From impoliteness to linguistic violence: a non-ideal speech-act theoretical perspective

This paper explores the complex relationship between violence and language from a non-ideal speech-act theoretical perspective. After highlighting the limited attention given to conceptualizing linguistic violence within non-ideal philosophy of language, I first examine perspectives that conceive of linguistic violence as arising primarily from either perlocutionary consequences or illocutionary forces, arguing that both have limitations. Building on Marina Sbisà’s work on the ethical basis of (im)politeness, I then establish a connection between violent speech and impoliteness. More specifically, I situate linguistic violence and impoliteness along a continuum defined by the degree to which speech acts disregard layers of others’ subjectivity. Subsequently, I introduce context-dependent criteria, including the persistence of subjectivity denial, the nature of the layers disregarded, the impact of the environment, and the vulnerability of the target. As I argue, these criteria interact with illocutionary and perlocutionary dimensions, pushing towards the threshold of violence. While the challenges of establishing precise boundaries remain, the proposed non-ideal framework aims to provide a starting point for clarifying when speech might legitimately be classified as violent through the disregard of subjectivity layers.