General characteristics: The research is carried out within the scope of functional linguistics: discourse analysis of linguistic units of non-nominative nature, that is - function words like particles, modal words, discourse connective devices and exclamatory elements that serve as speech operators by making a conversational discourse coherent and authentic. The motivation to study these small units that are often defined by modern English language analysts as discourse markers can be explained by the fact that English learners for whom native languages are Ukrainian or Russian neglect using them because they simply do not know how they work. At the same time these speech operators are important means of rendering quite a lot of semantic and pragmatic information in natural communication. Further experiments and tests with the students revealed the following: function words quite often cause difficulty to learners because they are devoid of nominative power, that is, they do not correspond to anything in the objective reality and have no direct equivalents in the native language. The most striking examples here are such discourse operators as anyway, in fact, actually, after all and a lot more.

Key objectives: Future ELT professionals are expected not only to speak authentic English but also to be able to teach their future students to speak naturally. To achieve this purpose the following tasks are to be considered:

• to provide a linguistic definition of discourse markers;
• carry out a research on the communicative import of discourse markers;
• to provide the list of possible language means used as discourse markers;
• to investigate semantic peculiarities of discourse markers;
• to investigate the connection between discourse markers and the emotional state of communicants;
• to investigate pragmatic situations which cause the appearance of discourse markers;
• to work out a classification of discourse markers based on their conversational value and functions;
• to investigate the connection between discourse markers and a social status of the communicants;
• to analyze the role of discourse markers in the process of speech manipulation;

Generally speaking, speech manipulation is the most recent Dr.Volkova's area of research. Her work in this paradigm is still getting under way.

Speech manipulation is our secret weapon when the speaker wants to induce the listener to make definite conclusions, to change his point of view or to perform definite actions. In other words, the speaker acts in his own interests and tries to manipulate the listener. Nobody likes being manipulated; therefore manipulation is not done openly. Manipulation is our secret weapon when we want the person we are talking with to act as we like or to say something we need. However, if we want to save face, we cannot do it too obviously - the listener should not be aware of it. The best way for the speaker to do it is by using small and invisible function words (discourse markers) because they possess a wide range of implicit meanings that are revealed only in the process of a detailed analysis. In this respect, function words can be called "Discourse Mafia" as the role they play in natural communication is, on the one hand, invisible and, on the other hand, pretty significant.

The results of research are presented in electives for undergraduate and graduate students, articles, conference abstracts and in the book "Theoretical Grammar of Modern English" (Volkova L.M. - Kiev:KNLU, 2007. - 120 p.). In 2007 the Master Paper by KNLU Master student Anna Vasylieva "Strategies and Tactics of Speech Manipulation in the English Conversational Discourse" (research supervisor - L.M.Volkova) won the first place in the all-Ukraine competition for students research papers. Anna Vasylieva was awarded a Diploma of the First Degree by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine.