Context Description: Email Communication

Context Description The email interaction that I am using is between myself and my aunt (Amy) on my mom’s side of the family. I am turning twenty during the time of this email conversation and my aunt is sending a congratulatory message. The emails span over a week in which my aunt also inquires into whether I have joined the cellphone application known as VIBER. VIBER is a Wi-Fi based communications application that allows users to communication through the Internet. What is important to note is that my aunt lives in Paris, France and communication through VIBER, which is cheaper and more convenient. This aunt in particular also tends to be closer compared to my other aunts and has a shrew attitude.
Dissecting discourse practices In the …show more content…
Thus I am subjugated to being her nephew and someone who is perhaps less mature. This relational dominance is established may times through our email exchange by her use of short abrupt sentences that are very direct and interrogatory questions that question my sincerity through implicatures. Examples of this relational dominance can be found in my aunts second email when she says, “is it because you have another smart phone that’s not an IPhone?” and in her last email “I’ve got Laney, Does she have and IPhone?” Although these few quotes may seem to be legitimate questions, knowing the individual my aunt is, there was most likely a bit of sarcasm behind those remarks. Thus my aunt is flouting the quality maxim, by addressing an issue she already knows the answer to. The use of short concise sentences that are very direct is an example of where my aunt uses the manner maxim with implicatures as to direct my response. Examples would be, “ Yours just didn’t show up.” and “See if you can get on that one.” Through these small implicatures based throughout the email, I believe that I am able to see the layers of interactional meaning that are being