Michael Halliday: Functions of Language.

Function	Example
Instrumental	Language to express needs etc… “I want…”
Personal	Language which expresses individual identity.
Interactional	Language used to develop social relationships.
Regulatory	Language to influencing the behaviour of others. Indicating “Do as I say.”
Representational	Language used for exchanging information.
Heuristic	Language aimed at learning and exploring the world around them. A “tell me why” feel.
Imaginative	Language to tell stories, jokes, to create imaginary worlds/story telling.

Mini Investigation:

To what extent can Skinner's reinforcement theory explain the language used by Evie and her Grandmother?

Introduction:

• My investigation is based on an early theory in child language acquisition which was proposed by Skinner. He believed that children learn language solely through their environment, imitating behaviour they see; he used the principles of reinforcement to explain language acquisition. He said that when a child’s behaviour (i.e. speaking) is positively reinforced they will repeat the behaviour. Positive reinforcement can be in the form of smiling to acknowledging the child to giving them what they want. 
• As the conversation is between Evie and her Grandmother theory suggests that Evie's language will improve/she will learn the adult form, when her Grandmother uses positive utterances/techniques. 

Collecting the Data:

• I am using a transcript between a child aged (2 years, 7 months) and her Grandmother. This is only a short recording of Evie and her Grandma and therefore it cannot reflect Evie’s language as a whole which compromises the reliability of the findings, for example if Evie had had a bad morning her language may be poorer, meaning it is not consistent with her usual level. The findings cannot be extrapolated to a wider population such as other children in different parts of the world as it is only exploring the language use of one female child. This research is ethically sound as the legal guardians of Evie gave fully informed consent to this data being used. 

Analysis:

• Evie's Grandmother says 11 positive utterances, for example“very good we’ve got five things in the picture…” “yeah that’s good” “that’s lovely” and “ah you’re smiling a nice smile”, to keep the conversation moving. Compared to only one negative utterance, “…no not that bath the house bath…” However the Grandmother quickly follows with “…oh yeah that’s it…” Suggesting that the Grandmother thinks Evie will stop co-operating if she is too negative, it could also suggest that in the past Evie has not responded to negative comments very well and therefore her Grandmother prefers to use encouraging language to shape her behaviour as this is more effective for Evie.
• Echoing can be seen as a form of positive reinforcement as it shows to the child that they said the ‘correct’ thing, (the adult form.) In this transcript the Grandmother echoes a lot of what Evie says in order to keep her talking. For example, Evie says “some more” and her Grandmother says “some more things” Although her Grandmother has added to the utterance with the plural of the noun “things” it is a way of showing Evie that she is on the right tracks and it leads her to pick out more toys to take pictures of. Instead of the Grandmother correcting Evie on mispronunciations she instead repeats the word in the following utterance, for example when Evie says, “a picture of [pit ɘv] tigger (.) picture of [pɪtɘ] tigger” she mispronounces picture twice and in the following utterance Evie's Grandmother says, “we’ll take a picture of tigger yep okay grandma’s got one so picture of wolf picture of tigger who else shall we take a picture of?” containing the word ‘picture’ four times. The next time Evie says picture she pronounces it correctly, “in the picture.” This suggests that instead of telling Evie her mistake (negative reinforcement) repeating the word in the correct form will give a child the ability to learn, which Skinner suggests is how we acquire language- through imitating.

Conclusion:

• This data displays a caregiver using positive reinforcement frequently. Although it moves the conversation forward, there is not enough evidence to suggest that it improves her language ability. 
• As this is a mini investigation I was unable to explore in depth Evie’s language, if I were to carry out a larger investigation I would hope to explore other situations in which Evie and her Grandmother are speaking to see if Evie's Grandmother always uses positive reinforcement during conversation.
• Skinner's positive reinforcement with respect to language acquisition may be able to describe many children’s language, however from exploring this data I would suggest that Evie's grandmother does not choose to use positive reinforcement to increase Evie's language ability, but because they seem to have a good relationship and therefore she will treat Evie nicely. 

COURSEWORK

Lakoff 1975: Women use; hedges + fillers; tag questions; apologetic requests, indirect requests, speak less; use fewer expletives, more intensifiers. She argued that these features of speech make women seem more inferior, weak and needy and prevents women from being taken seriously.

My Hypothesis:

• Women’s rights speeches written by females shortly before a significant change in a women’s right movement will contain less of Lackoff’s deficit features than those written/delivered at a period of no change.

I will collect *famous feminist speeches, throughout a period of time in which women were fighting for equality i.e. the suffragette movement in the late 19th and early 20th century. I will carry out a longitudinal study, comparing and contrasting speeches throughout the movement, how the language in those towards the end differs from those at the beginning. I thought that I would compare speeches at different times as Lackoff argued that women cannot be taken seriously when using this ‘deficit’ language, so perhaps I will find that speeches toward the *end will contain more ‘masculine’ language. 

