Second Language Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Second Language Interaction Pragmatics & Beyond Editor Andreas H. Jucker University of Zurich, English Department P...

Author: Salla Kurhila

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Second Language Interaction

Pragmatics & Beyond Editor Andreas H. Jucker University of Zurich, English Department Plattenstrasse 47, CH-8032 Zurich, Switzerland e-mail: [email protected]

Associate Editors Jacob L. Mey University of Southern Denmark

Herman Parret Belgian National Science Foundation, Universities of Louvain and Antwerp

Jef Verschueren Belgian National Science Foundation, University of Antwerp

Editorial Board Shoshana Blum-Kulka

Catherine Kerbrat-Orecchioni

Hebrew University of Jerusalem

University of Lyon 2

Jean Caron

Claudia de Lemos

Université de Poitiers

University of Campinas, Brazil

Robyn Carston

Marina Sbisà

University College London

University of Trieste

Bruce Fraser

Emanuel Schegloff

Boston University

University of California at Los Angeles

Thorstein Fretheim

Deborah Schiffrin

University of Trondheim

Georgetown University

John Heritage

Paul O. Takahara

University of California at Los Angeles

Kobe City University of Foreign Studies

Susan Herring

Sandra Thompson

University of Texas at Arlington

University of California at Santa Barbara

Masako K. Hiraga

Teun A. Van Dijk

St. Paul’s (Rikkyo) University

Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona

David Holdcroft

Richard J. Watts

University of Leeds

University of Berne

Sachiko Ide Japan Women’s University

Volume 145 Second Language Interaction by Salla Kurhila


Salla Kurhila University of Helsinki

John Benjamins Publishing Company Amsterdam/Philadelphia

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The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences – Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ansi z39.48-1984.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Salla Kurhila Second Language Interaction / Salla Kurhila. p. cm. (Pragmatics & Beyond, New Series, issn 0922-842X ; v. 145) Includes bibliographical references and indexes. 1. Conversation analysis. 2. Social interaction. I. Title. II. Pragmatics & beyond ; new ser., 145. P95.45.K87 2006 302.3’46--dc22 isbn 90 272 5388 9 (Hb; alk. paper)

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© 2006 – John Benjamins B.V. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publisher. John Benjamins Publishing Co. · P.O. Box 36224 · 1020 me Amsterdam · The Netherlands John Benjamins North America · P.O. Box 27519 · Philadelphia pa 19118-0519 · usa

Table of contents

chapter 1 Introduction 1.1 Setting up the problem: Interaction and understanding in talk between native and non-native speakers 1 1.2 Method of study, transcription, and data: Institutional vs. everyday conversation 3 1.3 Second language comprehension vs. interactional understanding 9 1.4 The organisation and the relevance of the study 16 chapter 2 Repair organisation as a means to construct understanding 2.1 Interactional understanding and repair organisation 19 2.2 Initiating or doing repair? 23 2.3 Trouble turns 26 chapter 3 Other-correction 3.1 Introduction 31 3.1.1 The preference organisation for repair in asymmetric conversation 33 3.1.2 Embedded vs. exposed correction 39 3.2 Types of other-repair sequences: Repair is not repeated 43 3.2.1 Extended answers: No overt orientation towards the correction by either of the participants 44 3.2.2 Repetition after new information: Ambiguous orientation to the correction by the recipient 50 3.2.2.1 Institutional conversation: A registering repetition 51 3.2.2.2 Everyday conversation: Acknowledging unexpected information 57 3.2.3 Conclusion 61

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3.3 Types of other-repair sequences: Orienting to correction by repeating it 62 3.3.1 Repair as a response to uncertainty 65 3.3.1.1 Repair (+ an affirmative particle) 65 3.3.1.2 Repair with a mitigating particle 72 3.3.2 Non-responsive correction by the NS 78 3.4 Discussion 84 chapter 4 Word search 4.1 Introduction 91 4.1.1 Word search in the CA tradition 92 4.1.2 Word search in L2-data 94 4.2 Lexical searches 97 4.2.1 Initiating the search: Interrogatives as a means to flag the problem 98 4.2.2 Resolving the search: Loan words 105 4.2.3 Resolving the search: Fennicized words 111 4.2.4 Initiating and/or resolving the search: Negating a semantically contiguous referent 117 4.3 Grammatical searches 123 4.3.1 A completing response by the NS 125 4.3.2 No substantial response by the NS 130 4.3.3 The discrepancy in the orientation by the participants: The junction of grammar and lexicon 140 4.4 Discussion: Difficulty in finding a word 147 chapter 5 Candidate understandings 5.1 Introduction 153 5.1.1 Defining the phenomenon 154 5.1.2 Properties of candidate understandings 157 5.2 Paraphrasing candidate understandings 161 5.2.1 Paraphrases by the NS – condensing previous turns 161 5.2.2 Paraphrases by the NNS – the client’s resource 169 5.3 Uncertainty-marked candidate understandings 174 5.3.1 Uncertainty-marked paraphrase as elaborating an utterance 175 5.3.2 Uncertainty-marked paraphrase as identifying a term 182

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5.3.3 Uncertainty-marked paraphrases as presenting a conclusion 188 5.3.4 Uncertainty-marked paraphrases: Summary 195 5.4 Completing candidate understandings 197 5.4.1 Completion as a response to difficulty 199 5.4.2 Completion as articulating (revealing) the other’s position in a problematic sequence 205 5.4.3 Completing candidate understandings: Summary 213 5.5 Discussion 215 chapter 6 Concluding discussion 6.1 Tendencies in NS-NNS interaction 219 6.2 Is there a “non-native fingerprint” in conversation? 221 6.3 Is there an “institutional fingerprint” in conversation? 225 6.4 Implications arising from the present study 228 Notes References Appendix Index

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chapter 

Introduction

. Setting up the problem: Interaction and understanding in talk between native and non-native speakers This book explores the interaction between native and non-native speakers. In particular, the focus of this study is on interactional understanding: how mutual intelligibility is established, checked and remedied in conversation where the participants do not have equal access to the linguistic resources. This issue is addressed by investigating interaction and the progress of conversation in a range of authentic institutional and everyday situations where native (NS) and non-native speakers (NNS) of Finnish meet and talk with each other. The following excerpt illustrates a conversational exchange which is typical of contemporary Finland (and other similar societies): an information exchange in an office between a client and a professional (cf. Sarangi & Slembrouck 1996). This exchange takes place in an office of an educational institution offering courses to foreigners in Finland; the participants are the native Finnish-speaking secretary and the client who speaks Finnish as a second language. The speakers are engaged in taking care of the matter that has brought the client to the office, which is the aim of such service encounters. (1) Office. The client (P) has come to the office in order to ask for help with filling in an application form for the student allowance. The secretary (S) is asking the relevant information and writing it down in the form. 01 S: On-ko tei-llä laps-i-a? have-Q you.pl-ADE child-pl-PAR Do you have children? 02 P: J[o- on m Venäjä-lle jä-i y[e- have Russian-ALL stay-PST Y[e- I do m in Russia stayed [ 03 S: [Jos[If-

[minä e-n [I NEG-1 [I don’t [ [joo (.) [yes (.)

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04 P: ti[edä mi-tä se (on).] kn[ow what-PAR it (is) ] kn[ow what it (is). ] [ ] 05 S: [maksa-tte-ko ] hei-stä elatusa↑pu-a [pay-2.pl-Q ] they-ELA alimony-PAR [do you pay ] alimony for them 06 P: Joo minä maksa-n mutt::a se: #ee# m:- m:i-tä se: se #öö# PRT I pay-1 but it what-PAR it it Yes I pay but:: it: #ee# w:- w:hat is: is #eh# it’s not 07 ei #ö# (2.0) ei ole (.) papere-i-ta [(.) sieltä NEG NEG is paper-pl-PAR [ there #eh# (2.0) there’s no (.) papers (.) [from there [ 08 S: [↑Mm 09 P: koska se on hehhh because it is hehhh 10 S: Just joo. (.) maksatte epävirallises↑ti Okay right. (.) you pay unofficial↑ly 11 P: Joo. Yes. 12 S: Jo[o just Ye[ah right [ 13 P: [˚Epävirallisesti˚ [˚Unofficially˚

As can be expected in second language conversations, the non-native speaker occasionally displays some linguistic difficulty in formulating utterances or in finding lexical items. In the excerpt above, the NNS’s turn (lines 6–7) is rather fragmentary, containing several hesitation sounds, sound stretches, pauses and restarts. Moreover, the utterance is left incomplete (line 9); the complement in the utterance is not produced. Despite these markers of hesitancy, there are no breaches in mutual understanding; the NS displays understanding by first acknowledging what the NNS has said and then by rephrasing the NNS’s meaning (line 10). The participants thus manage to establish mutual understanding which is sealed by their reciprocal confirmations (lines 11–12). This book is about instances in second language conversations where mutual understanding is potentially at stake – instances where the smooth conversational progress is halted. These instances are investigated by discussing when, and how, the conversational progress is disrupted; in what environments do the speakers begin to modify their own or the other’s talk, what are the elements that are being modified, and how do the participants return to the talk-in-progress after these modification sequences. This book approaches

Chapter 1. Introduction

understanding and the problems of understanding from a linguistic and interactional point of view, focusing on the participants’ joint construction of the meanings of the turns and of the whole interaction. In the modern industrialised world, the number of institutions where professional activities are performed mostly in and through second language conversations is increasing rapidly, and the participants of these encounters do not form any culturally or linguistically unified group. Tendencies such as ‘marketisation’ or ‘conversationalisation’ (Fairclough 1996) in late modern societies have resulted in the colonisation of ordinary life by economic and bureaucratic systems, and the increasing mobility of people makes these systems linguistically heterogeneous. Professionals and clients with varying linguistic backgrounds therefore need to negotiate about the relevant matters with the linguistic resources they have. In addition, the mobility of people not only affects the institutional or bureaucratic systems; members of contemporary modern societies are also privately more and more involved in interactional situations where all the participants do not share linguistic resources. The aim of this book is to shed light on these linguistically asymmetric interactions, to determine what kind of problems may emerge in them and how these problems are related to the participants’ nativeness or non-nativeness on the one hand, and on the other hand, to the type of the interaction (e.g. institutional vs. everyday conversation) as well as the interactional activities and linguistic practices that characterise these different interactions.

. Method of study, transcription, and data: Institutional vs. everyday conversation This study is conversation analytic in its orientation. It treats understanding as a dynamic communicational phenomenon, and it is based on the interactional or dialogical perspective on language. The methodological tools and organisational principles of conversation analysis (henceforth CA) form a key resource for the analyses (Sacks 1992a and b; for reviews of CA methodology, see e.g. Heritage 1984a, 1989; Psathas 1995; Pomerantz & Fehr 1997; Hutchby & Wooffit 1998; ten Have 1998). In particular, the mechanisms through which interactants deal with problems in hearing, understanding or producing talk (Schegloff, Jefferson, & Sacks 1977) are central for the study of interactional understanding. Until recently, the CA tradition has been monolingual. Researchers have worked with everyday conversation and later with different types of insti-

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tutional interaction, but the interactants have mainly had the same mother tongue. One explanation for this “bias” is the methodological basis of CA. As a part of its ethnomethodological heritage, CA is interested in the concept of ‘membership’ and the members’ competences which underlie ordinary social activities. CA is “directed at describing and explicating the competences which ordinary speakers use and rely on when they engage in intelligible, conversational interaction” (Heritage 1984a: 241, emphasis added). That is, CA sets out to study members’ practices, which are taken to be shared and arise from shared competencies involved in being a user of a language. It has thus been (at least tacitly) assumed that sharing practices presupposes sharing a language (cf. Firth 1996). This presupposition is, however, challenged in the expanding body of research which applies CA to linguistically asymmetric conversations, i.e. conversations which involve non-native speakers, speakers with different speech disorders, very young children, etc. (e.g. Goodwin 2003; Gardner & Wagner 2004; Richards & Seedhouse 2005). The results of these studies can contribute to our understanding of shared practices and membership, and further shed light on the fundamental methodological question of whether, or to what extent, practices for talking, understanding and reasoning rely on sharing a language. One of the fundamental principles of CA is the “emic” relevance of the different category memberships: the relevance of different categories has to arise from the data, as it is the participants (not the researcher) who can make particular categories relevant or salient (cf. e.g. Psathas 1995: 8–9). This demand to avoid precategorisation – to avoid imposing categories or roles on the data that might not have ‘procedural relevance’ (i.e. relevance that is demonstrable in the talk itself; see Schegloff 1991) – is perhaps another explanation for why CA and second language research have not been combined earlier. Those interested in second language talk are obviously keen on finding out what it is to be a learner and what it means to communicate with limited resources. The categories of ‘native’ and ‘non-native’ or ‘learner’ have been self-evident (and the reason for study) for many second language researchers. From a strict CA perspective, this is not a valid starting-point. The relevance of the speaker identities should be the result of the analysis, not the beginning of it (about CA and applied linguistics, see Schegloff, Koshik, Jacoby, & Olsher 2002). Sheding light on the (possible) interactional relevance of the speakers’ linguistic identities is one of the aims of this study. It is a fact that the natives and non-natives in my data interact with each other, but what remains to be seen is whether they interact as a native and as non-native speaker.


Despite the tension between a “pure CA approach” (allowing the data to guide the research) and an “applied second-language approach” (to find out something about being a learner), there is a growing interest in combining these two research traditions. Because of globalisation, both the volume of NS-NNS interaction and the variety of languages involved have increased exponentially over the last decades. Members of divergent societies are increasingly involved in various interactional situations, both publicly and privately, and all these participants do not share linguistic resources. Thus there is a need to find out what a context-bound but rigorous method can reveal about asymmetric interaction, and within the framework of CA, increasing interest has evolved to broaden the monolingual research agenda, especially during the last decade (see e.g. Kalin 1995; Firth 1996; Carroll 2000; Wong 2000a, b and c; Kurhila 2001; Egbert 2004; Gardner & Wagner 2004; Richards & Seedhouse 2005). It is a challenge to combine a method which builds upon the notion of intersubjectivity (e.g. Heritage 1984a; Schegloff 1992), and data where the participants (and the analyst) have limitations in their shared linguistic knowledge. According to Schegloff (in Wong & Olsher 2000: 114–115), “basically – people ought to work on materials in a language and culture that they’re native members of, so that all the native intuitions, whatever they are, are mobilized”. However, work on linguistically asymmetric conversations has already been successfully undertaken and, since such conversations are naturally occurring real interactions, there is no in-principle reason why they could not be studied from a CA perspective. Also, it is evident that attempts to limit the type of data that could be “legitimately” investigated by a conversation analyst lead to major problems. What would be the “sufficient shared culture” that the participants and the analyst should have? Which category memberships (gender, age, social class, race, nationality, mother tongue, etc.) would have to be the same and which could be different? It is not my intention to undermine the usefulness of shared background in analysing conversation; I only want to emphasize that boundaries cannot be erected between “acceptable” and “non-acceptable” data. It is, however, the analysis rather than general considerations which ultimately can prove the viability of CA for any type of data. The data of this study consist of approximately 16 hours of naturally occurring conversation in a range of everyday and institutional situations in Finland. The majority of conversations have been recorded in offices of three educational institutions offering courses on Finnish language for non-native speakers. In these dyadic conversations, the participants are the secretaries (i.e. the native speakers of Finnish) and the clients are those who either study at the institution, or who are planning to begin study there (i.e. the non-native

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speakers of Finnish). In addition to these office encounters, the data include conversations at the reception desk of a hotel, at the information desk in a bus station, and in the office hours of two teachers who teach Finnish as a second language at the university. Along with this institutional data, other sources of data are seven informal conversations between two friends (a Finn and his/her foreign friend), and two multi-party conversations involving both native and non-native speakers of Finnish. Institutional conversations thus form the biggest part of the database: approximately 11 hours, versus 5 hours of everyday conversation. There are approximately 100 non-native speakers in the data, from all over the world, and their knowledge of Finnish varies greatly. There are 22 native Finnish speakers, of whom five are secretaries. The data were both audio- and videotaped (although two everyday conversations were only audiotaped). For the office conversations, the duration of each encounter varied greatly, depending on the clients’ reasons for visiting. Some clients just came to the office to get a stamp in their credit book, whereas others wanted help in various matters concerning different types of permission and applications. Generally, the organisation of the encounters follows the structure of front desk encounters outlined by Kidwell (2000: 20–21): 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Opening Request for service Optional interrogative series Provision, or not, of the service Closing.

The optional interrogative series varied somewhat depending on the type of the office, and the relationship between the secretary and the client. Two of the three educational institutions were large well-established institutions which have over one hundred students and many different courses, so that the secretary cannot be expected to know everybody by name or sight. In these institutions, the interrogative series included the identification of the client, since the client’s status as an “already-enrolled” or “not-yet-enrolled” student was consequential for the subsequent procedures and for the relevant information. In contrast, the third “institution” was an intensive one-month summer course on Finnish language which is organised annually by the Ministry of Education. The participants for such a course are selected beforehand and their number is restricted to around 25. The identification sequence was not necessary at the office of this course, since the secretary knew all the participants, and the participants had the same status with respect to the institution.


The everyday conversations in the data were recorded in a variety of settings: two co-workers talking to each other while working in a small factory, a beauty therapist doing a friend’s facial, people having dinner and tea parties and two friends talking to each other on the phone. All in all, my database is rather heterogeneous. From a CA point of view, it is mundane conversation which is the primary data source, since its mechanisms organise the basic forms of social action and interaction (Zimmerman & Boden 1991: 4). However, the variety of the data enables this study to include dimensions such as institutionality in the analysis. Looking at phenomena both in mundane and in clearly goal-oriented institutional conversation increases our knowledge of the use and distribution of different linguistic practices, and thus sheds light on the linguistic realisation of institutionality (cf. Drew & Heritage 1992a). Moreover, the analysis of the interactional relevance of the participants’ linguistic identities can be sharpened when the participants’ activities can be observed in a range of varying situations. For example, it will be shown that the salience of the participants’ linguistic identities is connected to their institutional roles and the tasks and activities typical of those roles. The question of the mobilisation of different identities or category memberships has been at the heart of CA since the very beginning (see Sacks 1992 [e.g. fall 1965, spring 1966, spring 1967]). For this reason, CA can be considered to be an excellent tool for exploring the potential relevance of ‘(non-)nativeness’ (see also Egbert 2004). However, from an anthropological point of view, CA has been criticised for being a too “bloodless and impersonal method” (Moerman 1988: x) for the study of conversation between people from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds. Moerman insists that conversation must be studied in ways that are sensitive to the languages, cultures and settings in which social interaction occurs (ibid.: xi). Other lines of research, which also have paid more attention to the role of culture in conversation, are e.g. interactional sociolinguistics, most notably represented in the work by Gumperz (see e.g. 1982a and b, 1991 together with Roberts), as well as other empirical research on intercultural or interethnic communication (see e.g. Scollon & Scollon 1995; Rampton 1995; Di Luzio, Günthner, & Orletti 2001). However, as my data consist of approximately 100 non-native speakers with greatly varying language skills and linguistic backgrounds, it is not possible to focus on a particular ethnic identity. Rather, I will investigate situations where the non-nativeness (i.e. a minority identity regardless of the country of origin) can be oriented to. The examples in this study have been transcribed according to the conversation analytic conventions developed by Gail Jefferson (cf. Atkinson &

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Heritage 1984: ix–xvi). Transcription and glossing symbols are explained in Appendix. The turns in the examples are mostly represented by three lines: the first line is the original Finnish utterance, the second is the gloss line and the third line in bold is an approximate English translation. The gloss line is left out when it does not provide relevant information (e.g. in short utterances, where the English translation is word-for-word, or in utterances that repeat a part of the prior talk which already has been glossed in the example). Many “non-native speech features” produced by the NNSs surface at the morphological level, concerning for example, case endings. This is somewhat problematic for the translation, as Finnish and English are typologically very different. Finnish is an agglutinative language, which expresses grammatical functions, dependency relations and locations primarily by attaching various word-final suffixes. Nouns, pronouns, adjectives, verbs and numerals are inflected, and the inflectional morphemes are attached to the end of words as suffixes. The gloss line provides information on the different alternatives produced by the NNS if possible; the differences in typology and pronunciation between Finnish and English restrict idiomatic translation. In problematic cases, I provide comments on the translations in the text or in the footnotes. Gaze is marked in the transcripts where it is considered to be relevant in the interpretation of the example. I use a version of the system introduced by Goodwin (1981) and modified by Seppänen (1997, 1998). The speaker’s gaze is marked above the turn and the recipient’s gaze under the turn. The one who is gazing is indicated by the same initial that is used elsewhere in the transcript. A line (---) demonstrates the time one participant is gazing at the other, dots (...) illustrate the moment when the participant shifts her gaze towards the other participant, and commas („,) stand for the moment when the participant shifts her gaze away from the other participant. As almost all the examples come from dyadic conversations, the person the gaze is directed to is not mentioned above the line, given that it is always the other speaker. In the transcripts, the letter S stands for the native Finnish speaker, and all the other letters represent the non-native speakers. I have used the terms ‘native’ (NS) and ‘non-native speaker’ (NNS) in this book, although I am aware of the problems associated with these terms (cf. Firth & Wagner 1997; Carroll 2000). I admit that the label ‘NNS’ is vague and stipulates very little about the language skills of the speaker, but I have used it since it is still predominant in the studies on second language interaction. I use the acronyms ‘NS’ and ‘NNS’ to identify the speakers (instead of their names) and because, from time to time, these linguistic categories are shown to be relevant in the interaction. Yet I want to emphasize that the speaker status is only one of the innumerable


categories an individual can be ascribed to and not an sich more or less relevant, static or homogeneous than the other categories.

. Second language comprehension vs. interactional understanding The foci of this book – linguistic practices that are used in second language interaction to check and remedy the breaches in mutual understanding – have increasingly attracted attention in the recent research on second language acquisition (henceforth SLA). The present study contributes to this line of research but at the same time differs in some fundamental ways from the mainstream SLA studies. I will address these differences in order to relate my study to the field of SLA, and to show how SLA research could profit from interactionally oriented second language research. Second-language speech has been an area of interest and subject of study especially since the early 1980’s. The empirical work on second language talk is largely concerned with language acquisition.1 In this line of research, psycholinguistic and mental orientations toward language have been dominant (cf. Firth & Wagner 1997; Atkinson 2002). Although SLA studies often acknowledge that language acquisition takes place in a social setting, the object of inquiry is still the internal, mental process, the acquisition of new linguistic knowledge (Long 1997: 319). Contextual and situational dimensions in the language samples that are investigated are treated as external secondary factors, separate from the real object of inquiry. As Poulisse (1997: 324) observes: “You first need to describe the basic processes of learning and using language, and then to discuss the contextual factors that may influence these processes.” Thus, according to the mentalist SLA perspective, language (as a system), the use of the system and contextual factors are seen as separable. It then follows from this position that understanding – or comprehension, as it is usually referred to in SLA literature – is approached as a problem between the learner and the language rather than a problem between the interlocutors. For this reason, comprehension in SLA research is often measured by using some external criteria, e.g. the success of completing some predefined task (to draw a picture, to place objects correctly on a board, etc.). Interaction is treated as a variable possibly influencing comprehension and it is investigated insofar as it is consequential in completing the task successfully (see e.g. Gass & Varonis 1994; Long, Inagaki & Ortega 1998; Polio & Gass 1998). Generally, according to the SLA tradition, interaction is not seen as fundamentally being co-constructed as it is in CA thinking, where meanings are thought to be jointly created in the

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interaction. SLA treats meanings as packages that originate in one speaker, who then tries to transmit the message as accurately as possible to the other speaker so that she could then decode it (Poulisse 1997: 327). The interactional approach adopted in this study is based on a different view of language and interaction. According to the conversation analytic perspective, language use cannot be separated from its context. In other words, we do not speak in order to produce words and grammar, we speak in order to achieve various aims, in order to have an effect on other people. The immediate interactional environment (micro-context) and a larger macro-context are therefore fundamentally relevant to any piece of talk. Our talk is shaped by the context, and we also create or renew the context through our talk (Heritage 1984a). Thus, the speech by any speaker, whether native or non-native, should be investigated as it is produced in interaction, tied to the contextual and social environment in which it is uttered. Moreover, CA considers interaction and understanding to be intertwined. As a consequence, interaction cannot be merely a factor consisting of the speaker’s linguistic contributions, which can then be controlled and manipulated; instead, it is the essence of understanding, because it is through interaction that the speakers can display and achieve their shared understanding. The differences in these basic assumptions lead to differences in research questions, methods and data selection. While this study is qualitative, SLA studies have basically used quantitative methods and elicited data. Because of statistical and quantitative interests, SLA researchers have gathered as data language samples which are carefully planned and controlled, but which do not concur to any dominant forms of interaction in the world. The interaction in SLA studies is often “an interaction designed to allow the NNS to produce a language sample” (Liddicoat 1997: 315). From an interactional perspective, this is problematic – interaction is not accepted as it is, as the participants’ local achievement in situ. Furthermore, not only is this kind of conversation alienated from the interactional reality in the world, but it can also work against the aims of SLA research. Studies of SLA often explore and explicate ways to promote second language learning.2 For example, there is a large body of literature on the (possible) benefits of what are called recasts for the speaker’s language aquisition and use (see e.g. Long 1996; Mackey & Philp 1998; Mackey, Gass, & McDonough 2000). However, when Nicholas, Lightbown and Spada (2001) discussed the results of different recast studies in their review article, they noticed that “reacasts appear to be more useful input to learners in the laboratory setting than in the classroom setting” (ibid.: 749). Yet the laboratory studies also investigate recasts in order to find out whether recasts are a useful inter-


actional tool that may promote learning (and thus could be used in language teaching). Interactional practices cannot be separated from the activities they accomplish – they are interpreted in relation to the context in which they occur. In addition, interaction is not a stable unit which can be transferred from one environment to another. Linguistic practice that draws the learner’s attention to an error in a test situation where the participants talk to each other only for the purpose of completing a task a researcher has given, might function differently in a real classroom situation or in naturally-occurring conversation where the participants also have other aims, and they are not primarily interacting with each other as a native speaker and a learner. The (assumed) prominence of these linguistic identities – ‘native speaker’ and ‘learner’ – can thus be tied to the type of data in many SLA studies (NSNNS pairs talking to each other because they are told to do so). Because of the test situations, speakers’ nativeness or non-nativeness has been emphasized, and used to explain the linguistic behaviour of the speakers (cf. Firth & Wagner 1997). However, when second language speakers conduct their conversations with native speakers in everyday life, they have a much wider set of identities that can be activated in interaction; the speakers can be customers, clients, professionals, patients, etc. Evidence suggests that native and non-native speakers actually conduct their (non-pedagogic) conversations so as not to make their linguistic identities relevant (cf. Kurhila 2004; Brouwer, Rasmussen, & Wagner 2004; Wong 2004). Recently, considerable debate and discussion have arisen about the tacit or open assumptions about language and language use in SLA research, the biases in its research agenda and the future prospects of the field (see e.g. Block 1996; Gregg, Long, Jordan, & Beretta 1997; Firth & Wagner 1997, 1998; Hall 1997; Kasper 1997; Larsen-Freeman 2000; Kramsch 2000; Atkinson 2002). Firth and Wagner (1997: 285–286) have pointed out that SLA research has a skewed view on discourse and communication, and Lantolf and Appel (1994: 11) state that SLA has a delimited and asocial view on language learning and learners. Atkinson (2002: 535–536) even refers to the SLA research as being surrealistic in its “present absence of human beings”. He insists on treating the second language speakers “as real people, doing something they naturally do – not as mere sites for language acquisition” (ibid.: 539). If the speakers are mainly treated as representing the categories of native and non-native speakers, then their “linguistic outcome” is often interpreted as reflecting these categories. For example, speech perturbations such as hesitations, restarts and repetitions, or unspecific utterances by the NNSs can be seen

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as reflecting their deficient mastery of the target language. However, speech perturbations and unspecific utterances are common in all kinds of real-life conversations, and can even serve interactional functions. Moreover, sometimes speech perturbations can be used to display the speaker’s interactional competence rather than incompetence. I will exemplify this through a closer look at example (1): (1) [replicated] Office. (V=client, S=secretary) 01 S: On-ko tei-llä laps-i-a? have-Q you.pl-ADE child-pl-PAR Do you have children? [minä e-n 02 P: J[o- on m Venäjä-lle jä-i y[e- have Russian-ALL stay-PST [I NEG-1 Y[e- I do m in Russia stayed [I don’t [ [ 03 S: [Jos[joo (.) [If[yes (.) 04 P: ti[edä mi-tä se (on).] kn[ow what-PAR it (is) ] kn[ow what it (is). ] [ ] 05 S: [maksa-tte-ko ] hei-stä elatusa↑pu-a [pay-2pl-Q ] they-ELA alimony-PAR [do you pay ] alimony for them 06 P: Joo minä maksa-n mutt::a se: #ee# m:- m:i-tä se: se #öö# PRT I pay-1 but it what-PAR it it Yes I pay but:: it: #ee# w:- w:hat is: is #eh# it’s not 07 ei #ö# (2.0) ei ole (.) papere-i-ta [(.) sieltä NEG NEG is paper-pl-PAR [ there #eh# (2.0) there’s no (.) papers (.) [from there [ 08 S: [↑Mm 09 P: koska se on hehhh because it is hehhh 10 S: Just joo. (.) maksatte epävirallises↑ti Okay right. (.) you pay unofficial↑ly 11 P: Joo. Yes. 12 S: Jo[o just Ye[ah right [ 13 P: [˚Epävirallisesti˚ [˚Unofficially˚

I mentioned earlier that in this extract, the NNS displays some difficulty in formulating utterances or in finding lexical items. Indeed, the NNS’s turn


(lines 6–7) is rather fragmentary, containing several hesitation sounds, sound stretches, pauses and restarts. There is also the interrogative mitä se (on) ‘what is (it)’, which is reported as being a communication strategy (appeal for assistance) by the NNS (Tarone 1983: 62; Larsen-Freeman & Long 1991: 127). The NNS could also be interpreted as using another communication strategy, circumlocation, i.e. describing the elements or characteristics of some action instead of using the appropriate target language structure (Larsen-Freeman & Long 1991: 127). This is because he describes a characteristic of the action (that the payment is made without papers) instead of using the verb phrase, which the NS introduces a couple of turns later (‘pay unofficially’, line 10). However, the (main) reason for the speaker’s difficulty need not be his nonnativeness, and his hesitations and “circumlocation” do not necessarily reflect restrictions in his knowledge of the target language. It is illuminating to look at the fragmentary utterance (lines 6–7, 9) in light of its conversational location: the turn is also the NNS’s answer to a question about his economic situation in relation to his children. The action the NNS is describing – paying alimony unofficially – probably would not be easy to explain for a native client, either. Divorce and alimony arrangements are private and very personal issues, but they are also institutionalized and involve technical language. The arrangements after a divorce are indicative of the person’s relationships and his economic situation and, hence, reflect his ability to be a competent member in society. It should also be noted that the alimony is paid outside the official procedure. This makes the activity, not perhaps directly criminal, but at least somewhat suspect. Reporting an unofficial (i.e. non-institutional) arrangement to someone who represents an institution (albeit not the same type) is probably at least not facilitating the task. Therefore, the turn by the NNS could be seen as expressing a delicate matter. Delicacy and talking about delicate issues have been investigated in conversation between native speakers (Silverman 1994; Linell & Bredmar 1996). Signs of delicacy are speech perturbations – self-repairs and delays. Another indication observed to imply delicacy is laughter (cf. line 9), for it displays an affective stance towards performing the activity (Haakana 1999: 172; see also Jefferson, Sacks, & Schegloff 1987; Jefferson 1984). Thus, when having trouble in formulating the answer, the NNS is not necessarily only struggling with his linguistic restrictions. He is also constructing the turn as being delicate, as concerning matters which are commonly experienced as difficult to talk about. In other words, the “communication strategies” in the above example need not be produced to compensate, or not solely to compensate, the speaker’s deficient language skills. By hesitating and using circumlocation, the NNS can






construct a special relationship between what he says and how he says it; he can display his cultural competence and knowledge about delicate activities. A microanalytic reading of this excerpt reveals that it would be hasty to explain the speech perturbations by the NNS by citing his status as a not-yet-competent speaker of the language. A valid analysis of the NNS’s turns and activities (i.e. of his speech) cannot be given without taking into account the context in which the speech is produced. To make my position clear, I am not suggesting that the cognitivelyoriented work in SLA should be replaced by interactionally-oriented work. While a conversation analytic perspective can offer new insights into the data that have been examined using quantitative methods, it does not address the issues central in traditional SLA research, namely the development of the speaker’s use of particular linguistic structures. However, although conversation analysis has not been the method to analyse the longitudinal process of language learning, it is well suited to investigate interactional instances which may be relevant for language learning – instances where participants need to negotiate, check or clarify meanings in order to achieve a shared understanding. Also, examining speakers’ linguistic behaviour – what do the native and non-native speakers focus on while producing and receiving utterances, what do they correct in their own or in the other’s linguistic outcome and how – will offer new insights into the notion of profiency and provide information that can be exploited when developing teaching methods and curriculum to better respond to the challenges posed by real-life interaction. I therefore urge us to consider what the interactional view can bring to the research of second language. An interactional approach can be fruitful to SLA research in several ways.3 First, by exploring naturally-occurring conversations, interactionally-oriented research can avoid the inherent problems arising in the test situations. In CA, the object of the study is the speaker’s conduct in “real life” and not a result from the experiment itself (on “doing being an interactional guinea-pig”, see Wagner 1998). This book thus sheds light on the participants’ “normal” ways to correct, clarify or confirm each other’s utterances, when the language is a vehicle for interaction and not the focus of it. Second, a microanalytic reading of the conversational excerpts can challenge, or at least specify, the classification of the speakers’ linguistic conduct. Categories such as ‘indicators of non-understanding’, ‘comprehension checks’, ‘clarification requests’ and ‘conversational continuants’ (cf. e.g. Long 1983; Varonis & Gass 1985) can be rather vague; the basis for drawing the boundaries between different categories is usually not discussed at any length in


SLA studies. Indeed, Varonis and Gass note this difficulty when exploring a model for the negotiation of meaning. They argue (1985: 82) that “in many instances a particular example is ambiguous with regard to whether it is truly an example of a conversational continuant or whether it is an indicator of nonunderstanding”. More recently, Foster, Tonkin and Wigglesworth (2000: 357) have criticised the SLA literature for categorising different utterances into groups without discussing any criteria for this grouping. A microanalytic, context-sensitive reading of the examples can offer a more fine-grained analysis of the turns – of their structure, function, and sequential location. Third, following from the two previous points, an interactional approach offers a new way to consider the level of achievement in interaction. That is, aspects such as the (grammatical) correctness of speech and the need to achieve a mutually accepted understanding on the matters being discussed may be different when people are participating in an experiment where a specific predefined task is to be completed, than when people are interacting in a real life situation (cf. McNamara 1997). In experiments, the tasks to be completed are defined by the analyst. In real life situations, in particular in institutional encounters, the conversations have an “external” aim – a form to be completed, an exam to be taken, a fee to be paid, etc. In this way, the participants have a real need to reach a shared understanding, so that the purpose of the conversation, the institutional goal, can be achieved. Therefore, the participants cannot for example abandon the message totally (cf. e.g. Larsen-Freeman & Long 1991: 127). If they want to achieve their (institutional) goals, they have to come to a common understanding of what they are talking about. Finally, as a consequence of the previous points, interactional analysis makes it possible to treat the participants’ linguistic identities (as natives or non-natives) as a dynamic category. In other words, the relevance of the speakers’ nativeness or non-nativeness need not be taken as given, as automatically consequential for the interaction. Since the research setting does not presuppose a relevance of the speaker’s identity, it can be investigated as a dynamic factor, alive to the changes in the course of the conversation. The participants can but need not make their speaker identities salient in interaction. To summarise, this book on interaction between native and non-native speakers is methodologically and conceptually different from most SLA research that is concerned with interaction and comprehension. This study is rooted in the interactional view on language and it is distinctive among the traditional SLA studies in the ways mentioned above.






