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A basic finding of sociolinguistics is that, although both language and language usage are structured, it is the latter which responds most sensitively to extralinguistic influences (Hymes 1962, 1964; Ervin-Tripp 1964, 1967; Gumperz 1964; Slobin 1967).
Accordingly, a number of recent studies have addressed themselves to the problem of how factors in the social environment of speech events delimit the range and condition the selection of message forms (cf. Brown and Gilman 1960; Conklin 1959; Ervin-Tripp 1965, 1967; Frake 1964; Friedrich 1966; Gumperz 1961, 1964; Martin 1964). These studies may be viewed as taking the now familiar position that verbal cummunication is fudamentall a decision-making process in which, initially, a speaker, having elected to speak, selects from among a repertoire of available codes that whic is most appropriately suited to the situation at hand. Once a code has been selected, the speaker picks a suitable channel of transmission and then, finally, makes a choice from a set of referentially equivalent expressions within the code.
The intelligibility of the expression he chooses will, of course, be subject to grammatical constraints. But it's acceptability will now. Rules for the selection of linguistic alternates operate on features of the social envrionment and are commensurate with rules governing the conduct of face-to-face interaction. As such, they are properly conceptualized as lying outside the structure of language itself.
It follows from this that for a stranger to communicate appropriately with the members of an unfamiliar society it is not enough that he learn to formulate messages intelligibly. Something else is needed: a knowledge of what kinds of codes, channels, and expressions to use in what kinds of situations and to what kinds of people--as Hymes (1964) has termed it, as "ethnography of communication."
There is considerable evidence to suggest that extra-linguistic factors influence not only the use of speech but its actual occurrence as well. In our own culture, for example, remarks such as "Don't you know when to keep quiet?" "Don't talk until you're introduced," and "Remember now, no talking in church" all point to the fact that an individual's decision ro speak may be directly contingent upon the character of his surroundings.
Few of us would maintain that "silence is golden" for all people at all times. But we feel that silence is a virtue for some people some of the time, and we encourage children on the road to cultural competence to act accordingly.
Although the form of silence is always the same, the function of a specific act of silence--that is, it's interpretation by and effect upon other people--will vary according to the social context in which it occurs. For example, if I choose to keep silent in the chambers of a Justice of the Supreme Court, my action is likely to be interpreted as a sign of politeness or respect.
On the other hand, if I refrain from speaking to an established friend or colleague, I am apt to be accused of rudeness or harboring a grudge. In one instance, my behavior is judged by others to be "correct" or "fitting"; in the other, it is criticized as being "out of line".
The point, I think, is fairly obvious. For a stranger entering an alien society, a knowledge of when not to speak may be a basic to the production of culturally acceptable behavore as a knowledge of what to say. It stands to reason, then, than an adequate ethnography of communication should not confine itself exclusively to the analysis of choice within verbal repertories.
It should also, as Hymes (1962, 1964) has sugessted, specify those conditions under which the members of the society regularly to refrain from verbal behavior altogether.
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