A Sociolinguistic Analysis of
the Catcall as a Speech Act
Hailey Mac Arthur
Florida International University
ABSTRACT. In this paper, I argue that the catcall is a systematic and rule-governed
speech act. The current sociolinguistic literature includes several closely related speech
acts like complimenting and greeting that, while overlapping in some ways, in other ways
fail to explicate the louction, illocution, and perlocution unique to catcalling. Thus, I
necessarily propose six criteria for the identification of catcalls within and across speech
communities. Applying these criteria to an empirical investigation of catcalls in the
speech community of Miami, Florida, I identify and discuss the interaction of the
sociolinguistic variables of gender, power, and social distance implicit in the speech act.
An ethnography of speaking methodology is employed, including spontaneous speech
samples, to unpack the lexical, phonological, and syntactic-semantic features that
condition the speech act of catcalling.
KEYWORDS: Catcalling, Pragmatics, Speech Act
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INTRODUCTION
Despite the recent attention catcalls have received in popular media, there is to date no
generalizable definition of the catcall and, therefore, no systematic way of deciding what qualifies as a
catcall across and within speech communities. Analyses of the closely related speech acts of compliments
and greetings have been well documented in the sociolinguistics literature. While catcalling shares
qualities with these speech acts, it is distinct in several ways. This paper focuses on such issues, analyzing
catcalls with regard to the features that condition the occurrence of the speech act and distinguish it from
compliments and greetings.
Various sources have attempted to unpack the meaning of the noun catcall. Merriam-Webster
defines a catcall as “a sound or noise that someone (such as an audience member) makes toward a
speaker, performer, athlete, etc., that he or she does not like.” Alternatively, Oxford English Dictionary
defines a catcall as “a whistle, cry, or suggestive comment intended to express sexual attraction or
admiration (but usually regarded as an annoyance), typically made by a man to a female passer-by.”
Urban Dictionary captures the social texture of a catcall in its definition: “When a guy gives the wolf
whirl whistle or yells at a babydoll for the purpose of getting attention and in hopes of a future hookup.
This is usually done out of the window of a car. Typically a Pontiac Firebird, or Camaro.” As Bowman
(1993) describes it, catcalling “includes both verbal and nonverbal behavior, such as wolf-whistles, leers,
winks, and stranger remarks; the remarks are frequently sexual in nature and comment evaluatively on a
woman’s physical appearance or on her presence in public.”
My definition of the catcall as a speech act derives directly from ethnographic data, indicating
that catcalling incorporates six systematic features that make it a conventionalized speech genre.
In this paper, I will argue that the catcall is, in fact, a speech act that entails verbal formulas of a
highly conventionalized and rule-governed nature. That is, the catcall is a distinct genre of speech simply
because it acts as a system of expected patterns that organize a particular interaction between particular
interlocutors in a particular context. Thus, the hearer readily interprets an utterance as a catcall because he
recognizes a formula of meaning that is conventionalized across speech communities.
Before I can make such a claim, however, I must establish a set of criteria by which to determine
whether a given utterance or conversational exchange should qualify as a catcall. The context of
understanding what people say during catcalls is nothing more and nothing less than the sociocultural
climate that supports and is supported by the encounters in which the catcall occurs. The method by
which such encounters need to be studied must then minimally include (1) ethnography and (2) at least a
working definition of the phenomenon that is being investigated. Accordingly, data for this empirical case
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study consist of sequences of spontaneous speech samples collected in public settings in Miami, Florida.
All spontaneous data are in the form of field notes taken immediately following the speech act.
In what follows, I first briefly review the theoretical background for speech acts with
comparatively similar formulas, namely compliments and greetings. Then, I introduce six criteria for
identifying catcalls across and within speech communities. Using these criteria, I go on to identify catcalls
in one community where I collected spontaneous speech data. I will argue these empirical case studies
blatantly violate the established expectations of compliments and greetings, and I will show that they
perform a different kind of work through the interaction of gender, power, and social distance, thus
functioning as a distinct speech act: the catcall.
