EL1102 Studying English in Context
Lecture No. 5 (Part 1)

Introduction: terminology

· social varieties (or functional varieties) of English

· text = connected and meaningful stretch of language that is, in some sense, self-contained

· individual texts represent text types or genres.

· texts in each genre try to accomplish different things.

· different genres also presuppose different relationships between the participants

Why study conversation (‘common speech’)?

· conversation represents a genre which almost all language users should be familiar with – democratic – unspecialised and unmarked – no special training

· the kind of language we engage in most of the time

· available whether you belong to a highly literate, technologised culture or a ‘primitive’ or tribal culture

· something essentially humanising about conversation!

· correction of imbalance of traditional grammar

A grammar of spoken language?

1. HEADS (LEFT-DISLOCATION, TOPIC)

My grandchildren, they’re always complaining about things. [= ‘My grandchildren are always complaining about things.’]

2. TAILS (RIGHT-DISLOCATION)

She’s always late, my sister. [= ‘My sister’s always late.’]

In the examples, the extra noun phrases have been underlined, and the pronouns have been put in bold.

3. DISCOURSE MARKERS also characterise conversation.

Items like right, okay, anyway, I see or I mean signal that the speaker is starting or continuing or trying to conclude a topic of conversation.

Therefore:

· Informal conversational English is different from formal written English

· This does not mean that it is inferior, because it performs different functions

Describing the social context

(a) MODE

· means of communication

· role of language in the text

· spoken v. written (+ in-between)? face to face? possibility of feedback? role of language (cf. story telling v. buying and selling)?

· Therefore: conversation is essentially spoken (with face-to-face interaction available, but not absolutely necessary) and that allows for immediate feedback. Therefore, conversation is developed co-operatively. The talk element of conversation also constitutes the activity of conversation.

(b) TENOR

· relationship between the participants (who’s in charge? how well acquainted?)

· in casual conversation, no one has control of how the conversation develops; interlocutors can be close friends or total strangers (or in between).

topics covered, or the type of activity covered
‘topic’ of a conversation can encompass a whole range; the topic is not important because the emphasis is on establishing interpersonal relationships, rather than doing any ‘business’ (negotiating a contract, selling insurance).

On recording conversation

In order to discuss a conversation we will need to either listen to a live or recorded conversation, or read a transcription [= written record] of a conversation
‘live’ conversations is that they are evanescent
recording on audiotape is, however, difficult to work with, and is therefore not favoured by the analyst
better option: ‘freeze’ conversation in the form of a transcript.

How does a transcription work?

· a transcription is different from a written text

· transcript does not attempt to provide a ‘written style’ to a spoken text in the way that, say, the Hansard does.

· if we are not used to reading transcripts, a lot of what is written down might seem garbled, unless we attempt to ‘listen’ to what is said in our ‘minds’ ears’, as it were.

· written texts, on the one hand, don’t record some elements that are available in speech; and, on the other hand, record elements that cannot be ‘heard’ in speech

What does writing usually leave out?

· voice inflexions (voice quality, rising tone, etc.);

· stress patterns and loudness;

· non-linguistic features (movement, pointing, gaze, etc.);

· accent.

These are often called paralinguistic features = elements that are not strictly speaking linguistic in nature, but accompany the production of spoken language.

So what do transcribers do?

· Transcribers therefore either ignore orthographic conventions, or modify them

· Different transcribers use different conventions

A sample transcription

B: I’m not - oh thanks - not really comfortable - like this

A: hmm ---- you got a cold?

B: - no. - just a bit sniffy cos I’m - I am cold, and I’ll be all right once I’ve warmed up. do I look as though I’ve got a cold?

