Grooming talking, Facebook, Twitter

claytoncubitt:

“In linguistics, a phatic expression is one whose only function is to perform a social task, as opposed to conveying information. The term was coined by anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski in the early 1900s.

For example, “you’re welcome” is not intended to convey the message that the hearer is welcome; it is a phatic response to being thanked, which in turn is a phatic whose function is to be polite in response to a gift.”

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“Speech patterns between women tend to be more collaborative than those of men, and tend to support each other’s involvement in the conversation. Topics for small talk are more likely to include compliments about some aspect of personal appearance. For example, “That dress really suits you.” Small talk between women who are friends may also involve a greater degree of self disclosure. Topics may cover more personal aspects of their life, their troubles, and their secrets. This self-disclosure both generates a closer relationship between them, and also is a signal of that closeness.

By contrast, mens’ small talk tends to be more competitive. It may feature verbal sparring matches, playful insults, and putdowns. However, in a way these are also both creators and signals of solidarity — the men are signalling that they are comfortable enough with each other’s company to be able to say these things without them being taken as insults.” -Phatic communication

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“Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn were recently talking about the puzzle of “exhaust data.”   These are data that pass between friends on Facebook and Twitter…as when someone tells me they’re doing their nails, or I tell them I’m entertaining my cat.

Who on earth cares?  What kind of communication is this?  Can it be that we are using the internet to issue trivial facts about ourselves?   Facts? The “fact” that I am entertaining the cat is so staggeringly unimportant it fails to interest even the cat.

But there is another, anthropological, point of view.  Exhaust data is, I think, a clear case of “phatic communication.”  This is communication with little hard, informational content, but lots of emotional and social content.  Phatic communications doesn’t get much said, but it has social effects so powerful, it gets lots done.” -How social networks work: the puzzle of exhaust data