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Piotti - appunti completi primo

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Lingua Inglese 3 (Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore)

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06/10/2020

PIOTTI- LINGUA INGLESE 3

THE DISCOURSE
What is a discourse? A discourse is a written or spoken communication.
Discourse refers to both spoken and written communication: the notion of discourse is not related to the channel of
communication.
There are a couple of definitions:
- “Language/structure above the sentence” : this means that analysing the discourse is analysing the
language patterns in units larger, more extended, than one sentence relates to one another collectively
form some larger whole. The language patterns are larger units, they are made of more than one sentence.
This definition corresponds to the definition of a text.

Ex: The baby cried. The mommy picked it up is it a discourse or a random collection of sentences?
It is a discourse. Remember: IT is used to refer to a common gender, when used to refer to a living
“subject”. The two sentences are connected by “it” it is a cohesive device. It gives cohesion, which is one
of the properties of the discourse.

The relation bt these two sentences is justified by structural reasons (linguistic reasons), but also with
elements, which go beyond structure. They are related to one another by causality.
The verb tense is the same; it is a narrative sequence of events.
We can read it in different ways:
 Narrative sentence: The baby cried and then the mommy picked it up 
Causality: The mommy picked up the baby because it cried.
Linking words express the relationship btw two sentences.
What is it that causes us to read us in a way or in another way? The EXPERIENCE: it is an extra linguistic knowledge.

THE mommy why is “the” used? It refers to a specific mum. Is it the baby’s mommy? Yes, but the text does not
specify that. The experience tells us that.

EXAMPLES:
“Colourless green ideas sleep furiously. They usually do so.” Not a discourse because the sentences are related only
by structure.
“You can run a hou- whatcha- now whatcha you can run a house-you can run a house a- and do the job, which is
important, y’ can’t y- a man can’t do it himself, and a woman can’t do it himself w- if y’ want it to be successful. In
most cases.”
SO discourse is not only a structure.
 Unplanned spoken discourse: we start in a way the sentence and we end it in a different way.
There are mistakes, false starts, moments of silence
 “P” it is a sign; it conveys a message and information. We know that this makes sense because we have
experience of it; it depends on the context.
Problems:
 2 well-formed sentences: the look like a sequence of sentences but don’t mean anything 
Not even a well-formed sentence but has a meaning.  “P” is not even a sentence, but it has
a meaning.

It depends on the context.

“Whats the time?” Even a simple question like this has different function, we need the context.

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- Phatic function
- Emotive function
- Conative function
Another definition of discourse:
- SO the discourse is “Language in use” most used definition, the first one, as we have seen, has problems.
Language in used= language used to do and mean something, language produced and interpreted in a
realworld context. So any utterance which can be meaningful can be considered as a discourse.
Discourse analysis can be made by different scholars, also by persons that are not linguistics. There is also political
discourse analysis.

SO…
Text= linguistic object
Discourse= process of interaction/interpretation that produces meaning from language
NB IN SPEECH: Discourse comes first and then it produces a text. IN WRITING: text comes first, and readers produce
discourse from it.

Piotti 2 (12.10)

WORKPLACE AND PROFESSIONAL DISCOURSE

What features distinguish professional discourse?

A very first consideration we have to make when we come to professional discourse, is the fact that, professional
discourse is often classified according to two different dimensions: the horizontal and the vertical one.
According to the horizontal dimension, interactions that occur in a professional setting can actually take place across
a whole range of settings and contexts: in offices, in factories, in hospitals, in government offices, in private business,
in non-profit organisations… This dimension is reflected by the type of vocabulary and jargon used.
Another dimension is the vertical dimension (or sociolinguistic) this has to do with the type of interaction btw the
participants. The type of relationship can be different: professional, friendship… within a specific context,
institutional roles are very important ex: government, hospitals.
A kind of interaction can also take place btw people that share the same institutional roles: for example, when we
talk to colleagues. Other interactions can take place between two people that have different institutional roles: for
example, the boss and a worker, or between two persons that have a different knowledge about a topic. The
interaction is said asymmetrical: in term of authority, or in term of knowledge.
A very first distinction: do the participants know each other? If they do, how long have they known each other? Is it
an intimate relationship or an institutional relationship? What is the institutional role? is there a person who is more
knowledgeable?

So: WHAT ARE THE DISTINCTIVE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE PROFESSIONAL DISCOURSE?

Drew and Heritage (1992):
 goal orientation: participants are oriented to some core task or activity conventionally associated with the
institution in question professional discourse is task oriented. Participants are interested in each other as
coworkers. The main goal is transactional.
Discourse which take place in intimate settings, in normal settings in less task oriented, and more relational oriented:
people are more interested in establishing relations; they are more interested in each other as people. There is a
relational goal in normal settings comments and expressions of interest are common in small talks (ex: Lovely,
Really!)
How is the goal orientation expressed?
1. The use of suggestions: whenever people make suggestions there is a discussion about something.
2. The use of comments
3. Requests

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4. Orders
5. lexis used
Somebody might object that not all communication at work is always about work. Even when it is, people not always
focus exclusively on the task at hand. Even when we are at talk and when we are talking about work there are more
forms of communication that are more task-focused than others. That means that relational goal can also
characterised workplace, but it’s not a distinguishing feature of workplaces. Sometimes small talks are used as a sort
of ice breakers.
We better think of it as a sort of continuum with two ends points, represented by the task goal on a side, and a
relational goal on the other.
 turn taking rules and restrictions (only in spoken discourse): Another distinguishing feature of workplace
discourse is turn-taking rules (only feature which only applies to spoken discourse) this means that there are special
rules which apply to what people can say, in specific institutional settings. When we talk about turn-taking rules we
are speaking about speaking rights and obligations there are rules and obligations about who is allowed to say
something, when somebody is allowed to say something… this for example applies to courtrooms defenders are
only forced to answer questions, when they are asked to, not whenever they want. Participants are given these rules
in advance.
In many other settings no rules like these exist: many settings are characterised by unwritten restrictions on who
speaks when… for example a doctor-patient consultation. They are part of the culture.
How are these rules reflected in the language? What are the reflexes?
Grammar patterns: modal verbs are they used in courtrooms? The type of language used is very formal: they use
“might” instead of can, because it is more polite. “must” “cant” are not impolite, but they’re justified by the context.
The use of some words in a particular context are not impolite because they are part of the speaker’s authority (ex: a
judge). People very often interact basing on assumptions on the authority of the other speaker.
 constraints on allowable contributions: special and particular constraints on what kind of contributions are
considered allowable.
 professional lexis: Workplace and professional context is reflected in the lexical choices made by the people this
is often reflected by jargon (use of abbreviations and acronyms). The amount and the type of professional language
used depends on the amount of share knowledge.
 structure: workplace and professional discourse may be structured in specific ways. This has to do with the
overall organisation of discourse. The professional discourse is also characterised by turn-taking patterns in the
spoken discourse.
Other types of micro-structure? The division in paragraphs each paragraph deals with a different part of the
argumentation. When a text is divided in paragraphs, it is well organised.
When It comes to a written text, also titles are important the layout of the text tells us a lot about how the
discourse is organised. The layout helps us also to identify the genre of the text.
The use of the metalanguage: what is it? It means language about the language. “I’m going to ask you something”
thanks to the words I’m explaining to you what I’m going to do. Compared to intimate discourse, professional
discourse uses a lot the metalanguage.
Metalanguage and explicit performatives for example introductory words and expressions, that participants use a
lot:
- to clarify or emphasize their communication purpose
(Spoken: I’m just saying that… I don’t accept…
Written: this statement is in contrast with…)
- to state what they are going to say/write
(spoken: I’ve got a couple more questions… I want to discuss this with you…)
-to organize the discourse
(spoken: by the way, the next topic is, the next step is…
Written: First, secondly, in the first chapter…).

