Meaningful activities for the classroom

"Don't Tell My Father": Important Lessons Learned

Through EFL Classroom Small Talk

Gabriela Ayala González^*Miguel Adrián Leonel de Cervantes Orozco^**Víctor Daniel González Cabrera^***

Faviola Romero Mayoral^****

Gerrard Edwin Mugford Fowler^*****

Universidad de Guadalajara, Mexico

This article was received on January 20, 2011, and accepted on May 4, 2011.

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Nature of Phatic Communion

The origins of research on phatic communion can be traced to Malinowski who coined the term in the 1930s. A second era of research focused on discursive and situational approaches which led to our examining contemporary analyses in terms of rapport management and the interpersonal language use which has been the academic focus in this decade. First of all, however, we offer an example of phatic communion in the foreign-language learning context as a teacher interacts with students before the beginning of class.

1. Teacher: How was your day?
2. Brenda: Bad.
3. Teacher: Wow! You´re very honest. Why?
4. Diana: I have very busy day.
5. Alberto: Yeah, I always.
6. Benda: It's boring.
7. Teacher: Why boring?
8. Estefan: A lot of work.
   (Extract 1)

In Extract 1, the teacher demonstrates concern for his students' feelings and attempts to establish (or re-establish) a level of rapport. He is engaging in phatic communion. He is attempting to show supportiveness by trying to understand how his students feel. Phatic communion offers choices since, alternatively, he could have attempted to establish solidarity, or to use Aston's term, 'solidary routines' (1988, p. 255) by sharing the same feelings.

The term phatic communion was first proposed by Malinowski to describe 'a mode of action' (1923, p. 296) during which interactants develop interpersonal relationships as "ties of union are created by a mere exchange of words" (1923, p. 315). Malinowski, however, gave little importance to the actual words echoed in phatic communion, claiming that words merely fulfil a solidary rather than a referential or reflective function.

Whilst Malinowski pioneered the interactional dimension to language use, further work on phatic communion was limited until Laver revisited the concept and highlighted the social dimension of phatic communion especially in terms of how interactants may engage in exploratory talk at the beginning, in the middle and at the end of conversations. Far more than reflecting "a mere exchange of words", Laver argues that phatic communion is also used to avoid silence and to prepare the way to engage in "an initiatory function, in that it allows the participants to cooperate in getting the interaction comfortably under way [...]" (1975, p. 221). In other words, phatic communion prepares the way for language users to make the transition to transactional language use e.g. asking for or giving information. Stressing the social motivation behind phatic language use, Laver (1975) like Malinowski, underscored the formulaic dimension to small talk whilst downplaying the individual aspect of phatic communion.

Taking a much more local approach to phatic communion, Coupland, Coupland and Robinson (1992) emphasise the negotiatory dimension of small talk. Critiquing Malinowski's and Laver's formulaic and patterned approaches to phatic communion, Coupland, Coupland and Robinson argue that small talk should be examined in terms of 'relational engagement' (1992, p. 217) as language users approach each interaction on an individual basis depending on what they want to achieve socially and relationally from the interaction as 'this very indeterminacy may be the hallmark of phatic communion and the key to its social utility' (1992, p. 226).

Further highlighting the importance of small talk, Coupland (2000b) has argued for the discoursal importance of small talk. In his introduction to a collected volume of papers on phatic communion, Small Talk (Coupland, 2000a), Coupland argues for the contextual analysis of phatic communion and the need to examine "the relationship between form and function within those contexts, as is classically the case with discourse analysis" (2000b, p. 22). Coupland also edited a special edition of the journal Research on Language and Social Interaction dedicated to examining phatic communion from a more conversation analysis perspective. The collection of the articles "explores how small talk is achieved interactionally, turn by turn, and what this displays about small talk and its achievements for participants in situ" (Coupland, 2003, p. 5).

The study of phatic communion has therefore developed from seeing small talk as a nebulous exchange of words to situated language use. Current work focuses on small talk in terms of rapport management (Hernández López, 2008; Spencer-Oatey, 2008) and the personal dimension to phatic communion (Placencia, 2004). In this paper, we adopt the definition of phatic talk as local interactional language use aimed at establishing, developing and maintaining a given interpersonal relationship. In particular, we examine the solidary dimension of small talk. Rather than seeing phatic communion in generalised social terms (Malinowski, 1923; Laver, 1975) or discoursal and situational approaches (Coupland, Coupland and Robinson, 1992; Coupland, 2000a, 2000b), we examine small talk in interpersonal terms as interactants construct or even fail to construct phatic talk within a specific localised context. Dynamic and not always purely formulaic, phatic communion reflects deliberate and often tentative attempts to establish, develop and maintain relationships. Exploratory and hesitant talk may be even more underscored in the foreign-language classroom when teachers and students attempt to establish, develop and maintain their interpersonal relationship in the target language.

Phatic Communion and Solidarity

Whilst agreeing with Malinowski's assertion that phatic communion reflects solidary talk, we argue that the actual words do matter because the phatic actions do not produce automatic and predictable results. Furthermore, solidarity needs to be understood in terms of how it is expressed. In phatic communion, interaction can convey solidarity by matching the feelings of another interactant, or what Aston (1989) terms supportiveness, e.g.

1. Teacher: Did you bring your umbrella today?
2. Pedro: No.
3. Alicia: Yes, do you like it? It has flowers.
4. Teacher: Yeah, it is really beautiful. Personally, I don't like therainy days.
   Do you like the rainy days.
5. Pablo: Only when I am in my house. (Laughs)
6. Students: (Laugh)
7. Teacher: What about you guys?
8. Sergio: Yes.
9. Ivan: Yes, only when I am in my bed sleeping.
10. Teacher: (Laughs) Yeah or when you are not around Plaza del Sol where there is a big river. (Extract 2)

The common thread of laughter (lines 5, 6 and 10) and joking (e.g. line 9) reflects solidary talk as the interactants share common perceptions and feelings regarding rainy weather since they have all gone through the same experience. Furthermore, we would argue that the words do matter as interactants engage in speech acts (e.g. the compliment in line 4: Yeah, it is really beautiful) and creative language use (e.g. line 9: ...when I am in my bed sleeping).

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