A Discourse Analysis Of English TV Talk Show In China

With the development of society and the internationalization of exchange, English TV talk show has become a kind of popular program. In recent years, TV talk show in English has appeared as an emerging kind of program in China. In contrast to their counter parts abroad that arc widely analyzed by western scholars, English TV talk show in China hasn’t got enough and deep analysis yet. In this thesis, we are intended to address the following two central research questions:(1) How does English TV talk show proceed successfully from the perspective of conversation?(2) What kind of inspiration does the dialogue between host and guests bring to English communication?In this thesis, discourse analysis is done on the data base consisting of transcripts of three authoritative English TV talk show programs Dialogue, Top Talk and Yang Lan One on One. Ten editions of each program broadcasted in the year of2009,2010and2011are randomly sampled, totaling thirty editions.This thesis applies the research achievement of the model of discourse analysis by the Birmingham School and that of conversation analysis, analyzing systematically the English TV talk show in China from three perspectives:three-part exchange, turn-taking operation and adjacency pairs. The analysis reveals that in English TV talk show in China, conversation between the host and the guest follows the sequence of IRF (I=initiating move; R=responding move; F=follow-up move) with the third part optional. During the process of the program, the host and the guest carry on the conversation with the skills of taking the turn, holding the turn and yielding the turn. Besides, the adjacency pairs are mostly realized by the format of Q&A.Since the nature of English TV talk show is English conversation, the discourse analysis of it helps us to better understand and appreciate this kind of program, and at the same time, contributes to the design of the program and practice of English conversation.