TRUST IN LANGUAGE: Exploring the speech-action nexus

This chapter discusses the speech-action nexus as a theoretical juncture in communication inquiry, whose exploration addresses the relationship between words and deeds in given cultural discourses. Drawing on anthropological approaches to the study of language ideologies, as well as critiques of speech-act theory, the article juxtaposes two cultural discourses in Israeli speech culture-local versions of defiant discourse and communication culture, both of which capitalise on a trust in language. This trust is grounded in a speech-as-action language ideology. Both these cultural discourses highlight a performative view of language, but they diverge in their uses of speech forms and in their interpretations of the notion of action, functioning as alternative cultural discourses in contemporary Israeli public life. The chapter demonstrates these different expressions of the speech-as-action ideology through an interpretive reading of testimonies produced and disseminated by distinct groups of ex-soldiers regarding their participation in the Israeli military operations in Gaza in 2009 and 2014. The chapter concludes by showing how the study of the speech-action nexus can be used to foreground trust in language in exploring language ideologies.