Abstract
Despite having unwelcome effects on interpersonal relationships, disagreements constitute the mainstream of talk in dissertation defense sessions. This paper reports on variations in the design of disagreement turns in 20 Iranian defense sessions in L2 English. Drawing on and modifying Locher’s (2004) classification of disagreement strategies, turns were classified into two main categories of “mitigated” and “unmitigated”. Then, for each category, linguistic and paralinguistic devices, which were used in framing disagreements, were identified. The data features almost an equal number of mitigated and unmitigated disagreements. “But with hedged contradictory remarks”, and “hedges” were the most frequent mitigating strategies, whereas “Direct opposite views” and “but with contradictory remarks” were the most frequent strategies in unmitigated and aggravated disagreements. Finally, the implications of the results for research on face and institutional talk are discussed.
About the author
Ahmad Izadi (PhD) is Assistant Professor at Islamic Azad University, Abadan Branch, Iran. His area of interest is interpersonal and intercultural pragmatics and professional communication. He has published in several international journals, including Journal of Pragmatics and Language and Communication.
©[2013] by De Gruyter Mouton Berlin
