The paper examines the place of computer-mediated communication on the written-spoken continuum. It is based on an analysis of two CMC modes: an asynchronous (not real-time) discussion forum and a synchronous (real-time) chatroom interaction. The criteria for the analysis were chosen according to the characteristic features of written and spoken language and both CMC modes are represented by two comparable corpora. The study reveals a substantial degree of conversational strategies in both CMC modes, although significantly prevailing in the synchronous one. The results of the present paper contribute to the justification of the application of conversation analysis tools to the study of CMC which, in fact, is a written discourse.
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