Compare methods

	Speech Act Analysis	Conversation Analysis
Field	Linguistics	Qualitative
Family	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Year of origin	1962	Late 1960s–1974 (foundational lectures 1964–1972; landmark article 1974)
Originator	J. L. Austin and John R. Searle (analytic method derived from speech act theory)	Harvey Sacks, Emanuel Schegloff, and Gail Jefferson
Type	Qualitative pragmatic coding of utterances for illocutionary force	Qualitative research method
Seminal source	Austin, J. L. (1962). How to Do Things with Words. Oxford University Press. ISBN: 9780198245537	Sacks, H., Schegloff, E. A., & Jefferson, G. (1974). A simplest systematics for the organization of turn-taking for conversation. Language, 50(4), 696–735.
Aliases	Illocutionary Force Analysis, Speech Act Coding, Pragmatic Act Analysis	CA, talk-in-interaction, sequential analysis, interactional analysis
Related	4	6
Summary	Speech act analysis is the empirical, qualitative method of examining real utterances for the actions they perform — promising, requesting, apologizing, warning, declaring — rather than merely for what they describe. Building on J. L. Austin's insight that saying is doing and on John Searle's systematic taxonomy of illocutionary acts, the analyst segments discourse into utterances, identifies the illocutionary force of each, classifies it (as a representative, directive, commissive, expressive, or declaration), and notes whether the act is performed directly or indirectly. It turns the philosophy of language into a coding procedure that can be applied to conversations, written texts, and elicited data.	Conversation Analysis (CA) is a qualitative research method that examines the fine-grained sequential structure of naturally occurring talk and social interaction. Developed by sociologists Harvey Sacks, Emanuel Schegloff, and Gail Jefferson in the 1960s and 1970s, CA investigates how participants in a conversation accomplish social actions — such as invitations, refusals, or diagnoses — through the precise moment-by-moment organisation of their talk, including turn-taking, sequence structure, repair, and recipient design.