A Comparative Analysis of Casual Conversation and Institutional Talk

This article relfects on the process of transcribing spoken interaction and makes a comparative analysis of two different varieties of spoken interaction (casual conver-sation and institutional talk). By doing so, it reveals how the different purposes of speech result in their distinctive characteristics, and shows how language is struc-tured to construct ideational meanings (Field) and interpersonal meanings (Tenor) that deifne each context.