I will create a corpus of data and then possibly use systematic sampling to choose a random sample; i.e. giving each speech a number and then generating numbers on a computer. However, if there are not many significant speeches then I would have to re-evaluate how I would go about choosing the data I am studying.

I am aiming to quantify the amount of deficit features in each speech in order to create graphs to easily compare data. However, I think that it could become subjective as some of Lackoff’s deficit features could be arguable in certain situations, i.e. emotional evaluations rather than intellectual. 

Although it is ‘dangerous’ to have a strong opinion before acting the ‘neutral researcher’ in a study, I think that many of these types of speeches will not contain many of Lackoff’s features, because the aim of them is to appear strong and intelligent. However I was thinking that this in itself almost is on par with her ideas, i.e. to use masculine language to be taken seriously.

I may change my mind with the theorist that I choose to use because I think that there would be lots of interesting things to explore regarding language gender theories and women rights speeches.

In respect to my media text, I was thinking something along the lines of why women may have changed the way they speak. Why there is such a difference in the language of men and women. So if women’s language is deficit- I was thinking of exploring why. I was speaking with some people who are interested in feminism etc. and they suggested that when/if women had their power taken away from them by men in the past then they had to adapt their language in order to make ‘things’ run smoothly. For example if a ‘woman’ was not acting like a ‘woman’ they may not have gotten married? So lots of different aspects came together to create the “female”. But I’m not sure if this even makes sense. So I was hoping to talk about something interesting and slipping in some knowledge of language & gender theory as an addition or to back up my points. I think it would be purely an opinion article.  

(*Speeches which would be regarded as important, those which are well known and were said/written by well-known activists.)

(*when there was a final push and things started to change/governments noticed.)

  

SYNTHETIC PHONETICS

Synthetic phonetics is a way of teaching children to read and write by associating letters with their phonetics; linking ‘symbols with sounds’. The idea being that children will be able to ‘sound out’ new words they come across which they don’t understand. In a government data file uploaded in 2013 they described phonics as “…the most effective way of teaching young children to read.” They suggest that this method allows children to read much more complex texts because once they have mastered phonics they can sound out any word.

The disadvantages of phonics: studies have found that those who learn to read phonetically read at a slower speed to those who learnt with different methods. Some found that those who were taught phonetically were not so good at deciding if a word was real or not, (perhaps since they can sound out any word they may not have found patterns.) Research has also found that older people who were taught phonetically were worse at reading unfamiliar words which do not follow regular letter-sounds.

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/194057/phonics_check_leaflet_2013_.pdf

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/culture/2011-07/04/c_13964553.htm

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2010/jan/19/phonics-child-literacy

Chomsky vs Skinner

Child Language acquisition (CLA)

Behaviourist psychologist’s theories of CLA:

Classical conditioning can be applied to CLA, this is the theory that we learn through association. Infants learning to talk may associate certain things with noises/words etc…

Behaviourist psychologists also believe that we learn through imitation and observation.

In his book ‘Verbal Behaviour’ (1957) Skinner proposed that language acquisition is a solely learned behaviour. (I.e. we are not born with language in place; we must learn to acquire language.)  And that we learn through operant conditioning; the idea that we learn through rewards and punishments. For example, a child learning to speak may be met with smiling and clapping when they say a word/sentence correctly and not rewarded if their sentence is incorrect. The idea being that they will repeat the behaviour which is rewarded.

Chomsky reviewed skinners book, mainly disagreeing with him. For example, he said that learning to speak cannot be solely due to learning certain behaviours and the history of reinforcement, because we can say things and do things which we have not been trained to say/do. He also argued that we can understand things we have never heard before. Chomsky said that how we respond to certain things is a result of our views, opinions, understanding of certain environments and a wealth of knowledge in the region of linguistic rules and conventions.

Cognitive psychologist’s theories of CLA:

Noam Chomsky believed that we are born with a Language Acquisition Centre (LAD) which contains the basis of a language, including major grammatical structures. This means that children learning to speak only need to learn vocabulary and apply it to the *syntactic structures from the LAD (*arrangement/structure of a sentence.)

Chomsky argues that, as the language which adults speak is highly irregular, CLA cannot come from imitation/observation alone, as children do not copy speech which is grammatically incorrect. As well as this, children may try and apply grammar rules to verbs which are irregular, i.e. I runned instead of I ran. Suggesting that they understand how verbs are usually conjugated.

Chomsky used the sentence ‘colourless green ideas sleep furiously’ to show that we have a built in awareness of grammar; we can explain why “colourless green ideas sleep furiously” is acceptable and why “furiously sleep ideas green colourless” is unacceptable. Chomsky argued that we can tell the difference between a grammatical and non-grammatical sentence without ever hearing the sentence before and we can produce sentences that no one has ever said before.

