Research Korner: English Language

Metaphorical Systems and their Implications to Teaching English as a Foreign Language

p class="MsoBodyText" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph; line-height: 200%">                                      Metaphorical Systems and their Implications to Teaching English as a Foreign Language       Abstract       This paper is about an investigation into metaphorical systems as an approach to teach polysemous words to foreign language learners. Metaphorical usage is prevalent in authentic texts and the foreign language learner when dealing with them is faced with words that carry several meanings. In order to see the prevalence as such and also to see the nature of polysemy in comparison with the first language, two newspaper articles at random were chosen. The articles are both on the same topic, elections, and one is in English and the other in Japanese. The metaphorical systems found in the articles were found to be prevalent in both languages except for a few marked ones. However, the extent of polysemy seemed to differ. The method of translating each article into the other language made comparison of the usage of the polysemous words useful. It is argued that such an effective way of discovering polysemy may facilitate vocabulary learning. In conclusion, this study favors the introduction of an approach that uses metaphorical systems to develop the foreign language learner’s English vocabulary.     Introduction In their joint commitment to finding out ‘how people understand their language and their experience’,  (1980) studied the patterns of metaphors that occurred in everyday English. They found a systematicity in the usage of conventional expressions and novel language constructions as well as a systematicity in the reasoning of abstract concepts. Their findings led them to the generalization that ‘our ordinary conceptual system is metaphorical in nature’ (1980) and that it is in constant use just like the ‘system of grammatical and phonological rules’ that operate unconsciously and automatically (1993), and thus challenging the traditional view that figurative language is ‘unimportant, deviant, and parasitic on “normal usage” ’ (1993:). For the English teacher, such as myself, this has some important implications. I have often wondered of ways to promote the understanding of metaphorical concepts ‘in the way that the target language community does’ (1998). In the ‘authentic material’ I use, such as humorous language, song lyrics, movie scripts, newspaper and magazine articles, myths, tales and fables, the students have to deal with numerous metaphorical concepts which are sometimes quite different from their own Japanese ones. Usually, I would resort to paraphrasing, translations and dictionary definitions. But now with mounting evidence and empirical findings (1987; 1986;  1990) related to the systematicity and pervasiveness of conventional metaphors, I am motivated to think of a more macroscopic way of dealing with the problem. In this paper, I will attempt at identifying and comparing the ‘metaphorical systems’ (i.e.: the systematicity of metaphors) used in two newspaper articles, one in English and the other in Japanese. This is relevant to my teaching situation at Kyoto Municipal Saikyo Senior High School in Japan where I am preparing my students to read and comprehend university entrance examination reading texts which are usually‘adult level, well-written, grammatically and stylistically correct’ (1995). After an analysis of the metaphorical systems, it will be argued that the systematic nature of metaphorical systems can be of use to the foreign language learner. But, first I will clarify my understanding of the term metaphorical systems, and attempt at showing how pervasive they are supposed to be in everyday language. It is argued that by showing the pervasiveness of metaphors and their systems, the necessity of bringing them to the attention of learners becomes clearer.   1.      Metaphorical Systems             Metaphors   In their study of metaphors,  (1980) have found that far from being poetic and figures of speech, they were pervasive in conventional language and thought. Expressions like, Your claims are indefensible; He attacked every weak point in my argument; His criticisms were right on target; revealed the underlying metaphorical concept of: ‘Argument is War’. In this way, they were able to identify many metaphorical concepts underlying our language about time, events, motion, spaces and emotions, to name a few.   One salient feature of these concepts is the systematic way the words from the source domain (war) are used in everyday language to describe the abstract war-like aspects in the target domain (argument). Another, is that when using the Argument is War system, other aspects of the target domain (e.g., cooperative aspects) become ‘hidden’ ().   Metaphorical language allows us to express our abstract and difficult concepts in concrete terms. Therefore, I can talk about love in terms of falling in some bounded region; and not just be content with the literal meaning of love to convey that extraordinary feeling. These are some of the features that make up the essential nature of a metaphorical utterance.   For the native speaker who is unaware of the metaphorical systems operating in the mind readily understands and uses expressions such as: ‘Look how far we have come’, ‘It’s been a long, bumpy road’, ‘We can’t turn back now’ and ‘We’re at a crossroads’ (1993). Lakoff and Johnson say that this is possible due to the ‘generalizations governing polysemy’ and ‘generalizations governing inference patterns’ found in language.   This brings up the question, How can the foreign language learner acquire such unconscious behaviour?   