This is a PowerPoint presentation on Matthiessen’s Registerial Cartography, an approach to register studies.

1. GROUP THREE
• MEMBER
• NAME INDEX NUMBER
• ZEBTOR JANET AR/MLE/22/0001
• GLORIA HOGGAR AR/ENS/22/0009
• ARTHUR MAVIS AMA AR/ENS/22/0027
• WUMBEI, ABDUL-SAMMED AR/ENS/22/0014

2. LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL
INTERACTION
• OUTLINE OF PRESENTATION
 INTRODUCTION
 ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL INTERACTION
 THEORIES ASSOCIATED WITH LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL INTERACTION
RELEVANCE OF LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL INTERACTION
 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
 REFERENCES

3. INTRODUCTION
• Language is a fundamental tool through which human beings
communicate with one another. It plays a crucial role in social
interactions as it allows individuals to communicate, express their
thoughts, intentions, feelings, and establish connections with
others. The manner in which language is used in social interaction
plays a crucial role in shaping relationships, and influencing
outcomes.

4. ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL
INTERACTION
•The following are some aspects of
language in social interaction;
•A. Verbal Communication: This refers
to the use of spoken or written words
to convey messages.

5. ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL
INTERACTION CONT’D
•B. Nonverbal Communication: The use
of gestures, facial expressions, anything
other than words to convey messages.
•C. Turn-Taking: This refers to an
instance where individuals take turns to
speak.

6. ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL
INTERACTION CONT’D
• D. Pragmatics: Pragmatics refers to the study of how
language is used in different social contexts, and how
the meaning is interpreted based on the context..
• E. Politeness and Face-saving: Language in social
interaction is often guided by politeness norms and the
desire to maintain positive social relationships.

7. ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL
INTERACTION CONT’D
•E. Register and Style: Language use
can vary depending on the social
context, relationship between
speakers, and formality of the
situation.

8. THEORIES ASSOCIATED WITH
LANGUAGE IN SOCIAL
INTERACTION
• There are several theories associated with language in social
interaction that seek to explain how language is used and
understood in social contexts. Some are discussed below;
 Speech Acts Theory
 Politeness Theory
 Conversation Analysis Theory

9. SPEECH ACTS THEORY
Human beings perform actions whenever they
speak, that is, when people use language, they are
not only conveying information, but also
performing actions via the utterances (Yule, 1996).
The actions performed via utterances are called
speech acts, and in English, are commonly given
more specific labels such as apology, complaint,
compliment, invitation, promise, or request.

10. Levels of Speech Acts
•On any occasion, the action performed by
producing an utterance will consist of three
related acts;
 Locutionary act: The act of producing
meaningful linguistic expression.
Illocutionary act: The purpose or function
of an utterance.

11. Levels of Speech Acts Cont’d
Perlocutionary Act: This refers to the
intended effect of an utterance,
otherwise known as the perlocutionary
effect.

12. Levels of Speech Acts Cont’d
• Of these three dimensions, the most discussed is
illocutionary force. In fact the term speech act is
generally interpreted quite narrowly to mean only the
illocutionary force of an utterance.
• The illocutionary force of an utterance is what it ‘counts
as’. The same illocutionary act below can count as i. a
prediction, ii. a warning, or iii. a promise. These
different analyses of the utterance represent different
illocutionary forces

13. Example
• I will see you later.
• This statement could mean;
• I predict that I will see you later.
• I warn you that I will see you later.
• I promise you that I will see you later.

14. Example Cont’d
• One problem with the example above is that the
same utterance can potentially have quite
different illocutionary forces. How can speakers
assume that the intended illocutionary force will
be recognized by the hearer? The question has
been answered by considering two things:
Illocutionary Force Indicating Devices and
felicity conditions.

15. Illocutionary Force Indicating Device
•IFID: This is an expression where there is a
slot for a verb that explicitly names the
illocutionary act being performed. Such a
verb can be called a performative verb. For
example, instead of clean the house, one
will say, I order you to clean the house.

16. Felicity Conditions
• Felicity Conditions: These are the conditions that
have to be fulfilled before an utterance can be
said to be successful. These are the conditions
that have to be met before one can say that a
speaker has made a sincere statement.

