgamation

elucidate these two aspects of an utterance for analysis. This study converges on

conversations between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth to have a deeper focus on the verbal

irony that contributes to their characterization and plot development in discourse analysis.

We acknowledge that throughout the novel there are instances of verbal irony from other

minor characters, such as Mr. Bennet in his conversations with Mrs. Bennet; however,

since this study only focuses on the verbal ironies between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth,

verbal irony between other characters is not included.

Each ironical utterance is manually classified based on its echoic allusion (refer to

section 2.4.2 for echoic allusions) as the location of irony found for the S to show her

disagreement, neutrality, or agreement (three echoic groupings) for the H’s uptake. For an

ironist as the conversation’s initiator, her ironical allusion will be designated into one of

the three echoic groupings dependent upon her intention for the H’s uptake to be critical

(disagreement), civil (neutral), or friendly (agreement). Each of the 157 ironical

utterances of all conversations between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth is manually designated

as one of the three possible echoic groupings (see section 3.1.2 for echoic groupings), i.e.

disagreement, neutral or agreement (see Appendices A, B, and C). For the Pearson’s Chi-

squared test of the quantitative data, all 157 ironical utterances are tested for a correlation

between each of the speech acts and the three echoic groupings. The Chi-squared

goodness-of-fit test takes each speech act classification (assertive, directive, commissive,

expressive, and performative) and separately tests it for correlation with the three echoic

groupings, for a total of five tests. The test results show that ironical performative speech

acts have a correlation with the three echoic groupings, whereas the results for the other

speech acts do not show evidence of a significant correlation. The test results concur that

the 81 ironical performative speech acts are the prime focus of the text analysis to

illustrate how characterization occurs between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth through the

echoic grouping dominance phases based on Figure 5.1. Although the text analysis

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focuses on the 81 ironical performative speech acts, all 157 ironical utterances were

necessary for determining the echoic grouping dominance. Therefore, the classification

through modified speech act taxonomy and echoic allusions are vital for determining

echoic grouping phases of characterization for the analysis of ironical performative

speech acts, which will be discussed in Chapter 5.

4.1.1 Classification of Modified Speech Acts and Echoic Allusions

This paper emphasizes a pragmatic approach to the discourse analyses of the

conversations between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth in Pride and Prejudice. As such, note

that several linguistic concepts explained thus far are incorporated to help build the

analytical framework. This research is a concurrent exploration of the relationship

between the language structure and the principles behind the language’s use. Those

principles are the background context affecting choice of language, including but not

limited to culture, gender, nationality, age, law, etc. (Dynel, 2011). Discourse analysis

should not be separated from the study of grammar and phonology; in order to understand

the meaning of utterances one must be aware of the grammatical and phonological

stresses (McCarthy, 2002: 9). Linguistic forms are grammatical, lexical and phonological,

while the function of discourse will be dependent on the participant’s roles and settings;

this is where the difference is seen (Dynel, 2011: 1). For example, “The weather in

Beijing is perfect today” may have very different meanings dependent upon the context

when said by a particular S. A tourist who has never traveled to Beijing may truly

welcome a snowy winter day when this is said, while a regular outdoor traffic patrol

officer living in Beijing may be using an ironical allusion to express his discontent. This

utterance from a tourist will be taken literally, while this utterance from the traffic patrol

officer would be considered ironical.

A speech act can have dual propositions, hence “much of speech act theory is

devoted to striking the proper balance between convention and intention” (Sadock, 2004:

53). Irony in particular is said to be characterized by two conflicting or differing

propositions (Kissine, 2012: 186-187; Stanel, 2006: 37; Solska, 2005: 128, 135). Yet the

convention is how the utterances are classified. There are contentions concerning the

interpretation of intended illocutionary acts, in that they are able to be subjectively

perceived. The general consensus is that through the obscurity “at the level of

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conventional [literal] sentence meaning” is where the illocutionary force is to be found

for classification (Kissine, 2011: 124). It is in the literal meaning of an utterance where

the illocutionary point, the basis for classifying a speech act, can be found, and the

classification becomes less tricky as there are established rules of syntax and grammar

that are socially common (Sadock, 2004). In Searle’s analysis of indirect speech acts, he

affirms that when a sentence (in his example a directive) “is uttered with the primary

[intended] illocutionary point of a directive, the literal illocutionary act is also

performed” (1975: 70). He contends that indirect speech acts have two illocutionary acts

from the duality of literal and figurative meanings, and the literal meaning is important

for classification. It can be inferred from Searle’s explanation that the literal meaning of

an indirect speech act still performs, which is why this study uses the literal meaning of

an utterance for classification (Kissine, 2012: 171). For example, John invites Mary to go

to dinner, but Mary rejects his offer with an indirect speech act. John says, “Mary, let’s go

to dinner tonight” but Mary replies with “Sorry, I have to clean my kitchen.” Mary is

using the literal illocutionary act of her indirect response to convey the intended

illocutionary act that she does not wish to join John for dinner. Mary’s indirect speech act

has a literal meaning, which still performs the figurative illocutionary act, to decline

John’s invitation. That being said, this study analyzes the figurative and literal layers of

an utterance to give future researchers more context on the roles of verbal irony within

the text and how verbal irony functions pragmatically within speech acts.

