Some remarks on thematic and information structure in casual conversation

• Autores: Granato de Grasso, Luisa Graciana; Piatti, Guillermina Inés
• Año de publicación: 2010
• Idioma: inglés
• Tipo de recurso: documento de conferencia
• Fuente: Memoria académica
• Materia: Letras; Systemic functional approach; Casual conversations; Chat
• Institución: Universidad Nacional de La Plata

This study focuses on the interplay between thematic and information structures especially realized in the chat segments of casual conversations. With the aim of determining their contribution to the attainment of coherence in dialogue, predication themes are examined. A corpus of 60 colloquial verbal encounters between university students of 18 to 25 years of age is used as the basis for a cualitative analysis. The theoretical point of departure is the Systemic Functional approach to the clause seen as message, which considers that the choices of Theme/Rheme and Given/New are realized by the addressor with consideration of the addressee and represent decisions made within different dimensions. The results obtained showed that these verbal resources related to the way in which a clause is organized not only interact between themselves but also with perceptive and cognitive means that participants make use of in their communicative activities as social beings. The above mentioned options add to the coherence of a text through their relationship with the purpose of the talk.
Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación