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This paper deals with the presentation and evocation of emotion in performative face-to-face linguistic communication in Iran. Performance in linguistic communication is shown to involve the speaker's need to convey an impression of his or her own inner states. Since aectivity is one of the most dicult things to convey in face-to-face interaction, it is posited that a person employing successful linguistic performance skills must have a series of strategies available for demonstrating that he or she is truly conveying a speci®c intended emotion. This involves a two-stage process in which the speaker ®rst signals that a message conveys an emotion, then signals the nature of the emotion being conveyed. In order to accomplish this, culturally prescribed symbolic elements are presented by the speaker that must be performed for others to``read'' the emotional content of a communication. Added to the performative skills needed by the speaker is the requirement that the emotion conveyed be perceived as``sincere.'' This paper continues earlier research (Beeman 1986) demonstrating the eectiveness of speakers in Iran in creating the contexts for the interpretation of their own strategic communication. Performance, emotion, and linguisticsFormalist linguistics is greatly hampered in its ability to handle aectivity, because expressions that demonstrate states of human inner feeling are not merely cognitive in nature. They must be performed to be adequately communicated and understood. For this reason, performance is an essential component of emotion in language.

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A great deal of interest has developed in the last few years in studying children's linguistic routines in interaction as a means toward understanding child cognitive development (see for example Mitchell-Kernan & Ervin-Tripp 1977). In this study we hope to extend the parameters of this line of research to include cross- cultural investigation. We also hope to shift the focus of investigation away from concentration on children's routinized usage of linguistic form to concentration on children's strategies in their total communicative behavior, both linguistic and non-linguistic.