This study extends beyond the linguistic and grammatical boundaries of utterances,

looking at their action and interaction. The contexts of the utterances in light of Mr.

Darcy’s and Elizabeth’s echoic allusions are taken into account during analysis. This

study specifically uses infelicity conditions to establish a possible site for irony, stressing

speech act theory’s focus on recognizing the illocutionary act, S intent. According to this

research, the concept of infelicity is derived from the violation of any of Austin’s or

Searle’s felicity conditions for observing conventional rules when utterances are spoken

(see section 2.2 for Austin’s and Searle’s felicity conditions for speech acts). When a

felicity condition is violated, in this case most often sincerity, the utterance is deemed

ironical. In addition to the illocutionary act of an utterance, the discussion will also

highlight the importance of the perlocutionary act to the extent of reasoning how each

analyzed utterance is construed as ironical based on the H’s uptake of the verbal irony

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that is intended by the S. Therefore, verbal irony is identified through a modified speech

act taxonomy incorporating echoic allusions, according to the delimitation in this paper.

In order to illustrate a differentiation of speech acts that are not considered to be verbal

irony according to our definition (see section 3.1 on the theoretical basis), take the

following utterance from the novel. When Elizabeth rejected Mr. Darcy’s marriage

proposal, she claimed “I had not known you a month before I felt that you were the last

man in the world whom I could ever be prevailed on to marry” (Austen, 2003: 188). This

utterance may appear to be ironical to the H, because from Mr. Darcy’s (the H) point of

view Elizabeth could be exaggerating her feelings. However, from Elizabeth (the S)

herself, she is sincere in her statement expressing her resentment for Mr. Darcy.

Therefore this utterance does not meet the criteria for verbal irony that the S’s intention is

to convey irony through dual layers. In this literal utterance, there is no intention from the

S other than to insult Mr. Darcy.

The following examples illustrate how speech acts are classified for the data

analysis, and demonstrate the use of speech act theory’s concept of infelicity, as well as

echoic theory’s echoic allusion to show the two-tiered method of pairing S intent with H

uptake, respectively (for a review of Austin’s and Searle’s felicity conditions, see section

2.2 and for echoic theory’s allusions refer to section 2.4.2). Each of the examples are

underlined for the part that of the utterance which will be analyzed, and this same format

can be found in Chapter 5 for the data analysis.

Assertive

The first example is an ironical assertive speech act (ASR). Mr. Darcy’s response

with a subdued attitude to brush Elizabeth off by giving a short answer concedes to her

request to participate in the conversation. Elizabeth ironically replies with an assertive,

ASR18.01 “That reply will do for the present” (Austen, 2003: 90). The illocutionary

point of this utterance is to make a statement in reaction to Mr. Darcy’s response to her

request for conversation. The assertion in ASR18.01 violates Austin’s felicity conditions

B.1 and B.2. Elizabeth’s utterance violates B.1 because her response to Mr. Darcy is

unanticipated given her prior request for a conversation, and also violates B.2 because it

leaves the action of initiating conversation with Mr. Darcy incomplete by her abrupt

attempt to end the conversation. This infelicity of her assertion brings to light the irony,

seen through “that reply” in ASR18.01 as Elizabeth gives a more explicit ironical echoic

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allusion to insinuate that Mr. Darcy does not understand how to participate in a

conversation. She is mockingly telling him that she is satisfied, that he was able to utter a

“reply” to her instigation of initiating a conversation, yet we see that Mr. Darcy’s

utterance of consent to say whatever she wishes is a short reply and hardly sufficient to

invoke conversation. Elizabeth purposefully echoes Mr. Darcy’s short “reply” because

she intends for Mr. Darcy to understand her ironical reference, therefore her allusion

anticipates Mr. Darcy’s uptake of the irony in her use of “reply.”

