Lesson 3: Components of Communication

What to Expect?
At the end of the lesson, the students can:
1. describe participants and settings of communication;
2. describe purpose, channels, codes, and message content and
form;
3. differentiate genres, key, rules of interaction, and norms of
interpretation; and,
4. appreciate the whole system and components of communication.

Pre-discussion
Traditionally, speech behavior was said to involve a speaker and a hearer
and include the message transmitted between them.
Modern ethnographic descriptions and analyses have shown that many more
components must be considered if any particular stance of communicative behavior is to be
fully understood. Which of these components assumes a crucial role depends on a given speech
situation and the particular community in which it occurs.

Lesson Outline
Participants. This term includes the sender of a message (encoder, speaker,
or addresser), the intended receiver (decoder, hearer, addressee), and anyone who
may be interested in or happens to perceive (hear, see) the message—the
audience.
In a social context, a thorough ethnographic account of communicative behavior must
carefully note the characteristics of the participants. Age, gender, ethnic affiliation, relationship
(kinship) among participants, their relative social status, the degree to which they are acquainted,
and other factors can influence how communication proceeds.
Settings. Any communicative act or event happens at a particular time and place and
under particular physical circumstances—that is, it is characterized by a particular setting.
Settings are likely to vary somewhat from one instance to the next, even if the events are
similar, but the variation has culturally recognized limits.

104
 Small college classes normally meet in classrooms, but on warm spring or autumn days,
they may be conducted in the shade of a tree outside the classroom building; to meet in a
nearby tavern or the lobby of the administrative building would be considered inappropriate.
Purpose of communication. The purpose of speaking is only sometimes to transmit
information or to exchange ideas. Some- times it is to establish an atmosphere of sociability and
is the equivalent of a hug or a hearty handshake. Speech behavior to bring about such an
emotional effect is called phatic communion.
Channels. The motivation for communicative behavior varies from one occasion to the
next. An individual may make an offer or a request, threaten or plead, praise or blame, invite or
prohibit some action, reveal or try to conceal something, and so on. One’s goal or purpose quite
frequently determines how one speaks or acts. Even an aggressive person may speak meekly
and deferentially when stopped for speeding by a police officer, hoping that polite and
apologetic speech behavior will influence the officer to issue a warning instead of a ticket.
Although the acoustic channel, best exemplified by spoken words, is the most commonly
employed, other communication channels should be noticed. To do so would be to ignore that
communicative behavior that primarily uses one channel frequently depends on other channels
for reinforcement. To hear a play read aloud or to see it professionally performed can mean the
difference between experiencing boredom or enjoyment.
Message, content, and form. Message form and message content are closely related, or
as Hymes (1972) put it, “It is a truism . . . that how something is said is part of what is said.” A
paraphrase may be sufficient to indicate the message content, but only the exact words' quoted
can adequately represent the message form of a speech act. To paraphrase the statement “Like
hell, I’m kidding; I’ve warned you—now get out, fast!” as “I told him in no uncertain terms that
he was no longer welcome” does away with so much color and feeling that the changed form
no longer has much in common with the original content.
Here, it is appropriate to mention the term register, referring to various languages that
serve a particular social situation. In American linguistics, the term is used to differentiate
between broad varieties of a language—for example, between the vernacular (everyday, casual
spoken form) and the standard (prestige form) in English. In Great Britain, the register is used
for several specifically defined varieties, such as legal, scientific, religious, intimate, etc.
Genres. This refers to speech acts or events associated with a particular communicative
situation and characterized by a particular style, form, and content. For example, rituals or
religious occasions regularly call for special genres like prayers and sermons. Sermons and

105
prayers use a ceremonial style of speech with special attention to form. This is why thou, thee,
thy, and thine for “you,” “your,” and “yours” have survived to the present in prayers and the
language of the Friends (Quakers).
Keys. Perhaps more than genre or other components, key varies widely among cultures.
The term key is the “tone, manner, or spirit in which an act is done” and added that “acts
otherwise the same as regards setting, participants, message form, and the like may differ in
key, as, e.g., between mock [and] serious or perfunctory [and] painstaking” (Hymes 1972).
The key may even override another component, such as when a speaker presumably
praising someone becomes slowly but increasingly so sarcastic that the person spoken of feels
hurt or ridiculed. A particular key may be used so frequently by group members that it loses
much of its effect. In contrast, another key may be so rarely employed that it may require some
effort from hearers to identify it and comprehend its social meaning.
Rules of Interaction. Rules of interaction guide communicative activity. Under normal
circumstances, speech community members know what is and is not appropriate. For example,
interruptions are not considered appropriate among members of the middle class in the United
States except among close friends or family members. Still, if someone monopolizes a
conversation, there are acceptable ways of breaking in.
A compliment addressed to another person is usually gratefully acknowledged, or some
remark is made that the compliment may not be fully deserved. When rules of interaction are
broken or completely neglected, embarrassment results, and unless an apology is offered,
future contact between the parties may be strained or even avoided.
Norms of Interpretation. The judgment of what constitutes proper interaction is, of
course, subject to interpretation. The norms of interpretation (just as the rules of interaction)
vary from culture to culture, sometimes only subtly but usually quite distinctly or even
profoundly. Within a single society, if that society is socially or ethnically diversified, not all
members will likely use the same rules of interaction and the same norms of interpretation.
Moreover, a concept frequently used in recent years is termed frame (or, to endow it
with some dynamic framing). It is closely related to what Hymes called “key” and what is
referred to in modern folklore as performance. A particular performance—what the participants
in face-to-face interaction (or discourse) are doing when they speak—commonly determines the
frame of reference in which the exchange is interpreted and understood.
Authentic frames are culture-specific and vary, somewhat or greatly, from one society to
another. A short list of frames (or framings; the list could be greatly expanded) might include

106
bargaining, complaining, congratulating (someone), consulting, excusing (oneself), insinuating
(something), interviewing (someone), joking, mimicking (someone), and reporting (something).
These and other speech situations have meanings that participants are familiar with,
except in situations of wide difference in age or socioeconomic status. A lack of a common
frame could be extreme if two (or several) individuals of strikingly different cultural
backgrounds were to interact. The purpose of such a discourse might need to be better served,
or a serious misunderstanding could even result.

Summary
In discussing the various components of speech, Hymes used as a
mnemonic device the word S P E A K I N G, whose letters stand for settings,
participants, ends (discussed previously as “purpose”), act sequences (the
arrangement of components), keys, instrumentalities (discussed previously as
“channels,” “codes,” and “message form”), norms (of interaction and
interpretation), and genres.

Assessment/Enrichment
Whenever we communicate with someone face to face, we tend to copy
what we say in a style to fit the given situation.
What form would your speech behavior take if you were stopped by the state police for
speeding? If you were falsely accused of cheating? If you were reprimanded for not having
finished an assignment on time? How and why might these forms differ? (20 points)
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________

107
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________

References
Jourdan, C., & Tuite, K. (Eds.). (2006). Language, culture, and society: Key topics in
linguistic anthropology (Vol. 23). Cambridge University Press.
http://196.189.45.87/bitstream/123456789/29011/1/18%20pdf.pdf

Salzmann, Z., Stanlaw, J., & Adachi, N. (2014). Language, culture, and society: An introduction to
linguistic anthropology. Westview Press.
https://dspace.ttu.edu.vn/bitstream/handle/123456789/3457/

Stanlaw, J., Adachi, N. & Salzmann, Z. (2017). Language, culture, and society: An introduction to
linguistic anthropology. New York: Routledge. https://b-
ok.asia/s/language%20culture%20society

108