Functional and positional features of discourse markers in high frequency of occurrence in the context of daily speech in Turkish

Spoken discourse is a type of discourse which has features differing from written discourse. In this sense, daily speech is based on interactional elements among the speakers. One of these elements, discourse markers occur in spoken discourse as various morphological, phonological and syntactical units and, the functions of the discourse markers vary in enunciation. In literature, the initial broad analysis upon the discourse markers belongs to Schiffrin (1987). Within this frame, this study aims for describing the discourse markers in general, and provides descriptive analysis of the discourse markers in high frequency of occurrence in Turkish daily speech. Content analysis of the qualitative methodology is the research technique applied for this study. Under the guidance of the previous studies in literature, certain numbers of the discourse markers have been determined, and the frequency values of the discourse markers in Turkish daily speech use have been detected. Following this process, the descriptive analysis upon the discourse markers has been based on interpersonal function and textual function. Brinton (1996)'s taxonomy is the key category approved in this study, for analyzing the functions of the discourse markers. In this regard, a qualitative evaluation towards the discourse markers has been proceeded, assessing the registers selected from the transcriptions within the scope of the conversation analysis. The overall result of this study is the emphasisvii of the functional variance of the discourse markers in Turkish daily speech and their importance in the field of Linguistics. Keywords: Discourse Analysis, Conversation Analysis, Discourse Markers, Spoken Discourse, Daily Speech