· No ‘tidying up’: interrupted clause, repetition

· punctuation to show intonation

· underlining to show stress

· hyphens to show pauses (gaps), each hyphen = about ½ sec

Sample transcription (cont’d)

A: pull your chair up close if you want - is it *[inaudible]*

B: *yes. - I’ll be all right in a minute* it’s just that I’m

A: what have you got=

B: =stupid. I had er about five thousand books - to take back to the Senate House yesterday,

· Overlaps are recorded (here with paired stars)

· Transcriber’s remarks (including inaudibility) are enclosed within square brackets

· ‘Latching on’ or fast speech can be recorded (here with the equal symbol)

· non-words (er) recorded

General features of conversation

· generalisations – typicality and atypicality

· Because conversation is spoken, interlocutors can rely on paralinguistic and non-linguistic features as well as linguistic features

· you can say ‘I had a great day’ (linguistic features) in an animated tone (perhaps loudly, with a high fall intonation pattern: paralinguistic features), and you may have rushed into the room quickly, and are smiling broadly and looking wildly at everyone (non-linguistic features)

· you can say the same sentence (same linguistic features), but in a low voice and rather slowly, and you have slumped into a sofa

· computer-mediated communication aiming at sounding conversational might insert the equivalents of paralinguistic and non-linguistic features, like emoticons

Different organisational principles

· Conversations will also be organised differently from texts belonging to other genres.

· topic development: Because conversations are developed co-operatively by more than one party, and because of the fact that no one person is ‘in charge’ of the conversation, conversations develop in a less predictable fashion than texts belonging to other genres.

· speech functions: informal speech employs a greater range of speech functions. The four main speech functions sentences in English can perform are:

o Questioning. (What is the time?)

o Stating. (It is not half past five.)

o Commanding. (Come home before ten.)

· Exclaiming. (What an idiot I am!)

Organisational principles 1: grammar

· sentence structure: We can also predict that the lower-level structures will also be organised differently from texts in other genres. The fact that conversation is spontaneous, with very little planning time available will probably ensure that structures that are complex or that require a lot of pre-planning will be avoided.

· paratactic clauses

· unlikely to be long NPs like ‘The symbolisation of transfer features by angular brackets’ – cf. People have had to show transfer features, and these have usually been shown by using angular brackets

· verbal rather than nominal style – ‘symbolisation’ – actions or activities are more likely to be expressed through verbs rather than through nouns. This is the normal way of expressing actions or activities. Cf. ‘I saw her in her new dress and I had to laugh’ (verb phrases underlined) – ‘The sight of her in her new dress caused much laughter’ (noun phrases underlined).

· presence of pauses and/or fillers – non-fluency features. They might need to pause to choose the right word. These pauses can be vocalised; in other word, some kind of sound can be made, usually a vowel sound (‘er’, ‘ah’, ‘erm’, ‘uh’, ‘eh’, etc.). Sometimes also these can be not very meaningful

Organisational principles 2: lexis

· words like ‘you know’, ‘sort of’, ‘the thing is that’, which I will call fillers; and non-words like er or um, which we can call vocalised pauses

· We mentioned heads, tails and discourse markers earlier

· presence of back-channelling: yes, okay, mm-hm

· vague language:

o He was complaining about this and that.

o Something or other happened, and he got really annoyed.

o Do they serve sandwiches or something?

· hedging, so as to sound less face-threatening:

I was, like, irritated by what he said.

o I was, you know, sort of irritated by what he said

· core lexis (v peripheral) lexis; engagement (v detachment)

· emotional or evaluative lexis (v objective-sounding or technical) lexis (eg ‘Can’t stand these lousy TCS sitcoms’ – ‘The TCS situational comedies have not been imaginatively developed’

· use of swear words or expletives or strong language (‘These TCS sitcoms are so shitty’)

· time-worn v creative phrases or clichés like ‘in the final analysis’ or ‘hell hath no fury (like a woman scorned)’.

Organisational principles: turntaking

· overlap in turns

Organisational principles 4: explicitness

· not explicit, – sometimes a solitary word is sufficient to trigger the relevant ‘schema’ or ‘framework’. For example, I might say to my wife ‘Kriston?’

· Vague reference:

· Sentence fragments and ellipsis – clauses joined loosely (parataxis), or not at all

· Phrases/groups are not too long or involved – ‘Judgements about a speaker’s or writer’s educatedness are made … on the basis of the user’s conformity to presuppositions, perhaps misguided, about correctness’ (Professor John Honey, letter to The Times, 31/10/97). Part of the reason for the avoidance of complex phrases, as mentioned above, is that the verbal style is favoured over the nominal style. However, if we try to shorten the NPs above the result is something less explicit.

