Routine Formulas Revisited: A Pragmatic Analysis of Conversation Opening and Closing: English vs. Two Egyptian Arabic Varieties

The idea of conducting this study began to germinate in the author's mind 30 years ago, the first day he moved from his home town in Upper Egypt, 600 km south of Cairo, to settle in the cosmopolitan capital of Egypt. Problems of misunderstanding have ever since arisen between the Cairene and the Upper Egyptian varieties of Spoken Arabic. The English conversational openings and closings are used here as a point of departure. Opening or closing an exchange of talk is a universally patterned routine in terms of function though highly conventionalized and culture-specific. A complex network of routine formulas involved in English and Egyptian Arabic on the one hand and in sub-cultures: Cairene and Upper Egyptian, on the other hand, are examined from a functional perspective. That the world has become a small village is an established fact. Cross-cultural interaction is consequently an inevitable necessity, and focus should be made on the various dimensions of social events for better communication and fewer conflicts.