2016年美国总统大选辩论中的言语打断分析_英语论文

An Analysis of Conversational Interruption in the 2016 American Presidential Debates

摘要

话语打断在日常会话中十分常见，在2016年美国总统大选电视辩论中，话语打断现象尤其突出。本文以2016年美国总统大选的三轮电视辩论为语料,从会话分析的视角,对美国大选电视辩论中话语打断的具体表现进行探讨。

话语打断现象可分为冲突性打断和合作性打断。冲突性打断可以再细分成不认同型打断、话题转移型打断和话语权转移型打断三种。同样的，合作性打断也可分为认同型打断、帮辅型打断和阐释型打断三种。研究结果显示，由于身份差异和总统辩论的特点，总统候选人之间主要采取冲突性打断，其中不认同型打断出现频率最多，这些打断体现了总统竞选过程中双方争夺话轮的一种策略。而合作性打断多由主持人完成，出于节目效果或时间控制的需要。

关键词: 话语打断 冲突性打断 合作性打断 语言学

Abstract

Interruption is a common but special phenomenon in conversations. It can be found that interruption plays an important role in the development of the whole 2016 American Presidential Debates. So based on the three rounds of 2016 American Presidential Debates, this paper will analyze the phenomenon of Interruption in the 2016 American presidential debates from the perspective of discourse analysis. 

The interruptions in the 2016 American presidential debates can be divided into two types: conflicting interruption and cooperative interruption. It will further classify conflicting interruption into unacceptable interruption, topic-shifting interruption and power-shifting interruption. Similarly, cooperative interruption may be further subdivided into three major classes: acceptable interruption, auxiliary interruption and expository interruption. Results showed that because of the identity difference and the feature of debates, two presidential candidates usually initiate the conflicting interruptions in the debates. Among three conflicting interruptions, unacceptable interruption appears the most. These interruptions represent a strategy to win turns in the presidential campaign. On the contrary, the host, as the third party, is more likely to adopt cooperative interruptions in need of better program effectiveness or time control. 

Keywords: interruption   conflicting interruption  cooperative interruption   linguistics            

Contents

1 Introduction 1

1.1 Research Background 1

1.2 Significance of the Study 1

1.3 Structure of the Thesis 2

2 Literature Review 4

2.1 The Study of Interruption 4

2.1.1  The Definition of Interruption 4

2.1.2  The Patterns of Interruption 4

2.1.3  The Developing Study of Interruption in Institutional Conversations 6

2.2 The Study of American Presidential Debates 7

2.3.    Summary 7

3 Research Methodology 7

3.1 Research Questions 7

3.2 Data Collection 8

3.3 Data Analysis 9

4 Results and Discussion 11

4.1 Conflicting Interruption 11

4.1.1  Unacceptable Interruption 13

4.1.2  Topic-shifting Interruption 13

4.1.3  Power-shifting Interruption 14

4.2 Cooperative Interruption 14

4.2.1  Acceptable Interruption 15

4.2.2  Auxiliary Interruption 16

4.2.3  Expository Interruption 16

Conclusion 18

Acknowledgements 19

References 21