How questions shape interactivity in spoken monologic discourse

• Agnès Celle ^[1]
  1. [1] Université Paris Cité
• Localización: The Grammar of Interaction: Epistemicity, information management and discourse in language use / coord. por Susana Rodríguez Rosique, Jordi M. Antolí Martínez, 2025, ISBN 978-90-272-2860-4, págs. 265-285
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • This chapter aims to show how questions shape interactivity in TED talks, i.e. in a non-dialogical discourse where commitment updates cannot be regulated by turn-taking. It is argued that the interactional contribution of questions is restricted to discourse-management functions. The majority of questions are reported to be unanswered. However, questions are reported to be highly interactive by inferring and anticipating questions that may arise in the audience. We argue that they rely on an assumed knowledge state that they contribute to updating. The behaviour of polar, wh- and verbless questions in TED talks supports the idea that this single-speaker discourse genre is dialogically-motivated.