Evidence to support Chomsky’s theory is that observations of patients who have suffered damage to their brain (specifically the left hemisphere near the motor cortex) have suffered a loss of speech, especially in respect with grammar. They may put words together in the wrong order. Although this can be treated with language therapists etc… it is difficult to do so, technology has been invented especially for people who suffer this sort of brain damage in order for them to communicate effectively. This suggests that language acquisition, especially grammar, may have some biological origins. An example is that a patient could use the word ‘wood’ but not ‘would’ (grammatical). (This theory has mixed opinions; many now believe that it is too simplistic.)

Many argue that although it is somewhat obvious that language cannot be learned through imitation alone it does not prove that we have a LAD.

Chomsky’s ideas have been criticised due to the differences between languages, his theory suggests that we are born with the ability to learn any language seeing as the same principles apply, however he seems not to have taken into account the huge differences between languages such as sound, grammar, lexicon and meaning.

Daniel Everett (linguist, who wrote Language: The Cultural Tool) believes that human animals have language and non-human animals do not have language as they do not face the same sorts of problems which would necessitate detailed, effective communication, and that it has nothing to do with the LAD.  He studied the Pirahã community in the central Amazon to translate the bible for them as others “…could not work out the language…” for example they didn’t seem to talk about the “distant past or distant future” as this was not necessary for them. His experience changed the way he viewed language.  He disagreed with Chomsky’s ideas, in an interview he says that, “…language is not something mysterious that is outside the bounds of natural selection, or just popped into being through some mutated gene. But that language is a human invention to solve a human problem. Other creatures can't use it for the same reason they can't use a shovel: it was invented by humans, for humans and its success is judged by humans.”

http://www.psychologistworld.com/cognitive/psycho-linguistics/language-acquisition.php

https://aggslanguage.wordpress.com/chomsky/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/innateness-language/#ChoCasAgaSki

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/mar/25/daniel-everett-human-language-piraha

Stages of language acquisition in children

1) Basic Biological Noise (0-8 weeks.) Non-conscious responses; manly reflexive noises. Child starts with vowel ‘A’ sounds.

 

2) Cooing & Laughing Stage (8-20 weeks) Recognise parents face and speech, they recognise that language has a structure. Learn to express themselves through laughing and ‘chuckling’. Start to string ‘cooing’ noises together.

 

3) Vocal Play (20-30 weeks) Able to adjust pitch. Begin to use consonant and vowel sounds.

 

4) BABBLING STAGE (25-50 weeks) 2 types of babbling sounds-

Re-duplicating - repeat sounds (e.g. woof woof)

Variegated- use different sound patterns and put them together. The words have no meaning to the child as they think they are just making sounds.

5) Melodic Utterance Stage (10-13 months) Variation and rhythm is shown.

(12-18 MONTHS)

Developments occur rapidly, intonations used to show purpose or feelings. Children begin to develop at different stages. Single word utterances: concrete nouns. Child learns 10-20 words each month.

 

(AGE 18-24 MONTHS)

Have a vocabulary of 200 words – shows how quickly they are learning.

Pronunciation - some syllables dropped (e.g. tomato = mato)

Consonant clusters avoided i.e. sky - guy

Re-duplicate sounds- e.g. baby = baybay

no consistency of speaking

 

 

A2 Summer Reading

Nicole Mahoney.  Language Change. Available: http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/linguistics/change.jsp. Last accessed 13th Aug 2015. Report on factors behind language change such as social, economic and political pressures. Examples of language change due to migration and invasions. Mahoney says that the needs of the speaker play important roles in language change. For example, technology, words must be coined as items are invented. Social factors are important in language change for example, the fact that we pick up new words and phrases from all the different people we talk with, and these combine to make something new and unlike any other person’s particular way of speaking. How groups in society create their own way of speaking to create a 'group identity'.

The Linguistic Society of America. Is English Changing?. Available: http://www.linguisticsociety.org/sites/default/files/Is_English_Changing.pdf. Last accessed 13th Aug 2015. Article/pdf mentioning the works of Shakespeare and Chaucer, and why some people today believe that their language was more sophisticated.  Language may be a result of misinterpretation for example bird used to be ‘brid’, until it was pronounced differently more often and soon blended in to create “bird”. 

Lemetyinen, H. (2012). Language Acquisition. Available: www.simplypsychology.org/language.html. Last accessed 13th Aug 2015. Website post discussing the differences in the theories of behaviourists and biological psychologists in language acquisition. Skinner believed that children acquired language through association, imitation and reinforcement. He believed that our environment affects how we learn language. According to this view, children learn words by associating sounds with objects, actions, and events. They also learn words and syntax by imitating others. He suggested that adults shape their children’s language by rewarding the, reinforcing the correct, grammatical way of speaking.