. The organisation and the relevance of the study As mentioned previously, the focus of this book is on interactional understanding, which is manifested in the progression of conversation. I will begin by outlining the conversation analytical view on understanding, after which I will present repair organisation – the interactants’ mechanism to establish, maintain and remedy understanding in conversation. The analytical chapters of this study are arranged so as to shed light on the instances where the progress of conversation is (or could be) disrupted. In Chapters 3 and 5, it is the other (i.e. the recipient) who shifts focus onto something in the prior talk. In Chapter 4, it is the self (i.e. the speaker) who disrupts the talk in-progress by beginning to search for a word (or other linguistic unit). The difference between Chapters 3 and 5 lies in the status of the turns that shift focus to prior talk. Chapter 3 presents turns in which the speaker replaces a grammatically, most often morphologically, anomalous utterance with a version closer to the standard. Chapter 5 focuses on turns in which the speaker reformulates a stretch of prior talk. These turns involve lexico-semantically more substantial changes than the turns in Chapter 3. In terms of repair, Chapter 3 focuses on other-correction, Chapter 4 on self-initiated repair, and Chapter 5 on candidate understandings, which have been classified as other-initiated repair (Schegloff et al. 1977: 368). These phenomena are distributed so that other-correction is performed solely by the NSs, word searches (where the other speaker is invited to join in) almost solely by the NNSs, and reformulations somewhat more frequently by the NSs (the numbers are given in respective chapters). This study has a bearing on several areas of research. First, it contributes to our knowledge of interactional practices, in particular in cases where some doubt exists about the level of the intersubjectivity between the participants. Second, this study expands the traditional research agenda of both CA and second language research, in the way some researchers have suggested (e.g. Hatch 1978: 403; Firth & Wagner 1997: 285–286; McNamara 1997: 459; Wong 2000a: 261). By so doing, the present study builds a bridge between ethnomethodological and linguistic approaches, and paves the way for new, a more interactionally attuned and context-sensitive perspective on second language speech. Third, and within CA, this analysis contributes to our knowledge of institutional interaction, of the linguistic practices which are used to constitute an office encounter. Finally, a detailed micro-level analysis of interaction between native and non-native speakers adds to our knowledge of the questions that are central in second language acquisition research, such as when and how


the non-native speakers’ “linguistic output” is modified by themselves or by the native speakers, or when the non-native speakers display uptake after these modifications.



chapter 

Repair organisation as a means to construct understanding

. Interactional understanding and repair organisation In this chapter, I will discuss repair organisation which is a resource for the interactants to address a variety of problems in conversation (Schegloff, Jefferson, & Sacks 1977). First, I will relate the repair system to the conversation analytic perspective on understanding, and then I will discuss the distinctions in the repair organisation in light of second language data. In conversation analytic thinking, understanding and interaction are inseparable – understanding is a continuous, dynamic process, which is constructed and modified in and through interaction. In CA, the existence of mutual understanding is not an “in-principle” problem, as it is in many philosophy-based approaches (see e.g. Taylor 1992). Instead, shared understanding is treated as the expected state of affairs between the interlocutors. However, as Taylor (1992: 217) observes, the trust that our interlocutors interpret our interaction as we do is of the nature of working hypothesis; the assumption holds only “until further notice”. The speaker trusts that the recipient understands her until the recipient behaves in such a way so as to contradict that assumption. The speaker’s trust can be shattered only by “public” events – events which are displayed in interaction so that the speaker, and therefore also the researcher, can observe them. The core notion behind this “public display of understanding” is intersubjectivity. Intersubjectivity is based on the sequential architecture of interaction; linked actions are the basic building blocks of intersubjectivity (Heritage 1984a: 256; see also Schegloff 1992: 1295–1300). This means that an actor’s response to another actor’s behaviour will be taken as indicating understanding of that behaviour (Kalin 1995: 36). According to Heritage (1984a: 255), the point is:




however the recipient analyses the first utterance and whatever the conclusion of such an analysis, some analysis, understanding or appreciation of the prior turn will be displayed in the recipient’s next turn at talk.

For example, by producing an answer, the speaker displays that she has understood that the prior turn was a question, i.e. the kind of turn that has been produced. The linguistic details of the turn display the recipient’s understanding of the specifics of the question. In other words, each turn reflects the speakers’ interpretation of the prior turn and its sequential implications. Consequently, the succession of appropriately conjoined turns is, in fact, itself a demonstration of understanding between the interlocutors. Understanding need not, and usually is not, made explicit in conversation; it is an indirect outcome of the sequential activities of the participants (cf. Heritage 1984a: 259; Schegloff 1992). However, the “normal” state can be shaken and the progress of conversation disrupted if the participants have difficulty in interpreting each other’s turns. In this book, I will focus on such instances: conversational sequences where the participants, instead of providing the “next relevant turn”, orient to some prior turn or to the turn-under-construction. This happens in the data mostly when the NS changes a reference used by the NNS or when the NNS displays having trouble with the formulation of some word or utterance. These disruptions or “cracks” in the progress of conversation can be investigated with and through the repair organisation, which I will introduce in this section. The concept ‘repair’ is rather widely defined in the conversation analytic tradition; it is seen as a general mechanism to modify the talk (or its implications) after its production (see Schegloff, Jefferson, & Sacks 1977: 363). Consequently, what evokes repair need not be an error and not all errors prompt repair from the other speaker. In principle, everything in conversation can be (but need not be) repaired. Schegloff, Jefferson and Sacks (1977) were the first to describe the repair organisation in conversation. They make a distinction between ‘repair’ and ‘correction’ and suggest that these notions are hierarchically organised: repair is a more general term, whereas correction represents a sub-group of repair. Correction refers to a particular type of repair where an “error” is replaced by what is “correct” (ibid.: 363). I follow this distinction and use ‘repair’ when describing sequences in which the speaker produces an alternative reference for something the other speaker has said. ‘Correction’ refers to cases where an alternative version is produced to replace a linguistic unit which can be said to be erroneous according to the norms of the standard language. It should be

Chapter 2. Repair organisation as a means to construct understanding

borne in mind, however, that the notion of ‘standard’ in spoken language is not always clear. Still, there are plenty of cases which a native speaker immediately recognises as deviations from the “normal use of language”. In the present data, only the native speakers do corrections (i.e. correct linguistic units in the non-native speakers’ talk), whereas other type of repair turns are performed by both the NSs and the NNSs. In CA, repair is seen as one of the organisations in conversation. Together with turn-taking and sequential organisation, repair constitutes the fundamental framework for human interaction. Whereas the former organisations are concerned with the ways the turns are constructed and allocated and how they are linked to each other, repair organisation is the interlocutors’ resource for achieving intersubjective understanding. Although shared understanding is the goal and the expected state of affairs in conversation, interlocutors sometimes have difficulty in interpreting the other speaker’s turn, or they may interpret her turns differently from what she actually meant. To deal with such problematic cases – where some troubles in speaking, hearing, or understanding the talk occur – repair organisation is needed. The repair mechanism makes it possible for the interactants to remedy the breaches in intersubjectivity (cf. e.g. Schegloff et al. 1977; Schegloff 1992). Since mutual understanding (i.e. recognising [the implications of] the other speaker’s turn) is a pre-requisite for the progress of conversation, it is not surprising that addressing problems of understanding is a priority activity in conversation (Sacks et al. 1974: 720). Conversation cannot be continued (i.e. the speaker cannot produce a relevant response to the prior turn) before she has understood what the prior speaker has said (i.e. recognised the implications of the prior turn). Furthermore, the talk-in-progress can be returned to only after the problem has been clarified. Repair is a mechanism to achieve clarification, to re-establish mutual intelligibility after some perceived trouble.1 Episodes of repair activity are composed of parts. According to Schegloff et al. (1977), repair sequences consist, minimally, of the repairable and the repair. The repairable is the linguistic unit which contains the trouble source and which is being repaired, and the repair (proper) is the turn in which the problematic element is replaced with another. It is worth noting that the repairable becomes the trouble turn only retrospectively, after the subsequent talk has focused on it. That is, a repair can be said to create a trouble turn in the preceding conversation; when uttered, the repairable need not be marked as being problematic. The minimal pattern [repairable + repair] does not, however, account for all of the instances of repair in conversation. Very often the repair sequence






is more extended, in particular in the cases where repair is only initiated, not directly completed by the recipient. Schegloff et al. (1977) make a distinction between self- and other-repair on the one hand, and between repair initiation and outcome on the other. They note that the one who accomplishes the repair is not necessarily the one who initiated the repair operation (ibid.: 364). Repair can thus be initiated and/or performed both by the speaker and by the recipient. That is, both self- and other-initiation can be followed by both self- or other-repair. However, self- and other-initiations are made with clearly different initiator techniques. Self-initiations mostly occur within the same turn which contains the trouble source, and they consist of a variety of non-lexical speech perturbations (e.g. cut-offs, sound stretches, hesitation sounds, etc.). In the subsequent example (from Schegloff et al. 1977: 367), the speaker (A) produces typical markers of self-initiation (cut-offs, hesitations) before changing the wh-clause into a declarative sentence: (1)

A: W- when’s yer uh, weh- you have one day y’only have one course uh?

Other-initiations, for their part, use different turn-constructional devices to initiate repair (Schegloff et al. 1977: 367–368). They can be, for example, question words (who, where, when etc.), unfocused problem-markers (huh?, sorry?, what?; cf. open class repair initiators, Drew 1997), partial repeats of the trouble source with or without a question word (the who? to a where?) and, finally, possible understandings of the trouble turn, preceded by Y’mean or equivalent discourse particle, as illustrated in the subsequent example (from Schegloff et al. 1977: 368): (2)

01 A: Why did I turn out this way. → B: You mean homosexual? 03 A: Yes.

As a response to A’s turn (in line 1), B offers a possible understanding of the meaning of the referential expression this way. The conversation can proceed after A has confirmed the understanding check to be correct. Thus, repair can be initiated by both the self (i.e. the producer of the trouble turn) and by the other (i.e. the recipient for the trouble turn). In the subsequent section, I will further discuss the two dimensions that shape repair sequences: the distinction between the self and other on the one hand and between the outright repair and repair initiation on the other.


. Initiating or doing repair? One of the main findings of Schegloff et al. is that self- and other-correction are not equivalent alternatives for the interactants but, rather, self-correction is preferred over other-correction. This means that it is mostly the producer of the trouble turn who also performs the repair proper. Thus, both self- and other-initiation of repair tend to yield self-correction. The authors observe that other-initiations are used to provide the speaker of the trouble source an opportunity to repair the trouble source herself, even in cases where the other clearly “knows” the repair and could use the turn to do it (Schegloff et al. 1977: 377). Thus, having encountered a problem when interpreting the prior turn, the recipient, preferably, does not do repair. Instead, she can initiate repair by e.g. repeating (a part of) the trouble turn and thereby leaving the production of the correction to the first speaker. The following example illustrates such a case: (3) (Schegloff et al. 1977: 368) 01 A: ...I’m home by one ten. → B: One ten? 03 A: Two o’clock. My class ends one ten.

In this example, the first speaker produces an utterance (line 1) which turns out to be the trouble turn, i.e. the repairable. The partial repetition in line 2 functions as a repair initiation, after which the first speaker does the repair (line 3). Thus, instead of performing a repair, the second speaker creates an opportunity for the first speaker to self-repair. Although self-repair is preferred, the second speaker may also do an outright other-correction. This alternative is, however, dispreferred. This dispreferred status is seen in the structural constraints restricting the occurrence of outright other-corrections. The constraints operate both at the utterance level (i.e. in the design of correction turns) and in the local sequential environment. There are often modulations in the form of other-corrections; e.g. various uncertainty markers (I think, Y’mean, etc.) preceding or following the correction. Of the cases where correction is not modulated, a very large proportion occur in a particular conversational location: in a turn subsequent to modulated corrections or understanding checks (Schegloff et al. 1977: 378–380). Example (4) illustrates a typical instance of a (modulated) other-correction:

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


(4) (Schegloff et al. 1977: 378) 01 02 03 → 05

Lori: Sam: Lori: Ellen: Lori:

But y’know single beds’r awfully thin tuh sleep on. What? Single beds.//They’reY’mean narrow? They’re awfully narrow //yeah.

This example actually illustrates an instance of both other-correction (line 4) and other-initiation (line 2). Sam first initiates repair with the wh-question (line 2). Lori then starts repeating the repairable, thereby displaying that she thinks the problem concerns hearing (line 3). It is only after this that Ellen does the correction (line 4). Instead of plainly replacing the adjective thin with narrow, Ellen modulates the correction with the marker Y’mean and by using rising intonation. Example (4) also demonstrates the kind of sequential projections that a repair initiation and an outright repair create. Both can be defined as being conversationally disruptive, since they stop the progress of conversation by shifting focus to some element in the prior talk. Nevertheless, their sequential projections differ from each other: a repair initiation projects a repair as the relevant next turn (see e.g. Schegloff 1979: 267; in example (4), Lori begins a repair [line 3] after Sam’s initiation). Outright other-correction, for its part, is found to be followed by a repetition of the repair (or the repairable, if the repair is rejected; see Jefferson 1987: 90. In example (4), Lori repeats the correction). Drew (1981: 257) addresses the same issue by noting that correction in initial position (i.e. other-correction) provides for the relevance of acknowledgement by prior speakers, while forms of invitations to self-correct (i.e. other-initiation) occasion confirmations or corrections. However, there are cases where the distinction between the repair initiation and outcome is obscured, so that a turn can be interpreted either as initiating or doing a repair. The fuzziness of the boundary between these two activities is reflected in the overlap of the devices used to modulate other-correction and mark repair intiation. One device which is reported to be marking both activities is the utterance Y’mean. Schegloff et al. provide this expression as an example when discussing the typical markers of both outright correction and other-initiation (cf. examples (2) and (4)). This expression (and equal markers) can be seen to reflect the intersection of the two activities: initiating and doing a repair are not polar alternatives but, rather, constitute a continuum from one activity to the other. The subsequent “lingua franca” example (cf. Firth 1996) from my data illustrates a case which is, structurally, very similar to the instance of other-


correction (example (4)) from Schegloff et al. However, in this case, the repair is also offered as a possible understanding of a reference in the prior turn, and it is framed as being uncertain more clearly than in example (4): (5) Office; the client (Q) has just come in and given some relevant background information about himself. The client cannot speak Finnish, so the speakers are using English. 01 → 03 04 05 06

Q: S: Q: S: Q: S:

I need now (.) some er (.) card. ↑Eeeeh credit book? ↑Yes ˚cre[dit book˚ [↑Yes? ˚Yes˚= =↑You don’t have it?

In both examples (4) and (5), the recipient of the trouble turn does a repair by replacing the description used by the speaker (thin, card) with another (narrow, credit book). The repair turn consists of a modulating element (Eeeeh and Y’mean) followed by the new lexical item, pronounced with rising intonation. The first speaker acknowledges the repair by a confirming particle and a repetition of the new reference. However, in (4), the recipient corrects the slip of the tongue by the speaker, whereas in (5) the repair is not a plain replacement. The secretary offers an alternative reference for the client’s version: it is not a question of any card but a specific booklet which everyone taking courses in the institution is supposed to have. The repair turn in (5) is constructed to display cautiousness, which is not present to a similar extent in (4). The turn could be defined as try-marked (cf. Sacks & Schegloff 1979): it is pronounced with a markedly high pitch and it begins with a prolonged hesitation sound (eeeeh). These features frame the turn as being more uncertain than does the somewhat formulaic utterance Y’mean. While uttering the turn, the NS also gazes at the NNS and makes subtle head gestures towards him. Along with the prosody, gestural features likewise contribute to the tentative interpretation of the turn. The secretary is not just replacing an erroneous term with the correct one; instead, she is seeking information, inferring what the client might mean and asking him to confirm the suggestion. One way to differentiate the repair initiations from the outright repairs would be to look at the third turn, i.e. the response to the repair. As mentioned previously, repair proper and repair initiation usually have different sequential projections. However, some merging also occurs in the third turns, since Schegloff et al. (1977: 379) note that “both in uncertainty-marked modulations and in understanding checks, other-correction is not asserted, but is proferred






for acceptance or rejection”. That is, these turns project a (dis)confirmation as the relevant next turn, whereas outright other-corrections are usually followed by a repetition (cf. Jefferson 1987). In (4) and (5), the speakers, who are being corrected, do both: Lori orients more to the corrective nature of the repair turn by first repeating the new item, after which she produces the affirmative particle (line 5). In (5), the client first validates the understanding offered by the secretary with the confirming particle (yes) and then acknowledges the repair by repeating the new word (line 3). It is worth noting, however, that although the client repeats the repair, both participants orient to the correction rather minimally. The client articulates the repetition in a soft voice and hence it is by no means prominent, and the secretary does not wait until the client has finished his turn but continues in overlap with the repetition (line 4). I suggest that this minimal orientation toward repair is a typical feature of non-native speaker interaction, and I discuss it more extensively in the next chapter. In sum, some of the modulated repair turns are presented as being more tentative than others, and sometimes it is difficult to determine whether the participants treat a turn as replacing an element with another, or as creating a slot for the other to produce the correct element. I do not try to draw a line between the turns doing and initiating repair, nor do I present any general criteria for making such a distinction. Instead, I treat the hesitant-framed turns as potentially doing repair, and I consider the other implications of the turns separately with respect to the sequential environment of each example. I follow here, to some extent, McHoul (1990) who has also discussed the difficulty of distinguishing other-repairs from some other-initiations. He suggests that – at least in classroom interaction which forms his database – there is an organisational similarity between modulating the repairs e.g. by downgrading them and initiating repair (ibid.: 370). In the next section, I will focus on the part in the repair sequence which precedes the repair (or the repair initiation), i.e. the repairable.

. Trouble turns As I hope will be clear from the previous section, the boundary between performing repair and initiating it is not always clear-cut. By producing an alternative version, the second speaker can make a straigthforward replacement or create an opportunity for the first speaker to modify her prior talk. However, if the first speaker observes some trouble in her own speech, she does not have to wait for other-initiation or other-correction. Instead, the speaker can initi-


ate repair herself. According to Schegloff et al. (1977: 369), most self-initiated repairs are initiated in the same turn that contains the trouble source and, of those, the vast majority is accomplished successfully. As mentioned earlier, self-initiation is usually marked with various speech perturbations: (6) (Schegloff et al. 1977: 370) K:

He siz (1.0) W’l then what ‘r you so ha- er wuh- unhappy about.

Having begun pronouncing the word, which presumably would be happy, Ken stops, hesitates (er) and restarts (wuh-), after which he then produces the correct adjective (unhappy). Thus, the repair is initiated with different speech perturbations (cut-off, hesitation sound) and accomplished with the subsequent lexical item. NNS talk can reasonably be assumed to contain plenty of speech perturbations. Restarts, hesitation sounds and sound stretches can reflect the effort the NNSs, who only have limited linguistic resources, have to use in the formulation of utterances. By producing some vocalisation, speakers can take time out for processing the utterance but still hold the turn for themselves by indicating that there is more to come. For this reason, it is not always a straightforward decision as to whether perturbations in the learner language mark a specific repair initiation phase (cf. Brouwer 2003; Carroll 2004). The subsequent example illustrates an instance of the NNS speech production: (7) The secretary and the client are filling in the client’s application form for the student allowance. The secretary has just asked whether the client has studied in Finland before. 01

02

03 04

05 06 07

V: Juu minä: (.) ole-n >opiskel-lut< (2.0) työvoima- toimis:: yes I be-1 study-PPC employmentYes I: (.) have >studied< (2.0) the employment- off:: (0.8) ts- (1.0) employment offi ce-GEN organise-INF-INE (0.8) of- (1.0) S: Mm:?= V: =↓kursi. (.) [hehhh course [ =↓office. (.) [hehhh [ S: [Mm:? S: ↑Joo?= ↑Yes?= V: =Heh .h kurssi-ssa ja.= course-INE and =Heh .h in the course and.=

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


08

09

S: =˚Hyvä˚. (.) se varmaan pitäisi tähän laittaa. good it probably should here put =˚Fine˚. (.) it should probably be put down here. V: Ahaa. I see.

The turn by the NNS (lines 1–2) is somewhat discontinuous and contains perturbations: cut-offs, pauses, restars and sound stretches.These discontinuities in the speech production reflect the NNS’s difficulty in formulating a relatively complex construction, the so-called agentive participle construction työvoimatoimiston järjestämä kurssi ‘a course organised by the employment office’. The NNS’s articulation of the turn reflects the effort he has to put in the construction of the utterance: in addition to the slow tempo and sound strecthes, the heavy stress on the first syllables of every word (and even the parts of a compound word) indicates how difficult the task is for the NNS, and how it is accomplished “bit-by-bit”. The excerpt illustrates how it can be more complicated to make a distinction between the repair and the repair initiation in NNS talk than in NS talk (cf. examples (6) and (7)). Although there is a similar pattern of self-repair in both examples – the speaker cuts off a word, hesitates and then produces the correct form – these speech perturbations have differing roles. In the NS example (6), the perturbations discriminate the hesitant phase (=the initiation) from the normal, “unmarked” flow of speech. The initiation is the phase during which the speaker displays processing the trouble, and when the process is completed, he can again continue fluently. In the NNS example (7), however, the perturbations do not isolate the initiation from the correction. The correct form (i.e. the construction in line 2) still contains sound stretches and is pronounced very slowly. If repair initiation is thought to be a sign of the speaker’s processing of what he has said and wants to say, then in (7), the initiation is extended over the whole turn. That is, the initiation also includes the repair. It might be questioned how useful the notion ‘repair initiation’ is in NNS talk, if more or less everything that the NNS says can be defined as initiating repair. Can repair initiation in NNS talk be separated from the “normal” flow of speech? Despite the difference in the frequency of their occurrence, I would argue that the turns containing speech perturbations function similarly in NS and in NNS talk. In both cases, the perturbations indicate that the speaker is going to modify her linguistic output within the same turn. Hence, repair initiation demonstrates to the recipient that the speaker is aware of her speech production – she is actively processing the construction of her turn. By doing


so, repair initiation reserves the turn for the current speaker. It displays that, despite the trouble, the current speaker is attempting to finish the turn herself. Thus, repair initiation can be seen as a turn-holding device for both the NS and the NNS. However, this function is often much more relevant for the NNS, partly because of the linguistic asymmetry between the participants. The initiation phases (i.e. the markedly hesitant phases) are generally longer and more common in the NNS speech. If the NNS wants to formulate a difficult utterance or linguistic construction herself, she needs to inform the NS about the extra conversational space or time she needs, so that the hesitancy would not be treated as activating the asymmetric positions of the participants – as a plea for help. By demonstrating that she is processing the talk herself, the NNS can imply that she is not seeking assistance from the “linguistically knowledgeable participant”. Nevertheless, the various speech perturbations do not per se function as a turn-holding device. The crucial element shaping the participants’ interpretation of the perturbations turns out to be the speaker’s gaze (cf. Chapter 4). If the speaker is not gazing at the recipient while producing the uncertainty-markers, the recipient generally treats the turn as projecting the speaker’s self-repair (cf. the ‘thinking face’; Goodwin & Goodwin 1986) and waits for her modifications. However, if the speaker shifts her gaze to the recipient before or while producing the hesitancy-markers, the recipient often treats the turn as an invitation to join the search (cf. Goodwin 1987; Helasvuo, Laakso, & Sorjonen 2004). I will discuss these cases further in Chapter 4, as these repairables can be interpreted as initiating a word search.

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chapter 

Other-correction

. Introduction In this chapter, I will investigate instances where the participants’ orientation to understanding surfaces in the repair done by someone other than the speaker of the trouble turn. I will focus on instances where the recipient corrects a linguistic detail in the previous speaker’s turn. Such corrections are done only by native speakers in my data. In other words, I will explore instances in which the NNS first produces a stretch of talk which deviates from the native speaker standard. This deviation is then followed by a co-referential utterance by the NS which is modified to be grammatically correct. Following the repair organisation presented by Schegloff et al. (1977), these cases represent other-correction: the modification is made by the recipient and it includes replacing a deficient version by the standard expression. Non-native speakers who are not yet competent in their second language frequently use grammatical forms and utterances which deviate from the native speaker standard. Consequently, there are many situations in which the NS could make a linguistic correction. However, these opportunities are only rarely exploited in my data; most often the NS lets the error pass (cf. Jefferson 1988). It is evident that the NS cannot correct every deficient item or feature in the speech by the NNS, especially if the latter only has a very rudimentary knowledge of the target language.Therefore, the issue of selection becomes relevant: when does the NS correct a linguistic deficiency by the NNS? This chapter seeks to address this question, not from a language-learning perspective, as has been traditional in the second language studies, but from a sequential point of view. I will explore the issue of selection by investigating the NS’s corrections with respect to their sequential positions in conversation. Thus, this chapter focuses on instances in which the “unmarked” progress of conversation is (or could be) shattered: instead of (or along with) producing the next relevant turn, the NS chooses to modify the ungrammatical form by the NNS. It should be borne in mind, however, that the question of ‘standard’ is not always clear-cut. The standards or norms for spoken language are not ar-

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ticulated in grammar books, and it is not always easy to identify what is deviant and what is standard usage in the spoken language. Defining this boundary is not, however, necessary for my study. One advantage of the CA method is that the researcher does not need to make hypothetical classifications – she can rely on the members’ knowledge. I will let the NSs in my data make the decisions: I will investigate those instances which the NSs have selected to be corrected. Although the boundaries of standard language usage can be somewhat flexible, there are also many “clear cases”: grammatical anomalies which a native speaker immediately recognises as deviating from the native speaker norm (e.g. minä asun äidilleni kanssa ‘I live to with my mother’, cf. example (10) below). The deviations, and the norms behind them, are probably most easily identified within the domain of morphology. Only a limited number of grammatical morphemes exist and they can be combined with each other only in a particular way. Since Finnish is an agglutinative language, it has a rich morphology: the grammatical, temporal and spatial relations are mainly expressed by the use of different morphemes. In my data, morphological deviations are rather frequent in the speech by the NNSs. The NSs sometimes correct the deficiencies but most of the time do not. The main objective of this chapter is to determine if there is any systematicity in these corrections, and what is characteristic of linguistic repair in conversation between the NS and the NNS. Correction is an activity where the asymmetry of knowledge between the participants becomes salient. Therefore, correction is rather a frequent activity in the settings where the participants’ roles as an expert and a learner are oriented to, such as in classroom interaction (e.g. Kasper 1985; McHoul 1990; Seedhouse 2004). In NS-NNS interaction, there is also asymmetry between the knowledge statuses of the participants: the NS has the primary access to her language and hence can be taken as the knowledgeable participant with respect to linguistic matters, (on asymmetric positions of knowledge in conversation, cf. Drew 1991; Günther & Luckmann 2001). However, the conversations in my data are not pedagogic; their primary aim is not to increase the linguistic knowledge of the less competent. Since the NS is not responsible for any development in the NNS’s speech, she does not “need” to pay attention to (i.e. repair) grammatical details in the NNS’s turns.Given that no pedagogic need to correct exists, it is interesting to investigate when the NS nevertheless performs grammatical corrections. I will begin this chapter by introducing and discussing two phenomena – the preference for self-repair and embedded corrections – which are relevant for my analysis of other-correction. Thereafter, I will investigate environments where other-correction occurs in my data. First, I will focus on cases where the

Chapter 3. Other-correction

correction is not oriented to, i.e. the NNS does not acknowledge the correction by repeating it. Second, I will discuss cases where the NNS repeats the correction (i.e. orients to the repair activity). The repair sequence patterns are then discussed with respect to the different identities of the participants, and a characteristic native speaker correction – an en passant repair – is being proposed. The chapter is based on a collection of approximately 50 other-corrections from my database. In addition, I have access to a (comparative) collection of 51 cases of other-correction in native speaker interaction in English (everyday talk recorded both in Britain and in the U.S.).1 It is not yet clear to which extent the details of the Anglo-American and Finnish repair systems are equivalent and therefore comparable, so the starting point of the analysis is not the comparison. The English collection functions as a secondary data source which can be consulted in order to provide a fuller picture of some interesting phenomena in my data. .. The preference organisation for repair in asymmetric conversation The preference organisation for repair was first described by Schegloff et al. (1977). They observed self-repair to be preferred over other-repair, at least in conversation between equals. The data Schegloff et al. present in their article are from conversations between native speakers. The authors mention, however, that in adult-child interaction, and perhaps in other types of conversations which involve “not-yet-competent” speakers, other-correction seems to be more frequent. They suggest that other-correction could function as one vehicle for socialization but that its usage is only transitional and the supersession by self-correction is continuously awaited (ibid.: 381). Thus, according to Schegloff et al., other-correction may occur more frequently in asymmetric speech situations, but it does not change the fundamental preference organisation for repair. This issue has later been discussed by scholars who have focused on repair in asymmetric conversations (see e.g. Gaskill 1980; Norrick 1991; Hosoda 2000; Wong 2000a; Kurhila 2001). Gaskill and Hosoda‘s findings on everyday NS-NNS talk concur with those of Schegloff et al.’s: they observe other-correction to be a restricted phenomenon and a secondary alternative to self-correction. Wong (2000a) identifies some characteristics for the next turn repair initiations by the NNSs which have not been found in NS talk. Thus, she is able to point out a systematic difference between the NS-NNS talk and NS-NS talk, without challenging the preference organisation for repair.

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This view – the validity of preference organisation – is challenged by Norrick. He suggests that the main factor shaping the repair sequences is the participants’ perception of their respective abilities to complete the correction, rather than adhering to the preference organisation. That is, the factor that is crucial for corrective actions is the relationship between the interlocutors. Norrick presents a range of examples to demonstrate that, in asymmetric speech situations, outright other-correction occurs without any marking of its dispreferred status. Norrick maintains that this is due to the fact that correction in these situations is often treated as the knowing participant’s way to help the not-yet competent speaker. In other words, the not-yet competent go along with this organisation of repair in their own interests (Norrick 1991: 78). In my data, there are also occasions where the NS does an outright correction without marking it as being dispreferred. These corrections often concern grammatical morphemes. Since these corrections are grammatical, they belong to the domain of expertise of the NS and, therefore, could fit in with Norrick’s view: the motivation for doing outright other-correction could be the perceived imbalance between the interlocutors. Even so, this imbalance does not explain why only some, and indeed very few, of the grammatical deviations are corrected. It does not help answering the question of selection: when does the NS correct something in the NNS’s talk? It seems to follow from Norrick’s argumentation that, since the NS is linguistically the knowledgeable participant, she could correct all the linguistic errors by the NNS in the latter’s own interests. Yet it is evident that continuous correcting would inhibit the progress of conversation and be face-threatening for the participants (cf. Piirainen-Marsh 1995). Therefore, the NSs somehow have to select what they correct in the speech by the NNS and when. Although the asymmetric relationship between the interlocutors can have an effect on the repair sequence, it cannot per se account for correcting an error or letting it pass. Consider the subsequent excerpts from my data: (1) Conversation between friends; J tells S about his dog whose name is Raija. 01 J: #Ää# n:imi on (.) ˚>mikä se onwhat is itSuomala[inen nimiA Finni[sh nameja< halu-si-n vain oppi-a (1.0) #ööhh# si-tä (.) and want-PST-1 only learn-INF it-PAR A# (.) >and< I’d just like to learn (1.0) #eehh# the (.) 05 englanti myös-ki: myös:: #öö suome-a#. English.NOM also-CLI also Finnish-PAR English also: also:: #eh Finnish#. 06 (0.5) 07 S: Joo:? Yes:? 08 (0.5) 09 S: Oletteko meidän oppilas? Are you (one of) our students?

In (1), the NS does a correction: she replaces the modifier in the possesive construction (Finland’s) with the relevant adjective (Finnish). In (2), the NNS uses linguistic forms which deviate from the standard Finnish: the auxiliary in the verb phrase on tullut is conjugated in the third person instead of the first person, and the object of the studying (englanti, ‘English’) is in the nominative case, instead of the case of the object, the partitive. However, both of these turns are only acknowledged by the NS and no repair is made. Since the NS is the linguistically knowledgeable participant (and, according to Norrick, better able to do the correction) also in the latter example, she could use her linguistic expertise to produce the standard formulations. However, she acknowledges the information with an affirmative particle without making any modification (lines 3 and 7). Thus, I do not think that Norrick’s view on repair gives us the whole picture of the phenomenon. However, it seems that the participants’ positions of knowledge do have an impact on the repair sequences. The asymmetry makes particular types of repair possible, but it does not explain why or when they occur.

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The repair type commonly found in Norrick’s data, and which also can be found in my database, is outright other-correction. And, as in the examples by Norrick, there is no marking of these turns to be dispreferred. If the NS decides to perform a grammatical correction in my data, she does it in a straigthforward manner, without trying to get the NNS to self-correct and without hedging or mitigating the correction. Let us re-examine example (1): (1) [replicated] Conversation between friends; J tells S about his dog whose name is Raija. 01 J: #Ää# n:imi on (.) ˚>mikä se onwhat is itSuomala[inen nimiA Finni[sh nameo-is-ko< NEG is every year it is maybe is-COND-Q → h No it’s not every year it is maybe (1.0) >would it 03 se- (0.2) joka kolm- nyt sii-tä on kolme vuot-ta ku se itevery thir- now it-ELA is three year-PAR when it be< (0.2) every thir- it’s now three years since they 04 viime[ks ol-i. last [ be-PST last had it. [ 05 J: [Ahah aha [I see I see

In line 1, the last word of the NNS’s turn is left unfinished. In his next turn, the NS provides the standard spoken variant of the noun joka vuos(i) ‘every year’. Thus, the repairable, which evokes correction in this example (line 1), does not contain an error; the absence of a grammatical element (the final syllable in the noun vuos[i]) can be treated as a sign of trouble.2 The crucial point, however, is that the repairable (i.e. the trouble turn) is a question.3 A question projects an answer as the next relevant activity, and this is exactly what happens in the extract. The NS produces an answer to the NNS’s question, not a repair turn. This answer contains the missing information – the complete variant of the noun – but sequentially there is no disruption in the progress of the conversation: a first pair part is followed by the second part. Since the repair is not interactionally salient, the participants need not orient to the activity of repair. In embedded corrections, the recipient can always treat the turn with the replacement as performing the next relevant activity. This is also what happens in (6): the NNS waits until the NS has managed to formulate the information for the issue he has inquired about, after which he displays receiving the information as news (line 5: ahah aha ‘I see I see’). As the NNS does not incorporate the phrase joka vuos(i) ‘every year’ in his response, it is not clear whether he has registered the repair at all. Embedding repair in another activity leaves the choice to the recipient: (s)he can acknowledge the replacement in his/her subsequent turns, but there is no conversational need to do so. Embedded correction is one reason why language learning is difficult to explore in authentic conversations between native and non-native speakers. In the laboratory data, the NNSs are being tested after they have been cor-


rected and, thus, some claims can be made about the possible improvement or learning. In real NS-NNS conversations, however, correction can be introduced in a way that specifically makes it possible for the NNS not to respond to it. Therefore, the issue of learning (or having registered the new form) remains ambiguous. In this chapter, I have thus far presented two examples (1) and (6) of othercorrection from my data.4 In both these examples, the correction is done directly by the other (the NS), without trying to get the first speaker (the NNS) to self-repair. What is also common to the examples is the participants’ minimal orientation to the repair activity. In (1), the repair is produced en passant and, in (6), it is embedded in another activity. It seems that these are the prevailing features of correction in non-pedgagogic NS-NNS conversation: first, (grammatical) deficiencies are subject to outright repair but not to repair initiations and, second, (linguistic) correction is done so as to diminish the interactional prominence of the activity. In the subsequent sections, I will more thoroughly discuss the participants’ ways of reducing the corrective character of the repair sequences.

