Discourse Studies recent issues

Arguing within an institutional hierarchy: how argumentative talk and interlocutors' embodied practices preserve a superior--subordinate relationship

Argaman, E. — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:20:59 PDT

This article studies an argument that took place in an institutional setting and specifies six functions of talk and embodied practices employed in an argument between a superior and her subordinate. The article shows how certain argumentative conducts and their subsequent responses preserve the institutional hierarchical relationship. The article’s final section considers three resultant issues: 1) argumentative practices and their relation to various institutional hierarchies; 2) argumentative practices between people holding different versus similar hierarchical positions; and 3) the extent to which verbal defiance accompanied by embodied practices can be maintained.

Explaining the unexplained: warranting disbelief in the paranormal

Lamont, P., Coelho, C., Mckinlay, A. — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:20:59 PDT

Psychologists have studied paranormal belief for over a century, but have been concerned with belief in the paranormal rather than disbelief. However, disbelief in the paranormal is a position in its own right and, for many, by no means a self-evident position. An avowal of disbelief is, therefore, a social phenomenon that may involve some interesting discursive work. This article examines the discourse of self-ascribed ‘sceptics’, and analyses how they warrant their expressed position when faced with an ostensibly paranormal event for which they cannot provide a ‘normal’ explanation. We show how, for example, through the use of ‘definitely/something’ constructions, they appeal to an explanation that exists in principle, though the details are not available to them. Such devices can be seen as social and discursive forms of belief maintenance, in that they are designed to maintain a social position established through an avowal of (dis)belief.

One-sided laughter in academic presentations: a small-scale investigation

Politi, P. — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:20:59 PDT

This investigation focuses on analysing one-sided laughter (i.e. laughter initiated by the speaker and not shared with other parties) in academic presentations — a form of ‘institutional talk’ (Drew and Heritage, 1992) defined here as goal-oriented talk about and for the business (in the broadest sense) at hand, and given at structural settings of certain formality as the lecture theatre in this case. The analytical tool employed is a partial adoption of Partington’s (2006) laughter classification/categorization drawing on the theories of ‘Politeness’ (Brown and Levinson, 1978, 1987) and ‘Face’ (Goffman, 1967, 1981). This is a rather new approach which, nonetheless, contributes positively to the field of laughter analysis since these theories are ‘much less examined in relationship to institutional settings’ (Harris, 2001: 452). The data analysed for this purpose is David Nunan’s (2006) presentation entitled ‘Action Research and Professional Growth’, given at the JALT First Joint Conference in Japan. The findings suggest that one-sided laughter is a communication strategy of mainly rhetorical nature capable of revealing the underlying meaning of the interaction: its hidden ideology, purpose and goal.

An approach to corpus-based discourse analysis: The move analysis as example

Upton, T. A., Cohen, M. A. — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:20:59 PDT

This article presents a seven-step corpus-based approach to discourse analysis that starts with a detailed analysis of each individual text in a corpus that can then be generalized across all texts of a corpus, providing a description of typical patterns of discourse organization that hold for the entire corpus. This approach is applied specifically to a methodology that is used to analyze texts in terms of the functional/communicative structures that typically make up texts in a genre: move analysis. The resulting corpus-based approach for conducting a move analysis significantly enhances the value of this often used (and misused) methodology, while at the same time providing badly needed guidelines for a methodology that lacks them. A corpus of ‘birthmother letters’ is used to illustrate the approach.

'A bit of common ground': personalisation and the use of shared knowledge in interactions between people with learning disabilities and their personal assistants

Williams, V., Ponting, L., Ford, K., Rudge, P. — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:20:59 PDT

Personalisation is the new mantra in social care; this article focuses on how personalisation can be achieved in practice, by presenting an analysis of data from people with learning disabilities and their personal assistants (PAs), where traditional care relationships have often been shown to be disempowering (Antaki et al., 2007b). The focus here is on the ways in which both parties use references to shared knowledge, joint experiences or personal-life information. These strategies can be used for various social goals, and instances are given where shared references are used during non task-related talk. Both parties are seen on occasion to attempt to refer to shared information, and dense layers of inference can result, which move the interaction onto an ordinary, more symmetrical and friendly footing. The article concludes that shared knowledge referencing creates a way to shift between the personal and the professional, to blur the boundaries, and to create a new and more personalised relationship.

