Abstract

The paper documents a sociolinguistic exploration of Human-AI interaction and performativity guided by the idea, words create worlds. Sociolinguistics is the scientific study of the relation between language and society. It acknowledges the fact that language is a social and cultural phenomenon. Central to the study is J. L Austin’s ‘Speech Acts’ theory that identifies three types of meaning: locutionary act (the literal utterance), illocutionary act (the speaker’s intent) and perlocutionary act (the effect on the listener). According to him, language is not only used for communication but also to perform actions. The paper explores different sociolinguistic dimensions of human-AI interaction through speech-acts performativity theory. It investigates how the locutionary and illocutionary dimensions of the human prompts shape the perlocutionary force of the resulting AI narratives. The study raises the research question, how do the locutionary and illocutionary acts within human prompts influence the structure and meaning of AI-generated narratives in relation to the individual, society, culture and environment? It positions AI responses not as mere data outputs, but as performative acts shaped by human intent, language, within socio-cultural-environmental contexts. The study also underscores the relation between Austin’s Speech-Acts theory with Jurgen Habermas’ communicative action theory. By examining these sociolinguistic dynamics through a novel conceptual framework titled AHIMSA- Authentic Human Intent Mapping of Speech-Acts, and supported by an innovative exploratory empirical study, the paper contributes to a deeper understanding of how human intentions embedded in speech acts influence AI-generated discourse, revealing the inherently social nature of human-machine communication. The findings underscore the importance of sociolinguistic awareness and the need for consciousness-raising in the design and interpretation of AI narratives. As a result, it recognizes the broader cultural, societal and environmental implications of language technologies in shaping meaning, identity, and action in this digital era.

Keywords

Speech Act Theory, Artificial Intelligence, Human-AI Interaction, Communicative Action, Locutionary Act, Illocutionary Act, Perlocutionary Effect, AI Narratives, Performativity,

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