Chapter 8 Spoken Discourse

Linguistic Competence communicative competence: the knowledge we bring to using language as a communicative tool in conversation with other speakers.

chapter topics on discourse how we accomplish actions with words how we successively convey information and negotiate relationships in conversation how conversations are organized how we perform identities through speech

Discourse Analysis discourse: connected context (spoken, written, or signed) above the sentence level. utterance: the basic unit of spoken discourse discourse meaning = literal meaning + context

1. Speech Act Theory the premise: language performs actions; we do things with words ‘You are fired!’ Congratulations! I am sorry. Austin(1962) How to Do Things with Words

Aspects of Speech Acts locutionary act: the production of the sounds & words that make up an utterance and its referential meaning. illocutionary act: the intended act of the utterance perlocutionary act: the effect achieved by an utterance on the hearer

“There’s a coffee shop on the corner.” What is its locutionary act, illocutionary act, and perlocutionary act?

Types of Illocutionary Acts (see Table 8.1 on p. 240) Representatives (or assertives), Directives, Commissives, Expressives, Declarations

Direct and Indirect Speech Acts Could you get me some milk? Performative Speech Acts I promise you to clean the room tomorrow. I water the flowers. He promises me to clean the room. I promised/will promise you to clean the room.

Felicity conditions They determine whether a speech act is successful promising preparatory conditions: (S believes) H likes doing the act than not doing it. S would not normally do it. Propositional condition: The act is a future act. Sincerity condition: S intends to do A Essential condition: the utterance counts as an undertaking to do the act.

2. The Cooperative Principle Successfully Exchanging Information by H. P. Grice(1957, 1975) 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.

Conversational Maxims Quantity: Be as informative as is required. Quality: say what you believe to be true. Relation: Be relevant. Manner: Avoid obscurity of expression. Avoid ambiguity. Be brief/orderly.

Conversational implicature A: Do you know where I can buy a university sweater? B: The university bookstore is right down the street. A: Hey, will you go bowling this evening? B: I have an exam tomorrow.

Relevance ( p.248.) Jenny: What are we having for dinner? Michael: Paul just pulled in. J: I was hoping that you’d make macaroni cheese. M: Did you replace the lightbulb in the hall? Monique: I’m in the mood for some milk. Gary: I think there’s some in the fridge. Monique: Are you getting up? Gary: I’ll go to the store and get some milk. Monique: But it’s raining so hard.

Politeness and Face: Negotiating Relationships in Speaking Politeness: being considerate about the interlocutors’ feeling Lakoff(1973) 1. Don’t impose: keep distant. (formality/distance) 2. Give options (hesitation/deference) 3. Act like equals; make others feel good. (equality/camaraderie)

Brown & Levinson(1987): ‘face’ (desire/need) positive face: the want to be approved of and/or liked by others negative face: the want to be unimpeded by others face-threatening acts (FTAs) the higher level of FTAs, the higher level of politeness in order to mitigate the force of the acts.

Lend me your car./I need to use your car. Please lend me your car. I was wondering if..... Would you mind if.... I know that this is probably going to be a hassle for you, but.....

Discourse Markers verbal expressions used in spoken language that convey no semantic meaning, and that are optional, but carry out pragmatic functions. (so, however, then, now, well, oh, geez, you know,.... ) Read p.254-p.256.

Conversation Analysis (CA) CA examines the structure of conversation, one specific type of conversation. turn: the basic unit of conversation conversational floor Structure of Conversation: see Figure 8.2 on p. 257.

Turn-Taking Conversation: turn-taking negotiations among the speakers cues: silence, questions (adjacency pairs: Q-A, Greeting-greeting.. ) gestures, eye contact, intonation Turn-taking Violations: overlap, interruption back-channeling or minimal responses to maintain a conversation repair: self-initiated or other-initiated

Style Shifting Style: how to talk; formality (cf. code-switching: switching between or mixing dialects and/or languages) Gender Difference: Do Men and Women Speak Differently? the Deficit Model: Robin Lakoff(1975) the Difference Model: Deborah Tannen(1986) Dominance model