Benefits of inexplicitness

· We should not say that formal writing is better than casual conversation. They fulfil different functions. In fact, there are benefits:

· simpler constructions (shorter NPs, ellipsis, parataxis) or more easily available constructions (core lexis)

· by using the ‘shorthand version’ I imply that you and I share the same ‘shorthand’

· the context can often disambiguate what is linguistically ambiguous – ‘Can you play the piano?’

Back to our text

Extract from the transcript with B’s back-channelling (‘hmm’) left out

it’s just that I’m stupid. I had er about five thousand books - to take back to the Senate House yesterday, - and I got all the way through the college to where the car was at the parking meter at the other end and realised I’d left my - coat in my locker and I just couldn’t face going all the way back again with this great - you know my arms were and I thought well, I’ll get it on Tuesday. - it’s a bit silly cos I need it

Analysis 1: topic and sentence structure

· B’s condition (has she got a cold?) – B’s account about what happened the day before – knitting

· Sentence structure: We can also find that generally clauses are joined loosely or not at all.

Analysis 2: clauses

Clause 1: I had er about five thousand books - to take back to the Senate House yesterday,

· Clause 2 (paratactic): - and I got all the way through the college to where the car was at the parking meter at the other end

· Clause 3 (paratactic) and realised I’d left my - coat in my locker

· Clause 4 (incomplete, paratactic): and I just couldn’t face going all the way back again with this great

· Clause 5 (no conjunction) - you know my arms were aching

· Clause 6 (paratactic) and I thought well, I’ll get it on Tuesday.

· Clause 7 (no conjunction) - it’s a bit silly

· Clause 8 (hypotaxis) cos I need it

Analysis 3: nouns, etc.

· Nouns: (I, books, Senate House, college, car, parking meter, end, coat, locker, way, arms, it [= the coat], Tuesday), all of them refer to real things.

· Longest NP: the parking meter at the other end

· inexplicitness: which college? which car? which Tuesday?

· interrupted structures

· not is repeated

· sentences are not completed, as in: I just couldn’t face going all the way back again with this great

Analysis 4: lexis, turn-taking

· core items (stupid, books, car, etc.)

· evaluative items (eg stupid, silly)

· attempt to personalise account: you know my arms were aching.

· Turn-taking can be a little messy:

B: I *just couldn’t*
A: *hmm*
B: face going all the way back again

Effective contrast through re-writing

A possible ‘elegant’, ‘written’ version

I acted in a rather absent-minded manner on Friday, 28th March in that after returning the twelve books to the Senate House Library, I omitted to collect my navy blue duffel coat from the locker there. It was not until I had made the half-mile walk through St Antony’s College to my Mazda parked at the car park that I realised the omission. Because I was in a very tired state at that time, I decided to postpone the collection of my coat till Tuesday, 1st April. It was an unwise decision as the temperature today is 18º Celsius, and a coat would have been very useful.

Differences in the rewritten version

· Clause 1 (dependent): Because I was in a very tired state at that time,

· Clause 2 (independent): I decided to postpone the collection of my coat till Tuesday, 1st April.

· Clause 1 (independent): It was an unwise decision

· Clause 2 (dependent): as the temperature today is 18º Celsius,

· Clause 3 (dependent on Clause 1, joined paratactically to Clause 2) and a coat would have been very useful.

· Obvious exaggerations (‘about five thousand books’) have been changed.

· There has been a tendency also to impersonalise. Rather than saying ‘I need it’, we have ‘a coat would have been very useful’, where a passive structure has been used. The rather strong adjective ‘stupid’ has been weakened to ‘in a rather absent-minded manner’.

· attempt at making things more explicit can also been seen in how the college has been named, the marque of the car mentioned, the actual Tuesday identified by a date, and the actual temperature recorded (18º Celsius rather than just cold).

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