ABSTRACT
This chapter describes one such group of conversational strategy signals which offer insights into the way in which a dominant speaker may deliberately limit the discoursal options of a subordinate interlocutor. It also explains the effectiveness of these discourse control acts, it is necessary to turn to pragmatic theory, in particular to recent work on interpersonal pragmatics, such as that of Brown and Levinson and Leech. Bunt and Rosenberg make a similar distinction and introduce the term 'dialogue control act' to refer to: communicative actions bearing on the communication as such, rather than on the information transfer that is to be accomplished. Metadiscoursal comments have several functions. They can be used by the dominant participant in order to keep the subordinate from wandering from that previously established path, by disallowing contributions which do not contribute to the dominant participant's discoursal or social goals.
