Behaving according to protocol - How communicative projects are carried out differently in different settings

Oct 3, 2026

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There are a number of theories and models for capturing how organisational aspects relate systematically to communicative modes and genres. This paper focuses on the micro-level of organisations and presents a model explaining how similar communicative projects are carried out differently across activities. The account centers on the notion of conversational games as strategies that realize communicative projects while assigning speaker roles to dialogue participants.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages10

Reading Time25 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

Introduction

Defining interactions

Behaving according to protocol: How communicative projects are carried out differently in different settings Ellen Breitholtz & Christine Howes University of Gothenburg, Department of Philosophy, Linguistics and Theory of Science; CLASP [ellen.breitholtz@ling.gu.se](ellen.breitholtz@ling.gu.se) [christine.howes@gu.se](christine.howes@gu.se) Abstract There are a number of theories and models for capturing the aspects of organisations that are systematically related to the modes and genres of communication taking place within them. In this paper we will consider the micro-level of organisations and present a model of how similar communicative projects are carried out differently within different activities. Central to our account is the notion of conversational games, which can be seen as strategies for realising communicative projects while assigning speaker roles to dialogue participants. 1 Introduction It is well established in the literature on organisational communication that the type of organisation affects the type of communication occurring in it, and vice versa (Baker, 2007 ; Brown and Starkey, 1994 ; Yates and Orlikowski, 1992) . This has lead to a number of theories and models for capturing the aspects of organisations that are systematically related to the modes and genres of communication that take place within them. In this paper we will consider the micro-level of organisations and present a model of how particular interactions play out within social activities and communicative projects of certain types. In section two we will discuss some categories that have been used to analyse interactions and to define different types of interaction. In Section 3 we will show how these categories can be implemented in a formal theory of dialogue. In Section 4 we consider the dialogue moves involved in a particular conversational game of the type in which a suggestion is made. We consider two different dialogues where this game is being realised in two different ways depending on contextual parameters. Finally, in Section 5, we draw some conclusions 2 Defining interactions There are several areas of research which aim to categorise interactions in ways that are predictive of their communicative (including linguistic) features. These theories are based on a variety of concepts such as (social) (communicative) activity (Allwood, 2000),(communicative) project, frame (Levin and Moore, 1977 ; Carlson, 1982), (language) (dialogue) game (Lewis, 1979 ; Ginzburg, 2012), genre, etc. In this section we provide a brief overview of some of these concepts and theories. When defining genres, types of language use etc. a frequently used concept is that of activity, as in the activity in the context of which language occurs. A communicative activity can be described as a comprehensive communicative project tied toa socio-cultural situation type reminiscent of the Wittgensteinian concept “form of life”(Allwood, 2000 ; Malcolm, 1954) . On Allwood’s account an activity type is characterised by the goals, roles, artefacts and environment that are associated with it. The carrying out of an activity consists of a number of sub-goals being completed. These may be more or less communicative in nature. For example, instances of the activity type “Buying/selling coffee in a caf” are made up of sub-goals such as “conveying which product one wants to order”,“conveying how much the costumer should pay”, and, finally,“paying/receiving money”. Linell (2009) also draws on activity types for analysing interactions, but he emphasises the communicative projects that make up activity types. Communicative projects are often strongly associated with the sub-goals of particular activities. Thus in the caf-interaction, the goal “conveying which product one wants to order” is linked to a project like “establishing an order”. Another notion that has been used to define different classes of interactions is the concept of genre (see for exampl

FAQs

What is the main focus of the paper?

The paper models how similar communicative projects are carried out differently across different activities within organisations, focusing on the micro-level.

What central concept does the paper use to explain communicative project execution?

It centers on the notion of conversational games, viewed as strategies for realizing communicative projects and assigning speaker roles in dialogue.

How does the paper relate activity types, project types, and contextual variation?

It treats activity type and project type as independent categories, allowing the same project type to be embedded in many activity types, while conversational strategies may differ by contextual parameters.

Oct 3, 2026

Upload by Franzy