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  3. Studies in Interactional Sociolinguistics
  • General Editors: Rebecca Clift, Paul Drew, Lorenza Mondada, Marja-Leena Sorjonen

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32 results in Studies in Interactional Sociolinguistics

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Prosody in Conversation
  • Interactional Studies
  • Edited by Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen, Margret Selting
  • Published online:
    24 November 2009
    Print publication:
    11 July 1996
  • The essays in this volume are all original contributions dealing in one way or another with the analysis of prosody - primarily intonation and rhythm - and the role it plays in everyday conversation. They take as their methodological starting point the contention that the study of prosody must begin with genuine interactional rather than pre fabricated laboratory data. Through close empirical analysis of recorded material from genuine English, German, and Italian conversations, the prosody emerges here as a strategy deployed by interactants in the management of turn-taking and floor-holding; in the negotiation of conversational activities such as repair, assessments, announcements, reproaches, and news receipts; and in the keying of the tone or modality of interactional sequences.

The News Interview
  • Journalists and Public Figures on the Air
  • Steven Clayman, John Heritage
  • Published online:
    23 November 2009
    Print publication:
    11 July 2002
  • The news interview has become a major vehicle for presenting broadcast news and political commentary, and a primary interface between the institutions of journalism and government. This much-needed work examines the place of the news interview in Anglo-American society and considers its historical development in the United States and Britain. The main body of the book discusses the fundamental norms and conventions that shape conduct in the modern interview. It explores the particular recurrent practices through which journalists balance competing professional norms that encourage both objective and adversarial treatment of public figures. Through analyses of well-known interviews, the book explores the relationship between journalists and public figures and also how, in the face of aggressive questioning, politicians and other public figures struggle to stay 'on message' and pursue their own agendas. This comprehensive and wide-ranging book will be essential reading for students and researchers in sociolinguistics, media and communication studies.

Gender and Politeness
  • Sara Mills
  • Published online:
    13 November 2009
    Print publication:
    10 July 2003
  • Gender and Politeness challenges the notion that women are necessarily always more polite than men as much of the language and gender literature claims. Sara Mills discusses the complex relations between gender and politeness and argues that although there are circumstances when women speakers, drawing on stereotypes of femininity to guide their behaviour, will appear to be acting in a more polite way than men, there are many circumstances where women will act just as impolitely as men. The book aims to show that politeness and impoliteness are in essence judgements about another's interventions in an interaction and about that person as whole, and are not simple classifications of particular types of speech. Drawing on the notion of community of practice Mills examines the way that speakers negotiate with what they perceive to be gendered stereotypes circulating within their particular group.

Discourse and Identity
  • Edited by Anna De Fina, Deborah Schiffrin, Michael Bamberg
  • Published online:
    09 November 2009
    Print publication:
    29 June 2006
  • The relationship between language, discourse and identity has always been a major area of sociolinguistic investigation. In more recent times, the field has been revolutionized as previous models - which assumed our identities to be based on stable relationships between linguistic and social variables - have been challenged by pioneering new approaches to the topic. This volume brings together a team of leading experts to explore discourse in a range of social contexts. By applying a variety of analytical tools and concepts, the contributors show how we build images of ourselves through language, how society moulds us into different categories, and how we negotiate our membership of those categories. Drawing on numerous interactional settings (the workplace; medical interviews; education), in a variety of genres (narrative; conversation; interviews), and amongst different communities (immigrants; patients; adolescents; teachers), this revealing volume sheds light on how our social practices can help to shape our identities.

Grammar in Interaction
  • Adverbial Clauses in American English Conversations
  • Cecilia E. Ford
  • Published online:
    09 November 2009
    Print publication:
    08 April 1993
  • Cecilia E. Ford explores the question: what work do adverbial clauses do in conversational interaction? Her analysis of this predominating conjunction strategy in English conversation is based on the assumption that grammars reflect recurrent patterns of situated language use, and that a primary site for language is in spontaneous talk. She considers the interactional as well as the informational work of talk and shows how conversationalists use grammar to coordinate their joint language production. The management of the complexities of the sequential development of a conversation, and the social roles of conversational participants, have been extensively examined within the sociological approach of Conversation Analysis. Dr Ford uses Conversation Analysis as a framework for the interpretation of interclausal relations in her database of American English conversations. Her book contributes to a growing body of research on grammar in discourse, which has until recently remained largely focused on monologic rather than dialogic functions of language.

Discourse Strategies
  • John J. Gumperz
  • Published online:
    09 November 2009
    Print publication:
    30 September 1982
  • To understand the role of language in public life and the social process in general, we need first a closer understanding of how linguistic knowledge and social factors interact in discourse interpretation. This volume is a major advance towards that understanding. Professor Gumperz here synthesizes fundamental research on communication from a wide variety of disciplines - linguistics, sociolinguistics, anthropology and non-verbal communication - and develops an original and broadly based theory of conversational inference which shows how verbal communication can serve either between individuals of different social and ethnic backgrounds. The urgent need to overcome such barriers to effective communication is also a central concern of the book. Examples of conversational exchanges as well as of longer encounters, recorded in the urban United States, village Austria, South Asia and Britain, and analyzed to illustrate all aspects of the analytical approach, and to show how subconscious cultural presuppositions can damagingly affect interpretation of intent and judgement of interspeaker attitude. The volume will be of central interest to anyone concerned with communication, whether from a more academic viewpoint or as a professional working, for example, in the fields of interethnic or industrial relations.

