Context of Situation

1. Context of Situation • We act through language. • We do things through language. • Through words, we get others to do things for us – language is used to perform function/meaning e.g. to apologize. • The meaning that speakers carry is the intention. BBI3213 SEM 2 (2015/16)

2. The analysis of utterance production begins with observing a talk in context rather than an isolated sentence. • Participation structure - When people talk, they have a ‘joint’ activity where they alternate and collaborate in talking. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

3. CONTEXT (Ervin-Tripp, 1993) – • is known before speech occurs, • affects what is to be said • how it is said • how it is understood. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

4. Context (Hassan 1996) • The nature of the social process • The nature of the relationship • The nature of the mode for message transmission. • Aspects of the environment. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

5. CONTEXTUAL FEATURES AFFECTING SPEECH (Ervin-Tripp, 1993) • Situation – setting, personnel, activities • Participant status • Participant’s social relations • Shared environment & knowledge BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

6. SITUATION – Setting • Civil inattention – when other people ignore the speaker • Focused interaction – where people cooperate with a common focus of attention e.g. people’s attention is immediately directed towards a person calling for help. • Standing behavior patterns – regulated expected actions for a role in a setting e.g. a classroom can be turned into various settings like a party or courtroom, and our talk changes to suit such setting. • Conventional situation (norms) – situations with names e.g. seminar, lecture, football match which lead to a planned / formal discourse. Complex. • Familiar situation – a situation where participants come to recognize shared goals. E.g. phone conversations. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

7. Activities - • Determine whether talk is possible or necessary. • Establish roles for participants • Set up goals in order to maintain relevance. • Maybe verbal or non-verbal e.g. chatting / cooking. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

8. Overlapping situations – 2 types of activities occurring with the same people e.g. talking and eating during a meal. • Joint activities • Contextualization – we look for cues – posture, vocal indicators, topic, register, language . BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

9. PERSONNEL • Status of participant – ethnicity, nationality, social class, education level etc. • Social relationships – talking with close friends is different than with strangers. • Shared knowledge – talk with friends is more emotive and vivid. talk with strangers more formal and complex. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

10. Participation structure • Turn-taking in a conversation - exchanges and sequences in speech by participants (adjacency pairs) - organized timing in conversation, minimal overlap. - clues and cues control turns • WHAT KIND OF CUES AND CLUES? BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

11. Conversation Competence both speakers pay attention to what the other is saying and make appropriate replies. Show common interest, respect, acknowledge. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

12. DIMENSIONS OF CHOICE IN DISCOURSE (Ervin-Tripp, 1993) • Topic • Action • Social features • Key • Text • Genre BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

13. Topic • Topic control in conversation. • Topic uptake – is a from of compliance in getting others to support one’s topic. (don’t you agree, don’t you think so) • Topics are initiated, ,supported, changed • Participants must have a shared belief to achieve mutual comprehension BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

14. Action • Conversational engagement expressed through adjacency pairs and exchanges. (how are you? – I’m fine, thank you) • Sequences of moves in a dialogue • Manage turn by turn. • Must cooperate in order to achieve communication goal and negotiate understanding. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

15. Preferred response e.g. saying thank you when receiving compliments • Dis-preferred response e.g. making excuses to an invitation (Well…., actually…) • Closing e.g. goodbye, farewell, all the best. • Pre-sequences – being indirect e.g. Are you busy this Tuesday? BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

16. Social Features • Address terms e.g. nicknames are used if the person is close to you. You don’t address the vice chancellor with a nickname when you talk to him. • Politeness – relates to appropriate verbal and non-verbal behavior in certain contexts, e.g. you don’t go to a funeral and chat with your friend about your latest shopping spree. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

17. Key • Tone or mood in order to interpret meaning. e.g. How to know someone is serious or joking? BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

18. Text • What we finally hear in the text of the conversation. • Register – variety of language used in a certain social context, with different vocabulary and pronunciation. e.g. baby talk is different from a judge’s speech. • Code-switching from one language to another according to setting, e.g. BM and English. BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

19. Genre • A class of communicative events in the target discipline’s discourse community. e.g. a sermon or prayer in the mosque, church, A lawyer’s courtroom speech, BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)

20. Hymes (1974) SPEAKING Model S – Setting / scene P - participants E – ends, goals, purposes A – act sequence, order of discourse K – key, cues in tone, manner or attitude. I - instrumentalities, forms/styles of speech. N – norms, social rules, appropriacy. G – genre, speech act . BBI3213 sEM 2 (2015/16)