Hypothetically speaking, the acquisition process may be facilitated when the metaphorical systems are used to bring to the attention of the learner the ‘generalizations governing polysemy’ that are described ‘in terms of conceptual organization’ (1987) or for practical purposes exposure to the conventional usage of metaphorical expressions.   As far back as 1973,  hypothesized that many of our everyday metaphors relate to human perceptual systems and experiences with the real world and thus would occur across languages (1995). However,  (1980) have shown that everyday metaphors in a language are culturally as well as perceptually based.               Primary Metaphors   Just by functioning normally in the world, we automatically and unconsciously acquire and use a vast number of such metaphors. Those metaphors are realized in our brains physically and are mostly beyond our control. They are a consequence of the nature of our brains, our bodies, and the world we inhabit. (1999)    () point out that the reason we conceptualize for example: understanding an idea as grasping an object, lies in the primary metaphors we have built up since early childhood (). These metaphors are said to have developed after a period of conflation of our subjective and sensorimotor experiences. These experiences gradually give way to ‘a period of differentiation’ creating separate domains, while the cross-domain associations continue to persist (). This cognitive mechanism of cross-domain associations is what allows us to view a subjective experience of understanding an idea in terms of the sensorimotor experience of grasping. Similarly, there are supposed to be several hundred of such primary metaphors () prevalent in a culture. Some of them possibly exist, it is predicted, universal across cultures.               Basic Event-Structure Metaphor   The basic event-structure metaphor reveals ‘our most fundamental understanding of what events and causes are’ (1999). In addition,  (1993) had previously emphasized that ‘various aspects of event structure, including notions like states, changes, processes, actions, causes, purposes, and means, are characterized cognitively via metaphors in terms of space, motion, and force’.   The basic event-structure metaphors are fundamental categories through which we comprehend the world and such basic event-structure metaphors ‘are fundamental not only to our literal conceptualization of the world but to our metaphorical conceptualization as well’ (1999). Support for this comes from the studies of  (1974),  (1977),  (1981) and  (1984) who have shown that ‘our earliest and most natural form of categorization’ (1987) are the basic-level categories.   Of the many salient features of the basic event-structure metaphor (1999), the hierarchical nature found in the interaction between metaphorical systems seems to stand out as being relevant to the foreign language learner. For example, the Life is a Journey metaphor entails the interaction of other events in life such as, love, career and so on. In other words, The Love is a Journey and Career is a Journey metaphors inherit the structure of Life is a Journey metaphor ( 1993: ). This inheritance factor allows for expressing love and career domains in terms of the journey domain. This expression of metaphors in general categories is what connects them or in Lakoff and Johnson’s words gives them ‘coherence’ (19805).   2.4  Shortcomings   Though (1980; 1999) and  (1994) have emphasized that metaphorical systems motivate large areas of our language use, (1998) cites two crucial problems. One, that the perceptual experience ends up being, once again, “disembodied”,’ in their ‘well-structured and predictable mappings’ bearing similarities to the ‘abstract-based format of traditional semantic accounts’. Two, that findings in the field of meaning representation studies( 1997; 1997) show the inadequacy of the ‘inferential-literal’ language in describing many visual, haptic, kinesthetic and other perceptions (). In addition,  (1999), finds the present theory of metaphorical systems to be inadequate in explaining the partial and overlapping aspects of metaphor.   Furthermore,  (1991) points out, that we need more justification before we rush to generalize for example, She lost me then as evidence that she is behaving according to the underlying metaphorical concept of Learning is a Journey.  (1999) agrees and  () suggests the need for more ethnographic evidence.   2.      Metaphorical Systems in the Newspaper Articles In the next part of this paper, an attempt will be made at identifying the metaphorical systems found in similar newspaper articles of an English newspaper and a Japanese one. The systems will be compared and their similarities and differences will be highlighted. Finally, in this way, some important implications for the foreign language learner will be formulated.                 Materials and Method   For this study, an article about the elections in Iran from the February 21, 2000 issue of the Herald Tribune (see Appendix A) and a similar article on the same date from the issue of the Asahi Shimbun (see Appendix B), randomly selected, will be the subject of this investigation.   First, the metaphorical systems in the English newspaper article have been listed by categorizing the conventional metaphors (Table 1, Appendix C). Next, the same can be seen for the Japanese newspaper article in Table 2, Appendix D. Later, for the purpose of locating the similarities and differences in the metaphorical systems of the respective articles, the conventional metaphors were translated into the language of comparison (Table 1, and Table 2). However, only those metaphorical systems occurring more than once in the articles have been considered as the main metaphorical systems. The other metaphorical systems in the articles that were determined from single occurrences of conventional metaphors are not dealt with in this paper, but only those found to be different or marked when translated are cited and dealt with in section 3.6 of this paper (also Table 3, Appendix E). For this study, ‘The New Japanese-English Dictionary’ ( 1974) was the basis for all the Japanese to English translations, and  (Japanese English teacher at Rakusei Junior and Senior High Schools) expertise for the Japanese translations.               