Child Language Acquisition Theory. https://aggslanguage.wordpress.com/chomsky/. Last accessed 15th Aug 2015. Blog post discussing Noam Chomsky. He disagreed with Behaviourists ideas of language acquisition and proposed a biological explanation of language acquisition. Chomsky points out that adult speech is very irregular, (adult language is broken up and often ungrammatical) making it difficult for children to learn solely through imitation.  Chomsky said that humans have parts of the brain which are responsible for acquiring language at an early age, a language acquisition device (LAD) This contains all the means necessary to form language, children only need to learn new vocabulary and apply the syntactic structures from the LAD to form sentences.

Twitter Investigation

Hypothesis:
I predict that people with political power will use a higher level of formality in their tweets; one aspect which I will be looking at is the frequency of non-standard grammar.

Methodology:
In order to look at the level of formality in the tweets of someone with political power a radio presenter was selected for comparison. Fearne Cotton and Ed Miliband: Both are British, they share a similar age, both are in the media at the moment and both are influential.
Using tweets is an ethically sound method of studying language as they have been published and therefore consent had been pre-given.

Analysis:

	Miliband	Cotton
Non-standard English	0	12
The use of multimodal resources	1	2
First person pronoun	5	9
Emotive language	12	7

• Miliband uses much more descriptive language.
• Cotton uses 12 times more non-standard English.
• Miliband uses a lot of emotive language: we did not expect this. 

Conclusion and Evaluation:

There are comparable issues between the two chosen participants. The data gathered, mainly the use of non-standard English, supports my hypothesis. As Miliband always uses hyper correct grammar, this may be a sign of formality. The use of emotive language could in fact raise the formality levels as Milibands tweets could have been descriptive and useful whereas Cottons less emotive tweets may be 'empty'. However emotive language can be subjective as the audience will react to the language use in different ways.  

For the future: 

• Gather a larger data pool in order to compare more tweets.
• Avoid being subjective. 
• Quantify relevant things.

Grouping Texts Task:

Texts A, B, E and F all have an informal register. In text A, the informal register and the deictic referencing, “hello it’s just me.” “that thing,” “that book”, suggests that the people calling all have a good relationship with Katie, there is no need for them to explain themselves too deeply because they know she will understand. However the language used suggests that each person has a different relationship with Katie, which in turn affects the level of formality. For example, the lack of non-fluency features in message 4 implies that their relationship is much more serious or perhaps that the speaker is much more confident, compared to message 3 for example. Her ability to use the idiom, “I’m losing my marbles…” which would probably only be used in an informal situation, suggests that their relationship is friendly or that this speaker uses a lot of ‘sayings’ in their idiolect. Text B’s use of informal language is not surprising given the context, high frequency lexis is used as 3 year old “Sam” would not understand/have started learning much more difficult words. In fact only words with one or two syllables have been used in all of the dialogue, Sam uses “’cos” an abbreviation of ‘because’ perhaps as it would be easier to say/pronounce. The lexical choice is very ‘child-friendly’, words associated with the learning of a language such as family names “granddad,” “mummy,” “grandma” and day to day things like “house.” Again suggesting that the reason for the informal style of conversation is because simple words are easier to learn and pronounce and the mother has to accommodate her language to her child in order to communicate effectively without alienating Sam. Text E’s use of informal language could be due to the fact that they are an x-student, there is no longer any need to use hyper correct grammar since they are not in school. It may also suggest that the relationship between the student and teacher is relaxed, like the use of a nickname “bolivian ben.” The student was happy to use this “nickname” as they knew their teacher has a pragmatic understanding of when it was coined. However it is also possible that since they are “gap-yearing” they do not have enough time to re-read their email, for example the lack of capital letters, especially for their first person singular pronouns(i). Text F is an advertisement in a national newspaper, the use of bold yet scruffy graphology could be a means of standing out. Since it is a national newspaper it is possible that this advert would be situated between a formal article and perhaps an advertisement for a business or a beauty product. This juxtaposition would catch the reader’s eye. However the organisation, “The Samaritans” would not know this for sure and so their graphology and informal style has other purposes as well. One of these could tie in with the aim of the poster which is to find “…someone who’s patient + understanding…” The advert itself is almost the first test, the use of fillers such as “like” and “erm” make it difficult to read quickly so only people who got to the end can find out the job opportunity they are offering.

