Shifting of “expert” and “novice” roles between/within two languages: Language socialization, identity, and epistemics in family dinnertime conversations

Multilingua ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-117 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noriko Takei ◽  
Matthew Burdelski
Keyword(s):  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Language Socialization ◽  
The Self ◽  
Epistemic Status ◽  
Immigrant Family ◽  
Communicative Practices ◽  
Audio Recordings ◽  
Living Together ◽  
Expert And Novice ◽  
Epistemic Stances

AbstractThis article explores the construction and shifting of “expert” and “novice” roles between and within two languages (Japanese and English). Taking a language socialization perspective while drawing upon insights from conversation analysis on epistemics in interaction, it analyzes seven hours of audio recordings of dinnertime talk in a Japanese-speaking immigrant family with a university-aged adult daughter living together in Australia. The analysis identifies several key communicative practices, such as word definitions and repair, which participants deploy in displaying epistemic stances that constitute the self and family members as possessing relatively more or less knowledge and expertise (epistemic status) with respect to these two languages. The findings reveal the dynamics of language socialization in a bilingual/immigrant setting in which the relative roles of expert and novice emerge, shift, and are negotiated in interaction. In conclusion, the findings are discussed in relation to language expertise, power and hierarchy, agency and bidirectional language socialization.

Are gendered terms inference-loaded? Evidence from Greek talk-in-interaction

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 74-97
Author(s):  
Angeliki Alvanoudi
Keyword(s):  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
The Self ◽  
Relevant Aspect ◽  
Audio Recordings

The present study examines the relation between referential indexing of gender and speakers’ cognition in instances of gendered noticing in Greek talk-in-interaction, drawing on audio recordings of informal conversations as data and on conversation analysis as method. Gendered noticing occurs after actions that invoke specific presuppositions about gender, such as the norm of heterosexuality and stereotypes regarding ‘typical’ feminine and masculine attributes and behaviour. Speakers deploy gendered terms to attend to gender as a relevant aspect of context, and to position the self and others as women or men. It is shown that via gendered noticing, speakers uncover their covert assumptions about social gender and bring their conceptualisations of gender to the ‘surface’.

Initiating side-sequenced vocabulary lessons

2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 254-280
Author(s):  
Mariko Kotani
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Linguistic Knowledge ◽  
Naturally Occurring ◽  
Current Topic ◽  
Audio Recordings ◽  
Expert And Novice ◽  
Asymmetrical Relationships

Abstract This paper uses conversation analysis to describe the sequence in which participants in ordinary conversations are sidetracked from the current topic to engage in the repair of a word and display their orientation to asymmetrical linguistic knowledge between them. The participants frame themselves as being in a more knowledgeable and a less knowledgeable position, and this asymmetry provides an opportunity for learning. The analysis of audio recordings of 12 naturally occurring conversations between first and second language users of English reveals that such side-sequenced vocabulary lessons are initiated using at least three methods: partial questioning repeats, explicitly asking the meaning of the word that was just used, and other-directed word searches. The study captures moments in which participants’ language expert and novice identities temporarily become relevant. It also demonstrates how participants alter their relative epistemic positions with each other and redefine the asymmetrical relationships moment by moment in interaction.

Communicative practices in talking about death and dying in the context of Thai cancer care

2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 263-271
Author(s):  
Pairote Wilainuch
Keyword(s):  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
District Hospital ◽  
Death And Dying ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Religious Support ◽  
Communicative Practices ◽  
Health Centres ◽  
Third Person ◽  
Thai People ◽  
Depth Interviews

This article explores communicative practices surrounding how nurses, patients and family members engage when talking about death and dying, based on study conducted in a province in northern Thailand. Data were collected from three environments: a district hospital (nine cases), district public health centres (four cases), and in patients’ homes (27 cases). Fourteen nurses, 40 patients and 24 family members gave written consent for participation. Direct observation and in-depth interviews were used for supplementary data collection, and 40 counselling sessions were recorded on video. The raw data were analysed using Conversation Analysis. The study found that Thai counselling is asymmetrical. Nurses initiated the topic of death by referring to the death of a third person – a dead patient – with the use of clues and via list-construction. As most Thai people are oriented to Buddhism, religious support is selected for discussing this sensitive topic, and nurses also use Buddhism and list-construction to help their clients confront uncertain futures. However, Buddhism is not brought into discussion on its own, but combined with other techniques such as the use of euphemisms or concern and care for others.