Directive

To give an example of an ironical directive utterance (DIR), take DIR18.03 “But

now we may be silent” (Austen, 2003: 90). The illocutionary act of a directive is to

convince the H to do something for the S; in this case DIR18.03 is meant to ironically

order Mr. Darcy to “be silent” through a request. Elizabeth’s utterance breaks Searle’s

preparatory rule because her previous request for conversation from Mr. Darcy built up

the assumption in context that Elizabeth intended to speak with him, yet her utterance

opposes the assumption that she wishes to engage Mr. Darcy in conversation. Elizabeth

does not support her previous attempts at conversation with Mr. Darcy, and therefore

does not follow in the context of the preparatory rule. Thus, the infelicity of the utterance

is located in the violation of Searle’s preparatory rule. In DIR18.03, Elizabeth reverts to

silence which is echoic irony because clearly Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth have yet to

converse. The echo is made for the purpose of H uptake, and Elizabeth echoes Mr.

Darcy’s silence as his misconduct for social behavior in order to enhance her verbal

irony, which is meant to criticize, and at the same time to bring about the H’s attention.

The echo explicates the infelicity in her utterance, and Elizabeth’s request to remain silent

is completely ironical to overstate their silence.

Commissive

To illustrate the classification of a commissive speech act (COM), take the following

example: COM18.01 “But if I do not take your likeness now, I may never have another

opportunity” (Austen, 2003: 92). COM18.01 is an ironical commissive speech act

because the illocutionary act behind it shows a conviction in Elizabeth’s statement that

makes it a commitment to those words, more than an idea as in an assertive speech act.

As Kissine observed, a commissive speech act has the intention of the S to bring about

the truth of the propositional content (2011: 118). The primary distinction between

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commissive and directive speech acts is that a commissive speech act reveals a

commitment of the S, while a directive speech act attempts to commit the H to an act. She

is committing herself to what she says and not only suggests it, as found in directive

speech acts, but threatens Mr. Darcy that if he does not fulfill the requirement then

consequences will entail. The infelicity of the utterance can be found in the violation of

Austin’s felicity condition A.1, that the conventions must be followed under the accepted

circumstances, because Elizabeth will have future opportunities to see Mr. Darcy, yet she

states that she may not have another opportunity. The infelicity provides a location for the

irony of the utterance, which echoes her existing estimation of Mr. Darcy’s character, of

which Mr. Darcy is aware therefore the irony is intended for Mr. Darcy’s uptake. Her

echoic allusion highlights the incongruity that she has already decided against Mr.

Darcy’s moral character, although she ironically states that she wishes to gauge his

character at this moment. It is also noteworthy to explicate this type of speech act.

COM18.01 is seen to help elucidate character evaluation, as all types of speech act may

do. Searle’s fundamental concept for classifying a speech act based on its directional fit

(see section 2.2 for speech act theory) is in line with our classification criteria for

performative speech acts to depict characterization where a performative brings a claim

into existence in the world when spoken. Although other speech act classifications such

as COM18.01 may contribute to the process of character construction, this study adheres

to Searle’s classification based upon the illocutionary act of an utterance.

Expressive

For an example of the classification of an expressive speech act (EXP), take the

ironical expressive utterance EXP18.01 “Very well” (Austen, 2003: 90). This utterance is

Elizabeth’s first reaction to Mr. Darcy assuring her that anything she wanted him to say,

he would say in order for the two to carry on a conversation. The illocutionary point of an

expressive speech act is to reveal gratitude or an emotion. Gilbert emphasizes that the

emotions themselves are not part of the speech acts, but rather “beyond, or if preferred,

behind the words” (1999: 231). This means that emotions which are behind expressive

speech acts take the role of “communicating information about our internal states,

feelings, beliefs and desires. However, in other circumstances, our communicative tools

tell us that there is something wrong, discordance” such as in the case of irony (Gilbert,

1999: 231). Elizabeth’s illocutionary point is to ironically express her feigned gratitude to

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Mr. Darcy that she is satisfied with his response. The infelicity in Elizabeth’s expressive

is due to its violation of Searle’s sincerity rule, because she is not content with his

response to her desire to converse. EXP18.01 is insincere gratitude as the readership

knows that Mr. Darcy gives a quick reply to assure Elizabeth “that whatever she wished

him to say should be said” (Austen, 2003: 90). Instead of trying to participate in a

conversation with Elizabeth, Mr. Darcy’s short reply gives her an opportunity to echo his

irony by reciprocating his quick reply with an ironical expression of her insincere

gratitude, alluding to her dissatisfaction with his contribution. Her irony is belied by the

literal meaning of the utterance, to mean that he has barely contributed to the

conversation and has yet to satisfy her request.

