Abstract
This qualitative document-based study examines how language register shifts and institutional talk worktogether to produce authority, compliance, and moral order in Shirley Jackson’s short story “TheLottery.” Using a systemic functional linguistics (SFL) view of register (field, tenor, mode), supported byconversation-analytic ideas about institutional interaction and a pragmatics view of ritual language, theanalysis tracks how villagers move from everyday neighbour talk to procedural, official talk and finally tosanctioning talk that enables collective violence. The findings show three broad phases: (1) informalvillage interaction dominated by casual evaluations and community small talk; (2) institutionalizedprocedure marked by role-terms, directives, list-making, and routinized sequencing; and (3) a tighteningregister where imperative-like moves, reduced mitigation, and group alignment accelerate action. Acrossphases, the story portrays how institutional roles and ritual routines narrow speaker options, suppresscontestation, and reframe violence as “just the way things are done.” The study contributes an appliedlinguistic account of how register dynamics can be modelled in literary discourse, and how institutionaltalk may emerge inside small communities without formal buildings or professional officials.