Small talk

For every relationship, friendship or an acquaintance someone has made, it all started somewhere small. Asking someone what their favorite season is, how the weather is outside or even a comment about someone’s outfit can all play a part into what is called small talk. According to Matthias R. Mehl, Simine Vazire, Shannon E. Holleran and C. Shelby Clark (2010), small talk is ordinary, predictable conversations. It may also be known as “gossip,” “chat” or “time-out talk” according to Justine Coupland (2000). In Jennifer Tung’s article, 10 Big Rules of Small Talk, some simple guidelines are given on how to approach a small talk conversation. These rules include do a little homework, greet people appropriately, remember names, don’t hold back,…

Although most business is conducted in English, it is important that a translator is present in order to assist with any language barriers that may happen (Rushton, n.d.). Before any official business talk it is important to make small talk in order to ease tension (Yu, 2011). This can include family, culture, history, vacations, politics, etc. Family is very important in Uruguay and tends to be the conversation starter for many business meetings. Uruguayans are very personable people and are…

As the dominant speaker, for the most part, I observed that BS took time to sort of form his sentences out loud as he said them, almost as if he were saying thoughts as they came to him and editing them when they didn’t sound how he wanted them too. This is especially evident in the beginning where he utters, “What do you guys think about the whole, um, this is what was brought up during lunch time. The, uh, like, um, eating disorder awar//uh, the awareness week for--for…,” (BS, Convo. 2016:1).…

As my next customer approaches the register, I glance at the time, “thank God,” I thought, noticing only one hour until my shift ends. Although it was only my third day on the job, the multitude of mistakes that only I could possibly make crippled me as I dreaded what could happen with the nearing customer. Her walk and talk communicates an air of arrogance, and her curt response to my question, “How are you today?” affirmed this. Thankfully, I completed the transaction, managing to make the…

color of a piece of the puzzle, “Are you sure this blue is the same as the blue over there” (line 1-2)? Then immediately afterward, we are introduced to an image of one of the girl fancy about what she wants for the summer, “I need a darker two-piece this summer, the kind with elastic at the waist so it actually fits” (line 4-7). Obviously the two images show the poem is produced with fragments of a larger conversation the girls were having, there are missing pieces of the conversation and a lot…

In today’s fast paced world, it seems as if there is always something going on. Technology is a big reason why we have become so accustomed to the constant influx of information. With the likes of the Internet and its social media outlets, information is provided to the population faster than ever before. Due to the fact that this form of information sharing is new to the public, many adults are not accustomed to this quick and fast paced form of information sharing. I believe that this form of…

Philosophy Bites The podcast of my choice expounds on the topic “Deception with Words” that essentially tends to specifically dwell on the two concepts of “lying” and “deception” as the grand indicators of deception. The two subjects intrinsically gravitate to the construct of deception as a significant aspect of on-on-one engagement that betrays the norms of conversation and ruins the credibility of the “informant” position that parties in the conversation assume. Deception is such a common…

miraculous change in her son’s social development, Newman’s views are biased and her tone is solely positive. Not every technological encounter will yield positive results similar to Gus’s experience. To begin with, a problem lies within the ways virtual assistants are utilized. As Newman states, “For most of us, Siri is merely a momentary diversion” (631). Most people, and especially cadets, are not conversing with Siri in order to improve their conversational skills. Siri is not a cadet’s…

Two prime examples of this are small talk and flirting. Typically, when we engage in small talk, it’s out of boredom, or we are surrounded by strangers which forces us to engage in awkward social interactions. We talk about irrelevant current events that no one particularly cares about, but then we manage to relate these events back to us, or how we’re doing. That would be fine, except usually we only do this impose our level of importance on these strangers, and show them how magnificent we…

In the present, people are on their phones at almost all waking moments of the day. Face to face communication and small talk are a dying concept. People now days, need to put down their phones and communicate with their mouths rather than their thumbs. Garrison Keillor has many interesting thoughts on this topic. The article, The small-talk pleasantries we don't do much anymore, is about how we don’t talk to strangers and strike up good conversation anymore. Even in small towns, people walk…