• Samar Sami Hummadi

  Author

• Dr. Rana H. Al-Bahrani

  Author

• Shatha Al-Saadi

  Author

The obvious tension and similarity between the concepts of threat and warning
has made it difficult to distinguish between them and has remained a challenge for
students, researchers and translators. Surveying the literature review of these two
concepts, the researcher has found that little attention has been paid to the difference
between these two acts in general and to postgraduate students’ ability to distinguish
between them in particular. Accordingly, the current thesis is dedicated to investigate
the ability of Iraqi M.A. students to differentiate between the two acts pragmatically in
George Orwell’s novel “1984”. To achieve the objective of the study and answer its
research question, the researcher adopts Searle’s version of Speech Act Theory (1971)
amalgamated with the threat and warning features supported by Allan (1983). The
study reveals that most of the M.A. students confuse between the two acts because they
believe that both threat and warning are synonyms in their usage.

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