Self-repair In Semi-institutional Setting Discourse

This thesis reports on a systematic study of successful self-repair in Chinese TV talk shows (CTVTS). It aims at exploring the frequency and features of self-repair in CTVTS and identifying the semi-institutional nature of this kind of discourse. The thesis takes a conversation analytic approach to self-repair in data analysis, using both quantitative and qualitative methods.The data are from five popular Chinese talk programs (excluding news interviews) covering a relatively wide range of topics and are broadcasted recently (from March, 2009 to October, 2010). The data sources consist of altogether 20 talk show episodes lasting nearly 13 hours, and 892 self-repair cases are collected for our analysis. Based on the model of repair proposed by Schegloff, Jefferson and Sacks (1977), the thesis discusses self-repair in two trajectories, namely, self-initiated self-repair and other-initiated self-repair. Findings from our analysis of the data suggest that self-initiated self-repairs outnumber other-initiated self-repairs, which is consistent with the results of the studies on repair in Chinese conversation, as well as with the strong skewing found in the English empirical studies.According to the nature of the linguistic and the trouble source levels at which self-repairs occur, all self-repair cases in the data are formally and functionally classified and statistically analyzed. The formal classification includes phonetic self-repairs, lexical self-repairs and syntactic self-repairs, with the lexical self-repairs being used most frequently. According to functional classification, the causes of self-repairs are mostly attributed to delaying the production of next lexical item, speaking inaccuracy and speech plan variation, etc. Moreover, observing its information and entertainment oriented nature, the function of self-repair in TV talk shows can be understood more than just repair for error or inappropriateness. There is another tentative classification of functional self-repair which is repair for humor effect. This kind of self-repair only occurs in other-initiated self-repairs and its function is for humor. The function of gestures plays a very important role in conversation analysis. In the previous study, the usage of gestures in repair has seldom been touched upon. Therefore, in this thesis, gestures in the study of other-initiated self-repair may be discussed for the first time in Chinese data.Meanwhile, a systematic study of self-repair strategies is carried out. The repair strategies under which self-repair operates turn out to play an important role in the formal and functional classifications, namely, repetition, completion, replacement, insertion, reformulation and explanation. From the above statement, the major characteristics of self-repair are identified in Chinese TV talk shows. The preponderance of self-repair has been recognized as universal in ordinary conversation. The same preponderance of self-repair also can be found in our data. Our present study is characterized by the predominance of the lexical self-repairs which must result from the characteristics of Chinese structure and semi-institutional setting of the type of discourse.This study may help to gain a deeper insight into the nature of Chinese TV talk shows and may add to the existing body of work on self-repair in semi-institutional discourse. It is hoped that the investigation into the characteristics of self-repair can help the participants in this TV talk shows interaction take a positive attitude towards this phenomenon so as to achieve an effective and better communication.