The Speech Act of Requestives In Iraqi Romantic Poetry with Reference to English

Abstract

Request is defined in the light of existing literature as a universal category manifested in linguistic behaviour. Thus, making a request is a universal linguistic activity that expresses our interpersonal and social dealings. Request has been studied from the semantic, syntactic, pragmatic and sociological point of views. However, request as a speech act is known to be an attempt for the speaker to the let hearer do something. The term request has been classified under many labels: Exercitives . Directives and also a subclass of Directives which is requestives . Our main focus here is on requestives which tackle all acts which lead to future action ranging from the humblest prayer to the strictest order. However, studying requestives in literary texts and in particular poetry seems challenging especially if there are poets and a poetess who lived during the revolutionary events of the 20th century presented by free verse in which poetry was one way to express the current events in connection with their inner conflict feelings.