A Comparative Analysis Of Conversation In Chinese And American TV Talk Show

The TV talk show has gone through several different phases, and has achieved dramatic development since its emergence. And it has become one of the most important TV genres among all the programs. Meanwhile, as a kind of significant mass media, talk show has become a great concern in the academic field at home and abroad, and there are a growing number of scholars starting to analyze different parts of the talk show.On the basis of the conversation analysis, Yang Lan One on One and Ellen Show were selected as the subjects, and the similarities and differences between these two talk shows were discussed, respectively. The author selected five programs of each talk show, and transcribed all these ten interviews, and then a corpus was made. Then the comparative study between these two talk shows from the perspective of topic and turn was carried out, and the possible reasons that led to these similarities and differences were discussed as well.The study showed that there were similarities and differences between Yang Lan One on One and Ellen Show on the topic and the turn. For example, in selecting the topic, both programs talked about achievements or contributions with the guest, and the new topic was usually initiated by the host, but that didn?t mean the guest had no chance to start a new topic; in discourse coherence and cohesion of the topic, trail connection was frequently used in both two talk shows, but the methods of topic switching were varied. As for the turns, there were more sentence groups in Yang Lan One on One than in Ellen Show, and the turn was taken more frequently in the Ellen Show; general supportive verbal feedbacks were frequently used in Yang Lan One on One and Ellen Show, and highly supportive verbal feedbacks were rarely used in two talk shows; inquire-answer was the most common adjacency pair used in both talk show, besides, state-state was also used a lot in Ellen Show; as for the discourse interruption, there were more discourse interruptions in Ellen Show.In accordance with the results of the analysis, the author generalized the reasons for the similarities and differences. There were some essential elements which can make a program successful, which also explain the similarities that Yang Lan One on One and Ellen Show share. The reasons that led to the differences were divided into three categories: orientation of the program, charisma of the host and the influence of culture.The author hopes that this study may give people some inspirations of how to carry out a successful conversation, and provide some enlightenment for the media producers, and it may also give some hints to the future studies in this field.