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The writer/speaker wants to help the other party through the discourse. The cooperative principle of Grice  this is
an example of how this principle works in this context.
 asymmetry: basically, this refers to the fact that often interactions and forms of communications in workplaces
are asymmetrical: they show the differences of the distribution of power, authority, special knowledge/ experience.
Sometimes people with the highest institutional role, possess less knowledge about the topic in question there are
plenty of examples.
When we talk about power, we are talking about someone’s authority: one participant is often more powerful than
the other party because of his/her institutional role eg: Magistrate vs defendant, boss vs employee. There is always
one party more powerful than the other.
Participants often talk with the assumption that the institutionally powerful member had authority to tell what he
should do/ask them to do something.
Speakers and writers make their institutional relevant through the discourse roles they take up.
When we speak about expert knowledge one participant is institutionally more knowledgeable than the other. Ex:
Teacher-student, Doctor-patient

PIOTTI 3

VARIATION IN WORKPLACE AND PROFESSIONAL LANGUAGE: CONTEXT AND REGISTER

 How does the language in different workplace and professional settings/situations vary?
Any “competent language-user” need to know more than just a set of rules of grammar to make himself understood
in a particular context.
Any competent language user needs to know how to use language in a CONTEXTUALLY appropriate way:
- right kind of utterance: when you can use the right kind of utterance (in spoken or written discourse); when and
with whom they are allowed to use a kind of utterance.
- the right time
- the right person

THE CONTEXT surrounding discourse I very important context is a highly complex notion, which has been
conceptualised in many different research traditions:
- Anthropology
- Psychology
- Philosophy- Pragmatics
- Sociolinguistics
- Text linguistics
- Discourse Analysis
- Systemic- Functional Linguistics

We are focusing only on two notions of context:

1- HYMES: his notion of complex is widely popular among Sociolinguistics and Anthropologists
2- HALLIDAY AND HASAN: their notion is also the most popular notion among linguistic.

Before speaking about this, we have to speak about Chomsky (1960s) he had distinguished bt linguistic
performance ( what language users do) and linguistic competence (what language users must know in order to be
able to do it).
The work of Hymes and Halliday and Hasan are related to the work of Chomsky. They are close connected. 
HYMES (1970s): he speaks about communicative competence basically according to Hymes, any competent
language user must have communicative competence, which is rules of speaking, to produce discourse.
 HALLIDAY AND HASAN (1980s): Context of situation, that are rules of interacting.

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They try to explain and to give a set of rules, that must be possessed by the language user in order to produce a
discourse, and how some contextual variables must be taken into account in order to produce discourse. Any
competent language user must possess some rules.

Hymes’s model is popularly known as “SPEAKING” (1972) S:

Setting (location in time and space)
P: Participants (who are the participants? What is their role?)
E: ends (What is the purpose?)
A: Act sequence (What speecj act are used to achieve the purpose? In what order are they produced?)
K: Key (tone or manner? Familiar? Casual…?)
I: Instrumentalities (what channel or medium is used?)
N: Norms of interaction (what rules for producing/interpreting speech act?)
G: Genres (What “type” does speech event belong to?)

HALLIDAY AND HASAN’S MODEL

The model of context situation tries to explain the extra- linguistic variables surrounding discourse and creation of
text.
 WHAT is it about?
 WHO are the participants?
 WHERE/WHEN is the discourse taken place?
 HOW: what is the channel used?
 WHY: what is the purpose of discourse?
According to Halliday and Hasan there are the contextual variables, which give the details about a communicative
event.
Why are they relevant to us? Because each of these contextual variables is marked linguistically and formally in
discourse.

Halliday and Hasan’s model is popular among linguistics.

All the contextual variables that surround discourse, can be divided in three main notions: the motion of field, the
notion of tenor and the notion of mode. All together these contextual variables represent the REGISTER of the
discourse.
Knowing the context of situation, we can easily predict the formal and language features that are used register. The
relationship bt the contextual variables and the formal and language features is neutral. Similarly, focusing on the
formal and language features of the text we can easily identify the contextual variables surrounding the
communicative event.

THE MODE OF DISCOURSE: how is a communicative event taking place?

It has to do with the channel of communication:
 Phonic (spoken)  marked by some lay out features (speech turns) and language features (vocalisations, unfilled
pauses…)
 Graphic/Visual (written discourse) marked by lay out features (text organisations, paragraphs, bullet lists,
spacing…)
 Mixed (written to be spoken: TV news reading… or spoken to be written down: police statement, magazine
interview, recorded announcement).
It has also to do with the medium of communication:
 Physical Medium: person talking to somebody else, that can be seen and heard by audience 
Mechanical medium: written or electronic media.
The type of language used, depends both on the channel and on the medium.

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PIOTTI 4
CONTEXT AND REGISTER
MODE= CHANNEL OF COMMUNICATION. When it comes to the channel of communication, a main distinction can be
made bt phonic and graphic channel, and there also are instances of communicative events which basically rely on
both.
For example, when we speak about phonic communication, we have face to face conversation, or telephone
conversation
While, when speaking about graphic channel, we have letter, novels, fax…
Chats and text messages rely on both phonic and graphic channel: they basically rely on the graphic channel, but
they exhibit lots of formal and language features that basically occur in spoken exchanges.
Both face to face conversation and telephone conversation rely on the phonic channel, but why are they different?
How these differences are reflex in the language?
Face to face conversation: we use body language; facial expressions are seen. Neither gesture nor facial expression
are likely to be reflected in the language. There is some kind of contact: there is eye contact and contact in terms of
space and time the participants share the same physical environment. There is a space and temporal contact. This
contact is marked linguistically by deixis and feedbacks:
 deixis: this, these, that, those, adverbs (now, today, yesterday, tomorrow) we use them whenever there is
temporal/ space contact.
 feedbacks: response tokens like “yes, ok, all right, mmm…”: they are used often in spoken discourse or written
meant to be read. They are examples of language choices that we create when we want to give a feedback.
They are more likely to be used in prototypical spoken discourse, but also in chats and text massages.
Telephone conversation: in this kind there is only a contact in terms of time.

Prototypical spoken discourse allows some kind of immediate feedback between participants, while prototypical
written discourse does not allow any immediate feedback between participants. But there are a LOT of intermediate
steps between these two end points.

PIOTTI 27.10.2020

The field of discourse

It has to do with: WHAT? WHY?  it is strongly connected with goal-orientation and professional lexis.
it focuses on:
- what kind of social activity is going on (nature of the social activity)
- the kinds of acts being carried out
- sort of topic
- their goals
- specific knowledge shared by participants

What grammatical and vocabulary choices does the field of discourse demand?

