Teaching paralinguistic features as expressing emotion: A phonological* approach to Appraisal?

Griselda BOMBELLI
Lidia SOLER
(National University of Córdoba, Argentina)

ABSTRACT: As EFL pronunciation teachers, it seems to us that most studies on Appraisal focus on lexico-grammatical resources and on the written language, and that a phonological approach might also be attempted. The purpose of this paper is 1) to present a description of the way in which we deal with the expression of attitude in our English pronunciation courses, and 2) to pose some questions that might lead to future research on Appraisal in spoken discourse. Following Brown’s (1990) taxonomy of paralinguistic features and through carefully planned activities, our university students are trained in the use of phonological resources that contribute to the expression of emotion. Hypothesizing about possible connections between paralinguistic features and Appraisal, we wonder, for example, whether paralinguistic features are complementary to Appraisal and whether they constitute a system on their own.

KEY-WORDS: paralinguistic features, appraisal, phonology, EFL teaching