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Chapter 5. The prosody and phonetics of OKAY in American English

  • Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen
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OKAY across Languages
This chapter is in the book OKAY across Languages

Abstract

This chapter is devoted to a study of the prosodic and phonetic realization of the particle OKAY as deployed in American English mundane conversation. Its primary aim is to explore the question of whether there are recurrent prosodic-phonetic formats associated with positionally distinct uses of OKAY. The data come from telephone and face-to-face interactions between family and friends spanning a period from the 1960s to the present. Currently there are approximately 200 tokens in the collection. The older and more recent data sets are considered separately in order to capture changes that have ensued over the last fifty to sixty years.

Abstract

This chapter is devoted to a study of the prosodic and phonetic realization of the particle OKAY as deployed in American English mundane conversation. Its primary aim is to explore the question of whether there are recurrent prosodic-phonetic formats associated with positionally distinct uses of OKAY. The data come from telephone and face-to-face interactions between family and friends spanning a period from the 1960s to the present. Currently there are approximately 200 tokens in the collection. The older and more recent data sets are considered separately in order to capture changes that have ensued over the last fifty to sixty years.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Acknowledgements vii
  4. Chapter 1. Introduction 1
  5. Chapter 2. Data and methods used in the study of OKAY across languages 29
  6. Generic sequential uses of OKAY across languages
  7. Chapter 3. OKAY in responding and claiming understanding 55
  8. Chapter 4. OKAY in closings and transitions 93
  9. OKAY in specific languages
  10. Chapter 5. The prosody and phonetics of OKAY in American English 131
  11. Chapter 6. Rising OKAY in third position in Danish talk-in-interaction 175
  12. Chapter 7. OKAY as a response to informings in Finnish 205
  13. Chapter 8. When OKAY is repeated 235
  14. OKAY in specific activities and settings
  15. Chapter 9. OKAY in health helpline calls in Brazil 269
  16. Chapter 10. A resource for action transition 301
  17. Chapter 11. OKAY projecting embodied compliance to directives 337
  18. Chapter 12. Coordination of OKAY, nods, and gaze in claiming understanding and closing topics 363
  19. Appendix. Transcription conventions and glossing symbols 395
  20. Bibliography 401
  21. Name index 433
  22. Subject index 437
https://doi.org/10.1075/slsi.34.05cou

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Acknowledgements vii
  4. Chapter 1. Introduction 1
  5. Chapter 2. Data and methods used in the study of OKAY across languages 29
  6. Generic sequential uses of OKAY across languages
  7. Chapter 3. OKAY in responding and claiming understanding 55
  8. Chapter 4. OKAY in closings and transitions 93
  9. OKAY in specific languages
  10. Chapter 5. The prosody and phonetics of OKAY in American English 131
  11. Chapter 6. Rising OKAY in third position in Danish talk-in-interaction 175
  12. Chapter 7. OKAY as a response to informings in Finnish 205
  13. Chapter 8. When OKAY is repeated 235
  14. OKAY in specific activities and settings
  15. Chapter 9. OKAY in health helpline calls in Brazil 269
  16. Chapter 10. A resource for action transition 301
  17. Chapter 11. OKAY projecting embodied compliance to directives 337
  18. Chapter 12. Coordination of OKAY, nods, and gaze in claiming understanding and closing topics 363
  19. Appendix. Transcription conventions and glossing symbols 395
  20. Bibliography 401
  21. Name index 433
  22. Subject index 437
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