A conversational analysis of silence in harold pinter's the homecoming

Abstract EN

Conversational silence is a means of communication that conveys implied messages produced intentionally by participants in situations where speech is expected by others.

The present paper is limited to the pragmatic analysis of Pinter's employment of conversational silence in his selected play, namely (The Homecoming).

Moreover, it aims at: 1) identifying the forms of silence that manifest conversational silence, 2) specifying the mainly breached Grice's maxims, 3) finding out the most common illocutionary force, 4) manifesting the performed politeness strategies, and 5) pinpointing the most common functions of conversational silence used in the play.

For the sake of analysing the data, this study develops a model of analysis.

Dependent on the model, a qualitative and quantitative analysis is conducted for investigating the forms of silence that manifest conversational silence, the pragmatic strategies, and the functions.

Based on the data analysis, conclusions are drawn.

The most crucial of which are that the manifestation of conversational silence depends fundamentally on three forms of silence, i.

e.

interactive, internal, and extended silence with illocutionary force, which occur simultaneously in conversation, and, therefore, the forms used are equally common.