The nature and function of language as Man's chief vehicle of communi cation occupies a focal position in the human sciences, particularly in philosophy. The concept of 'communication' is problematic because it suggests both 'meaning' (the nature of language) and the activity of speaking (the function of language). The philosophic theory of 'speech acts' is one attempt to clarify the ambiguities of 'speech' as both the use of language to describe states of affair and the process in which that description is generated as 'communication'. The present study, Speech Act Phenomenology, is in part...