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 Vocabulary: jargon (also acronyms and abbreviations: we can use them with people with the same amount of
knowledge as we do)
 Grammar: definiteness, vague language (ex: things, stuff… whenever we use them, we are assume that the
other party already knows what I am talking about), speech acts (the type of speech tells us a lot about the
type of activity) and mood.
What is mood? It’s very importantIt is the grammatical feature for making the communicative function an
utterance fulfils.
It is generally expressed to verb inflection (indicative, imperative, subjective mood…). It expresses MODALITY, which
is the speaker’s attitude towards what they are saying (ex: desire, command, hypothesis, statement of fact,
nonfact…).
How does mood relate to the field of discourse? The nature of the social activity can be a statement of fact, of
nonfact, of desire and so on.
Mood has to do with the expression of factuality (facts) and non-factuality (desire, non-fact, command).

In English, mood covers three subcategories

 Indicative mood: “fact mood”: it deals with situations as facts.
The speaker considers the situation expressed by the verb phrase to be factual or conceivably real. Ù
It covers the standard uses of present and past tenses in English.
 subjunctive mood: “thought mood/ what-if mood”: it speaks about situations as non-facts or hypothesis.
It expresses situations that are hypothetical or non-factual.
In modern English this is primarily done through modal verbs, semi-modals, the modal past and the subjunctive.
There are three types:
1. Formulaic subjunctive it is typically used in formulas expressing wishes (or in other fixed expressions).
Positive wishes or blessings are sometimes called optatives (a-b) while negative ones or curses are sometimes called
maledictives (c):
a. God save the Queen b. God bless America c. Satan take your soul!
2. Mandative subjunctive: expresses some sort of obligation, orders or intentions. Typically appears after
nouns, verbs, and adjectives expressing requests, orders, compulsions and the like. Rare in BrE, but used quite
extensively in AmE.
a. I demand that he be executed.
b. It is imperative that he show respect and humbleness.
c. There's a standing order that any private present his weapon for inspection.
3. “were”- subjunctive: expresses that the situation is a hypothetical wish Has the form of 'were' across
the board – even with 1st and 3rd person sing. subjects a. If I were you, I'd put that gun away, son.
b. If Britney Spears were my girlfriend... I'd be very embarrassed.
 Imperative mood: “the will mood”: it deals with non-factual situations that are desired by the
speaker/writer to become true in which the speaker/writer wants the hearer/reader to be the primary order. It’s
used to indicate that the situation expressed is desired to such a degree that the speaker or writer feels that he or
she can order other people make that situation happen. Different uses:
-1. Directive imperative: The typical use of the imperative in English. In English, it covers the following
subfunctions: Giving orders, Command, Instruction, Request, Advice, Permission, Prayer.
WATCH OUT: Use of directive imperative presupposes, or constructs, an unequal power relationship btw
speaker/writer and hearer/reader (TENOR). But there are differences across functions: Giving orders/commands:
speaker/writer is required to have some sort of authority over hearer/reader in order to use the imperative:
Give me that light saber, my apprentice.
Kill him now!
Stand at ease, privates!
Stand up now! (command)

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The following uses of the imperative: speaker/writer does not have authority over hearer; these uses are
nevertheless sanctioned by unequal power relations (TENOR):
Request: Stand up, please.
Instruction: Press play on tape.
Advice: Buy that CD. It's the best they've ever recorded.
Permission: Take £50 in the safe, sonny.
Prayer: Oh Lord, save us from the immoral forces in society.
ADVICE is interesting: it is based on a specific kind of power called expert power (TENOR) speaker/writer has access
to knowledge that hearer/reader does not have access to.
2- Other functions: Here the directive-function is less apparent or perhaps not even applicable at all:
Go to hell. (rejection, insult) Come
on, you stupid car.
Start, dammit, start! (wish)
Enjoy the movie. (wish)
Say another word and I'll bite your knee caps off. (threat)
Yeah, just eat your orange. [to somebody eating an orange] (comment)
Get up, stand up. Fight for your rights. (encouragement)

THE TENOR OF DISCOURSE it deals with the “who?” of the situation: the participants, the relationship between the
participants…
It has to do with the turn-takin rules and restrictions, constraints on allowable contribution, asymmetry.
NORMS OF INTERACTIONS (HYMES) it reflects the nature of the relationship bt the participant. It
focuses on:
- who is taking part in the interaction?
- what is their status?
- what is their role?
- degree or control (power) of one participant over the other/s
- social distance how well do they know each other? Did they have a previous interaction? Personals bonds?

Modal verbs they can be used in two modalities:

 deontic meaning: when you want to give suggestions, orders, obligations…
 epistemic meaning: when you are making a logical deduction, expressing expectations, expressing degrees of
certainty/ probability.

Language features:
1. vocabulary: slang
2. grammar: contracted forms (Short forms are very informal, they are typical of informal interactions) ,
imperative (the use of imperative is not perceived as rude as long as we are in the familiar context; when
used in non-familiar context, it is considered rude) , politeness strategies (use of particular language feature
that we use to let the other party realize that we take care of them, that we do not want to offend them,
that we want to show respect…) , formality (it shows us the type of relationship among the participants),
mood , modality…

JOSS’S MODEL (1961)

He has developed a model with different styles in spoken English.
Even though it refers to spoken English, it also can be applied to written English.
1. FROZEN: static register typical of printed unchanging language, which often contains archaism or fixed
expressions. Wording is exacting the same every time it is spoken/written.

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Examples: the language of contracts, Biblical quotations

2. FORMAL: one-way participations there are no interactions bt participants, it is a formal language made of
technical vocabulary or exact definitions. It includes presentations or introductions between strangers. Formal tenor
level is specifically used between people who do not know each other.
3. CONSULTATIVE: two-way participation: there is some kind of interaction. It occurs in verbal exchanges
where some background information is provided, even though no prior knowledge is assumed. It includes “uh uh, I
see, I understand”.
It’s a type of tenor level which allows interactions.
Example: teacher/student, doctor/patient.
4. CASUAL: type of register which applies to in-group friends. No background information is provided,
participants know each other very well. There is no background information.
It relies on the use of slangs expression; ellipsis, interactions are common.
It typically applies to the familiar setting.

They are in a descending scale of formality.