Limitations The method of identifying the metaphorical systems is limited by the ability to recognize the source and target domains. There is going to be a ‘measure of subjectivity’ and ‘randomness’ in such a ‘unilateral approach’ (1999). In addition, ‘peripherally relatable’ () cases of metaphors might be emphasized due to reading the articles many times over. Finally, with an approach that is dependent on translation for seeking out the differences and similarities there is the danger of being satisfied when the ‘truth conditions’ (1987) have been fulfilled, thereby missing ‘how concepts are organized’.                       The Main English Metaphorical Systems in the English Newspaper Article and their prevalence in Japanese   The following metaphorical systems were found to operate in more than one instance of conventional metaphorical expressions in the English newspaper article: l  Election is a Race l  Election is War l  Elections are Locations l  Election is a Movement of an Object                                     (refer to Table 1, Appendix C for details)   The four metaphorical systems underlying the English newspaper article is dispersed in the following way: l  Election is a Race has thirteen sentences. l  Election is War has nine sentences of which seven overlap with the Election is a Race system. l  Elections are Locations has four sentences. l  Elections is a Movement of an Object has five sentences.     Now, in order to see the prevalence of the conventional metaphors found in the English newspaper article in Japanese, the expressions were translated. Conventional metaphors in Japanese were found prevalent for a majority of the cases. The exceptions were found for one sentence in the Election is a Race system, and all the five sentences in the Election is a Movement of an Object system.   The sentence, ‘Preliminary results showed Mr. Rafsanjani coming in as far down the list as twenty-fifth’ uses the words coming in metaphorically. This when translated to Japanese is nonsensical as the ni kiteiru the Japanese translation for coming in cannot be used to describe the meaning of the English sentence. Instead, the sentence would have to be translated using the Japanese words ni ranku sareta to literally mean, was ranked so as to describe the result of the candidate.   As for Election is a Movement of an Object, all the five sentences do not have translations using the same English equivalents for went to, put in, give, handed and moving (refer to Table 1, Appendix C) which in Japanese are ni itta, ni oku, ataeru, tewatasu and ugokasu, respectively. Instead, tori meaning has taken; nari meaning became; ni yori meaning through, ijoushita meaning transfer, and ni meaning towards, are the translations for the English words cited above. Nevertheless, these are words describing movement of an object. This indicates the similarity of the system but differences in describing the concepts. Moreover, as the words are all from the same source domain of movement of an object, it is likely that this is a case of ‘coherence’ showing the connections between the metaphors in both languages.               The Main Japanese Metaphorical Systems in the Japanese Newspaper Article and their prevalence in English   The following metaphorical systems were found to operate in more than one instance of conventional metaphorical expressions in the Japanese newspaper article: l  Election is War l  Election is a Race l  Positions are Body Parts                                     (refer to Table 2, Appendix D for details)   The Japanese newspaper article is mainly based on two metaphorical systems and one other metaphorical system in a minor way. The occurrence of the metaphors are as follows: l  Election is War has twenty-one sentences. l  Election is a Race has seven sentences of which three sentences overlap with the Election is War system. l  Positions are Body Parts has two sentences.   Interestingly, all the Japanese conventional metaphors in the newspaper article could be translated into English without any sense of loss of the concepts that are expressed (refer to Table 2, Appendix D).               A Closer Look at Both the Systems   The two articles seem to highlight similar concepts about the elections in Iran. They highlighted the war and race aspects of the elections. However, the Japanese newspaper article stressed the war aspects more while the English newspaper article stressed the race aspect a little more than the war aspect. There were quite a few sentences indicating the location and movement of an object aspects, as well.   As a result, the cooperative and journey aspects that elections carry were hidden in both articles. For example, the elections might have been held in a very orderly and under civil circumstances (in some areas) showing cooperation among the voters, election officials and candidates. Besides, the long-term effects elections have on a country and the direction they take the country in have been hidden or downplayed.   Other similarities can be seen in the use of the expression landslide victory in both newspaper articles, and many instances of the use of the same polysemous words in the war and race domains. Similarities in most of the concepts can be seen in translations, where most of the metaphorical expressions were found to exist in both languages.   