Conversational routine

This collection of essays addresses the notion of 'conversational routine', and explores the characteristics of some of the more prepatterned, formulaic, and conventionalized aspects of conversational activity from a variety of perspectives. In his preface, Coulmas claims conversational interaction has its own rules, different from a linguist's notion of 'rule', and that 'conversational rules and routines purport to structure and make possible both the predictable and the non-predictable aspects of conversation' (p. x). Hence the importance of this relatively unexplored side of conversational…