Linguistic Analysis Of Spontaneous, Non-Scripted Conversation

Introduction

Conversations take place in our everyday life. Some of them are planned while others are spontaneous. People make different kinds of conversations such as business meetings with colleagues, chit-chats with friends or family, conversations at the doctor´s, supermarket and so on and so forth. These conversations take place without even knowing that they all have linguistic characteristics. In this paper, I shall analyze a conversation between Deb and Dick which might be a couple or husband and wife. The conversation is a transcript of a spontaneous phone call because it starts with the ringing of a phone. First of all, I will have a closer look at conversation analysis including adjacency pairs, turn-takings, overlaps, sequences and backchannelling. Secondly, I will focus on Searle´s macro structure of speech acts. Lastly, I will analyze the conversation regarding cultural and interpersonal background knowledge.

Conversation Analysis

Adjacency pairs

In this conversation, some adjacency pairs can be found. These are a set of two speech acts that belong together. The first pair occurs in line 1 to 2. This is called GREETING-GREETING and starts the conversation between Deb and Dick. 01 Deb: [Hello. ?hh 02 Dick: Good morning. =The next adjacency pair is QUESTION-ANSWER and can be found in line 3 to 7 and furthermore in line 14 to 15, 22 to 26, 56 to 57 and also in line 59 to 60. The conversation is continued by EVALUATION-AGREEMENT in line 8 to 11 where Deb is stating that everybody is still here and therefore telling Dick what is happening at her place at the moment. Another EVALUATION-AGREEMENT can be found in 28 to 29. 28 Dick: hh that´s all I could do was leave messages. 29 Deb: owhFurthermore, a TELLING-ACCEPT can be found in this conversation. But in this case, it its split over a sequence of turns. The TELLING is introduced by Deb in line 13 and the ACCEPT only appears later in line 16. In between there is a QUESTION-ANSWER. This adjacency pair may occur because Dick does not really know what Deb means. The same appears in line 58 and 62. This is possible because adjacency pairs do not have to be adjacent. In line 47 there is only a TELLING without ACCEPT. Another TELLING-ACCEPT adjacency pair can be found in line 54 to 55 and 62 to 63. The conversation ends with a typical FAREWELL-FAREWELL adjacency pair in line 64 to 65. 64 Deb: Bye bye. 65 Dick: Bye.

Turn taking

From line 1 to 21 Deb and Dick are talking alternately. In line 22 Deb is raising a question and therefore Dick is asked to take over the turn. Dick takes over the turn and is talking until line 28. In line 29 Deb is only answering with owh and therefore Dick continues talking. Deb is answering with o(h)h(h)0huh(. ) well: I´m sure you´ll have a good time. This may be because she is not really interested in what Dick is doing. He is only answering with [oh because he might think that Deb will take over the turn what she obviously does in line 36. Another TURN-TAKING occurs in line 54 to 56 as well as in line 59 to 60.

Overlaps

In the conversation between Deb and Dick many overlaps can be seen. They are produced by both, Deb and Dick, but mostly Deb interrupts Dick. This conveys the feeling that she does not want Dick to get a chance to speak. Especially because the overlaps occur at the end of the line. Only in line 44 where Dick is interrupting her by naming Deb honey she stops talking and Dick is able to continue. There is also an overlap in line 47 where Deb wants to end the conversation but Dick is overlapping with a question as he wants to continue the conversation. Therefore, it indicates that this conversation is more a spontaneous than a scripted one.

Sequences

According to Cutting (2008: 29) sequences are stretches of utterances or turns. Such sequences appear in line 47 to 57 (Did the kids get in the-the water. ) where Deb wants to end the conversation for the first time but Dick is interrupting her by raising a question. The second one appears between line 58 and 63 (Are they leaving today? – I don´t know) where Deb tries to end the conversation for the second time but Dick again asked her a question. Therefore, the end of the conversation is extended by Dick. The conversation ends with a FAREWELL-FAREWELL adjacency pair which is initiated by Dick (line 63). This, again, indicates that the conversation must be a spontaneous one.

Backchanneling

Very important words such as MHM, OH, YEAH indicate the attention and agreement during a conversation. These words can be found in the conversation between Deb and Dick and conveys the speaker the feeling that the addressee is listening and also following the conversation. Would these words not occur, the speaker might have the feeling that the other one is not interested in having a conversation or does not really pay attention. Furthermore, these words are also used as a sign of hesitation to fill pause which is also called hesitation phenomena. Hence, these words show that the conversation between Deb and Dick is a spontaneous conversation rather than a scripted. Most of these linguistics signals are used by Deb.

Speech acts according to Searle´s macro-structure of speech acts

There are many different variations of speech acts in this conversation. The first DIRECTIVE occurs in line 4 where Dick is asking Deb how she is. 04 Dick: Not too ba: d. Howareyou? 05 Deb: I´m fi: : ne. Another DIRECTIVE can be found in line 6 and in line 22 to 23 where Deb is asking about Dick´s plans. Also in line 49 and line 59 a DIRECTIVE occurs. Furthermore, a REPRESENTATIVE can be found in line 13 where Deb is describing the water quality of the pool and later in line 17 to 18 she is explaining in more detail what might be the reason for the yucky pool. One EXPRESSIVE occurs in line 21 where Dick expresses his feelings about the utterance from Deb above (line 13, 15, 17) Also line 16 could be an EXPRESSIVE as this utterance belong together with line 21. 16 Dick O[h]. 21 ick: Oh. That´s too ba[d].

Background knowledge

First of all, both share the cultural background knowledge that Deb is somewhere with the kids while Dick is staying at home. Deb is talking about a pool and Dick is stating in line 10 „Oh they stayed” and later in line 59 „Are they leaving today?“. Therefore, it can be assumed that Deb is probably with their kids on a short summer vacation. Furthermore, both must have had a previous conversation because in line 22 Deb is asking Dick about his plans for today. Hence, both share an interpersonal background knowledge. In addition, Deb is talking about Heidi, Terry and Kirk without explaining Dick who they are and it seems that Dick already knows them. The same is assumed with the utterance of Dick in line 25 where he is mentioning Brian and his dad. Another interpersonal background knowledge can be found in line 6 where Dick is asking “Howdit go?”. In this question, the it is used as a pronoun, or in other words as an anaphor. Therefore, Dick must have been talking with Deb about “it” before because he does not mention a preceding noun but Deb still knows what he means with this utterance.

Conclusion

The analysis of the conversation between Deb and Dick has shown that nearly every line consists of linguistics features. At first, I thought that Deb and Dick are just friends or acquaintances because it seemed that both were not very interested in having a conversation with each other which is also noticeable due to the numerous use of telling – accept adjacency pairs. But since Dick named Deb Honey and that they have children I drew the conclusion that they must be a couple or husband and wife. Furthermore, Deb definitely wanted to hold the floor in this conversation because she often interrupted Dick. In my opinion, it is important to know at least a few linguistic features because it affects our life every day and sometimes one could read between the lines.