Language and Occupation

Question 1

What is ‘Inter-Organisation Communication’?

Answer 1

Takes place between different organisations

Question 2

What is ‘Intra-Organisation Communication’?

Answer 2

Takes place within an organisation

Question 3

What is ‘External Communication’?

Answer 3

Communication from an institution to an external group

Question 4

What does the term ‘To Codify’ mean?

Answer 4

Using language that’s designed to include groups of people, the process of inclusion occurs because people understand the lang that’s being used

Question 5

What does the term ‘To exclude’ mean?

Answer 5

The concept of exclusion doesn’t mean that lang is being used to deliberately exclude people, more that it’s used amongst specific groups w/ particular knowledge or understanding of a field

Question 6

What does the term ‘Discourse Community’ mean?

Answer 6

It’s used to represent the desire to form communities and all occupations have them

Question 7

What is meant by the term ‘Legalese’?

Answer 7

Language of Law and is pejorative term, associated with the traditional style of legal writing

Question 8

What is a theory that can be linked to ‘Legalese’?

Answer 8

David Mellinkoff in ‘The Language of the Law (1963)’ says “The law is a profession of words”
Whether it’s legislation, classroom activities or documents of restriction on daily life, the words of the law are the law

Question 9

What are some problems with ‘Legalese’?

Answer 9

• Can be difficult to understand, esp. with the general public
• In a Democracy, the law should be accessible for all

Question 10

What is meant by the term ‘Function Shifting’?

Answer 10

Many common words have uncommon meanings when used in an occupational context

Question 11

What are the five functions of Language?

Answer 11

• Communicating info
• Requesting help
• Confirming arrangements
• Instructing employees/colleagues to do something
• Making things or enacting them to happen

Question 12

What does the term ‘Jargon’ mean?

Answer 12

Specialist vocab of an occupation

Question 13

How can jargon be used positively?

Answer 13

Allows people to communicate quickly and effectively

Question 14

How can jargon be used negatively?

Answer 14

Not all can understand and can be used to gain superiority and power over those who don’t understand

Question 15

What was Cameron’s ‘Call Centre Research’ theory?

Answer 15

• Concludes that such telephone interactions are subject to a worrying degree of managerial control, characterised by ‘codification’ and ‘surveillance’
• Research showed that many call centres give very detailed specifications or even full scripts for what the agent should say and that the calls are monitored + recorded and used as a basis for appraisal
• She says, this results in a standardisation of interactions + reduction of autonomy of call centre employees

Concludes that all call centres are ‘communication factories’ with employees working in conditions similar to a production line

Question 16

What was Drew and Heritage’s ‘Institutional Talk’ theory?

Answer 16

Workplace or professional talk differs from ordinary conversation in a number of ways:

• goal orientation
• turn-taking rules or restrictions
• allowable contributions
• professional lexis
• structure
• asymmetry

Suggested that members of a discourse community share inferential frameworks with each other, consisting of an implicit way of thinking, communicating, and behaving

Question 17

What was Goffman’s ‘Face Theory’?

Answer 17

Politeness theory - an individual has both positive and negative needs

Question 18

What was Koester’s ‘Interpersonal Relationships’ theory?

Answer 18

• Importance of phatic (conveying emotions rather than ideas) talk is in getting jobs done
• Although some employers are represented as discouraging talk that’s not strictly work-related, Koester shows that being sociable and engaging in personal chat is an important aspect in effective working
• As well as power, then, solidarity - the ability to connect with one’s workmates - is an important dimension in workplace communication

Question 19

What was Swales’ ‘Discourse Communities’ theory?

Answer 19

He defined a discourse community as having members who:

• Share a set of common goals
• Communicates internally
• Using + ‘owning’ one or more genres of communication
• Use specialist lexis + discourse
• Possess a required level of knowledge + skill to be considered eligible to participate in the community

Question 20

What was Nelson’s ‘Business Language’ theory?

Answer 20

Found what he describes as a ‘semantic field of business’ involving a limited number of semantic categories:

• terms to do with ‘business people
• companies
• institutions
• money
• business events
• places of business
• time
• modes of communication
• lexis concerned with technology’

Question 21

What was Brown and Levinson’s ‘+/- Face Needs’ theory?

Answer 21

• Developed a theory of how the notion of face, which has to do with basic human needs + feelings of self-worth, influences how people interact. Negative face + Positive face
• Positive or negative face can be threatened in various interactive situations by what Brown and Levinson call face-threatening acts

Question 22

Fairclough’s ‘Unequal Encounters’ theory summary

Answer 22

Fairclough:

People in power decide what is correct and appropriate in conversation

Question 23

Pateman: power comes in two forms

Answer 23

Pateman: power comes in two forms:

1. REPRESSIVE - coercive, solidarity
2. OPPRESIVE - top down, controlling

Question 24

Michael Nelson; Business Jargon

Answer 24

Michael Nelson; Business Jargon

Business lang is field-specific + involves semantic fields to do with money, people, and events

Question 25

Levine’s theory

Answer 25

Levine:
Employers prefer to stick to non-personal topics in small talk to maintain a degree of social distance, whereas employees appreciate this opportunity to engage in small talk

Question 26

Janet Holmes’ theory

Answer 26

Janet Holmes:
Looked at small talk in New Zealand workplaces and found senior staff set agenda, give orders + summarise decisions - to do this, they use subtle strategies like convert prestige

Question 27

Ng and Bradac’s theory

Answer 27

Ng and Bradac:

Looked at ways of exercising covert prestige over others this is increasingly the way power is being exercised

Question 28

Howard Giles’ ‘Accommodation Theory’

Answer 28

Accommodation Theory:

We can converge our language to help a customer understand + not to threaten them with jargon

Question 29

Kim and Elder’s theory

Answer 29

Kim and Elder:

Occupational lang is culturally relative - Korean and USA air traffic control struggle to communicate with jargon

Question 30

Brown and Levinson’s ‘Face Theory’

Answer 30

Face Theory:
Positive Face = forming bonds with others, having status + being included in the conversation, feeling valued
- could use positive politeness strategies to achieve a positive face

Negative Face = getting your view across unimpeded, keeping a level of distance + respect between yourself and others

Question 31

Drew and Heritage’s theory summary

Answer 31

Drew and Heritage:

We expect to be spoken to in different ways by different occupational jobs

Question 32

John Swales’ theory summary

Answer 32

John Swales:
Discourse communities - language used by people in the same field, have the same goals + specialist lexis, a certain level of knowledge is required to be able to use it

Question 33

What is meant by ‘Styling’?

Answer 33

Implicit scripts for interaction with customers that give a uniformed experience

Question 34

What theory did Pateman (1980) conclude about Power in the workplace?

Answer 34

Pateman (1980):
Examines power from the perspective of:
Oppressive (power) and repressive (top-down/coercive power - superior emphasising solidarity to gain listeners goodwill) discourse