17. Classification of speech Acts
• Assertives/representatives: These speech acts are used
in making statements. They are those kinds of speech
acts that state what the speaker believes to be the case
or not.
• Directives: These speech acts are used in giving
commands. These speech acts are used by the speaker
to get someone else to do something.

18. Cont’d
• Commissives: These speech acts are used in making
promises. These speech acts are used by the speaker
when they are committing themselves to some future
action.
• Expressives: These speech acts are used in expressing
emotions. These speech acts state what the speaker
feels.

19. Cont’d
• Declaratives: These speech acts are used in
making declarations. These speech acts change
the world via their utterances. For declaration to
be performed appropriately, a speaker must have
a special institutional role, in a specific context.
E.g. Presiding Judge: I hereby sentence the
defendant to two years imprisonment

20. Structural Types of Speech Acts
• Direct Speech Act: a speech act whose proposition is
clearly represented in the utterance and understood by
the addressee. For example, please put on the fan.
• Indirect Speech Act: a speech act whose proposition is
not clearly stated, however, through inference, and
implicature, an addressee understands the intention of
the speaker. For example, it is very hot in here.

21. NOTE: It is important to note that each time we make an
utterance, we are using the utterance to perform certain act.
Such act may be directly stated by the speaker, or indirectly
stated. Certain verbs are used to explicitly signal that an
utterance is meant to perform an act, such verbs are called
performative verbs, while the utterance in which they occur is
called performative utterance. For any utterance to be judged as
sincere, it has to meet certain felicity conditions. Some
utterances have surface forms that differ from the intention of
the speaker, such utterances are called indirect speech acts.

22. POLITENESS THEORY
• This theory, developed by sociolinguists, Penelope
Brown and Stephen Levinson, explores how people
use language to maintain social harmony and
manage face saving in interactions.
• There are two key concepts in this theory;
politeness and face

23. Meaning of Politeness
• Politeness is the kind of disposition we have
towards other people that make us not want to
hurt their feelings, or do things that we know will
make them feel unwanted.
• Politeness, in an interaction, can be defined as
the means employed to show another person’s
face (Yule, 1996).

24. Meaning of Face
•Face means the public self-image of a
person. It refers to that emotional and social
sense of self that everyone has and expects
everyone else to recognize. Every individual
has got a positive and a negative face
(Brown & Levinson, 1987).

25. Types of Face
 Positive Face: A person’s positive face is the need
to be accepted, liked by others, to be treated as a
member of the same group, and to know that his or
her wants are shared by others (Yule, 1996).
 Negative Face: A person’s negative face is the need
to be independent, to have freedom of action, and
not to be imposed on by others.

26. Face Threatening Acts (FTAs)
• If one says something that makes other people feel embarrassed
or uncomfortable, or something that threatens another person’s
self-image, the speaker is said to have employed a Face
Threatening Act (FTA).
• On the other hand, when you say something that lessens possible
threat to another person’s face, you are said to be performing a
face saving act. Politeness strategies are employed to deal with
face threatening acts.
• Politeness strategies are employed to deal with face
threatening acts.

27. Politeness Strategies
•Brown and Levinson (1987) identified four
major types of politeness strategies, namely;
•Positive Politeness: these are face saving acts
concerned with a person’s positive face that
tend to show solidarity, emphasize that both
speakers want the same thing, and that they
have a common goal.

28. Politeness Strategies
•Negative Politeness: these are face saving
acts oriented towards a person’s negative
face which tend to show deference,
emphasize the importance of the other’s
time or concerns, and even include an
apology for the imposition or the
interruption.

29. Politeness Strategies
• Off Record Strategy: this is a politeness strategy in
which a speaker does not directly ask an addressee
for anything.
• For example, just as we have given the earlier
example, a speaker in this same context can decide
to go the off the record strategy by searching their
bag and make the following utterances, Oh, I forgot
my pen. Or Hmm, I wonder where I put my pen.

30. Politeness Strategies
•Bald on Record: this strategy is employed
when a speaker directly addresses the
other as a means of expressing their
needs.
•This strategy does not attempt to
minimize the threat to the hearer’s face.

