Approaching Dialogue: Talk, interaction and contexts in dialogical perspectives

349 Pages·1998·84.032 MB·IMPACT: Studies in Language and Society

by  Per Linell

APPROACHING DIALOGUE
IMPACT: STUDIES IN LANGUAGE AND SOCIETY
IMPACT publishes monographs, collective volumes, and text books on topics in
sociolinguistics and language pedagogy. The scope of the series is broad, with
special emphasis on areas such as language planning and language policies;
language teaching and language learning; language con½ict and language death;
language standards and language change; dialectology; diglossia; discourse stud-
ies; language and social identity (gender, ethnicity, class, ideology); and history and
methods of sociolinguistics
GENERAL EDITOR
Kirsten Malmkjær (University of Cambridge)
ADVISORY BOARD
Lars-Gunnar Andersson (Göteborg University)
Laurie Bauer (Victoria University of Wellington)
Paul Drew (University of York)
Rod Ellis (University of Auckland)
Margarita Hidalgo (San Diego State University)
Richard A. Hudson (University College London)
Björn H. Jernudd (Hong Kong Baptist University)
Rudi Keller (University of Düsseldorf)
William Labov (University of Pennsylvania)
Robin Lako¤ (University of California, Berkeley)
Joseph Lo Bianco (NLLIA, Belconnen)
Peter Nelde (R.C.M. Brussels)
Adama Ouane (UNESCO, Paris)
Dennis Preston (Michigan State University)
Jan Renkema (Tilburg University)
Muriel Saville-Troike (University of Arizona)
Elaine Tarone (University of Minnesota)
Humphrey Tonkin (University of Hartford)
Vic Webb (University of Pretoria)
Ruth Wodak (University of Vienna)
Volume 3
Per Linell
Approaching Dialogue
Talk, interaction and contexts in dialogical perspectives
APPROACHING
DIALOGUE
Talk, interaction and contexts
in dialogical perspectives
PER LINELL
Linköping University
JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY
AMSTERDAM / PHILADELPHIA
TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
8 American National Standard for Information Sciences — Permanence of
Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1984.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Linell, Per, 1944-
Approaching dialogue : talk, interaction and contexts in dialogical perspectives / Per
Linell.
p. cm. -- (Impact : studies in language and society, ISSN 1385-7908 ; v. 3)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Dialogue analysis. 2. Discourse analysis. 3. Semantics. 4. Communication. I. Title.
II. Series: Impact, studies in language and society ; 3.
P95.455.L56 1998
401’.41--dc21 98-39787
ISBN 90 272 1833 1 (Eur.) / 1 55619 852 3 (US) (Hb. alk. paper)
ISBN 90 272 1846 3 (Eur.) / 1 58811 091 5 (US) (Pb. alk. paper) CIP
© 2001 – John Benjamins B.V.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any
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John Benjamins Publishing Co. • P.O.Box 36224 • 1020 ME Amsterdam • The Netherlands
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Table of Contents
Table of Contents v
Preface xiii
PART I
Monologism and Dialogism Contrasted
CHAPTER 1
Perspectives on language and discourse 3
1.1 Language as system vs. language in practice 3
1.2 Discourse: Individuals' use of language or interactions-in-contexts . . 5
1.3 Dialogism, dialogicality and dialogue 8
1.4 The traditional conflation of 'dialogism' and 'dialogue' 9
1.5 Dialogue: Interaction between co-present individuals through
symbolic means 12
CHAPTER 2
Monologism: Its basic assumptions 17
2.1 Cognition and communication as empirically distinct phenomena ... 17
2.2 Cognition as information processing by individuals 18
2.3 The transfer-and-exchange model of communication 21
2.4 The code model of language structure 24
2.5 The indirect dependence on written language in monologism 27
2.6 The ontological assumptions of monologism 32
CHAPTER 3
Dialogism: Some historical roots and present-day trends 35
3.1 Interactions, contexts and social (re)construction 35
3.2 Dialogism of classical times 37
VI TABLE OF CONTENTS
3.3 Before the 20th century 38
3.4 Some 20th century traditions 40
3.4.1 Phenomenology: Perspectives and multiple realities 40
3.4.2 Pragmatism: The gradual emergence of meaning 43
3.4.3 Symbolic interactionism and social behaviourism: The three-
step model of communicative interaction 44
3.4.4 Sociocultural theory: Activity types and semiotic mediation . . 46
3.4.5 Summary: Some dialogistic ideas 48
3.5 Some present-day research traditions.: Empirical studies of discourse
in interaction and contexts 49
CHAPTER 4
Language structure and linguistic practices 55
4.1 The monologistic theory: Social realism plus individualism 55
4.2 Radical interactionism 57
4.3 Social constructionism 59
PART II
Interacting and making sense in contexts
CHAPTER 5
The dynamics of dialogue 67
5.1 Conversation as the habitat of dialogical principles 67
5.2 The sequential organization of a social activity 69
5.3 Coordination and synchronization of utterance segments in dialogue . 71
5.4 Co-accomplishment in concerted activities 73
5.5 Interaction as expressing and testing mutual understanding 77
5.6 The local production of meaning and coherence 80
5.7 Dialogue as a series of opportunities for relevant continuations .... 82
5.8 The dynamics of discourse units 84
5.9 Summary: Some dialogical principles 85
5.9.1 Sequentiality 85
5.9.2 Joint construction 86
5.9.3 Act-activity interdependence 87
5.9.4 A superordinate principle: Reflexivity between discourse and
contexts 88
5.10 Differing perspectives on dialogicality 89