However, the use of the exact same words differed in certain places. For example, the word run used to express running for elections had a corresponding word in Japanese called shutsuba (literally meaning running away or run for). On further analysis this word revealed that it is used only to describe the act of standing for election or running for election. Though the Chinese characters of 出 (shutsu, meaning emerge or put out), and 馬 (ba meaning horse) have metaphorical connotations, Lakoff and Johnson would call such usage as a ‘dead metaphor’ (1999).   Moreover the Japanese word for run is hashiru which is not used to express the act of running in an election. In other words, the polysemous meanings of the English word run are not the same for the ones found for hashiru. One clear example can be seen in the following sentence where hashiru is not used for the translation: His arguments run counter to what we have proposed. The converse is also true. The Japanese language uses the word hashiru (run) to describe a moving car such as in the following: hashitteiru kuruma kara tobi oriru (Jump off a moving car). In the English language it would sound nonsensical to say, Jump off a running car.   There were many such words where the extent of polysemy varied. The Japanese particles ‘ni’ and ‘o’ are polysemous, too. ‘ni’ can mean in, at, on and into. While ‘o’ can mean at, of, on, in and with. This could be a very troublesome area to learn for a foreign language speaker, and in addition this seems to cause a lot of confusion to my students when dealing with English prepositions.   In the Japanese expressions under Positions are Body Parts, English equivalents were available, but on closer examination, there is a small difference in the Chinese character for head used to describe a leader or a head of an organization. The character used is 首 (neck) and not 頭 (head).   There were also two Japanese sentences with words that would sound odd when translated into English.  The metaphorical systems followed were, Blood Relations are Real and Omission is a Leakage which are quite marked for the English language (refer to Table 3, Appendix E). The word jittei (real younger brother) is used to distinguish blood relations from other relations. It is common in the Japanese language to combine the Chinese character for real (実) with family relations such as, real-father (実父), real-mother (実母), and real-older-brother (実兄).   In the case of the metaphorical system Omission is a Leakage, a single occurrence of a Japanese sentence that describes a person being omitted from the list as a leakage (moreta), quite awkward in English. However, this word moreta (past tense of moreru) is also used for describing a leaked secret, very similar to the English usage in this sense.   Finally, phrases such as social labels, labeled as an American and labeled as a slang in my dictionary are marked expressions in Japanese. The conventional usage of the word for label (retteru) is different in Japanese, though it is used to translate the just mentioned phrases. The English metaphorical system of Categories are Labels seems to sound odd in the Japanese language.   All in all, most of the metaphorical systems found in both the newspaper articles could be translated back and forth into the two languages with little loss of the meaning they carry. It may be safe to say that the metaphorical systems used for describing elections are very similar in the two languages. This could be due to the universality of the concepts governing elections across many languages. However, the extent of the polysemous usage of the words appearing in the metaphors seems to vary.   3.      Implications for Foreign Language Learners It is believed that as foreign language learners already possess ‘ world knowledge’ and ‘discourse knowledge’ which can be used to help where there is a lack of ‘linguistic knowledge’ (1991), an awareness of universal and differing metaphorical concepts may also be helpful. Translating tasks are very common in Japanese English classrooms and this practice is highly favoured by most of the Japanese secondary school English teachers (1988;1999). However, using this task for ‘hypothesis testing’ (1987) is rare as mostly the practice is to do with building vocabulary and grammar knowledge (ibid). It is possible that by using translation as a tool to seek the metaphorical systems that underlie the target text the Japanese English teachers may find a way of providing for a more stimulating discussion of the phrases and words being used. By contrasting and comparing the metaphorical systems used in authentic texts by first setting up a task of translation may offer the foreign language learner the opportunity to obtain ‘data crucial for the testing of hypothesis’ (1987). The data will speak of the similarities and differences in the metaphorical expressions and polysemous usage of words. For example, the information gleaned from the comparisons made between the English and Japanese newspaper articles on the elections in Iran could be extended to a writing exercise to describe elections in Japan. Furthermore, such topics as politics or debating could be described using the same source domain of War (same as for elections). In this way, the foreign language learner could form generalizations and strategies through trial and error for expressing abstract concepts, and in addition develop a strong familiarity with the polysemous meanings of the words. However, the introduction of metaphorical systems as an approach for understanding the target language may first require some understanding of the ‘approach’ itself. Metaphorical idioms may be a good source. One book, The Big Picture (1999) in particular stands out for listing such idioms under metaphorical systems.  () suggests that it becomes easier to remember such idioms when the meanings they entail are understood. Interestingly, the many metaphorical idioms are described in pictures, too. Again, a compare and contrast task by translation of the metaphorical idioms could be one way to introduce the ‘approach’. Familiarity to the foreign language may be facilitated, if not accelerated, by developing a familiarity to the metaphorical concepts that underlie the target language. Teachers of English as a foreign language need to provide tools and strategies to their learners to help them effectively build semantic memories of the words and phrases in the target language. The effectiveness can only be judged to the extent such knowledge of words and phrases are retained in long-term memory. The argument here is that metaphorical systems provide patterns in the linguistic data which may help build solid semantic mappings of words and phrases in the learner’s brain as opposed to rote learning and learning from lists. However, it is acknowledged that for a pattern to be discerned the brain requires quantum amounts of experience (2002), which again are necessary for applying the pattern (ibid). In learning a foreign language as opposed to a second language, exposure is mainly limited to the classroom thereby making ‘quantum amounts of experience’ a far cry. Then what should be given priority is to provide efficient modes of exposure to the foreign language learner. It may be interesting to note, that for example, a study in 1987 concluded that students (not foreign language students, however) were generally retaining, 10% of what they had read, 26% of what they had heard, 30% of what they had seen, 50% of what they had seen and heard, 70% of what they had said, and 90% of what they had said as they were doing something (1987). It could be possible then, that the task of translating into the first language with the purpose of discovering the behaviour of polysemous words through contrast and comparison with the target language may actually help the learners retain more knowledge of the vocabulary and its semantics.     4.      Conclusion This paper has been an attempt to find the implications of metaphorical systems in teaching English as a foreign language. For this purpose, random and dated newspaper articles which appeared in both English and Japanese dailies, that happen to be about elections in Iran, were selected and their respective metaphorical systems were compared and contrasted. The findings point to the many similarities in concepts regarding the description of elections. This study attempted to formulate some implications metaphorical systems have for the foreign language learner. Though this research has not been exhaustive, an attempt has been made to find a use for the pervasive nature of metaphorical systems. Metaphorical language is often a part-and-parcel of authentic material. In dealing with such material the foreign language learner is faced with the polysemous use of words. To be able to adequately grasp and use these words the learner requires a methodology that follows a systematic and reliable approach. This study into the nature of metaphorical systems and their pervasive nature in languages has shown that it may be one such approach. However, further research, especially empirically based evidence, is required to justify the use of metaphorical systems as a tool for teaching some areas of English as a foreign language.

Metaphorical Systems and their Implications to Teaching English as a Foreign Language

p class="MsoBodyText" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph; line-height: 200%"> ...

English

WORKSHEET B – UNIT 13     Task 6 – How and why can a student’s pronunciation affect the quality of his/her communication?             Student’s pronunciation affects the quality of his/her communication, in a way that it boosts the confidence of the student to speak and communicate more.  Being able to have a good pronunciation skill may let the student easily cope with conversations. Sometimes, wrong pronunciation may lead to misunderstanding and misinterpretation which may result in conflict, hence, through proper pronunciation this will be avoided.       Task 7 – Indicate the major ways in which English sounds are joined and linked. Give your own examples:     The relationship between English spelling and English pronunciation is not very clear. English dictionaries, therefore, need another way to show the pronunciation of English words. Most dictionaries use a variation of the characters proposed by the IPA- International Phonetic Association - to show English pronunciation. There is a system for writing the sounds of English.             Task 8 – What are the benefits in students learning the phonemic alphabet?     Phonemic awareness is an important tool in the decoding of written English. Phonetic symbols are a great help when it comes to learning to pronounce English words correctly. In addition, learning the phonemic alphabet may help the students to easily understand what the word in indicating. In addition, if the student has complete phonemic awareness it may help them read words which they have not seen before and it may also help in spelling and memorizing. Another benefit is writing.  Students may express their thoughts using phonemic symbols even if he has never seen the word in print before.       Task 9 – Referring to the phonemic alphabet, transcribe the phonemic text at the end of the course unit into standard script:

English

WORKSHEET B – UNIT 13 Task 6 – How and why can a student’s pronunciation affect the quality of his/her communication? ...