Texts A, D and G all use imperatives. Text A, messages on an answerphone, could use a direct way of stating something because of the context of the messages, for example there is not enough time to politely ask for something as answerphone messages should be short and concise. The imperative in message one, “get the drinks in while…” suggests that this person has a good relationship with ‘Katie’, the determiner before the noun (drinks) indicates that they probably had plans, “the drinks,” and so Katie will know which drinks to buy etc… There is no need to ask politely here or mitigate the imperative as it is highly likely that this friendship is a good one. However the use of imperative in message four seems to have a different meaning, the formality of the message and the lack of non-fluency features suggests that this message was said quickly and confidently. The imperative used, perhaps to assert power, “…put that book in your bag the minute you walk through the door.”  Could suggest that Katie has one of “Caio’s” books and needs to give it back, but we cannot be sure. Katie’s ‘mum’ uses an imperative, “give me a ring” an idiom which is a generic way of asking for someone to call you back, however it could be tied in with her own idiolect. Since text D is an advert the use of an imperative “Prove it.” seems to be a much more thought out use, whereas in text A it’s possible that these imperatives, especially that they were in natural speech, were not thought about. The imperative in this advert could be mimicking a possibly frequent conversation between a girlfriend/partner “her”, and boyfriend. Perhaps in their market research before the advert they found that many people’s girlfriends use this imperative “Prove it.” In a straight forward slightly aggressive way of asserting power. This imperative then seems to tie in with the intended audience which is probably men as it is about football, (a sport highly dominated by men- interest and playing.) It could also tie in with a language theory which states that men prefer to here imperatives as they are much clearer. However the fact that many of us would subconsciously make the assumption that “her” is a girlfriend and that this is an advert only for men could make this advert quite gender biased. Assuming that women will not watch football for example and that men must use “BT” to come up with a lie to tell their girlfriend does not give BT a good reputation. Text G could be classed as a weak inclusion since it uses mitigated imperatives, (perhaps to tie in with the intended audience which may be more sophisticated women) whereas the other texts in this group use much more straight forward imperatives. The imperatives are in the instructions on the packet which is not surprising, however the word choice is interesting for example “Draw the tights up…” The word choice softens the imperative and fits in with the luxury of the product, replacing it with a synonym; perhaps ‘pull’ stops the feeling of serenity which “Lite legs” has created.

Texts D, C, F and G all share a purpose which is to persuade. Text D uses humour to persuade the reader. The ambiguity in the pronoun “her” means that the audience has to engage in the advert to work out who “her” is. The intended audience, which would probably be men, means that when they work out that “her” is girlfriend/partner; familiar situations which they may have had would come to mind. Feelings of familiarity can make the audience feel like this advert is tailored for only them. Women may also find this advert entertaining, playing into gender stereotypes can be amusing as a vast majority would understand the message it is saying. Perhaps that men ‘cant’ talk to their partners whilst watching television for example. An interesting way in which Text F persuades the audience is by giving the ‘people in need’ a voice. The use of the intensifier “really” in the sentence: “If you can we really need you,” gives a strong sense of hopelessness and desperateness. They are ‘really’ asking for help. The capitol letters in the sentence, “IMAGINE HOW THEY FEEL,” targets your subconscious, the larger and bolder font means many people will absorb this information as ‘important’. The statement: “If you can we really need you.” directly addresses the reader and the third person pronoun could make the reader feel as though ‘we’ are the people who need help, which could make the audience feel guilty if they are declined to donate/apply for a position. Text G’s formal language suggests that this product is for older women.  The salient feature for persuading could be the lexical field of perhaps invention, which is used, it gives the product much more prestige, for example, “new concept,” “modern,” “technology,” “revolutionary,” They have managed to make “hosiery” different from the other products on the shelf which is a brilliant way of standing out and thus selling more products. The adjective “modern” could enable the seller to create trust between their product and the buyer, since the word modern is associated with science and money etc… 

Romantic Fiction

After a few minutes Daisy realised she had been re-reading the same sentence over and over. Just outside her window the pale blue sky and the green rolling hills beckoned her, and she sighed at the work she had been trying, unsuccessfully, to complete. She stared out the window at a tabby cat rolling playfully in the sun; stretching its paws forward and watching a bird hop from branch to branch in the cherry tree behind her house- too lazy to try and catch it. She rose from her desk, pulled on her boots and hopped down the stairs and headed for the back door. Once outside she inhaled deeply, Mr. Harvey was in his garden next door mowing the lawn: she adored the smell of freshly cut grass and a smile rose on her face as the heat of the sun washed over her. She hated that people spent so much time cooped up in their houses. After climbing over her back wall to escape onto the fields behind her house, her skirt caught on a bramble and she became agitated at the thorn clinging to her and trying to steal the pastel green thread from her clothing. On hearing a snuffling noise she turned her head to see a large chocolate Labrador at her feet, “Do you need help with that?” A tall man bent down to retrieve a tennis ball and the dog raced towards it almost tripping over itself with excitement when he threw the ball in the opposite direction. It was Mr. Harvey’s son: Jason. They had known each other for a few years now but he had never seemed interested in her, while she stayed at home with her mum and studied he went off to travel the world; he worked in orphanages and built wells for the local communities. After throwing the ball he massaged his wrist, “I messed up my back when I was in Africa; I offered to carry some bricks to build a school house and overestimated my own strength,” he chuckled at himself; two rows of white teeth shining in the sun. He stretched his arms out, she could see the outlines of his muscles under his shirt; she quickly darted her eyes away. “Could you?” she pointed to the tangled mess of thorns and fabric, “Ouch,” he mimicked her sarcastic tone and smiled again. He moved close to her, his soft hands brushed her arm as he started to deal with the mess she had made. “So how have you been Daisy? My father tells me you’re quite the poet.” As soon as her name passed his lips she felt her heart start to race; the thought of the Harvey’s discussing her at home excited her. “Um... Yeah, I guess: I like to write.” Her voice was much quieter than she had hoped for. He stood up to face her, “Done,” his tone was much deeper and he had a serious look on his face, The moment she realised she had been staring into his deep-blue mysterious eyes for longer than a usual encounter, she felt herself blush. He remained as cool and calm as normal. She gazed down at her skirt; he had removed the thorn without causing much damage, she couldn't help but think about her annoyance of his capability to talk to her without screwing up like she did. Her sandy hair had fallen in front of her face and she almost jumped when his hand delicately brushed it behind her ear and rested against the side of her face. She felt herself lean into his gentle touch: feeling his skin against hers. Her eyes began to close but he pulled away and she was swept back into reality by his barking dog dropping a ball at her feet.

