Is commenting an expositive illocutionary act?

Abstract The paper outlines an analysis of the act of commenting within the author’s Austin-inspired speech-act theoretical framework. The general lines of that framework are concisely expounded, and it is suggested that the act of commenting should be described as belonging to Austin’s Expositives. The preliminary problem whether the act of commenting is illocutionary at all (given the absence of a performative use of the verb “to comment”) is discussed, and it is argued that nothing stands in the way of analyzing it as illocutionary. Some difficulties that can be found in dealing with commenting as an illocutionary act, concerning the variable linguistic form and the diversity of functions of the utterances that can be taken to be comments, are illustrated and discussed within the theoretical framework adopted. The characterization of commenting as having (among others) also a specifically expositive illocutionary effect is illustrated. Finally, some open problems worthy of further discussion are highlighted.