Everyday Spoken English is ‘Formless and Unstructured’

Everyday Spoken English is ‘Formless and Unstructured’     Language has been a part of each nation enabling people to communicate systematically through sounds and conventional symbols. It embodies our cultural identity and heritage and makes it possible for us to reach out to others, express our diverse ideas, build interpersonal relations, shape our thoughts, explore our customs and construct laws. In giving light to the claim that everyday spoken English is ‘formless and unstructured’ the relationship between and among language, culture, and past and shared experiences and activities were analyzed using the informal conversation between Pip and Phyllis to illustrate the characteristics and function of everyday spoken English by highlighting the evident structures of informal talk along with the excerpts from the transcribed conversation between the couple to present examples of why everyday spoken English appear ‘formless and unstructured’.     Dimensions, Systems and Functions of Language According to  (1978) communicative competence includes both knowledge for and ability for language use.  (1980), and  (1986) state that there are four dimensions of communicative competency: grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence, and strategic competence. One of the most important aspects of the communicative approach of language is that it pays systematic attention to functional as well as structural aspects of language (1981). However, some old customs have to be transformed and people adapt to these changes and learn other practices, including the language they speak. Thus, a linguistic repertoire is created wherein a set of language varieties is demonstrated in the speaking and writing patterns of a certain speech community.    (1999) claimed that “language takes meanings from the context in which it is used and in spoken language, the distinctions between language and context, and language and culture begin to blur” (p. 5). Linguists normally describe informal conversation as disorderly due to the inexplicit use of language, randomness of the topics discussed, lack of structure  and ‘errors’ compared to formal language. These make everyday talk appear hesitant, ambiguous, and full of half-finished sentences and interruptions (1999). The framework developed by  (1973, 1975) explains the seemingly formless and unstructured language by identifying the functions and purposes of language use relative to the social context and cultural environment.   Halliday’s framework highlights the social and cultural use of language as it adapts to the demands of the society making it multi-functional. He presented seven functions of language as the following: (1) instrumental, (2) regulatory, (3) interactional, (4) personal, (5) imaginative, (6) heuristic, and (7) informative. The instrumental use of language is evident when it is used to get things done and satisfy needs, its regulatory use is evident when language functions as a means of control or authority over other’s behaviors, the interactional function is used to form or maintain social relationships, language’s personal use could be a way to express emotions and thoughts, its imaginative function is relevant when creative expressions are illustrated while its heuristic function highlights knowledge-seeking use of language and its informative function can be illustrated when informing others (1996).     Pip and Phyllis who have been married for 46 years were asked to fill out an evaluation form for the tour company they traveled with during their holiday break in Rome. Examples of Halliday’s functions of language can be illustrated using the conversation between Pip and Phyllis.   ·   instrumental Phyllis: [mm] [Yes…] Well if you read the letter / I think the girl that greeted us at the airport / We should / She should have mentioned it / If you look at the letter again / But she was chattering with somebody. Most likely / She had the leaflet because it was company / I saw the coaches (…) Pip: mm… A leaflet like the one… Phyllis: Yes. Her company and she didn’t. I think that was a mistake.   ·   regulatory Phyllis: Let’s start our self with, uhmm … Pip: Let’s start our self with the resort / I don’t call Rome a resort. But still that’s what it says, resort.   ·   interactional Pip: Uhmm… One thing that bothered me a bit / The question of putting towels. Phyllis: Yes, it was a bit dirty, wasn’t it? Pip: [Yes.] Phyllis: It was awful in a way.   ·   personal             Phyllis: [Well the flight was excellent.] Pip: What d’ you say on the flights? The flight was excellent. I mean British Airways is not your favorite flight / compared with what we have recounted.   ·   imaginative             Phyllis: The room was nice. Pip: It wasn’t a very big room.   ·   heuristic Pip: You either have to book early on without knowing a great deal about ‘em. Or else when you get there you couldn’t book. That is practical to us. Well … Phyllis: it’s a different company. I think the one we went with was a much bigger company and it was more chaotic. We were in Paris that time. We have to struggle ourselves. No. I think that was great.   ·   informative Phyllis: ‘Cause it seems quite small. Pip: [Yes.] Phyllis: A bit noisy. But ... Phyllis: ‘Cause I have my earplugs. So that was okay.   Using the transcribed conversation between the couple it would seem that their everyday conversation appears chaotic and unstructured. But  this only goes to show that their shared experiences and cultural orientation enabled them to come up with conversational skills and techniques that they alone understand as a couple which may seem vague to other people who might participate in their talk.  