Expressing the Self

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
The Self ◽  
Epistemic Status ◽  
First Person ◽  
Semantic Categories ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Person Reference ◽  
De Se ◽  
Novel Method ◽  
Cultural Pragmatics

This book addresses different linguistic and philosophical aspects of referring to the self in a wide range of languages from different language families, including Amharic, English, French, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Newari (Sino-Tibetan), Polish, Tariana (Arawak), and Thai. In the domain of speaking about oneself, languages use a myriad of expressions that cut across grammatical and semantic categories, as well as a wide variety of constructions. Languages of Southeast and East Asia famously employ a great number of terms for first-person reference to signal honorification. The number and mixed properties of these terms make them debatable candidates for pronounhood, with many grammar-driven classifications opting to classify them with nouns. Some languages make use of egophors or logophors, and many exhibit an interaction between expressing the self and expressing evidentiality qua the epistemic status of information held from the ego perspective. The volume’s focus on expressing the self, however, is not directly motivated by an interest in the grammar or lexicon, but instead stems from philosophical discussions of the special status of thoughts about oneself, known as de se thoughts. It is this interdisciplinary understanding of expressing the self that underlies this volume, comprising philosophy of mind at one end of the spectrum and cross-cultural pragmatics of self-expression at the other. This unprecedented juxtaposition results in a novel method of approaching de se and de se expressions, in which research methods from linguistics and philosophy inform each other. The importance of this interdisciplinary perspective on expressing the self cannot be overemphasized. Crucially, the volume also demonstrates that linguistic research on first-person reference makes a valuable contribution to research on the self tout court, by exploring the ways in which the self is expressed, and thereby adding to the insights gained through philosophy, psychology, and cognitive science.

scholarly journals Agency and the Successive Structure of Time-Consciousness

Erkenntnis ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Camden Alexander McKenna
Keyword(s):  
Temporal Structure ◽  
Basic Structure ◽  
The Self ◽  
Necessary Condition ◽  
Epistemic Status ◽  
Mental Attitude ◽  
Time Consciousness ◽  
Possibility Space ◽  
The Right ◽  
Wrong Sort

AbstractI argue for constraining the nomological possibility space of temporal experiences and endorsing the Succession Requirement for agents. The Succession Requirement holds that the basic structure of temporal experience must be successive for agentive subjects, at least in worlds that are law-like in the same way as ours. I aim to establish the Succession Requirement by showing non-successively experiencing agents are not possible for three main reasons, namely that they (1) fail to stand in the right sort of causal relationship to the outcomes of their actions, (2) exhibit the wrong sort of epistemic status for agency, and (3) lack the requisite agentive mental attitude of intentionality. I conclude that agency is incompatible with non-successive experience and therefore we should view the successive temporal structure of experience as a necessary condition for agency. I also suggest that the Succession Requirement may actually extend beyond my main focus on agency, offering preliminary considerations in favor of seeing successive experience as a precondition for selfhood as well. The consequences of the Succession Requirement are wide-ranging, and I discuss various implications for our understanding of agency, the self, time consciousness, and theology, among other things.

Fine-tuning the Relationship between Religion and Intellectual Humility

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 305-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Everett L. Worthington
Keyword(s):  
Religious Belief ◽  
The Self ◽  
Content Area ◽  
Fine Tuning ◽  
Epistemic Status ◽  
Intellectual Humility ◽  
The Core ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Meaning System ◽  
The Relationship

I examine religious humility, which is one content area of intellectual humility. Intellectual humility is the subtype of humility that involves taking a humble stance in sharing ideas, especially when one is challenged or when an idea is threatening. I position religious humility within the context of general humility, spiritual humility, and relational humility, and thus arrive at several propositions. People who are intensely spiritually humble can hold dogmatic beliefs and believe themselves to be religiously humble, yet be perceived by others of different persuasions as religiously dogmatic and even arrogant. For such people to be truly religiously humble, they must feel that the religious belief is core to their meaning system. This requires discernment of which of the person’s beliefs are truly at the core. But also the religiously humble person must fulfill the definition of general humility, accurately perceiving the strengths and limitations of the self, being teachable to correct weaknesses, presenting oneself modestly, and being positively other-oriented. Humility thus involves (1) beliefs, values, and attitudes and (2) an interpersonal presentational style. Therefore, intellectually humble people must track the positive epistemic status of their beliefs and also must present with convicted civility.

The epic “Künnü körgen Kün Köök” in self-recording and audio recording

2021 ◽  
pp. 51-64
Author(s):  
L. N. Arbachakova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
The Sun ◽  
Live Performance ◽  
Audio Recording ◽  
Physical Effort ◽  
Heroic Epic ◽  
Audio Recordings ◽  
Small Period