TABLE OF CONTENTS vii
CHAPTER 6
Speakers and listeners 91
6.1 Monological speakers or dialogical interlocutors 91
6.2 Speaking: The production of utterances? 92
6.3 Embodied minds and persons in interaction 96
6.4 The production of utterance meaning 97
6.4.1 Reference and situated description 98
6.4.2 Responsive properties 99
6.4.3 Obligational aspects 100
6.4.4 The 'why' of communication 100
6.4.5 Social languages 101
6.5 The role of the speaker's partners in authoring utterances 101
6.5.1 The addressee 102
6.5.2 Other listeners 104
6.5.3 Principals and remote audiences 107
6.6 Conclusion 109
CHAPTER 7
Sense-making in discourse and the situated fixation of linguistic
meanings Ill
7.1 Linguistic meaning and situated interpretation 1ll
7.2 Meaning in fixed codes and fixed contexts, or accomplishments in
situated activities 112
7.3 Situatedness: Contextualization, decontextualization and
recontextualization 115
7.4 The nature of lexical meanings: Stable features or dynamic
potentials? 118
7.5 Fixed word meanings or temporary fixations 121
CHAPTER 8
Contexts in discourse and discourse in contexts 127
8.1 The incompleteness of language 127
8.2 Types of contextual resources 128
8.3 Dimensions of contexts: cross-classifying contexts and contextual
resources 131
8.4 Two perspectives on contexts of discourse 134
viii TABLE OF CONTENTS
8.5 Some additional properties of contexts 136
8.5.1 Backgrounding 136
8.5.2 Relevance 137
8.5.3 Partial sharedness 138
8.5.4 Dynamics of utterance, contexts and understanding 139
8.6 Recontextualizations at the micro-level; selective use of cotextual
resources 140
8.7 Fragments of discourses and contexts 144
8.8 Local decontextualizations 148
8.9 Perspectival conflicts and competing context spaces 151
8.10 Recontextualizations at a global level: Intertextuality and
interdiscursivity 154
CHAPTER 9
Elementary contributions to discourse 159
9.1 Elementary building-blocks: Utterances, idea units and turns at talk . 159
9.2 The response-initiative structure of contributions to dialogue 161
9.3 Excursus: The elements of social action 166
9.4 Varieties of contributions to dialogue 169
9.5 Utterances that are not full-fledged contributions to dialogue 173
9.6 Initiative and response as relational aspects of turns 175
9.7 Coding elementary contributions to dialogue 177
9.8 The dialogicality of larger units of discourse 178
CHAPTER 10
Episodes and topics 181
10.1 Topic progression in the flow of discourse 181
10.2 The joint production of a topic 183
10.3 Episodes: units of natural social interaction 186
10.4 Monotopical and polytopical episodes 188
10.5 Non-topical episodes 190
10.6 Local and global coherence 191
10.7 Topical trajectories and transitions between episodes 193
10.8 Topical development in monologue 195
10.9 Episodes as the locus for creating temporarily shared
understanding 198
10.10 The gradual determination of indeterminate topics 200
TABLE OF CONTENTS ix
10.11 Episodes and topics as emergent and dynamic events 200
10.12 Units of talk-in-interaction 202
CHAPTER 11
Communicative projects 207
11.1 Communicative actions as interactions 207
11.2 Speech act theory: Monological acts by individual speakers 208
11.3 Intentionality and responsibility 211
11.4 From speech acts to local sequences, language games and
communicative projects 212
11.5 The notion of a 'communicative project': A first approximation ... 217
11.6 Communicative projects: Asymmetrical participation and
collective accomplishment 220
11.7 Limits to sharedness: Misalignment of parties' projects, and
coordination of competing goals 224
11.8 The nested nature of projects 225
11.9 Communicative strategies: Methods of accomplishing
communicative projects 227
11.10 The past- and future-orientation of communicative projects 230
11.11 'Communicative project' as a discourse-analytic concept 231
CHAPTER 12
Situation definitions, activity types and communicative genres 235
12.1 Activity types as situation definitions 235
12.2 Communicative genres 238
12.3 Genres of 'ordinary conversation' 241
12.4 The global structure of activities: Core activities and phase
structure 243
12.5 Communication in relation to non-communicative activities 244
12.6 Coherence, relevance and topic progression as activity-dependent . . 249
12.7 The creative accomplishment of routines within genres 253
12.8 The partial sharedness of activities and genres 254
12.9 Classifying communicative activities in families 257
x TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART III
Monologism and dialogism reconciled? 261
CHAPTER 13
Dialogism: opportunities and limitations 263
!3.1 Dialogical principles and the theory of discourse structure 263
13.2 Dialogue theory and empirical methods 265
13.3 Extending dialogue theory: A general epistemology for
communication and cognition 266
13.3.1 Monological speech and thought 267
13.3.2 Dialogism and written texts 268
13.4 Dialogism as opposed to radical social constructionism 270
13.4.1 Subjects and agency 270
13.4.2 The material basis as constraints on discursive
construction 271
13.5 Dialogism as a context-specific framework 274
13.6 The limits of dialogism 275
CHAPTER 14
Reconstructing monologism as a special case 277
14.1 Monologism and dialogism as perspectivized frameworks 277
14.2 In support of monologistic practices 278
14.3 From decontextualizing practices to decontextualized theories .... 281
14.4 Conclusion 286
References 289
Appendix: Transcription conventions 321
Index 323