SUMMARY
Negotiations are part of human communication. In order to communicate with other people effectively, we should also know how to react to lexical meanings that are not comprehensible within a specific social and cultural context (especially at the initial stage of a foreign language learning). Notably Spanish, for instance, is not a homogenous language but a far more complex phenomenon if we consider its dialectical varieties and thousands of cultures that represent it (López Morales, 2005). In our paper, we will present the functions, structure and characteristics of negotiations from the perspective of discourse analysis and verbal behaviours, taking into account the problems of intercultural communication in the Spanish-speaking world and teaching Spanish as a foreign language. We will also analyse conversational instruments and, in particular, speech acts, which might help learners negotiate both linguistic and cultural meanings. Finally, we will discuss models of verbal communication that might facilitate the prevention of intercultural conflicts.