The paper compares the variants of the Shor heroic epic “Künnü körgen Kün Köök” (“Kün Köök that saw the Sun”) recorded in 1999 with an interval of two months in the narrator’s self-recording (written in January 1999) and in audio recording (recorded in March 1999 by L. Arbachakova from V. E. Tannagashev (1932–2007). The version in the audio recording was performed by the Kai narrator accompanied by komus in the performer’s apartment in Myski city. V. E. Tannagashev learned this epic from his teacher P. N. Amzorov. The small period between the recordings resulted in insignificant discrepancies in the versions that were complementary and hardly influenced the qualitative content of the legend. The Kai narrator’s memory did not let him down, with the plots almost coinciding and different epic formulas used only in some fragments of typical places, or there were some permutations or omissions of lines. Sometimes the narrator uses synonymous words, or there are repetitions and reservations. However, there are practically no such flaws in the self-recordings. The typical points used by the kaichi, sometimes expanded and colorful, sometimes compressed, probably depended on his mood, as well as on different ways of fixing the epic (in the kaichi’s selfrecording and audio recordings). Live performance is influenced by the mood, health of the narrator, and other factors. Self-recordings made by hand are the most time-consuming since they require physical effort, perseverance, attention. It is perhaps for this reason that the recording turned out to be more shortened.

Transcription for Conversation Analysis

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Galina B. Bolden ◽  
Alexa Hepburn
Keyword(s):  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Interaction Analysis ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Orthographic Representation ◽  
Transcription System ◽  
Social Actions ◽  
Audio Recordings ◽  
The Rich ◽  
The 1960S

The transcription system for Conversation Analysis (CA) was originally developed by Gail Jefferson, one of the founders of CA, in the 1960s. Jefferson’s transcription conventions aim to represent on paper what had been captured in field audio recordings in ways that would preserve and bring to light the interactionally relevant elements of the recorded talk. Conversation analytic research has demonstrated that various features of the delivery of talk and other bodily conduct are basic to how interlocutors carry out social actions in interaction with others. Without the CA transcription system it is impossible to identify these features, as it represents talk and other conduct in ways that capture the rich subtlety of their delivery. Jefferson’s system of conventions evolved side by side with, and was informed by the results of, interaction analysis, which has shown there are many significant aspects of talk that interactants treat as relevant but that are entirely missed in simple orthographic representation. Conversation analysts’ insistence on capturing not only what is said but also details of how something is said, including interactants’ visible behaviors, is based on the assumption that “no order of detail in interaction can be dismissed a priori as disorderly, accidental, or irrelevant” (according to John Heritage in 1984). Conversation analytic transcripts need to be detailed enough to facilitate the analyst’s quest to discover and describe orderly practices of social action in interaction.

Storytelling in guided tours

2014 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 328-346 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Burdelski ◽  
Michie Kawashima ◽  
Keiichi Yamazaki
Keyword(s):  
American History ◽  
The Self ◽  
Sense Making ◽  
Japanese American ◽  
Vicarious Experience ◽  
American Museum ◽  
Communicative Practices ◽  
Guided Tours

This article examines storytelling (narratives) in interaction at a Japanese American museum. The analysis draws upon audiovisual recordings of tours led by older, male Japanese American docents. It examines ways docents tell stories — primarily of vicarious experience — in educating visitors on Japanese-American history, and ways they use a range of verbal and non-verbal communicative practices that invite visitors’ engagement in the telling as a social and sense-making activity. We categorize two types of communicative practices: elicited and non-elicited. Elicited practices include (1) interrogative and polar questions, which are further divided into (a) known and (b) unknown information questions, and (2) other-repetition + list intonation. Non-elicited practices include affective talk and gestures in recounting past events. We show ways that visitor engagement varies in relation to elicited and non-elicited practices. Finally, we discuss storytelling as a vehicle for displaying and positioning the self and others in relation to stance and identity, and in working towards the goals of the museum.

The use of ‘my side telling’ during history taking in psychiatric consultations

2021 ◽  
pp. 146144562110016
Author(s):  
Xueli Yao
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Study ◽  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
History Taking ◽  
Patients Rights ◽  
Outpatient Visits ◽  
Psychiatric Outpatient ◽  
Audio Recordings ◽  
Sense Of Reality ◽  
Psychiatric Conditions

Using the method of conversation analysis, this article examines an interactional practice through which psychiatric practitioners exhibit knowledge about their patients’ problems, symptoms, or experiences in psychiatric outpatient consultations. This practice is referred to as ‘my side telling’. The data were from audio recordings of 55 psychiatric outpatient visits to four psychiatrists in China. In the data, the psychiatrists employ ‘my side telling’ within larger sequences of talk where psychiatrists solicit their patients to elaborate on their problems or experiences, treating prior answers of the patients as unsatisfactory. Based on empirical study of the data, it is argued that ‘my side telling’ in psychiatry is not merely used to elicit information. Rather, through facing patients with facts or evidence which the psychiatrists got from other sources, it acquires a confrontative function and may be employed as a tool to test the patients’ sense of reality and willingness to talk about their experiences. Thus, it is shown to work towards assessing patients for possible psychiatric conditions and forming diagnostic hypotheses. I further argue that ‘my side telling’ allows the psychiatrists to achieve a balance between respecting the patients’ rights to report their own experiences and influencing the directions in which the information is reported.

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