Language and Gender

Dominance Theory: In “mixed-sex conversations” men are much more likely to interrupt than women do. This is backed up by an old study consisting of a small sample of recordings by Zimmerman and West. They found that in 11 conversations between men and women, men interrupted significantly more than that of women. However, it is important to recognise that this was a rather small-scale study which may have been a product of its time (1975). It would not be safe to generalise the findings to other people. This could be supported by Geoffrey Beattie who found that, after recording conversations, men and women interrupt as much as each other (men 34.1, women 33.8)- the difference here being too slight to be notable. Zimmerman and west concluded that interruptions are a sign of dominance; they don’t want to listen any longer and have the ability to speak over someone, which lead Beattie to ask: "Why do interruptions necessarily reflect dominance? Can interruptions not arise from other sources? Do some interruptions not reflect interest and involvement?" 

Deborah Tannen and difference: Deborah Tannen explains men and women's language use as being extremely different. She pin-pointed 6 main areas: 

• Status vs. Support.
• Independence vs Intimacy.
• Advice vs Understanding.
• Information v. Feeling.
• Orders vs. Proposals.
• Conflict vs. Compromise.

Status vs support: Men live in a world whereby conversations are seen as ways of gaining authority/status. Meaning that throughout conversations they must not let others ‘dominate’them. Whereas women use conversations as support; ways to share ideas.

Advice vs understanding: Deborah Tannen explains the ways in which men and women react to complaints. Suggesting that men see it as an opportunity to ‘correct’ the situation, whereas woman are usually seeking an understanding- “When my mother tells my father she doesn't feel well, he invariably offers to take her to the doctor. Invariably, she is disappointed with his reaction. Like many men, he is focused on what he can do, whereas she wants sympathy.”

Orders v proposals: Woman are less likely to tell someone what to do (order) and instead hedge their point or use indirect ways to get what they want: “could we…” “should we…” etc. Men prefer to use imperatives for a direct approach. 

Robin Lakoff published many assumptions of women's language and how they use language. Among the list are many ways which seem to have a negative spin on the way in which women talk; a language which seems to create ‘timid’ people who perhaps are ‘unsure of themselves’. For example:

• Use indirect commands and requests: Like, “My, isn't it cold in here!” Which is actually a request for the closing of a window for example.
• That women do not have a sense of humour and do not understand jokes. Meaning they find it difficult to tell jokes correctly.
• Hedge more; “sort of”, “kind of” etc…
• Use question intonation in declarative statements: So when stating something, women raise the pitch of their voice at the end of the sentence suggesting that they are unsure of themselves.

http://www.universalteacher.org.uk/lang/gender.htm#tannen

Overview: Fairclough’s unequal encounter,   status of both participants, power asymmetry.

Para 1

·         Barrister seems to have most of the power- due to role in court: instrumental power. Leads the encounter, asks questions. Non fluency features. Asks leading questions.

·         Long questions; status allows him to explain himself. Also the conventions of a court room.

·         Questions the witness as if he is the one on trial. Suggesting he wants to ‘blame’ something on Mr Neil- changes how he speaks to him.

·         Partly rehearsed speech? “you put two and two together Mr Neil and you made five…” Very structured in comparison with Mr Neil’s answers. Time to prepare. Mr Neil has no real time- however he may have decided what things he would like to answer/not answer etc…

Para 2

·         Mr Neil influential power- make himself look ‘good’/innocent to the judge: Overlaps, answers quickly, probably thought question was over, ‘no time to waste’; suggesting that he knows what he wants to say- doesn't need to think about his answer.

·         Short answers. Lower power than Barrister.

·         The two long pauses, as if Mr Neil is thinking how he wishes to proceed. The pause before, “no it’s not right.”

