The significance of intonation in discourse 41One may think, in this particular case, of the wide range of options that
comprise the general paradigm at each of the two places being reduced by
shared card-playing conventions and then further reduced by shared experience
of the immediate conversational environment of the response.
The examples used so far suggest that the non-prominent/prominent
distinction is very similar to the textually given/textually new distinction,
but this is misleading; rather we are concerned with the interactionally
given. All interaction proceeds, and can only proceed, on the basis of the
existence of a great deal of common ground between the participants: that
is, what knowledge speakers (think they) share about the world, about
each other’s experiences, attitudes and emotions. Common ground is not
restricted to shared experience of a particular linguistic interaction up to
the moment of utterance; rather it is a product of the interpenetrating
biographies of the participants, of which common involvement in a particular
ongoing interaction constitutes only a part.
Thus one can imagine a situation in which items are contextually given
but not linguistically realized. In a game of cards after one player has,
without saying anything, put down the jack of hearts; the next player could
quite naturally verbalize
13 // QUEEN of hearts //
using prominence to indicate that the suit is unchanged and contextually
derivable.
Tone choices
In discussing the significance of tonic pitch movement we will confine
ourselves to primary delicacy and the central meaning opposition realized
by end-rising and end-falling tones respectively.
All interaction proceeds, and can only proceed, on the basis of the
existence of a great deal of common ground between the participants.
In fact a major difference between interactions between strangers and
those between friends lies in the degree of uncertainty about the boundaries
of common ground and the amount of time spent exploring these boundaries.
‘Common ground’ is intended to encompass what knowledge speakers
(think they) share about the world, about each other’s experience, attitudes
and emotions. Thus, it is not restricted to shared experience of a particular
linguistic interaction up to the moment of utterance; rather it is a
product of the interpenetrating biographies of the participants, of which
common involvement in a particular ongoing interaction constitutes
only a part.
It was suggested above that the speaker has a major choice between an
end-rising referring tone, symbol ‘r’, and an end-falling, proclaiming tone,
symbol ‘p’. Brazil suggests that in choosing to attach a referring tone to a
particular part of his message the speaker is marking it as part of the existing