31. Politeness Principle
• Politeness principle is a set of maxims, just like the
Cooperative Principle. These maxims were proposed by
Geoffrey Leech. Leech observes that participants in
social interaction try to interact in an atmosphere of
relative harmony. Below are the maxims;
oTact Maxim: minimize cost to other, maximize benefit
to other. E.g. Can you spare just a minute please?

32. Politeness Principles
• Generosity Maxim: minimize benefit to self,
maximize cost to self. This maxim makes it clear
that to really express politeness in conversation, the
speaker should put others first before
himself/herself.
• Modesty maxim: minimize praise of self, maximize
praise of others. We should find opportunities to
praise others, while we dispraise self.

33. Politeness Principles
• Agreement Maxim: minimize disagreement between self
and other, maximize agreement between self and other.
• Sympathy Maxim: minimize antipathy between self and
other, maximize sympathy between self and other. One
way of expressing politeness is to identify with people by
congratulating them, commiserating with them, or
expressing condolences when they are bereaved.

34. Politeness Theory Summary
• It is natural for us, as we interact, to be sensitive to the
social situation in which the interaction takes place.
• One way of being sensitive to the social situation and
the cultural practices is to be polite in our interaction.
Politeness is one phenomenon in our daily interactions.
• Pragmatists have identified the strategies we use when
being polite and the maxims we observe in the process.
Some of these pragmatists include, Brown, Levinson,
and Leech.

35. CONVERSATION ANALYSIS THEORY
• This theory, developed by sociolinguists, Harvey
Sacks, Emmanuel Schegloff, and Gail Jefferson,
focuses on the detailed analysis of naturally
occurring conversations.
• It examines the structure and organization of
conversation, including turn-taking, error-repair
mechanism, and preference organization.

36. Turn-Taking and Turn Allocation
• Turn taking is a general feature of conversation.
This refers to the orderly manner in which
interlocutors interact in a conversation.
• Speakers and listeners change their roles in order to
begin their speech (Coulthard, 1985). Turn taking
mechanisms may vary between cultures and
languages. Some rules that govern turn taking in
discourse are;

37. Rules Governing Turn-Taking
• When the current speaker selects the next speaker, the
next speaker has the right to and is obliged to commence
the turn.
• If the current speaker does not select the next speaker,
any one of the speakers have the right to self-select and
become the next speaker.
• If neither the current speaker selects the next speaker
nor the next speaker self-selects, the current speaker
may resume his or her turn (Sacks, Schegloff & Jefferson,
1974).

38. Turn Eliciting Signals
• There are signals to turn-taking that are called turn-
eliciting signals. We have the Turn Construction Unit
(TCU), which is the fundamental segment of speech in
conversation.
• It describes pieces of conversation, which may comprise
an entire turn. The end of a TCU is called a Transition
Relevance Place (TRP).
• TRP marks a point where the turn may go to another
speaker, or the present speaker may continue with
another TCU.

39. Adjacency Pairs
• Adjacency pair is a unit of conversation that
contains an exchange of one turn each by two
speakers.
• The turns are so related to each other that the
first turn requires a range of specific type of
response in the second turn. For example,
Question – Answer Pair, Invitation - Acceptance

40. Insertion Sequences
• An insertion sequence is a sequence of turns
intervenes between the first and second parts of an
adjacency pair. It is a kind of delay in which the
response expected is not given, rather, an entirely
different, though related response is given.

41. Error – Repair Mechanism
• In conversation, we do not always say things the correct way we
desire to say them. When we did not say what we ought to say,
we still have a way of saying them. This is called error – repair.
• Overlap in Speeches: An overlap in speech occurs when two or
more interlocutors are talking at the same time. It can also be
described as occurrences of two or more participants trying to
take their turns at the same time after the previous speaker had
finished his turn, or is about to finish his turn. The real overlap
occurs when the two participants start their turns
simultaneously, and none of them relinquishes the floor for the
other.

42. Conversation Analysis Summary
• Analyzing a conversation involves how turns are taken
and allocated, and other features such as how people
correct their errors in speech when they realize them.
• Apart from all these, we realize that the talks overlap,
especially, when the speakers involved are eager to
make their points, or when a speaker feels that the last
speaker has finished their turn.
• In fact, when a conversation moves on without any of
these features, it seems less natural than when they are
present.

