Preface

Glossary of Linguistic Terms

Definition:

A preface is an audible device, such as one of the following, used within a turn to put off a dispreferred response :

Examples:

There are prefaces of token agreement, appreciation, self-repair, and so forth in the following sentence:

Um, yes, thanks, but you--I mean, I’ll just do it myself.

Source:

334–336

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library. Version 5.0 published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 2003.