Scripted “Conversations”

Step 1: Make two or three calls to a large company which has some sort of customer-service facility. Do one of the following (Be nice and polite to the call center agents!):

(a) try to speak with a different representative each time so that you can compare their script;

(b) track different routes of an automated customer service to listen to the different choices that are given.

Step 2: Prepare an account of your exchange/s:

— what company did you call? what service system(s) did they use?

— Did the automated messages and/or the conversation with the representatives remind you of the Cameron article? In what ways?

— To what extent were “top-down talk” features reproduced?

— In what ways did the script deviate from the scripted “top-down talk”?

— (If you spoke with real people, were there signs of “women’s language” (as it’s explained in Thursday’s lecture)? In what way/s?