Conversation Analysis In Of Mice And Men

Of Mice and Men is one of the best works of American writer John Steinbeck.Upon its publication in1937, the play or movie based on the novel swept the wholecountry immediately. Meanwhile, Steinbeck earns both the fame and wealth from thenovel and also secures his position in the American literary history. Any careful readerwill notice that two thirds of the novel is composed of conversations among people.This novel has attracted numerous studies both in China and abroad on topics such aseco-criticism, structuralism and so on. But as the author knows there is little study havebeen done from a stylistic perspective, particularly from a pragma-stylistics perspective.Therefore, this thesis is to make an attempt to analyze this novel from the pragma-stylistics perspective.Based on the stylistic approach, this thesis has explored its stylistic effects at thelexical, syntactical and rhetorical level. The novel’s informal language highlights thelinguistic characteristics of the text which is consistent with the characters’ culturalbackground. By intentionally violating the maxim, the author tries to study the deepermeaning of the language and the stylistic effects. George and Lennie’s power andpersonalities in the novel are illustrated by analyzing turn-taking, turns, adjacency pairsin CA. By means of conversational analysis on Of Mice and Mice, the present thesisfrom a new perspective helps to reveal the theme and characterization more convincing.Through the research, we finally conclude that the informal style accords with theprotagonist’s image and cultural background in the novel. Conversation analysis and thecooperative principle vividly portray the character traits in the novel, deepening thetheme of the novel and providing an effective model for us to appreciate the novel.