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
Before I can define the catcall as a speech act, however, I must first define speech act, itself. A
speech act is an utterance that serves a performative function in language use. Speech acts are commonly
taken to include such acts as promising, ordering, greeting, warning, inviting, and congratulating. The
current use of the term derives from J.L. Austin’s (1975) development of performative utterances. In How
To Do Things With Word’s, Austin identifies three distinct levels of action beyond the act of the utterance
itself: his theory of locutionary, illocutionary, and perlouctionary acts. A speech act has three aspects: (1)
locution, physical utterance by the speaker, (2) illocution, the intended meaning of the utterance by the
speaker, and (3) perlocution, the action that results from the locution. In other words, Austin distinguishes
the act of saying something, what one does it saying it, and what one does by saying it.
Given my claim that the six criteria introduced below should allow researchers to identify catcalls
across languages and communities, it is important to establish whether the same criteria can allow us to
exchange words and exchanges that are not catcalls. Good candidates for such a test are compliments and
greetings. Analyses of these closely related speech acts have appeared in the sociolinguistics literature
and are well documented in their analyses. Catcalls shares qualities with each of these speech acts;
however, I will show that the catcall is distinct in several ways.
According to Searle (1976), compliments are classified as expressive speech acts. In other words,
their propositional content specifies a reaction of the speaker to a situation in which the hearer takes an
active or passive role. The majority of authors who have dealt with compliments have underlined that
their function is to establish, increase, or consolidate solidarity bonds between interlocutors (Chen 1993;
Herbert 1989, 1991; Jaworski 1995; Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk 1989; Manes and Wolfson 1981;
Wolfson and Manes 1980; Wolfson 1983). Thus, Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk states, “They are typically
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performed to make the addressee feel good by saying something nice to him/her, in this way possibly
satisfying the addressee’s expectations rather than expressing a position judgement for a referential or
informative reason” (1989, p. 75). Moreover, the topics of compliments tend to be general and relate to
things such as appearance, abilities, skills, possessions, personality or friendship (Herbert 1991; Holmes
and Brown 1987). Yet, there is cross-cultural variation as far as topic is concerned and topics-selection
depends on the different underlying set of values that comprise the idea of politeness in a particular
sociocultural group (Herbert 1991; Manes 1983).
Greetings are another significant aspect of the politeness phenomenon that exists universally. As
Brown and Levinson (1978) claim, greetings occur in all languages. Like compliments, greetings may
serve as the means for opening conversations appropriately and for establishing and maintaining social
relationships (Goffman 1971). For example, such greetings as “Hello,” “How are you?,” and “Pleased to
meet you” often occur in English. Analogous to regular greetings, Goffman (1971, p. 75) considers
passing greetings to be a type of supportive ritual. He explains passing greetings as the following:
When two acquaintances pass close by each other on their separate daily rounds in consequence
of what is seen as the routine intersecting of their activities, they are likely to exchange ‘passing
greetings’, often without otherwise pausing. Often these displays will be relatively muted and
fully exhaust the encounter to which they give rise; nonetheless, the spontaneous impulse to
perform them is very strong.
As before, Searle (1969) and Searle and Vanderveken (1985) proposed to analyze greetings as an example
of expressive speech acts aimed at the “courteous indication of recognition of the other party” (Searle and
Vanderveken 1985, p. 216). Bach and Harnish (1979) classified greetings as “acknowledgments,”
interpreting the act of greeting as an expression of “pleasure at seeing (or meeting)” someone.
SIX CRITERIA FOR IDENTIFYING CATCALLS
Building upon the examples in the literature mentioned above (and a few more not), it is possible
to extract a set of six recurring features to be used as criteria for the identification of catcalls within and
across speech communities. The six criteria I will argue for are as follows:
1) shared public speech situation;
2) unacquainted interlocutors;
3) topic of sexual objectification;
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4) emphatic intonation contour;
5) possible predictable semantic-syntactic structure; and
6) asymmetrical turn-taking structure.
As will become apparent in the following discussion, some of these features could be conflated into
larger categories. For example, features 1 and 2 define the social factors and features 1, 5, and 6 define
the spatial and temporal factors of the exchange. Features 2 and 3 (and, in some ways, 6) focus on the
inextricably intertwined sociolinguistic variables of gender, social distance, and power. In addition,
features 3, 4, and 5 cover the interdependence between the lexicon, phonology, and syntax of English,
respectively. Although future research may prove the need to regroup or even to eliminate some of the
criteria I am proposing, for the purpose of this paper, I have chosen to retain the six criteria as is to ensure
a broader spectrum of potentially relevant cases to examine. Furthermore, there are a slew of linguistic
and paralinguistic cues that are integral for the interpretation of intended meaning in any conversational
exchange. I should mention that although both verbal and nonverbal aspects of catcalling were taken into
consideration in the choice of defining features, I will favor verbal over nonverbal aspects of catcalls.
This is simply due to my efforts in this case to draw attention to the importance of specific verbal patterns
used in catcalling and is not meant to undermine the importance of gestures and motion in the analysis of
communicative interaction.
1. SHARED PUBLIC SPEECH SITUATION
Speech takes places in speech situations, which are socially definable. We can specify the spatial
and temporal factors that define the context in which the speech act occurs. Moreover, we may group
these social factors under three headings, covering (1) public space, (2) shared perceptual and/or auditory
field, and (3) beginning-of-discourse occurrence.
1.
PUBLIC SPACE
Catcalling is also called street harassment or street remarks. Appropriate to its name, street
harassment can take place on the streets, in stores, on public transportation, in parks, and at beaches.
According to the findings of a 2,000-person, nationally represented survey reported by Stop Street
Harassment (2014), the majority of street harassment (67 percent) occurred on the street or sidewalk,
either of foot or on a bicycle or skateboard. The next most-common place for street harassment was in a
store, restaurant, movie theater, or mall (28 percent). In addition, evidence from Gardner (1995) suggests
that women in metropolitan areas are more susceptible to harassment from stranger than women in
suburban and rural areas.
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2.
SHARED PERCEPTUAL AND/OR AUDITORY FIELD
Catcalls involve a face-to-face interaction. They either immediately follow or are constitutive of
the speaker’s public acknowledgement of the hearer’s presence in a shared perceptual and/or auditory
field. Unlike greetings, it is not necessary that the catcall is initiated after the interlocutors have sighted
each other (Duranti 1992; Kendon and Ferber 1973). In fact, there may or may not be any reciprocal
acknowledgement at all during a catcall. In some cases, making acknowledgment visually available to the
other interlocutor—through the act of leering, for example—may achieve a similar effect to catcalling. In
other cases, auditory acknowledgement such as a wolf whistle performs a comparable role. Catcalls as a
speech act, however, require a visual acknowledgement followed by a verbal acknowledgement. Thus,
catcalling would be the speaker’s response to viewing himself within the hearer’s visual and/or auditory
range. Finally, it is important to note that this shared perceptual and/or auditory field need only be shared
temporarily.
3.
BEGINNING-OF-DISCOURSE OCCURRENCE
We can routinely expect catcalls to occur at the beginning of a social encounter, although they
may not always be the very first words that are exchanged between interlocutors. This first feature of
catcalls is related to their potential function as attention-getting devices and their ability to establish a
shared field of communicative interaction, or, at least, the access to it. Catcalls are like greetings in that
they have to do with marking a change of access in social relationships. For Goffman, they are a type of
interpersonal ritual, or, more specifically, “supportive rituals or tires that serve to support social
relationships” (1971, p. 67). Goffman further classifies these acts as access rituals. While farewells mark
a transition from increased to decreased access, greetings and catcalls signal the opposite.
2. UNACQUAINTED INTERLOCUTORS
We can also define the participants in the speech act and the relations among them.
1.
