The infant-directed speech of Wolof-speaking Senegalese mothers and French-speaking
mothers living in Paris were compared to relate infant-directed communicative acts
to the value system of the society to which the speaker belongs, and to describe the
child’s place in those societies. Mother-infant linguistic interactions
with 4-month-old infants were recorded (five dyads in the French group and four in
the Wolof group). The discourse variables of the pragmatic and semantic categories
in the mothers’ speech were analysed. The cross-cultural analysis included
a comparison of the conventional versus shifted use of person markers by the mothers
in the two cultures. The results demonstrated some features common to both groups,
namely, a high percentage of expressive speech acts and the importance of
affect-related statements. Some culture-specific emphases and tendencies were also
noted. Whereas the French mothers’ conversational exchanges with their
infants were dyadic in organisation and centred on the immediate physical
environment, the Wolof mothers frequently expanded the dyadic framework to introduce
third parties as conversational partners but talked very little about the immediate
physical environment. Thus, it appears that cultural conceptions influence not only
the content of mother-infant exchanges but also their participant structure.
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