The long years that they have been together enabled them engaged in collaborative conversations which illustrate their great deal of shared background knowledge. As such, the incoherent aspect of informal talk, of everyday spoken English in particular illustrates the cultural and social connectiveness between people along with the different uses of language as a social and cultural tool.             Structure of Informal Language Sacks, Schegloff and Jefferson (1974) explained that instances of interruption characterize collaborative activity between individuals during conversations. These are evident in everyday spoken language because informal conversations arise spontaneously out of fluid and changing everyday activities and relationships (1999). Informal conversation includes (a) any unfinished phrases or clauses; (b) one speaker cutting on the other jut before a transition relevance point; (c) duetting or both speaking together or collaborating to complete a phrase; (d) back-channel support or short agreements like ‘yes’ and ‘mm’; and (e) imprecise or implicit references which rely on their shared experience for understanding ().   (1983) identified five types of interruptions which include (1) smooth speaker-speech, (2) simple interruption, (3) overlap, (4) butting-in interruption, and (5) silent interruption. Meanwhile,(1975) classified interruption instances of simultaneous speech that began before the word immediately preceding a transition-relevance place in the speaker’s utterance while overlaps began at a transition-relevance place or immediately preceding the word highlighting their claims on indicators of conversational dominance. Nonetheless, the couple has been very effective in illustrating the features of collaborative conversation as characterized by several unfinished phrases and clauses, one speaker cutting the other, duetting as well as back-channel support and imprecise or inexplicit references while filling out the assessment form. Examples include the following excerpts:   ·         unfinished phrases and clauses 1.    Phyllis: Let’s start our self with, uhmm … Pip: Let’s start our self with the resort / I don’t call Rome a resort. But still that’s what it says, resort.   ·         one speaker cutting on the other 1.    Pip: mm… A leaflet like the one… Phyllis: Yes. Her company and she didn’t. I think that was a mistake. Pip: [Yes.] [mm…] [Yes.]   ·         duetting 1.    Phyllis: It’s the 27th of April / number of nights / four. Pip: [Right. April / number of nights / four.] Departure (…) Right. These are the categories: excellent, very good, good, fair, poor. Phyllis: [Well the flight was excellent.]   ·         back-channel support 1.    Phyllis: Well, it was very good. The receptionist was terribly helpful. Pip: [Yes, they were.]   2.    Pip: Uhmm… One thing that bothered me a bit / The question of putting towels. Phyllis: Yes, it was a bit dirty, wasn’t it? Pip: [Yes.] Phyllis: It was awful in a way.   ·         Imprecise or inexplicit reference which rely on shared experience 1.    Phyllis: it’s a different company. I think the one we went with was a much bigger company and it was more chaotic. We were in Paris that time. We have to struggle ourselves. No. I think that was great.   2.    Phyllis: [mm] [Yes…] Well if you read the letter / I think the girl that greeted us at the airport / We should / She should have mentioned it / If you look at the letter again / But she was chattering with somebody. Most likely / She had the leaflet because it was company / I saw the coaches (…)   From these excerpts, it is evident that the couple who engage in informal everyday talk illustrate the ‘formless and unstructured’ everyday spoken English; ‘formless and unstructured’ in the sense that their shared knowledge and cultural orientation as well as shared activities in the past were able to supply them information that necessitated relatively comprehensive exchange of words.           Gender Differences in Language             Researches on gender and discourse argue that males and females grow up in different cultural environments and develop different habits for signaling their intentions and understandings since they learn their styles of talking in sex-separate peer groups (1990;  1982). Hence, men and women develop different norms for establishing and displaying conversational involvement which account for the differing conversational patterns and mutual negative evaluations as a result of cross-gender interactions ( 1996).   The first chapter of the Audiovisual Notes also claimed that men most often than not control conversations that involve male and female participants by introducing topics for discussion as well as through minimal conversational support.   In the recorded conversation, Pip was the one filling out the evaluation form initiating questions that directed the discussion and formed the structure of the conversation. However, analyzing the transcript and flow of conversation between Pip and Phyllis, it was evident that Phyllis was able to portray more in control of the discussion by taking the lead and elaborating the topics introduced by Pip. During the conversation, it can be observed that Phyllis was able to share more information and was also able to air interruptions to insist her assessment on things being discussed.     