GENDER AND RACE
Even though definitions of catcalling are predominately gender-neutral (save for Urban
Dictionary), preliminary research on this topic typically focuses on instances in which men initiate the
speech act with women. Indeed, sixty-five percent of women (two out of three women in the U.S.) have
reported having experienced some form of catcalling. Of these, Hispanic and Black women were more
likely than White women to report experiencing catcalls, representing 48 percent, 45 percent, and 36
percent, respectively (Stop Street Harassment 2014).
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2.
RELATIONAL DISTANCE
There is considerable variation in the type of language used according to who is using it and in
exchange with whom; according to whether those speaking are related to each other in some socially
institutionalized way—some kind of permanent relationship, say a familial relationship—or, whether they
meet each other under some casual and temporary conditions, such as we see in the case of catcalls.
Relational distance, then, determines multiple features of the modes of address in language use. As with
much speech behavior, the social distance variable is a strong feature of catcalling.
Catcalls are scarce with interlocutors who are familiar. That is, catcalling is a speech act that is
not typically encountered at the extreme end of the social distance continuum in which interlocutors are
intimate or even familiar. In fact, Fairchild and Rudman (2008) refer to catcalls as stranger harassment.
3. TOPIC OF SEXUAL OBJECTIFICATION
Sexual objectification is a clear component of catcalls. The common thread running through all
catcalls is “the experience of [the intended hearer] being treated as a body (or collection of body parts)
valued predominately for its use (or consumption by) others” (Fredrickson and Roberts 1997, p. 174).
Such an experience may be accomplished through lexical choice. For example, in (1) and (2) below, the
pronouns mami and baby do not refer to the speaker’s actual mother or an actual infant. Instead, these
refer to the hypersexualized and eroticized extension of the words. Other personalized pronouns are
shown in (3), (5), and (7): chica linda [cute girl], un bombón [sweet thing], and muñeca [doll face],
respectively. The use of intensifiers and adjectives bolsters the theme of sexual objectification, as
evidenced with good, damn, chica [cute], really, chuparte los dedos [finger-licking], juguete [toy].
Unsurprisingly, the stereotypical male gaze of (8) has expanded to the related sensual imagery of the male
appetite in examples (5) and (6), in which the intended hearer of the utterances is reduced to, quite
literally, a piece of meat in the latter. Overall, examples (1) through (7) all share in common an
underlying evaluative comment on a woman’s physical appearance, accomplished through the use of
intensifiers, adjectives, sensual imagery, and personalized pronouns.
(1)
Hey, mamicta [little mommy]. You looking good. Can I get your number?
(2)
Damn, baby. How are you doing?
(3)
¡Chica linda! [Cute girl!] Those jeans are really working for me.
(4)
¡Que curvas! [What curves!]
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(5)
Estas para chuparte los dedos, sos un bombón, [You are finger-licking good, you
sweet thing.]
(6)
Tanta carne y yo sin dientes. [All that meat and me with no teeth.]
(7)
¿De qué juguetería te sacaron, muñeca? [What toy store did they get you from,
doll face?]
(8)
¡Quién fuera bizco, para verte dos veces! [I wish I was cross-eyed, so I could see
you twice!]
4. EMPHATIC INTONATION CONTOUR AND DURATION
Both pitch variations across an utterance (intonation) and length of the utterance (duration) are
definable features of catcalling. Specifically, short catcalls like example (4) above will demonstrate an
intentional rising intonation contour in each word and a deliberate lengthening of each word.
Figure 1 below shows the intonation contour of the utterances “Hey, baby?” followed by “Hey,
baby!” in Pratt, in which the former utterance is classified as a question and the latter, a catcall. Both
speech samples show rising intonation. This pattern of pitch is hearer-oriented, and the degree of rise is
matched to the degree of uncertainty. We can describe this pattern as either (1) high rise or (2) low rise
and, accordingly, assign meaning to each. The high rise found in the former utterance is a more marked
pattern, which is typical of yes-no questions. The low rise found in the latter utterance is more common
and is used in a variety of speech situations, including catcalls. (Yavas 2011).
