Prosody in Conversation

The essays in this volume are all analyses of prosody--primarily intonation and rhythm--and the role it plays in everyday conversation. Prosody emerges as a strategy deployed by interactants in the management of turn-taking and floor-holding; in the negotiation of conversational activities such as repair assessments announcements reproaches and news receipts; and in the keying of the tone or modality of interactional sequences. The material studied is taken not from constructed laboratory data but from genuine English German and Italian conversations.