Example Email:
“Dear Professor Thorbury,
It appears that we will be including your Forum commentary in the spring issue. I would greatly appreciate if you
could send a disk copy of your response for production purposes to my office at San Francisco State University. Please
label the disk with the word processing program you are using.
Thank you in advance,
Sandra Mckay.”
It is the response from the editor of an academic journal to a professor, who has sent an article to that journal.
Which is the field? The field is academic publishing: this means that the field of discourse is clear bc of the presence
of words like “spring issue”, “disk copy”, “production purposes”, “processing program”.
What kind of activity is going on? I am asking in a polite way to somebody to do something, I am expressing a desire
expressions of non-factuality: “I would greatly appreciate if you could”, it is a statement of desire.
What kind of speech act is this? It is a request, which is expressed in an indirect way: it is framed as a statement.
The writer is asking the receiver to do something, and this can be easily realised if we focus on the grammar and on
the words used.
“please label the disk” this is framed as a statement, but indeed it is a request.
What is the tenor of discourse? Since it is an email response to an article, that the receiver has sent to the writer, we
know that there has been some kind of previous interaction bt the participants how is this reflected in the
language? How is the shared information/knowledge reflected in the language?
With the use of polite expressions: whenever we address somebody with Dear + an honorific, it suggests that
Sandra is acknowledging an institutional role of the addressee. She avoids causing any offense by using “Professor”.
“Please, label!” what is the mood? The use of the imperative “label” is mitigated by the use of “please”. Basically,
we know that we don’t know each other very well, they probably haven’t seen each other in person. They know
very little about each other. The social distance between the two is quite big: it’s not the maximum, but it’s close to
it. We can see that there are forms of politeness: highly indirect language, for example the requests are framed as
statements.
The language is also modalized: the writer uses modal verbs like “would/Could”, which make the request even more
indirect. The use of modal verbs represents a modalized language, that creates a bigger distance between the
participants. The tenor is between consultative and formal, influenced by the fact that the participants do not know
much about each other.
What about the mood? The channel of communication is graphic emails communication in general is an informal
medium of communication, but Sandra uses a formal language.

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PIOTTI 2 NOVEMBER
SPEECH AND WRITING
They are equally important: you must possess both writing and speaking skills you must know how writing works
and how speech works.
We use speech/writing depending on the context.

ATTITUDES TO SPEECH AND WRITING

The interest into spoken language is quite recent: in the 19th century  linguists and phoneticians, like Grimm and
Jones focused their attention for the first time on speech. Before the 19 th century speech was considered somehow
inferior of writing it was considered less polish, full of errors and hesitations.
By the early 20th century, speech only was considered of serious linguistic analysis, and according to language
scholars speech was considered as primary, while writing was considered a secondary form of language derived from
speech this is the attitude that the most lay people have (spoken language= “true” language).
But this attitude does not correspond to what contemporary language scholar think: speech and writing are different
systems, each one with its own rules and its own reflexes in the language.

SITUATIONAL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SPEECH AND WRITING

It has to do with the identification of components there are some situational differences between speech and
writing, which mostly have to do with the MODE (channel of communication) and with the TENOR of discourse.
The features that we are going to analyse have to do with what linguistic have in mind when they think of
prototypical speech and prototypical writing “prototypical= representative displaying essentials feature”.
The prototypical features of spoken/written discourse apply to most forms of spoken/written discourse, but not to
all of them, and they may apply also to some form of written/spoken discourse.
Very often there are some forms of discourse, which shows a lot of similarities in public speeches vs written
expositions:
 public speeches are different from written exposition: public speeches rely on the phonic channel, while written
expositions rely on the graphic channel (= they are different because of the channel used), but they are similar in
terms of tenor (basically in public speeches and in written exposition, the relationship is between a party with a
knowledge and authority over the other party and furthermore the social distance between the participants is
maximum: the parties do not know each other.)
 A conversation and a public speech: they share the channel, but they are different because of the tenor: a
conversation is likely to apply between friends, while a public speech is very likely to occur btw people, who do not
know each other.

BIBER when we think of a typical speech, we immediately think of a face-to-face conversation, while when we think
about a typical writing, we think about an expository prose.

SIX COMPONENTS OF SITUATIONAL CONTEXT

1. Physical channe l 2. Cultural use
3. Relation of participants to each other : it is a function of the tenor of discourse.
The relation of participants to each other can be further subdivided into five components:
- Extent of interaction
• In speech: listeners may immediately respond; we can have an immediate feedback. (showing
understanding, disagreement, asking questions…) listeners are under pression because they have
to understand quickly.
• In writing: the reader cannot provide any immediate feedback to the writer.
- extent of shared knowledge
• In speech: speakers are likely to reduce the amount of information they provide, and this is
something which occurs, when discourse unfolds.

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• In writing: even though a writer imagines a target audience

In spoken interactions is more difficult for an outsider to get the point, because the extend of shared
knowledge cannot be adjusted.
- negotiability of goal and topic just like listener’s knowledge can be adjusted, so can the goal and
topic of the interaction: they can be adjusted when discourse unfolds.
• In speech: there is negotiability of goal and topic. (lots of rephrasing, lots of changing in the
organization of the discourse, lots of hesitation…)
• In writing: The negotiation is impossible in writing. Even though some scholars found out that the
writing is also interactive, it is an interaction between the text and the reader.
- effort required to maintain relationship
• In speech: the social relationship is established at the beginning of the interaction and has to be
maintained through a continuous monitoring. It can be adjusted during the interaction.
• In writing: The relationship is established in advance when the writer writes, he imagines a reader.
The reader, while reading, can accept or reject the writer’s attitude towards the audience.
- extent of shared cultural knowledge
• In speech: Speakers are familiar with the audience’s cultural background.
• In writing: the writer may address the readers with a variety of cultural backgrounds. Writers tend to
not reflect the cultural knowledge of the people: its more sterile in term of the cultural background.
4. Relation of participants to external context :
The relation of participants to external context is associated to deixis.
Speakers and listeners in spoken interactions share a physical context, whereas in writing they do not. (we
are speaking of PROTOTYPICAL).
Speakers and Listeners also share a temporal context, while writers and readers are separated in time (this
applies to typical speech and to typical writing, but if we think of text messages it is different).
5. Relation of participants to text
With regard to the degree of performance: written texts are planned in advance, planned, edited… so they
are permanent, while speech has a temporary nature: it is mutable.
Speed of production and comprehension: speech is faster to produce than writing, and the listeners are kind
of under pression to understand quickly and to react quickly; on the other hand readers are free to dedicate
the amount of time they want to understand the text.
6. Purpose
Writing is often associated with the ideational purposes: idea of conveying information.
Speech is associated with interpersonal purposes.
But we have got plenty of examples where it is different text messages, postcards: written with
interpersonal purposes.

SPOKEN DISCOURSE
Many studies on speech and writing have enlightened that speech is less complex than writing: sentences in spoken
discourse tend to be shorter, there is less use of subordination. Speech is also less explicit: the assumption and the
logical deduction may be not included in the text, because the participants share a lot of knowledge. In spoken
discourse there are more implicit information than in writing.
Furthermore, speech is more contextualised than writing: speech is more dependent on the temporal/physical
context and on the background knowledge.
Speech is more interactive, is more personally involved.
Writing is more abstract, more sterile in terms of interaction btw the participants.
Speech is less planned and organised than writing.

Speech is faster than writing, and the speed of talk can vary there are variations in speed.

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There are also variations in loudness and quietness: when we represent spoken discourse, we use arrows in order to
indicate this change.
PHRASAL STRUCTURE
Generally speaking, speech in terms of structure is less complex.
Pronouns are preferred to nouns: it reflects a shared knowledge btw the participants and it enable the participants
to male references to the immediate situation.
 Adverbs are preferred to prepositional phrases because the use of adverbs favours the speed of communication. 
simple structures are preferred: determiner + one adjective + noun.
This simple structure is basically a result of the fact that speakers have little thinking time.
 clause combination: in spoken interactions, clauses tend to be structured in a non-hierarchical way; coordinating
conjunctions are preferred to subordinating conjunctions. When subordinating conjunctions are used, they are very
simple.
Furthermore, clausal blends are frequent. A clausal blend is a syntactic structure, which is completely different from
the syntactic structure of the previous part a sentence should finish in a way, but it is completed in a different way.
Ex: “In fact, that’s why last year they rented a nice house in, er Spain, it, that near the airport.”
Often, subordinate clauses can occupy complete speech turns  whenever this occurs, the subordinate clause has
the function of evaluating what have been said.
Example: “Well, actually one person has applied” “yes” “which is great”.