·         Seems to gain power throughout, starts off with fillers etc… Suggesting he is guilty? Unsure of what he is going to say/phrase it. However, about halfway through he starts to gain confidence perhaps? “[laughing quietly] that’s not true no”.  The addition of “no” at the end of many of his sentences seems to suggest that he is completely sure in what he is saying. Leaving nothing for the barrister to twist.

Although the barrister has instrumental power from his job in the court room, Mr Neil uses his influential power to try and stop the barrister from portraying him as ‘guilty’ to the judge. This unequal encounter displays the power asymmetry between participants in the courtroom due to the status of the speakers.

The barristers role in the court room means that he able to ask closed/leading questions, “…isn't that right?” and spend a long time structuring his points, whereas the witnesses language, is constrained due to his lack of power and the ‘time limit’ in which he must speak within. The barrister’s instrumental power could also suggest why Mr Neil decides not to challenge the barrister’s arguments and instead replies with short answers. An affordance of the barrister’s job is that he is able to plan what he is going to say. The barristers use of the intensifier “so” to modify “many” lowers Mr. Neil's status since it is highly likely that this was said in a patronizing tone. The barrister is probably using this modifier to portray to the audience (the judge and/or jury) that Mr Neil is in fact ‘troublesome’, perhaps to nullify Mr. Neil's testimony in order to protect his client. However this ‘mocking’ tone is not questioned/corrected by the judge, who holds the most power in the room, which could suggest that it may have not come across as ‘un professional’ or that the judge is in agreement with the fact that Mr. Neil is one for being involved with the police regularly. 

Language + Power: Theory

Erving Goffman: “The presentation of self in everyday life.”

Goffman observed that face had to do with the ‘positive social value’ that we like to maintain in social interactions. Linguistic studies of face focus on the way in which we use language to acknowledge the fact that people have face ‘needs’. 

Brown and Levinson’s model (1987) claims to provide a universal account of how face-work operates. Suggests there are 2 distinct types of face ‘positive’ and ‘negative’. Positive face reflects our desire to be accepted and liked by others. Negative face reflects our wish to have the freedom to do what we want and to have independence.

Face threatening acts (FTA’s): insults, expressions of disapproval which can harm the addressee’s positive face. Requests can also be face-threatening.

If some actions might be interpreted as a threat to another’s face, the speaker can say something to lessen the possible threat- face saving act (FSA). 

On and off record:

• On record: “give me a pen,” “Lend me your pen,” Mitigating devices to soften the demands: ‘would you,’ ‘please,’ etc…

• Off record: “Uh, I forgot my pen,” “Hemm, I forgot where I put my pen.” These statements can be ignored. 

Grouping Task:

Texts A, E, F and D all share either a primary or secondary purpose to instruct. Texts A and E are the back of a product, instructing how to use them, A being watermelon seeds and E being the back of a moisturiser for children. Strong inclusions A, E and D all use imperatives to give clear and concise information in a manner which is quick to read. For example, text A uses imperatives throughout like, ““Sow in thoroughly warmed soil”, “Cover with 1” of fine soil,” and “Keep evenly moist.” The use of imperative here instructs without confusing the reader with long winded explanations, and also as a means of saving space as the text has to fit on the back of the seed packet. Text D is the information on an ID photo card for the train. The use of imperative in this text coincides with the formal register of the information, for example, “produce it for inspection,” and “Show this Photocard when you buy a Season Ticket or Travelcard.” Which suggests a sense of importance and informs the reader of problems which may arise if you do not use the card correctly, for example, “It must not be used by any other person.” The information here has been crafted in a way which instructs with no confusion. Weak inclusion F is a charity leaflet its primary purpose being to persuade and its secondary purpose being to inform. The instructions in the poster are mitigated as they are telling the reader how to give to their charity and want to avoid making the audience feel forced to “donate”. For example, “Donate your clothes,” and “pop them into the cardboard collection bin...” These imperatives are softened by the word choices. The word donate could give the reader a sense of power, if they donated their unwanted clothing it is their choice, and they are contributing to a good cause. Whereas a synonym of donate, such as give, could make the reader feel as though they are being told what to do, which could make them less inclined to give generously which is one of the many purposes of the leaflet . And the word choice of “pop” is very friendly and creates personality as opposed to a synonym such as “put”, which could seem too ‘forceful’ for example. Text E shares this ‘gentle’ way of instructing, “Use as often as required…” this imperative does not come across as commanding, again it gives the reader the power in the situation, as they decide how often they use the cream. This coincides with the lexical field of serenity, words such as “gently,” “softens,” “nourishes,” “soft,” “sensitive,” “supple,” all are used to create a calm feel. So the imperatives must match the way in which the producer wanted to sell their product, a cream for children with “sensitive skin”. The intended audience here would be parents and so the word choices are important as they must work with the secondary purpose which is to persuade people to buy the product.

