Wang & Peng 1

Tracy Wang and Brian Peng

Professor Nash

Introduction to Linguistics

December 15, 1988

 

Pauses

Introduction

        Do pauses play an important role in speaking?  Yes, they really do because people need pauses to take a breath, show their hesitation, or prepare to continue speaking.  People also pause “at the end of a completed syntactic structure like a phrase or sentence” to show that their turn in the conversation is over (Yule 143).  In this report we will discuss pauses in monologues, including their length, location, functions, the use of silence or words in pauses, and the conditions in which pauses are needed. 

 

Design

In order to collect examples of real pauses, we asked three teachers and four students in the English Department, Fu Jen Catholic University, to discuss one of the following questions:

(a)  If you were not a teacher anymore, what would you like to do?

(b)  What is your attitude toward homosexuals and AIDS?

The teachers spoke English in their responses, and the students spoke Mandarin.  All responses were tape recorded and transcribed, with special attention to pauses.

 

Findings and Discussion

        According to our recordings and transcriptions, we divide pauses into two types:  shorter pauses (around 1 to 3 seconds), and longer pauses (about 4 to 8 seconds).  The length of pauses and the conditions in which they occurred seemed to be closely related, in both Mandarin and English (see table 1).  Shorter pauses tended to be related to pausing out of habit (two of the speakers paused much more frequently than the others, so that they seem to have a real habit of pausing), pausing to moderate the atmosphere (in order to feel more comfortable discussing a sensitive topic), emphasis, and planning the next thing to say.  [Professor's note: perhaps some examples taken from the data should be shown here to support the points about short pauses.  Ideally, some examples should be given somewhere either in the text/table or the appendix.] Longer pauses were associated with thinking, organizing ideas, a lack of ideas to continue speaking with, or a failure to find the right words to continue.  Some of the speakers did not like our topics because of their personality or lack of background information, causing them to pause more and for longer periods in the beginning of their responses.  Sometimes speakers felt what they said was not right, and then made a longer pause and started another response. [Note: Examples here for long pauses, as above for short pauses.]

 Length of and conditions for pauses in both Mandarin and English

1-3 seconds	out of habit to moderate atmosphere to take a breath thinking to prepare the next thing to say to emphasize something
4-8 seconds	thinking to organize ideas a lack of ideas to continue not familiar with the topic (in the beginning) really do not know how to start or how to continue cannot find suitable words or expressions to express their ideas

        Both English and Mandarin speakers used silent and filled pauses.  Tables 2 and 3 show the rough frequency of different pause fillers at the beginnings of sentences and within sentences in English and Mandarin.  We found that silence was used most in both positions because people needed to think a while.  Two examples of within sentence silence were:  We should not judge . . . despise . . . or pity them; I’d like to be a teacher . . . a fashion designer . . . or a journalist.  (Three periods indicate a pause.)

       We noticed some interesting things about filled pauses in English. Concerning ennn . . . and eeee . . ., we think many people say them out of habit when they need to pause.  Moreover, speakers use I find and I think very often because these two openings are more suitable for showing personal response.  With regard to and, people say it in order to connect ideas or linguistic units like sentences, phrases, verbs, or nouns.

After our analysis of pauses in Mandarin, we noticed that silence was used most often.  Then, ennn . . . and eeee . . . and the Mandarin equivalents of I feel [我覺得] and I think [我想] were the most frequent pause fillers, used very often owing to the same needs or habits as English speakers.

 

Pause Fillers in English 

Frequency	Sentence beginning	Within sentence
More often	silence ennn    eeee I find I think	silence and ennn  eeee because
Often	if	or so after (V)   after (N) a click sound
Less often	you know I try   in other words  of course  first of all    we can maybe I don’t think    perhaps  it will be anyway I don’t know how to say	well  like lots of and then in general in general part of it first an intentional cough

　

Pause Fillers in Mandarin

Frequency	Sentence beginning	Within sentence
More often  Couldn’t find the character they used-- 也 with a mouth	silence ennn 嗯  eeee [欸﹖咿﹖]    wo xiang 我想 ‘I think’ wo juede       我覺得 ‘I feel’	silence ranhou 然後 ‘and then’  yinwei 因為 ‘because’ jiushi 就是 ‘that is’ erqie 而且 ‘also’ suoyi 所以 ‘so’ danshi 但是 ‘but’ eeee ennn 嗯
Often	wo   我 ‘I’  jeyangzi       這樣子 ‘this way’   wo xiwang 我希望 ‘I hope’ jeshi 這是 ‘this is’  nashi 那是 ‘that is’  neige 那個 ‘that’ jege 這個 ‘this’	naaa 那 ‘that; so’ keshi 可是 ‘but’ namaaa 那麼 ‘so then’ xiang 像 ‘like’ jeshi 這是 ‘this is’  . . .dehua 的話 ‘if’ neige 那個 ‘that’ jege     這個 ‘this’
Less often	a 阿  click sound  intentional cough	bijiao 比較 ‘comparatively’ jezhong 這種 ‘this kind’ ne 呢 attention marker ma 嗎 question marker nenggou 能夠 ‘can’

 [Professor’s note: The general terms used in Table 2 for “frequency”--“more often,” “often,” and “less often”—should be defined.  In other words, how many times did a pause filler occur for it to be classified into the “more often” category or into one of the other categories.]