SYNTACTIC POSITIONING OF ITEMS

 in speech it is much more flexible than in writing: in writing we have an order (SVO) , in spoken interactions it is
much more flexible.
As a result, adjuncts may occur often in non-standard positions: they may occur after tags:
“Spanish is more widely used, isn’t it outside Europe?” basically we can no longer realize that the question mark
refers to the tag.
“… the draft resolution that is today on the table”: today should be at the end of the sentence. Placing space and
time adjuncts in nonstandard position is very frequent in speech, and occurs both in spontaneous interactions, as
well as in public speeches in formal contexts.
 Fronting is frequent. The items that are more likely to be fronted are objects and complements.
“I like David, but Pat I find rather odd”
 headers (= left dislocations, it’s a type of fronting): a noun or a noun phrase + one or more pronouns
referring to it.
 Tails (right dislocation): a noun phrase which clarifies/repeats the referent of a pronoun in the preceding
clause.
“Are they both at the university, your brother’s kids?” 
Pausing: when we talk, we also make lots of pauses.
 Unfilled pause= brief silence. It can mark shift in topic, or that the speaker is thinking about what to say
and how to say it. When it comes to transcribing, unfilled pauses are expressed like this (.). Normally unfilled
paused are measured in seconds, so often we find numbers: (1.5) this means that the moment of silence
last for 1.5 second.
 Filled pauses: they are also very frequent. Filled paused are occupied by vocalization (er, erm, uh, um), or
they can be occupied by lexical forms like: like, well, you know…
Filled pauses may also signal that the speaker has not finished talking and is selecting the appropriate words.
“How is she taking the new job?”
“okay, I think… Are you coming to the museum next week?” this pause signals a shift in topic.

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Piotti 09.11
LINGUISTIC FEATURES OF SPEECH: DEIXIS, ELLIPSIS AND RESPONSE TOKEN

Analysis of a short extract:

“Mrs Anan,
Dr Arima, representative of the Government of Japan for DESP Affairs,
Mrs Rima Salah, Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF,
Professor Rockefeller,
Distinguished Members of the Diplomatic Corps,
Colleagues from the UN system,
Distinguished guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Let me first say how delighted I am to be joined at this event by Mrs Nane Anan, wife of the UN SecretaryGeneral;
I know that this is a subject she cares about deeply and I very much appreciate her interest and support.
It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to the sixth meeting of the EFA High-Level Group.
I am particularly pleased to welcome Mrs Laura Bush once again to UNESCO Headquarters. In her role as
Honourary Ambassador for the United Nations Literacy Decade, Mrs Bush has become a dedicated partner
of this Organization, and inspiring leader and advocate. The White House Conference on Global Literacy
that Mrs Bush hosted last September – and that I had the honour of attending – was a truly landmark
event. We had very rich discussions on the importance of female literacy, and the impact of literacy on
health and well-being. I would like to thank you, Mrs Bush, for taking this new initiative, which turns
attention to the critical issue of teacher training needs in literacy. […]”

RED: social deixis, they refer to the people in the audience. They mark an interaction btw the speaker and the
audience.

GREEN: they are all personal pronouns. They refer to people who have already been mentioned in a previous part of
the text. Basically, these words are simply personal pronouns, used in order to avoid repetitions. It contributes to
text cohesion. They are not deixis.

Whenever we come across personal pronouns: some of them can be deictic elements, while others can be used
simply to avoid repetitions. They are used to structure the text, they are used to move back and forward in the text,
to refer back to a previous part of the text or to anticipate a later part of the text.

BLUE: space and time deixis, they refer to the temporal and physical context.

What is a deixis? How do we know what “this” refers to? If we are not a member of the audience, we are very
unlikely to understand the subject of the conference. There is nothing in the text that tells us the subject of the
conference: it is part of the shared knowledge btw speaker and audience: only those who are attending the
conference, know what the conference is about.

Deictic elements are often present in spoken discourse.

Deictic forms can refer to the participants involved (social deixis), they refer to the speaker/ to the audience/ to
third parties.

Sometimes social deixis and the use of “us vs them” and “we vs they” represent conceptualises insiders vs outsiders,
to distinguish friends from enemies (propaganda and political speeches).

Deixis can also refer to space or time: here, behind, this, that, there, come, go, take, bring… they can express
proximity to participants or movement towards or away from participants (verbs of movement). They are space
deixis.
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They can also refer to the time of speaking now, a minute ago, last year… they show the closeness/distance in time.
They are time deixis.

Emotional deixis they show the attitude of the speaker towards what they are saying. Often, they are expressed by
“this/ that”
1. This: used to point to something familiar to the speaker and to the audience, to show something which is
newsworthy, and also to conceptualise a positive attitude.
2. That: it shows distance, a more detached and critical attitude, and a feeling of rejection.

EXAMPLE:

(1) Bridget: Okay, well let’s go ahead.

(2) Claudia: Bridget, I can’t hear you very well.
(3) Bridget: James, you? (4) James: Not very well
(5) Bridget: Is that better? Can you hear me now?
(6) James: mm…Much better
(7) Bridget: Okay, great. Okay thanks for joining the call, it’s about sales representatives. […] did you see the
presentation I sent you?
(8) James: I did
(9) Claudia: Yes

Some of them are ungrammatical some grammatical elements are omitted. They are grammatical omissions.
DID in number 8: “Did” is a sign for what has been omitted. It is a Grammatical substitution.

GRAMMATICAL OMISSIONS:

“He applied and got the job” there is a subject omission in the second part of the sentence: we have got two
clauses connected by “and”. Whenever we have two clauses connected by coordinating conjunctions, that have the
same subject, we can easily omit it in the second clause. The omitted element can be recovered by simply looking
back.

“Those who prefer, can stay indoors” even though it is acceptable, the verb “prefer” requires an object. “Those who
prefer to stay indoors, can stay indoors”. It is omitted to avoid repetition. Th omitted element can be recovered by
looking forward.

The recoverability depends on the textual relations among the words within the text, they do not depend by the
context.

“He admits he stole the money” we should add “that”. But very often in speech we omit that element. The full form
would be “He admits that he stole the money”. How do we manage to recover the omitted element? Because of our
knowledge of the English language.

The recoverability does not depend on the textual relations, but on our knowledge of the grammatical rules, like in
the following sentences:

“US heading for new slump”  we are missing the verb “is” and “a” new slump, and also “the” US. The full form
“The US is heading for a new slump”.

“The person arrested is a female aged 23” full form: “The person who has been arrested is a …”.

Other examples:
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A: “Coffee? we can understand that they are offering coffee because of the intonation. B:
“I’d love one”

A: “Seen Lucy?”

A: “You coming?”
B: “Think so”

The intonation in these examples is very important. Unlike the previous examples, these are very informal. They all
show instantiations of grammatical omissions.
The recoverability of the omitted element(s) is the context.

ELLIPSIS: it occurs whenever there is grammatical omission. The result is an “ungrammatical” sentence.
Ellipsis basically occurs whenever the speaker wants to provide only the needed information and avoid unnecessary
long sentences.
We distinguished different types of ellipsis, depending on the recoverability.

1. Textua l: the recoverability depends on textual relations. The omitted element ca be recovered by looking
into the elements of the sentence. They are often conjunctions, prepositions, auxiliaries, pronouns in relative
clauses… The referent of the element omitted occurs in the sentence, before or after the point we are
reading.
It contributes to text cohesion: in order to find out the omitted element we have to move back/forward.
It is a type of ellipsis which occurs both in speech and in writing.
Two types: Anaphora and cataphora.
Anaphora: he applied the job and got the job.
Cataphora: Those who prefer can stay indoors.
2. Structura l: the elements omitted can not simply be recovered by moving backward and forward btw the
text. The recoverability depends on the knowledge of grammar.
Elements that are often omitted are determiners, pronouns, prepositions… function words, which occur in
grammatical predictable positions.
They occur both in speech and in writing they often occur in headlines, book titles, notices, news, notes,
telegrams…
3. Situationa l: they do not depend on textual relations. The recoverability depends on the knowledge of
extralinguistic context.
It is mainly used in speech, and mainly in very informal contexts.

RESPONSE TOKENS
They are a subcategory of back-channelling the process thanks to which the audience provides feedback. Response
token is one of the channels in which back-channelling works.
Response tokens can be divided into:
 Minimal responses 
Non-minimal responses.

They include adjectives (fine, good, great, excellent, right, lovely…), adverbs (absolutely, definitely, indeed, really…),
and also “mmm”, “ahh”….
They show a positive feedback/ acknowledgement that somebody has understood.
They mark boundaries in the conversation.
They are very used.
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SPOKEN WORKPLACE GENRES (Cucchi- Murphy chapter 1)

When it comes to workplace discourse, there are some forms of interactions:

 SPOKEN FORMS OF INTERACTION

• Meetings
1. problem- solving
2. decision-making) (collaborative)
• Negotiations (collaborative)
• procedural discourse: instructions and procedure, they are non-collaborative.
 WRITTEN
• Memos: it is something we share with the people we work with; it is a sort of list of things to do.
• letters
• emails
• etc

PIOTTI SETTIMANA 7
When it comes to workplace discourse, spoken interactions and written discourse represent the two end points
often spoken genres have close links to written genres and the other way round: there are a lot of intermediate
genres btw these two end points.

METTINGS
It is the first type of genre we analyse.
Meetings play a very important role in almost every organisation, because they are decision making oriented and
problem solving oriented.
STRUCTURE:
 they are multi party: the chair and lots of participants.
 They are highly structured and controlled: they have clear beginning, clear middles and clear ends and the chair
plays an important role in structuring and controlling the meeting. The chair also makes his role relevant in the type
of language he uses.
 Meetings follow a pre-set agent (ex: a list of topics that are going to be discussed)
 often participants receive written agenda beforehand
 they are basically decision-making and problem-solving oriented.

PARTICIPANTS:
• Chair: very often is the more senior person in the organisation.
 he is the person who organises the meeting and opens the meeting (giving an overview of the topics
that are going to be discussed)
 he leads the discussion: he keeps track of the progress of the meeting, he controls the meeting (=he
decides who has got to talk: he decides speech terms) and he is the person who negotiates
consensus of the meeting.-->he closes the meeting: before closing the meeting, he should make sure
that all the topics on the agenda are covered.
 he uses a specific language: he makes his role relevant through a specific language. He uses
metalanguage to refer to the topics that will be discusses (Ex: these are the topics; I would like to
give an overview…). He uses also discourse organizing words, to structure and to link the main
points.
• Other participants: they basically are acknowledging understanding.
 they can show interest in what others are saying
 they can show interest/appreciation
 they can show agreement or disagreement

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 they can show recriminations

 Take make their role relevant through specific language features: by looking at language feature, we
can identify the discursive role the participants are playing if they are passive listeners or active
listeners.
 language features:
- back channelling (minimal responses= response tokens. Whenever listeners acknowledge
that they are understanding, they play the role of passive listeners).
- participants can show interest and appreciation by means of humour, small talks, and
affective meaning. Very often, this is one of the strategies that speakers use as a
collaborative device.
- participants can also use non-minimal response this is the case of politeness. Polite
behaviour is something we will look later. Apart from minimal responses, they can also use
non-minimal response, as for example the use of a polite language.
- participants can use metalanguage to basically get back to the other participants or to the
chair: “What I wanted to say is…” “I don’t think I agree with you…”. So, like the chair, also
the participants make their role relevant through language features.

Very often, meetings are asymmetrical interactions. The type of asymmetry is connected with the institutional role of
the participants ex: boss vs subordinates. And it relies also on the different levels of knowledge of the topic. But
when we think of meetings with parties from other organisations (ex: clients, costumes, service providers…), the
type of power is different: theirs power is not institutional, but it is bargaining power the type of asymmetry has
nothing to do with the institutional role of the parties nor has to do with a specifical knowledge of the topic, but it
has to do with different degrees of bargaining power that participants have.
(bargaining power: potere contrattuale).

SAMPLE TEXT 3
1 Mike: okay (.) the uh topics I wanted to handle when we get together right now were (.)
uhm distribution of David Johnson’s database after he’s gone and that’s something we have to
decide kind of now. and uh and that relates to the fact that Jim Murray is uh (.) likely gonna start
working with us within the week. uh he’d like to – by the way he’d like to start working with us
right away if he can without coming up first, and so we gotta talk about that a little bit too
2 Amy: well we have to have signed agreement before (.) we give him anything 3 Mike:
⎣yeah
4 Mike: yeah but I mean that can be done by fax (3) uhm (.)
5 Amy: what’s the downside of having him start before (.) really isn’t one is there?
6 Mike: ↑well the only downside is that we ha– then we have to have a written agreement before we actually ever
meet him face to face
7 Tom: we’ve met him face to face
8 Mike: well in a totally different context though ⎣Tom: (Mm)⎦ uhm so anyway that’s– one thing is what to do about
David Johnson’s database, the second thing is (.) uh consolidated sales force idea that (.) Bill would like to propose,
and uh potential F.G. Deck circulation changes which we don’t necessarily have to do right now but we do have on
our schedule for getting the ninety-eight planning by Friday uhm certain things. and part of that has to do with
what happens with F.G. and the other thing is what we do about– with N.T. Deck, because there are also some
other ideas on the table for that. so uh (.) I think the first thing we should deal with is– is uh (.) is the first two 9
Amy: okay
10 Mike: and hopefully we’ll get to the other ones

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11 Mike: so uhm (.) David Johnson’s database – here’s the deal. with– with Murray um what we offered him was
basically [. . .]
↓