Texts B and C are both transcripts of either partly rehearsed or spontaneous speech, text B is an interview between a news presenter and president Obama, and text C is a conversation between friends. Different speech features are used in order to suit the context in which the conversations are taking place. Text B has a much more formal register than that of C and the transcript could be mistaken for writing due to the lack of non-fluency features like fillers and false starts. The formality of the two transcripts could be displayed by how the individuals address one another. Text C uses the second person pronoun “you” when referring to one another whereas Obama and the interviewer use each other’s names. This could also suggest power; usually the conventions of an interview mean that the interviewer, the one asking the questions, is the “dominant speaker”. However in this case, due to Obamas status, he is the one who leads the interview. The greeting at the beginning: “Mr.President, thank you for doing this,” differences from usual interviews where the interviewee may thank the interviewer for their time for example. This may be because of Obamas status, the news channel he appeared on here is sophisticated and the content of the interview is complex and important. Obama will be used to speaking under these circumstances and therefore has many skills when speaking to a vast audience. Whereas text C’s audience is only the two participants in the conversation who are most likely friends. This is suggested by the anaphoric referencing to earlier conversations suggesting that the two participants talk often. As well as Sally asking John, “so how's your new job going?” which, at a first glance, could be phatic talk however she then asks more meaningful questions about his job “so you've got to deal with all the moaning and complaining…” suggesting Sally cares about Johns feelings.

Texts A and B both contain specialised lexis. Text A is the back of a packet of seeds and contains words such as “fusarium wilt”, “anthracnose”, “sow” and “seedlings”. These words are specialised to the lexical field of gardening meaning the intended audience would be ‘keen gardeners’ who are familiar with these plant diseases, it also suggests that the intended audience is people who perhaps grow water melons annually as water melons would not be the easiest plant to grow and so the manufacturer is able to use complex gardening jargon on the back of their product as its highly likely that only people with a pragmatic understanding of the product would buy the seeds. At first glance text B, a transcript for an interview with president Obama, seems to appeal to a wide audience, however the use of political jargon such as, “the Senate”, “the Speaker” or “Republican” suggests that the intended audience is people who have knowledge of the subject. This could suggest that this particular audience is very narrow. Even though text B is for the news, the communication is very specific, speaking only about recent political events and avoiding any type of phatic talk, using specialised lexis such as “the bill” which would only be understood with a pragmatic understanding of the context in which this specialised lexis is being used.

Grouping by the Genre to Persuade:

Texts A, B, C and E all share either a primary or secondary purpose to persuade. Strong inclusions, A and B, are advertisements belonging to an organisation promoting specific issues; A which is smoking and B badger culling. Text E is also a strong inclusion: a blurb to a fiction book, its purpose being to persuade the audience to buy said book. All the texts use features which directly address the audience. The use of the second person pronoun in text E, “Enter-if you can bear it-the…” adds a personal touch to the blurb of the book inviting you in, which contrasts with the previous description of the book which is simply to inform . The use of a mitigated imperative here, which is softened with the embedded clause: “…if you can bear it...” makes it almost a challenge for the reader to ‘enter’ the book. This persuades well because instead of the reader feeling forced to read the book, they may feel it is their ‘choice’ and that they haven’t been persuaded at all, which possibly increases the likelihood of people buying this book. The second person pronoun in text A, “Every time you smoke your blood gets...” works effectively with the use of graphology to create a bigger impact, of perhaps horror or shock, as it is implying that ‘your’ blood will get ‘thick and dirty’ just like the disturbing image they have used. This suggests that their primary audience is people who already smoke as well as the secondary audience of putting people off who have not yet tried smoking. Text B uses the imperative: “Don’t shoot!” as the main feature of the advertisement, this possibly is used to play with the readers emotions, implying the badger is asking you not to shoot making you feel responsible and guilty especially as it is an exclamatory sentence, which could lead you to make links with similar situations, for example, innocent civilians in war situations. The entire leaflet works effectively with this first bold message. The lexical field of war has been used, for example, words such as “kill zones”, “survive” and “shoot”, end up making the badgers on the right/innocent side in this ‘war against badgers’. The bold orthography in this sentence attracts the eye to the word “shoot”. This could give the reader a sense of power, implying that they have this ‘metaphorical gun’ where they have the choice to do right or wrong. The audience for this leaflet is everyday people; it would be posted through doors where the household has no subscription, for example, to the RSPCA, meaning the bold orthography also works as a means of making sure that they pick up this leaflet as opposed to throwing it away. Weak inclusion C has a secondary purpose to persuade. It is packaging for ‘lush’ where it is promoting recycling. Its primary purpose being to inform, giving facts about the dangers of littering, for example, “Plastic waste kills up to 1000,000 sea mammals and countless fish every year…”. However, the fact that the packaging is based entirely around spreading an environmentally friendly message, including graphology such as well-known logos like the recycling symbol, is a means of persuading the audience to buy the product. Lush is well known for being environmentally friendly and many people would shop there being well aware of this fact. This means that the information about plastic waste would actually persuade the audience to buy the product.