The form and function of questions in informal dyadic conversation

Abstract This paper presents an analysis of 1275 question tokens which occured in approximately seven hours of conversation between twelve pairs of same-sex friends; the conversations were taped in an experimental setting. The paper establishes a taxonomy of question functions which illustrates how questions vary along an information continuum and presents findings which show a notable correspondence between the pragmatic/social function of questions and their syntactic form as used in informal dyadic conversation. Central to the discussion are the specifies multiple ways that questions function for speakers in casual conversation and the correspondences between the function and the syntactic form of the questions used to accomplish these particular goals.

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