English in Hong Kong English, being the universal language has been the focus of a lot of researches in the field of linguistics. They are particularly interested on how English is being transformed as well as used in other social settings particularly in communities that use other languages as the primary mode of speech. Taking the perspective of Hong Kong conversational language,  (1999) highlighted the importance of understanding social and cultural norms in the region for a foreign person to adapt easily to the lifestyle and social environment of the locales. They pointed out the role of newspapers and its circulation in the community which defines and distinguishes literate individuals and common characterization of the Hong Kong people. They argued the relevant connection and interrelatedness between and among the concepts of writing, reading, comprehension, literacy that facilitate the effective and efficient function of language.       Moreover,  (1995) investigated the changing use of the English language during job interviews in Hong Kong. They explained why and how job interviews in Hong Kong at present do not necessarily require facilitating the interviews purely in English which was the norm before the 1970’s. They identified the different levels of English language comprehension between interview panel members who are composed of English-speaking foreigners as well as Hong Kong local associates. They were able to show how on certain localities, the practical use of language is valued more than the formal aspects of conversing and structure of English as a language. This study highly illustrated the relative conceptualization of formal English language use and supports the paper’s argument that a everyday spoken English only appear formless and unstructured because of the shared knowledge between individuals that supply for the language gaps that characterize informal conversation.          Conclusion             As was evident in the discussion, the claim that everyday spoken English language is ‘formless and unstructured’ only applies to the informal talk if the evaluation of such common language use is based on the rigid rules of syntax and grammar of formal English speech. The ‘formless and unstructured’ structure of informal conversation is only a result of the confounding and overlapping interplay of social relationships and shared cultural background and orientation of the individuals involved. The universality of the English language resulted to different and differing use of the said language relative to the context of the people using it. Whatever the case maybe, informal talk or conversational English has form and structure that serves the effective and efficient communication to its users in each and respective of the socio-environmental context and setting they are in.           Transcript of the Conversation   Pip: Well, it’s so often that one has to complain. Phyllis: [That’s right.] Pip: ‘Bout a holiday that (…) makes a change / that we can say / well / with how we enjoyed it (…) Phyllis: Let’s start our self with, uhmm … Pip: Let’s start our self with the resort / I don’t call Rome a resort. But still that’s what it says, resort. Phyllis: [Well, it can / yes.] Pip: (…) visiting until that and the language (…) I can’t remember that. You’ll have to remember that. Phyllis: It’s the 27th of April / number of nights / four. Pip: [Right. April / number of nights / four.] Departure (…) Right. These are the categories: excellent, very good, good, fair, poor. Phyllis: [Well the flight was excellent.] Pip: What d’ you say on the flights? The flight was excellent. I mean British Airways is not your favorite flight / compared with what we have recounted. Phyllis: [British Airways.] [Yeah, it wasn’t.] Pip: Yeah, it was very good. Excellent. Phyllis: [Yeah, it was good. We give them extra.] Pip: Ferry or rail / we didn’t have (…) Phyllis: Hotel. Pip: Hotel Solis. Phyllis: Well, it was very good. The receptionist was terribly helpful. Pip: [Yes, they were.] Phyllis: The room was nice. Pip: It wasn’t a very big room. Phyllis: No. I put excellent for services and room, good. Pip: Very good? Good? Phyllis: [Good.} Good. Pip: [Yeah.] Phyllis: ‘Cause it seems quite small. Pip: [Yes.] Phyllis: A bit noisy. But ... Pip: mm Phyllis: ‘Cause I have my earplugs. So that was okay. The departure airport… Pip: Uhmm… One thing that bothered me a bit / The question of putting towels. Phyllis: Yes, it was a bit dirty, wasn’t it? Pip: [Yes.] Phyllis: It was awful in a way. Pip: You either have to book early on without knowing a great deal about ‘em. Or else when you get there you couldn’t book. That is practical to us. Well … Phyllis: it’s a different company. I think the one we went with was a much bigger company and it was more chaotic. We were in Paris that time. We have to struggle ourselves. No. I think that was great. Pip: Well, that’s right. Phyllis: Yeah. I think that was. It was very, very successful. Pip: mm… So in the past you said something ‘bout the towels and we / (…) would have like more information about… Phyllis: [mm] [Yes…] Well if you read the letter / I think the girl that greeted us at the airport / We should / She should have mentioned it / If you look at the letter again / But she was chattering with somebody. Most likely / She had the leaflet because it was company / I saw the coaches (…) Pip: mm… A leaflet like the one… Phyllis: Yes. Her company and she didn’t. I think that was a mistake. Pip: [Yes.] [mm…] [Yes.] Phyllis: But otherwise, I thought she was great.

Everyday Spoken English is ‘Formless and Unstructured’

Everyday Spoken English is ‘Formless and Unstructured’ Language has been a part of each nation enabling people to communicate s...