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It can be called as a ‘dispreferred’ response since it is not fully fitting to the speaker’s presupposition. It can also be called as a challenge rather as
response since it is challenge the presuppositions of the preceding utterance; and, it is a face threatening. It can be done by employing a declaration of ignorance, a
declaration of inability to fulfill the speaker’s presuppositions, unwillingness to fulfill the speaker’s presupposition, a challenge to the speaker’s presuppositions
and by using fillers, hesitations, or evasive answer to indicate the reluctance. The example taken from The Day After Tomorrow is as follows:
Jack Hall : Are you sure you cant get home any sooner than tomorrow?
Sam Hall : Well, looks, Dad, I would if I could, you know. Its just. … This
smell is unbearable, Dad. c.
Temporization It is a response that contains a postponing the decision-making. Therefore,
it is not fully fitting to the speaker’s presupposition and can also be called as a ‘dispreferred’ response. The example taken from The Day After Tomorrow is as
follows:
Jack Hall : Sam is a straight-A student. He doesnt fail classes.
Dr. Lucy Hall : I dont have time to talk about this now.
The schematization of the three major subclasses of responding acts is: Fully fitting
Positive responding act Response
Negative responding
Not fully fitting Temporization
I. Status and Role
In all of the many social groups where individuals belong to, people have a status and a role to fulfill. Status is a relative social position within a group, while
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a role is the part of the society expectation to their members to play in a given status
http:anthro.palomar.edustatusstat_2.htm . Sociologist Louis Zurcher
1983 in Golder defines social role as a set of behavioral expectations for what a person should do, when occupying a position in a specific social setting 223.
Meanwhile, Erving Goffmans 1959: 16 in Golder defines a social role as the enactment of rights and duties attach to a given status. This assessment has room
for both formal and informal status, and acknowledges the relationship between status and behavior i.e. rights and duties. Combining these two theories, it is
important to consider both what one does i.e. in the context of his social dramas and what one can do i.e. the rights and duties ascribed to him.
http:web.media.mit.edu~golderprojectsrolesgolder_thesis.htm .
In The Day After Tomorrow, the characters are customized with various statuses and roles. For example, Jack Hall has a status as a father in his family.
Because of this status, he is expected to fulfill a role for Sam Hall as his only son to nurture, educate, guide, and protect him. Thus, the expected role of Jack is the
same like all fathers around the world that is as a protector and a provider for his wife and his son.
It is a fact that social group membership gives a set of statuses and roles that allow people to know what to expect from each other and make it more
predictable. However, it is common for people to have multiple overlapping statuses and roles. The social group membership gives the members a set of role
tags that allow them to know what to expect from each other, but they are not always straight jackets for behavior
http:anthro.palomar.edustatusstat_2.htm .
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Hence, in generating a successful communication, the recognition of the participants’ statuses and roles also become the important aspects of
communicative competence as the term of communicative competence is used to describe the speaker’s ability in using language appropriately. Saville-Troike in
Wardhaugh, 1998 states as follows: Communicative competence extends to both knowledge and expectation of
who may or may not speak in certain settings, when to speak and when to remain silent, whom one may speak to, how one may talk to persons of
different statuses and roles, what nonverbal behaviors are appropriate in various contexts…. - In short, everything involving the use of language
and other communicative dimensions in particular social settings 246. In conclusion, communicative social interaction requires more than
knowledge of the topic and the setting of the conversation. It is also important to know something about the people with whom one is interacting, and know their
statuses and roles domain in which the conversation takes place.
J. Film