Book review: MARIA DE LOS ANGELES GOMEZ GONZALEZ, J. LACHLAN MACKENZIE and ELSA M. GONZALEZ ALVAREZ (eds), Languages and Cultures in Contrast and Comparison. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2008, xxii + 364 pp., ISBN 978 90 272 54191

Timofeeva, E. — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:20:59 PDT

Book review: DAVID MACHIN and THEO VAN LEEUWEN, Global Media Discourse: A Critical Introduction . London and New York: Routledge, 2007, viii + 188 pp

Hou, S. — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:20:59 PDT

Haggling exchanges at meat stalls in some markets in Lagos, Nigeria

Ayoola, K. A. — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

This article centres on the social activity of haggling during service encounters in a typical Nigerian urban market place. The data corpus is derived from transactions between meat vendors and customers at meat stalls in some markets in Lagos, Nigeria. Haggling exchanges between meat vendors and their customers were secretly recorded and subsequently analysed to elicit the significant elements of haggling; identify the stages in a haggling exchange; and describe the discourse strategies employed by both classifications of interactant (vendor and buyer) involved in the socio-linguistic activity. The findings revealed that English, Pidgin and Yoruba were generally used in the transactions. The findings also revealed that both categories of interactant employed discourse strategies which include humour, dysphemism and euphemism, cajoling, flattery and flirting to achieve their ultimate goal of maximizing profit/bargain during the buying and selling encounters.

`And then I'm really like . . .': `preliminary' self-quotations in adolescent talk

Lamerichs, J., Te Molder, H. F.M. — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

This article explores the discursive uses of a self-quotation in adolescent talk. The self-quotation uses the quotative marker be + like to convey or project bold statements as part of a larger narrative. We will demonstrate how the preface leading up to the self-quotation is designed as hard to counter, and instructs the hearer how to understand what comes next. The self-quotation, on the other hand, constitutes the assessment as a `mere characterization' that provides the speaker with a number of opportunities for testing the proposed view. Speakers are thus able to bolster potentially controversial views against refutation while also giving them a preliminary status. These features make for an interesting conversational resource that enables speakers and recipients to engage in a collaborative process of putting potentially bold statements to the test.

`I was here!': addressivity structures and inscribing practices as indexical resources

Noy, C. — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

The article examines how practices of inscription and structures of addressivity (Goffman) at a symbolic site provide implicit indexical means for establishing subjectivities and agencies. By examining a visitor book located in a national commemoration site in Jerusalem, Israel, the article first argues that inscribing practices themselves can function as implicit indexical mechanisms. In ritualized environments, inscribing assumes the function of a non-referential indexical because discourse is materially engraved unto a surround. These environments are also characterized by prescribed addressivity structures. The article goes on to discern between a number of addressivity structures, evinced in visitors' aesthetisized entries. These structures serve as contextualizing cues and evince the ways visitors establish subjectivities and participation in national commemoration. Addressivity structures are shown to construct different types of social actors, and the spaces and temporalities within which they operate. Building on previous research on performance, the article shows how addressivity and inscription together supply the prerequisites for situated performances of identities and selves on inscribed and symbolic stages.

The audience as actor: the participation status of the audience at the victim hearings of the South African TRC

Verdoolaege, A. — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

In this article Goffman's theories on participation framework and change in footing are applied to discursive material from the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The main finding is that a discursive setting such as the public hearings of a truth and reconciliation commission can be highly intricate and layered when considering the role of the various discourse participants. The testifying victims, the TRC commissioners and the audience engaged in various forms of subordinate communication — byplay, crossplay and sideplay — in addition to the standardized and expected interaction between victims and commissioners. This tells us that face-to-face talk should not be regarded as the prototypical participation framework, even not in a highly stage-managed discursive setting. Moreover, by paying attention to the co-presence of also a `virtual' audience, the Goffmanian framework is taken beyond its confines of only discussing interaction between discourse participants who are physically present in a speech situation. In the end, each of the discourse participants tried to exploit the possibilities offered by this complex framework, thus adding to the impact the TRC had on South African society at large.

