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Part of
Technology Mediated Service Encounters
Edited by Pilar Garcés-Conejos Blitvich, Lucía Fernández-Amaya and María de la O Hernández-López
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 300] 2019
► pp. 145–170

Chapter 6
Call centre service encounters

Second-language users, conversationalisation, (im)politeness and discursive practices

Non-native English-speaking call-centre agents, often located hundreds of miles from their customers, engage in asymmetrical transactional relationships with callers who often question their language proficiency and their overall work competence. Potentially placed at a communicative disadvantage with their native-speaking callers, the operators cannot directly confront their customers. Furthermore, agents tend to engage in conversationalised transactional talk as they adhere to scripts, standardised politeness routines and “synthetic personalisation” (Fairclough 2010). A critical discourse analysis framework examines Mexican call centre agents’ own perceptions regarding how they face up to the challenges of constructing a dialogue on equal terms, negotiate conflictive situations and overcome a sense of powerlessness due to their restrictive discursive options.

Keywords: call centres, foreign language use, critical discourse analysis, (im)politeness, conversationalisation
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Call centre service discourse
    • 2.1Formulaic greetings
    • 2.2Conversationalisation
  • 3.Mode of enquiry: Critical discourse analysis
  • 4.A pragmatic-discoursal framework
    • 4.1Ideational function
    • 4.2Interpersonal: Seeking acceptance
    • 4.3Textual
  • 5.Research interest
  • 6.Methodology
    • 6.1Data and participants
    • 6.2Participants
    • 6.3Data collection instrument: The use of interviews
  • 7.Results
    • 7.1Findings
    • 7.2Ideational
    • 7.3Interpersonal
    • 7.4Textual
  • 8.Discussion
    • 8.1Ideational rejection
    • 8.2Lack of interpersonal identity
    • 8.3Textual formulaicity
  • 9.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 10 January 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.300.06mug
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