I try and put on a real ensemble performance, all phatic fakery and apologetic grimaces to anyone who endeavours to catch my attention along the way.

A pub conversation may well transmit information, but what also bulks large in such dialogue is a strong element of what linguists would call the 'phatic', a concern with the act of communication itself

There is no doubt that the cross can serve as a phatic signal and as a degenerate index, triggering off an effusive and devout meditation, but this should be radically distinguished from the conceptual content articulated by the symbolic sign.

the communication [...] is in an important sense 'phatic'; a deployment of the appropriate forms and conventions of discourse which has as its goal nothing more than the delightful exercise of taste and reason

In the golden era of structuralism, Roman Jakobson deployed the notion of ‘phatic’ function, which he derived from Malinowski’s concept of phatic communion, the use of language to maintain a social relation through ritualised formulas such as greetings, chit-chat about the weather, and related formal niceties of social communication.