Apéndices interrogativos de control de contacto en el habla de inmigrantes colombianos en Madrid

Abstract

Since the early 20th century reference has been made to the existence of a phatic or contact function in human communication, although only recently has it begun to be studied in depth. This function is realised through the use of various verbal and non-verbal resources with different ends: to ensure that the communication channel is open and working; to initiate, prolong or end communication; and to attract the interlocutor’s attention. With a view to understanding better how phatic resources work, what functions they perform in interaction, and how they are influenced by certain social (sex, age, education) and geolectal factors, we are currently engaged in a socio-pragmatic study which will enable us to document general and variable behaviour patterns. Focusing on the first of those subfunctions, this paper analyses the appearance of contact control question tags in the Colombian immigrant sub-corpus of the Dynamic Corpus of Immigrant Spanish (Corpus Dinámico del Español de la Inmigración –CORDIESIN). The results provide us with a first approximation to which verbal resources (question tags) are most commonly used by Colombians resident in Madrid and how they function. They also permit us to make some comparison with the corresponding state of affairs in the speech of Spanish Madrilenians, the upshot being that there is convergence with the host community.