Conversationwhether
Conversationwhether is a neologism used in discourse studies to describe a conversational practice in which participants jointly explore and delay commitments by embedding 'whether' clauses within ongoing talk. The term blends 'conversation' with the logical question word 'whether,' signaling a method of presenting alternatives without finalizing a course of action. As a research concept, it aims to capture how speakers co-construct deliberation, defer decisiveness, and manage alignment through tentative phrasing rather than explicit choices.
In typical instances, conversationwhether features turn-by-turn insertions of 'whether' statements that assess options, risks, or permissions
Examples: “We could try the new approach, whether that’s better remains to be seen.” “Let’s pause here,
Applications of the concept include discourse-analytic analysis of deliberative dialogue, design considerations for AI dialogue systems
Limitations include the fact that whether-clauses are common across languages and genres, making the term hard
See also: hedging, stance, discourse marker, deliberative conversation.