The language of Conversation

Conversation
• Ordinary conversation is perhaps the most important
variety of social language use, and the most basic, in the
sense that in infancy we are motivated to learn the
language or languages we hear around us just so that we
can interact with other people.
• We continue to use language in daily conversational
interaction with others throughout our lives.
• Many of us, it is true, might spend some of our time using
the written medium to complete forms or produce notes,
letters, reports, essays, articles or books, but for all of us,
most of our time is spent talking to others.
• Conversation analysis has become an
important branch of language study. Its aim is
to discover the rules and regularities that
govern how we talk to one another and to
show how our more or less subconscious
knowledge of these rules and regularities
helps us to make sense of each other.
Conversation analysts are particularly interested in three
aspects of talk:
• how participants use the various resources of spoken
language, e.g. pitch, stress, pause, tempo, vocabulary
and grammar, in their production of conversation;
• how participants manage conversation as a kind of
activity that must simultaneously involve the separate,
but interlocking, behaviors of several speakers;
• how participants manage conversation to achieve their
own particular purposes.
• Most of us think of conversation as the thing that is going on when
two or more people talk to each other, on an equal footing, about
people they know, things they have been experiencing or doing, their
plans for the future and so on.
• When talk about these matters has some underlying professional
purpose or context, e.g. a police interrogation, a job interview, a
media interview or chat show, we would not regard what is going on
as ordinary conversation.
• Furthermore, when we produce a piece of talk with a well-defined
purpose such as asking someone to call in at the chemist's, asking for
directions in the street, or complaining about someone's behaviour
towards us, we would not usually call such talk conversation.
• Nevertheless, conversation analysts do regard such
forms of talk as conversational, in the technical
sense that the talk involves participants in the
reciprocating roles of speaker and listener, and is
spontaneous rather than scripted or planned.
• Thus the conversation analyst is interested in any
talk that involves people who, at various points in
the talk, will be both speaker and listener, and who
will be spontaneously constructing what they have
to say.
 Conversation
• is a variety of English according to medium
• is a type of spoken variety.
• is interactive communication between two or more
people., people who generally know quite well each
other.
• seemingly breaks all of the grammatical rules.
• is aimed at the target audience and addresses them as
such.
• is also the language we use most and understand best.
• The most commonly used kind of English
• No limitations who can participate
• Used in casual context.
• No formal training required
• Informal style (all the characteristics of
informal language)
• Discussion at all levels
• Randomness of subject matter
• Spontaneous, no coherence of ideas
• Not well thought of
• A general lack of conscious planning as the conversation proceeds
• The lack of an overall theme, but of course you can guide the course of
conversation towards a given theme.
• The subject can change, the switch from one subject to another, the
potential for change
• Any kind of language can occur, without being linguistically inappropriate
• Complete switches in the accent or dialect for humorous effect or to indicate
familiarity or intimacy
• The repetitive nature of certain parts of discourde
• Redundancy that allows omissions
• Inexplicitness of the language,
• Usually the participants have a common personal background, that’s
why they are able to take a great deal of what they were trying to
say for granted.
• Apparent ambiguities, only when isolated from the context
• Incompleteness of many utterances because the context makes it
clear to the speakers what is intended, thus making redundant its
vocal expression.
• A large amount of phonologically obscure utterances because the
participants lower their voices
• A chance for recapitulation or repetition upon request
• A chance for interruption
• Very simple words
• Avoidance of specialized terms and formal phraseology
• Not straight answers, noises of agreement, disagreement
• Empty words: you know, you see, I mean, sort of, you
know what I mean,
• "Hmm..." or "Let me see..." to show you are thinking
about what the other person said
• Colloquial language
• “In group” slangs, familiar to participants
 Grammar
• Fewer restrictions of the kind of structures used
• Avoid long complex sentences
• Coordination mostly
• Loosely coordinated sentences
• Short sentences
• “Disjointedness” , many sentences and clauses are incomplete.
• The tendency to break up and keep short the potentially
lengthy units
• Minor sentences, esp. in response utterances
•  
• Mostly active sentence
• Elimination of passive sentences
• The use of colloquial ellipses
• The occurrence of the whole range of tense forms and
aspects
• Group structure, both verbal and nominal groups, is
relatively uncomplicated.
• Subject+predicate
• Subject+predicate adverbials
• The occurrence of contracted verbal forms: he’s, I’ll
• Sentences may begin with pronouns and end
with verbs.
• Sometimes there are fragmented sentences
infused to display a thought.
• Use as many contractions as you can. ...
• Engage your readers with rhetorical questions.
• Keep your sentences and paragraphs short
• Vocatives are common, especially in initial position
• A lot of questions
• Personal pronouns “We”, and “I” as subjects,
“You” in its impersonal function, do substitute,
“one”
• The verbs: think, assess, evaluate, etc.
• Subjective
• Not precise use of language
• No social restrictions on the range and depth
of emotions
• The linguistic expression of emotions is
unrestricted
• The frequent use of adjectives, intensifying
adverbs: very, highly, a bit, notably
• Eye contact
• Body language
 Normal non-fluency
• A high proportion of errors
• Hesitation, “not getting to the point”, “beating around the
bush”
• Voiceless hesitation, trying to search for the word
• Slip of the tongue
• Substantial amount of overlapping or simultaneous
speech
• The distribution of the errors
• Toleration of the errors, hesitation
• The expectation they will occur
• Frequency of silence
• Artificial clearing of the throat or coughing for
different purposes
• pauses in conversation
• The greater use of onomatopoeic words and
sounds
• The frequent absence of end-of-utterance pauses due
to the rapid taking up of cues
• You don't have to answer completely, just say
something like "Hmm..." or "Let me see..." to show you
are thinking about what the other person said
• A little chance of uniformity between speakers
• The frequency of silence, for breath taking, for purpose
of pause
• A high frequency of voiceless hesitation at random
(ëmm)
• The absence of a stable pattern of rhythm or tempo
• The compound tones, the fall-plus rise
• The important variation in loudness to show the
importance of what a speaker is saying
• The tempo is uneven, within and between
utterances
• No regular speed for conversation
• Tempo is as flexible as one wishes it to be.
• Variation in loudness to suggest the importance of what
the speaker is saying
• Back Channeling
Back channeling is the activity that the person who is not talking does in a
conversation to show that he or she is interested, is listening, is sympathetic,
understands, and wants the speaker to keep talking. Back channeling is both
verbal and non-verbal.
• Here are some common words and expressions for back channeling:
• To show you're listening: Mm...hmm. Right. Unh hunh
To show interest: Really? Wow! That's interesting! I didn't know that.
To show surprise: You're kidding! What? That's amazing! That's incredible! I
can't believe it!
To express agreement: True. Absolutely. That's for sure. Definitely. Right.
After an explanation: I see. O.K. That makes sense.
After good news: Excellent! Fantastic! Super! That's great! .
After bad news: Oh, no! That's terrible! Oh, I'm so sorry. How awful!
Small talk (light or casual conversation)
• Remember to relax, smile and make eye contact when
you use the phrases and you should be fine.
• In America, after the greeting or opening, people
usually start to ask questions to find something to talk
about.
• For the conversation to keep going both have to
participate. One person should not dominate, nor
should the entire conversation center around one of
the speakers. Once you have found a common interest
of some sort, the conversation can develop from there
• A helpful trick for finding an area of common interest is to
use open-ended questions. These are questions which
cannot be answered by just yes or no. They often use
question words such as what, when, why, where and how.
An example: "Do you play sports?" is not open-ended, but
"What kind of sports are you interested in?" is. When you
give short answers to a question or answer only yes or no,
the conversation will probably end soon. The person who
gives such answers also gives the other person the
impression that he or she is unfriendly, not interested, or
simply does not want to talk.
• But what do you talk about? You can't discuss the weather
forever! Nobody discusses just the weather, but it is a common,
safe topic which you can start with. Some other common topics
are: work, school, weekend or vacation activities, family, finances
(investments, stocks, etc.), possessions, sports, hobbies, yourself,
and current affairs. These topics may seem unimportant or
uninteresting to some people, but small talk is very important for
getting to know people and making them feel comfortable. We like
to use such introductory or safe conversations to help us decide if
we want to get to know the other person better. Small talk can of
course lead to conversations about more interesting, serious and
important topics
 How do you start a conversation?

• Hi. How are you? / Hello. How are you?

/
Hi. How ya doin'? 
/
Hi. How's it goin'?
/
How've you been? 
/
Hi. How goes it? 
/
Hi. How are things?
/
Hi. What's happening?
/
Hi. What's new?
 What are some phrases for ending a conversation?

•
A. Well, I gotta get going.
B. Okay. Talk to you later.
A. Have a good one.A. Well, gotta get back to work.
B. Same here. See you.
• A. I've gotta run, but it was great talking to you.
B. Good talking to you, too. Hope to see you again
soon.
A. Take care.