Exploring grammatical features of informal talk in English literature

Abstract EN

The most fundamental social function of conversation through which people's social identities are set, maintained and modified urged researchers to use interchangeably terms like 'talk', 'conversation' and 'discussion' throughout their entire texts.

In addition of being informal, conversation is predominantly spontaneous, interactive, interpersonal, and always takes place in a shared context.

It also displays speakers' identity.

The present reflective piece is an attempt to shed light on the fact that informal talk has special grammatical features different from those of written language and that can be easily depicted in literary works.

Writers and novelists, not only the contemporary ones have been making efforts to highlight the whiff of spontaneous conversation.

These grammatical aspects have been described through Anthony Trollope's Victorian perceptive satire 'The way We Live Now'.