Figure 1: Intonation Contour of “Hey, Baby?” and “Hey, Baby!”
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In the utterance “Hey, Baby?” we observe phrase-final high rising intonation. By contrast, in the
utterance “Hey, baby! ” we observe an intonation contour in each word. The way a speaker shapes his
utterances depends on his intended meaning. For example, the syllable with the major pitch change is
typically the result of emphasis. The speaker is creating distinct meanings in the enunciation of the same
words in the same order through distinct emphasis.
Figure 2: Waveform and Spectrogram of “Hey, Baby?” and “Hey, Baby!”
Figure 2 above shows the waveform and spectrogram of the same speech samples in Pratt. The
blue lines represent the intonation contour we observed in Figure 1. In Figure 2, the spectrogram is a
spectro-temporal representation of the utterances, where the horizontal axis represents time expressed in
seconds. The total duration of the utterance “Hey, baby?” is .56 seconds, while the duration of merely the
first syllable in the utterance “Hey, baby!” is .66 seconds, alone nearly 18 percent longer than the entirety
of the former utterance. The total duration of the latter utterance is 1.59 seconds. As such, the total
duration of the catcall is more than 180 percent longer than the duration of the same phrase in question
form.
5. POSSIBLE PREDICTABLE SEMANTIC-SYNTACTIC STRUCTURE
Most catcalls appear to be identical in their semantic-syntactic structure to another type of speech
act: compliments. Manes and Wolfson have shown in several works (Manes and Wolfson 1981; Wolfson
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1981, 1983; Wolfson and Manes 1980) that most compliments are realized by means of a limited set of
highly predictable semantic-syntactic structures. This led the authors to conclude that compliments can be
considered formulae whose interpretation would be relatively straightforward and would not involve
much difficulty or effort for hearers. As Herbert puts it, “The noncreativity of the compliment act is a
striking fact: these are speech formulae. It is tempting to speculate that such noncreativity is directly tied
to a need for easily recognizable formulae in status- and solidarity-negotiating gambits in speech. That is,
in making a social move of this kind, the use of a formula decreases the likelihood that the move might be
misinterpreted or unnoticed by an addressee” (1991). According to Manes and Wolfson, there are three
very commonly used semantic-syntactic structures for the realization of compliments (1 through 3),
although other six minor patterns can also be appreciated (4 though 9):
1) NP [is/looks] (really) ADJ;
2) I (really) [like/love] NP;
3) PRO is (really) (a) ADJ NP;
4) You V (a) ADJ NP;
5) You V NP (really) ADV;
6) You have (a) (really) ADJ NP;
7) What (a) ADJ NP;
8) ADJ NP; and
9) Isn’t NP ADJ!
If we turn back to the examples under criterion 3, we see that: example (1) follows pattern 1; (2),
(3) and, to an extent, (6) follow pattern 8; (4) and (7) follow pattern 7; and (5) follows pattern 4. Although
the final example, example (8), begins with the structure of pattern 2, it doesn’t follow through.
Therefore, just as most compliments fit one of the nine predictable structures elucidated above, so do
most—but not all—catcalls.
6. ASSYMETRICAL TURN-TAKING STRUCTURE
According to Stop Street Harassment (2014), only about half (53 percent) of all survey
respondents reported that at least once they had done something proactive about the catcalling they have
experienced or witness. The other half (47 percent) did not.
The final criterion of a catcall is the turn-taking structure that does not rely on interlocutor
response. That is, the hearer may take an active or may take a passive part in the communicative
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interaction without affecting the type of speech act. Hence, it is the asymmetrical structure that is an
integrated feature of the catcall.
Indeed, catcalls separate themselves from compliments and greetings by this very asymmetrical
structure. The sequential format of the typical turn-taking communicative interaction allows interlocutors
to engage in an encounter that exhibits some evidence of mutual acknowledgement and mutual
understanding. For example, Herbert (1991) found that compliments from males are generally
acknowledged and accepted, especially by female hearers. Yet, the catcall opening turn is often met with
a violation of conversational cooperation: silence. Silence, in effect, is a rejection of a turn.