Performative

Finally, extra attention is given to an example of an ironical performative speech act

(PER), which is distinguished from an assertive speech act in that an assertive affirms a

preexisting truth, while a performative brings an opinion into existence, creating a truth

whether it is temporary or permanent. In PER31.08 Darcy says to Elizabeth “We neither

of us perform to strangers” (Austen, 2003: 171). The illocutionary act of the intended

meaning is to construct both Mr. Darcy’s own and Elizabeth’s characters to be similar. In

PER31.08, Mr. Darcy is violating Austin’s felicity conditions Γ.1 and Γ.2. By saying that

they do not perform to strangers, Mr. Darcy violates Γ.1 because he and Elizabeth do

“perform” to strangers, for they do not reveal their true opinions to others through the use

of verbal irony. Also, Γ.2 is violated because they do not conduct themselves in the

manner to which the utterance refers, and instead continue to “perform to strangers”

through future use of verbal irony. The irony, shown through the infelicity in Mr. Darcy’s

utterance, is echoing Elizabeth’s statement, alluding to her comparison of the two at the

dance earlier at Netherfield, that they have a “great similarity” in their minds (Austen,

2003: 90). The echoic allusion to Elizabeth’s comparison entails irony because it is meant

for Elizabeth to comprehend; therefore the echo is determined to be made for the H’s

uptake.

Based on Searle’s speech act theory, with an addendum of Butler’s performative

speech acts to replace declarations (see section 2.2 for an explanation of Searle’s speech

acts and section 3.1.1 for performative speech acts), all ironical utterances between Mr.

Darcy and Elizabeth are classified. All speech acts identified as ironical utterances

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between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth are included in the data, although the focus is placed on

performative speech acts as it is this classification deployed to depict Elizabeth and Mr.

Darcy’s characterization within the novel.

The echoic theory contends that a S forming an ironical utterance does so by

alluding to some previously existing thought. The ironical utterance is evaluative, posing

as an interpretation upon some preexisting assumption which the H is able to discern

according to the concept of relevance. A S’s attitude provides a dissociative view that

distances himself from the statement. The statement could also be exaggerated to indicate

an implicit evaluation. Whatever the S’s stance may be, the echoic allusions are not taken

at face value, and the H is expected to gather the figurative meaning of the S through an

adjustment to its preexisting linguistic assumptions. Echoic allusions of verbal irony are

essential to help identify the ironical utterances in that the echoic allusions expose

infelicity (or incongruity); therefore, the S’s true attitudes reveal the three possible echoic

groupings (disagreement, neutral, agreement). This study contends that all ironical

utterances are traceable to an echoic allusion which is the location of irony meant for the

H’s uptake intended by the S.

4.1.2 Analytical Methods

It is essential to distinguish between our quantitative test and qualitative analysis. In

the quantitative test section (see 4.1.2.1 for a description of the Chi-squared goodness-of-

fit test), each ironical utterance is manually classified according to our echoic groupings

as disagreement, neutral or agreement based upon its echoic allusion. Then, each

classification of the modified speech act taxonomy is tested to find whether a correlation

exists with characterization according to the three echoic groupings. Therefore, the

statistical test addresses all 157 ironical speech acts in our dataset. The purpose of the

quantitative test of the study is to provide supporting data for the text analysis of the 81

ironical performative speech acts which depict characterization. This study tests only

categorical variables, thus we use cross tabulation and Pearson’s Chi-squared test in order

to determine if in fact a correlation exists between ironical performative speech acts and

the three echoic groupings. This is called bivariate analysis, or analyzing the relationship

between two variables.

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4.1.2.1 Descriptive Statistics: Cross Tabulation and Chi-squared Goodness-of-fit Test

The 157 collected ironical utterances (shown in Table 4.1) have been examined

using descriptive statistics in order to show any existing relationship between each

classification of utterance according to modified speech act taxonomy and the three

echoic groupings. Descriptive statistics tell us useful information about the data, and

bivariate analysis in particular allows us to see if a correlation exists between two

variables. Each of the five speech act classifications are variables, and the variable being

tested against the five classifications is the echoic grouping, which has three possible

“values” (disagreement, neutral, agreement). Cross tabulation simply puts the data into a

table so that it can be clearly summarized and tested. All of the variables are categorical,

meaning there is no numeric data; Pearson’s Chi-squared test will examine each pair of

variables to determine the significance of a relationship. The study attempts to determine

the relationship between each ironical speech act classification and the three echoic

groupings, therefore the variables will be the ironical speech acts (assertives, directives,

expressives, commissives, and performatives) and the three echoic groupings

(disagreement, neutral, agreement). We manually categorize each utterance classified via

modified speech act theory individually as belonging to one of three echoic groupings

based upon the echoic allusions of the utterance as shown in the context of the novel

chronologically (see Appendices A, B, C). Each ironical speech act classification is tested

with the three echoic groupings to find a correlation between the two variables.