17/11/20
FOLLOW - UP ACTIVITY in week 6
• “We” and “us” are used as examples of social deixis. “He” and “him” are simply personal pronouns used to
refers to Jim Murray without repeating his name, not an example of social deixis, but an example of
anaphora, which is a cohesive device (textual cohesion is different from social deixis), because the refer to
items in previous or later sentences. The process enables writer and speaker to move backward and forward
within the text, not necessarily so the reference to the personal pronoun can occur in sentences earlier or
later, not in the same clause. This process can occur in spoken and written discourse.
• “Yeah” in speech turn number 3 and “okay” p.9 are response tokens, they don’t represent situational deixis.
They are used by the collaborators to give feedback and in this case to confirm that they have understood.
• The 3 “that” p.1 can’t be an example of emotional deixis because it refers to something which has just been
mentioned. The last that is a textual device. “That” p.8 is a cohesive device.
• “Before” p.6 is not used as a deictic item, because if we focus on what he says that no date has been set yet
(quando ci incontreremo prima o poi faccia a faccia). It’s not a time deixis because it’s not referring to a
specific moment that has been set, but simply discussing a general situation.
• “By Friday” is an example of time deixis.
• The expression “ideas on the table” is a metaphorical expression and doesn’t represent closeness to the
ideas concerning the issue at stake but metaphorical in a different sense: it is a metalinguistic expression and
metaphorical expression which could replace the concept “proposals, ideas,
suggestions”. space
• “Here” is an example of deixis. Questions:
1) Who is the chair? Mike, because he organizes the meeting by introducing the topic to be discussed in speech
turn number 1, by saying the order in which the topic is to be discussed and leads discussion in speech turn
number 8 and also controls speech turns and organizes discourse. He also negotiates consensus in speech turn
number 11.
2) Can you identify the metalanguage (language used to talk about language) used my chair or metalinguistic
expressions that the chair uses to refer to the topics to be discussed? “topics I wanted to handle” p.1 and “we
gotta talk about that a little bit too”. Bill would like to propose and ideas on the table p.8. “Get to the other
ones” p.10. “Talk about” and “propose” are verbs which always refer to verbal activities, so they’re more
obvious as metalinguistic expressions than “deal with”, “handle”, “ideas on the table”  there’s a difference in
terms of prototypicality. These last 2 terms don’t always refer to verbal activity, but in this context they do.
The least obvious metalinguistic expression is “get to” p.10, which is primarily a verb of motion (=referred to a
physical activity), but in this context it’s used as a verb which refers to verbal activity. What are some discourse
organizing expressions: “that relates to the fact that” p.1, “that’s one thing”, “the second thing is” p.8, “the
other thing is” , “the first thing … is”, “by the way”, “anyway”, “so” (usually to refer back to something or to
recap).

PIOTTI 24.11.2020

NEGOTIATIONS (chapter 1, Cucchi)

What are the differences btw negotiations and meetings, considering the language used?
They are both structured, but there are differences. Unlike meetings where there is a chair, in negotiations all the
parties involved are equally important, there is no one in charge of controlling and leading the discussion.
Negotiations are highly structured, even though they’re less controlled.

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Koester in 2004 did a study about negotiations. Most studies on negotiations have been carried out in different fields
of studies, there are only little that have been carried out in linguistics. One of them is Koester’s study.
“Many aspects of work and business communication involve negotiating. A negotiation is basically about trying to
reach a mutually satisfactory agreement in a situation where two people or parties have some differing (but also
some shared) interests and goals. Sales negotiations, in which buyers and sellers discuss the price and other
conditions for the purchase of a product or service, are usually carefully prepared and may last hours or even days.
But negotiating can involve all kinds of things […]”.
Negotiations have to do with reaching a deal btw the parties involved.
In a sales negotiations for example the buyer has the bargaining power over the seller.
THE STRUCTURE
 The structure can be planned in advance, but sometimes it may develop quit differently from the original plan. 
Negotiations may be also not planned at all but can arise spontaneously out of a particular situation.

Koester distinguishes four phases:

1. exchanging information : it is essential before the beginning: both parties know the interests and need of the
other side. It’s a kind of preparatory phase.
2. Bidding : it marks the beginning of the actual negotiation: it involves making initial offers or proposals. It is
one of the most important phases.
3. Bargaining : it is the core phase. Negotiators argue their case, try to persuade the other party and may link
the offers to certain conditions. From a linguistic pof this is the most important phase.
4. Settling and concluding : if negotiation is successful, it ends in a mutually satisfactory agreement.

Clues can help us to individuate the phases: they can be the content of what participants are saying. Another type of
clue that we can use to identify phases is also represented by the words that the participants use: “proposals”
“offers”… they are clear signals.
Another type of clue is represented by intonation: there is a tendency to lower their phase at the end of a phase and
to raise their voice at the beginning of a new phase.
Along with linguistic information, we can also use clues that are reflexes of non-linguistic information, like pauses
they come btw the phases.

ACTIVITY
SITUATIONAL CONTEXT
Participants: Andy, the head of a departmental office of a North American University, and Don. Don is older than
Andy and has worked in the office much longer.
What: discussion over student applications to the
department and how often the incoming applications
should be checked and the information entered into the
office computer system. Read through the transcript and
answer the following questions:
1) Divide the conversation into the 4 phases of a
negotiation
2) Which clues in the text helped you to decide
where each phase begins and ends? Clues could
be: -the content of the conversation; -the words
speakers use; discourse markers -their intonation
(whether speakers raise [ ] or lower [ ] their voice)
-pauses
3) Identify the institutional roles of the speakers.
Who’s the boss? Who’s the subordinate?

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4) Are their institutional roles reflected in their discursive roles? In other words, does the subordinate assume a
typically subordinate role? Which clues in the text helped you to provide your answer?

ANSWERS
1 ) Different phases
First phase: 1-5. Intonation and the content help us.
Second phase: 6-7.
Third phase: 8-20. There is a rise in the intonation, and they start arguing about the content of the speech: they start
to argue and try to convince the other party. First stage of the bargaining phase.
“But” it helps us to understand that it is the beginning of the bargaining phase.
21-26: first stage of the settling phase
27-29: Don reopens the bargaining phase. Don resumes the bargaining phase. 30-
32: second stage of the concluding phase.

NB: NOT ALWAYS do the phases of a negotiation follow each other in a linear order. In this conversation, Don
reopens bargaining in line 28, although in line 25 he has already agrees to do things Andy’s way.

2) The most important type of clue is the actual content of what speakers are saying.
 ex: BIDDING PHASE: “So I can do ‘em”: Both Don and Andy make their own proposals. Also, the use of “so” helps
us to understand.
Bargaining phase: involves arguing about how often applications should be checked
Settling and concluding: Don agrees to check applications more often than once a week

3 and 4) Andy is Don’s superior Don is the subordinate. But at the very beginning we also said that Don has been
working in the office longer than Andy, so Don should be the most knowledgeable. In some passages he does not
assume a typically subordinate role.

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It is an asymmetrical relation: there is a different in both the institutional role and in the degree of knowledge.
Speech terms 6 and 7 they reflect the speakers’ institutional role. He opens the negotiation with his bid this is
something that normally the boss does.
After agreeing, Don reopens the negotiations in 28. He argues more forcefully than Andy.
Normally subordinates do not interact in this way with their superior.
For most of the times, they do use a language appropriate to their institutional role. in some cases, Don uses some
disagreement forms where the words used challenge the authority of the boss.
Don Is also older his way of interacting Is not a function of his institutional role. there are factor different from the
hierarchical and institutional role that are important, as for example the age and the fact that Andy has been
working there much longer this can actually play an equally important role as the hierarchical status of speakers.
Roles and relationship can be negotiated through talk, and speakers may play different roles at different times.

