Telephone Conversation In Institutional Settings

M recent years, more attention has been given to conversation analysis. It has been available for study for ages, but only quite recently, in the early 1960's, has it gained the serious and sustained attention of scientific investigation. It was only with the advent of recording devices, and the willingness and ability to study such a mundane phenomenon in depth, that 'the order of conversation' -or rather, a multiplicity of 'orders' - was discovered. This thesis reviewed relevant literature in conversation analysis. Dynamic, natural, real data were used for this case study under these theoretical bases. To ensure the reliability and validity of the research, a combination of methods was employed. The thesis attempts to analyze Chinese telephone conversation in the approach of conversation analysis. The author aims to discover whether sequences and organization derived from western calls recur in Chinese, and to explore contextual bearings on the conversation through the comparison of institutional and mundane telephone calls.The research is based on tape recordings and transcripts of 73 institutional calls, the conversation analysis methodology of close examination and induction is adopted. The opening section contains two sequences of a universal character, summons- answer and identification/recognition. In contrast with western institutional calls, Chinese institutions investigated fail to make categorical self-identification. Upon answering the call, which often results in a confirmatory sequence that resolves identity uncertainty, institutional call opening proceeds like that in personal calls, in that participants prefer other-recognition or tacit recognition to self-identification regardless of an institutional or personal context, and that the exchange of greeting tokens and how-are-you inquires are not frequent even in personal calls. Western scholars argue that institutional calls are a specification and reduction of personal calls is not verified. As far as topic organization is concerned, institutional calls are categorized into request calls, inquiry calls and informing calls on the basis of turn types, turn allocation, topic initiation and response, and information/knowledge distribution. Institutional calls are specified, focused,routinized, and transactional. Institutional calls gain some regularity due to repeated practices oriented to by both institutional and ordinary people under an institutionalized unequal setting, which supports discoveries of western language. Coming to the closing sections, institutional calls can be either brief or complex, which is closely related to the previous content of a call. Institutional call closing is often briefer than that in personal calls, and the latter has some unique personal closing items. Generally institutional call closing puts the transaction to a proper end, while personal call closing lays an emphasis on the continuation of the relationship.