Professor K. K. Luke was invited to delivera keynote speech on the 2017 International PhD Forum on Linguistics and Applied Linguistics. The keynote speech, titled “Talking, Thinking and Doing Things: A Unified Approach to the Study of Language and Communication”, was given on the morningof May, 6th, 2017. The lecture was chaired by Professor XU, Hai, ViceDirector of the National Key Research Center for Linguistics and AppliedLinguistics (CLAL).
The lecture sketched various accounts from Hayakawa,Sapir, Whorf, Austin, Wittgenstein, Wertsch, Sacks and Schegloff on the linkageamongst language, thought and action. The three, as a unitary whole, was arguedby Professor Luke analyzable within a unified framework of ConversationAnalysis. Professor Luke further emphasized that the process of data collectionin terms of CA should follow a set of stringent rules and principles. Thespeaker showed some data collected under these principles and demonstrated how language,thought and action could be studied through careful observations of the detailsof words choice, grammatical structures, prosody, tone of voice, gesture, eyegaze, body postures, and the totality of the communicative situation. Throughthese analyses, professor Luke summarized that through Conversation Analysis,language may be seen as representative of thought, and also that ofimage-management. Also, Professor Luke mentioned that the complex nature oflanguage has seriously deprived its users of an adequate amount of commonsenseassumptions about language, and that we should tread with care with languageuse, or its nuances will slip away from our feet. Finally, in Q&A session, Professor further elaborates on the delineation of thoughtas well as on the methodology in the treatment of Conversation Analysis.