Metaphors of cancer in scientific popularization articles in the British press

Williams Camus, J. T. — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

Metaphor is a significant tool in the recontextualization of specialized knowledge in popularizations transmitted through the mass media. This study explores metaphor in popularizations of scientific articles on cancer in the English press. Metaphors used for cancer and cancer research were identified and analysed in a corpus of 37 articles from The Guardian. Special attention was paid to the aspects emphasized and de-emphasized as they can have potential ideological implications. Fifteen conceptual metaphors were identified in the corpus, ranging from the most frequent CANCER IS WAR (20 texts) to an isolated reference to Achilles' heel. The average was 2.9 metaphors per text. The quantitative data and contextual analysis indicate that no single metaphorical system is sufficient to represent the complexity of cancer-related knowledge. Metaphors are used in combination to perform three main functions, attracting the reader, structuring and explaining scientific concepts, and organizing the text into a narrative.

Book review: CHRISTOPHER S. BUTLER, RAQUEL HIDALGO DOWNING and JULIA LAVID (eds), Functional Perspectives on Grammar and Discourse: In Honour of Angela Downing. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2007. xxx + 482 pp. ISBN: 9789027230959 (hbk)

Ogutu, J. N. — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

Book review: SHI-XU (ed.), Discourse as Cultural Struggle. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2007. 200 pp. ISBN: 9622098118

Jing Chen, — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

Book review: CLAIRE MOON. Narrating Political Reconciliation: South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2008. 179 pp

Gallardo, A. R. — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

Book review: LAURA KAJETZKE. Wissen im Diskur: Ein Theorienvergleich von Bourdieu und Foucault [Knowledge in Discourse: A comparison of Bourdieu's and Foucault's Theories]. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag fur Sozialwissenschaften, 2008. 200 pp. {euro}29.90 (pbk)

Mick, C. — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:45:00 PDT

The facework of unfinished turns in French conversation

Chevalier, F. H.G. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

In this article, I consider the notion of facework in the context of unfinished turns in French conversation. Unfinished turns in French conversation normally occur in the environment of talk that can be characterized as delicate or problematic. They provide a mechanism for dealing with such talk in a way that both manages misalignment and divergence between the participants and minimizes possible threats to the participants' face. They provide a subtle avoidance or minimization mechanism in that they enable the participants to hint at what remains unarticulated, whilst registering enough of the type of actions that they seek to accomplish. I conclude that, although unfinished turns can be seen as one way in which participants engage in facework, their analysis suggests that only an interactional-sequential account reveals the work that they accomplish, and insists upon a conceptualization of face/facework as interactional.

Space, materiality and the contingency of action: a sequential analysis of the patient's file in doctor--patient interactions

Frers, L. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

Focusing on the multi-dimensionality of interactional settings, this study analyzes how the material world is a significant factor in the sequential co-production of the video-taped doctor—patient interactions. The analysis shows how a material artifact, the patient's file, is relevant in two ways: a) as a device which is employed in the sequential organization of the interaction. The patient's file is being used in the contexts of topic development and topic change. b) The file with its specific physical and symbolic features is being co-produced and contested by both actors as a knowledge reservoir. Further inspection of the interactions in concert with theoretical reflections of the role of space and materiality suggests that interactions should be interpreted as happening in spatially arranged constellations of material objects and actors. In these both rigid and flexible constellations boundaries are established, access is distributed, and meaning is solidified.

