Between semiotics and pragmatics: Opening language studies to textual agency

This paper examines how pragmatics and semiotics intersect by unveiling what I claim to be a blind spot in language studies, i.e. objects’ textual agency. By textual agency I mean the capacity to produce speech acts or, more broadly, discursive acts, a capacity that has traditionally been ascribed solely to human actors. As shown in this paper, a semiotic approach to communication allows us to open up the traditional speaker–hearer schema by showing how textual entities can also be said to be doing something discursively. In keeping with the semiotic openness to non-linguistic objects, while acknowledging the incarnated dimension of communication, as highlighted by pragmaticians, I show that pragmatics could therefore benefit from opening its perspective to textual agency. Building on Sbisà's work on speech act theory and what Descombes identifies as tetravalent structures, I show to what extent a given speech act can be attributed not only to the person who produced it, but also to the textual entity he or she produced. It is precisely this logic of imbrication and representation that allows us to open up the traditional speaker/hearer schema by highlighting the chain of agencies that pervade any interactional situation.