Lost – What to say when words don’t come easily – Introduction

0.1      Drafting phenomena – a definition

Drafting phenomena are the the noises, pauses, fillers, hesitations, restarts, repetitions that occur as speakers compose what they want to say in real time. It is a natural feature of spontaneous speech. In these materials, we will see how we can apply some of the these drafting phenomena in speech examinations to make you sound more fluent.

0.2       Introduction

Many types of language are carefully prepared and planned. For example, in writing we have poems, novels, Acts of Parliament, and in speaking we have political speeches, news reading, and sermons. While people are writing, they might cross out some words, change their minds entirely about the order of sentences, or they may pause for a coffee, or pause to decide what to write next. Importantly, (and this is most important), all of these events are are invisible in the final product.

The situation is different in spontaneous speech: the processes of drafting, reviewing and changes-of-mind leave audible traces in the sound substance (the stream of speech).

These traces include silent pauses, filled pauses (um), restarts (Let me … I think that), repetitions (again and again) and reformulations (big, enormous, hug), and they are often treated as if they are symptoms of something wrong in speech. For this reason some teachers feel strongly that it is inappropriate to teach them. They are often labelled disfluencies, and discussed using words with negative connotations such as ‘hesitation’ and ‘indecision’.

However, these traces are the natural result of the processes of constructing meaning in real time. They are absolutely normal and contribute significantly to the sound substance of spontaneous speech. We can use some of these traces to make our speech sound more fluent.

The term drafting phenomena as a collective term for these traces. We will look at pauses (both silent and filled), repetitions, restarts, interjections and vague language such as sort of .

Many of the examples in this chapter come from Dan, a doctor, who talks about his singing experiences at primary and secondary school, and later as an adult. In order to understand his examples, it is necessary to know some context. His experiences include being the soloist (aged ten) in a school choir which reached the final of a competition at London’s Royal Festival Hall. Dan’s musical ability was so impressive that he was made leader of the school orchestra which is unheard of for someone who couldn’t play the violin. Dan also had an audition for the television programme Pop Idol (a predecessor of the more famous X-Factor) in front of the much-feared producer, Simon Cowell. There will also be examples from Toby, a thirty year-old teacher from the UK whose hobby is climbing; from Terry a university lecturer from Dublin; from Mohamed, a university academic from Sudan; from Ellen a student from the USA, and Jess a teacher who is also from the USA.

Below is a draft list of contents..

1. Silent pauses
2. Filled pauses
3. Repetitions
4. Restarts
5. Markers of imprecision
6. Softeners
7. References to speaker roles
8. References to the process of thinking
9. Varying speed
10. Activities
11. Answer key