43. Significance of Language in Social Interaction
• The manner in which language is used in social
interactions plays a crucial role in shaping
relationships and influencing outcomes.
• This aspect of the presentation aims to discuss
the significance of language in social interaction
with relevant examples.

44. Significance Cont’d
• Establishing and Maintaining Relationships:
Language plays a vital role in establishing and
maintaining relationships.
• Expressing emotions and feelings: Language
allows individuals to express their emotions and
feelings, enabling others to understand and
empathize.

45. Significance Cont’d
• Negotiation and Conflict Resolution: Language serves
as a tool for negotiation and conflict resolution in
social interactions.
• Establishing social norms and cultural identity;
Language plays a crucial role in establishing social
norms and cultural identity within a community.
Through language, individuals convey and reinforce
shared values, beliefs, and customs.

46. Significance Cont’d
• Power Dynamics and Social Hierarchy; Language can
reflect and perpetuate power dynamics and social
hierarchies in social interactions.
• Individuals with higher social status or authority may
use language to assert dominance or control, while
those with lower status may adopt more deferential
language.

47. Summary and Conclusion
• In this presentation, we have tried to look at language in
social interaction in its absolute totality. As we have
pointed out that language is the fundamental tool for
human communication, it plays some crucial roles in
social interactions. The roles that language play in social
interactions are determined by how we use the language.
• We have identified a few aspects of language in social
interaction; verbal and nonverbal communication,
pragmatics, turn taking, amongst others.

48. Summary Cont’d
• We have equally discussed some of the theories that
are associated with how language is used in social
interaction; speech acts theory, politeness theory, and
conversation analysis theory.
• There are two key concepts in politeness theory;
politeness and face. Politeness has to do with
recognizing the face wants of the other, while face
refers to one’s self-image.

49. Summary Cont’d
• The speech acts theory also recognizes the fact that when we
speak, we don’t just utter sentences or utterances, but we
perform certain actions via our utterances, such as issuing a
command, making a complaint, giving an order amongst many
others.
• There are three levels of making an utterance, the
locutionary act, which has to do with constructing meaningful
linguistic expressions, the illocutionary act, which has to do
the with the purpose or intention of the utterance, and then,
the perlocutionary act, which has to do with the effect of the
utterance.

50. Summary Cont’d
• We have equally explored the fact that for a particular
speech act to be sincere or successful, certain conditions
ought to be met, these conditions are technically referred
to as felicity conditions.
• Speech acts are categorized into asserstives, declaratives,
commissives, expressives etc.
• We have indeed also pointed out that for a conversation to
be natural, it cannot flow continuously, there ought to be
errors, which the speakers sometimes try to correct or
repair, they ought to be overlaps in speeches as well.

51. Summary Cont’d
• Speakers may sometimes also take turns during speech
amongst others, conversation analysis theory deals with
this aspect.
• We have identified also that, language plays a
significant role in social interact such as; establishing
and maintaining relationships, negotiation and conflict
resolution, expressing emotions and feelings,
establishing social norms and cultural identity.

52. REFERENCES
• Austin, J.L. (1975). How to Do Things with Words (Vol. 88). Oxford
University Press.
• Coulthard, M. (2013). Conversation Analysis and Social Skills
Training. Radical Approaches to Social Skills Training (Psychology Revivals),
205.
• Hall, J.A. (2013). The Psychology of Interpersonal Communication.
Routledge.
• Holtgraves, T. (2013). Language as Social Action: Social Psychology
and Lasnguage Use. Psychology Press.

53. REFERENCES CONT’D
• Leech, G.N. (2014). The Pragmatics of Politeness. Oxford
Studies in Sociolinguis.
• Sacks, H., Schegloff, E.A., Jefferson, G. (1978). A
Simplest Systematic for the Organization of Turn Taking
for Conversation. In Studies in the organization of
conversational interaction (pp. 7-55). Academia Press.
• Yule, G. (1996). Pragmatics. Oxford University Press.
Oxford.