The analysis of canonical and non-canonical questions in an English language podcast

Abstract

This bachelor’s thesis studies direct questions in “Grammar Day,” an episode of a linguistics podcast Talk the Talk. The aim is to analyze the formulation and function of canonical and non-canonical direct questions in natural oral discourse. The approach used is similar to that of conversation analysis and, hence, the analysis does not proceed from any specific hypotheses. Instead, the thesis takes a data-driven approach. The thesis consists of five sections: the introduction, the section comprising the literature review, an analysis of direct questions in the annotated transcript of the podcast episode, the conclusion, and the list of references. The introduction highlights the importance of examining canonical and non-canonical questions as well as the reasons for choosing podcast as a source for compiling the corpus of this study.