. Types of other-repair sequences: Repair is not repeated The turns in which a repair is managed can thus be used for various purposes, such as ‘putting things right’. In embedded corrections, these turns also have always other functions. The ambiguity makes it possible for the recipient to choose the level of orientation towards the repair. How she treats the embedded correction becomes visible in the third turn (i.e. the turn after the repair). If the NNS repeats the repair in the third position turn, she orients to the difference between her own version (repairable) and the NS’s version (repair): an alternative, in some way more appropriate, is being observed to replace the original expression. If the NNS produces something other than a repeat, she does not treat the repair as needing interactional attention (or she has not registered it). The cases in my data basically fall into the latter category: embedded correction does not evoke an exposed acknowledgement of the correct form. The problem which might arise when investigating embedded corrections has to do with the notion ‘sequentially relevant next activity’. Some turns, the first parts of adjacency pairs in particular, clearly project a certain type of response as the next relevant activity (e.g. Schegloff & Sacks 1973). However, in other cases, the projection of a turn can be rather vague. Therefore, no exhaustive pre-defined classification of embedded corrections can be given. It is

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most important to demonstrate that the turn in question performs the relevant next activity, that it could occur in the same sequential location even without modifying anything in the prior turn. One of the clearest cases is giving an answer. Answering is a relevant activity after a question (about adjacency pairs, see e.g. Sacks [1968] 1992; Schegloff & Sacks 1973). The slot or the turn in which the recipient answers is also one location where corrections can be found in my data. It is important to note that corrections do not occur randomly in NS-NNS conversation. Instead, they tend to cluster in particular sequential environments. For this reason, I suggest that the question I posed at the beginning of this chapter as to ‘when NSs correct the speech of NNSs and how’ can be explained, not so much in terms of the types of errors or deviations, but in terms of the kinds of environments in which the deviations occur. In other words, corrections in NS-NNS talk are systematic with respect to their location in conversation rather than to the types of modifications they manage. In the following, I will discuss the sequential environments where corrections can be found in my data. .. Extended answers: No overt orientation towards the correction by either of the participants One conversational location where previous talk is repaired in my data is the answer turn, i.e. a turn subsequent to a question. The sequence can be illustrated with the pattern: NNS: question which includes a deviation NS: repair embedded in an answer NNS: turn orienting to the “unmarked” activity of embedded repair, i.e. to the new information the answer provides.5

Let us look at (6) again: (6) [replicated] Friends. S has been talking about a common friend who has been to a sauna conference. 01 J: On-ko semmonen kongressi on (.) joka vuo- vuo is-Q that kind congress is every yea- yea Is there such a congress is (.) every yea- yea 02 S: ((ähkäisten)) h Ei oo joka vuos se on ehkä (1.0) >o-is-ko< NEG is every year it is maybe is-COND-Q → h No it’s not every year it is maybe (1.0) >would it 03 se- (0.2) joka kolm- nyt sii-tä on kolme vuot-ta ku se itevery thir- now it-ELA is three year-PAR when it be< (0.2) every thir- it’s now three years since they


04

viime[ks ol-i. last [ be-PST last had it. [ 05 J: [Ahah aha [I see I see

As analysed in the previous section, the NS corrects the incomplete noun in his answer. It is noteworthy how the correct form is embedded in the answer. The answer turn (lines 2–4) provides the information inquired about, but before that, the NS disconfirms the NNS’s assumption about the frequency. This disconfirmation is rather substantial; instead of a plain negative word (ei ‘no’) or a negative phrase (ei oo’no it’s not’), the NS produces a more complete utterance by also repeating the temporal expression. The “full” negation (ei oo joka vuos ‘no it’s not every year’) makes the turn sound almost over-complete. One way of embedding a correction in an answer is thus to produce the answer in an extended form so that the relevant part of the question is repeated in the answer. The term ‘extended’ is used here to indicate that the answer is not minimal (or according to the written language norms elliptical). In the unmarked situation, the answer is based on the syntax of the question, so that the elements from the question need not be repeated. For example, an unmarked answer to the question Where were you last night? would be e.g. At the cinema. The more substantial (and more infrequent) alternative I was at the cinema last night can be seen as being marked. (See e.g. Sacks (1992) [spring 1972]; Schegloff 1996a; Hakulinen 2001.) Hakulinen (2001) observes that using a fullsentence as an answer allows the speaker to change the verb. She further reports that the full-sentence answer seems to achieve two goals at once: while offering an affirmative answer, it also more or less discreetly produces a repair of something in the question by changing several of the linguistic details in the description of the state of affairs presented (ibid.: 176).6 Thus, an answer is sequentially an “easy” location to do an embedded correction: the speaker can repeat linguistic units from the question (in a modified form) by constructing the answer to be a grammatically complete, text-book like sentence. However, the modification does not change the status of the turn: it is still an answer to a question, and that is how it is treated in (6). The NNS does not acknowledge the production of the searched-for form in any way but responds only after the NS has produced the information in response to the question (‘How often is the conference held?’). In his response (line 5), the NNS orients not to the form, but to the content of the repair turn: the acknowl-

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edgement token aha (‘I see’) recognises the novelty value of the information in the prior turn. In the following excerpt, a similar pattern of repair and a third turn response can be found: (7) Hotel. The reservation has been made and the client asks about some details. 01 B: Milloin ee (2.0) ee huone p- ee me£ne: ↑pois?£ hehe when room go away When ehm (2.0) ehm does the room p- ehm £go: ↑ away?£ hehe 02 S: £Öö£ te-i-dän tarvitsee luovutta-a huone pois (.) .hh öö you-pl-GEN need return-INF room away → £Eh£ you have to check out of the room (.) .hh eh 03 huomenna puoleenpäivä-än menn-e-ssä (.) kello kahte-entoista tomorrow mid-day-ILL go-INF-INE o’clock twelve-ILL tomorrow by noon (.) by twelve o’clock 04 menn-e-ssä. go-INF-INE 05 (.) 06 B: ↑Kachteentoista. ↑By twelve. 07 S: Joo. Yes.

Example (7) resembles (6) in many ways. The NNS asks a question (line 1) but encounters difficulty in formulating it. The question includes a deviation from the native speaker standard. Furthermore, in this extract, the repairable (i.e. the question) is marked as being troublesome: the NNS pauses for two seconds, hesitates and pronounces the last word of the utterance with a very high pitch. Moreover, she begins similing when uttering the verb phrase (menee pois ‘goes away’) and ends the turn in laughter. After the NNS’s question, the NS produces an extended answer (lines 2–4). Instead of providing only the temporal information that was asked for, the NS produces a grammatically complete sentence with the subject, verb and object (Teidän tarvitsee luovuttaa huone pois ‘You have to check out of the room’). The third position turn (line 6) is similar to that of (6): the NNS orients to the new information the answer povides, not to the modifications in the utterance formulation. In the excerpt above, the NNS indeed produces a repetition in the third position (line 6), but the repeated piece of talk is the institutionally relevant information, not the repair. In (7), the first part of the answer (line 2) consists of the repair: the receptionist changes the client’s version (‘the room goes away’) with the proper hotel terminology (‘check out’). The turn-initial replacement accomplishes various functions: on the one hand, there is the corrective dimension of replacing a


marked (in this case even amusing or childlish) expression with a proper technical term. On the other hand, the turn is collaborative, as the NS provides the NNS with the target utterance she has displayed as being difficult to find. Furthermore, the repair is lexically tied with the repairable: the NS repeats the word pois ‘away’ in her turn. The word sounds somewhat redundant, as the semantic component ‘away’ is inherently present in the Finnish verb phrase for ‘check out’, (luovuttaa huone, literally ‘return the room’). As ‘returning’ here means approximately the same as ‘giving away’, further repetition of the particle strengthens the impression of over-completeness. The particle pois in the receptionist’s turn can be seen to tie the repairable and the repair lexically together: the more common elements (words) there are in the two turns, the less radical is the repair (huone menee pois → luovuttaa huone pois ‘room goes away → return room away’). Along with diminishing the change between the repair and the repairable, the repetition of the particle pois can also be seen as a means to facilitate understanding. By using familiar items from the NNS’s own turn, the NS can make the new utterance more accessible and facilitate its interpretation. This might be useful especially if there are considerable modifications in the lexicon or syntax between the first and the second version. By preserving the particle pois, the NS makes it easier to understand that the basic meaning of the utterance has not been changed: both the repairable and the repair contain the key noun (‘room’) and the particle expressing the direction (‘away’). In addition to its corrective and collaborative character, embedded correction in (7) can be said to accomplish a third function, checking that the NS’s understanding of the NNS’s question was correct. This activity of checking is especially prominent in institutional encounters, since the accuracy of information is essential for the institutional procedures and subsequent activities. Thus, the extended answer by the receptionist can serve the institutional aim of being precise and giving accurate information: through rephrasing the trouble turn, the NS can expose her understanding of the prior utterance(s) to the client, so that she can check that the answer is providing information to a right question. An extended answer thus manages both a repair and a confirmation check without placing emphasis on either activity. The subsequent example contains a similar instance of embedded correction: (8) The students (A and B) are talking with the teacher (S) in her office during an office hour. The students have asked details about an exam they are planning to take.

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01 B: Eli:: ööhhh m- (.) jos me halua-mme (.) osallistu-a (.) ˚tämä˚ PRT if we want-1pl participate-INF this In other words:: eehhh m- (.) if we want to (.) take part 02 .hh koe=˚>pi t-i- ködid one have to mother. S: ----------03 S: Äiti-si kanssa? j[oo? just mother-POS with y[es right → With your mother? yes? right [ 04 V: [Joo [Yes V: -05 V: Ja (.) kysymys on And (.) the qustion is

Examples (9) and (10) are very similar, both in structure and in prosodic realization. First, the secretary asks a question, after which the client gives an answer which specifies or modifies the assumption in the question. In the third turn, the secretary repeats (the key part of) the answer with a rising intonation and without gazing at the client. The repeat is followed by an affirmative particle, which is also pronounced with a rising intonation. In (10), however, this pattern also accomplishes a correction. There is an additional morphological element (the morpheme -lle) in the NNS’s response (line 2). In her subsequent repetition, the NS deletes this morpheme, thereby providing the standard form of the word. The repair turn (line 3) in (10) could be interpreted as carrying out a straigthforward correction: it provides no new information (in contrast to the extended answers), but simply modifies the erroneous phrase. Although the turn is modifying the grammar, some features suggest that correction is not the only, or not even the primary function of the turn. First, the partial repeat is pronounced with a rising intonation. The secretaries (this one in particular) use rising intonation when acknowledging answers (cf. example (9)); in assertive corrections, rising intonation is not found in my data (cf. example (1)). Furthermore, the prosodic similarity between the elements in the repair turn, äitisi kanssa? and joo?, make the turn sound formulaic, or as a routine utterance. Although the repair and the particle are two separate intonation units,

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they are pronounced in a row with the same beat, so that there is no break in the rhythm of the pronounciation. According to Couper-Kuhlen (1992: 359), repairs which are produced rhythmically are camouflaged prosodically as ‘routine’ matters for which no one need be made responsible. In (10), the repair begins rhythmically in accordance with prior turns, and the prosody of the two elements – the repair and the subsequent particle – is regular, exhibiting a pattern of rising intonation on the final syllable (sound) in the utterance. The second feature to diminish the corrective impression of the partial repeat (line 3) is the secretary’s gaze. She shifts her gaze away from the client before beginning the repair turn. As when registering new information (cf. example (9)), she gazes at the papers when uttering the repetition, thus directing her attention away from the client to the form where she should fill in the new piece of information. The disengaging gaze shift gives the impression of not needing to talk about the current matter anymore and preparing to move on to the next question on the form. Third, the repetition (line 3) is followed by two affirmative tokens, joo and just (‘yes’ and ‘right’). Joo is an affirmative response token which, among other things, can receive prior talk as understood, display an orientation to the incompleteness of a larger activity, and, as a consequence, invite the previous speaker to continue (Sorjonen 2001). These functions can be recognised in the affirmative particles in repair turns. When produced directly after a correction, an affirmative token can be interpreted to frame the correction as “not crucial with respect to understanding”. A correction-final affirmative particle displays the speaker’s ability to understand what was said in the repairable, despite the “error” which is being corrected. That is, the partial repeat can function as a correction, but the immediately following particle joo displays understanding and acceptance of prior talk, which makes the orientation to the correction (or to the error) less relevant. Thus, the particle can be said to suggest closure of the repair sequence. As Sorjonen (2001: 86) has observed, if the turn to which joo responds forms a departure from some main line of talk that the speaker is developing, then joo suggests closure of this departure. Finally, the sequential location of the secretary’s turn in (10) makes other interpretations possible in addition to that of correcting. The post-answer turn is a conversational slot where prior speech can be repeated even if no modifications need to be made.7 Consequently, the correction can be treated as the next relevant activity, as solely repeating the core information of the answer. The potential modifications in the repetition need not be oriented to. In (10), the NNS does not repeat the new form; instead, he briefly acknowledges the NS’s repetition (line 4) and proceeds with the conversation (line 5). As in ex-


tended answers, the correction is managed without a separate repair sequence, as minimally as possible. Thus, the interactional salience of corrections in institutional NS-NNS conversation can be mitigated by prosodic, lexical and sequential means. The formulaic, routine intonation or rhythm is one way to diminish the prosodic prominence of repair. However, it is not the only alternative, as illustrated in the subsequent example: (11) The office of a summer course. The student is asking about an assignment; Kerttu and Virpi are names of teachers. 01 P: Kuinka mon-ta tekst-i-äh hh how many-PAR text-pl-PAR How many texts h hh 02 S: Äää #mm# sinu-n pitää sopi-a Ke- ole-t-ko Kertu-n (.) you-GEN have.to talk-INF are-2-Q 1nameF-GEN Ehh #mm# you have to talk with Ke- are you in Kerttu’s (.) 03 ryhmä-stä vai[:: group-ELA or [ group or:: [ 04 P: [.hhh mt E-n ööö Viltti-n h[hh [ NEG-1 (name)-GEN [(viltti=blanket) [.hhh mt No ehhh Viltti’s hhh [ 05 S: [ Virpi=↓joo= [Virpi.NOM yes → [Virpi=↓ yes= 06 P: =>Joo< =>Yes< 07 S: Voitte sopia opettajien kanssa. You can negotiate with the teachers.

The NNS’s answer in line 4 contains no grammatical anomalies, but his pronunciation of the teacher’s name (Virpi) differs from the native speaker standard. The NS provides the standard pronunciation in her repetition in line 5. The excerpt is similar to (10): the client provides information (line 4) which modifies the assumption in the secretary’s question (lines 2–3), after which the secretary produces the repeat followed by an affirmative particle, in an “unmarked” post-answer slot (line 5). In both extracts, the repeat (i.e. the repair) only evokes a brief acknowledgement by the NNS, after which the talk in progress is immediately continued. Thus, although the secretary’s repeat substitutes a deficient version with the correct one, there is no overt orientation to correction. A separate repair sequence does not emerge, since the NNS repeats neither the repair nor the repairable.

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Although the examples are sequentially similar, they are prosodically different. In contrast to (10), the repair and the particle are not produced in the same rhythmic pattern in the excerpt above. The secretary begins increasing the speech tempo at the end of the repair turn, so that the affirmative particle is latched to the repair. The rhythmic pattern is thus disrupted and, hence, there is no impression of a routine repetition. However, the immediate production of the particle joo can also be interpreted as a way to avoid emphasizing the activity of correcting. The secretary “rushes forward” from the modification to the affirmative particle, which indicates that she has no difficulty in understanding what the other speaker has said. Couper-Kuhlen (1992) has observed the potential sense of urgency which is connected with repair but which is wholly lacking in other kinds of side sequence: the interactants are likely to re-establish the ritual order as quickly as possible, especially “if the problem necessitating repair is such that it can be traced back to some personal insufficiency or shortcoming on the part of one of the interactants” (ibid.: 345). The secretaries thus can use different prosodic and rhythmic means to downgrade the interactional salience of the repairs. The repair can be framed as a routine repetition or it can be rushed through as quickly as possible. In neither case is the difference between the deviant and the standard form highlighted. The subsequent element after the repair is often the affirmative particle joo, which demonstrates that the NS has received the prior information as understood (‘yes I know, you meant this’), rather than topicalising the error (‘it’s Virpi, not Viltti’). The closing implicative particle (Sorjonen 2001: 86) reflects the asymmetric positions of the participants: the fact that the speaker (NS) suggests closure of the repair sequence even before the recipient (NNS) has reacted to the correction displays the NS’s epistemic authority over the issue.8 Most correction examples discussed thus far have come from institutional encounters. This is not a co-incidence but reflects their distribution in the data. The distribution can be understood in light of the location of corrections: they occur either in the answer turns or in the post-answer repeats. Office conversations offer a number of such locations, since they largely consist of question-answer sequences. Many institutional activities involve inquiring and gathering information, and these activities are accomplished by asking questions and giving answers (cf. Drew & Heritage 1992a; Sarangi & Slembroock 1996). Also, there is a need to be exact with the information in institutional encounters; this in turn creates a need for checking and confirming. For this reason, it is not surprising that turns which make explicit the participant’s interpretation of the prior are to be found mostly in institutional interaction. By producing an extended answer, the secretary can also display her understand-


ing of the question. By acknowledging the new piece of information openly (i.e. by repeating it), the secretary makes it possible for the clients to further check and, if necessary, comment on the secretary’s interpretation of the information. Naturally, questions and answers occur also in everyday conversation. However, everyday conversation does not typically include activities – such as filling in forms – which produce long strings of question-answer sequences and where the information has to be registered for some talk-external purpose. Consequently, the sequences where some prior information is repeated differ from those in institutional interaction. In the next section, I will discuss an environment that seems to foster repetition in everyday conversation. Again, this is also a location where corrections can be found in my data. ... Everyday conversation: Acknowledging unexpected information Utterances which repeat (a part of) the co-participant’s utterance have been discussed in linguistic and conversation analytic literature (cf. e.g. Quirk et al. 1985; Schegloff 1996b; Sorjonen 1996; Svennevig 2004; Kasper & Ross 2003). Quirk et al. argue that “echo utterances” are either interrogative or exclamatory in function. The basic function of echo exclamations is to express astonishement (ibid.: 835–838). From a conversation analytic point of view, repeats have been observed e.g. to initiate repair (Schegloff et al. 1977), accept an other-correction (Jefferson 1987), confirm allusions (Schegloff 1996b), express some form of uncertainty (Sorjonen 1996) and display receipt of information (Svennevig 2004). Heritage (1984b) touches upon repeats when he discusses the different environments for the change-of-state token (oh). In some of the environments – e.g. in the context of ‘counterinforming’ – the (possible) repeat following the oh-token accepts the new information (i.e. the correction), and can be seen as functioning as an “echo exclamation”: (12) Family Dinner. (Heritage 1984b: 312) 01 02 03 04 → 06

B: It looks like beef’n bean curd. (1.0) J: Well I wan’ lots of beef. D: I think it’s pork. B: Oh. Pork. D: Mm hm.

The repetition in this excerpt resembles the cases of registering repetition discussed in the previous section. However, instead of the question-answerrepetition sequence, there is a sequence of informing-counterinformingrepetition (lines 3–5). ‘Counterinforming’ is an activity which is very close to the answer turns in my data (cf. examples (10)–(11)). These answers pro-

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vided new information which modified or specified the assumptions in the question. Thus, in both cases, the second turn – the answer, the counterinforming – provides information which is in contrast to (or more specific than) the information in the first turn. This new information is then acknowledged by a repeat. The repetition turns, however, reveal the difference between institutional and everyday conversations. In the institutional examples, the repetition was produced together with an affirmative particle whereas, in the excerpt above, the turn begins with the change-of-state token (cf. Heritage 1984b). By displaying a change of state, oh can also be seen as displaying an attitude (e.g. surprise) toward this change. In contrast, the affirmative particle joo receives the prior talk as understood (cf. Sorjonen 2001), without colouring the subsequent talk with any attitude. Consequently, the “neutral” affirmative particle is better suited to the institutional needs, (see e.g. Drew & Heritage 1992a about orienting to neutrality in institutional talk). Thus, in institutional talk, repetition is not used to display the novelty value or unexpectedness of the information in the prior turn; instead, the prevailing use of repetition is the registering, “bureaucratic” use.9 In everyday conversation, there is no similar need to withhold showing emotions. In contrast, if a friend tells something which is news to us, we are expected to acknowledge the newsworthiness of the matter (cf. Heritage 1984b). Therefore, the “echo exclamations” (i.e. the turns receiving news) in everyday conversation are more prone to be preceded by the change-of-state token than by the affirmative particle, which could be experienced to be too cold or impersonal a way to take notice of the new information. When chatting with friends, the interlocutors are expected to be personally more involved than merely registering the facts of the co-participant’s speech. In this section, I will discuss examples where the NS repeats a piece of information from the NNS’s prior turn. By repeating it, the NS treats the information as new or unexpected. As in the examples from office conversations, however, the repetitions also modify the prior utterances to bring them into line with the norms of the standard language. Therefore, these repetitions can be said to perform a linguistic correction. The subsequent example is rather similar to (12): the first speaker (the NS) repeats the new piece of information by the second speaker (the NNS) in the third position and begins the turn with the change-of-state token:


(13) Factory. S and X are chatting while working in the same room. 01 S: No e-t sä tul-luk-kaan autta-maan minu-a tä-ssä (.) . PRT NEG-2 you come-PPC-CLI help-INF I-PAR this-INE job-INE So you didn’t come to help me in this (.) <job>. 02 X: Mu-ll+o oma tö-i-ssä(h).hh .hh= I-ADE is own job-pl-INE I have an own in the job(h). hh .hh= 03 S: =Ai su-l on oma työ sii[nä PRT you-ADE is own job.sg.NOM the[re → =Oh you have your own job there [ 04 X: [Jeh he he .hh= [Yeh he he .hh= 05 S: =Tä-l o-is ol-lu niin kiire this-ADE is-COND is-PPC so hurry =This would have been so urgent

In this example, the NNS responds to the criticism by the NS (line 1) by giving an acceptable reason for not helping others: the NNS states that he is in the process of doing his own job (line 2). The word työ ‘job’ in the NNS’s turn, however, has an additional inessive case ending. In the third position (line 3), the NS displays that the NNS’s answer provided new information to her: she first produces the change of state-token ai ‘oh’, and then acknowledges the new information by repeating it. However, the repetition is not an exact echo of the prior: the NS deletes the inessive case ending (töissä) thereby providing the standard form of the word in this construction (työ). In addition, the NS produces the locative pronoun siinä ‘there’ after the corrected form. The pronoun makes the utterance sound “more natural” or “more complete” in spoken Finnish, but it also makes the phonetic realisation of the repairable and the repair more similar by providing a sibilant sound also in the repair (oma töissä – oma työ siinä). In this respect, this case resembles (7) where the repair turn (the extended answer) also included an “additional” element (the word pois ‘away’), which made the repairable and the repair more similar and thus potentially facilitated the recognition of the turn. The repair activity does not become interactionally salient in (13). According to the already familiar pattern, the NNS’s response to the third position repeat is an acknowledgement token (here through laughter), which does not specify whether he has registered the modification. Thus, rather than treating the modified repetition as being a correction, the NNS treats it as receiving news. It is important to note that this is also how the NS frames the repetition. The part of the repetition stressed by the NS is the unexpected element (oma ‘own’) and not the correct form of the word työ. Despite the grammatical

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substitution, the corrective character of the turn is diminished by prosodic (i.e. stress), lexical (the change-of-state token) and sequential (the location of an echo exclamation) means. In the following example, the prosodic and sequential means frame the turn as being tentative: (14) Factory. Chatting while working. 01 S: E-n tiedä kuul-i-n-ko mä oikein mut sano-ko-ha se Baku (.) NEG-1 know hear-PST-1-Q I right but say-Q-CLI it 1name I don’t know if I heard right but did Baku say that he 02 ol-lee-nsa (.)ranska-n kiele-n opettaja-na. be-PPC-POS French-GEN language-GEN teacher-ESS had been (.) a teacher in French language. 03 X: .h Äi englanti-n kiele=˚ope˚taja˚˚ NEG English-GEN langu=teacher .h No in English langu=˚teach˚er˚˚ 04 S: Englanni-n ↓kie[le-n English-GEN lan[guage-GEN → In English ↓language [ 05 X: [Juu: [Ye:s 06 S: ˚Ai jaa.˚ ˚I see.˚

Example (14) exhibits a similar repair pattern to the one in (13). First, the NS produces a statement, after which the NNS introduces some new information in a turn which grammatically deviates from the native speaker standard (line 3).10 This turn is followed by a partial repeat by the NS where the deviation is replaced by the standard form (line 4). Again, however, the correction is not emphasized: the stress in the repair turn is not placed on the grammatical modification but on the unexpected element. The NS frames the contrast as being between the two languages (English and French) and not between the two inflections (englantin – englannin). Unmarked in Finnish, the NS stresses the first syllable of the word and not the last one which contains the new consonant. The NNS then acknowledges the partial repeat with a confirming particle. The situation could also be described by saying that there are two different repairs: the correction of the facts and the correction of the grammar. The NNS introduces the first repair (line 3) and the NS the latter (line 4). The NS is the knowing participant with respect to the grammar, but the NNS is the expert concerning the facts, as the topic of the conversation is a person who is a closer friend to the NNS.


The unmarked sequential locus and the prosodic and lexical elements of the repair turns contribute to interpreting the third position repeats (both in institutional and everyday conversation) as acknowledging information rather than as a correction. This is also how the NNSs treat the turns (examples (10)– (14)): in none of the cases does the NNS orient to the correction by repeating the modified form. The third position repeats are designed so as to provide the standard form without performing an overt correction. The same holds true for the extended answers. Answering in an extended manner or acknowledging the new information with a partial repeat gives the (native) speaker an opportunity to modify linguistic details in the prior turn, without shifting interactional focus on the activity. In institutional conversation, the extended answers and partial repeats also serve the aim of being precise and checking the accuracy of the information. However, in a broad sense, this same aim can also be detected in everyday conversations: repeating the deficient expressions in a modified form can be seen as a means of confirming the level of intersubjectivity between the participants. .. Conclusion Most of the deficiences in the examples in this section (3.2) are interactionally minor mistakes which do not prevent understanding. The wrong or missing case endings (examples (6), (13)), the wrong consonants (examples (11) and (14)) or the absent or additional morphemes (examples (8) and (10)), do not obscure the meaning of the utterances. In their contexts, all the turns are easily identifiable by a native speaker. Despite their “cosmetic” character, these deviations get straightened out by the NS. I argue that this is due to the interactional locus of the deviations. Since one standard way to receive new information is to repeat it, the deviations which occur in the turns delivering news are likely to be corrected. If the NS is to repeat the news, she will also correct the forms which deviate from the native speaker standard, given that she uses the “native speaker language”. The same is true in institutional interaction: the deviations occurring in the NNS’s answer which modifies the previous presupposition(s) are corrected by the NS, since she is likely to repeat such an answer. Similarly, deviations occurring in a question are often subject to correction. The recipient can choose how syntactically complete an answer she wants to provide. Therefore, it is interactionally easy (i.e. it does not disrupt the “unmarked” progress of interaction) to embed linguistic units from the question in the answer. The main observation about corrections in my data is their restricted occurrence. Corrections cluster in particular sequential environments that cam-

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ouflage their correcting character. Generally, correction does not interrupt the talk in progress; the participants can treat the repair turns as managing some other activity. I will discuss this observation in relation to preference organisation in the discussion-section (3.4). For now, suffice it to say that my data do not support Norrick’s (1991) claim that the crucial factor organising correction sequences in asymmetric conversation is the relationship between the interlocutors rather than the preference organisation. Furthermore, the question of selection, which I posed at the beginning of this chapter – when does the NS correct a linguistic deficiency by the NNS – can now be offered a preliminary answer: the deficiencies which occur in sequential locations where prior speech can be “unmarkedly” repeated are likely to be corrected. This answer explains why the NS does a correction in most of the examples in this chapter (6–14) but lets the error pass in example (2). The secretaries do not usually correct the clients’ utterances when the clients are involved in describing something, such as when they prepare to present their reasons for coming to the office. The secretaries do not interrupt the client’s telling by doing an exposed correction. However, the sequential explanation does not account for example (1); it does not tell why the modifier in this case is corrected. The correction is not embedded in any other activity and, as a consequence, it creates a repair sequence in the conversation – the NNS repeats the correction. In the following section, I will investigate cases where correction becomes interactionally salient in my data.

. Types of other-repair sequences: Orienting to correction by repeating it In the examples discussed so far, repair is embedded in, or merged with, the next sequentially relevant activity. Repair as an activity is not oriented to either in the way that it is managed or in the NNS’s response. This is the most typical repair type in instutional interaction in my data.11 In conversation between friends, however, linguistic corrections can also be made overtly, so that a separate repair sequence emerges in conversation. These repair sequences exhibit the following pattern: NNS: repairable NS: repair (+ particle) NNS: repetition of repair (+ affirmative particle).


It is worth noting that very often the sequence remains minimal; it consists only of the two turns after the repairable – an outright correction and its repetition – after which the talk in progress continues. This is in contrast to the NS repairs: very few instances of other-correction occur in the collection of NS corrections which do not lead to some kind of negotiation about, or at least a comment on, the correct form. Moreover, the NNSs in my data typically respond to correction by repeating the new version together with a confirming particle. This type of third turn is practically non-existent in the collection of repair sequences in the (English) NS data. In this section, I will discuss examples of exposed linguistic corrections in my data. As mentioned, these are more easily found in non-institutional talk. This might be due to the more flexible nature of everyday talk; neither the topics of the talk, nor the duration of the conversation, is as strictly constrained as in institutional encounters. Since “effectivity”, i.e. the need to cover certain topics and reach a conclusion within a time limit, is not usually crucial in talk between friends, side-sequences can more freely emerge and linguistic issues become topicalised during everyday conversation. Despite there being fewer constraints, other-correction does not occur freely in everyday conversation. Native speakers do not always repair the deficient forms by the NNS. In the conversation between the collaborators in the factory, the NS corrected the minor mistakes by the NNS when they occurred in the “echo exclamation” position. The following extract, from the same conversation, demonstrates that the NS does not react to all minor errors: (15) Factory. S teases X about his attempts to try to learn to ski. 01 S: Mite-s ne (.) su-n (.) hiihtohomma-t sujuu oo[k+sä how-CLI that.pl you-GEN skiing business-pl go is[-2 you How’s (.) your (.) skiing business going have you [ 02 X: [Ei minä [NEG I [I can 03 osaa ei ei ei. can NEG NEG NEG not no no no. 04 S: E-t-kö oo harjotel-lut. NEG-2-Q is practice-PPC Haven’t you practiced.

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05 X: E-n mä kokeil-la kun yksi kerta tai kaksi kerta-a. NEG-1 I try-INF only one time or two time-PAR I didn’t to try more than one time or two times. 06 S: No (.) miten-kä-s ne on men-nyt. PRT how-CLI-CLI that.pl is go-PPC Well (.) how were they.

Example (15) contains several minor deviations from the native speaker standard – minor in the sense that they do not prevent understanding – in the speech by the NNS. In line 2, the NNS uses the third person form of the negation instead of the first person (ei minä osaa instead of en minä osaa). In line 5, he uses the infinitive form of the verb (kokeilla ‘to try’) instead of some past tense conjugation. Also, the phrase yksi kerta ‘one time’ would be yh[d]en kerran in the standard language. Yet, none of these deviations evokes a correction by the NS. Instead of repeating units from the NNS’s talk, the NS proceeds with the conversation by posing follow-up questions (lines 4 and 6). The situation in this excerpt is different from those in (13) and (14). The deficiencies are not produced in turns which would provide unexpected information (i.e. which would be in contrast with the first speaker’s assumption) and, hence, project a slot for repetition. The NS is rather aware of the NNS’s skiing history, which is reflected in the clitic particle in the question words (mites, mitenkäs; see Halonen 2002; Raevaara 2004), and it becomes evident when a third person enters the room (data not shown) and the NS tries to persuade the NNS to tell “the skiing story” (kerro se hiihtojuttu) to her. Example (15) thus represents a typical instance of conversation in my data: linguistic deficiencies by the NNSs are not corrected by the NSs. In everyday talk, as well as in institutional talk, it is much easier to find forms (by the NNS) which can be identified as deviating from the standard language than to find linguistic corrections by the NS. However, at times corrections do occur but, again, only in restricted sequential environments. In everyday conversation, corrections tend to cluster in turns subsequent to a hesitant-framed turn by the NNS. That is, the NS does a correction typically after the NNS has displayed uncertainty in her utterance formulation. In this section, I will first focus on these cases where the NS’s repair can be interpreted as a response to the NNS’s uncertainty-marking. Second, I will investigate the “deviant” cases, i.e. the instances of “unmotivated repair” where the NS does a correction although the NNS has not demonstrated having difficulty with the repairable. In both cases, the NNS responds to the correction by producing an exact repetition of it (often together with the affirmative particle).


.. Repair as a response to uncertainty The examples found in this section consist of three elements: the uncertaintyframed repairable, the repair with either an affirmative or a mitigating particle, and the NNS’s repetition of the repair which can be preceded or followed by the confirming particle joo. Uncertainty in repairables is marked e.g. with restarts, sound stretches, hesitation sounds, rising intonation and laughter. I will discuss the data found in this section in two parts: first, I will focus on examples that have more “plain” repairs – the repair turn consists of either a plain partial repeat or, at the most, it is preceded/followed by a confirming particle. Second, I will examine examples that have the repair produced together with a mitigating particle. The sequences in the first group represent the “core” cases of correction: the NS substitutes a deficient linguistic unit for the standard, without hedging the repair turn. After such a turn, the NNS immediately repeats and confirms the repair. In the second group, the NS does the repair more cautiously – the mitigating particle frames it as seeking confirmation – but the NNSs still treat the turns as doing a correction. Instead of just confirming the repairs, the NNSs also repeat them. In these cases, the non-native speakers orient to the difference between the repairable and the repair and, hence, to the activity of correcting, by exposing their acknowledgement of the modification. ... Repair (+ an affirmative particle) The data included in this section can be illustrated by the following pattern: NNS: hesitant-framed repairable NS: repair (+ affirmative particle) NNS: repetition of repair + affirmative particle.

