I walked onstage in Salt Lake City and said “Good morning” to a crowd of three hundred or so. I received a somewhat tepid “Good morning” in return. I followed my initial greeting by asking, “How are you doing?” and received an even weaker response with a few people mumbling “good” and one person shouting out “great.” The entire interchange, based on a superficial cultural formula, was largely meaningless for most, if not all, in the room. This often-used pattern of communication is called formulaic language formation, where I begin in a predictable manner and the audience responds in an
...more
This highlight has been truncated due to consecutive passage length restrictions.