Critical discourse analysis, topoi and mystification: disability policy documents from a Norwegian NGO

Grue, J. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

In disability studies, social and medical explanatory models are seen as being conflicting or mutually exclusive, and as mystifying respectively bodily impairment and the agency of social and environmental factors. This article uses critical discourse analysis (CDA) to discuss the relationship between such models in policy documents produced by The Norwegian Federation of Organizations of Disabled People (FFO). Analysis of key topoi in the policy documents shows that they display elements of both social and medical discourse, and that the consequences of medically defined impairments are used as justifications for policy interventions in a framework of social justice. While a strict version of the social model is adopted in general programmatic documents, arguments about specific policy fields conceptualize disability as a property of individuals — traditionally, a medical model framing. Analysis of topoi is shown to be a useful tool when CDA is applied to policy texts.

Mixed-ethnic girls and boys as similarly powerless and powerful: embodiment of attractiveness and grotesqueness

Kamada, L. D. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

An ongoing study examining the discursive negotiation of ethnic and gendered embodied identities of adolescent girls in Japan with Japanese and `white' mixed-parentage is extended to also investigate and compare boys . This study draws on Feminist Poststructuralist Discourse Analysis which views women and girls as `simultaneously positioned as relatively powerless within a range of dominant discourses on gender, but as relatively powerful within alternative and competing social discourses' (Baxter, 2003: 39). Here, this is taken further by also giving voice to boys. Furthermore, ethnic discourses are examined alongside of gender discourses. Not only girls constructed the `idealized Other', within discourses of femininity, but boys similarly viewed their bodies against a model of idealized masculinity within discourses of masculinities. The boys revealed a feminized, narcissistic body consciousness where they struggled to resist a `discourse of foreign grotesqueness' and instead worked to embody themselves within a positive `discourse of foreign attractiveness', as did the girls.

The effect of text type on the use of so as a discourse particle

Lam, P. W.Y. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

Discourse particles have received a considerable amount of scholarly attention in linguistic research. Although their use in specific text types has been discussed, few studies have actually attempted to look at the effect of text type on their use. Therefore, how the use of discourse particles is related to the situational context in which they are produced remains a largely unexplored area. In this article, the use of one of the most frequently occurring yet often overlooked discourse particles, so, in a number of monologic and dialogic texts is examined. Drawing on data from a spoken corpus of Hong Kong English, the present study shows that the frequency rates and functions of so as a discourse particle vary according to the text type in which it occurs. Findings from the study thus argue that the full range of functions realized by so as a discourse particle cannot be determined without taking into account the wide range of communicative events in which the particle is used. This highlights the fact that contextual cues are indispensable in the interpretation of the pragmatic meanings of discourse particles.

Book review: FRANCES CHRISTIE and J.R. MARTIN (eds), Language, Knowledge and Pedagogy: Functional Linguistics and Sociological Perspectives. London: Continuum, 2004. 267 pp. ISBN: HB: 0--8264--8917--6, hardcover

Sajjadi, S. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

Book review: ANTHONY J. LIDDICOAT, An Introduction to Conversation Analysis. London: Continuum, 2007, x + 319 pp. {pound}19.99 (pbk)/{pound}75.00 (hbk)

Rodriguez Munoz, F. J. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

Book review: PAUL TEN HAVE, Doing Conversation Analysis: A Practical Guide. London: SAGE, 2007, 246 pp

Grant, L. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

Book review: TEUN A. VAN DIJK, Discourse and Context: A Socio-Cognitive Approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008, XII + 254 pp

Liu Lihua, — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:19:43 PDT

Questions, questioning, and institutional practices: an introduction

Tracy, K., Robles, J. — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

This article introduces the special issue on questions, questioning, and institutional practices. We begin by considering how questioning as a discursive practice is a central vehicle for constructing social worlds and reflecting existing ones. Then we describe the different ways questions and question(ing) have been defined, typologized, and critiqued, in general and within seven institutions including policing, the courts, medicine, therapy, research interviews, education, and mediated political exchanges. The introduction concludes with a preview of the articles in the special issue.

