College Of Basic Education Research Journal

Abstract

This study investigates the types, functions, frequency and importance of discourse markers (henceforth, DMs) in thirty private synchronous online Yahoo chat texts. The data are drawn from same- and cross- sex dyadic interactions. Adopting Schiffrin's (1987) and Fraser's (1999) models, the study seeks to address certain research questions such as how are the forms of DMs in online chat discourse realized; which DMs are the most frequent; Does gender type play a role in the chatters' use of DMs, etc.
Certain hypotheses are formulated out of which DMs are frequently used in online chat. Second, there are differences in the use of DMs in same- and cross-sex dyadic interactions; it is also hypothesized that conjunction is the most frequent DM in all types of interactions; and that some DMs are informal while others are quite formal.
The results of the study match the hypotheses raised. Thus, it has been found, among the concluding remarks, that there are frequent use of DMs by chatters and that there are gender differences in the use of DMs though conjunction has the highest percentage.