        Another important feature of pauses is their location.  Generally speaking, pauses appear before sentences, within sentences, or at the ends of sentences.  These situations fit pauses in both English and Mandarin.  Table 4 shows the locations of pauses in our English sample.  We found that pauses made out of habit or to moderate the atmosphere could occur in many different locations, so we feel that maybe we may pause in English quite freely.

Grammatical Locations of Pauses in English, with Examples 

After subject	After verb	After introductory particle	After noun
I . . .	I find . . . I think . . .    I suppose . . . I don’t think . . . I feel . . . You know . . . Do . . .	Eeee . . . Ennn . . . Say . . .   Well . . . Ohh . . .	about AIDS . . . about homo-sexuals . . .
After infinitive	After adverb	After auxiliary verb	After pronoun
I try to . . .	of course . . .  anyway . . . perhaps . . . maybe . . . and then . . . first . . .	We can . . .	part of it . . .
After conjunction	After preposition	After adjective	Before sentence
in other words . . . first of all . . . or . . .   and . . .     because . . .  but . . .      so . . . if . . .	like . . .   lots of . . .	general . . .     it’s possible . . .  it’s time . . .	silence    eeee . . .  ennn . . .  intentional cough  click sounds

        A comparison with the location of pauses in Mandarin (see table 5) shows that Mandarin and English speakers pause in similar locations, except for the ne and ma question endings in Mandarin.  English speakers seem to use intonation or sentence structure to show that what they are saying is a question.

Grammatical Locations of Pauses in Mandarin, with Examples 

After subject	After verb	After introductory particle	After noun
Wo . . . 我	wo xiang . .我想 wo xiwang 我希望 wo juede    我覺得 jeshi 這是 nashi 那是 jiushi 就是 danshi 但是 keshi 可是	ennn . . .嗯  eeee . . . a 啊	jeyangdehua 這樣的話
After adverb	After auxiliary verb	After conjunction	After preposition
ungchang 通常 changchang 常常	nenggou 能夠	jeyangzi     這樣子 ranhou 然後 yinwei 因為 jiushi 就是 erqie 而且 na 那 suoyi 所以 danshi 但是 keshi 可是 bijiao 比較 namaaa 那麼 jeyangdehua 這樣的話 jishi 既是	xiang 像
After adjective	Before sentence	After grammatical particle	After any class of words
jezhong 這種 neige 那個  jege 這個	click sound    intentional cough	ne 呢 ma 嗎	laughing click sound intentional cough

Conclusion

        Our research into pauses, an element of language which is often ignored, has shown how complicated and influential they are in our speaking.  We found a difference between the conditions for shorter and longer pauses, and some similarities between silent and filled pauses in English and Mandarin.  It is interesting that in these two different languages we make similar sounds to fill pauses (ennn . . . eeee . . .and clicks and coughs) and use similar words as fillers (because 因為, I think 我想, so 所以, like像, I find 我覺得).  Before they say anything, speakers may pause to think about their response, or to prepare the first thing they will say.  Within sentences, speakers may pause to take a breath, to search their memories for a suitable word, or to try to think of what to say, or because they lack ideas to continue with.        However, because we collected pauses from speakers who were answering our questions, we only have examples of pauses in monologues.  We have no examples of pauses in conversations with two or more speakers.  For this reason, we could not investigate pauses used in turn-taking, as discussed by Yule (143-44).  This is a weakness in our study.  Perhaps some other classmates who studied this topic found out more about pauses in conversations.  Still, our speakers in their monologues did use pauses in a way discussed by Yule. Although they were essentially in one-person discussions, they still worked to hold the floor by “using connectors like and, and then, so, but,” pausing “at points where the message is clearly incomplete,” and filling pauses “with hesitation markers such as er, em, uh, ah” (Yule 144).

                                                                        

@ Starting a New Page Here ~~~

Work Cited

 Yule, George.  The Study of Language.  2^nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1996.

 

 Professor's comments

        Good overall MLA format.  Good presentation of data in tables, with the tables connected to the text of the report to help the reader (e.g., “see table 1”).  Clear and brief explanation of methodology.  Interesting data.  Good control of English.

        Analysis of the data could go further. There isn’t really much discussion of the data.  The Findings and Discussion sections of the report perhaps should be separate. For instance, little is said about Tables 4 and 5, grammatical locations of pauses, which are somewhat confusing.  In Table 5, several filled pauses are listed under more than one grammatical category (e.g., jiushi 就是, danshi但是, keshi 可是, and jeyangdehua 這樣的話), and the division into grammatical categories is not entirely clear.  An analysis of the grammatical location of pauses might better begin with consideration of larger units such as clauses and phrases. Transcriptions (neatly typed) of the monologues could be included as an appendix, so that the professor and other readers of the report could see the pauses in context, and thus better evaluate the authors’ analysis.

        We suggest that students use this sample report mostly as a model for the format.  Remember that the purposes of doing a term report for this course are to practice directly observing and analyzing language yourselves, and to practice writing up what you find in a clear and interesting manner, following the conventions of academic work in the English Department.

[Back to Report]