From politeness to discourse marking: The process of pragmaticalization of muy bien in vernacular Spanish

Abstract

In this paper a conversation analysis approach is adopted as the basis for a qualitative study of the adverbial phrase muy bien, which is widely employed in evaluative and polite contexts in standard Spanish. The study shows how this expression has expanded its range of functions to act as a discourse marker in the vernacular Spanish of Castellón (Spain). In spoken discourse, muy bien has a number of different uses. For instance, it can function as an affirmative answer in reactive interventions, or as a signal of self-confirmation or self-correction in initiative turns. Moreover, it also has other metadiscursive functions such as that of introducing new topics or redirecting old ones. The multifunctionality of this adverbial phrase is a consequence of a process of pragmaticalization, that is to say, a semantic blurring away from the referential meaning towards more procedural and discursive ones in different conversational contexts. Furthermore, the issue of formal and semantic convergence with oral Catalan (in its Valencian variety) is discussed.