In order to avoid potential bias, we looked at each ironical utterance in Mr. Darcy

and Elizabeth’s conversations individually to determine its echoic grouping

categorization. The echoic groupings are not regularly distributed in order throughout the

157 ironical speech acts. Rather, the 157 ironical utterances may fall into any one of the

three echoic groupings (see Appendices A, B, C). After the Pearson’s Chi-squared test

results, the echoic groupings will be designated as three echoic grouping phases

determined by the echoic grouping dominance for data analysis in Chapter 5. The method

for classifying each utterance as disagreement, neutral or agreement is to determine the

disposition and real attitude of the ironist intended for H uptake within the context of the

plot. For an illustration of how these ironical utterances are classified in terms of the three

echoic groupings, take the following as an example: a wife normally bakes delicious

cakes for her husband. However, today the wife overcooked and ruined the cake, but still

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served it to her husband. To show a disagreement ironical utterance, the husband might

say: “Perfect, I always wanted to know how burnt cake tasted!” In the disagreement

utterance, the character’s ironical utterance will be severe and attacking to refute the

other’s opinion or provoke the polemical. A neutral ironical utterance will be less

aggressive and more constructive or inquisitive to show civility and concern rather than

simply attacking another’s character and distinguishing flaws: “Interesting taste. Is this a

new recipe?” Agreement ironical utterances may be considered banter between the

couple. The husband might respond: “Thank you for giving me a chance to put myself on

a diet.” In each of these examples one may detect the S’s intended meaning through an

echoic allusion, which determines the echoic groupings. Once designated into one of the

three echoic groupings, the five speech act classifications will be tested for correlation

with echoic groupings.

The test is completed using SPSS statistical software; other software packages such

as Stata or R can be used for conducting this particular test, but we have chosen SPSS

due to our familiarity with the program, as well as its pervasive use in several disciplines.

The Pearson’s Chi-squared test examines all 157 ironical utterances. The categorical

variables in the test have been dummy-coded, or assigned numerical value. So for each

type of speech act, there is either a 1 or 0; if the utterance in question is a particular type

of speech act, then 1 will be placed under the particular classification variable, and 0 will

be placed under all other types of speech acts. The three echoic groupings (disagreement,

neutral, agreement) will be designated as 1, 2 or 3 (respectively). The Pearson’s Chi-

squared tests the null hypothesis that the number of ironical speech acts will be

distributed as expected by chance. This means that the Pearson’s Chi-squared value

should show any existing discrepancy between the expected distribution and the actual

distribution of ironical speech acts within the three echoic groupings. We test the

significance at the p< 0.05 level, which means we can reject the null hypothesis with 95%

confidence that the variables do have a correlation and are not independent.

4.1.2.2 Data Analysis through Echoic Groupings

Using the incongruity and superiority theories explained in the analytical

framework, each ironical utterance is analyzed according to echoic groupings. When

dealing with verbal irony through echoic groupings (disagreement, neutral, agreement),

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the ironical utterances are identified through reasoning based on echoic allusion. The

three echoic groupings are our original contribution to echoic theory, theorized by Wilson

and Sperber (2012) in their examination of verbal irony. The echoic groupings suggest

that a S is forming an ironical utterance and does so by echoing some previously existing

thought or even alluding to a specific direct or indirect quotation previously spoken. The

ironical utterance is evaluative, posing as an interpretation upon some preexisting

assumption which the H is able to discern according to the concept of relevance (Wilson

& Sperber, 2002).

Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy’s conversations abound with indirect quotations which

dually report a contextual utterance while echoing the S’s dissociative attitude upon it, in

essence following the general definition of verbal irony. The concept of verbal irony is

supported by Muecke’s interpretation that irony’s essential element involves “a double

layered or two-story phenomenon” contextualized by a literal locution of the utterance

offset by some decidedly ironic illocutionary conditions (1980 [1969]: 19). The S’s real

attitude is hidden within the utterance itself, but identified through the breaking of felicity

conditions in its illocution. Thus Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy’s conversations convey a

number of dualities amidst the speech acts which their utterances perform. Each utterance

will give information about some original context or text, and the echo expresses the S’s

dissociative attitude or reaction to the speech act paradigm it reiterates. Echoic allusions

of verbal irony are necessary to identify the ironical utterances that show the three echoic

groupings. Echoic groupings provide a basis for the three phases of echoic grouping

dominance through which characterization is revealed. Although each utterance has an

individual echoic grouping independent of the phase in which it is located, each ironical

utterance is analyzed according to the echoic grouping dominance phases. The evidence

to support our argument for the three echoic grouping dominance phases that illustrate

characterization will be provided in Chapter 5. The following section presents the data

collected for analysis.