Language in Late Modernity
  • Interaction in an Urban School
  • Ben Rampton
  • Published online:
    22 September 2009
    Print publication:
    23 February 2006
  • The study of teenagers in the classroom, and how they interact with one another and their teachers, can tell us a great deal about late-modern society. In this revealing account, Ben Rampton presents the extensive sociolinguistic research he carried out in an inner-city high school. Through his vivid analysis of classroom talk, he offers answers to some important questions: does social class still count for young people, or is it in demise? Are traditional authority relationships in schools being undermined? How is this affected by popular media culture? His study, which provides numerous transcripts and three extensive case studies, introduces a way of perceiving established ideas in sociolinguistics, such as identity, insecurity, the orderliness of classroom talk, and the experience of learning at school. In doing so, Rampton shows how work in sociolinguistics can contribute to some major debates in sociology, anthropology, cultural studies and education.

Matters of Opinion
  • Talking About Public Issues
  • Greg Myers
  • Published online:
    22 September 2009
    Print publication:
    28 October 2004
  • Matters of Opinion offers an interesting insight into 'public opinion' as reported in the media, asking where these opinions actually come from, and how they have their effects. Drawing on the analysis of conversations from focus groups, phone-ins and broadcast interviews with members of the public, Greg Myers argues that we must go back to these encounters, asking questions such as what members of the public thought they were being asked, who they were talking as, and whom they were talking to. He reveals that people don't carry a store of opinions, ready to tell strangers; they use opinions in order to get along with other people, and how they say things is as important as what they say. Engaging and informative, this book illuminates debates on research methods, the public sphere and deliberative democracy, on broadcast talk, and on what it means to participate in public life.

Reporting Talk
  • Reported Speech in Interaction
  • Edited by Elizabeth Holt, Rebecca Clift
  • Published online:
    22 September 2009
    Print publication:
    07 December 2006
  • Reported speech, whereby we quote the words of others, is used in many different types of interaction. In this revealing study, a team of leading experts explore how reported speech is designed, the actions it is used to perform, and how it fits into the environments in which it is used. Using contemporary techniques of conversation analysis, the authors show how speech is reported in a wide range of contexts - including ordinary conversation, storytelling, news interviews, courtroom trials and medium-sitter interactions. Providing detailed analyses of reported speech in naturallyoccurring talk, the authors examine existing linguistic and sociological studies, and offer some insights into the phenomenon. Bringing together work from the most recent investigations in conversation analysis, this book will be invaluable to all those interested in the study of interaction, in particular how we report the speech of others, and the different forms this can take.

Interaction and the Development of Mind
  • A. J. Wootton
  • Published online:
    24 August 2009
    Print publication:
    10 April 1997
  • This study identifies key mechanisms through which a young child operates with external knowledge in her immediate social context. Central to this is the child's capacity to draw on discourse-based understandings which have become evident in prior interaction. These understandings are shown to inform and shape various aspects of the child's behaviour, notably request selection, the emergence of new request forms and various kinds of child distress, and they form the 'context' to which the child's actions come to be increasingly sensitive. In contrast to studies which analyse development under different headings, such as language, emotions and cognition, Tony Wootton links these aspects in his examination of the state of understanding which exists at any given moment in interaction. The result is a distinctive social constructivist approach to children's development.

Crosstalk and Culture in Sino-American Communication
  • Linda W. L. Young
  • Foreword by John Gumperz
  • Published online:
    19 August 2009
    Print publication:
    26 May 1994
  • Chinese and Americans often unwittingly communicate at cross purposes because they are misled by the cultural trappings of talk. This book aims to clarify their misunderstandings by examining their different ideals and strategies of talk. It draws on cultural, philosophical, and linguistic insights and traces the development of Chinese communicative strategies from Confucius through the 'eight-legged essay' to the boardrooms and streets of Hong Kong. Its formal analysis of taped interchanges and in-depth interviews reveals Chinese speakers' distinctive ways of communicating and relating. Crosstalk and Culture in Sino-American Communication will alert people to the pitfalls of cultural misunderstandings and the hidden assumptions and expectations underlying talk.

Laughter in Interaction
  • Phillip Glenn
  • Published online:
    08 August 2009
    Print publication:
    18 September 2003
  • Laughter in Interaction is an illuminating and lively account of how and why people laugh during conversation. Bringing together twenty-five years of research on the sequential organisation of laughter in everyday talk, Glenn analyses recordings and transcripts to show the finely detailed co-ordination of human laughter. He demonstrates that its production and placement, relative to talk and other activities, reveal much about its emergent meaning and accomplishments. The book shows how the participants in a conversation move from a single laugh to laughing together, how the matter of 'who laughs first' implicates orientation to social activities and how interactants work out whether laughs are more affiliative or hostile. The final chapter examines the contribution of laughter to sequences of conversational intimacy and play and to the invocation of gender. Engaging and original, the book shows how this seemingly insignificant part of human communication turns out to play a highly significant role in how people display, respond to and revise identities and relationships.

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