Speech acts and uptake: In defence of Reinach’s internalism

Speech-act theorists generally agree that speech acts require uptake from the addressee. But is a speech act that has not secured uptake still performed? Adolf Reinach answers yes to this question and thereby endorses the view that what the speaker does is not dependent, for its existence as a speech act, on the hearer’s doing. Call this position “internalism about speech acts.” Externalists, by contrast, answer no to the question and thus maintain that what the speaker does is dependent, for its existence as a speech act, on the hearer’s doing. This paper defends Reinachian internalism in two steps. First, it distinguishes between the performance of a speech act and its product: the former being an atomic event, the latter a continuant. Second, it advances three arguments in support of Reinach’s position. It is argued that this view (i) avoids the absurd metaphysical consequence that the nature of an act can change retroactively depending on future events; (ii) correctly distinguishes the performance of a speech act from the attempt to perform one; and (iii) respects the distinction between motivating and normative reasons. The paper maintains that since externalism about speech acts conflicts with these three points, Reinach’s internalism is to be preferred.