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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2013 Dec 11.
Published in final edited form as: Can Mod Lang Rev. 2011 Nov;67(4):10.1353/cml.2011.0025. doi: 10.1353/cml.2011.0025

Table 4.

Categories of Discourse Markers

Category Discourse Markers Explanation
Response Markers Yeah, yes, right, oh yeah,
oh yeah?, oh sure enough
Indicative of a response to
previous discourse with
expectation of continuation
of the old topic and
previous speaker
Negative Response Markers oh geez, oh boy, shoot, uh
oh, imagine that
Response Markers that
indicate a negative response
to previous discourse
Evaluative Response
Marker
oh good, good, very good
right, wow, that’s
wonderful, I see, you’re
right, perfect, excellent, it’s
okay, very interesting,
that’s alright
Response marker that acts
to evaluate the previous
discourse
Attention Markers Then, now, let’s see, so Indicate that attention
should be turned to the
speaker’s utterance
Attention Markers of
Disagreement
well, but, I mean, course,
actually, or, but
Indicate that attention
should be turned to the
speaker’s utterance, which
will be a disagreement
move
Topic Shifters Kay, mkay, nkay (we coded
these as English because of
their phonological
characteristics), alright,
okey dokey, basically
Indicate movement from an
old topic to a new topic
Floor Shifters Right?, kay? Indicate turning the floor
over to a new speaker