4.2 Data

In this study, we counted and identified (refer to Table 4.1) 157 ironical utterances to

be designated as belonging to one of the five categories of the modified speech act

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taxonomy. The number of ironical speech acts by classification is as follows: 81

performative speech acts, 33 directive speech acts, 31 assertive speech acts, 7

commissive speech acts and 5 expressive speech acts. The dataset formerly included only

113 ironical utterances when the data were first collected and analyzed, and originally

more ironical assertive utterances were classified than the other classifications. However

upon further inspection, we realized that the definition for each speech act in the

modified speech act taxonomy was not as clear as it could be. This discovery led to

improvements, namely the elucidation of the definition for each speech act classification

(refer to section 2.2.2 for illocutionary acts and section 3.1.1 for performative speech

acts). In order to enhance the data collection methods, we first reexamined the definition

of each speech act classification, namely using the literal illocutionary act of each

utterance for S intent, and then further identifying H uptake through echoic allusions

(refer to section 2.4.2 for echoic allusions). The most important modification made was to

our definition of performative speech acts, which now includes Butler’s (1997) concept

of subjection for identity construction. Including Butler’s subjection was essential in

order to clarify the differences between assertive speech acts and performative speech

acts. From the revised speech act taxonomy further delimited for scrutiny, in addition to a

reexamination of the novel, the updated dataset includes 157 ironical utterances.

In Table 4.1, the count is separated by speech act classification to provide a clear

representation of how many ironical speech acts from each classification are present

within each chapter that includes Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth’s conversations. A remarkable

observation to be noticed is that throughout the novel, Mr. Darcy rarely converses other

than in Elizabeth’s presence, which is why the analysis stresses the value of focusing on

the discourse between these two characters. There are other verbal ironists in the novel,

such as Mr. Bennet; however Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy are the novel’s protagonists and

the most endearing characters to the readership, which is why they are the primary focus

of the research. This section gives an account of how the data are collected, and the

compilation of ironical utterances to be analyzed in Chapter 5. Both tables and graphs

have been provided to show the data which supports our hypothesis that the three echoic

groupings demonstrate characterization.

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Table 4.1 Ironical Speech Act Totals by Classification

Chapters in the Novel

Conversations between Mr. Darcy & Elizabeth Including

Third Parties

ASR DIR COM EXP PER Totals

Ch. 3 1 1 1 0 0 2 4

Ch. 6 1 1 1 0 0 1 3

Ch. 8 1 0 1 0 0 5 6

Ch. 9 2 3 1 0 0 7 11

Ch. 10 3 3 6 1 1 12 23

Ch. 11 1 0 0 1 1 20 22

Ch. 18 2 13 11 2 3 12 41

Ch. 31 2 5 5 3 0 8 21

Ch. 32 1 0 0 0 0 0 0

Ch. 34 1 4 4 0 0 4 12

Ch. 46 1 0 0 0 0 0 0

Ch. 54 1 0 0 0 0 0 0

Ch. 58 3 0 0 0 0 1 1

Ch. 60 1 1 3 0 0 9 13

Totals 21 31 33 7 5 81 157

Figure 4.1 Ironical Speech Acts in the Novel

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Figure 4.2 Ironical Performative Speech Acts in the Novel

Figure 4.3 Ironical Assertive Speech Acts in the Novel

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Figure 4.4 Ironical Directive Speech Acts in the Novel

Figure 4.5 Ironical Commissive Speech Acts in the Novel

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Figure 4.6 Ironical Expressive Speech Acts in the Novel

Figure 4.7 Echoic Grouping Distribution in the Novel

4.2.1 Speech Acts in the Novel

In Chapter 3 of the novel, Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth meet at a social gathering and

their relationship is immediately strained as Mr. Darcy offends Elizabeth, deeming her

insufficiently attractive for his attention. In this chapter, the ironical utterances are

composed of 2 performative speech acts, 1 assertive and 1 directive speech act, for a total

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of 4. Chapter 6 continues with the ironical attacks between Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy in

their disagreement, with 1 performative speech act, 1 assertive and 1 directive for a total

of 3. The characterization increases in Chapter 8 with 5 performative speech acts between

Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth, and 1 directive for a total of 6 ironical speech acts. Chapter 9

has 7 performative speech acts, a further increase in characterization. Chapter 9 also

includes 3 assertives and 1 directive, for a total of 11 ironical speech acts. In Chapter 10,

there is a total of 23 ironical speech acts. Twelve of these are performatives, 6 directives,

3 assertives, and 1 expressive and 1 commissive. Chapter 11 has 22 ironical speech acts

in total. Twenty are performatives, with 1 expressive and 1 commissive each. The most

ironical performative speech acts are found within Chapter 11, making it the peak chapter

for character construction.