Thus far, there has been one example of repair in this chapter which has not been explained through its sequential location (example (1)). It is an instance of this repair pattern. Let us have a look at the whole extract: (16) [1]. Conversation between friends. 01 S: Raija on tytö-n nimi Suome-ssa (.) on-ko Sveitsi-ssä 1nameF is girl-GEN name Finland-INE is-Q Switzerland-INE Raija is a girl’s name in Finland (.) is there in Switzerland 02 Raija (.) #e# semmos-ta tytö-n nime-ä. 1nameF that.kind+PAR girl-GEN name-PAR Raija (.) #eh# such a girl’s name. 03 J: Ee# N:o#

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04 S: ˚E[i˚ ˚N[o˚ [ 05 J: [Mei-llä ei ole Raija. [we-ADE NEG is 1nameF [We don’t have Raija. 06 S: ˚Mh˚ 07 J: #Ää# n:imi on (.) ˚>mikä se onwhat is itSuomala[inen nimiA Finni[sh nameHarrastus=>jooA hobby=>yesEt sinänsä ei me ol-la< (0.5) tunne-ttu varsinaise-sti ku that as.such NEG we is-INF know-PPPC actual-ADV only >Like we haven’t really< (0.5) actually known each other more 02 joku kolme vuot-ta (.) ˚sillee neljä vuot-ta˚ some three year-PAR PRT four year-PAR than some three years (.) ˚like four years˚ 03 J: ˚No hyvä se on hyvä˚ ˚Well14 good that’s good˚ 04 (1.8) 05 S: [No (se) [Well (it) [ 06 J: [Tu- tutustu-a tois-i-in [niin kova [get.to.know-INF other-pl-ILL [so hard [To ge- get to know others [so hard [ 07 S: [Joo joo [Yes yes 08 S: Joo Yes 09 J: £Et-te oo kova-sti tai£ hah. NEG-2.pl is hard-ADV or £You haven’t much or£ hah. 10 (0.5) 11 S: ˚Ehkä hyv-in˚ perhaps good-INS → ˚Perhaps well˚ 12 J: Hyv-in $joo$ h k(h)ova-st(h)i hehe heh K(h)OVA-ST(h)I hehah good-INS yes hard-ADV hard-ADV Well $yes$ h m(h)uc(h)h hehe heh M(h)UC(h)H hehah

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13

hah >joo joo< hah >yes yes< 14 (0.5) 15 S: Tot(h)ta noin (.) kaverei- kavere-i-den kautta PRT PRT friend-pl-GEN through Yea(h)h well (.) throu- through the friends ((goes on))

In this excerpt, the participants interpret the ongoing sequence differently. The NS orients to the termination of the topic, and he is prepared to move on in the conversation. His turn in lines 1–2 does not provide any new information but sums up the previous statements. He does not immediately respond to the NNS’s evaluation (line 4), and when the NNS begins to elaborate on it (line 6), the NS produces a series of affirmative particles (lines 7 and 8). The reduplication of the particle in line 7 strengthens the interpretation of receiving the prior talk as understood: it demonstrates the already existing understanding. The NNS, however, does not treat this sequence as finished. From his point of view, the turn in line 6 is not a summary of prior talk leading to a new topic but is itself a topicalisable turn. Being hesitant with the use of the adjective kova ‘hard’, the NNS seeks better alternatives in his subsequent turn (line 9). He attaches the adverbial ending sti to the word.15 The reformulation makes the utterance sound more natural in Finnish; ‘it’s good to get to know (each) other much’ is an understandable utterance, whereas ‘hard’ in this context sounds awkward. However, the NNS frames his reformulation as being uncertain: he smiles and laughs and finishes the turn by inviting other possibilities with the particle tai ‘or’. The discrepancy in the participants’ orientations is reflected in the pause in line 10. The NS takes the turn only after a delay and produces the alternative adverb hyvin ‘well’ (line 11). Furthermore, the repair is not assertive: it is hedged with the particle ehkä (‘maybe’) and pronounced with a soft voice. Despite the hedging of the repair, the NNS treats the turn as doing correction: he repeats the new word together with the affirmative particle. However, in this example, the NNS orients to the repair even more substantially: he also, laughingly, repeats the repairable, the deficient version, thus ridiculing his mistake (line 12). The misalignment in the speaker’s orientations extends the repair sequence. The NS orients to the termination of the topic and, thus, treats the turns in the example as summing up the old talk and leading forward to a new topic. For this reason, the NS encourages the NNS to continue and does not treat the final turns as needing elaboration. The NNS, however, produces the evaluations and the specifications as substantial turns which should be re-


sponded to. Specifically, he orients to his role as a language learner: he displays uncertainty with the use of a certain adjective (kova ‘hard’) and leaves space for the NS to repair the utterance the NNS eventually comes up with. In this example, the NNS orients to the linguistic asymmetry between the participants. First, he “persuades” the NS offer a repair and then, he demonstrates acknowledgement of the new version by repeating and confirming it (line 12). Moreover, instead of moving forward in the conversation after the repeat, the NNS focuses on the error and starts ridiculing his prior words. The repair sequence is extended because of the NNS’s orientation to the situation as an environment for learning: he repeats his old version twice, thus displaying recognition of the error. Such an overt pedagogic dimension is missing in the short and compact en passant repair sequences. It is important to note that extract (21) is from a conversation between a Finnish student and his Japanese friend. The Finn studied Japanese and the Japanese studied Finnish, and they had decided to take turns when choosing the language of their interaction. Thus, when they met, they talked Finnish every other time and Japanese every other time. In other words, they used the conversations (in addition to the interpersonal purposes) to practice their language skills. This pedagogic aim can be seen in the repair sequence: the participants orient to the correct (new) forms and to the mistakes more than the interlocutors in other conversations, where corrections are mostly done as en passant as possible. It should be noted, however, that although the repair sequence is more extended in this conversation, it is not similar to those occurring in the NS conversation (cf. example (18)). In NS talk, the repair turn can easily lead to negotiation about the participants’ position of knowledge. In this conversation, the positions are taken for granted – the NNS does not challenge the NS’s position as the linguistic knowledgeable participant. The examples in this section illustrate situations where the NS does repair as a response to the uncertainty displayed by the NNS. The uncertaintymarking is most often accomplished by repeating a part of a word, modifying the problematic element, or producing hesitation sounds and laughter. When the NNS is not certain of a word inflection or other grammatical rule-governed detail, the NS produces the repair straigthforwardly, without any hedging or delay, by applying the rules of the language in which she is an expert. As a consequence, she does not need to ask the NNS to confirm the repair; these repairs are not tentatively made and they are followed by an affirmative particle which encourages the NNS to continue. In those instances in which the repair involves changing lexical items, the target form behind the repairable is not always clear. Consequently, the sub-

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stitutions are preceded by concluding or mitigating particles (e.g. siis ‘so’, ehkä ‘maybe’). However, this hedging does not affect how the NNS treats the turn; she accepts the repair as doubtlessly being the correct form. As for the more “laconic” repairs, the NNS immediately repeats and confirms the new word. Thus, the participants’ orientation toward their linguistic identities can shape the repair sequences. In sum, one typical sequential location for other-correction in everyday conversation between a NS and NNS is the turn following some uncertaintyframing by the NNS. The interactional function of these repair turns is twofold: while being corrective by substituting a marked word or utterance with a variant closer to the standard, they are also co-operative by helping the NNS out of the problematic situation. In other words, responsive corrections do not interrupt the ongoing activity; instead, they help to terminate the hesitation phase and thus facilitate a return to the talk in progress. Generally, repair sequences in NS-NNS talk are short with little negotiation about the participants’ positions of knowledge. This is also true in the few corrections in my data which do not occur in the typical locations, i.e. which are not preceded by uncertainty-marking. These cases are discussed in the following section. .. Non-responsive correction by the NS Linguistic corrections which are not preceded by hesitant-framed expressions and which are made in a slot, which typically does not contain a (partial) repeat of prior talk, are very rare (3 instances) in my data. These are the cases where the NS makes relevant the linguistic asymmetry of knowledge between the interlocutors. By overtly correcting linguistic details in the NNS’s talk, the NS can be seen to be orienting to the linguistic asymmetry between them: instead of producing the relevant next turn, the NS disrupts the ongoing activity by doing a correction. In the institutional conversations in my data, there is only one such case. This is the “deviant” case in which the NS corrects the linguistic details of the NNS’s prior turn so that the correction is not embedded in another activity:


(22) Office. The client has inquired about the philosophy courses organised by the institution. 01 S: Mei-llä tässä ei oo (.) .h ei oo tot filosofia-n we-ADE here NEG is NEG is PRT philosophy-GEN We don’t have here (.) .h we don’t have ehm philosophy 02 kursse-j-a. course-pl-PAR courses. tarkoita (.) (.) tuleva 03 A: E-n tar- mä e-n NEG-1 I NEG-1 mean information-pl-PAR coming.NOM I don’t me- I don’t mean (.) (.) coming 04 kurssi-a. course-PAR course. 05 S: Tulev-i-sta kurs[se-i-sta coming-pl-ELA cour[se-pl-ELA → About the coming courses [ 06 A: [Joo ˚tulevi[sta kursseista˚ [Yes ˚about [the coming courses˚ [ 07 S: [>Mut+ku< mei-l on [ but+when we-ADE is [>But see< we have 08 l:ukujärjestykse-t nyt ainoastaan tä-lle jakso-lle yksi. time.table-pl now only this-ALL period-ALL one the time tables now only for this period one.

The correction in line 5 is overt: it occurs after the NNS’s turn where he specifies the meaning of his prior utterances. Slight tension exists between the secretary and the client: the client would like to study philosophy at the institution and he has already been to another office where the secretary advised him to contact this office about the matter. This institution, however, does not offer philosophy courses at the moment, and the secretary does not know whether any will be offered in the next period, either. Therefore, the secretary cannot help the client. In lines 3–4, the client specifies that he does not need information about the upcoming course offerings (thus perhaps indicating that he wants to reserve a place there), but the secretary holds to her position: she cannot do anything about the matter. Before formulating her argument (lines 7–8), the secretary, however, straightens out the incongruous case endings in the client’s utterance (line 5). The NNS has not framed the noun phrase as being difficult to formulate: no self-repair occurs in the expression in lines 3–4, nor do any hesitation sounds or sound stretches.

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The correction is thus not preceded by hesitancy-marking and not embedded in another activity. Still, this excerpt exhibits a familiar pattern. First, the correction (a morphological modification; line 5) is produced without delays, hesitations or other mitigations. Second, the NNS’s reaction is immediate: he accepts the correction even before the NS has uttered the whole turn. The accepting turn (line 6) consists of a confirmation (the affirmative particle joo) and the exact repetition of the correction, which is pronounced in a very soft voice. The softness of the repetition indicates that the NNS does not utter it as a prominent interactional element to be expanded on; it is produced as a memorizing repeat. After the NNS’s repetition (or actually already in overlap with it; line 7), the conversation is carried on without further negotiation or comments on the correction or the error. Thus, despite its different sequential location, this overt correction is managed en passant, as the repairs in the “typical” location (i.e. subsequent to an uncertainty-framed turn). Since the correction is overt, the NNS orients to it, but the orientation is minimal: he and the secretary produce their turns after the repair (lines 6 and 7) in overlap with prior speech, so that they get out of the repair sequence as quickly as possible. The en passant nature could be suggested as a characteristic and distinctive feature of linguistic other-correction in NS-NNS talk. Let us compare (22) with an extract from the NS data containing a repair turn that is similarly plain and unmitigated: (23) [NB:IV:13:R:25] 01 02 → 04 05 06 07 08 09 10

E: Yih guh dunt wor(.)k uh yih don’t go tuh work til three:,h (0.2) L: Fou:r. (0.6) E: [Oh: fou:r. L: [T’da:y’s Sa:turday. (.) E: ↑Aoh that’s ↓˚right.˚ L: Ye:ah, E: .hhhhhhhhhhh ↑A:ND AH’LL SghEE YIH NEXT WEEK (goes on)

In line 1, E presents a statement about L’s working hours. L corrects the assumption in her next turn without hedging (line 3). Subsequently, E repeats the correction (line 5) at the same time as when L gives an account for the repair (line 6). Even though that the participants’ positions of knowledge are clear in this example – L is unambiguously the knowledgeable participant, as the question is about her job – there are still four turns in which the participants orient to the correction after its production (lines 5–9), as opposed to one turn (line 6) in (22), before the participants continue with the talk in progress.


In contrast to (22), the correction in (23) is both preceded and followed by a pause. Also, the repetition in the third turn (line 5) is not preceded by an affirmative particle but a particle displaying some change in the state of the speaker’s knowledge. This is similar to the previous example from the NS data (12). The distinction between the two particles – oh and yes – is illuminating with respect to the participants’ positions of knowledge. The affirmative particle acknowledges the repair in a very different way than the change-ofstate token. The particle oh clearly notices the difference between the repair and the repairable by crediting the repair with some novelty value, whereas joo merely confirms the repair as being what the speaker meant (and, thus, what she should have said) without displaying any attitude (surprise, doubt, etc.). Oh credits the repair with novelty value, but it is neutral with respect to the accuracy or validity of the repair. It becomes clear later in (23) that E also knew about L’s working hours (line 8) but, despite this knowledge, the repair sequence is not as quick and as minimally oriented to as in NNS-conversation. In the NNS example (22), there is no hesitancy or delay in the correction or its acceptance; the sequence displays the NNS’s recognition of the correction but, simultaneously, the participants are working to get out of the repair sequence as quickly as possible. Example (23) does not exhibit a similar orientation to the rapid closure of the repair sequence. The speaker (L) produces the repair delayed (cf. the pause in line 2). There is even a longer pause after the repair (line 4), after which L comes up with an account or an explanation for the correction. E first repeats the correction (line 5) and then acknowledges the explanation (line 8). The pauses and delays in the repair sequence reflect the absence of any “omnipresent” asymmetry between the participants. Both participants have relevant knowledge about the issues that are discussed, (working hours with respect to the week-days). L is primarily the knowledgeable participant, but she does not perform the correction from a superior position. The correction is not slipped in (or accepted) as a quick side remark: this is reflected both in the pauses (lines 2 and 4) and in the account L gives after the repair (line 6). In NS-NNS data, there are neither comparable accounts for the correction, nor negotiations about the correct form, including the NNSs’ nonconfirmatory responses (prefaced by ‘oh’). Grammatical corrections are managed and received from the positions of linguistically knowledgeable and less knowledgeable. In addition to the one institutional case (22), two instances of overt, nonresponsive corrections occur in the more mundane conversational data. It is probably not a co-incidence that these instances can be found in the con-

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versation between the Finn and the Japanese whose interaction has a pedagogic undertone that is lacking in the other conversations between friends. In the following example, the repairable again contains a wrong case ending. In this excerpt, however, the morphological error is rather consequential for the meaning of the utterance: (24) S and J are talking about marriage, relationships and their mutual friends. 01 J: Ve- Veli sano-i että mi- sano-i minu-lle että Kirsikka? 1nameM say-PST that say-PST I-ALL that 1nameF Ve- Veli said that I- said to me that Kirsikka? 02 S: Joo Kirsi Yes Kirsi 03 J: Kirsi? 04 S: [Joo [Yes [ 05 J: [£Tulee maa-sta£ [ come country-ELA [£Comes out of the countryside£ 06 S: Maa-lta country-ABL → From the countryside 07 J: £Maalta£ ˚hehheh˚ £From the countryside£ ˚hehheh˚ 08 S: Joo Yes 09 J: £Ja hän sano-i (0.2) (>mi-tä se onhä- hänt-< and he say-PST what-PAR it is (he- him-) £And he said (0.2) (>what is ithe- him-< 10 Timo sano-i ää (0.4) oma vaimo 1nameM say-PST own wife Timo said ehm (0.4) own wife 11 S: Jo[o Ye[s [ 12 J: [Vaimo (.) se on p(h)are-mpi (0.2) tyt- pare-mpi (0.2) ää [wife it is good-COMP good-COMP [Wife (.) it is b(h)etter (0.2) gir- better (.) ehm 13 (.) tyttö on pare-mpi joka tulee £maa-stah.£ girl is good-COMP who come country-ELA (.) the girl is better who comes £out of the countryside.£ 14 S: Maa-lta country-ABL → From the countryside


15 J: M >AAH< mt #maa-lta# .hh >joo joo< heh hah country-ABL yes yes M >AAH< mt #from the countryside# .hh >yes yes< heh hah 16 ha(h)n sa(h)no-ih. hh he say-PST h(h)e sa(h)id. hh 17 S: Joo Yes

This extract comes from a longer sequence in which S and J have been talking about their mutual friends’ relationships. J is telling a story about a common friend; he reports what his friend has told him about his friend’s wife. J smiles when uttering the quote by the friend, the verb phrase tulee maasta16 (line 5). The NS does not reciprocate the smile or even comment on the content of the turn; instead, he corrects a grammatical property in the utterance. A similar pattern of correction, involving the same verb phrase, emerges a couple of turns later in the conversation (line 14). The NNS is approaching the punchline of the story – summarizing the common friend’s generalising opinions (lines 12– 13) – when he, again, uses the wrong case ending. The NS responds in the same way as before: he leaves aside the content of the turn and focuses on its formal properties by doing a correction (line 14). Correction is an overt activity, even though the NNS has not displayed uncertainty in producing the repairable. In spite of this, the characteristic feature of the correction sequences in NS-NNS talk – brevity – is evident. The NS makes the corrections (lines 6 and 14) from the position of the knowledgeable participant, without delays or hesitations. The NNS accepts the new forms without question, by repeating them (lines 7 and 15), after which he continues with the talk in progress. The correction is neither explained nor accounted for, as it was in (23) between the two native speakers. In (24), one reason for the NS making the correction might be the semantic consequences of the choice of the wrong case ending.With the noun maa, changing the case ending makes a semantic difference: the elative case (maasta) indicates that something is coming (i.e. growing) out of the ground, whereas the ablative case (maalta) is used when a person is from the countryside. It should be noted, however, that even though there was a semantic issue hung on the correction, it is not manifest in the data. The NS does not explain the danger of mixing the case endings or the wrong connotations that the elative case evokes. As in the previous cases, the repair is not explained or justified. In sum, the native speakers very rarely correct the linguistic details in the speech of the non-native speakers if the non-native speakers have not framed the repairables as being problematic. However, corrections do occur, especially

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in non-institutional talk where the linguistic issues can more easily be topicalised. In the present data, all such instances were found in a conversation with a potential pedagogic undertone. This implies that, even though the many opportunities arise for it, interactionally disruptive (i.e. non-responsive) othercorrection is generally an infrequent conversational action in talk between the NS and the NNS. This is understandable, since correction is both sequentially and interpersonally consequental for the ongoing talk. Repair imposes sequential obligations on the next turn (Schegloff 1979), thus interrupting the ongoing activity and creating a side-sequence in the talk (cf. Jefferson 1972, 1987). Repair may also disturb the interactional balance between the participants by placing their asymmetrical positions in focus. The affirmative particle, which often is produced together with the repair, can be seen as addressing these issues: by downgrading the error’s influence on understanding, it diminishes the interactional salience of the activity. The participants’ identities as native and non-native speakers respectively are reflected in the shortness and rapidity of the repair sequences. A prerequisite for the sequence to be compact is that both participants orient to their linguistic identities. The NS does not have to question her own linguistic knowledge if she knows that the other speaker is a learner of the language and, therefore, can be expected to make mistakes. Furthermore, the NNS needs to treat the NS as having superior linguistic knowledge: the sequence is not extended if she immediately abandons her version and accepts the new one without asking reasons for the replacement.

. Discussion In this chapter, I have discussed instances of the native speaker producing an alternative version of the word or phrase the non-native speaker used in her turn. I have focused particularly on cases where the new NS version changes a linguistic element, most often a grammatical morpheme, in the prior speaker’s utterance. These instances, albeit not frequent, occur throughout the data, in both institutional and non-institutional conversation. Moreover, this activity is unidirectional. Grammatical modifications of prior speaker’s turns are made only by the NS, not by the NNS. One prevailing feature in the data is that all the linguistic modifications are done as outright corrections. There are no instances of the NS initiating repair by repeating the trouble turn. In general, the repair initiators, which serve as invitations to self-repair, are absent in the data. Thus, the NNS is provided with


the correct form; she is not invited to self-repair any grammatical details (cf. Brouwer, Rasmussen, & Wagner 2004; Wong 2005). Moreover, outright grammatical corrections are manifestedly not delayed, mitigated or hedged by using other dispreference markers. These features are in contrast with the predominant repair pattern both in talk between equals (Schegloff et al. 1977) and in pedagogic interaction (e.g. McHoul 1990). Several factors underlie the greater frequency of outright other-repair over initiating repair in NS-NNS talk. First, by initiating repair, the speaker projects the prior speaker’s self-repair as the relevant next turn (Schegloff et al. 1977). Initiating repair using a form which leaves it to the recipient to see how what she said might be incorrect, requires that the speaker assumes that the recipient has the necessary knowledge or information to recognise the mistake and to be able to correct it appropriately. In NS-NNS conversation, however, the prior speaker’s (the NNS’s) level of knowledge cannot be taken for granted; she might not be able to recognise the error and, therefore, perhaps cannot perform the correction. This is especially true when the NNS has already marked the repairable as being problematic. In these cases, initiating repair with e.g. a partial repeat would be redundant: the uncertainty-marking indicates that the NNS already knows what is problematic – what she does not know, or is not certain of, is the correct formulation. By not creating an opportunity for the NNS to self-repair, the NS avoids the risk of putting the NNS in a position where she would not be able to do the next sequentially relevant activity. Second, initiating repair delays the production of the actual repair by at least one turn, thus extending the repair sequence. The plain, unmodulated replacements help the repair sequences to remain short. The NNS is not left selecting the item in need of correcting. In addition, initiating repair by repeating the trouble source can be interpreted as highlighting the error, as drawing attention to it. Consider the following, fictitious version of example (10), in which the outright correction by the NS has been replaced with a repair initiation, (such instances were not in the data): NS: Asut perheesi kanssa? You live with your family? NNS: Asun äidilleni kanssa. I live with to my mother. NS: Äidillesi kanssa? With to your mother? NNS: (possible repair)

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The speakers produce repair initiations to indicate that they experience the repairable as being somehow problematic. However, the initiation does not specify the nature of the problem. In the example above, the partial repeat by the NS could be heard as questioning the content of the NNS’s answer rather than its form: is it really the case that the NNS (a man in his forties) is living with his mother? Such misinterpretations are avoided when the correction is direct. Third, other-initiated self-repair is the most frequent repair type in traditional classroom interaction (cf. McHoul 1990). Correction has been found to occur frequently in settings where the participants’ roles as an expert and a learner are oriented to, such as classroom interaction (cf. e.g. Kasper 1986; van Lier 1988; Seedhouse 1996). The prevailing use of other-initiated repair in non-pedagogic conversations would highlight the asymmetric positions of the participants by drawing attention to the error, and it would create an impression of teaching or instructing in a non-pedagogic context. By doing an outright repair, the native speakers manage to accomplish correction without becoming “language teachers”. The linguistic corrections by the NS can sometimes be seen as having a didactic character (i.e. informing the NNS about the correct formulations), but activating ‘teaching’ as an attendant activity (cf. Jefferson 1987) is still avoided. Despite the (potential) didactic dimension, other-corrections are constructed not to resemble the corrections in classroom interaction. The NSs do the linguistic corrections in a way which avoids being overtly pedagogic. Other-correction is an activity which can establish asymmetry between the participants: by replacing the prior speaker’s utterance with her own version, the current speaker treats her version as somehow more apt. When doing a linguistic other-correction, the NS thus orients to her role as the knowledgeable participant, but she does not emphasize the asymmetric situation – she does not take the role of the teacher. Other-correction is a more discreet way of providing the NNS with a linguistic element or informing her of the marked use of some word or phrase than initiating repair. Thus, the participants’ orientation to their linguistic identities result in repair sequences which are manifestedly shorter and more discreet (i.e. done en passant) than the repair sequences found in native speaker talk. This is due to the fact that the NS can do the grammatical corrections immediately after the repairable, without any hedging or hesitation, (i.e. from the position of the knowledgeable participant). The NNS, for her part, immediately accepts the correction by both repeating and confirming it; she does not challenge the modification or ask for any justification or explanation for it. This can happen


even if the correction is hedged by using a tentative particle. After the repetition, the participants return to the talk in progress and the repair sequence is closed. It is important to note that the corrections accepted as given in NS-NNS conversation are linguistic. In other words, other-correction, which is in the domain of NS expertise is not argued about, whereas the repair of more substantial matters is subject to negotiation according to the participants’ respective domains of knowledge, as in NS talk. Thus, the en passant-nature of repair in NS-NNS talk stems partly from what is being repaired. In sum, my data indicate that (linguistic) repair in NS-NNS talk is organised somewhat differently from the talk between native speakers. The prevailing difference is the absence of repair initiatiors (or the dominance of outright correction). However, my data still do not support Norrick’s (1991) claim that the repair organisation in asymmetric conversation is based on the relationship between the participants rather than on the preference structure. The interlocutors’ positions as the NS and the NNS can, indeed, be said to shape the repair sequences, but the repairs in NS-NNS talk are still sensitive to the preference organisation. Although outright other-correction occurs in conversation between the NS and the NNS, its occurrence is nevertheless sequentially constrained. Other-correction occurs in conversational locations where prior speech can “unmarkedly” be repeated, or as a response to some uncertainty-marking by the NNS, i.e. in locations where it does not interrupt the ongoing activity. As for the question I posed at the beginning of this chapter (When do the native speakers correct the utterances by the non-native speakers), an answer can now be offered. Native speakers do linguistic corrections when they can avoid the sequentially disruptive consequences of the activity. In other words, correction is found in slots where it is managed without emphasising it. In institutional conversation, such slots are typically answers or registering (third position) repeats. In everyday talk, corrections occur often as a response to hesitancy by the NNS. In institutional conversation, repair is very often intertwined with the activity of checking or confirming. As the accuracy of information is essential in many bureaucratic procedures, repair can serve to confirm that the NS’s interpretation of the prior turn was correct. In light of this, it is not surprising that repairs tend to cluster in slots which typically contain a repetition of (a part of) the prior turn. The turns prior to the repetition-slots are the ones containing important and institutionally consequential information, given that this information is worth repeating even if no problems or mistakes arise in the utterance.

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In everyday talk, information is not requested and checked in the same way, or to the same extent, as in bureaucratic encounters. Hence, repair is seldom used as means to check the accuracy of the prior turn. Confirmation-seeking repair also occurs in non-institutional conversation, but it is not the prevailing function of repair. Confirmation-seeking repair is found in everyday talk especially when the NS makes a more substantial semantic change in the repairable. These repairs are preceded by a mitigating particle or framed as tentative by prosodic means. There are, however, also locations in everyday talk where prior speech can, unmarkedly, be repeated. If the NNS tells the NS something as news and if this utterance contains an error, the NS can use an exclamatory repeat to replace the deviant element with the standard one. Again, this repair is undertaken discreetly, without initiating a separate sequence for it. The examples in this chapter exhibit some clustering: the cases where the NNS does not orient to the correction by repeating it are from institutional conversation, and instances where the NNS repeats the (more exposed) correction are mainly from everyday talk. The proportion of the examples reflects their occurrence in the data. In institutional talk, correction rarely occurs as an exposed activity; it can be embedded in or merged with the next relevant activity. This is aligned with the fact that linguistic details, or other “noninstitutional” issues, are not usually topicalised during the encounter. As a consequence of embedding the correction, the alternative version is not often repeated by the NNS, which means that no separate repair sequence emerges in the conversation. In everyday talk, topics can fluctuate more freely and also cover linguistic issues. The largest part of the outright repairs in everyday talk arise as a response to the uncertainty the NNS has displayed when pronouncing some linguistic element. These repairs are made overtly and the NNS orients to them by repeating them, but the repair sequence remains minimal: it is not extended over the two turns – the repair and the repeat. Despite its exposed character, correction in these locations need not be a disruptive activity. The “smooth” progress of interaction has already been halted by the NNS’s hesitation. By producing the target form, the NS closes the search sequence and thereby makes it possible for the participants to return to the talk in progress. By displaying hesitancy concerning the formulation of some linguistic unit, the NNSs activates the linguistic identities by orienting to her status as the language learner. This activated asymmetry gives the NS an opportunity to use her superior knowledge and perform outright repair as a collaborative activity. Despite the collaborative character, the native speakers often minimize the salience of the repair turn by, for example, producing the repair with an affirmative particle, which encourages the previous


speaker to continue. In general, corrections are performed in such a way that their interactional prominence is minimized. The repair sequences in NS-NNS conversation are thus managed so as to minimize intrusion into, or disruption of, the talk in progress. The organisation of the sequences is shaped by sequential constraints, the type of the conversation, as well as the participants’ orientation to their linguistic identities. The question-answer sequences in institutional encounters and the need for accuracy create an opportunity for the NS to do an outright correction to some extent in an embedded way, by e.g. extending an answer or modifying a registering repeat. In these cases, correction is intertwined with the activity of checking. On the other hand, when outright corrections are made, the participants’ identities as native and non-native speaker – i.e. their access to the linguistic knowledge – make possible the management of the repair en passant, without any participant’s substantial orientation to the activity.

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chapter 

Word search

. Introduction In this chapter, I will discuss another environment where understanding, or the participants’ orientation to understanding, surfaces in the data. In these cases, it is not the recipient who focuses on the prior turn at talk but, instead, the speaker who focuses on the talk-in-progress. I will investigate instances where the speaker (in most cases the NNS) displays hesitancy in utteranceformulation and displays having difficulty in finding the relevant linguistic items to convey the meaning so that it would be understood by the other speaker. Thus, the progressivity of the turn (and, hence, the conversation) is halted because of the speaker’s problems in formulating (understandable) talk. I have already touched upon this phenomenon in the previous chapter: hesitancy-marked turns were found to be one environment preceding other-repair. In this chapter, I will more thoroughly discuss hesitancy-marking and its interactional consequences, investigating the whole sequence with the problem-signalling turns, potential solutions, requests for help and responses. I will call these sequences ‘word searches’, although the item which is being sought can be grammatical as well as lexical, or sometimes a longer syntactic unit. Moreover, it is not always clear what the missing element is in the sequences. Word search can be investigated as a separate activity, but can also be seen as belonging to the repair organisation. From the point of view of conversational repair, word search can be defined as representing self-initiation of repair. Schegloff et al. (1977) observed that self-initiations (within the troublesource turn) were often marked with non-lexical speech perturbations, e.g. cut-offs, sound stretches and “uh”s. These same perturbations have been reported as prototypical features preceding word search sequences (Goodwin & Goodwin 1986; Goodwin 1987). Thus, word search can be understood as one specific type of self-initiation of repair. Word searches are found in all kinds of interaction, but their occurence is more likely the less linguistic knowledge or resources the participants share. I

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have a collection of 78 instances from my data where the progress of conversation is disrupted because of the speaker’s failure to find a linguistic item. In 72 of the cases, the search is initiated by the NNS, and six times it is initiated by the NS. This chapter contains an investigation of these instances and an exploration into the construction of a sequence through which word search is initiated, recognised and resolved. I will begin by giving a brief outline of the previous conversation analytic research on word searches. Subsequently, I discuss word search sequences and the potential problems in defining them in the non-native speaker data. Thereafter, I will outline some distinctions which are relevant for constructing and completing the activity of searching for a word. These distinctions pertain to the type of the linguistic item being offered as a resolution to the search and the orientation the participants exhibit towards the activity. It will be argued that the organisation of a word search sequence depends partly on the type of the element being sought – whether it is lexical or grammatical – and partly on whom the search is directed to, i.e. whether to the speaker herself or to the recipient. A word search is completed when the participants have reached intersubjective understanding of what they are talking about. However, there are differences in how the participants signal having achieved mutual understanding. These differences reflect the speakers’ identities as native or non-native speakers, so that, as in correction, an orientation to the category of ‘(non)-native’ can be detected. .. Word search in the CA tradition In conversation analytic literature, word search is found to be a distinctive phenomenon. It has been studied e.g. by Charles Goodwin (1980, 1986 [with M. H. Goodwin], and 1987), Lerner (1996), Laakso (1997, 2003), and Helasvuo, Laakso and Sorjonen (2004). According to Goodwin and Goodwin (1986), a prototypical word search is preceded by sound stretches or other speech perturbations and a pause, and it is initiated in the mid-course of a turn constructional unit (TCU). One further feature which is frequently present is a facial gesture called a ‘thinking face’. Goodwin and Goodwin have noted that speakers systematically withdraw gaze from the recipients when they begin to be involved in a word search, and simultaneously produce a characteristic ‘thinking face’, which is not only stereotypic but also recognisable in a range of different cultures (ibid.: 57). Goodwin and Goodwin have paid special attention to gaze and have shown that the participants’ orientation to the word search can be seen in the way they shift their gaze. For instance, speakers prototypically withdraw gaze when

Chapter 4. Word search

they start searching for a word, whereas the recipients typically shift gaze to the speaker during the search. The gaze given during a word search demonstrates the recipient’s continued orientation to, and coparticipation in, the talk in progress. That is, by directing her gaze to the speaker, the recipient can indicate that she is attending to the word search while still allowing the speaker to produce the word being sought (Goodwin & Goodwin 1986: 53–54). This characteristic pattern of activity means that a word search does not necessarily have to be a sign of linguistic deficiency, as has traditionally been thought, but that a search can, for example, be used as a way to obtain heightened attention from the recipient (ibid.: 54–55). Lerner (1996) has studied word searches and their construction from a more syntactic point-of-view. He concentrates on those word searches where the recipient comes in with a suggestion for the missing word. That word search is an activity which is “specifically designed for conditional entry by recipients” (ibid.: 261) is a starting point in Lerner’s article, and his interest lies in the details of this design (ibid.: 263–264). The turns (to be completed) in Lerner’s examples are very similar to the word search turns which Goodwin and Goodwin discuss. In Lerner’s examples, the speaker also stops in the mid-course of a TCU, produces a sound stretch, a hesitation sound, or simply pauses and then the recipient takes the turn. Lerner also finds other practices that allow for the recipient’s completion, including word cut-off and word repetition, both of which are relevant in recognising and classifying word searches in my study. Both in Goodwin and Goodwin’s and Lerner’s work, it is evident when the ongoing speech is disrupted and the speaker starts hesitating in her speech production. Moreover, the word search episodes are usually rather short; in most cases, the target word is found within the same turn or in the immediately following turns. Laakso (1997) and Helasvuo, Laakso and Sorjonen (2004) have investigated a different type of data: conversation of aphasic speakers. In these conversations, word search is a frequent activity and the search sequences can be rather extended. My data resembles the aphasic data in that there is a great amount of “word search potential”. The non-native speakers who only have a rudimentary knowledge of the language often interrupt themselves, hesitate, pause and produce sound stretches. In the subsequent section, I will consider in more detail what impact the participants’ different linguistic knowledge might have when studying word searches. I will begin by placing my study among the work already done on word searches in NS-NNS talk.

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


.. Word search in L2-data I will explore word searches mainly from the conversation analytic perspective. Word searches have been considered in second language literature, but seldom as a focus of study. Rather than investigating word search as an interactional phenomenon, second language studies have focused e.g. on the strategies non-native speakers use when they encounter problems in their language production. In many cases, these communication strategies are attempts to resolve word searches. However, ‘communication strategy’ is a broad concept and various things have been studied under that label (see e.g. Faerch & Kasper 1983a; Bongaerts & Poulisse 1989; Kasper & Kellerman 1997). Communication strategies have been studied for example by organising test situations where the NNSs have been given various tasks, (e.g. to describe different objects and shapes, see e.g. Bongaerts & Poulisse 1989). In these studies, the informants have to find the means to explain figures without necessarily knowing their names so that someone else could recognise them. Thus, the task resembles word search activity, but this kind of work on communication strategy lacks the interactional aspect which is crucial in conversation analysis. In the early studies, communication strategies were defined as the learner’s resource, as her means to compensate for her deficient linguistic knowledge by e.g. reducing her communicative goal or expanding her communicative resources (cf. Faerch & Kasper 1983b: 52–53). Later, some strategies have been labelled as interactional (cf. Yule & Tarone 1997: 20), but the approach is still not interactional; interactive strategies are merely means for the speaker (who is seen as the source of the linguistic problem) to address the recipient in the hope of assistance Communication strategies have been classified and listed in various ways, and some of the strategies (e.g. semantic contiguity, borrowing and foreignizing) can be found in my data as the NNSs’ attempt to resolve word searches. I will use the names of the strategies in my study, but otherwise my approach differs from the traditional second language approach. In contrast to the psycholinguistically-rooted communication strategy studies, I will treat word search as an interactional phenomenon which involves both interlocutors and is resolved through both participants’ activities. I aim to answer questions such as how the word search sequences are initiated, how the participants negotiate within the activity the kind of co-participation it is to receive, and how the participants jointly resolve the situation. Recently, word search has been investigated from an interactional perspective also in second language conversation (Brouwer 2003; Carroll 2004, 2005).


Word search as an interactional phenomenon seems to be similar in NS talk and in NS-NNS talk – word search can be used e.g. to secure proper dispalys of recipiency (Carroll 2004). However, as speech perturbations are relatively common in the NNS talk, a question then rises: which perturbations disrupt the talk in progress? What is the normal, “fluent flow of speech” in NS-NNS talk? When do participants engage in word searches? It is important to bear in mind that structural incoherences (i.e. different speech perturbations) need not per se make the participants orient to a word search. Consider the following example: (1) Office. C: „ aika (.) mi-tä aika- aika-a opi 01 C: Mikä (.) mikä what.NOM what.NOM time.NOM what-PAR time time-PAR ? What (.) what time (.) which time- time is C:..----------02 (.) öö (.) toimisto auki office open (.) ehm (.) the office open S:..-----------03 S: Mmm (.) yhdeksäs- kahdeksa-sta yhte-entoista varm-imm-in nine eight-ELA eleven-ILL sure-SUP-ADV Mmm (.) from ni- from eight to eleven most probably 04 ja sitten yhde-stä neljä-än. and then one-ELA four-ILL and then from one to four.

