7.5. Psychological and linguistic peculiarities of dialogic and monologic speech. Types of monologue

7.5.1. Psychological characteristics of dialogue and monologue

Dialogue and monologue are two forms of speaking. Psychologically the following common features characterise them:

- speech is always addressed to an interlocutor and communicatively motivated;

- speech is always purposeful; it is aimed either at informing somebody about something or at being informed;

- speech is always contextualised; it occurs in a certain situation or context;

- in the majority of cases speech is emotionally coloured, for a speaker expresses his ideas, feelings, attitude to what he says. This peculiarity of speech alongside with greater situational conditionality is more characteristic of a dialogue.

Dialogic speech can take place only when there are at least two partners taking part in a conversation. Each partner’s replies depend on the other partner’s communicative behaviour greatly. This, in its turn, involves the necessity of spontaneity, i.e. an interlocutor has to react verbally at rapid speed. Thus, dialogue cannot be planned thoroughly beforehand because it much depends on the verbal context, upon the situation.

Monologic speech, on the other hand, is more thoroughly planned in advance. It is characterised by relative continuity and semantic completeness, logicality and consistency, contextuality.

7.5.2. Linguistic characteristics of dialogue and monologue

Psychological peculiarities of dialogue and monologue have influence on the choice of linguistic means. Thus, a good conversationalist uses a great deal of elliptical forms; his usage of speech formulas and clichés makes him use emphatic intonation, lots of interjections and non-verbal components. As a result, his speech is obviously rich in contracted forms and incompleteness of replies.

Any storyteller will tell you that making a narration interesting and sound is not an easy task. To begin with, monologue is the product of individual construction. It exists as a more or less lasting utterance of a single person addressed to his interlocutor or audience. Monologue is called one-way directed, for with monologue we do not expect any reaction in the form of loud speech. Linguistically, monologue is characterised by consistently coherent and syntactically complete sentences. Completeness of structures makes verbal information more detailed. Thus, sentences become complex and compound containing 23-25 words. To make his speech easier to comprehend, the narrator would use heterogeneous structures connected in logical consistency. Thus, special means of inter-phrasal cohesion become a vehicle of connection between separate semantic parts of monologue. It is cohesion that distinguishes monologic speech from a set of sentences produced at random. Phrases produced arbitrary, as a desultory chain can form a group of disconnected sentences. Not less than two coherent phrases make monologue.

Cohesion of monologue has two aspects: the psychological aspect and the linguistic one. In the first case, the coherence of ideas is meant. This coherence is expressed in the compositional-semantic unity of a text as a product of speaking. In the second case we deal with coherence of speech, which presupposes mastering linguistic means of inter-phrasal connection. The means of speech coherence are lexical and pronoun reiteration, conjunctions and adverbial conjunctions, adverbs, adverbials, articles and the like. E.g.: I have a friend. His name is Yura. Yura is 16. He is not a student, he is a schoolboy.

In this passage, the second sentence is connected with the 1^st one with the pronoun reiteration (his name – my friend’s name), exactly the same way as the 4^th sentence is connected with the 3^rd one. Meanwhile the 3^rd phrase is connected to the 2^nd phrase with the complete lexical reiteration (Yura – Yura).

Another set of speech coherence means is the so-called oral speech formulas, framing the beginning and the end of an utterance (to begin with, I’d like to tell you, let’s leave it at that, to top it all and the like) and expressing the speaker’s attitude towards the subject of his speech (fortunately, unfortunately, in my opinion, it seems to me, etc.). E.g. Some people like spring and summer, others like winter. Strange enough but I like autumn best of all. It’s true it often rains in autumn… etc.

Such consistently coherent sentences obviously display the development of the key phrase in the phrases coming after. The so-called Idea Development is the specification of a thought providing additional information to this thought, its clarification, further explanation and so forth. However, consistency can follow a temporal scheme. E.g.: I want to write a letter. I go to the post-office. I buy an envelope, a stamp and writing paper. I write the letter, seal up the envelope and drop it into a pillar-box. In this example, the consistency of operations is purely temporal. An utterance like this could hardly be considered a real life monologue.

Logical-syntactical scheme

Although the example above describes a sequence of actions, such a description occurs to happen rather seldom, let alone its artificially peculiar character.

In reality, what governs speaking is a phrase production basis. It is understood as a model combination scheme kept in a speaker’s memory in the form of a stereotype. This stereotype is implemented in our memory in a generalized form as a logical-syntactic graph. E.g.: 1) I wanted to go to the theatre yesterday. But, to my regret, I could not get the seats. The thing is it was the first night. 2) The thing is we arrived late yesterday. And I wanted to see Bob. But, to my regret, he had already left.

If we try to analyse a sufficient number of utterances we can easily notice that phrases, or rather their sequence, composing these utterances is not chaotic. What’s more important, this sequence is neither arbitrary nor unique. Moreover, it’s repeated rather frequently in real life situations. In other words, their number is finite.

Another important aspect is that the sequence of phrases reflects logical elaboration of a thought. This logical development is manifested through the repetition of syntactical cohesion between phrases. Thus, using the allotted parts of phrases, revealing syntactical cohesion (I wanted to, the thing is… etc.) one can compose an infinite number of utterances. Hence, if it is possible to display main logical-syntactic schemes, then, these schemes can be successfully used in teaching monologue. This idea has been proved experimentally by A.V. Kunin. It is considered that such schemes help develop the characteristics possessed by monologic utterances:

- to express a complete, communicatively addressed idea;

- to make consistent the evolvement of the idea;

- to speak fluently, without groundless pauses.

Thus, the stages for achieving the required characteristics should be the following: 1) students should acquire the habit of expressing one complete idea. For this purpose, students are required to produce an utterance on the subject on the level of a single phrase. There is only one restriction: all phrases should deal with the subject suggested by the teacher;

2) students are required to pay attention to the consistency of phrases, i.e. to logical connections between phrases. E.g.: Our classroom is large. There’re 4 windows in it…

3) the volume of an utterance is increased, new logical tasks are set, elements of discussion and argumentation are included. E.g.: Prove the correctness of the statement: ‘Our town is attractive for tourists’.

It is necessary to point out that a phrase can be an element of both monologue and dialogue. Mastering a phrase takes place at the stage of forming speech habits. However, it is not mastering monologic speech yet. Teaching monologic speech starts only with the task of producing not less than two coherent phrases, i.e. mastering monologic speech starts at the stage of developing habits. That is why any utterance for developing monologic speech habits should be at the super-phrasal level. It has to possess all speech characteristics from the very beginning. It is the volume and complexity of an utterance that is growing with the course of mastering monologic speech. Thus, at the stage of habit development (the text level) students should produce utterances with all distinctive features of these speech habits at the level of 2 or 3 phrases. Such an utterance can be called a micro monologue. The stage of skill perfection (the after-text level) presupposes producing utterances of greater volume and higher complexity. The means of achieving this final goal can be:

1. Producing utterances with the help of logical-syntactic schemes. E.g.:

I like… (this game).

And I can… (play football well).

…quite often (we go to the stadium).

But… (we don’t have a coach).

2. Extending utterances. E.g.: - I like football very much. And you?

– I like football too. I enjoy watching football matches on TV. But I have no time to go to the stadium.

3. Reducing utterances (passages). E.g.: - leaving out unnecessary words; - conveying the content in 2 or 3 phrases.

4. Speaking on the suggested situation. E.g.: - a talk on the picture; - a talk on the plan; - a free talk on a given subject.