Spoken Discourse

Question 1

What is a self-related comment?

Answer 1

A comment where the speaker talks about themselves, e.g., “I’m run off my feet.”

Question 2

What is negative face?

Answer 2

The need for independence and a desire to avoid doing something unwanted, like giving money to a stranger.

Question 3

What is positive face?

Answer 3

The need to maintain self-esteem, threatened when criticized.

Question 4

What are negative politeness strategies?

Answer 4

Strategies aimed at avoiding offense by showing deference, including hedges, formal terms of address, and apologies.

Question 5

What is the Quality Maxim?

Answer 5

It requires speakers to only say what they believe to be true and have evidence to support their claims.

Question 6

What is the Relation Maxim?

Answer 6

It focuses on keeping the conversation relevant to the current topic.

Question 7

What is the Manner Maxim?

Answer 7

It emphasizes clarity and communication without obscurity or ambiguity.

Question 8

What does it mean to be mastered in a term?

Answer 8

You know these terms very well!

Question 9

What is an idiolect?

Answer 9

A personal way of speaking and writing, your linguistic ‘fingerprint.’

Question 10

What is a sociolect?

Answer 10

Language associated with social groups (family, friends, work), influenced by age, class, and gender.

Question 11

What is a dialect?

Answer 11

Non-standard ways of speaking specific to a geographical region.

Question 12

What is an accent?

Answer 12

Pronunciation influenced by geography or cultural groups.

Question 13

What are prosodics?

Answer 13

Volume, pace, stress, intonation.

Question 14

What is substitution in phonetics?

Answer 14

One phoneme is replaced for another, e.g., ‘wabbit’ instead of ‘rabbit.’

Question 15

What is deletion in phonetics?

Answer 15

A phoneme is deleted, e.g., ‘arry’ instead of ‘harry.’

Question 16

What is hedging?

Answer 16

A way of avoiding giving a direct answer or opinion, expressing certainty or uncertainty.

Question 17

What are adjacency pairs?

Answer 17

A pair of utterances in a conversation that go together, such as a question and an answer.

Question 18

What is a dispreferred response?

Answer 18

An unexpected or unwelcome response that threatens social solidarity.

Question 19

What are openers?

Answer 19

Expressions used to begin a conversation.

Question 20

What are closures?

Answer 20

Expressions designed to bring a conversation to a close.

Question 21

What is an other-related comment?

Answer 21

A comment made by the speaker about another person in the conversation, e.g., ‘You look tired.’

Question 22

What is phatic conversation?

Answer 22

Speech used to maintain social relationships without conveying significant meaning.

Question 23

What is backchanneling?

Answer 23

Supportive terms like ‘oh’ or ‘really’ to show engagement.

Question 24

What is feedback in conversation?

Answer 24

It serves a phatic function, keeping the conversation dynamic and alive.

Question 25

What is turn-taking?

Answer 25

Taking turns in a conversation for one another to speak.

Question 26

What is agenda setting?

Answer 26

Establishing the main topic of the conversation.

Question 27

What is topic management?

Answer 27

Organizing or passing topics from one speaker to another in a conversation.

Question 28

What are Goffman's concepts?

Answer 28

Positive face, negative face, and face-threatening acts.

Question 29

What is bald on-record communication?

Answer 29

Direct and blunt communication, e.g., 'Sit down.'

Question 30

What is off record communication?

Answer 30

Communication where no offense is given.

Question 31

What are positive politeness strategies?

Answer 31

Intended to avoid causing offense by emphasizing friendliness.

Question 32

What is pragmatic failure?

Answer 32

Occurs when there is an inability to understand what is meant by what is said.

Question 33

What are conversational maxims?

Answer 33

Four key maxims proposed by philosopher Paul Grice.

Question 34

What is the Quantity Maxim?

Answer 34

Providing enough necessary information without overwhelming the listener.

Question 35

What is accommodation theory?

Answer 35

Explores how individuals adapt their language, accents, and dialects.

Question 36

What is convergence?

Answer 36

A speaker moving towards another's accent or dialect.

Question 37

What is upward convergence?

Answer 37

Changing one's speech to align with a more prestigious way of speaking.

Question 38

What is downward convergence?

Answer 38

Making lexical choices more informal to match another person's speech.

Question 39

What is overt prestige?

Answer 39

The dialect used by a culturally powerful or prestigious group.

Question 40

What is covert prestige?

Answer 40

High social status achieved through non-standard forms of language.

Question 41

What is divergence?

Answer 41

When a speaker actively distances themselves from another speaker.

Question 42

What is descriptivist?

Answer 42

An attitude to language that describes what is there, explaining it without judgement.

Question 43

What is prescriptivist?

Answer 43

An attitude to language that suggests some forms are more valuable than others.