The client’s turn (lines 1–2) contains various structural incoherencies. He repeats parts of his turn, corrects himself, cuts off a word, and produces a hesitation sound. In addition, there are several pauses in the turn, arising mid-course in a TCU. The client’s facial expression cannot be seen in the video because, at the beginning of this turn, he turns his head away from the camera and the secretary and “talks to the wall”. The secretary is involved in writing down some information, and her gaze is directed to the papers. She raises her head just before the client says the word toimisto ‘office’; immediately after this, the client turns his head back to the secretary. The incoherencies in the client’s turn demonstrate that he encounters problems in finding the right words and especially the right case endings for the words. The client first produces the words (mikä, aika) in the unmarked nominative case and thereafter starts changing the case endings (line 1). Searching in this example actually makes the production process visible. By presenting and eliminating alternatives and starting from the unmarked form, the client’s






turn demonstrates the route he is taking – a kind of a mental path – to the case ending he ends up with. However, word search is not a single activity which would stand out for the participants as something they would orient to. The NNS’s turn (line 1) includes a few self-corrections, but the progressivity of the NNS’s turn (lines 1–2) is not disrupted because of his failure to find a linguistic item and he does not invite the NS to help him with the search. In this chapter, I have chosen to focus on “substantial” word searches. By substantial, I mean searches where the speaker tries to involve the recipient in the searching process. By addressing the recipient, the speaker treats her as being the knowledgeable participant and creates an expectation that she will contribute to finding a solution. The search turns have different interactional consequences depending upon whom the search is directed to. A self-directed search holds the turn for the speaker and can be used to attract attention from the recipient, whereas an other-directed search functions as a first pair part and creates a slot for a response. However, it is quite common in my data that both types occur during a search sequence: the speaker is first doing a self-directed search, and if this does not lead to a result, the search then is directed to the recipient. For this chapter, I have collected instances which include other-directed searches. In other words, I have left out cases where the speaker disrupts her speech in the middle of a TCU but finds the target word without (seeking) help from the recipient. I will focus on the more “substantial” searches, since they more clearly halt the progress of the conversation and, hence, are relevant for understanding: the speaker indicates her need for the other’s contribution in order to be able to construct the turn and, hence, proceed with the conversation. Speakers in my data appeal for assistance mainly by directing the search to the recipient by shifting gaze to her. As Goodwin and Goodwin (1986) observed, speakers withdraw gaze when beginning the search process. If, however, the speaker shifts her gaze to the recipient while beginning (or in the middle of) the search, then the recipient is invited to take part in the searching process. Gaze shift is found to occur systematically in speakership changes (Goodwin 1981), and it is one means to invite another speaker to be a co-teller in a story (Goodwin 1987). In aphasic interaction, Laakso (1997) has made a distinction between interactionally directed and self-directed word searches mainly on the basis of the eye contact of the participants. In the former, the participants have an eye contact, whereas in the latter the speaker usually gazes away. Other reserachers have also reported the relevance of gaze in word search sequences (Carroll 2004; Helasvuo, Laakso, & Sorjonen 2004). My data concurs with these findings: the speakers use gaze shift to indicate that they need help in


the utterance/word formulation. I will discuss the role of gaze more thoroughly together with the relevant examples. Example (1) does not, however, seem to fall into the picture of substantial searches: there are no changes in the directions of the participants’ gaze during the NNS’s self-repair, until the end of the turn. The non-native speaker produces his turn rather slowly, but he is retaining possession of the turn by not directing his gaze to the secretary until he has found all the words. By not asking for help, the client gives the impression that he is capable of finding the relevant words by himself. He goes through some alternatives and chooses some of them. The fact that a certain amount of mental work is needed and presented in the utterance-construction does not become an issue. The secretary does not react to the way the turn is realized but to the sequential-substantial side of it: she does not comment on the shown-to-be-difficult elements but answers the question (line 3). The secretary begins to gaze at the client during the last pause (line 2), which could be seen as a sign of a recipient-orientation to a word search in a Goodwinian sense, but it is also worth noting that this happens immediately after she has finished her writing; this is also the first point that she is free from the other activity and is thus able to direct her attention to the client. With this example, I wish to show that recognising a word search in the non-native speaker data is not an unambiguous issue. In the conversation analytic tradition, recognising and collecting phenomena in the data is never a mechanical task; the individual examples have to be interpreted and examined in their local contexts. Next, I will investigate examples in my data where the speaker orients to the lack of a word. I have divided the cases into two groups, lexical and grammatical, mainly on the basis of how the search is initiated in conversation.

. Lexical searches In this section, I will discuss instances where the speaker “flags” an (upcoming) problem in conversation (cf. Wagner & Firth 1997: 325), such as demonstrating that she is experiencing difficulty with some linguistic unit. In the examples in this section, the focus of the search is on lexical items and, hence, I will call these sequences lexical searches (as opposed to grammatical searches in the next section). The distinction between lexical and grammatical search is, however, only operational. The names should not be read as suggesting the kind of units the speaker has in mind; instead, they refer to the ways in which the search






is initiated. In grammatical searches, the speaker displays an orientation to linguistic units within lexical items. For example, the speaker can begin a word but not complete it. Lexical searches can then be negatively defined in relation to grammatical searches: they are the cases where the other speaker, rather than just completing an already-begun word, provides a new lexical item (or items) in conversation. .. Initiating the search: Interrogatives as a means to flag the problem The speaker can signal that she is having trouble in finding relevant linguistic items in various ways. In this section, I will focus on one of the most explicit means: utterances which verbalise the failure to find some item(s), (e.g. ‘what is it’, ‘what’s the word’ etc.). In the collection of 78 word searches, 37 are flagged by explicit means, with interrogative utterances announcing the absence of some target item. All six word searches initiated by the NS are flagged by interrogatives. In all of these cases, the missing item is a name or a term, as illustrated in the following examples: (2) K and S are friends who are chatting. 01 S: Hei sillon muuten kun sä ol-i-t to-n (1.0) ˚mikä se-n PRT then PRT when you is-PST-2 that-GEN what it-GEN → By the way then when you were with that (1.0) ˚what 02 edellise-n kundi-n nimi ol-i˚ previous-GEN guy-GEN name is-PST → was the name of that previous guy˚ 03 (3.0) 04 K: Norman Norman 05 S: Normanin kanssa. ((goes on)) With Norman.

(3) R is a beauty therapist who is doing a facial to S. 01 S: Kato mä ost-i-n semmose-n ol-i hirvee-n hyvä PRT I buy-PST-1 that.kind-GEN is-PST terrible-GEN good → See I bought a kind of it was really good y’know (1.0) 02 niinku (1.0) mikä se on se japanilainen merkki ˚hei˚ PRT what it is it Japanese brand PRT → what is it that Japanese brand ˚y’know˚ 03 R: Kaneebo Kanebo 04 S: Nii ni si-ltä ol-i semmonen niinku finnistikki PRT PRT it-ABL is-PST that.kind PRT pimple stick Yeah so they had a kind of like a pimple stick


The NS makes explicit that she lacks a linguistic item (=a name) by producing an interrogative utterance (lines 1–2 in both examples). In both cases it is the recipient (the NNS) who produces the name (lines 4 and 3, respectively), thereby completing the search sequence. The recipient can easily do the completion since, in both excerpts, the NNS can be defined as the knowing participant (cf. Goodwin 1987) in relation to the missing item. In (2), the sought-for element is the name of the NNS’s ex-boyfriend and, in (3) it is a product which belongs to the domain of the NNS’s professional expertise. For this reason, the NS treats the NNS as the one who can resolve the problem; in neither of the cases does the NS attempt to resolve the search herself. This is particularly evident in (2): although it takes three seconds before the NNS takes the turn, the NS does not suggest any potential resolution or offer more cues about it. Thus, the interrogative utterance by the speaker (the NS) is produced and treated as a “real” question which is to be answered. In contrast, the interrogative utterances by the NNSs (the remaining 31 cases of explicitly flagged word searches) are mostly followed by the NNS’s attempt to resolve the search. In other words, the NNSs do not leave it to the recipient (the NS) to complete the search after the interrogative, and the NSs do not try to do it, either, not until the NNS has given more information about the missing item. Thus, the interrogative utterance seems to function differently in turns by the NSs and the NNSs. Evidence of this difference is found in the following excerpt: (4) Beauty therapist. 01 R: Nyt now → Now 02 (.)

mä värjää-n tota sun (1.0) ˚noi˚ (2.0) ˚mikä ne nyt on˚ I dye-1 PRT your those what they now is I’ll dye ehm your (1.0) ˚those˚ (2.0) ˚what’s they now˚ nä-i-tä ripse-t this-pl-PAR eye.lash-pl (.) these eye lashes 03 (.) 04 R: Kato-t+sä ylös. look-2+you up Would you look up.

The word search in line 1 resembles those in the previous examples. The speaker interrupts her talk before the completion of a TCU, pauses, and then produces an interrogative, thereby making explicit that she lacks a word. The interrogatives in the examples are, however, rather different. They all begin with the interrogative pronoun (mikä ‘what’) and have the copula (olla ‘be’) as the verb. In (2) and (3), however, the referent, which the question focuses on,



 Second Language Interaction

is already specified in the interrogative (‘what was the name of the previous guy’, ‘what was it the name of that Japanese brand’) whereas, in (4), the interrogative does not offer any new information about the referent (‘what’s they now’). In the former cases, the referent is introduced by a full noun phrase, as opposed to the bare demonstrative pronoun in (4). Since the referent cannot be identified in (4), the interrogative can be (and is) treated, not as a real information-seeking question, but as an announcement of the trouble. Almost every interrogative produced by the NNSs to flag a word search is unspecified. Of the 31 interrogatives, only one identifies the referent. In all the other cases, the “unknown element” is referred to only with a pronoun, if at all. The most common interrogative in the data is mitä se on ‘what is it’ (n = 15). Moreover, two cases arise where mitä se on is preceded by an utterance (Minä) en tiedä [mitä se on] ‘I don’t know [what it is]’. Other interrogative constructions are much more infrequent: there are four instances of mikä se (nyt) on ‘what is it (now)’, (plus example (4), where the pronoun is in plural), and three instances of the bare question word mitä/mikä ‘what’. The remaining six interrogatives are all single occurrences. Interrogatives beginning with a question word focus on one constituent in the utterance, (as opposed to a yes/no interrogative, which is a question about polarity, see e.g. Hakulinen & Karlsson 1979: 282–283; Halliday 1985: 45). However, the pronoun-initial interrogatives vary in specifity. The interrogative pronoun kuka is semantically narrower than mikä which, in turn, is narrower than mitä. In other words, the interrogatives with the initial mitä are the broadest in their reference, and an answer to these questions can be a third-order entity (i.e. a whole proposition), as well as some more specific unit (Hakulinen & Karlsson 1979: 283). Thus, the interrogative (mitä se on), which the NNSs in the data most frequently use to flag the upcoming problem, is very open in its reference: it has the least specific question word and the entity to be inquired about is referred to by a bare pronoun. I suggest that this kind of unspecific interrogative functions as a “general word search marker”; the broad reference of the interrogative is well fitted to this function. Rather than asking the recipient to provide a name for an already identified referent, the speaker uses an unspecific interrogative to inform about and account for her problems in the turn-construction. This assumption is supported by these subsequent examples:


(5) Office. V tries to explain that he does not get a reduction (a student fare) in the public transportation in the area where he lives at the moment. 01 V: .hh #öö# Joskus vaikea #öö# >koska minä< (.) e-n voi sometimes difficult because I NEG-1 can .hh #eh# Sometimes difficult #eh# >because I< (.) can’t S: ---------------------------------------------------------V:.-------------------02 #m# saada .hh ↓mi-tä se o##n↓ laske-llinen #öö# get what-PAR it is ?lower-ADJ.SUFFIX → #m# get .hh ↓what is i##t↓ ((an adjective)) #eh# S: ----------------------------------------------V: -03 (.) ((V draws a square in the air)) S: -S: --04 S: Mm::, V: --V: ----------------------„ 05 V: .h Minä en voi (.) saada #m# ˚mitä se o- phhh˚ → .h I can’t (.) get #m# ˚what is i- phhh˚ S: --------------------------------------------06 (4.0) S: --V: ..------------------------07 V: >Laskuton< (lasketu-) minen bill.less ?descend ((a suffix)) >Bill less< (descend) ing S: --„ 08 S: <J:oo?> mmm mmm V: -----------

(6) Four friends. R (who is French) is telling about his studies to S1 who is planning to study in France. S2 and S3 have previously studied in France. (The gazes of R are marked down in the transcript.) at S1 --------------01 R: Ja:: öö nyt ohh- minä opiskelen venäjää. An::d eh now ehm- I study Russian. at S1 --02 (0.8) at S1 ------„ ..-----03 R: Se on [(öö) phh ˚mitä se on˚ (0.5) ˚deug˚ hmhh .hh ääm (0.5) → It is [(eh) phh ˚what is it˚ (0.5) ˚deug˚ hmhh .hh ehm (0.5) [

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 Second Language Interaction 04 S1:

05 R: →

[Jooh [Yes at S2..-------------mt #mi-tä se on suome-ksi# (1.0) #mi-tä se: what-PAR it is Finnish-TRA what-PAR it mt #what is it in Finnish# (1.0) #what is:

06 S3:

at S3-----[se# >miten [it how [is# >how [ [Ee- ei si-l [ NEG it-ADE [I- it hasn’t

at S3 -- [------------------------oo vastinet-ta. 07 S3: oo [ei si-l is [NEG it-ADE is equivalent-PAR [it has no equivalent. 08 R: [s[? [s-

In (5), the NNS cannot find a word for ‘concession’ or ‘reduction’. The whole turn (lines 1–2) is somewhat fragmentary – there are hesitation sounds and pauses – and the interrogative can be seen as making explicit, “announcing” the word search. By producing the interrogative, the NNS can inform the NS about the nature of his problem – that he lacks a linguistic item – and simultaneously account for the perturbations in the turn: they result from the missing lexical item. In addition, the interrogative can be seen as accounting, not just for the NNS’s trouble in speech production, but also for the subsequent candidate resolution. The attempted resolution is not any existing Finnish word, but there are elements from different linguistic units in Finnish (cf. word coinage as a communication strategy, see e.g. Faerch & Kasper 1983b: 50). The candidate resolution is produced immediately after the interrogative; it does not need any more try-marking, since the interrogative has already made explicit that the lexical choices in the turn are problematic. Thus, the interrogative functions as a marker which frames the subsequent talk as “possibly not right”. The formulaic character of the marker becomes more clearly evident in the NNS’s second verbal attempt to resolve the word search. When the NS does not display recognition of the candidate resolution (lines 3–4), the NNS makes another attempt (line 5). He recycles (cf. Schegloff 1987b) the (core) part of his previous turn, leaving out the function word, which is the clause-initial conjunction koska (‘because’). However, the interrogative is also included in the second production, even though it could be thought as being closer to a “function word” than a “content word”. By using the interrogative, the speaker can inform the recipient that he is again involved in a word search and, thus,

Chapter 4. Word search 

take time out for the processing. This strategy works, since the NS does not take the turn during the four-second-pause followed by the interrogative (line 6). At this point in the conversation, the NNS does not need to inform the NS about the nature of the problem; it has become clear in the previous turn (line 2). The interrogative is thus produced as a word search marker, used to account for the trouble in the progress of the conversation and for the potential markedness of the subsequent resolution attempts. The latter example (6) conveys well the status of the mitä se on -interrogative as a formulaic marker, rather than a “real” information-seeking question. In (6), the NNS tries to find a Finnish name for the French exam, DEUG. He again flags the word search with mitä se on -interrogative (line 3). In contrast to (5), he does not try to invent a Finnish word but, after a half-second pause, provides the original term. Not getting any response, the NNS produces a new interrogative, specifying that the problem lies in his knowledge of Finnish (line 5). After the third interrogative, the NS (S3) begins to respond so that the fourth interrogative overlaps the answer (lines 5–6). In other words, it takes three interrogatives before any of the recipients responds to the search in any way. Why does the response then come after the third interrogative, given that the first two had not evoked any reaction? The crucial factor is the speaker’s gaze. In (6), the NS (albeit not the one who is gazed at, but one of the “knowing participants”, cf. Goodwin 1987) begins responding after the NNS has started uttering the interrogative while gazing at one of the recipients. In the two prior interrogatives (which have not been responded to), the speaker did not gaze at any of the recipients. The formulaic, “non-information seeking” character of the mitä se on -interrogative is due to the fact that it is generally uttered without the speakers making a gaze contact. This is also evident in the previous example (5): the speaker does not gaze at the recipient while producing either of the interrogatives (lines 2 and 5). The latter instance is particularly illuminating, since the speaker has been gazing at the recipient, but he turns his head away just before beginning to pronounce the interrogative (line 5) and does not bring his gaze back until he comes up with a possible solution to the search (line 7). One additional feature supports the idea of the mitä se on -interrogative as a formulaic marker. These interrogatives are very systematically prosodically marked. They are usually uttered with a voice quality that is quieter (or lower; somehow less prominent) than the surrounding talk. This, together with an absence of gaze, creates the impression that the speaker is not trying to direct the obligations of an interrogative to the recipient but, rather, to herself (cf. Brouwer 2003: 538). Since a question is a first pair part which should be fol-

 Second Language Interaction

lowed by an answer, a self-directed interrogative is a good way to retain the speakership when the speaker wants to find the target word herself. Typically, speakers shift their gaze away before (or when) producing the interrogative in a soft voice (thus implying that the interrogative does not involve the recipient), and they gaze away until the question is either answered (the speaker herself comes up with a possible resolution, cf. example (5)), or until its sequential implications are cancelled or postponed (e.g. the speaker requests help from the recipient, cf. example (6)). In either case, the speaker gets more time to process the trouble, to consider what her resources are to resolve the problem, as well as the kind of assistence she needs from the other participant. In sum, one way to account for problems in utterance-construction is to produce an interrogative. This is most often done with the formulaic mitä se on -interrogative. The interrogative is prosodically marked and the speaker shifts her gaze away when uttering it. The function of the interrogative is two-fold: on the one hand, it accounts for the pauses and other problems in turn construction by making explicit that they result from an absence of a relevant linguistic item, (cf. interrogatives which are produced after pauses, e.g. example (4)). On the other hand, the interrogative can be used as a turn-holding device, such as accounting for the pause potentially following the interrogative and making it an intra-turn pause instead of an inter-turn pause (cf. examples (5) and (6)). In the latter cases, the interrogative can also sometimes be interpreted as accounting for the potential markedness of the next element after the pause, i.e. the resolution attempt (cf. example (5)). In the present data, unspecified interrogatives are produced by the nonnative speakers. Of the 31 interrogatives by the NNSs, 30 are unspecified, whereas of the 6 interrogatives by the NSs, only one is unspecified. The distribution of these interrogatives can be seen as reflecting the difference in the speakers’ linguistic position. Non-native speakers can be expected to have more difficulty in utterance formulation and, given that unspecified interrogatives account for such a difficulty, they are to be found mostly in turns by the NNSs. In other words, an unspecified interrogative is a conversational resource well suited to the interactional situation which is more typical of non-native speakers. In the following, I will move from the initiation of the search to its resolution. The examples in this section have already demonstrated two possible ways to try to resolve a search, namely by producing a direct loan (cf. example (6)) and by producing a “Fennicized” word (cf. example (5)). I will discuss these resolutions respectively in the subsequent sections.

Chapter 4. Word search 

.. Resolving the search: Loan words This section introduces the ways in which the participants try to bring a search sequence to an end. When the speaker indicates that she cannot find some relevant linguistic item, the progress of the conversation is halted. In order to be able to return to the talk in progress, the search should be completed (or cancelled). If the speaker does not know or remember some relevant word, she can try to make it recognisable by other means, such as by producing an alternative to the missing word, a kind of intermediary between the “empty” situation in the beginning and the unknown target form. There are three main ways in which the speakers in the data try to make the missing word identifiable. First, the speaker can use words from other languages in order to clarify what she means. I call these solutions loan words. Second, the speaker can try to discover a Finnish word for the concept she has in mind. This can be done e.g. by foreignizing (cf. Faerch & Kasper 1983b: 47) words from other languages (i.e. modifying them so as to fit the Finnish grammar and pronunciation). I call these solutions “Fennicized words”. Third, the speaker can employ semantic contiguity when explaining the unknown word to the recipient. In the data, this is mostly done by using contrast – a semantically close lexical item is introduced and contrasted to the target word. These groups are not mutually exclusive but, rather, partially overlapping: especially the Fennicized words and the contrasts are used together. I will discuss these three groups (i.e. resolution attempts) respectively below. I speak of loan words when the speaker displays having difficulties in finding a linguistic item and then produces a word in another language. This kind of situation has been referred to for example as borrowing, language switching or code switching in the communication strategy literature (cf. Corder 1983; Tarone, Cohen, & Dumas 1983; Faerch & Kasper 1983b). Code switching in conversation, in bilingual speech communities in particular, has been rather widely investigated (see e.g. Poplack 1980; Gumperz 1982a; Auer 1998). I will, however, investigate code-switching only in a very restricted environment: as the speaker’s means to resolve a word search. The subsequent example illustrates such a case:

 Second Language Interaction

(7) Beauty therapist. S’s eye lashes are being dyed, so she sits in a chair with her eyes closed. R sits behind S and tells about her future trip to Africa. She plans to fly from Sweden, since it is cheaper. (The gaze of the speaker in the search turn is marked down in the transcript.) 01 R: Ne ilmottaa sit sielt Ruotsi-sta et et miten se they announce then there Sweden-ELA that that how it They then tell there from Sweden that that how it 02 niinku (.) vahvistaa si-tä PRT confirms it-PAR y’know (.) confirms it. 03 S: Jaa ahaa.= Uhuh I see.= R: --------------------------------------„ 04 R: =Kato ku ne [nyt se on tämmönen ku #mikä se nyt on## PRT because they[now it is this.kind as what it now is =See because they it’s now this kind of #what is it now## [ 05 S: [Joo [Yes 06 (.) R: ..------------------07 R: → (preliminary reservation) ((Swedish)) 08 S: Mm↑hm 09 R: Joku tämmö>nen et ne ei voi [niiku< some this.kind that they NEG can [PRT Some kind >of that they can’t [y’know< [ 10 S: [Ku- nii että kuka on [?Wh- so that who is 11 kiinnostunu. lähtemä[än vai. interested. in goin[g or. [ 12 R: [Nii. kato ku nii-llo- nii-l [PRT PRT because they-ADE they-ADE [Yes. see because they’v- they don’t 13 ei oo vielä ne uude-t hinnasto-t. NEG is yet those new-pl price.list-pl have those new price lists yet.

This example illustrates some features that are distinctive for the search sequences involving direct loans in the data. First, loan words occur in noninstitutional data. The clients and the secretary can switch from one language to another in the middle of an encounter, but they very seldom use separate words from other languages. Second, loan words are often preceded by selfdirected interrogatives (line 4 in the example above), i.e. the speakers account

Chapter 4. Word search 

for the loan words by displaying insecurity in their lexical choices. Third, the loan words are not treated as unmarked constituents of the turn. Instead, they are usually translated into Finnish, or if a direct translation is not possible, the direct loan is followed by a sequence where its meaning is clarified (lines 9– 11 in the example above, see also example (6) in the previous section). This is probably due to the change in the participation framework (cf. Goffman 1981; Goodwin & Goodwin 1990) during the search turn, which is the fourth distinctive feature: after the self-directed problem-indicating phase, the gaze is brought back to the recipient when the loan word is uttered (cf. line 7 in the example). That is, the loan word is directed to the recipient and thus imposes on her a higher expectation of a response (a change in the speakership) than the self-directed interrogative. Example (7) is rather revealing with respect to gaze in the search sequence. The participants are unable to have eye contact, since the NS has her eyes closed throughout, given that her eye lashes are being dyed. Despite the unilateral situation, the speaker’s shifts in gaze follow the familiar pattern: the NNS shifts her gaze away before the interrogative and brings it back when uttering the loan word. It is interesting to notice that this gaze shift, which displays a temporary disengagement from the interaction and holds the turn for the speaker, is so automatic that it is even used when the recipient cannot see the speaker. Thus, the NS cannot see that the loan word is directed to her. However, she takes the turn after the NNS has produced the direct loan and acknowledges the word with a mm↑hm-particle (line 8). The rising intonation of the particle makes it sound like a continuer. The NNS does not, however, treat the minimal particle as a sufficient recognition; she does not continue with the story but begins explaining the meaning of the word (line 9). The NS joins the explanation and begins her own version overlapping with that of the NNS’s (line 10). The NS begins her turn with the particle chain nii että, which indicates that she is paraphrasing something that has been said in the previous turns (cf. ISK: 984). It is worth noting that the NNS’s turn contains little semantic information before the overlap: she produces the subject (‘they’) and the verb (‘can’t’) but the activity (i.e. the main verb) is left open. The NS’s turn (lines 10–11) shows that she has recognised the loan word: she is able to provide an explication of it without getting more information. The turn by the NS is not a syntactic completion of the NNS’s turn; rather, the NS produces her own explanation for the loan word. It should be noted, however, that despite the paraphrasing character of the NS’s explanation, it is presented as somewhat tentative. The disjunctive particle vai at the end of the turn paves the way for other possible explanations.

 Second Language Interaction

In the subsequent example, both the NNS and one of the NSs treat the loan word as something to be oriented to after its production: (8) Four friends. R is telling about the French military service. (R, S and S2 are sitting around a table. S and R are mainly talking with each other, S2 participates quite rarely. S2 is sitting with his back towards the camera, so his gazes cannot be seen. R’s gaze is marked down in the transcript and S is gazing at R throughout the excerpt.) at S -----at S------------01 R: Mu-lle ol-i (.) mahdollisuus öömm:: mt mh jää-dä hh #ää# I-ALL ia-PST possibility stay-INF I had (.) the possibility ehmm:: mt mh to stay hh #eh# at S ----------„ 02 armeija-ssa. ARmeija-an. army-INE army-ILL to the army. IN the army. 03 S: Mmm?, at S----at S2 ...... 04 R: Mutta: (0.5) ööhhh se ol-i m- h ˚mm mi-tä se on (.) öö (.) but it is-PST what-PAR it is Bu:t (0.5) eehhh it was m- h ˚mm what is it (.) eh (.) at S2 ------05 contract?˚ → ((French pronunciation)) R: at S2 --06 (1.0) 07 S: Sopimus? Contract? R: ..----at S ---------„ 08 R: Sopim- so[pimus. Contr- co[ntract. [ 09 S: [Nii. [Yes. at S..--------10 R: .hh ää Kolme vuotta, hh .hh eh Three years, hh

Both participants, R and S, treat the loan word as something which is to be processed further. R has been telling the others about his military service and, when unable to find a relevant word, he produces the familiar pattern: he makes the absence explicit with a prosodically-marked interrogative without gazing at the recipient(s). After that, R shifts his gaze to the other recipient (whom he knows to know French) and produces the loan. A sudden gaze shift from the

Chapter 4. Word search 

primary recipient (S) to the silent participant (S2 ) can be interpreted as an invitation for him to join in. The NNS thus produces the loan word as something to be commented on; he directs it to the “knowing participant” (cf. Goodwin 1987) and does not continue until a response is provided (cf. line 6). Also S, the primary recipient for R’s description, treats the loan word as something to be oriented to. When S2 has not come up with a translation after one second, she produces one (line 7). As in example (7), the clarification of the loan word is offered as a suggestion; here with a rising intonation. At this point in the conversation, the search-indicating interrogative is followed by a loan word which has solicited a translation. However, the search sequence is not yet closed. The translation is followed by the NNS’s repetition (line 8), which is still followed by the NS’s confirmation (line 9), before the talk in progress is continued (line 10). Recurrently, the NNSs acknowledge the translation (or the explication) of the loan word before returning to the talk in progress, either by repeating it, or by producing an affirmative particle. That loan words are not treated as unmarked elements in utterances is particularly clear when the NNS repeats the translation. A repetition functions as the NNS’s way to carry out a self-repair: she replaces the word she has previously used (the direct loan) with the new word offered by the NS. Furthermore, by repeating the translation, the NNS can be seen to orient to her identity as a non-native speaker: she demonstrates that she has registered (“learnt”) a (new) Finnish word (cf. repetitions after correction in Chapter 3). One more example illustrates how the recipient (the NS), along with the speaker, can also treat loan words in a word search as being “marked constituents”: (9) Friends. 01 J: >Mutta minä katso-i-n< semmon ee (1.0) >mi-tä se on< eee (.) but I look-PST-1 that.kind what-PAR it is >But I saw< a kind of ehm (1.0) >what is it< eee (.) 02 non-fikshön (0.2) [teeveeohjelma non-fiction [TV-program → non-fiction (0.2) [TV program [ 03 S: [Joo [Yes 04 S: Tev- joku dokumentti TV- some documentary

 Second Language Interaction 05 J: Dokumentti joo A documentary yes 06 (0.4) 07 J: Et joskus ((goes on)) So that sometimes

Before uttering the word, the NNS hesitates, pauses and produces a prosodically-marked interrogative (line 1). Having pronounced the loan word (‘nonfiction’), the NNS pauses again, thereby leaving space for the recipient’s reaction (line 2). After the pause, the participants start talking simultaneously: the NS produces an acknowledgement token, while the NNS brings the turn to its syntactic completion (lines 2–3). The NS first acknowledges the word (line 3) and then translates it (line 4).1 Thus, the NS treats the loan word as an element that needs attention after it has been produced in the interaction. However, the same is true for the NNS: he orients to the difference in the two references by repeating the translation (line 5) before continuing his story and returning to the “main line” of the conversation. There is yet one feature which is common to the examples in this section. When the native speakers translate the loan words, they do not produce these turns as assertions but, rather, as suggestions. The turns are hedged with elements that make the utterances sound more open and less definite. In (7), the explication is concluded with the question particle vai ‘or’ (line 11). In (8), the translation is pronounced with a rising intonation (line 7) and, in the example above, the translation is approximated with an indefinite pronoun joku ‘some’. Thus, although replacing the loan word by a Finnish version, the NS manages to do it “discreetly”, without imposing her linguistic knowledge.2 Rather than firmly asserting a translation, the NSs offer the word as “something of this kind”. This makes the interaction sound more like a negotiation and not an asymmetric or pedagogic situation where one speaker knows the words and the other one does not. When the translation is not presented as “the right answer”, the preceding loan word need not be interpreted as the speaker’s failure in finding a word. Some features typical of word searches that involve loan words can be presented on the basis of the examples in this section. First, loan words are not treated – in particular not by the non-native speakers – as unmarked elements in the turn. The NNSs account for the loan words by exhibiting hesitancy in lexical choices, particularly with prosodically marked interrogatives. Furthermore, if the NS translates the loan word, the NNS often makes explicit her recognition of the translation by repeating it. If the NS does not translate the word, on the other hand, the NNS can still shift the focus to the word by


beginning to explain or clarify it. However, the NSs also orient to the loan words. They either acknowledge them with affirmative particles, or they translate them. When translating the words, the NSs often hedge the Finnish version with some uncertainty-marking or approximation and thus avoid activating (or strengthening) the linguistic asymmetry between the participants. The fact that the NSs verbally respond to loan words is aligned with the change in the participation framework which occurs systematically in the search sequences. After a phase of self-directed display of hesitancy, the speaker brings her gaze to the recipient while (or just before) uttering the loan word. This gaze shift invites the recipient to participate in the search, to comment on the word the speaker has come up with. A characteristic feature of the word search sequences involving loan words in the data is, thus, that the loan words are treated as marked contituents in the turn. Loan words are produced, and often received, as material to be processed further. In other words, loan words are treated, not as the final resolutions to the search, but as a means to find the resolution. The prosody of the loan words lends support to this idea: loan words are pronounced in a soft or normal voice (cf. examples (6), (8) and (9)). Yet, the word the speaker treats as the resolution to the search is typically stressed (or pronounced with a higher voice quality, cf. Laakso & Klippi 2001: 93; Local 1992). In the following, I will discuss cases where the speaker attempts to resolve a word search by using the Finnish language. .. Resolving the search: Fennicized words In this section, I will explore cases in which the speaker attempts to resolve the search by producing a lexical item which is, or phonotactically could be, a Finnish word. This group is not homogenous; it contains instances which have been classified under several “interlanguage-based strategies and interlingual transfer” (Faerch & Kasper 1983b: 46–50) in the traditional communication strategy literature. These strategies include foreignizing, generalization and word coinage (or morphological creativity, cf. Poulisse 1987). The reason I have grouped all these instances together stems from the fact that the boundaries between different strategies are not always clear-cut. The common feature in the group of “Fennicized words” is the choice of the language: in contrast to the loan word cases, the speakers try to resolve the search by using resources from the language of the interaction, i.e. Finnish. Thus, the term “Fennicized” refers not only to the words which are “foreignized” to be Finnish (i.e. adjusted to the target language phonology and/or morphology, cf. Faerch & Kasper 1983b: 47),






but also to other instances where the speaker tries to resolve the search with a potentially Finnish word. Word searches that include Fennicized words resemble the searches that include loan words, as is evident in the following example: (10) Friends. R is telling about studying in France. (The gaze of R is marked in the transcript, S is gazing at R throughout the excerpt.) R: ---------------------------„ 01 R: Ja sitten on #eäämm# tulee #m# öö tämä t- tenti. and then is comes this ?e- exam And then there is #ehhmm# will be #m# eh this e- exam. 02 S: Joo. Yes. R:--------03 R: Ja: mhh mt eemm se on- se ei ole #e### tenti se on ↓˚am and it is it NEG is exam it is And mhh mt eemm it is- it is not #e## an exam it is ↓˚am R:-------------04 mm mi-tä se on (0.5) konkurssi tai˚↓ what-PAR it is bankruptcy or → mm what is it (0.5) a bankruptcy or˚↓ R: -05 (.) 06 S: Siis k- kilpailu (.) vai Y’mean a c- competition (.) or R: ------------------------------R: --------07 R: Joo se on Yes it is 08 S: Nii= Yes= R: --R: ------------„ 09 R: =>Tai jotainOr somethingku+se< on niin musta-a when+it is so black-PAR >when+it< is so black

S has introduced the issue of Arabic beauty care and J continues to talk about it in lines 1–2. During this turn, J is preparing something and she begins the turn with her back towards S. Having pronounced the word koolia, she turns around and shifts her gaze to S. J produces this Fennicized word rather fluently as the next element in the turn, but she shifts focus to the word after its production. That is, the prosodically marked account follows the Fennicized word instead of preceding it (line 2). Immediately after the word, the NNS produces an interrogative utterance (tiedätsä ihan ‘[do] you know’) with rising intonation and, simultaneously, turns towards the NS and shifts her gaze toward her. Also, the NNS does not stop after the interrogative but goes on to give a description of the Fennicized word. This description, which is prosodically marked with creaky voice, is left incomplete: the NNS cuts off the final postposition ympärille ’around’. It is evident that J is not going to continue her unfinished turn. She does not produce any vocalisations after the cut-off, and she keeps gazing at S during the pause (line 3). As in the previous example, the NS takes the turn and produces a candidate understanding (line 4) of the Fennicized word. This candidate understanding is formulated on the basis of the description: in the






