Speech situation and its components

We face it every day and more than once. In it, we can take both active participation and maintain neutrality. She lies in wait for us at home, on the street, at work, in the store, in the transport ... You still have not guessed, about what or about whom are we talking about? No? Then allow me to imagine: her majesty speech situation! And we will begin our acquaintance, of course, with vivid examples.

Speech situation: examples

Remember the Soviet lyrical comedy Eldar Ryazanov "Office Romance"? In one of the initial scenes, the unfortunate, unsure of himself, a senior statistic, Comrade Novosel'tsev, during a party with a friend, tries to "priudarit" behind his boss, the "heartless" and "wicked" Kalugina-Mydra, but all his attempts fail. Why? There are many reasons for this, but one of them is trivial: the participants in this dialogue simply had a different vision of the "what is a speech situation". And now about everything in order.

Participants in the speech situation in practice

So, all situations of speech communication primarily involve participants. They are major and minor. In our case, Anatoly Yefremovich Novoseltsev and Kalugin are the main participants, who are usually called the speaker and listener, or the addressee and addressee. During communication their roles are constantly changing. This is characteristic of dialogue, conditionally - for a dispute, and it is impossible - for oratorical speech. Secondary participants in this speech situation are Samokhvalov and Ryzhova - close friends and colleagues Novoseltseva, who mainly play the role of observers and advisers. It is believed that the observer is a passive position. However, this is not quite true. Even without directly participating in a dialogue, it can influence its course, which we see in the example described.

Relations

Now about the relationship between the participants. This is another important item on the topic "Speech situation and its components". Speaking of them, first of all, do not mean relations in the literal sense of the word, but social roles of the speaker and the addressee. In the case described, the relationship between Kalugina and Novoseltsev is defined as "boss-subordinate". However, stability is not observed here either. It all depends on the circumstances and circumstances. In an official setting, at work, in the office, during business meetings, an emphatically-business style of communication should be maintained. But if the "place of action" is transferred from the government office to the usual home environment - in the apartment Samokhvalova, there is a change of scenery: music, festive table, guests ... In short, the situation becomes unofficial, respectively, social roles and communication styles are changing.

Wrong vision of the situation

But the "old woman" stubbornly does not notice this, ignores the awkward attempts of courtship on the part of Comrade Novoseltsev, and, in the midst of everyone's fun, continues to maintain an official-business tone. It is also incomprehensible to her the purpose of their forced communication. Urgency and perspective, as the main defining objectives of business communication, are absent, so there is nothing to talk about anymore. However, the shy, shy "senior statistician" - either from the experience of fear, or from the accepted cocktail - also goes beyond the limits of what is permissible. After several challenging attempts to charm the companion with his singing, reading poetry and dancing, and not having received the proper recognition, he openly, in the presence of the guests, calls Lyudmila Prokofievna "heartless" and "fierce". The comedy of the situation is obvious. But this is, so to speak, a speech situation, examples. And what does the theory say?

The concept of "speech situation"

One of the sections of linguistics is linguopragmatics. It is a science that studies the practical use of language, that is, how a person uses a "word" to influence the addressee, and what determines the features of a person's speech and behavior in the process of communication. And the speech situation in this case is precisely the basic concept of linguistic pragmatics, on the basis of which basic research is conducted. It consists of several components: participants in communication, their relationships, the subject of communication, external and internal communication conditions. The speech situation and its components were presented in detail by the example of a scene from a motion picture, so to speak, in practice. For a better understanding in theory, one can use the scheme proposed by NI Formanovskaya and supplemented by TA Ladyzhenskaya. What is the speech situation and its components is clearly visible in the figure below.

Addressee

As for the participants in the communication, we think that this can not arise with this: the addressee and the addressee are the one who speaks and the one who listens. In other words, the addressee is the initiator of the speech situation, he is its active participant. It can be both speaking and writing, depending on how and in what form communication takes place - written or oral (the sixth item in the table "Speech situation"). The scheme, as you can see, is quite simple. It is believed that the role of the addressee is often tactically advantageous, since he sets the theme, tone and pace of communication. He is the "director" of this action, which means that he has special rights: he directs the conversation in the right direction and, accordingly, can regulate its time frame.

