Pragmatik: `Description of English Dialogue' (Do 14-16, C5-141)

Course plan and notes

Course announcement

`...a euphonium. A what? Euphonium, E-U-P- -- Oh, I thought you said ``You're phoning them!'' '
`Are you really sure you want to quit? Click'
Dialogue is the interaction of at least one speaker and hearer in a communicative verbal interaction, generally spoken. But of course an exchange of letters, interactions at a computer keyboard, including Internet chat groups, and many other kinds of interaction are often described -- often somewhat metaphorically -- as dialogues.

Goals: The main goals of the course are to enable participants...

1. to learn how to use scientific methods for the description of dialogue data of different kinds, including digital tape recording, transcription, construction of a lexicon and grammatical analysis and dialogue strategy modelling.
2. to become acquainted with some of the more important theoretical aspects of dialogue analysis, and to test the theories using the data.
3. to present descriptions with audio-visual aids, including Internet techniques.

Addressees: The course falls into the `Pragmatik' part of the `Semantik/Pragmatik' category of in the `Magister Anglistik Grundstudium, Wahlpflichtveranstaltungen', but it is also open to `Lehramt SII' students who are keen to improve their knowledge of the details of English dialogue usage, and to students studying Linguistics who wish to learn about pragmatics through the detailed analysis of English dialogue.

Preparation: The following book is recommended: Levinson, Stephen C. (1983). Pragmatics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. It is not the most recent, but still a very useful source of essential information on dialogue.

A detailed plan and reading list will be distributed at the beginning of term. Meantime try and find definitions and descriptions of a `euphonium' by using Internet dialogue. And check my teaching pages for updates:
http://coral.lili.uni-bielefeld.de/Classes/Summer98/