4: Com and action

Question 1

pointing as social actions

Answer 1

• Pointing gestures have a referential and a social element (Tomasello, 2008)
  • Talk also has a referential and a social element (e.g., ‘do you have a pen?’)
  • People use talk to implement social actions (this idea was introduced in speech act theory; Austin, 1962)

Recipients make sense of someone’s turn by asking themselves ‘what is this doing’?

Question 2

Actions are sequentially organised (Sacks, Schegloff, & Jefferson, 1974; Schegloff & Sacks, 1973)

Answer 2

• Speakers’ turns come one after the other (because of the ‘one at a time’ rule examined last week)
  • Recipients make sense of someone’s turn by relating it to the just previous turn

There is a social expectation that a speaker addresses what has come just before their turn

Question 3

Actions done through talk form joint activities

Answer 3

Usually, people do not use talk for isolated actions
People use talk to engage with others in joint activities
(Clark, 1996; Levinson, 1992; Schegloff, 2007)

Question 4

Sequences of action

Answer 4

Sequence = a type of joint activity formed by interconnected actions done by different speakers

initiating action –> Responsive action

Question 5

starting a sequence: initiating action

Answer 5

REQUEST SEQUENCE: a request invites fulfilment

OFFER SEQUENCE: an offer of information invites acknowledgement and perhaps gratitude

DIRECTIVE SEQUENCE: a directive invites compliance (telling someone what to do)

NOTICING/SHARING SEQUENCE: a sharing invites appreciation

QUESTION-ANSWER SEQUENCE: a yes/no question invites a yes/no response

Question 6

Sequences in great ape communication (Rossano 2013)

Answer 6

old and young monkey make eye contact - establishes participation framework

wrist-bent gesture implements an action (a carry request)

the request introduces the expectation of a fulfilment (being carried)

Question 7

Pika et al 2018 - average timing of response

Answer 7

0.2 seconds

suggests evolutionary basis to how we communicate

Question 8

summary

Answer 8

sequence of 2 actions: initiating and responsive action

first action introduces the expectation of a second action that is collaborative*

*(which collaborate at 2 levels: Structure and stance, aka alignment and affiliation) (Stivers, 2008)

have organised participation frameworks

Question 9

Different ways of responding to an initiating action

Answer 9

(expanded on in w9)

conversation has rules

can evade a question or answer a different question (politicians)

if the recipient doesn’t respond, person A can pursue an answer

Question 10

Application: Drew 1992: US assault trial

Answer 10

attorneys use yes/no responses to restrain the victim’s responses

now recognised as a harmful practice leading to 2ndary victimisation

focus is on how victims work to evade the contraints of questions through transformative answers

Question 11

Missing/ delayed responses

Answer 11

Last week, we learned that silences are made sense of in the context of the one at a time rule for turn taking.

What was missing there is the basis for how silences are treated in the way they are. How they are interpreted depends on their position.

The silences we consider here acquire meaning because they follow an initiating action. They thus embody lack of or delaying of a response that is normatively due. 

silences have a communicative action

Question 12

A’s response to silence

Answer 12

with B’s hesitation, A anticipates there might be a decline of the request, so produces a question that may make it easier to decline

Question 13

Summary: on-time vs delayed-responses

Answer 13

• Rule: people should respond on-time (due to pressure from the rules of participation seen in Week 3)
  • Delays and hesitations in responding are therefore a source of meaning: people ask themselves, ‘what is this doing?’
  • Delays are sometimes understood as forecasting a response that does not fulfil the project embodied in the initiating action (e.g., declining an invitation)
  • So, conversational rules are a source of meaning

Question 14

Sequence expansions: (schegloff 2007)

Answer 14

• Sequences of actions composed of an initiating and responding action implement projects (something that the initiator is trying to accomplish)
  • People use practices to maximise the chances that the project is successful
  • We refer to these as sequence expansions

These demonstrate that people track one another’s inferable intentions

Question 15

Type of sequence expansion 3

Answer 15

pre-expansion (before initiating action)

insert expansion (in between iniating and responding action)

Post-expansion (after responding action)

Question 16

e.g. of pre-expansion

Answer 16

asking ‘what are you doing?’ before asking someone to do something

Links to recursive inference and perspectival representation (and self-monitoring)

Question 17

e.g. of insert expansion (Pino et al 2022)

Answer 17

e.g. if someone asks if you have illnesses, you may ask for specifics e.g. ‘now?’ before providing your answer

Links to recursive inference and perspectival representation (and self-monitoring)

Question 18

e.g. of post-expansion

Answer 18

base sequence: ‘are you a coffee drinker?’ ‘no’

post expansion: ‘no?’ ‘i hate coffee’)

asks for more info after answer

Question 19

Summary:

Answer 19

• Talk implements actions
• Actions done through talk form joint activities
• Some of these activities consist of sequences of two actions
• In these sequences of action, an initiating action creates the expectation of a responding action that supports the project embodied in the initiating action

These sequences can be expanded

Question 20

application: a competent speaker who cannot speak (Goodwin 2004)

Answer 20

man with aphasia

- His resources: three words (yes, no, and), prosody, gesture, and uses of the environment and context
- He leads others to speak and piggybacks what they say to construct communicative actions
- Example: Helen, his wife, has told a story about an earthquake. He then initiates a related story about an earthquake they experienced 30 years ago. It dangerously displaced a picture which was about to fall over the crib of their son.

- Common ground

• prosody

Question 21

Greetings

Answer 21

• Greetings are organised in sequences of actions where a first invites a second (which is usually a ‘reciprocal’)
  • Greetings routinely happen at the start of interpersonal interactions
  • They serve to create co-presence, declare mutual availability, and (re)affirm the nature of the relationship

They can be verbal (saying ‘hi’), gestural (waving), and tactile (handshakes, hugs)

Question 22

reading: rules to convo

Answer 22

• subconscious rules (we only occasionally make errors)
• if someone asks a question this should be responded to. not just good manners
• regulating the flow of talk is a group activity; joint action

Question 23

reading: breaking rules

Answer 23

Even slight breaches of conversational norms can quickly lead to upset and personal conflict

rules only really become apparent when someone is breaking them

breaking rules too often could be a sign of mental illness