Discourse Analysis Exercise

Discourse Observation & Analysis

Prewriting/Reflection:

Observe a conversation—one in which you are not taking part—and take notes. Later, look through your notes and see if you can answer several of the following questions about the conversation you observed:

  • How did the choice of wording and intonation color the meaning of what was said?
  • Did you suspect that one person had bad intentions? What gave you that impression?
  • Could you imagine good intentions underlying the same way of speaking?
  • Did you feel any discomfort watching this interaction? What was the source of this discomfort?
  • In what ways did people in the conversation respond to each other similarly? (For example, did they just listen, try to draw similarities to their own experiences, or offer solutions)?
  • In what ways did they respond differently?
  • How was the conversation affected by having people involved who were all male? All female? All talkative? All quiet?
  • Were there any other influences, such as relative rank or how well people involved knew each other?
  • Can you think of anything that was said in the spirit of connection?
  • Can you think of anything that was said in the spirit of status?
  • How did body language play a role? What did it suggest for each player in the conversation?
  • Were people sitting or standing? Did these positions fit into a pattern?
  • Was small talk involved? What was the purpose or role of this talk?
  • Did you detect any patterns in the topics? What do they suggest?
  • Were there any requests made? Were they direct or indirect? What did this influence about what was said or heard?

Prompt: Please write an informed, research-based short paper (1 page, single-spaced, 2-3 paragraphs) that ties Deborah Tannen’s principles of communication and gender to the conversation you observed. Argue for or against her theories of gender communication on the basis of your own observation and your critical analysis of her abstracts and articles.

Overview of paper:

  1. Summary of conversation
  2. Analysis and argument: how does the conversation relate to Tannen’s/other researchers’ points on communication and gender?
  3. Conclusion: what generalizations can you draw from your conversation regarding gender and discourse?

Requirements: 1 summary, 1 paraphrase, 1 quote with interpolation and ellipses, 3 vocab words (all correctly documented, highlighted and labeled). You must include MLA-style citations of your sources at the end of your paper and utilize parenthetical documentation. It is anticipated that your tone will be fairly formal and academic, except perhaps for the conversation you’re quoting, paraphrasing or summarizing. Please use 3rd person.

STEPS:

  1. Transcribe conversation & respond to prewriting/reflection questions
  2. TTAPP
  3. Rough draft
  4. Final draft with works cited & labeled quotes, summaries & paraphrases.

****

SAMPLE discourse analysis

Never will a perfect balance exist between men and women. Always, unshakable inequalities that were bred into our society and human nature long ago will come between us. The essence of a male-female discourse is that of dominance coupled with skewed perceptions by both parties. One particular conversation soundly illustrates the differentiating modes of discourse between a man and a woman as outlined by researcher Deborah Tannen.

The clock struck 1AM on an early Sunday morning at an eighteenth birthday party. A handful of teenagers sat on a breezy outside porch and Richard, a seventeen-year-old high school senior, brought up a political view of his which was answered byRebecca, an eighteen-year-old senior. He indicated his support for universal healthcare. She disagreed and gave her reasons—all of which Richard censured and used to foment a fight. By the end, he had declared himself the winner and she was fuming indignantly.

Richard and Rebecca’s conversation reveals the truths behind Deborah Tannen’s ideas about discourse between men and women. Richard had said, “If socialized medicine is so bad, why do we use it with old and poor people?” Rebecca looked flustered and she folded her arms across her chest. Accordingly, Tannen notes that women fair poorly in controversial atmospheres and take the masculine method of poking holes in their adversary’s logic as an individual attack on them personally (“Don’t just sit there!—Interrupt!”290). As Tannen foresaw in her essay, “Fighting,” Rebecca took offense to Richard’s responses rather than building a productive conversation out of them.

The conversation continued to support Tannen’s findings. Rebecca later said, “Well, socialized stuff may be good in some things but not healthcare.” Richard replied that she was contradicting herself. The last exchange reflects Tannen’s observation that when a person doubts his or her ideas, he or she hedges so as to fend off attacks—which, ironically, invites more attacks (“Don’t just sit there!—Interrupt!”290). Rebecca conceded that socialism might serve a purpose in some facets of American society so that she would not be so harshly attacked by Richard when she expressed her view.

As Tannen predicted, Rebecca’s effort to hedge actually put her in a worse position because it made her look weak. Before Rebecca could speak again, Richard went on, “You don’t even have any real arguments so we should switch to universal healthcare.” The tension in the air was palpable. Tannen remarks, “When two people have different assumptions about how long a pause is “natural” between one speaker's turn and another's…the one who waits for and never gets the longer pause accuses: ‘You're interrupting me,’ ‘You're self-centered…’” (“Don’t just sit there!—Interrupt!” 290) . In this part of the discourse, Richard cut Rebecca off as a result of their differing ideas on how long a pause ought to be. Because she did not get a chance to respond before Richard launched another salvo of his reasoning, Rebecca likely felt that Richard was hectoring her and being overly aggressive. All of these findings dovetail with Tannen’s observations about gender and communication.

The art of discourse is a fragile one. With so many variations of perception embedded in a single conversation, there is no wonder why men and women have such a challenging time conversing with one another. Richard and Rebecca’s conversation conveys that men deal with conflict better than women. Given this fact, are we as a society struggling against the correct and natural order of our race when we make efforts to secure equality for women?

Summary

Paraphrase

Quote w/ellipses

Works Cited

Tannen, Deborah. "Fighting." The Longman Writer. Ed. Linda Stern. New York: Pearson Education, Inc., 2003. 289-291. Print.

---. “‘Don’t just sit there!—Interrupt!’ Pacing and Pausing in Conversational Style.” American Speech 75.4 (2000): n pag. Web. 27 Sept 2009.