„MALÁ SLOVA“ A JEJICH PODÍL NA STYLU MLUVENÝCH PROJEVŮ
“Small words” and their contribution to the style of spoken discourse

Summary/Abstract: In contrast to written language, spoken utterances evince a much higher incidence of deictics, indefinite and pseudo-demonstrative pronouns, contact particles (phatic expressions), specific conjunctions and other connectives, interjections, fillers and hesitation sounds. Corpus-based data should make it possible to attempt a new typology of such expressions (of a broad category of “discourse markers”), independent of the traditional categorization of the parts of speech. The research of spoken Czech syntax must take into account these groups of lexical means that are innate to spoken discourse, i.e. this important area where lexis and syntax meet. Such words as the Czech jako, teda, jakoe, jakoby seem to be semantically vague or empty, but they have a special effect on the connectedness and cohesion of spoken discourse. Moreover, the syntax of spoken discourse has to be investigated in terms of its dialogic and processual nature, inevitably respecting the relationships between utterances and dialogue turns; that is why special attention must be given to “small words” employed at the beginning or end of various types of turns. Their participation in the turn-taking mechanismus, as well as other functions, demonstrates that the “small words” in most cases cannot be regarded as redundant expressions, and that they contribute to the style of spoken discourse.

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