PROCEDURAL DISCOURSE

Procedural discourse: basically, is refers to working together and getting people to do things. While negotiations and
meetings are collaborative genres, a procedural discourse in an instantiation of a unidirectional genre of course we
have a person who givers info and instructions, which means that the type of asymmetry is asymmetry in expert
knowledge and roles of participants: the type of asymmetry is a function of the difference in expert knowledge btw
participants: the person who is more knowledgeable is the instruction giver and the person who is less
knowledgeable is the instruction receiver. This also creates an asymmetry in the roles because the instruction giver is
also the person who controls the activity, while the other part is less active.
Procedural discourse is action based: is has to do with giving and receiving instructions and explanations.

The instruction giver is also the discursively dominant speaker telling the addressee what to do and how to do it:
most of the language we focus on is the language used by the instruction giver. He can rely on different strategies to
engage the receiver.
Like meetings and negotiations, also procedural discourses can be found in different working contexts.

The instructions can either be general instruction or explanations of procedures (like in training a new colleague or
learning a new job) or can include directives or instructions related to a specific instance.
Procedural discourse is generally prompted by queries from one of the two parties (the party who is less
knowledgeable, not necessarily by a subordinate).
It is always prompted by a request the instruction giver relies on different speech acts to give instructions. The
instruction giver gives back to the queries made by the instruction receiver by using directive speech acts: they tell
people what to do and how to do it. There are different forms of directive speech acts:
- the use of the imperative
The imperative is the form that immediately come to mind when we think of directive speech acts.
There are different types:
a) Bald imperative: “ask her to stick it in.”
b) “You imperative”: “You get this and do this” there is the use of “you”
c) “just” imperative: “just e-mail me the names.” it’s a sort of combination
d) “Let’s” imperative: it expresses more solidarity, it’s more polite that the others. “Let’s have a look at
that one. Let me give you”
Very often this kind of imperative is used whenever the instruction giver wants to give the
instruction as a suggestion, as an advice.
Also, speaker uses this kind whenever he wants his instruction to sound like a suggestion that the
other party can benefit from.
- the use of deontic modals : have to, need to,…: they express the necessity.
Ex: “What you need to is set your dates”

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There are different types of deontic modal verbs: the least frequent are the most direct (need to/
have to), while the most frequent are the least direct ones (should/ want to). It’s very unlikely to
come across “must”. The use of these verbs is a function of the social distance btw the two parties.
- the use of interpersonal markers : mitigating forms, vague language ( the use of modals like could and
would), the use of “we” instead of “you” (whenever we use an inclusive we, that means solidarity), the use
of intrapersonal markers .  Mitigating force: just/like
 Vague language: things, stuff, something
Ex: “I would have a quick word with Paul”

When it comes to give instructions, the instruction-giver uses a clustering of devices, not only one device.
There are different factors that influence the linguistic form of devices:
- personal relationship btw speakers : the instruction giver doesn’t have to pay attention on the solidarity for
example.
- institutional rank and power : the instruction giver does not expect the instruction receiver to show
response, and again we don’t expect the instruction giver to pay attention to solidarity and face needs,
because they know each other very well. They can also use more directive deontic modals.
- concern for relational goals (ex: solidarity and face needs): situations in which the instruction giver is not the
boss, is not the person with the highest institutional role, the instruction receiver is not a subordinate. In
such contexts the instruction giver pays attention to solidarity and face needs. He is less likely to use strong
deontic modals, or imperatives, but the i.giver is likely to use mitigating forms, for examples.
- settings : (University office, white/blue collar office contexts, factories…) we distinguish routine directives
(they involve routine tasks and clear power relationships) and non-routine directives (less face threatening
directives the instruction receiver is the superior. Power relations are not as clear ad the ones in the
routine directives).
- ethnic factors
- Cultural factors (especially intercultural encounters)

Face needs: when we talk about face, it is connected with the notion of politeness. Whenever we interact, there are
some needs we pay attention to everyone has the need to feel appreciated, admired, approved… in linguistics there
are both positive face needs and negative face needs. Whenever somebody shows interest and concern for what the
other party is feeling admired, good.
Negative face needs: the speaker pays attention to how he criticize/ disagree/ ask to do something

The instruction giver is the discursively dominant speaker.

The instruction-receiver:
 he is the less dominant speaker
 he has a lot of features to provide feedback. Basically both i.giver and receiver behave with the assumption that
there is a cooperation btw the two.
 he can acknowledge understanding (by means of minimal responses)
 he can provide a positive feedback
 he can encourage the i. giver (especially when the i.giver is new in this role or he is a subordinate) 
he can show interest and appreciation

The receiver can rely on minimal and non-minimal responses (nonminimal are intensifiers, deontic modals,
politeness strategies).

ACTIVITY
NOMINAL PRINTOUT

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Conversation between a professor and department secretary in a British university.

The professor, (Hugh), has just taken over as head of dept.
The secretary, Liz, is explaining a particular form (the ‘nominal printout’) to him.
A subordinate is training a new person, her boss non-routine directive.
1) How does Hugh respond to Liz’s instructions? Make a note of the different types of things
heSays.
2) In what way are some responses ‘non-minimal’? In other words, what do they add over
andabove simply acknowledging understanding?
3) Why do you think High uses non-minimal responses like this? How do they affect
theinteraction as a whole?

1 Liz: understanding your nominal printout

2 Hugh: oh yes just what I want
3 Liz: that’s how it comes, and then (.) (3) that carries on where the table goes off
4 Hugh: ⎣ oh wonderful
5 Liz: and these are all the different things (.) that it could (.)
6 Hugh: oh I see, yeah
7 Liz: could end up as
8 Hugh: well that’s– that–
9 Liz: ⎣ right (.) So let me give you that, and then (.) 10 Hugh: do you want this back?
11 Liz: no no you can have that one
12 Hugh: ⎣right
13 Hugh: okay
14 Liz: and if I give you (.) (10) [looks for forms] mm (2) if I give you a– a form like that that’s May ’96 ⎣
Hugh: mhm, April ’96 April 2 April (.) May (.) (3) if I give you those to have a look through
15 Hugh: great yeah (1)
16 Hugh: yes that’s just– that’s just around– yes alright okay
17 Liz: ⎣that’s another for May
18 Liz: these– these are all just our maintenance accounts
19 Hugh: yeah fine yeah that– that’ll be
20 Liz: oh that’s the– oh– this is before they started to back things up21 Hugh: ⎣↓ just what I want
22 Liz: we now have things– ⎣Hugh: mm⎦ backed up(1) instead of single sheets (.) that’s right then we
go onto the June ones yeah 23 Hugh: backed up?
24 Liz: I– like this now (.) oh (.) ↑hm (1.5)
25 Hugh: oh I see ↓yeah yeah.
26 Liz: they used to send them on single sheets but now they
27 Hugh: ⎣yeah yeah yeah.
28 Liz: back everything up for us
29 Hugh: oh great
(1) Double-sided

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