Western context of beauty care, the substance that is put (i.e. is used to draw a line) around the eyes is most likely an eye liner. This is not, however, what the NNS meant. After a short pause, she produces an affirmative particle njii (line 6) which, because of the palatal sound j, seem to display more hesitancy than the “normal” variant nii ‘yes or yeah’ (see also Jefferson [1978] on ‘nyem’). Moreover, the particle is followed by a further explanation beginning with the contrastive mut ‘but’, which implies that a proper term has not yet been presented (lines 6–7). After the new explanation, the NS comes up with a new candidate understanding (line 8) which the NNS accepts with the confirming particle nii (line 9). It is only after the NS’s additional confirmation (joo joo) that the NNS moves forward in the conversation (lines 11–12). This example resembles the previous one in that the Fennicized word is not immediately recognised by the NS. Furthermore, the “communication strategy” can be interpreted as being similar: a foreignisation (phonologically adjusted version) of a source word. Compared to konkurssi, however, the word kooli does not mean anything in Finnish. It is most probably derived from the Swedish word for coal, kol. The mother tongue of J is Swedish, and as she later accepts hiili ‘coal’ as the right word, kooli can be interpreted to be a self-made translation, analogous to such existing loan words as e.g. val (Swedish) → vaali (Finnish) ‘election’. Examples (10) and (11) illustrate how Fennicized words differ from loan words as resolutions to a word search. In (10) and (11), it takes time for the participants to resolve the search and it requires methods other than just using the Fennicized word. In the cases of loan words, in contrast, the NSs recognised the direct loans and the search sequence was completed shortly after the loan word. The NSs demonstrated their recognition of the word either by translating it (cf. examples (8) and (9)) or by producing an explication of it (cf. example (7)). The easier identification of loan words can be explained by their status, as they are established units of a particular language. The reference of the Fennicized words is not necessarily that transparent. First the recipient has to decide on what basis the Fennicized word has been formed and, having decided that, she has to select the right source word from the possible alternatives (cf. example (10); ‘entrance examination’ vs. ‘competition’). Therefore, word search sequences involving Fennicized words tend to be longer than searches with loan words that usually require less negotiation about the references of different words. In many respects, however, Fennicized words are used like loan words. Both are used as the NNS’s way to move forward in the search sequence towards the goal of resolving the search. Both are used to make the unknown referents iden-


tifiable for the recipient, to help the NS find the final resolution to the search. Being able to produce Fennicized words demands a fair amount of linguistic knowledge about the Finnish language. This can be seen particularly clearly in (10) where the derivation the NNS produces (concours → konkurssi) results in a real Finnish word. Inventing a name for an unknown referent could be an economical way of resolving a word search, but in my data the recipient does not usually recognise the word immediately. Rather, the Fennicized word functions as a gloss (cf. Jefferson 1985) and gives the participants a starting point from where they can begin to further develop the negotiations about the referent. Apart from the Fennicized word, example (10) illustrated another means to make the unknown referent identifiable: by negating a semantically close referent, which will be discussed in the next section. .. Initiating and/or resolving the search: Negating a semantically contiguous referent Semantic contiguity has been defined as one type of communication strategy (see e.g. Yule & Tarone 1997: 20). Semantic contiguity can be exploited when trying to describe an unknown referent so that the speaker tries to make the referent identifiable through synonymic, metonymic, antonymic or superordinate relations to other words she knows and remembers. In (10), the NNS introduced a semantically related lexical item before producing the Fennicized word. I repeat the example below: (12) [10]. Friends. (The gaze of R is marked in the transcript, S is gazing at R throughout the excerpt.) R: ---------------------------„ 01 R: Ja sitten on #eäämm# tulee #m# öö tämä t- tenti. and then is come this ?e- exam And then there is #ehhmm# will be #m# eh this e- exam. 02 S: Joo. Yes. R:------03 R: Ja: mhh mt eemm se on- se ei ole #e### tenti se on ↓˚am and it is it NEG is exam it is → And mhh mt eemm it is- it is not #e### an exam it is ↓˚am R:---------------04 mm mi-tä se on (0.5) konkurssi tai˚↓ what-PAR it is bankruptcy or mm what is it (0.5) a bankruptcy or˚↓






R:-05 (.) (.) vai 06 S: Siis k- kilpailu Y’mean a c- competition (.) or R: -------------------------------

As analysed in the previous section, the NNS moves towards the resolution of the word search by producing the Fennicized word konkurssi. Before coming up with the potential resolution, the NNS has introduced and rejected the lexical item tent[t]i ‘exam’ (lines 1 and 3). The word tentti is semantically related to the target word (pääsykoe ‘entrance examination’), being more general or broad-ranging in its reference. Introducing a semantically contingent lexical item in a negative form (‘it’s not x’) is the third recurrent means for the speakers to move forward in a search sequence in my data. In contrast to loan words or Fennicized words, negation can be produced both as a marker of a word search and as material to resolve the search. In the example above, the negation can be seen as initiating the search sequence: it demonstrates that the speaker is not satisfied with the word he has previously used and, hence it paves the way for searching for other (better) alternatives. Apart from flagging the search, the negation, however, also helps resolving it: it defines the semantic field from where the target word is being sought. In all of the examples containing negation in the data, the negated element is semantically close to the searched-for word. The negated element provides a starting point for further negotiations; it tells the recipient that “the word I am looking for is of this type but not this particular one”. Thus, when involved in a word search, the speakers proceed towards the resolution by e.g. producing loan words, Fennicized words or negations of semantically related referents. As was seen in the previous sections, loan words and Fennicized words were not produced as the final resolutions to the search but, rather, as material for the recipient to find the resolution. The same is even more true with negations. Negations are not final: they demonstrate that the target item has not yet been found (‘it’s not x’) and, therefore, they project continuation (if it’s not x, then what is it?). Negations facilitate the recipient’s participation in the search both conceptually and interactionally. By specifying the scope of appropriate referents, they provide information about the word class the speaker is looking for. Interactionally, the turns with a negation provide a syntactic place for the recipient to do a completion: they resemble compound constructions (Lerner 1996). The first part, “it is not x”, makes relevant the continuation “but y”. In the two examples presented below, the word


search functions exactly this way: the NNS finishes his/her turn by rejecting a referent, after which the NS comes up with an alternative. (13) Beauty therapist. 01 R: Arvaa mikä tää on tää on mä rev-i-n mä ol-i-n pieni me guess what this is this is I rip-PST-1 I is-PST-1 small we Guess what this is this is I ripped I was little we played 02 leiki-tt-ii ni ol-i tommonen (0.8) tommone:# häkplay-PAS-PST yard-ADE PRT is-PST kind.of kind.of häk and there was a kind of (0.8) a kind of:# häk03 (.) tai siis no mhh mt ↑hek↑ (.) siis tommos-i-i (.) pus- mhek PRT that.kind-pl-PAR or PRT PRT (.) or I mean well mhh mt ↑hek ↑(.) I mean those (.) (pus- m-) mut [tommos-i-i 04 siis (1.0) ei nyt pu-i-ta PRT NEG now tree-pl-PAR but [that.kind-pl-PAR → I mean (1.0) not really trees but [those [ 05 S: [Pensa-i-ta. [bush-pl-PAR [Bushes. 06 R: Nii pensaita. nii se revi. Yes bushes. so it tore.

The word the NNS is searching for in this excerpt is pensas ‘bush’ or something close to it; this is at least the word the NS offers and the NNS accepts (lines 5 and 6). Before the negation (line 4), the NNS produces both a Fennicized word and a loan word. The mother tongue of R is Swedish, and, in Swedish, a general name for ‘bush’ is buske, while ‘hedge’ is written häck and pronounced approximately [hek]. The word which R cuts off (the end of line 2) could be the beginning of the Fennicized version of häck, i.e. häkki. The next occurrence of the word (hek; line 3) is probably a loan, i.e. the original Swedish word for ‘hedge’. Since the recipient does not display recognition of these words, the speaker stops giving names for the referent and produces the negation (line 4). She introduces a new word in a negative form ei nyt puita ‘not really trees’, thus creating a projection of the positive alternative and the completion of the utterance (‘but y’). The NS provides the completion: her suggestion comes in immediately after the NNS’s contrastive particle (mut), so that the utterance becomes syntactically coherent: ei nyt puita mut pensaita ‘not really trees but bushes’. The NNS accepts the word substantially, both by producing a confirming particle (nii) and by repeating the word (line 6). The negated word defines the semantic scope of the searched-for word: it should be found in the world of flora. As in (12), the NNS first introduces a more general, and thus probably more accessible, word. ‘Exam’ is rather a

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 Second Language Interaction

common term in the context of studying, and ‘tree’ similarily frequent in the context of flora. The words which are being sought, ‘entrance examination on the numerus clausus basis’ and ‘hedge’, are semantically more specific than the first terms. The first term thus introduces the relevant semantic category, which then has to be narrowed down to a sub-category in order to find the right word. In (13), the word is not, in fact, narrowed as much as it could be, given that the NNS produces the Swedish word for ‘hedge’ but nevertheless is offered and subsequently accepts ‘bushes’. This word is, however, closer to the target than the first word ‘trees’. Presenting a semantically related lexical item comes close to another method of resolving a word search, namely a “clarification-by-script-link” (Mazeland & Zaman-Zadeh 2004: 138). The cases that the authors discuss do not involve negative formulations but, in some respects, the method of resolving the search is the same. In the example by Mazeland and Zaman-Zadeh, the speaker tries to make a referent identifiable by introducing a category which is linked to the referent. As in my examples, the speaker proceeds towards the resolution of the search by establishing a knowledge link from familiar knowledge to the target knowledge. What is different in the practices, however, is their syntax-for-interaction. The negation (‘it’s not x’) resembles a compound construction which, in word search sequences, allows for turn-taking and the recipient’s completion (cf. Lerner 1996). The following example shows how the ‘it’s not X’-construction can be exploited in turn-taking, even though the speaker cannot produce the missing referent as smoothly and coherently as in (13). (14) France. R and S talk about whether students write their assignments by computer or by hand in French universities. 01 S: Nii et sä kirjot-i-t ne käs-in ja palau[t-i-t. so that you write-PST-2 those hand-INS and retur[n-PST-2 So that you wrote them by hand and handed them in. [ 02 R: [Joo. [Yes. 03 S: Joo. Yes. 04 R: Mm 05 S: .Just .Right 06 R: [Mutta tietysti mhh äm mhh (.) kun ol-i-n ääm tämä (.) gradus [but of.course when is-PST-1 this MA.thesis [But of course mhh ehm mhh (.) when I was ehm this (.) thesis [


07 S: [˚Joo˚ [˚Yes˚ 08 S: Mm:? 09 R: .hh Tietysti- äämh #mm se on:: (.) mu-n pitää mm# kirjoitta-a of.courseit is I-GEN have.to write-INF .hh Of course- ehmhh #mm it is:: (.) I have to mm# write 10 tämä hh .hh se ei ole (.) kirja mutta se on hh mm [vähän kun this it NEG is book but it is [little as → this hh .hh it is not (.) a book but it is hh mm [a bit like [ 11 S: [Siis[You mean12 S: Ni pitää kirjotta-a puhtaa-ksi. PRT have.to write-INF clean+TRA So you have to type it up. 13 (0.5) 14 S: .h Siis koneet: [kirjotus-↑konee-lla [vai PRT machine- PRT [typing-machine-ADE [or .h You mean writer- like with the type↑ writer or [ [ 15 R: [Joo. [joo mm joo= [Yes. [yes mm yes= 16 S: =Joo =Yes 17 R: ˚Joo˚ ˚Yes˚

In this example, the NNS faces difficulties in trying to explain that the thesis has to be typed when it is submitted. Having brought the term ‘thesis’ into the conversation (line 6), R starts telling S something about it (lines 9–10). The explanation is, however, somewhat fragmentary. R cuts off the first word, restarts with a construction se on ‘it is’, but leaves it incomplete and begins a third time with mun pitää kirjoittaa ‘I have to write’. This utterance also remains unfinished; instead of the object of the writing, he produces the negation (‘it is not a book’). The NNS also begins the latter part of the compound construction (mutta se on ‘but it is’) but does not complete it. And, again, the NS takes the turn after the NNS has begun the latter part (lines 10–11). It is worth noting that, in this excerpt, the NS does not have the target word ready for a quick completion as in (13): she cuts off the first word and restarts the completion (lines 11–12). Despite the absence of a clear target word, the NS makes use of the compound structure: she takes the turn at the point in the construction where the alternative (Y) should be presented (i.e. after ‘it’s not an X but it is’). The NS thus takes the turn so as to complete the construction. However, the completion is not syntactically coherent, as it was in (13). This discontinu-

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 Second Language Interaction

ity can be explained through the fact that the contrast is actually between the two activities, writing by hand and typing, rather than between the two nouns, ‘book’ and ‘some kind of typed text’. However, the NNS does not mention the typing; instead, he gives an idea of the shape and look of the thesis with a reference to a semantically close concept (‘book’). If a written work is not a book but something of the kind, it is rather obvious that it should be typed. In the first part of the compound construction, the NNS negates the word ‘book’. Instead of completing the construction with an alternative to this noun, the NS provides an alternative to the activity the NNS has mentioned (line 1; writing by hand). The completion, pitää kirjottaa puhtaaksi ‘it has to be typed out’, does not evoke any response from the NNS (cf. line 13); it might be that he is not familiar with the expression kirjoittaa puhtaaksi (which literally means ‘write clean’). When the NS elaborates the utterance by naming the instrument of typing (line 14), the NNS accepts the completion with multiple confirming particles (line 15). In other words, despite the syntactic incongruity, the compound structure with initial negation solves the problem of the missing word by providing the NS the opportunity to come in with a solution. In line of the previous examples, the negated word is rather an elementary member of its semantic class. ‘Book’ represents a general and common word in the class of written texts, as ‘tree’ is in the context of flora and ‘exam’ is in the context of studying. It seems, thus, that one way of trying to make a specific term recognisable is to relate it to a relevant semantic category, and that this is mostly done by using a general representative word for the category. If the word is used only to activate a certain semantic class, it is understandable that it is as prototypical and recognisable a member of the class as possible. Negation is thus one way for the speaker to move forward in the search sequence, towards the completion of the search. It is, however, different from the two previous resolution attempts, loan words and Fennicized words, in the kind of link it establishes to the target word. Loan words and Fennicized words can be seen as linguistic means to approach the target word, whereas the negation establishes a knowledge link between the target word and the resolution attempt (cf. Mazeland & Zaman-Zadeh 2004: 139). That is, loan words and Fennicized words address the recipient’s linguistic knowledge, whereas negation relies more on the recipient’s general semantic or category knowledge. Also, negation is interactionally more multifunctional: it can be used to initiate a search but, simultaneously, its syntactic construction provides an opportunity for the recipient to participate in (and possibly complete) the search. However, these three resolution attempts are not mutually exclusive. As was


seen in the examples, they may be exploited successively when trying to make a referent identifiable. The examples in this chapter have mostly come from everyday interaction.3 This reflects the distribution of the word search instances in the data: in particular, lexical searches can be more easily found in conversations between friends than in institutional interaction. One explanation for this unequal distribution may lie in the difference in the typical activities in an office conversation as compared to chatting with friends. In general, NNSs engaged in word searches in the middle of narratives, when they were describing some event or state of affairs (cf. examples (6)–(14)). Narratives, in turn, are likewise unequeally distributed in the data: they are the fabric with which most conversations between friends are woven, whereas in office encounters, narratives are rare. In office encounters, the question-answer sequences (through which a specific goal is approached) play a central role. For example, when gathering information in order to fill in different forms, the NS mostly asks the questions and the NNS answers. That is, the NNS is in a responsive position and, when formulating her turns (the second pair parts), she can profit from the lexical choices and the syntax of the first pair parts. In a narrative, a temporary division of labour arises between the interlocutors: roughly, the teller could be thought of as assuming an initiative position and the recipient a responsive position (cf. Sacks 1992 [e.g. spring 1970]). When the NNS is the teller, she cannot rely on the previous turns as much as when responding to questions. Consequently, she is more often involved in a situation in which she has to discover the linguistic means to describe an event or a referent. Apart from being more common in everyday conversation, word searches are also more common in the turns by the NNSs than by the NSs. Of the 55 cases in my data that I have defined as lexical searches, 6 are initiated by the NS and 49 by the NNS. In addition to the quantitative difference, there is also a “qualitative” difference in the type of searches that the NSs and the NNSs initiate. So far, I have discussed lexical word searches. The other type, grammatical search, is something produced solely by the NNSs in my data. In the subsequent sections, I will discuss this type of search and the responses it evokes from the NS.

. Grammatical searches As mentioned earlier, the distinction between grammatical and lexical searches is operational and should not be read as indicating what the speaker has

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 Second Language Interaction

in mind when beginning the search. The distinction is mostly based on the speaker’s way of initiating the search. I interpret those instances in which the speaker begins a word and then shifts focus on some part of it to be grammatical. That is, in grammatical searches, the speaker gives a recognisable version of (at least of) the stem of the word, but the completion of the word appears problematic. The problems are displayed e.g. through repetitions and self-corrections. Of the collection of 78 interactionally-oriented word searches, I have defined 23 as grammatical and 55 as lexical. One difference between lexical and grammatical searches is that the latter do not include interrogatives. Grammatical searches need not be specifically “announced”; the definition that I have used for a grammatical search includes the markers of the search. Repeating modified versions of a word makes explicit that a search is in progress. However, as in the cases of negations, the initiation markers also function as material to resolve the search. Modified repetitions both indicate that the speaker has difficulty in inflecting the word, while they can also simultaneously present some alternatives for the target form. In the modified repetition, the part which remains invariant is the beginning of a word. The end of the word, the suffixes and the immediately preceding syllable, are either modified or left open. In other words, the search is focused on the final syllables in the words. This can be explained through the typological nature of the Finnish language: nouns, pronouns, adjectives and verbs are inflected, and the inflectional morphemes are attached to the end of words as suffixes. This means that it is, in principle, possible to begin a word without having decided about the suffix one is going to use. So, the NNSs sometimes begin to utter words even if there is some uncertainty about the morphophonological rules and the inflection. Grammatical searches are initiated only by the NNSs in the data. Thus, grammatical searches seem to be a feature of linguistically asymmetric Finnish conversations – an activity in which the linguistically less competent participants engage. As these searches mostly focus on different suffixes, it seems that the NNSs put an effort in inflecting the words correctly. I will return to this observation in the concluding section of this chapter. I have grouped grammatical searches in my data with respect to the response they evoke from the NS. First, I will discuss cases where the NS completes the word begun by the NNS and then cases where the NS displays understanding by other means. A contradiction in the orientations of the participants is observed, and this contradiction is more fully explored through a case study in the third sub-section.


.. A completing response by the NS This section presents a discussion of cases where the NNS initiates a grammatical search and the NS joins the search by providing the target form. These cases come close to one of the typical forms of correction in the data – correction as a response to uncertainty – which was discussed in the previous chapter. The NSs were found to do corrections when the NNSs have displayed hesitancy in formulating a word. Similarly, in grammatical searches, the NNSs also display hesitancy, but the NSs provide the standard word (i.e. the completion) before the NNSs end up suggesting an alternative. Therefore, the activity by the NS can be defined as a completion rather than a correction. The following excerpt illustrates such an instance: (15) Babies.4 01 J: .hhhh Sitte he (0.2) huomaa huomu- huom- huoma= then they notice.PRS.3 (variations of the verb stem) → .hhhh Then they (0.2) notice notid- noti- notic= 02 S: =Jo[o huoma-s ye[s notice-PST.3 → =Ye[s noticed [ 03 J: [Ohuomat ˚huoma-s˚ [ notice-PST.3 [Onotic ˚noticed˚ 04 S: ˚Joo˚ ˚Yes˚

In this excerpt, the NNS’s begins a grammatical search by uttering the verb huomata ‘notice’ (line 1). The modifications of the verb include only the very beginning of the word, roughly the part which is invariant (huoma-) regardless of the following suffixes. These modifications do not thus give much information about the target form. However, the NS comes up with a completion (line 2) after the NNS’s third modification. This completion, which the NS offers, is the past tense form of the verb; he can assume this to be the target form, since the NNS has mostly used the past tense in his narrative (prior to this segment). The NNS accepts the completion by repeating it (line 3). It is interesting that the pattern of the search rather accurately follows the pattern of the corrections as a response to uncertainty (cf. 3.3.1). First, the correction/completion turn contains not only the new version, but also an affirmative particle. The particle joo can receive the prior talk as understood (Sorjonen 2001) and, as in the correction cases, it can be seen as indicating that the level of intersubjectivity has not been shaken by the problem, that mutual

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 Second Language Interaction

understanding still prevails. By so doing, it can be understood as encouraging the NNS to continue, to move forward from the search sequence. Second, the NNS accepts the new version substantially, by repeating it. This repetition demonstrates that the NNS orients to the completion as providing him with the “right answer”. Third, the completions (as the corrections) are offered and accepted straightforwardly; no explications for the new forms are given or requested. All these features build up an orientation to the linguistic identities which could also be traced in the correction examples. Because of their linguistic positions, the NS can provide and the NNS can receive the completion as undebatable, as the correct alternative. When displaying hesitancy about the inflection, the NNSs can be seen as orienting to their linguistic identites, i.e. portraying themselves as not-yetcompetent speakers. However, this does not mean that the NNSs would immediately ask for help from the NSs. As in lexical searches, it is mostly through gaze that the recipient is invited to join the search. The subsequent extracts demonstrate the role of gaze in the search sequences: (16) Friends talking. K is telling S about his interests. (K’s gazes are marked in the transcript; S is gazing at K during the whole excerpt.) 01 K:

Historia ol-i m n[yt vain hh hämm history is-PST n[ow only History was m really only hh homm [ 02 S: [Mmm K:. .------------------------03 K: Harrast(h)uhh hä- h[arrashob(h)hh ho- h[ob→ A hob(h)hh ho- hob[ 04 S: [Harrastus. [njoo:?, [hobby.NOM [yes → [A hobby [nyeah:?, K:---------- [ 05 K: [>Harrastus=>jooA hobby=>yes ääm mä luulen että #ööm# (1.0) kielet <But: nowhh> ehm I think that #ehm# (1.0) languages K: ---, .-------02 ova-t ääm (0.5) tärke-imare important-SUP → are ehm (0.5) the most impor-


03 S: Mhm.= ((nods)) K: --K:----------04 K: =Tärke-immä-t important-SUP-pl.NOM → =The most important 05 S: Joo. Yes. K: -, K:----------06 K: Tärk[e-imp-i-ä impo[rtant-SUP-pl-PAR → The [most important [ 07 S: [.joo [.yes ((nods)) K: --, .----------, ..------08 K: Hheh .hh £˚tärke-imp-i-ä˚£ ja: nyt mm= important-SUP-pl-PAR and now Hheh .hh $˚the most important˚$ an:d now mm= 09 S: =Eli su-l on nyt niinku sit (.) suomi PRT you-ADE is now PRT then Finnish =So you have now like (.) Finnish Swedish K: -------------------------------------------10 ruotsi ja venäjä. Swedish and Russian and Russian then. K: -------------------

In this excerpt, the NNS pays considerable attention to getting the inflectional morphemes correct. He tells about his study interests and he starts the word tärkeim- (line 2) but does not finish it. The word is recognisable to a Finn: it is some case of the superlative form of the adjective tärkeä ‘important’. The part left unfinished here is, again, the case ending. And once more, the search is directed to the recipient: K turns his gaze to S when he starts producing the beginning of the word (the end of line 2), and he continues to gaze at her virtually throughout the entire search until he repeats the form he has ended up with (line 8). Example (18) illustrates an other-directed grammatical search similar to the ones in the previous section. However, it is only the NNS’s participation which is similar: he shifts his gaze to the NS when repeating the modified versions of a word. The NS, in contrast, does not substantially participate in the search by completing the word the NNS has begun. Instead of providing the missing ending, the NS indicates that she has understood what the NNS was

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 Second Language Interaction

saying by using acknowledgement tokens (lines 3, 5 and 7) and head nods (lines 3 and 7). Thus, the participants are on partly different tracks in this example. They both treat the search as other-directed, as needing a response from the recipient, but their understanding of the relevant type and amount of the participation is somewhat different. The contributions of the NS are as minimal as possible: rather than focusing on the word form which is being sought, she claims understanding. Her acknowledgement tokens and nods display an orientation to an aim beyond the actual search, that is to a mutual understanding and to aid the progress of the conversation. The NS’s orientation to the broad aim of getting the interaction going is particularly well reflected in her acknowledgement in line 7: it is produced in overlap with one of the versions by the NNS (line 6). The NS thus receives the prior talk as understood even before she has heard the form that the NNS produces. Apparently, she does not consider the case ending to be relevant. Not even the subsequent repetition with which the NNS topicalises the word (line 8) evokes a comment from the NS on its appropriateness. Instead of focussing on the form of the NNS’s turn, the NS responds to its content by developing the proposition further (lines 9–10). The NNS, however, has a more local aim than getting the interaction going. For him, it is not enough that the recipient merely recognises the word he was going to use; the NNS also wants to find the target form and get it right. Thus, despite the indications of recognition and understanding (lines 3, 5 and 7), the NNS concentrates on the missing element: first, he produces the word in nominative case (line 4), then he corrects himself (line 6) and finally, having ended up with a version, he topicalises it by repeating it (line 8). In sum, it seems clear that both participants try to close the search sequence. However, the ways in which they try to accomplish the closing do not coincide. The NNS’s recipe for completing the search is to find the target word, and he addresses the NS in order to achieve this aim. The NS, in contrast, attempts to close the search by displaying understanding; she has already recognised the word that the NNS is trying to formulate and hence there is no need to focus on the inflection of the word. The NS responds to the NNS’s hesitancy and gaze shift but instead of responding with a substantial turn (which would comment on the alternatives), she repeatedly displays understanding. That is, the NS’s recipe for getting out of the search sequence is to demonstrate that it is interactionally unnecessary to continue with the search. There is thus a discrepancy between the participants’ orientation towards the grammatical search. The NNS orients to its linguistic aspect: the aim of the search is to bring the target word to a grammatical completion. The NS, for her part, orients to the interactional aspect: she interprets the aim of the search


as achieving a state of mutual understanding. This discrepancy prolongs the sequence: the NNS tries to find the target form and tries to involve the NS in the search process, whereas the NS tries to show that she already understands what the NNS means and, hence, tries to disengage herself as well as the NNS from the search process. Example (18) is an excerpt taken from a conversation between friends, but a similar discrepancy can be found in institutional encounters. The NNSs can orient to the linguistic form of their turns, whereas the NSs orient to the progress of the conversation and to the (institutionally relevant) information in the turns. Rather than orienting to their status as the linguistically knowledgeable participants, the NSs orient to their institutional role and the tasks and responsibilities combined with that role, as illustrated in the following example: (19) Office. The secretary and the client are going through and filling in the client’s application form for the student allowance. The secretary has just asked whether the client has been studying in Finland before. V: -„ 01 V: Juu minä: (.) ole-n >opiskel-lut< (2.0) työvoima- toimis:: yes I is-1 study-PPC employment offi:: → Yes I: (.) have >studied< (2.0) the employment- offi:: S: ---, .----------------------V:-------------------------02 (0.8) ts- (1.0) ?offemployment offi ce-GEN organise-INF-INE → (0.8) off- (1.0) S: -------------------------------------------------------S: --03 S: Mm:?= V: --V: -------„ 04 V: =↓kursi. (.) [hehhh course.NOM [ → =↓office. (.) [hehhh S: -------------„[ 05 S: [Mm:? [Mm:? 06 S: ↑Joo?= ↑Yes?= 07 V: =Heh .h kurssi-ssa ja.= course-INE and → =Heh .h in the course and.=

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 Second Language Interaction 08 S: =˚(Ihan)˚. (.) se varmaan pitä-isi tä-hän laitta-a. PRT it probably have.to-COND this-ILL put-INF =˚(Quite)˚. (.) it should probably be put down here. V:------, 09 V: Ahaa. I see.

The client begins the word työvoimatoimisto ‘employment office’ in line 1, but stops short in the middle and, after an additional restart, tries again at the beginning of line 2. In this example, the NNS is not just trying to find a single case ending; instead he is formulating a relatively complicated construction with an agentive participle form (työvoimatoimiston järjestämässä kurssissa ‘[in] the course organised by the employment office’). The way the utterance is pronounced reveals the effort the NNS puts in the formulation of the construction: in addition to his slow tempo, sound stretches and pauses, the heavy stress he places on the first syllables of every word (and even the parts of words) reflects the difficulty he has in formulating the utterance. In addition, the stress he places on the very last syllable of the construction (line 2), which is unusual for Finnish, only adds to the impression of an ‘I struggled through it!’ -task. Moreover, during the two-second pause in line 1, just before uttering the construction, the NNS shifts his gaze markedly away, by turning his head towards the ceiling and thus displays being involved in thinking or processing. While constructing the utterance syllable by syllable (line 2), the NNS shifts his gaze to the NS and maintains his gaze at her (lines 3–4). The NS takes the turn but, as in the previous example, does not produce a substantial response – complete or comment on the efforts by the NNS or on the version he has formulated. Instead, she produces a minimal response token (line 3), thereby providing the NNS an opportunity to continue. A further discrepancy arises in the participants’ orientations in this example: the NNS’s orientation is linguistic, whereas the NS’s orientation is institutional. The difference between their perspectives becomes evident in the subsequent turns: the NNS continues to focus on the grammatical details of the utterances, whereas the NS responds to the turns on the basis of their institutional relevance. The NNS first completes the agentive participle construction by producing a head of the noun phrase (kurssi ‘course’ line 7).5 He continues to gaze at the NS while saying the word. Again, the NS does not comment on the completion; she produces continuation-relevant particles (lines 5–6) to give the NNS room to provide further information. The NNS does not, however, provide any new information; instead, he shifts focus to the linguistic form of his prior turn by making a morphological self-correction. He replaces


the former case ending of the head noun (line 4) by the inessive (line 7), thereby making the head agree with the modifiers. When the NNS shifts focus to the morphological details, the NS produces a more substantial turn. Rather than commenting on the correctness of the alternative versions by the NNS, the secretary verbalises the institutional aim: to fill in a slot for “the previous studies” in the form (line 8). The Finnish utterance translated as ‘it should probably be put down here’ reflects the secretary’s institutional interest: she needs the information in order to carry out her institutional task. The secretary verbalizes the practical applications of the (institutionally relevant) piece of information thereby implying, since no new information on the issue is presented, that the topic of “previous studies” can be closed and the conversation can be continued. Hence example (19) reveals the different orientations of the participants: the NNS pays attention to the grammatical details of the turns, whereas the NS mainly encourages the NNS to proceed with the conversation, so that she can get all the information she needs in order to perform the institutional activity she is responsible for, i.e. to file the information correctly. The tendency which was noted in correction sequences – that the NSs avoid activating the linguistic asymmetry (by e.g. not initiating overt corrections) – can also be found in grammatical searches. The NNSs can make relevant their non-nativeness by showing their hesitancy to use a linguistic form, but the NSs do not easily orient to their position as the linguistic expert (by e.g. evaluating or otherwise commenting on the linguistic outcome of the NNSs’ turns). If we consider, for instance, the following example: (20) Summer course. The secretary has just told the student about different exhibitions in town. (The secretary has posted an announcement of a baseball game on the notice board, but the topic of baseball has not been mentioned by during the conversation.) 01 O: .h Jaa: #a# sinä: (.) pan:e-e (.) pane-t (.) >pan-na< on p(.) and you put-3 put-2 put-INF is → .h An:d #a# you: (.) put:s (.) put (.) >to put< has p- (.) 02 sinä (.) äää ole-n o↑le-t pan-nut (.) ääm: (.) paperi. you is-1 is-2 put-PPC paper → you (.) ehm has ha↑ve put (.) ehm: (.) paper. 03 (1.0) 04 O: Ääm (.) mm th uth u ((osoittaa karttaa pöydällä)) täälä. (.) Eem (.) mm th uth u ((points to a map on the desk)) here (.) 05 ˚mitä se on˚ ˚what is it˚ 06 (.) ((S is looking at the point on the map))



 Second Language Interaction 07 S: .hh Ää (1.0) ↓mm↓ tarkotatko pesäpallo.hh Ee (1.0) ↓mm↓ do you mean baseball08 O: Joo pesäpalloa. Yes baseball. 09 S: Joo .h joo laito-i-n sinne .h että: m- on pesäpallo-ot↑telu yes yes put-PST-1 there that is baseball match Yes .h yes I put down there .h that there’s a baseball game 10 jos joku haluaa men-nä katso-maan. se on vapaaehtoinen. if someone want go-INF watch-INF it is voluntary if someone wants to go to see ((it)). it is voluntary.

Here, the NNS is facing difficulties in formulating the utterance sinä olet pannut ‘you have put’. She begins the turn (line 1) with a personal pronoun (sinä ‘you’) but has difficulties in making the verb agree with the pronoun. She first produces the verb in a third person form, which she then repairs to a second person form. She is nevertheless dissatisfied with this form, because she changes it again: she rapidly produces the infinitive form of the verb (panna ‘to put’) after which she produces an auxiliary and starts pronouncing the verb, but she then cuts off this attempt. The auxiliary indicates that the student is also looking for another verb tense. By this stage, the search has already lasted a while, so the student repeats the second person pronoun sinä (the beginning of line 2) so as to make clear what the missing form of the verb is (i.e. second person singular). The following auxiliaries imply that the target tense is the present perfect, but the auxiliary has still to be inflected. The student first uses the auxiliary in the first person singular form, which she then corrects to the second person form. This is finally the form the student has been looking for: she stops modifying the verb and can move on to the next element in the turn (paperi; the end of line 2). The secretary has maintained her gaze at the student during the whole turn (lines 1–2) but she does not verbally contribute to the search in any way. It is, however, impossible to know whether the student has been inviting the secretary to join the search, or whether she has framed the search as a private activity with “a thinking face”. The face and hence the gaze of the student cannot be seen because she turns her back towards the camera just when she begins asking the question in line 1. Given that the student might not have asked for help, the secretary’s silence during the pauses in the first turn (lines 1–2) is not very revealing. What is revealing, though, is the silence after the turn. The student has made an effort to produce a grammatically well-formed utterance, but the secretary does not comment on the effort or the turn in any way. In fact, she does not even acknowledge it (line 3). For the secretary, it is not relevant whether or not the student manages to find exactly the right suffixes to formu-


late a grammatically correct utterance; for her (to be able to respond) the main issue is to find the institutional relevance of the turn, to understand what the student is asking. The grammatical correctness of an utterance does not help if the implications of the utterance are unclear. The student makes an effort in trying to formulate the tense and the agreement of the subject and the verb correctly. She succeeds in this, but it does not help her in having the message (or the sequential implications) of the utterance understood. It is only after the topic of baseball has been introduced (lines 6–8) that the secretary can interpret the first turn and begin to respond (lines 9–10). In all the examples in this section, the NNSs oriented to their role as a nonfluent speaker of a language by displaying their effort to formulate a word or an utterance correctly. The NSs did not, however, adopt the role of the linguistic expert; instead of topicalising the problematic word forms, the NSs produced continuation-relevant particles to encourage the NNSs to proceed with the conversation (or the NSs refrained from responding). The activity by the NSs can be seen as serving interactional purposes, as an attempt to carry the conversation forward instead of getting caught up in a detail. However, the orientation to the progress of the conversation can also serve institutional purposes; in addition to the local aim of the smooth flow of the interaction, institutional conversations have an external aim, a task to be fulfilled. The institutional task of the secretary is to provide the client with the relevant assistance or information about the issue for which is the client originally came to the office. In order to know what is relevant each time, the secretary needs to gather background information from the client. By encouraging the client to continue (with her information-providing turns), the secretary orients to the institutional goal of the conversation and to her role in achieving it. It became clear already in the correction sequences that a “hierarchy” exists in the participants’ orientations. When offering linguistic corrections, the NSs did not activate their identity as the linguistic expert. The corrections were made so as to perform an institutionally relevant activity or, alternatively, as a response to the NNS’s uncertainty-marking. Similarly, in grammatical searches, the institutional role of the NS overrides the role of the linguistically knowledgeable participant: even when the NNS displays hesitancy with some construction, the NS does not necessarily topicalise the construction or orient to the linguistic aspects of it in the turn. It is interesting that it is the NNS whose activities bring the linguistic identities into interactional focus. The NNSs can display hesitancy when inflecting words or exhibit trouble in lexical or morphological choices. The NSs, for their part, display linguistic expertise only in response to the asymmetry-oriented



 Second Language Interaction

activity by the NNSs. In institutional situations, however, even these responses can be absent. Instead of commenting on the exposed linguistic efforts by the NNSs, the NSs produce turns that are institutionally relevant and aimed at achieving the institutional goal. There are several reasons why the NNSs can be seen as more eager to activate their linguistic identity. First, most of the institutional conversations take place in the offices of institutions which give courses in Finnish language and in other subjects for foreigners in Finland. The clients are either studying Finnish or they would like to begin to study Finnish in the respective institution. For this reason, they might find it profitable to portray themselves as “good learners”, as being interested in the details of the language and as trying to produce as error-free language as possible. A more general version of this idea can also be applied to the non-institutional conversations: by focussing on the linguistic details, the NNS can reveal the knowledge she already has about the language, portraying herself as a careful and committed speaker (or learner) of the target language. This view is supported by the fact that in the search sequences where the NSs do produce the completion, the NNSs usually repeat it. That is, the NNSs overtly take notice of the correct form offered by the NSs. In addition, by exposing some of the difficulties they face in formulating utterances, the NNSs can remind the NSs of their disadvantageous position and demonstrate how much work it requires (from the NNS’s part) to keep the conversation going, i.e. to produce meaningful sentences. Since formulating utterances demands such effort by the NNS, the NS could (or perhaps should) make an equal effort to understand (or “receive”) the utterances.6 It is also possible that the NNSs treat grammatical correctness as being a more important factor in understanding than the NSs. The NNSs become involved in grammatical searches because they want to make sure that their utterances are intelligible. Moreover, if the NNS finds that it is difficult and time-consuming trying to inflect a word, she can initiate a grammatical search in hope of getting assistance from the NS. In other words, the NS and the NNS may have similar interests – to move on in the conversation – which, however, result in different linguistic activities. The NSs may avoid orienting to the linguistic details in order to demonstrate that the precise correctness of the grammatical elements is not necessary for the successful comprehension and the progress of conversation. Understanding in interaction is possible without the correct version of every morpheme. On the other hand, the NNSs may orient to the grammatical details for the same reasons: they seek help in completing an utterance so that the conversation and interaction can be continued. If this is the case, it presents a challenge for second language teaching:

Chapter 4. Word search 

how to teach Finnish grammar so that it helps rather than prevents successful interaction by the NNSs with the native speakers? A related possibility is that the NNSs use the interaction as a learning environment. If this is the case, the NNSs’ persistent focussing on a linguistic element is a result of their aim to find out and learn a particular linguistic detail. Consequently, the NSs’ interactional orientation contradicts the objective by the NNSs and thereby makes it more difficult to close the search sequence. In other words, the fact that the NSs orient to the progress of the conversation rather than to a linguistic detail in fact inhibits progress. A claim of understanding by the NS is not enough for the NNS to close the search sequence if the NNS wants to find out a particular word form. The fact that the NNSs seek help from the NSs reflects their orientation to the linguistic asymmetry between the participants. It has been reported that the speakers invite the “knowing participants” to join the search, i.e. the interlocutors who share knowledge about the issue which is being talked about (cf. Goodwin 1987). In grammatical searches, the NNSs were often telling new information to the NSs (cf. examples (15)–(19)). As the NNSs directed their search to the NSs demonstrates that the NNSs credited the recipients with some relevant knowledge to finish the search. Since the NSs did not have access to the events or experiences the NNSs were describing, the knowledge has to be linguistic. The main way to address the recipient in the search is by shifting gaze to her. In all the examples, the recipient responded in some way after a gaze was directed at her. However, the recipient can choose to what extent she participates in the search. She can complete the unfinished word or she can claim understanding. In the first case, the NS can be seen as orienting to the linguistic identities: the NSs display linguistic knowledge by completing the word on behalf of the NNS. The NSs produce the completions from their knowledgeable position, as the “right alternatives”: they are not hedged or framed uncertain. The NNSs also receive the completions from their asymmetric position: they take notice of these completions by repeating them and they do not challenge them, even if the form is not the one which is being searched for (cf. example (17)). So far, I have presented and discussed word searches as being either grammatical or lexical. I distinguished the two types on the basis of the initiation of the search: grammatical searches include (modified) repetition of a word or an utterance, whereas the lexical searches do not. However, even this rather broad definition does not separate all the cases. In the subsequent section, I will discuss a word search which falls somewhere between lexical and grammatical

 Second Language Interaction

searches, and which also nicely illustrates the discrepancy in the participants’ orientation in completing the search. .. The discrepancy in the orientation by the participants: The junction of grammar and lexicon In this section, I will present and discuss only one example. This rather lengthy excerpt summarises many of the findings in the previous sections. Moreover, it demonstrates how fuzzy the boundary can be between lexical and grammatical searches: (21) Office. The secretary is filling in the client’s application form for the student allowance. Just before this segment, the secretary has asked about the client’s accommodation, and the secretary then writes down the information. The gaze is marked for the first 25 lines. 01 V: Ja m- (.) kysymys on että (2.5) and question is that can-COND is-Q And I- (.) the question is that (2.5) S:..----V:..----------------------02 mahdollis-ta jos myöhemmin minä: siirrä-n (.) Helsinki-n possible-PAR if later I transfer-1 Helsinki-GEN possible if I: later on transfer (.) in the Helsinki S: -------------------------------------------------------V: -----------------------------------------------------------03 aluee-lla koska minä (.) as- as- asu-n Vantaa-lla ja siel= area-ADE because I li- li- live-1 (place)-ADE and there area because I (.) li- li- live in Vantaa and there= S: -----------------------------------------------------------S: ----04 S: =Joo:?, =Yes?, V: --„ 05 V: .hh #öö# Joskus vaikea #öö# >koska minä< (.) e-n voi sometimes difficult because I NEG-1 can .hh #eh# Sometimes difficult #eh# >because I< (.) can’t S: ---------------------------------------------------------V:..------------------06 #m# saa-da .hh ↓mi-tä se o##n↓ laske-llinen #öö# get-INF what-PAR it i##s ?lower-ADJ.SUFFIX? #m# get .hh ↓what is i##t↓ ((an adjective)) #eh# S: -------------------------------------------------


07

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V: -(.) ((V draws a square in the air)) S: -S: --S: Mm::, V: --V:--------------------„ V: .h Minä en voi (.) saada #m# ˚mitä se o- phhh˚ .h I can’t (.) get #m# ˚what is i- phhh˚ S: --------------------------------------------(4.0) S: ----V: ..-------------------------V: >Lasku-ton< (lasketu-) minen bill-less ?descend? ((a suffix)) >Bill less< (descend) ing S: ---„ S: <J:oo?> m[mm m[mm V: -----[----------------------V: [.nff Lippu-n (.) varten. [ ticket-GEN for [.nff For (.) ticket. S:..----------S: ----------------S: Öö ↑mat[kalippua, Ehm ↑tra[vel card, V: --------[---------------------V: [Lipuu-a varten. joo [ticket-PAR for yes [For the ticket. yes S:--------------------S: -----S: ↑Bussi, ↑A bus, V: -----V: ---„ V: J:[a: (.) mhehh S: -[-----------S: [Vai ↑ei (.) ei [Or ↑no (.) no V:--------V: .h Joo. minä matkustan (.) junalla. .h Yes. I travel (.) by train. S: -----------------------------------



 Second Language Interaction S: ---„ 20 S: Joo just ahaa Yes right I see V: --„ V: „----------------------------------------------------------21 V: [Ja minu-lla e-n ole (.) minu-lla ei ole #m# (.) oik- oik[And I-ADE NEG-1 is I-ADE NEG is righ- righ[And I have am not (.) I haven’t got #m# (.) the righ- righ[ S: ..----------------------------------------------22 S: [˚Ihan totta joo˚ [˚That’s right yes ˚ S: --------23 S: Oikeutta. The right. V: --------V: ----------24 V: Oikeutta:## The right:## S: ----------S: ---------------25 S: Saada alennusta. To get a reduction. V: ----------------26 V: Joo. [koska minäYes. [because I[ 27 S: [Junasta. [Of the train. 28 V: Koska minä Because I > 29 (.) 30 S: .h Aa[a ikä .h O:[h the age [ 31 V: [˚Aha˚ [˚Uhuh˚ 32 V: Ikä. The age. 33 S: Joo (.) niinpä. Yeah (.) that’s right. 34 (0.8) 35 V: J[a A[nd [ 36 S: [Helsingissä saa. [In Helsinki you’ll get.

Chapter 4. Word search 

The missing word in this excerpt, alennus ‘concession’ or ‘reduction’, causes an extended negotiation sequence. The NNS’s explanation (lines 5–6) about his reasons for moving (“transfer”, line 2) to another city is disrupted, since he cannot find a relevant word. This turn (lines 5–6) can be classified as a lexical search, including a Fennicized word as a resolution attempt. The search is made explicit by the means that are familiar from the lexical searches in the data: the NNS produces a prosodically marked unfocussed interrogative (mitä se on; line 6) without gazing at the recipient. The interrogative is followed by a word which could phonotactically be Finnish but which does not have a meaning in the standard language (line 6). The word is directed to the recipient through a gaze shift. The resolution attempted by the NNS, laskellinen, does not mean anything in Finnish, but it can be recognised as being an adjective because of the final suffix -llinen.7 The first part of the word probably derives from the verb laskea (‘lower, go down’; also ‘count’). The suffix -llinen is not attached to verbs in Finnish, but the NNS uses Finnish grammar in an innovative way and combines the suffix with the verb laskea. The contamination the NNS ends up with is laskellinen, but it is not recognised by the NS, presumably because of the unusual combination of components. The NS responds with a delayed mm::token; the prolonging of the particle and its non-falling intonation (line 8) make the turn sound hesitant and display uncertainty about a relevant answer. The NNS makes another attempt to resolve the search by re-starting his utterance. The second search (line 9) echoes the first one (line 6): here the same utterance, disrupted at the same point, is followed by the same interrogative. The continuation is also very similar: in both cases, the speaker offers an attempted resolution which consists of different elements of the Finnish language. In the former case (line 6), there is one derivation from the verb laskea, whereas in the latter case (line 11), the resolution consists of two or three words, which are derived from the same verb. It is difficult to hear the latter candidate (line 11) properly, but what the client appears to be doing is to offer a new derivation (laskuton), and then another derivation in two separate elements (lasketuand minen). The first version (laskuton)8 is derived from the word lasku ‘bill’ which, in turn, derives from the verb laskea, as it also means ‘count’. The speech tempo of the NNS is quite fast here; he seems constantly to be processing his linguistic knowledge of Finnish in order to find the right combination of the elements to construct an identifiable word. His next candidate consists of two parts: (the stem of) a verb and a derivational morpeheme. The verb that the NNS pronounces most resembles the intransitive verb laskeutua ‘go down, de-

 Second Language Interaction

scend’. The subsequent morpheme -minen is very productive in Finnish; this morpheme can nominalise verbs somewhat similarily as -ing in English. The NNS pronounces separately the last two elements in the turn – stress is placed on both words – but the derivational suffix -minen cannot occur by itself, so the combination he ends up with is lasketu+minen ‘descend+ing’. In essence, the two searches (lines 6 and 9–11) are similar, except for the one additional derivation in the latter case. However, this derivation is enough to transfer the search to another category: in line 11, the NNS produces modified versions of a word (or a stem) and, hence, this search could be defined as grammatical, as opposed to the lexical search with a Fennicized word in line 6. These two largely identical searches, which nevertheless can be defined as belonging to the different categories of word search, illustrate the permeability of these categories. As I have tried to emphasize earlier in this chapter, grammatical and lexical searches are not mutually exclusive alternatives and should not be interpreted as indicating what the speaker has in mind when initiating the search; grammatical morphemes can be used to search lexical items. The resolution attempts by the NNS show how he makes use of his grammatical knowledge of Finnish: he chooses one verb (laskea) that he knows to describe the target situation and attaches various suffixes to it, first by combining those into words and finally also separately. The fact that the NNS also utters the parts separately gives an idea of what kind of solution the candidates are: they are not “the final truths”, which should be recognised per se, but more like reflections of the NNS’s logic and reasoning in the way towards determining the target form. They are given to the recipient as raw material, out of which she could then construct the target expression. The NNS is thus relying on the grammar when resolving the search; he tries to make the word identifiable with the help of different suffixes. The grammatical creativity of the NNS does not, however, help the NS to identify the missing word. The NNS directs the attempt (line 11) to the NS through his gaze, but the NS can join the resolution process only after the NNS has produced further lexical information. The NNS’s subsequent turn (line 13) could be seen as a completion of his previous utterance (Minä en voi saada X – lippua varten ‘I can’t get X – of the ticket’). Thus, having produced several variants of the X in the utterance, the NNS moves on to complete the utterance. As soon as the NS hears an identifiable lexical item (lippu ‘ticket’), she produces a more substantial turn (line 14). She then takes the new item as the starting point and she uses it as a basis for beginning to develop a chain leading to the target word (ticket → travel card → bus). In other words, the NS interpolates lexical items in order to find the missing word.

Chapter 4. Word search 

It is interesting to compare the participants’ resources in resolving the search. The NNS relies on the grammar and uses grammatical resources so as to make the word (‘concession/reduction’) identifiable. He has one verb (laskea) which he modifies with different derivational suffixes. The NS, by comparison, uses lexico-semantic resources. She displays uncertainty while the NNS offers the different variants of one verb and she participates in the search only after a recognisable lexical item has been produced. The NS therefore approaches the target word through a semantic chain: she offers specifications of the lexical item she was able to recognise (lines 14 and 16). The form of the words is not important; her main objective is to ascertain the relevant lexical information. This is particularly evident in her second specification (line 16). The first specification (line 14) is grammatically bound to the previous turn: it is inflected in the partitive case, as are the nouns preceding the postposition -varten. The other specification is, however, just a single word – it is in the unmarked nominative case and there are no other elements in the turn. The uninflected word bussi is produced as an attempt to clarify or define the semantic scope that the target word is related to. The discrepancy noted in grammatical searches can also be detected in this example. The NNS orients to the grammar in (resolving) the search, whereas the NS orients to the lexical information. The NS even “undresses” the lexical items from the grammar by producing them in the most basic form, grammatically unbound. The NNS, for his part, pays attention to the grammar. In addition to choosing the derivation as the means to resolve the search, he focusses on the form of the words: he produces a morphological self-correction changing the case endings to follow the norms of standard language when completing his search turn (lines 13 and 15). The NS does not respond to this correction in any way; she continues detecting the target word by offering lexical alternatives (line 16). The NS thus approaches the target word via different lexical items, whereas the NNS holds to one lexical item, the verb laskea. The relationship between the verb laskea and the verb alentaa ‘reduce’, which is the source for the target word alennus ‘reduction’, is somewhat similar to the relation between the words in the searches with negations (cf. 4.2.4). The verb that the NNS uses as a basis for his derivations (laskea) has a larger semantic scope than the verb alentaa. In addition to the transitive (‘take down’) and intransitive (‘go down’) meanings, laskea also means counting, whereas alentaa only means the transitive action of reducing something. As in the cases of negation, the element that is initially introduced is a more general term which can then be narrowed down to the target word.

 Second Language Interaction

The grammatical-lexical search (lines 6, 9, 11–16) is not the only search in the excerpt. There are two instances that can be defined as grammatical searches, being more prototypical representatives of the category. The first one is in line 3: the NNS repeats the beginning of the verb asua ‘live’. However, he finds the correct form without involving the recipient in the search, so this case falls outside of the focus of this study. The second search (line 21), in contrast, represents a typical instance of “grammatical search with a completing response by the NS” (cf. 4.3.1). The NNS begins a word but, instead of finishing it, he repeats the invariant part of it, while gazing at the NS. The NS takes the turn and completes the alreadybegun word (line 23). The completion (the partitive case oikeutta) is produced from a knowledgeable position: there are no mitigating elements or hesitations in the turn; the word is stressed and uttered with a terminal intonation. After the NS has provided the target form, the NNS repeats it, as was the case in many previous examples. That is, the NNS displays being a second language speaker by first seeking help in inflecting the words, and then by registering the new form (line 24). This plain repetition simply takes notice of the new word, acknowledges it as a piece of information the speaker was after without challenging it or without displaying any attitude towards the new information. This example also demonstrates how the type of search is related to the NS’s possibilities to act as the linguistically knowledgeable participant. In both searches (lines 6–11 and 21), the NNS invites the NS to join the search, but only in the latter case can the NS complete the search from the knowledgeable position. It is easier to provide “the right answers” when completing already-begun words: the inflection of words follows systematic rules that the NS has internalised (cf. lines 21 and 23). It is more difficult to provide a new lexical item as a self-evident resolution to the search: the speaker may be uncertain about the word for which the other speaker was searching, and the other speaker could also perhaps experience it as threatening if the first speaker was “force-feeding” him with her words. If the NSs provided the NNSs with non-negotiable words as “the right answers”, this would then challenge the NNS’s right to choose his own words, and thereby could even cast doubt on the NNS’s ability to describe his own matters, on his ability to be a competent member in a category of speakers. The fact that the NS produces the resolution from the knowledgeable position in line 23, but not in lines 14 or 16, can thus be attributed both to the type of the search and to the participants’ access to the relevant knowledge. The grammatical character of the search in line 21 makes it possible for the secretary to apply her linguistic expertise, and the interactional situation makes it profitable (preventing another search).

Chapter 4. Word search 

This example shows how the participants can treat the same search (lines 6 and 11) as either grammatical or lexical: they try to resolve the search at the different linguistic levels. For this reason, the boundaries between different searches are flexible. The participants define the categories through their actions, which can also be seen in the other searches in this excerpt (lines 3 and 21). These searches are different from each other because of the NS’s contributions. In line 3, the NS does not respond to the repetitions by the NNS and, hence, the turn resembles many turns in any conversation; false starts can also be easily found in the turns by the NSs. The latter search (line 21) is more distinctive, since the NS responds to the false starts by the NNS. Both of the turns in lines 3 and 21 have thus “word-search potential”, but the orientation and the participants’ actitivites make them different: the former does not become interactionally relevant, whereas the latter creates a sequence that reflects the participants’ orientation to their linguistic identities.

. Discussion: Difficulty in finding a word In this chapter, I have explored instances where the speaker indicates difficulty in finding a linguistic item. I have focussed on word searches which I called substantial: the searcher tries to involve the recipient in the search process. Because of this definition, the sample of word search cases may be somewhat biased: it is perhaps more likely that the NNSs seek help from the NSs when formulating utterances than vice versa. However, some type of restricting definition was necessary for this study; using the definition from the CA literature – disruptions in turn-constructional units preceded by pauses or hesitations (cf. e.g. Goodwin & Goodwin 1986) – would have resulted in an immense number of cases that would have not necessarily had much in common. Although the broader definition would certainly have included more searches by the NSs, this definition would have also substantially increased the number of the searches by the NNSs. As a result, almost all turns by some NNSs having only a rudimentary knowledge of Finnish could have been analysed as word searches. To get a sharper scope of cases, I decided to focus on searches which are interactionally oriented, which involve both participants in the resolution. It is important to observe that the recipient might not be able to produce the target word or otherwise might refuse to do so (cf. 4.3.2); the point is that the searcher directs the search to the recipient and thereby invites her to participate. The most crucial factor in directing the search is the speaker’s gaze. When the speaker turns her gaze away from the recipient, she temporarily dis-

 Second Language Interaction

engages herself from the conversation and indicates that she is in the private activity of thinking. In the other-directed searches, the connection with the recipient is established or strengthened: gaze is directed to the recipient and can be accompanied by recipient-directed gestures. The interactional role of the gaze is evidenced in the examples in this chapter: if the speaker shifts her gaze to the recipient while displaying uncertainty, then the recipient takes the turn and produces some vocalisation (minimally these would be discourse particles). This happens even when the recipient chooses not to participate in the search (cf. examples (18) and (19)), and when the recipient does not recognise the speaker’s attempts at resolution (cf. example (21)). In many of the search sequences, both self- and other-directed phases occur. Typically, the word searches in my data are constructed so that, first, there is a self-directed phase in which the non-native speaker displays hesitancy and “marks” being involved in the search. In the subsequent other-directed phase, the non-native speaker produces some material by uttering either some candidate solutions or initial syllables of some target word, on the basis of which the native speaker can try to resolve the search. Although the NNSs initiate the majority of the searches, the NSs also undertake substantial searches. That is, sometimes the NS’s speech production is disrupted because of she fails to find a word and she then tries to resolve the situation by seeking assistance from the NNS. The targets in the searches by the NSs are, however, generally more limited than in the searches by the NNSs. As discussed in Section 4.2.1, the NSs were usually searching for names belonging to the domain of (the personal or professional) expertise of the NNS. The NNSs, for their part, were searching both for names and other lexical items or grammatical elements. Moreover, they were often involved in a search when describing what is called A-events9 (Labov & Fanshel 1977: 100); knowledge of events to which they as speakers have authoritative access (cf. Drew 1991: 27). This difference in the participants’ positions of knowledge reflects their linguistic identities: the NSs approach the NNS in matters with which she is expected to be familiar, whereas the NNS can also direct his search to the NS when he himself is the primary source of knowledge. By inviting the recipient to join the search, the speaker credits her with the status of the knowledgeable participant and treats her as someone who can resolve the search. Since the NS cannot, for example, recall better how things were or become a co-teller in a narrative when the NNS is the authoritative source of knowledge, the help she can (and is expected to) offer is therefore linguistic. Thus, the content of the talk guides the direction of the search more in the NSs’ talk than in the NNSs’ talk.

Chapter 4. Word search 

Despite the distributional difference, it is important to note that both speakers, native and non-native, are involved in other-directed searches. Seeking help from the other speaker in turn-construction is not just an activity by the NNS. Instead, both the NSs and the NNSs can try to engage the recipient in the search. The NSs and the NNSs use the same conversational resource but to a different extent. Along with the difference in the quantity of the searches, however, there is also a difference in their quality. The searches by the NSs are lexical, whereas the NNSs also engage in grammatical searches. Although this distinction does not always define the category of the target item it can nevertheless indicate where the focus of the search is: within the construction of a turn or within the construction of a word. The searches by the NSs all fall in the former group, whereas approximately one-third of the searches by the NNSs (23/72) belong to the latter group. The NNSs thus seek help not only in finding the relevant words, but also in inflecting them. That is, in addition to the information in the turn, the NNSs orient to the form of (the elements in) the turn. The NSs do not always share this orientation; instead of completing the words or commenting on the alternatives presented by the NNSs, the NSs may try to move on in the conversation. Thus, a discrepancy can arise in the participants’ orientations during the word search sequences. The NNSs orient to the linguistic asymmetry by displaying hesitancy in the utterance-formulation and by inviting the NSs to participate in the search when telling about things with which they are more familiar than the NSs. Furthermore, if the NSs produce a resolution to the search, the NNSs often take notice of it by repeating it. As for the NSs, they both orient and do not orient to the asymmetrical positions. In grammatical searches in particular, the NSs may complete the search from the knowledgeable position, but they may also avoid focusing on the linguistic elements by just claiming understanding. It seems, thus, that particularly the NSs would be ready to sacrifice grammatical correctness in the interests of making sense and communicating messages. As discussed earlier, this may indicate, for instance, that the NNSs consider grammatical correctness to be more important for understanding. On the other hand, the discrepancy can also be related to the potential relevance of the participants’ linguistic identities. The linguistic conduct of the NNSs may be challenged and looked at in light of her non-nativeness, whereas the NSs do not need to justify their linguistic authority. The NNS’s errors and hesitations can be interpreted as signs of her non-nativeness, casting doubt on her ability to formulate her thoughts and impressions, whereas speech perturbations in the NS’s turns are probably interpreted more locally, not challenging her membership in the category of speakers. The potentially more damaging

 Second Language Interaction

character of “bad language” may guide the NNS to pay more attention to the linguistic form of her turns. The NS does not necessarily have a similar need to portray herself as a careful and committed speaker. The participants’ orientation to their linguistic identities is further reflected in the search sequences in the way they are launched. Both the NSs and the NNSs often marked the search with an interrogative, but the NSs produced focused other-directed interrogatives, whereas the NNSs produced unfocused self-directed interrogatives. In other words, when not finding a name or a word, the NSs immediately addressed the NNSs, whereas the NNSs turned to the NSs only after having addressed themselves. By not immediately asking help from the NS, the NNS can demonstrate that she is actively working for the speech production, that she is potentially able to cope with the problems – i.e. display her competence as an interactant. By first self processing the trouble, the NNS does not transfer the responsibility of her turn-construction to the NS; she still has the primary right to her linguistic conduct. The NS, however, can immediately address the NNS; as she has the linguistically knowledgeable position, the NS’s failure to find a word is more easily interpreted as being a temporary and context-bound problem (e.g. a memory failure, cf. e.g. Hokkanen 2001). In contrast, if the NNS’s failure to find a word were to be explained with her non-nativeness, it would become a more permanent shortcoming: the speaker’s inability to find relevant words in order to formulate her thoughts and ideas, i.e. to communicate. That is, by not immediately addressing the NS, the NNS holds the right and responsibility to formulate her own turns. By so doing, the NNS portrays herself as a competent and responsible interactant; the linguistic difficulties she may experience do not change this situation. One feature which reflects the potentially threatening character of word search in NNS talk (if taken as a sign of her inability to communicate) is laughter. In other institutional conversation (doctor-patient interaction), laughter has been observed to frame the activity delicate, to display an affective stance towards the performing of the activity (Haakana 1999: 172; see also Jefferson, Sacks, & Schegloff 1987). In word searches in my data, laughter occurs when the NNS has made a considerable effort to produce the grammar of the turn correctly, without the help of the NS (cf. examples (18) and (19)). In other words, the NNSs laugh after having struggled with the level of the language that is highly internalised by the competent speakers. As in doctor-patient interaction, laughter can be seen as indicating the affectivity of the activity. The considerable amount of time and energy the NNS is using for inflecting the words reflects the asymmetry in the particpants’ linguistic positions. The fact that the NNS needs to make such an effort to construct a turn in conversation


may be seen as a threat to her status as a competent member of the category of speakers or interactants. The self-directed interrogatives in the word searches by the NNSs function similarly to laughter. Apart from showing the speaker’s role and responsibility in the word search, the self-directed interrogatives announce or flag (cf. Wagner & Firth 1997) the search. While guiding the recipient’s attention to a particular direction and telling her to sharpen her inferencing (ibid.: 340), the flag (i.e. the interrogative) also accounts for the possible markedness of the resolution which follows. This account demonstrates that the speaker might be using awkward language, but she is aware of it. That is, the account is again used to display the competence of the speaker. By accounting for the markedness, the speaker demonstrates that as a linguistically competent member, she would not use such words or constructions but, because of her linguistic limitations, she has to resort to these deviant alternatives. In sum, failure to find a word, in particular if made interactionally salient, halts the progress of the conversation. The state of mutual understanding is shaken if the speaker cannot formulate her turn so that it would be identifiable for the recipient. Mutual understanding is restored when the speakers can again agree on what they are talking about and recognise the referents in each other’s turns. Although both participants are working to achieve this aim, their means to remedy the situation do not always coincide. The different orientations of the participants can be regarded in light of their linguistic identities: since the NS is the linguistically knowledgeable participant, she need not specifically display competence as a speaker in her activities. In contrast, the linguistic identity of the NNS makes her status more vulnerable. Since the linguistic conduct of the NNS can be connected to her non-nativeness, she is under greater pressure to show that certain features in her talk are not signs of her incompetence. The less knowledgeable position of the NNS creates a paradoxical situation: the NNS has a greater need to portray herself as a competent speaker and, hence, she pays special attention to her linguistic choices and formulations. This attention results, for example, in grammatical searches and self-corrections which, in fact, can be interpreted as signs of her nonfluency.



chapter 

Candidate understandings

. Introduction Thus far, I have investigated instances where conversational understanding surfaces in and through a disruption in the progress of conversation. Either the speaker or the recipient may, instead of providing the (projected) next relevant turn, shift focus to some elements in the prior speech. Nevertheless, the participants’ orientation to understanding need not always completely disrupt the progress of conversation. When experiencing something as problematic in the prior speaker’s turn, the speaker can repair the problem (as in Chapter 3), but she can also check her understanding of the problematic utterance. In other words, the speaker can articulate her understanding of the other speaker’s meaning. While such articulations shift focus on the previous turn(s), they need not be solely backward-oriented (as e.g. the corrections). Since the speaker uses her own words to describe what she thought the other speaker was saying, she often introduces new elements into the conversation. So, rather than just modifying the prior, articulations take a step forward from the problematic situation by presenting a potential reading of the trouble turn. In terms of conversational repair, these articulations, or candidate understandings as I will refer to them in this chapter, come close to other-initiations of repair: a possible understanding of prior turn (preceded by Y’mean) is mentioned as one typical other-initiation technique (Schegloff et al. 1977: 368). It should be noted, however, that the class of other-initiations is large. The recipient has various ways of coping with the situation when she encounters a problem in interpreting (the implications of) the prior turn. She can, for example, display her difficulty in producing a relevant response by initiating an open class repair (e.g. ‘Sorry’, ‘What’, see Drew 1997), by verbalising her difficulty (‘I don’t quite follow’) or by requesting clarification from the speaker (‘What do you mean?’). All these repair initiations indicate that the prior speaker’s turn was somehow problematic; moreover, they leave it to the speaker to decide where the problem lies. That is, such repair initiators are unfocused; it is up

 Second Language Interaction

to the speaker to decide how to modify her previous utterance so that it would be more understandable or more acceptable for the recipient. One important observation is that such unfocused markers of interactional difficulty rarely occur in my data. The native speakers, in particular, barely ever indicate that they experience the previous utterance as being troublesome without locating or specifying the trouble in any way. When they are uncertain about something in the prior turn, the native speakers in my data do not put the non-native speakers in a situation where they should modify their prior talk. Instead, the native speakers reformulate the trouble turn in their own words and they offer a candidate understanding of what the NNS has just said. .. Defining the phenomenon In this chapter, I will explore utterances which I call ‘candidate understandings’. These turns can, to a large extent, be identified according to Drew’s (1998: 32) definition of a formulation: they are means through which participants may make explicit their sense of “what we are talking about”, or “what has just said”. Formulations are a means for constructing an explicit sense of the gist of the talk thus far (ibid.: 32). Heritage and Watson (1979: 130) have presented two types of formulations: gists and upshots. The former formulate the sense or gist achieved thus far either in a conversation in toto or in some foregoing section of the conversation, and the latter provide an upshot which presupposes some unexplicated version of gist (ibid.: 130, 134). I will investigate both types as candidate understandings. However, the identification of a candidate understanding poses analytical problems. Within the conversation analytic framework, almost every utterance could be labelled as a candidate understanding, since understanding is seen as a dynamic process during which the participants continuously update their interpretations of the other’s utterances (see e.g. Heritage 1984a). Consequently, all turns reflect the participants’ interpretations of the prior turns and, hence, function as indications of understanding. The succession of appropriately conjoined turns is, in fact, itself a demonstration of understanding between the interlocutors. Typically, then, understanding lies in the background of every move in the proceeding of a conversation, but it need not be specially oriented to if there are no breaches in the intersubjectivity between the interlocutors. When doubt arises concerning the level of intersubjectivity, the process of understanding is brought into focus. Speakers give priority to addressing problems of understanding within conversation (Sacks, Schegloff, & Jefferson 1974). This occurs because the appearance of a problem interrupts the ongoing

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings

activity; the interlocutors need to shift their attention to (resolving) the problem before they can go on with any other activity. One means for doing this – restoring or securing mutual intelligibility – is to produce a turn that explicitly articulates the recipient’s interpretation of the trouble turn. These are the turns which I call ‘candidate understandings’. Instead of only implicitly reflecting the participants’ interpretations, these turns bring the process of understanding to the interactional surface. Candidate understandings are used to check the level of shared knowledge between the participants. Since a candidate understanding is only a potentially accurate interpretation of the prior speaker’s utterance, it needs to be confirmed by her. A candidate understanding functions as the first pair part of an adjacency pair, since it projects a confirmation as the next turn. Heritage (1985), who has studied formulations in news interviews, observes that a formulation minimally invites the prior speaker to confirm or deny the re-presentation of her experiences and, more generally, serves to solicit further information (ibid.: 102). Heritage and Watson (1979) have further observed that a preference is evident in the choice of responses for formulations: confirmations are massively preferred. The interlocutors avoid directly faulting a formulation, as it may terminate the ongoing stream of topical talk. Moreover, direct faulting can also constitute a criticism of a co-conversationalist’s attention, and thus imply a challenge to the formulator’s membership: his capacity and competence in monitoring, cognitively processing and reproducing the gists of talk (ibid.: 144). Thus, some sequential constraints facilitate the identification of candidate understandings: they are a locus of a side sequence (cf. Jefferson 1972). That is, although every turn in conversation reveals the recipient’s understanding of the previous turn, a candidate understanding has a particular sequential projection: it projects a confirmation as the next relevant turn. Formulations have thus been analysed in the conversation analytic literature, and generally formulations have been found to occur rarely in everyday talk but fairly frequently in different kinds of institutional interaction (Drew 1998; Heritage 1985). However, a brief scan of the second language data reveals that formulations (or candidate understandings) can be readily found in NS-NNS conversation, even in everyday talk. In the second language research, a number of studies have been published on (implicit) “corrective or negative feedback”, a concept which can be regarded as including candidate understandings (see e.g. Polio & Gass 1998; Mackey & Philp 1998; Long et. al 1998; Braidi 2002). One form of corrective feedback is ‘recast’, which Long (1996: 434) has defined as an “utterance which rephrases a child’s utterance by changing one or more sentence components while still referring to its central



 Second Language Interaction

meaning”. If the ‘child’ in the definition was replaced with the ‘prior speaker’, then this definition covers many of the candidate understandings in my data. However, the studies on recasts and other forms of negative feedback are mostly concerned with the issue of language acquisition and, as mentioned in the previous chapters, their research questions and interests are somewhat different from mine. There are, however, second language studies based on naturally occurring interaction and these investigate turns that produce a somewhat modified version of the prior. These reformulations1 have been studied both in institutional and non-institutional second language situations (e.g. Kalin 1995; Bremer & Simonot 1996; Williams, Inscoe, & Tasker 1997). Reformulations are treated and investigated mostly as a problem-solving strategy. Furthermore, reformulations can be made both by the producer of the trouble turn or by the recipient. For example, Kalin and Bremer and Simonot explore reformulations as the NS’s way of remedying her own talk, after the NNS has indicated that she does not understand. However, formulations studied in the conversation analytic literature are produced by the recipient. The formulations (studied in NS talk) and the reformulations (studied in NS-NNS talk) consequently are not equivalent activities. In the institutional situations in the NS talk, formulations are used, for example, to construct controversy (in radio call-in programmes, see Hutchby 1996), to highlight the speaker’s position without directly commenting on it (in news interviews, see Heritage 1985) and to propose a settlement (in industrial negotiations, see Walker 1994; for an overview, see Drew 1998). None of these studies reports formulations as being used as a remedy for problems of understanding, which is the main purpose of reformulations in the second language literature. My approach towards candidate understandings incorporates elements from both research traditions. The (re)formulations I focus on in this chapter are all produced by the other speaker. That is, it is the recipient who re-presents a stretch of talk by the prior speaker, as in the conversation analytic studies of formulations. However, the re-presentations function often as the reformulations in the second language studies: as a means to demonstrate or check understanding or to resolve an interactional difficulty. In other words, candidate understandings in my data are used to articulate, not only the implications, but also the linguistic realisation of the prior turn(s). Candidate understandings can be both linguistic reformulations of prior talk and conclusions on the basis of prior talk. In sum, the focus of this chapter is the following pattern:


A: trouble turn (or problematic sequence) B: candidate understanding A: confirmation/rejection + explanation.

