Integrated Language Skills 1 Lesson 3 November 6, 2015
1
Spoken Discourse • Just as written discourse has rules which govern its form and help convey meaning, so too does spoken discourse have rules which we follow. • These rules have one major difference, however, from the rules which govern written texts, and that is that we are largely unaware of them. • In fact in two-way conversations we are unconsciously taking part in a script which hasn’t been written yet. 2
• As we improvise our way to sharing an experience, explaining ourselves, getting information, telling a joke or even spreading gossip we are negotiating time with our respondent in which to speak, knowing when we have a signal to take a turn in speaking and supporting the other speaker during her/his turn.
3
• Spoken discourse exists within a social context, and here we aim to use everyday speech events as a starting point from which to recognise that while we may not speak in words, sentences and paragraphs, we do have rules to follow, though they can be broken just as the rules of syntax can be.
4
• It’s important to realise that spoken discourse should not be judged using the rules of written English: terms such as ‘word’, ‘sentence’ and ‘paragraph’ above, all come from the study of writing.
• The written form is not an appropriate medium for spoken language but, of course, in order to properly analyse speech we need to see it on paper. • So, it becomes a form of a text.
6
7
Speech events • Imagine how the conversation might go as you take your leave of someone after having had dinner at their house. • You might signal your intention of leaving by some line such as ‘I must be going’, you might express gratitude for the meal, you might say thank you, you might praise the excellence of the food, you might suggest a return visit to your place, the conversation might drift back to an earlier topic or even start a completely new one, you might say thank you again, and then you embark on the ‘goodbyes’ and ‘goodnights’ before finally going.
8
• In such a situation or speech event as this English speakers will be unconsciously following rules whose purpose is to express thanks, reinforce relationships, leave on good terms and allow a suitable length of time between first suggesting you must go and actually going. • Saying you must go and then immediately fleeing the house would be considered inappropriate and rude—certainly in British culture. • Conversation, then, exists within a social context and this context determines the purpose and shapes the discourse.
9
• Speech event, to put it briefly, is a contextual situation of the discourse.
• Conversation, however, is not always clearcut, and sometimes a breakdown in communication occurs because intention is misunderstood.
11
• Try this situational context, for example: the case of the woman who had just undergone surgery to have a lump removed from her breast. • She tells her female friends that she found it upsetting to have been cut into, and that the operation had left a scar and changed the shape of her breast. Her friends replied: ‘I know. It’s as if your body has been violated.’ But when she told her husband, he replied: ‘You can have plastic surgery to cover up the scar and restore the shape of your breast.’
12
• She felt comforted by her friends’ comments, but upset by what her husband said. • Her friends gave her understanding but her husband reacted to her complaint by giving advice. • His intention was to offer help, but what his wife heard was him telling her to undergo even more surgery. 13
• Intention lies behind a range of specific utterances called speech acts.
14
Classification of Speech Acts 1. Representatives: the speaker is committed, in varying degrees, to the truth of a proposition, e.g. ‘affirm’, ‘believe’, ‘conclude’, ‘report’. 2. Directives: the speaker tries to get the hearer to do something, e.g. ‘ask’, ‘challenge’, ‘command’, ‘request’. 3. Commissives: the speaker is committed, in varying degrees, to a certain course of action, e.g. ‘bet’, ‘guarantee’, ‘pledge’, ‘promise’, ‘swear’. 4. Expressives: the speaker expresses an attitude about a state of affairs, e.g. ‘apologise’, ‘deplore’, ‘thank’, ‘welcome’. 5. Declarations: the speaker alters the status quo by making the utterance, e.g. ‘I resign’, ‘you’re offside’, ‘I name this child’, ‘you’re nicked’, ‘you’re busted punk’. 15
Activity • Look at the following examples: which group does each belong to? – insist – congratulate – I now pronounce you man and wife – vow – deny 16
Commentary 1. ‘Waiter, I insist on seeing the manager’ is an example of a directive. 2. ‘I’d like to congratulate everyone involved in making the show such a success’ is an expressive. 3. ‘I now pronounce you man and wife’ is a declarative. 4. ‘I vow to obey the rules of the Black Hand Gang’ is a commissive. 5. ‘I deny all knowledge of the facts’ is a representative. 17
Indirect speech acts • In reality, in everyday discourse, many speech acts do not directly address the listener. • For many reasons—because we might be obeying the politeness principle, for example, and don’t wish to impose— we may ask for something to be done indirectly. ‘Can you pass the salt?’ for instance, is not really a question but a directive; an answer of ‘Yes’ without any attempt to actually pass it would seem totally inappropriate. • Forms, then, such as ‘Can you pass the salt?’ in preference to the more direct ‘I command that you pass the salt’ are known as indirect speech acts. 18
• It’s possible, of course, to phrase speech acts in various ways —you can, for instance apologise without actually using the term ‘apologise’, as in ‘OK I was wrong’; have a bet with someone by saying ‘You’re on’, etc. • Directives can be especially interesting in the gradient they take from direct order to humble question. • Imagine that you’ve got a fly in your soup in a restaurant; a gradient might go something like this:
19
1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Waiter, get the manager immediately Waiter, I insist on seeing the manager. Waiter, I want to see the manager. Waiter, I’d like to see the manager, please. Waiter, if it’s not too much trouble I’d like to see the manager. 6. Waiter, I don’t suppose I could see the manager, could I?
20
Activity • Try a similar gradient from direct to indirect speech act: – 1 Asking someone out on a date – 2 Requesting someone to stop talking in the cinema.
21