Chapter 18 is the turning point in the novel, with the most ironical speech acts

compared with other chapters. It has a total of 41 ironical speech acts, including 13

assertives, 12 performatives, 11 directives, 3 expressives and 2 commissives. The graph

in Figure 4.7 continues its downward trend as the ironical exchange fails to be led by

contempt and adopts a more benevolent tone to maintain civility between the two

characters than in previous chapters. The scorn between the two subsides and both Mr.

Darcy and Elizabeth are left contemplating possible feelings for each other. Chapter 31

includes 8 performative, 5 assertives, 5 directives, and 3 commissives, a total of 21

ironical speech acts. In Chapter 31, Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth frequently engage in ironic

banter during their interactions. Chapter 31 is mostly comprised of neutral ironical

utterances, for the civil banter between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth has increased.

By Chapter 34, Elizabeth has discovered that it was Mr. Darcy who foiled the

marriage between her sister Jane and Mr. Bingley, which makes her feelings of hatred rise

to the surface once more. It is in Chapter 34 that Mr. Darcy proposes to Elizabeth, a

proposal which she vehemently declines in light of what Mr. Darcy has done to prevent

the romance between Mr. Bingley and Jane. In spite of Mr. Darcy’s love, Elizabeth

cannot envision a future with such a man, and her scathing rejection is formed with

rhetorical irony to say the least that it should be obvious to Mr. Darcy why she could

never accept his offer (Austen, 2003: 186). Elizabeth holds steady to her belief about Mr.

Darcy’s ill-famed identity, a character she modeled herself through her own prejudiced

ironical performative speech acts in addition to Mr. Darcy’s own characterization of

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himself. It is clear that Mr. Darcy’s character has been altered, while Elizabeth has

perhaps repressed any budding romantic feeling for Mr. Darcy. Chapter 34 has 12 ironical

speech acts total, including 4 assertives, 4 directives, and 4 performative speech acts

each.

The graph (Figure 4.2) of performative speech acts in Chapter 46 at this point begins

to decline, as the ironical utterances ebb due to Mr. Darcy’s and Elizabeth’s newfound

romance. In Chapter 46 Elizabeth receives the dreadful news that her sister Lydia has

eloped with the despised Mr. Wickham. Mr. Darcy surprisingly enters the scene with

compassion and resolve. After this gesture, Elizabeth realizes her true feelings for Mr.

Darcy that her perceptions of him have been altered. Chapter 58 has 1 ironical speech act:

a performative. In this chapter Elizabeth learns that Mr. Darcy intends to offer her a

second proposal. After meeting with Mr. Darcy, she thanks him and confesses that her

feelings towards him have changed, and she accepts his marriage proposal. Chapter 60,

the final chapter in the analysis, has 9 performative, 3 directive and 1 assertive, a total of

13 ironical speech acts. By this chapter, Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth are no longer at odds

and the exchanges between them reflect their recently discovered feelings, which is a

stark contrast to their initial encounter.

4.3 Pearson’s Chi-squared Goodness-of-fit Test Results: 157 Ironical

Speech Acts

This section will provide the results from our Pearson’s Chi-squared test, but the

implications of the results will appear in the final chapter. For each classification of

ironical speech act, there are two tables depicting the results. The first table shows the

expected distribution of the ironical speech acts compared to the actual distribution of

ironical speech acts found in each echoic grouping. This table lets us know if the

distribution was normal; if the actual and expected distributions have a large discrepancy,

then we can conclude that the distribution of ironical speech acts is not normal. If the

distribution is abnormal, this is an indication of a possible correlation between the

variables. The second table displays the results of the statistical tests. The test we are

interested in is the Pearson’s Chi-squared test, which analyzes the relationship between

two variables; the null hypothesis, or the hypothesis that there is no relationship between

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the variables, is tested. We are interested in the p value of the Pearson’s Chi-squared test,

which tells us if we can reject the null hypothesis. If the significance, which we call p

value, is at 0.05 or below, we are able to reject the null hypothesis and conclude that the

two variables are correlated. As previously mentioned, the three echoic groupings have

been dummy-coded, with 1, 2, and 3 being disagreement, neutral, and agreement,

respectively. The results are shown in the tables below.

Table 4.2 Ironical Assertive Cross tabulation Results

Echoic GroupingTotal

1 2 3

Assertive

0Count 75 36 15 126

Expected Count 71.4 40.9 13.6 126.0

1Count 14 15 2 31

Expected Count 17.6 10.1 3.4 31.0

TotalCount 89 51 17 157

Expected Count 89.0 51.0 17.0 157.0

Table 4.3 Ironical Assertive Chi-squared Results

Value dfAsymp. Sig. (2-

sided)Exact Sig. (2-

sided)

Pearson Chi-squared 4.596a 2 .100 .111

Likelihood Ratio 4.444 2 .108 .124

Fisher's Exact Test 4.216 .120

N of Valid Cases 157

a. 1 cells (16.7%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is 3.36.

