What is Conversation Theory

There is growing recognition of the important role conversational quality has in online learning, particularly within virtual organizations. Discerning the quality of online conversations poses a serious challenge for online designers and researchers. The purpose of this article is threefold, namely to: (1) provide an overview of conversation theory and conversational pragmatics, (2) identify a taxonomy of conversations and key conversational competencies for online learning conversations within virtual organizations, and (3) offer practical guidelines for evaluating online learning conversations within virtual organizations using conversational pragmatics. This article is based on prior work supporting that a disciplined approach to conversation can offer virtual organizations a tool for gauging online learning communities. It should be useful to those who study, develop, evaluate and moderate online communities for e-learning, e-business, e-government and other related domains.