Conversations are not “a succession of disconnected remarks,” but cooperative efforts where
participants recognize a common purpose, “or at least a mutually accepted direction” (Grice 1975, p. 45).
The Grecian approach to cooperation argues that it is a universal rule of all human interaction: “Make
your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted
purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged” (Grice 1975). Silence or rejection of
the two-part turn-taking structure is an example of a violation of Grice’s cooperation principle. Yet, what
may appear to be an example of non-cooperation may be, in fact, an intentional flouting in order to
generate an implicature. That is, silence on the turn of the hearer will be interpreted as an expression of
rejection of the preceding utterance of the speaker.
AN EMPIRICAL CASE STUDY
Any proposal for criteria needs empirical investigations to support it. In the rest of this paper, I
will offer a brief discussion of catcalls collected in Miami, Florida as a way of assessing and refining
some of the claims made so far. In addition, I will use this space to discuss the illocution of the speech act
and how it is conditioned by the interactions of the sociolinguistic variables of gender, social distance,
and power.
Data for the study consist of sequences of spontaneous speech collected in public settings. All
spontaneous data are in the form of field notes taken immediately following the speech act. It should be
understood that what follows is not an exhaustive study of Miami catcalls. Such a study would require a
project expressively designed with the goal of collecting all types of catcalls used in Miami speech
communities. Although the data discussed here are drawn from a range of interactions, they do contain a
considerable number of exchanges that qualify as catcalls according to the above-mentioned criteria.
The following exchange occurred between an unacquainted male (A) and female (B) in the shared
public space of a Cuban café in Miami Beach, Florida:
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(A):
Great legs! Are you an athlete, or is that genetic?
(B):
I’m not an athlete, so it must be.
(A):
Those are the best kind.
(B):
nods
(A):
Those calves are phenomenal!
(B):
silence
(A):
Don’t be so serious. You only live once.
This exchange qualifies easily as a catcall, according to the six criteria established above. The exchange
occurs immediately following the arrival of (A) to the public location in which (B) was already present
(criterion 1). It also exhibits a shared perceptual and auditory field, as defined by the response of (B) to
the initial turn of (A). The interlocutors were strangers of separate genders (criterion 2). The opening turn
is an evaluation of the physical appearance (criterion 3) in which each word in the two-word utterance
displayed an audible intonation contour (criterion 4). The catcall is predictable in its semantic-syntactic
structure, subscribing to an established ADJ NP pattern (criterion 5). The exchange is sequentially
organized into a simple two-pair structure that does not necessarily require hearer response (criterion 6).
When two interlocutors, at least one of which is ostensibly going somewhere, cross into each
other’s visual field of perception and are close enough for their voices to be heard (the volume of the
speaker’s voice being adjusted proportionally to the physical distance between them), they have met the
first criteria for a shared public speech situation:
(A):
Hey, sexy. Where you going?
(B):
Fuck off.
(A):
Hey!
(B)
silence
(A)
Baby, come back here! I like ‘em feisty!
(B):
silence
First, we must contextualize this exchange. Speaker (A) is a stationary male propped in the doorway of a
convenience shop in Miami Beach, Florida, while speaker (B) is a female moving along the sidewalk in
front of the shop (criterion 2). Under this shared public speech situation, the initiator of the exchange
addresses the other, who may or may not respond, or respond in kind (criterion 1). Second, we must
recognize that the first two turns conform to the turn-taking scheme expected in a question-and-answer
interaction with an added caveat: the non-cooperative retort of (B). The first turn by (B) implicates an
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acknowledgment and consequential rejection of the catcall (criterion 6). Although the semantic-syntactic
structure does not subscribe to one of the nine most common structural realizations of a catcall (criterion
5)—acting on the semantic-syntactic surface level as more of a greeting than a compliment—we can,
nonetheless, qualify the initial utterance as a catcall because of the evaluative lexical choice of the
intended hearer’s physical appearance in the term sexy (criterion 3). However, it is the wh-question
structure of the catcall itself that points to the underlying sociolinguistic variables of gender and power.