The above tables hold the results chart for the test to see if there is a relationship

between ironical assertive speech acts and echoic groupings. Table 4.2 shows the

distribution of the total 31 ironical assertive speech acts throughout the echoic groupings.

Table 4.3 shows that with a Pearson’s Chi-squared exact significance (p value) of .111,

we conclude ironical assertive speech acts and echoic groupings are independent.

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Table 4.4 Ironical Directive Cross tabulation Results

Echoic GroupingsTotal

1 2 3

Directive

0Count 70 40 14 124

Expected Count 70.3 40.3 13.4 124.0

1Count 19 11 3 33

Expected Count 18.7 10.7 3.6 33.0


Expected Count 89.0 51.0 17.0 157.0

Table 4.5 Ironical Directive Chi-squared Results



sided)

Pearson Chi-squared .132a 2 .936 .962

Likelihood Ratio .136 2 .934 .923

Fisher's Exact Test .111 1.000



Above are the results from the test for a correlation between ironical directive speech acts and

echoic groupings. Table 4.4 shows the cross tabulations of the distribution of the 33 ironical directive

speech acts within each echoic grouping, including the actual number versus the expected number of

ironical speech acts. Table 4.5 shows the results of our Pearson’s Chi-squared test: that the exact

significance is p = .962, or 96.2% which means that we fail to have a significant relationship.

According to the results, there is no correlation between ironical directive speech acts and echoic

groupings, and we can declare the two independent.

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Table 4.6 Ironical Commissive Cross tabulation Results

Characterization Total

1 2 3

Commissive

0Count 86 48 16 150

Expected Count 85.0 48.7 16.2 150.0

1Count 3 3 1 7

Expected Count 4.0 2.3 .8 7.0


Expected Count 89.0 51.0 17.0 157.0

Table 4.7 Ironical Commissive Chi-squared Results



sided)

Pearson Chi-squared .571a 2 .752 .870

Likelihood Ratio .564 2 .754 .870



a. 3 cells (50.0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is .76.

Table 4.6 shows there are only 7 ironical commissive speech acts in the data.

Because there are few ironical utterances in this category, the Pearson’s Chi-squared

value is low, and the confidence level does not make the cut, as the p value is higher than

the 0.05 cutoff, at .870 shown in Table 4.7. Thus, there is no evidence of a correlation

between ironical commissive speech acts and echoic groupings.

Table 4.8 Ironical Expressive Cross tabulation Results

Echoic GroupingsTotal

1 2 3

Expressive

0Count 87 48 17 152

Expected Count 86.2 49.4 16.5 152.0

1Count 2 3 0 5

Expected Count 2.8 1.6 .5 5.0


Expected Count 89.0 51.0 17.0 157.0

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Table 4.9 Ironical Expressive Chi-squared Results



sided)





a. 3 cells (50.0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is .54.

The above result is that of the 5 ironical expressive speech acts and their relationship with echoic

groupings. As shown in Table 4.8, the expected counts are nearly identical to the actual counts. Thus,

the p value is .393; in other words, the p value fails to meet the ≤0.05 significance level. According to

the amounts in Table 4.9, there is no indication of a correlation between these two variables. We fail to

reject the null hypothesis.

Table 4.10 Ironical Performative Cross tabulation Results

Echoic Groupings Total

1 2 3

Performative

0Count 38 32 6 76

Expected Count 43.1 24.7 8.2 76.0

1Count 51 19 11 81

Expected Count 45.9 26.3 8.8 81.0


Expected Count 89.0 51.0 17.0 157.0

Table 4.11 Ironical Performative Chi-squared Results



sided)






Shown in Table 4.10, the expected counts of the 81 total ironical performative

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speech acts are far from the actual counts of ironical performative speech acts in all of the

echoic groupings. Therefore, our Pearson’s Chi-squared value (shown in Table 4.11) is

higher at 6.531. The results have a significance of .039, which meets the p<0.05 level

needed to determine correlation. For ironical performative speech acts, we can reject the

null hypothesis that it has no correlation with echoic groupings; the two variables are not

independent at a confidence level of just over 95%.

The results establish statistical evidence to support our hypothesis by confirming

that echoic groupings have a correlation with ironical performative speech acts. From the

three echoic groupings of verbal irony tested in the Pearson’s Chi-squared goodness-of-fit

test, we were able to discover that echoic groupings depict characterization. The data

analysis in Chapter 5 is based on the three phases of echoic groupings of characterization

to reveal the role verbal irony plays in the character constructions of Mr. Darcy and

Elizabeth, the main focus of this study.

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Kris' Dissertation Chapter 4 Methodology and Data Collection

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