Final point

3.8 Final point

In recent years there has been an unprecedented confluence between oral and written expressions:

• Television and radio are expressed orally but mainly on the basis of written or prepared discourse
• In the most traditional written formats, such as the book and the press, new technologies have made spectacular development in typography and design possible, to such an extent that graphic design can be seen as the area where the written discourse of the delivery is applied
• Apart from this, some of the new media discourses in written format (electronic mail, chat, SMS, etc.), respond to strategies which up to now have been considered features of and exclusive to orality (simultaneous production and emission, the possibility of interaction, minimum structuring).

So, the clear distinction that the oralists place between oral and written expressions is today more arguable than ever. One of the most polemical points is the identification of oral expression and a lack of structuring which many experts still defend, explicitly or implicitly. As we have already seen, the improvised bertso is a conscious and sufficiently structured discourse, although this structuring has limits imposed by the oral and improvised nature of the genre.

In any case, the non-structuring of the discourse would be a defining character of certain modes of oral expression (informal conversation, live broadcasts of sporting and social events, etc.), but no one format is the definitive feature of all oral expression. Neither is improvisation synonymous with non-structuring. Improvised bertsolaritza, the nature of which we have tried to explain here, is living proof that orality does not necessarily mean non-structured discourse.

The oral or written format of discourse is a valid criterion to typify the various rhetoric genre, but it is not enough. For an adequate typification of the current different modes of rhetoric, the following aspects have to be taken into account, as a minimum:

• Mode of production: oral /written
• Mode of production: improvised /non-improvised
• Level of structuration, above all determined by the genre to which the discourse is initially assigned
• Mode of emission: purely oral/oral aided/write
• Mode of emission: simultaneous/non-simultaneous.

The combination of all these aspects allows us to suitably typify the large number of discourse in circulation today, throwing up the similarities and differences that exist between them.

The improvised bertso, for example, may be typified as an oral production discourse, structured in function of its rhetorical-epideictical character, and simultaneously and orally emitted without written assistance.

This typification allows us to appreciate the complex relationship between improvised bertsolaritza and other formats. Let us have a look at some of the ones closest to bertsolaritza:

• Informal conversation. As in bertsolaritza, it is a type of orally produced improvised discourse, emitted orally and simultaneously. The greatest difference with regards to bertsolaritza is, apart from the fact that it is an uttered discourse, it is not sung and, undoubtedly due to its lack of rhetorical-persuasive intentionality, it has less structuration.
• Chat. Like bertsolaritza, it is an improvised discourse, of simultaneous production and emission. What is novel is that both the production and the emission are in written form. Technological advances, against all predictions, have allowed the written form to appropriate features of what has been considered to date to be exclusively oral, such as improvisation and the simultaneousness of production and emission. We believe adopting this point of view is far more productive than struggling to pontificate about the oral character of certain texts produced in written format. As regards the level of structurating, chat is more akin to informal conversation than to the improvised bertso.
• SMS. This is a discourse mode very similar to chat with the difference being that, for the moment, the technology only allows using 162 characters. This, to a certain degree, reminds one of the technical restrictions facing the bertsolari. Now, the bertsolari, making a virtue of necessity, exploits the technical constrictions of the art to full advantage. In SMS, on the other hand, the problem of limitation of physical space is resolved by means of strategies which appear merely mechanical (suppression of vowels, reduced orthography, etc.) rather than rhetorical and which threaten to bring us back to an age prior to phonation or to the hieroglyphic writing of Ancient Egypt.
• E-mail. Steve Morris, in a book full of interesting data(87), states that, in a hypothetical continuum the extremes of which are, at one end, the classic written letter and, at the other, the informal chat over a cup of coffee or tea, the most appropriate style for business e-mails is much closer to the coffee-house than to the typical business letter. Of course, one has to distinguish between the business function of e-mail and its private use, where it more resembles electronic chat. Regarding its more formal use, which is what Morris analyses, we believe the author uses criteria which are self-contradictory. After stating that the appropriate style for business e-mails is more like that of spontaneous conversation than the business letter, the author uses most of his book to analyse the most suitable rhetorical strategies for achieving an effective discursive structuring in business e-mails, taking into account, amongst other aspects, the importance of the letter-heading and the closing formula, the type of linguistic register to use, suggestions about syntax and textual structure. The rhetorical conditions in which these business e-mails have to be drawn up reminds one, to a great extent, of those the improvising bertsolari has to face in her/his art mode: pressure of time, the need to structuralise while practically improvising a structure that works, the use of previously drawn-up elements, etc.

The voices raised about the galloping impoverishment of discourse are many. We believe that such impoverishment is not inseparable or inevitable but is due, in fact, to a flagrant lack of rhetorical-discursive ability. Compounding the decline of the nuclear family as a conversational school is the manifest inability of the schooling system to remedy the lack of rhetorical-discursive ability amongst younger people. We have already mentioned, in reference to regression to hieroglyphics in SMS, some symptoms, of this rhetorical and communicative inability. We do not wish to leave unmentioned, however, another symptom of this same ailment which afflicts us: we mean the appearance, in chat and e-mail texts, of a more informal register than in the so-called emoticon. By means of these charicatural graphic symbols, we are trying to make up for the lack of appropriate rhetorical strategies. Discourse, in itself, is not capable of arousing emotion in the recipient. It needs a pointer in each paragraph to indicate what the intended reaction of the transmitter is, as in those mediocre TV sitcoms where the canned laughter prompts the viewer when to force a smile and when to guffaw.

Unlike this communicative dysfunction which we suffer from, the rhetoric skill of the bertsolari consists precisely of improvising a structured oral discourse in a matter of seconds. This is a skill which we feel is highly worthy in ambits other than bertsolaritza, itself, such as in the new ways of connecting people arising from cutting-edge technology. In the art of bertsolaritza, the Basque school system has an unbeatable instrument for encouraging rhetorical skills. To ignore it would be a terrible waste in these times when, it is said, communication is the key to almost everything and to opening almost every door.