Intercomprehension en communication telephonique - une etude conversationnelle de conversations telephoniques allemandes et francaises

The organization of understanding in telephone conversations - a conversational study of german and french phone calls

• Auteur / Autrice : Günter Schmale
• Direction : Pierre Bange
• Type : Thèse de doctorat
• Discipline(s) : Linguistique
• Date : Soutenance en 1995
• Etablissement(s) : Lyon 2

Résumé

La transmission de signaux non verbaux (non voco-acoustiques), qui occupent de multiples fonctions non negligeables en communication face-a-face, est exclue en communication telephonique. Ce fait, ainsi que la separation locale des participants, entrainent-ils une forme specifique de l'intercomprehension en communication telephonique? l'analyse conversationnelle d'enregistrements allemands et francais de conversations telephoniques authentiques etudie si les interactants intensifient leurs efforts d'organisation en surstructurant leurs activites reciproques, s'ils restreignent le choix des moyens d'organisation utilises, ou si, d'un autre cote, ils rencontrent des problemes de comprehension specifiques a resoudre afin de negocier un etat de similitude dans l'attribution reciproque de significations aux activites qui permet la poursuite d'un but communicatif. Quatre domaines d'organisation conversationnelle sont examines : l'alternance des locuteurs, la constitution d'une conversation telephonique comme processus sequentiel, les schemas d'interaction depassant l'organisation locale, et les problemes d'intercomprehension en communication telephonique. Les resultats des analyses tres detaillees de ces quatre domaines d'organisation demontrent que le nombre des phenomenes que l'on pourrait appeler specifiques a la communication telephonique est extremement limite. En depit de la privation de signaux visuels, les interactants constituent conjointement une conversation telephonique de facon organisee, sans avoir recours a une intensification, surstructuration ou restriction des moyens d'organisation employes, et sans connaitre des turbulences particulierement frequentes ou graves.

Non verbal visual signals, which have a great number of organizational functions in face-to-face interaction, are obviously not available in telephone conversations. The non transmission of non verbal visual signals, as well as the local separation of the participants, could entail a specific form of the organization of understanding in telephone conversation. The conversational analysis of authentic german and french phone calls studies three aspects : firstly, do the participants intensify their organizational efforts, that is to say do they in some way over-structure their mutual activities? secondly, do they restrict the choice of organizational means employed? thirdly, do they have specific comprehension problems to resolve in order to negotiate a state of similitude in the reciprocal attribution of sense to their activities enabling them to pursue a communicative objective? four organizational structures are examined in detail : the organization of turn-taking, the sequential organization of a phone call, interactional (macro-structural) patterns organizing activities going beyond the simple adjacence pair, and finally manifest comprehension problems. The results of the analyses show that what could be called specific phenomena to telephone conversation is an extremely limited class. In spite of the absence of non verbal visual signals, telephone conversation functions normally, i. E. Without any intensification, over-structuring, restriction of organizational means, and without encountering particularly frequent or serious comprehension problems.