As may be gathered by an examination of its social context, the “where are you going?” catcall is more
than an expression of greeting. Rather, it is an attempt to sanction the reciprocal recognition of each
other’s presence with some specific request of information that may or may not receive a satisfactory
response. Although highly predictable and conventional, the “where are you going?” catcall forces the
intended hearer to deal with a wide range of issues including the speaker’s rights to have access to
information about the hearer’s whereabouts, culture-specific expectations about the ethics of venturing
into public space, the force of questioning as a form of social control, and, hence, the possibility of
withholding information as a form of resistance to public scrutiny (Keenan 1976).
The speech act analysis proposed for greetings, then, cannot be easily extended to catcalls, given
that to initiate a “where are you going?” catcall is definitely more than (and most definitely different
from) a “courteous indication of recognition” (Searle and Vanderveken 1985, p. 216) or a conventional
expression of pleasure at the sight of someone (Bach and Harnish 1979, p. 51-52). Moreover, to ask
“where are you going?” is not just a simple request for an account of information. The way in which this
particular exchange is played out illustrates a number of important points about the social organization
presupposed by the encounter, as well as the social organization achieved by it.
First, the situation displays a noticeable gender gap between the male (A) and the female (B). As
such, (A) expresses his ability to judge and comment upon the physical appearance of (B), a female with
whom he is unacquainted, but with whom he temporarily shares the same public space.
Second, the propositional content of the catcall indexes a power disparity between (A) and (B).
Despite the conventionality of the exchange between two interlocutors whom are unfamiliar, what is said
and how it is said is extremely important. The illocutionary point or goal of the catcall is not just “a
courteous indication of recognition, with the presupposition that the speaker has just encountered the
hearer,” as demonstrated with greetings (Searle and Vanderveken 1985, p. 215). Although
acknowledgement (and approval) is certainly involved, the exchange plays out a set of social relations and
cultural expectations: It is only males who get to occupy that verbal space. Only males are permitted to
comment upon a woman’s physical appearance simply because she shares the same public space as he.
Thus, the catcall is neither a friendly greeting nor a generous compliment between acquaintances if it
reinforces heterosexual male power to claim public space.
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In this way, catcalling further works as a way to restrict and control the spaces to which women
have access. Catcalls, as expressions of power, are part of a larger problem of gender inequality wherein
men sexually objectify women to exert their control over them, and this power play in a speech
community plays out in the speech acts of that community.
CONCLUSION
The preceding sociolinguistic analysis of the speech act we commonly term catcalling indicates
that the catcall is systematic and rule-governed in the speech community of Miami, Florida. The analysis
of catcalls presented here shows that discourse analysis must be integrated with ethnographic information
if we want to provide an adequate pragmatic analysis of speech behaviors within and across speech
communities. Whatever catcalls accomplish in their illocution, they do so by virtue of the interlocutors’
ability to interpret a recognizable formula within a particular social context.
After proposing such a definition of the catcall consisting of six criteria, I have shown that this
speech act is distinct from other expressive speech acts of complimenting and greeting. While catcalls
share a semantic-syntactic structure with compliments and overlap in the social variables of greetings,
they violate many norms of complimenting and greeting speech behavior. My analysis of two examples of
catcalls in Miami, Florida offers an empirical corroboration of the six criteria and proposes some new
hypotheses about the work that is done during catcalls that will be of further research. In particular, I have
shown that (1) catcalling needs to be explicated as its own speech act and (2) the sociolinguistic variables
of gender and power underscore the speech act of catcalls. Overall, catcalling appears to be a frequent
experience for women and, therefore, is deserving of future research designed to more fully elaborate the
experience of street harassment.
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