Conversation and psychotherapy: how questioning reveals institutional answers

Bartesaghi, M. — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

By analyzing session exchanges and questionnaires administered to family therapy clients, this article examines questioning as conversational practice grounded in institutional goals that are therapist-directed and therapist-conceived. In their manifestation in talk and text, therapeutic questions function to replace client accounts with the nosological accounts of institutional psychiatry. The analysis illuminates three ways in which questioning works in the session and then locates these in therapy's professional and institutional logic. A critical reflection on psychotherapy's questioning practices in a social context concludes the article.

`It's just a process': questioning in the construction of a university crisis

Castor, T. — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

Questioning in an organizational context is a challenging event in multiple senses. Questioning may be used to criticize the leaders of an organization. For the criticisms to be heard as legitimate, however, the questioner must operate within contextual constraints (Shotter, 1993). The main purpose of this article is to examine how questioning functions to construct a university's crisis. Discourse within two faculty senate meetings is analyzed. Three faculty questioning strategies are described: appealing to another organizational entity, requesting either/or information; and metacommunicative commentary. Administration and senate leadership responded to questions using the strategies of appealing to a process and metacommunicative commentary. Faculty questioning functioned to challenge a current course of action while operating from within the organizational guidelines of discourse. Alternatively, leadership responses deferred any substantive change in the course of action. The strategies are related to issues of power, social action, and models of educational governance.

How questioning constructs judge identities: oral argument about same-sex marriage

Tracy, K. — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

An important but unstudied event in US legal institutions is when judges question plaintiff and defense attorneys about the issue that brings them to an appeals hearing before a state supreme court. In this article I analyze judges' questioning during the oral argument phase of the New York Court of Appeals' hearing of Hernandez v. Robles, a case concerning whether the state was violating same-sex couples' constitutional rights by denying them access to marriage. The article's purpose is to show how the content, format, and language style of judges' questioning turns constructs the judges as persons possessing particular attitudes, judicial philosophies, political leanings, and personalities. The article provides a quantitative overview of the 186 questioning turns and analyzes the discourse in selected episodes to evidence how features of questioning generate identity inferences. The conclusion considers how the oral argument phase of Appeals Court proceedings contributes to larger discourses of the law.

The acquisition of memory by interview questioning: Holocaust re-membering as category-bound activity

Bartesaghi, M., Perlmutter Bowen, S. — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

In this discourse analysis of how memory acquires and is acquired in interview exchanges, we investigate remembering as a category-bound activity, both a tensional and collaborative process of moral ratification of `survivor' as membership category. We propose the term re-membering to mean piecing together possible versions of survivor experiences in talk; these versions, offered by respondents and elicited by interviewers through questioning strategies, are epistemic claims to acquire the Holocaust as memory, or institutional History. We explore the accounting dynamic of interviewer and respondent, the relationship of ownership between survivors and memory, and the duties and moral obligations of the category `Holocaust survivor' that can be shown through the interviews of survivors and their adult daughters.

Book review: MICHAEL BAMBERG (ed.), Narrative -- State of the Art. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2007. vi + 271 pp. EUR95.00/USD143.00

Farrell, E. — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

Book review: MICHAEL A.K. HALLIDAY, Language and Society: Volume 10 in the Collected Works of M.A K. Halliday, ed. by Jonathan J. Webster. London and New York: Continuum, 2007. xii + 304 pp. ISBN 9780826458766 (hardback), {pound}75.00

Zhiying Xin, — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

Book review: STUART PRICE, Discourse Power Address: The Politics of Public Communication. Hampshire: Ashgate, 2007. ix + 249 pp

Balfaqeeh, M. A. — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

Book review: KLAUS P. SCHNEIDER and ANNE BARRON (eds), Variational Pragmatics. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2008. vi + 371 pp. ISBN 9789027254221 (hardback)

Zhong Hong, — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT

Book review: ELSA SIMOES LUCAS FREITAS, Taboo in Advertising. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2008. xix + 214 pp. ISBN 9789027254238

Burridge, J. — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:39:04 PDT