Addressee

However, as they say, everything in this world is absolutely and relatively simultaneously. Therefore, the role of the addressee in the dialogue is not always a passive position. During the conversation, the listener performs a number of such necessary speech-processing operations as:

• Control the volume of what is reported to him,
• Control of understanding,
• Generalization,
• Definition of concepts,
• Correction of positions.

All the above mentioned points are realized with the help of obligatory jet replicas: "Thank you for the information", "Of course", "In other words, you think that ...", "If I understand you correctly ...". By the way, every speech situation, be it acquaintance, greeting, congratulations, has its own set of stable phrases and expressions - this is the so-called "formula of the speech situation". With the help of these clichés, the addressee can seize the initiative and continue to act as a speaker.

The social nature of relations

It is impossible to deny or minimize the importance of the social roles of communicants. Imagine that a mother who just has a warm conversation with her daughter at breakfast, an hour later, speaks at school as a teacher of her child. Relations change. In one case, they act as a "parent-child", in another - "teacher-student". Accordingly, both speech situations and their speech roles will be completely different. Anyone who does not understand or does not see the difference, does not own the situation, is doomed to inevitable problems.

Social roles can be permanent and variable. The first ones are those that are determined by the gender of the participant in the conversation, his age, kinship ties, and so on. The second, alternating roles are those that determine the social status and social status of one communicant at the moment of communication in relation to another: "teacher-student", "leader-subordinate", "parent-child", etc. Indicators of social Status are official and social status, merit, prosperity.

External conditions of communication

The external conditions of communication include the place and time of communication. To the question of whether they are important and which play a role in the communication process, one can cite as an example the remarks of playwrights in the play. The place of action, time, lighting, description of the interior, the surrounding nature - everything that "outside" will necessarily reflect "inside" - in every word, sigh, phrase.

Depending on the participation of the space-time factor, canonical and non-canonical speech situations are distinguished (according to the "Russian language" children write even abstracts on this topic). Canonical - when the addressee and addressee are in the same place or, at least, see each other, they have a common field of view, and the time of utterance of the statement of one coincides with the time of perception by the listener. In other words, all participants in the speech situation are in direct interaction. As for the second variant, here we see absolute non-fulfillment of all the above conditions: the coordinates "I-you-here-now" are absent.

Internal circumstances

Motives and goals are also important elements of the concept of "speech situation". Why are we talking? Why do you say this or that phrase aloud? What are the intentions of all participants in the communication? The goal is an invisible connecting thread between the speaker and the listener. There is no it - the connection breaks, and the speech situation ceases to exist. What are the goals, so that the thin thread does not disappear for as long as possible? The first is a desire to inform, tell, describe, give an idea of something. The second is the declination, the conviction of the listener in something with the help of evidence and arguments. The third is suggestion, a change in the partner's emotional state . Here, the appeal is not only to the mind, but also to the feelings of the interlocutor. Emotional means of influence are used. The fourth is the motivation for action. In this case, the desired response is immediate action. And the last - the maintenance of mutual positive emotions, the desire to please yourself and your partner by the process of communication.

Take, for example, the phrase: "I have an important business meeting." It can be used for the purpose of failure. You are planning an important event, and you can not accept the invitation of friends to go to the cinema: "I have an important business meeting" (so I can not go with you). Another speech situation is the delay in the anniversary of a close comrade, another goal is an apology: "I have an important business meeting" (which I can not miss in any way). This statement can encourage colleagues to work, help them move the business from a dead end, hence the new goal - to inspire confidence: "I have an important business meeting" (partners promise us new projects, new prospects). As can be seen from the examples, the same sentence can sound and be perceived in different ways. Everything depends on the speech situation and intentions of the speaker, conscious or unconscious.