TOPIC-SHIFTING

COMMUNICATIVE STRATEGY
Amanonce, Bermio, David, Lopez, Palacpac
Definition:
• Is the strategy that is used in introducing another topic.
• This strategy works best when there is follow-through so that a
new topic continues to be discussed. This is also used in repair
Communicative Strategy .
Topic Shift Clues: Do’s
Clue Words Shifts and Deictic
Expressions
 Clue Words Shifts and Deictic
Expressions

"By the way," "but," "yeah," etc., indicate the

start of a new topic
Explicitly Labeled Shifts
 Explicitly Labeled Shifts

"What I was saying before," "speaking of X,"

etc., can be markers to indicate topic shift.
Repetition of Words
 Repetition of words

A speaker sometimes repeats what s/he said in

the preceding conversation, and it works to
show the topic has ended.
Tense Shift
 Tense Shift

A switch in tense also indicates a topic shift. For

example, in order to close a topic, a shift from
past tense to present tense is effective. And
conversely, a shift from present to past tense
indicates the beginning of a new topic.
Mode of Reference
 Mode of Reference

In discourse, a speaker refers to an entity by a

pronoun or by a non-pronoun. The shift in
pronoun and non-pronoun indicates a shift of
his/her attention to the entity, and also a shift of
topic.
Topic Shift Clues: Don’ts
Topic Avoidance
 Topic Avoidance

You try not to talk about concepts difficult for you

to talk
Message Abandonment
 Message Abandonment

You leave the message unfinished because of the

language difficulty
Use of Fillers
 Use of Fillers

Use of filling words to gain time to think