The trouble turn can be explicitly marked as being problematic, or it can become a trouble turn retrospectively, after the candidate understanding has shifted focus to it. A candidate understanding displays the recipient’s need to check the implications of the prior turn, and thereby marks the interactional uncertainty experienced by the recipient. While being a marker, however, a candidate understanding also offers a possible resolution to the perceived trouble: were the candidate confirmed as correct, no more effort would be needed to clarify the problem. In contrast to the unfocused problem-markers, a candidate understanding does not hold up the conversation or disrupt its progress; a candidate understanding is also a step towards solving the problem. Thus, candidate understanding can be used both to signal and resolve a problem of understanding. In the following, I will investigate the candidate understandings occurring in my data. First, I will focus on the properties and on the types of these turns. I will describe a few features common to all cases. Thereafter, I will present some features that distinguish the cases from each other. On the basis of these features, three different categories for candidate understandings are identifed. Subsequently, I will explore the sequential environment of these three types of candidate understandings. Finally, I will discuss candidate understandings with respect to the type of the conversation and the participants’ identities as the native and the non-native speaker. .. Properties of candidate understandings The class of candidate understandings is by no means homogeneous. When identifying cases in the data, I have used as criteria both the construction of the turn as well as the activity with which the turn is occupied. Adopting Drew’s (1998) definition of a formulation, I have focused on turns which represent an issue or an implication from the prior speaker’s turn(s). However, re-presenting might not be the only activity that the candidate understanding is involved in. The examples below illustrate the variation of candidate understandings in my data:



 Second Language Interaction

(1) Telephone conversation between friends. 01 S: No# >no mi-tä kuuluu< opiskele-t-ko nyt PRT PRT what-PAR hears study-2-Q now Well# >well how are you< do you study now 02 V: .hh Ööm eiei nyt ei hh .mthh öö nyt o:le-n koto-na NEGNEG now NEG now is-1 home-ESS .hh Ehm nono now no hh .mthh eh now I am: at home 03 S: Aha? Uhuh? 04 V: .hh Öö (0.2) >koska:< ö psyhologia ö- ei onnistu-nut. because psychology NEG succeed-PPC .hh Eh (0.2) >because:< e psychology e- didn’t succeed. 05 S: Ahaa.= I see.= vuode-ssa 06 V: =Ö tä-llä viikko-lla (0.2) öö tä-llä this-ADE week-ADE this-ADE year-INE =Eh this week (0.2) eh this year 07 S: >Aha< e-t opiskele nyt psykologia-a, PRT NEG-2 study now psychology-PAR → >Aha< you don’t study psychology now, 08 V: Mhm e:i .hh[h Mhm no: .hh[h [ 09 S: [Joo. [Yes. 10 V: Öö va:in öö suomea Eh on:ly eh Finnish 11 S: Joo. Yes.

(2) Office. 01 T: O- on-ko (.) s- minkälais-i-i ↑englanni-n kiele-n i- is-Q what.kind-pl-PAR English-GEN language-GEN I- is there (.) s- what kind of ↑courses in English 02 kursse-j-a te-i-llä on?= course-pl-PAR you-pl-ADE is language do you have?= 03 S: =Ehmm: 04 (0.5) 05 S: Tarkoita-t-ko mi-nkä tasois-i-a [tai mean-2-Q what-GEN level-pl-PAR [or → Do you mean which levels [or [ 06 T: [Niin ja [Yes and 07 S: Joo Yes

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings  08 T: Ja saa-n-ko (.) saa-n-ko itse niinkuin men-nä sinne koska and can-1-Q can-1-Q myself PRT go-INF there because And can I (.) can I like go there myself because .hh I 09 .hh opiskele-n siellä #ä# (.) siellä (.) yliopisto-lla study-1 there there university-ADE study there #e# (.) there (.) at the university

(3) Office. The client (H) tries to persuade the secretary to write a note for him which would allow him to join a course which is already full. 01 H: =Mutta saisi-n-(ne-ko) kirjoitta-a (0.5) ki- kirjoitta-a but may-1-(?-Q) write-INF wr- write-INF =But may I (you) write (0.5) wr- write this tämä(llais-i-a). (0.5) mi- minä mukaan (.) leika-tu-n this.(kind-pl-PAR) I- I with clip-PPPC-GEN (kind of thing). (0.5) I- I with me (.) a piece of 02 paperi-n. paper-GEN paper. 03 S: Että näytä-t o[pettaja-lle. PRT show-2 t[eacher-ALL → So that you show ((it)) to the teacher. [ 04 H: [(Jälkeen) joo [(After) yes 05 S: E- minä e-n kirjoita sellais-ta. n- I NEG-1 write that.kind-PAR No- I don’t write such a thing.

The above examples demonstrate the variation in the types of turns which can be labelled as candidate understandings. The linguistic construction of the arrowed turns is different, and they are framed differently as being tentative. Consequently, the turns can be identified as doing varying activities. Nevertheless, these turns also share properties. First, they all explicate the NS’s understanding on the basis of something the NNS has previously said. That is, one activity they all manage is checking the understanding. Second, the turns have a two-part format: the initial part consists of a particle or a question utterance (aha, tarkoitatko, että), and the latter part reformulates the information present in (or deduced from) the NNS’s prior turns. Third, the format is designed to elicit a confirmation: the candidate understanding could be interpreted as describing a B-event,2 since it reformulates information which originated in the prior speaker’s (the NNS’s) turn, and to which the prior speaker has primary access. Such utterances prompt comments on their accuracy (cf. Heritage 1985; Sacks 1992 [1966]; Pomerantz 1980). Fourth, and as a consequence of the previous point, the candidate understanding turns are a locus of a side sequence

 Second Language Interaction

(see Jefferson 1972). This side sequence consists, minimally, of the candidate understanding and its confirmation. When the participants are not involved in an argument or a disagreement sequence (examples (1) and (2)), the NS also produces a post-confirmation confirmation (lines 9 and 7), before the talk in progress continues. Despite these shared properties, the candidate understandings in the examples differ from each other in certain respects. One difference is the extent of confidence with which the utterances are produced. Example (1) presents a situation in which the NS’s display of understanding demonstrates her recognition of the NNS’s talk. The candidate understanding receives the prior talk as news: the initial particle (aha(a) ‘I see’ in lines 5 and 7) is a news receipt token and the subsequent utterance is merely a paraphrase of the NNS’s previous words. Example (2) is more hypothetical: the turn is presented in a question format (tarkoitatko ‘do you mean’) and finished with the disjunctive particle vai ‘or’ which creates an expectation for other alternatives. In (3), the NS presents a conclusion on the basis of the NNS’s turn. That is, she articulates the implied consequences of the NNS’s utterance. According to the classification by Heritage and Watson (1979), examples (1)–(2) could be defined as formulations of a gist, whereas (3) represents a formulation of an upshot. In the following, I will investigate the different types of candidate understandings according to their degree of tentativeness and in relation to the gist/upshot-distinction. The cases are divided into three categories (represented in the above examples) on the basis of the initial particle and the relationship between the information in the candidate turn and the preceding turn(s). In the first category, the candidate understandings do not provide new information; they merely summarize something which has been previously said. These candidates begin with particles displaying understanding. The second group consists of candidates which are linguistically marked as being uncertain e.g. with interrogative pronouns or disjunctive particles. In the last category, the candidate understandings further develop the proposition in the previous turn; they verbalise the upshot of what the previous speaker has said. In these instances, the preceding turn is often either grammatically incomplete or obscure in its references. The main initial particles of these candidate understandings are ni(i) and että. The first two categories are more like formulations of gists, while the last comes closer to formulations of upshots. Since my classification is based partly on the form of the candidate understanding (the initial element in the turn) and partly on its relation to the surrounding talk, the boundaries between the different categories are somewhat fuzzy. Another way of grouping the cases would have been e.g. on the


basis of the formal criteria only. However, this type of categorization would have led to a high number of categories, with some containing only a couple of cases. Moreover, it is not clear that the NNSs and the NSs use the same particles in the same environments, as will be shown below. My criteria for grouping the candidate understandings resulted from the fact that I wanted to discuss the examples within larger units so as to capture some general tendencies about the function of different candidate understandings in conversation.

. Paraphrasing candidate understandings The first group of cases consists of candidate understandings which are mainly occupied with rephrasing a stretch of prior talk. I have labelled these cases as ‘paraphrasing candidate understandings’ (or more concisely as ‘paraphrases’), since they provide a reverbalisation of prior talk by paraphrasing or summarising the previous turn. The candidate understandings in this group begin with particles that display recognition or realisation of something that has been said. There are news receipt tokens (aa, aha[a], sometimes also followed by other particles e.g. ahaa elikkä, ahaa siis), claims of recognition (ai niin) and affirmative particles (joo). In addition, I have included cases with the initial eli(kkä) (e.g. ‘in other words’ or ‘so’) in this category. According to the Descriptive Dictionary of Finnish, turn-initial eli(kkä) is a particle that can be followed by a paraphrase of the previous text (ISK: 983; see also Sorjonen 2000). Generally, paraphrasing candidate understandings orient backward rather than forward in conversation: the reverbalisation shifts focus to (a part of the) prior talk. Paraphrasing candidate understandings are produced both by the NSs and the NNSs in my data. I will first investigate cases in which the paraphrase is a resource used by the NS. .. Paraphrases by the NS – condensing previous turns The majority of the paraphrasing candidate understandings in the data are to be found in the turns by the NS. A data run on 36 office encounters and 5 fairly lengthy conversations between friends resulted in a collection of 23 paraphrasing candidate understandings. The NS is the producer of the turn in 17 instances, whereas the NNS is the producer in 6 instances. Example (1) from the previous section is one such paraphrase by the NS:



 Second Language Interaction

(1) [replicated] Telephone conversation between friends. 01 S: No# >no mi-tä kuuluu< opiskele-t-ko nyt PRT PRT what-PAR hears study-2-Q now Well# >well how are you< do you study now 02 V: .hh Ööm eiei nyt ei hh .mthh öö nyt o:le-n koto-na NEGNEG now NEG now is-1 home-ESS .hh Ehm nono now no hh .mthh eh now I am: at home 03 S: Aha? Uhuh? 04 V: .hh Öö (0.2) >koska:< ö psyhologia ö- ei onnistu-nut. because psychology NEG succeed-PPC .hh Eh (0.2) >because:< e psychology e- didn’t succeed. 05 S: Ahaa.= I see.= vuode-ssa 06 V: =Ö tä-llä viikko-lla (0.2) öö tä-llä this-ADE week-ADE this-ADE year-INE =Eh this week (0.2) eh this year 07 S: >Aha< e-t opiskele nyt psykologia-a, PRT NEG-2 study now psychology-PAR → >Aha< you don’t study psychology now, 08 V: Mhm e:i .hh[h Mhm no: .hh[h [ 09 S: [Joo. [Yes. 10 V: Öö va:in öö suomea Eh on:ly eh Finnish 11 S: Joo. Yes.

This example is taken from the beginning of a telephone conversation between two friends who have not talked with each other for a while. In this “howareyou” sequence (cf. Schegloff 1972; Hakulinen 1993), the participants update their knowledge about the other’s life situation. The caller, the NS, poses the first explicit question (‘do you study now’, line 1), to which the NNS answers with a rather indefinite, almost enigmatic utterance (nyt olen kotona ‘now I’m at home’). An explanation, however, follows in the two subsequent turns by the NNS (lines 4 and 6). The NS’s candidate understanding (line 7) is a summary of the information in the three prior turns by the NNS: it combines the causal link between being at home and the failure of psychology (‘didn’t succeed’, line 4), and it takes into account the temporal specification (in the adverb ‘now’), which the NNS presents in her turn in line 6. In other words, the NS’s turn in line 7 is a condensed version of the NNS’s prior speech. The candidate understanding has no new elements; the already mentioned causal

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

and temporal reasons for ‘being at home’ are merely rearranged so as to form one utterance describing the current situation (et opiskele nyt psykologiaa ‘you don’t study psychology now’). The candidate understanding is preceded by a particle aha which can be described as a news receipt token (ISK: 774). The NS produces a “fuller” version of this particle (ahaa) before the candidate turn, as a response to the NNS’s explanation (line 5). It is therefore worth noting that the NS has not displayed having any problems of understanding before the candidate turn (line 7); she has encouraged the NNS to continue (line 3) and acknowledged the new information (line 5). Hence, the candidate understanding – paraphrases in particular – need not always be an attempt to remedy an exposed interactional problem or a misunderstanding. The speaker can produce a paraphrase to demonstrate her ability to understand the other speaker’s talk, to lay out her understanding of the prior so that, in the event that it concurs with that of the other speaker’s, the participants can move on in the conversation. This is consistent with the observation by Raevaara (1993: 48) that an understanding check does not necessarily imply a problem in receiving the prior turn. It can be a way to demonstrate the recipient’s understanding of the implications of the previous turn. Since paraphrased candidate understandings present a condensed version of prior talk, they can be used to check or secure the core parts of the information that the previous speaker has given. This function is particularly useful in institutional talk, where the accuracy of the information is essential. The following examples illustrate such cases (candidate understandings are in italics): (4) The office of a summer course of Finnish. 01 E: Minä tarvitse-n myös (1.0) aika-a mm (.) jos: bussi-le (.) I need-1 also time-PAR if bus-ALL I need also (1.0) time mm (.) if: for the bus (.) the 02 bussi lähtee mm (.) Turku-un. bus leave Turku-ILL bus leaves mm (.) to Turku. 03 (.) 04 S: J:oo:? (.) koska= Y:es:? (.) when= 05 E: =O- on-ko sinu-a (.) aika-a (.) aika-a ja (.) ja soittaa i- is-Q you-PAR time-PAR time-PAR and and phone =A- are you (.) time (.) time and (.) and to phone (1.0) 06 (1.0) soittaa myös:, phone also to phone too:,

 Second Language Interaction 07 (0.5) 08 S: Joo. vo- (0.5) voi-n soitta-a (0.5) ˚hetkinen˚ (.) eli yes cacan-1 phone-INF moment PRT → Yes. I ca- (0.5) I can phone (0.5) ˚a moment˚ (.) so 09 halua-isi-t:::h (.) mt b::ussi-lla Turku-un. want-COND-2 bus-ADE Turku-ILL → you’d like::h (.) mt ((to go)) to Turku by bus. 10 E: J- juup Y- yes 11 S: Joo:?, Yes:?, 12 E: Viikon-loppu-na. week-end-ESS At the week-end. 13 S: ˚Joo:˚ ˚Yes:˚

(5) Office. One secretary is filling in a form for the client. The other secretary has gone to get photocopies of some pages of the client’s passport. 01 S: Sitten then here have.to-COND be-INF first permit Then 02 (1.5) 03 S: Oleskelu˚˚ The residence ˚˚ 04 V: Joo no se on pass[˚i-ssa˚ > Yes well it is in the pass˚port˚ [ 05 S: [>Joo< se o:n joo:? [>Yes< it i:s yes:? 06 (1.0) 07 S: ˚(ulkomaalainen)˚ ˚(foreign)˚ 08 V: ↓Joo:. ku se on ↓Yes:. because it is 09 S: Just (.) eli te-i-llä on o- oles↑kelu-lupa (.) ↑joo:? PRT PRT you-pl-ADE is residence-permit yes → Right (.) so you have a r- residence visa (.) ↑yes:? 10 V: ˚Joo se on (>kirjote-taanwritingVoi-te-ks< te merkata mu-lle tä-hän sisään sen ten˚ti-n˚ can-2.pl-Q you.pl mark I-ALL this-ILL in it-GEN exam-GEN >Can you< mark the exam for me in he˚re˚ 02 S: Kyl[lä? Yes[? [ 03 C: [Tenti-n? [exam-GEN [The exam? 04 (0.5) suomal- hist05 C: Se ol-isi ihan hyvin >mu-l on< perus-tiedo-t it is-COND PRT well I-ADE is basic-knowledge-pl Finn- histIt would be: quite well >I’ve< the basic knowledge of Finni06 suome-n historia-sta on niin hyvä-t et .hhh eh heheh .h he Finland-GEN history-ELA is so good-pl PRT hist- Finland’s history is so good so that .hh eh heheh .h he 07 S: Ai niin se suullinen sä [puhu-t nyt sii-tä PRT PRT it oral you [talk-2 now it-ELA Oh y’mean that oral you [talk about that now → [ 08 C: [hjoo [hyeah 09 C: Ja [se men-i ihan hy(h)vin .hh he and [it go-PST PRT well And [it went rather we(h)ll .hh he [ 10 S: [Ahaa [I see

In these examples, the NS produces the candidate understanding to provide a summary of the relevant parts of the NNS’s prior talk. In (4), the secretary reproduces the consequential elements – the means of travelling and the target location – from the client’s request in a condensed form, (bussi lähtee Turkuun ‘the bus leaves to Turku’ → bussilla Turkuun ‘to Turku by bus’). In (5), the NNS has responded to the secretary’s turn about the existence of the visa by naming its location (se on passissa ‘it is in the passport’). The secretary’s candidate understanding then makes explicit the presupposition in the client’s turn: that he has a valid visa. In (6), the secretary verbalises the type of the exam (suullinen ‘oral’) the NNS has been talking about.

 Second Language Interaction

In all the examples, the paraphrase can be said to seek confirmation of the secretary’s understanding of the (institutionally relevant parts of the) client’s utterances. Thus, the candidate understanding functions as the secretary’s way to ensure that the information she has is correct.3 The accuracy of the rephrased elements is essential, since they are consequential for the subsequent procedures. In (4), the secretary checks the key elements in the client’s request before beginning to perform the requested action and, in (5), she checks the necessary precondition for filling in a certain slot in an application form. In (6), the secretary uses the paraphrase to check certain conditions (the type of exam) in the client’s turn, on the basis of which she can then propose the next relevant action. The candidate understandings in (4)–(6) can thus be said to serve the institutional aim of being precise, which may be lacking in the everyday examples. However, the construction of the turn and its procedural relevance in conversation are similar in all examples. All the paraphrases present an utterance describing a B-event on the basis of something the NNS has said. The turns rephrase parts of the NNS’s prior talk: some elements of prior turns may be echoed, but some are substituted with other references. The paraphrases can contain previously unmentioned linguistic items – given that some units are substituted for others – but usually the substitutions are made within the same semantic category. This means, for example, that the temporal reference may be replaced by another temporal element, but the turns neither offer new perspectives on the issue, nor develop the proposition further. Another common feature of paraphrases is that they are a locus of an insertion sequence in the conversation: they evoke a confirmation by the recipient. The side sequence consists, minimally, of the candidate understanding and its confirmation. However, a closer look on the examples reveals that the sequence often has three parts. I repeat the relevant parts of the examples here for convenience: From example (1): 07 S: >Aha< et opiskele nyt psykologiaa, >I see< you don’t study psychology now, 08 V: Mhm e:i .hh[h Mhm no: .hh[h [ 09 S: [Joo [Yes

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

From example (4): 08 S: Eli haluaisit:::h (.) mt b::ussilla Turkuun. So you’d like::h (.) mt ((to go)) to Turku by bus. 09 E: J- juup Y- yes 10 S: Joo:?, Yes:?,

From example (5): 09 S: Eli teillä on o- oles↑kelulupa (.) ↑joo:? So you have a r- residence visa (.) ↑yes:? 10 V: ˚Joo se on (>kirjotetaanwritingsitte se kirja< ol-isi taas minu-lla täällä. office-GEN so then it book is-COND again I-ADE here >then the book< would be here with me again. >Ahaa siis< ensi maanantai-na. PRT PRT next Monday-ESS >I see so< next Monday. .h No esimerkiksi maanan- milloin tule-t tänne PRT for.example Monda- when come-2 here .h Well for example on Monda- when you come here yliopisto-lle nin .hh university-ALL to the university .hh A[ha I[ see [ [Jos ei siit- jos e-t tarvitse nii- (.) ↓tuo-ta kirja-a.↓ [if NEG it if NEG-2 need thothat-PAR book-PAR [If that’s no- if you don’t need tho- (.) ↓that book.↓

(8) Office. The client has asked about the location of a certain course. The secretary has told that it is in the “auditorium nine”. As the client is not familiar with this place, the secretary takes out a map. 01 S: Tää on se paikka auditorio yhdeksän This is the place the auditorium nine 02 (0.5) 03 U: Tämmä= This= 04 S: =Tässon paikka. =Here is the place. 05 U: Tämmä paika [ihan This place [quite [ 06 S: [Joo >eli< täs on pää-ra- #a# tämä rakennus (.) [yes PRT here is main-buithis building [Yes >in other words< here is the main bui- #a# 07 (.) mutta se #ö# se on Senaatin-tori-n puole-lla but it it is Senate-Square-GEN side-ADE this building (.) but it #eh# it is on the side of the Senate Square 08 (0.5) 09 U: Aa toise-n puole-lla= PRT other-GEN side-ADE → Ah other side=


10 S: =Joo =Yes 11 U: Mi- mikä keros ˚ehkä˚ Wh- which floor ˚maybe˚

The paraphrases by the NNSs display the speaker’s understanding of some (institutionally relevant) information in the prior talk. In (7), the NNS focuses on the temporal reference in the NS’s turn which is relevant for her own future action. She reproduces and combines the temporal elements (‘Monday’ and ‘next week’) which define the time-table for her next visit to the office (line 5). In (8), the NNS displays that she identified the location (line 9) she needs to know in order to be able to go to the course. Both candidate understandings begin with a particle indicating some kind of revelation (ahaa, aa). The former paraphrase is, however, checking understanding more clearly than the latter. In (7), the turn preceding the candidate understanding is potentially problematic to interpret: it is rather long, and it contains hedges and insertions (lines 1–4). The secretary is not solely laying out the time-table for the next action; instead, she is “thinking aloud” about the relevant temporal factors. The thinking aloud -character of the turn is signalled by the hesitation sounds, the modal particles (kyllä varmaan), the self-directed utterance at the end of line 1, and the conditional mood (jos tulisit – niin sitte olisi ‘if you came – then it would be’). Thus, the candidate understanding in this example can be seen to register and clarify the information the NS has given in her somewhat fragmentary response. In particular, the NNS uses the candidate understanding to clarify the information which is consequential for her expected future actions. The same tendency can be observed in (8), even though this candidate understanding is recognising rather than checking in character. Again, however, this piece of information (about the location) is relevant for the NNS’s next action: she needs to talk to a certain teacher as soon as possible and, to be able to do this, she has to find out where the teacher is lecturing. The distribution of paraphrasing candidate understandings in the data (17 by the NSs, 6 by the NNSs) could indicate that this linguistic resource is somehow better suited to the typical linguistic behaviour of the NS. It should be borne in mind, however, that in my data the NS is often also the representative of an institution. As was evident in Chapter 3, there are conversational locations in institutional encounters which involve certain activities, in particular that of checking. The paraphrasing candidate understandings resemble these corrective second or third position turns: the secretary can produce the paraphrase to clarify the client’s question (cf. examples (4) and (6)) or the client’s



 Second Language Interaction

answer to the previous question (cf. example (5)). This type of candidate understanding could, actually, represent a version of a modified repetition studied in Chapter 3; the modification is just more substantial than a morphological change. In (morphologically) modified repetitions, the NS does not, however, produce post-confirmation confirmations, since the modifications are already followed by an affirmative particle. In this sense, the (morphologically) modified repeats – with confirming particles that immediately follow – are more “purely” registering in character, whereas the candidate understandings establish an expectation of a confirmation and, therefore, are also inquiring in character. To summarise, the unequal distribution of paraphrasing candidate understandings does not necessarily, or solely, reflect the linguistic asymmetry between participants. It may also result from the participants’ institutional roles and the activities associated with these roles. Paraphrases are largely used to accomplish a particular function, to check the speaker’s understanding of some prior information. The secretaries are more often involved in activities where they have to find out and write down exact information about the other participant. The clients need also to understand the details in the secretaries’ turns, in particular when some relevant future actions are described. Yet these situations are more infrequent: the secretaries gather information throughout the managing of the matter, whereas the instructions for future procedures tend to occur at the end of the encounter. Usually, the instructions and suggestions are based on the information the secretary has collected during the encounter. Paraphrasing candidate understandings can have multiple functions in conversation. For example, the secretaries often use paraphrases to confirm their understanding of the accuracy of some piece of institutionally consequential information. The NNSs, for their part, produce paraphrases to check that they have understood the necessary/relevant details in the institutional actions they are expected to undertake. In both cases, however, the paraphrase is a means to shift the focus on the institutionally relevant parts in talk. Paraphrasing candidate understandings do not occur only in institutional talk. They also can be found in everyday NS-NNS conversation. This is interesting, since formulations – turns through which participants construct an explicit sense of the talk thus far (Drew 1998: 32) – are generally not found in everyday conversation between native speakers (cf. Heritage 1985). Is it, then, a distinctive feature of NS-NNS conversation that it contains turns which are mainly occupied with presenting the recipient’s understanding of prior talk? It would, nevertheless, be hasty to draw such a direct conclusion. Although understanding probably becomes more salient the less shared linguistic resources


the interlocutors have, this is not readily apparent by comparing paraphrasing candidate understandings and formulations. As noted earlier, these two turns are different. Formulations can be used to develop further the original proposition or colour it with a new attitude (So you’re really accusing them..., see Drew 1998: 36). Formulations seek to find out the limits of the prior speaker’s proposition; what (all) she can accept as having meant with her previous utterance. In contrast, paraphrases mainly rephrase some stretch of prior talk, usually the “central information” in it. Thus, rather than the limits, paraphrases seek to find out the core in the prior speaker’s meaning. That is, candidate understandings are more explicitly serving the purpose of intersubjectivity: they are produced to establish or confirm mutual intelligibility, whereas formulations are also used to establish a challenge, a contradiction etc. Since paraphrasing candidate understandings can be considered to be a vehicle for intersubjectivity, it is not surprising to find them in conversations in which there is both a demand for shared information and somewhat restricted resources to produce this information. In other words, paraphrases are well fitted to the needs of office conversation between NSs and NNSs. As checking information is an essential activity for any secretary, paraphrase is a useful resource for secretaries in general, regardless of their clients’ linguistic background. The usefulness of this strategy is highlighted in NS-NNS encounters which can be expected to be more prone to misunderstandings. In conclusion, paraphrasing candidate understandings have different functions and these are exploited by all speakers. These functions are, then, connected to the conversational activities the speakers are engaged in. The fact that these turns can be found more frequently in institutional than in everyday NS-NS talk indicates that they serve more as a resource for the secretary than for the NS. Thus, the observation that, in general, it is the NS who has (and takes) principal responsibility for the success of the interaction (cf. e.g. Roberts 1996) can be specified in the following terms: the NS makes an effort to clarify utterances and check her understanding in the cases which are institutionally important. Similarly, however, the NNS produces clarifications in cases which describe an institutionally relevant future activity for her. The difference in the amount of the candidate understandings the NSs and the NNSs produce in the data can be, to a large extent, explained through the institutional roles of the NS and the NNS, and the activities typically combined with these roles.



 Second Language Interaction

. Uncertainty-marked candidate understandings The second category of candidate understandings to be found in my data are cases which are marked as being uncertain: hence I will call them ‘uncertaintymarked candidate understandings’ or ‘uncertainty-marked paraphrases’. These are similar to paraphrases in that they are backward-oriented: they often present a paraphrastic reading of the prior speech. However, this group of candidate understandings differs from the paraphrases in that there is an element that indicates uncertainty. The speakers frame the turns as uncertain through the interrogative elements in Finnish (a question word or the interrogative morpheme kO). Further, I have included in this group candidate understandings with the initial conclusive particle (siis, ai, e.g. ‘y’mean’, ‘so’) or with the utterance-final particle vai ‘or’; these particles have been found typically in second-position questions in Finnish (Raevaara 1993, 1996: 35–36). Rising intonation can also mark the second-position questions in Finnish (Raevaara 1993: 48), so I have likewise counted this as an uncertainty-marking element. Finally, I have included utterances beginning with the second person singular form of the verb tarkoittaa ‘mean’ in this category. Some of the NNSs seem to use forms of the verb tarkoittaa (e.g. sinä tarkoitat ‘you mean’) instead of the Finnish conclusive particles. In other words, I have classified the cases in this category as “uncertaintymarked” on the basis of intonation, interrogative elements or particles that the turns contain. Like the paraphrases, uncertainty-marked cases shift the focus backward rather than forward. However, as uncertainty-framed turns are marked as being interrogatives (either grammatically, lexically or prosodically), they often function as repair initiators. Instead of primarily claiming and demonstrating understanding (like paraphrases), they check (or clarify) the speaker’s understanding of the prior. Uncertainty-marked paraphrases are to be found mostly in talk by the NS in my data. In the previously mentioned sample of the data, there are 50 turns which can be labelled as uncertainty-marked candidate understandings. Of these, 43 are produced by the NS and 7 by the NNS. The functions of these uncertainty-marked turns partly overlap with paraphrasing candidate understandings. There are however, also usages which are typical only of the uncertainty-marked category. One such function is resolving a word search by identifying a term. In addition, uncertainty-marked candidate understandings are used to elaborate a prior reference and to present a conclusion on the basis of prior talk. I will discuss these functions below.


.. Uncertainty-marked paraphrase as elaborating an utterance Uncertainty-marked turns that are used to elaborate some linguistic unit in the prior speaker’s talk often function as repair. That is, they do repair in the broadly conversation analytic sense; instead of replacing an item with another, they modify or provide additional information to the previous reference. In general, the elaborations provide a more specific description of some prior stretch of talk; the specification may involve replacing a superordinate term with a more specific subordinate term, replacing a pronoun with a full noun or, in general, providing more information about the prior utterance. When used to elaborate the prior, uncertainty-marked paraphrases can be said to change the level of reference from more general to more particular. Consider the following examples: (9) [2] Office. 01 T: O- on-ko (.) s- minkälais-i-i ↑englanni-n kiele-n i- is-Q what.kind-pl-PAR English-GEN language-GEN I- is there (.) s- what kind of ↑courses in English 02 kursse-j-a te-i-llä on?= course-pl-PAR you-pl-ADE is language do you have?= 03 S: =Ehmm: 04 (0.5) 05 S: Tarkoita-t-ko mi-nkä tasois-i-a [tai mean-2-Q what-GEN level-pl-PAR [or Do you mean which levels [or → [ 06 T: [Niin ja [Yes and 07 S: Joo Yes 08 T: Ja saa-n-ko (.) saa-n-ko itse niinkuin men-nä sinne koska .hh and can-1-Q can-1-Q myself PRT go-INF there because And can I (.) can I y’know go there myself because .hh 09 opiskele-n siellä #ä# (.) siellä (.) yliopisto-lla study-1 there there university-ADE I study there #e# (.) there (.) at the university

(10) Friends. R tells how he managed to get a flat when he arrived in Helsinki. 01 R: Ol-i-n 04 S: Joo:? Yes:? 05 R: Se on äää (.) Pirk- Pirkkala-n: lähellä(h)[h hehh It is ehh (.) near Pirk- Pirkkala(h) [h hehh [ 06 S: [Joo nii eli vähän [Yes right so a bit 07 (.) kauempa↑na (.) further awa↑ y 08 R: .hhh Ja: m: mt #evv# mh mä (.) mä löysin #äää# .hhh And: m: mt #evv# mh I (.) I found #ehh# 09 S: Soit-i-t+sä va- siis sä vaan nä-i-t ilmotukse-n. call-PST-2+you PRT you only see-PST-2 ad-GEN → Did you call- so you just saw the ad. 10 R: Joo m- [m- mä Yes I- [I- I [ 11 S: [.h Ja sit sä soitit:. [vai. → [.h And then you called:. [or. [ 12 R: [˚Mh˚ 13 R: Joo mm- me soitimme ja: Yes mm- we called and:

In the examples above, the uncertainty-marked turns are used to specify the previous utterance. In (9), the reference is narrowed down to a “sub-category”, i.e. a qualification of the prior is provided. The question ‘what kind of ’ is narrowed down to refer to the different levels (line 5). In (10), the uncertaintymarked candidate understanding decomposes the action (‘I found’) into its probable or possible components (‘you saw the ad and then you phoned’). Despite their similarly elaborating character, uncertainty-marked candidate understandings can be used to accomplish different conversational functions. The distinction between institutional and everyday conversation is, again, manifested in the examples above. As in most of the cases thus far, the candidate understanding in institutional talk (9) is used to check and confirm some details relevant for the following procedures and activities. Before beginning to provide any information, the secretary specifies the reference of the question word in the client’s turn. In conversation between friends, in contrast, the candidate understandings are used more for interpersonal and interactional purposes. In (10), the uncertainty-marked turn displays the NS’s involvement in the narrative and her ability to follow the NNS’s description. By producing utterances or terms that are co-referential but more specific, the NS

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

demonstrates that she has followed the NNS’s description and has recognised the relevant parts in it. That is, the turns manifest intersubjectivity and mutual understanding between the participants: the NS is interested and involved in the NNS’s narrative, given that she wants to know more about the details of the NNS’s story. The differences in the conversational function of the candidate understandings are reflected in the design of the sequences above. In the office conversation, it is necessary for the secretary to know the exact reference of the client’s question before attempting to answer. Thus, the secretary poses a clarificatory question (line 5). In (10), the NS does not wait for an answer to her question (line 9); instead, she begins modifying and developing the question further herself (line 11). This intensifies the impression of her being involved in the other’s narrative – almost a will to be a co-author – whereas the pattern “clarificatory question – answer – acknowledgement” is suitable for the typical institutional activity of checking the accuracy of information. Another type of elaboration in the candidate understandings adds an element to the prior utterance usually to provide a place reference. Sorjonen (2001: 58) has observed that one type of trouble that candidate understandings often pick up on is the reference of indexical expressions. In these cases, the recipient produces a turn that contains a nominal element which through its semantics and casemarking targets a deictic expression in the coparticipant’s prior utterance and offers an understanding of its reference (ibid.: 112). In my data, there are cases where the candidate understanding is produced to “open up” a deictic expression (cf. example (12)), but it is also produced to add the location in utterances where it has not been mentioned: (11) Office. The clients (T and P) have said that they would be interested in beginning to study English language and data processing. 01 S: .hh (.) Te olette uusia oppilaita ette ole opiskelleet .hh (.) You are new students you haven’t studied here 02 meillä aikaisemmin: ˚ei[kö niin.˚ before: ˚ri[ght˚. [ 03 T: [Mhm. 04 S: Silloin (.) seuraava-n jakso-n alu-ssa (.) jae-taan then next-GEN period-GEN beginning-INE deal-PAS Then (.) at the beginning of the next period (.) we give away 05 sellaise-t vapaa-t paika-t (.) [jo-tka (.) on jää-nyt (.) that.kind-plfree-pl place-pl [that-pl is remain-PPC those free places (.) which (.) have been ↓left over [ 06 T: [Mhm

 Second Language Interaction 07 S: ↓täyttä-mä-ttä ↑peruu[tus-paika-t. fill-INF-ABE cance[llation-place-pl ↑the c[ancellation places. [ 08 T: [Mhm 09 (0.5) 10 T: ˚Joo˚= ˚Yes˚= 11 S: =Eli [ei ole paljon paikko-j-a. PRT [NEG is much place-pl-PAR =So [there are not many places. [ 12 P: [>Siis< (s’-lle) tietokone:-kurssi-lle. [PRT (it-ALL) computer-course-ALL → [>Y’mean< (in the) computer course. 13 (.) 14 P: [ [Q → [ [ 15 S: [Siihen↑kin (.) mutta se on vain kahdentoista oppilaan ryhmä? [There ↑too (.) but it’s only a group of twelve people?

(12) Four friends talking about studying. 01 R:

Ja:: öö nyt ohh- minä opiskelen venäjää. And:: eh now stu- I study Russian. 02 (0.8) 03 R: Se on [(noin) phh ˚mitä se on˚ (0.5) ˚deug˚ hmhh .hh ääm (0.5) It is [(about) phh ˚what is it˚ (0.5) ˚deug˚ hmh .hh ehm (0.5) [ 04 S: [Jooh [Ye:s 05 R: mt #mitä se on suomeksi# (1.0) #mitä se: [se# >mitä mt #what is it in Finnish# (1.0) #what is: [is# >what [ 06 S2 : [Ee- ei sil+oo [Th- there’s no 07 R: [o:n< [i:s< [ 08 S2 : [ei sil oo vastinet[ta. [there’s no equival[ent. [ 09 R: [Hhhheh he [.hhh [

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings  10 S:

11 R:

[£Nih£ hh kr[hm [£Yes£ hh kr[hm [ [Se on öö fhhh [It is eh fhhh

12 S2 : Se on kahen vuoden:, It is a two-year:, 13 R: Joo. Yes. 14 S2 : ↓Tutkinto. ↓Degree. 15 S: Joo: Yes: 16 S2 : Siis siin on niiku kaks vuot-ta opiskelu-a [˚ja sitte˚ PRT there is PRT two year-PAR studying-PAR [and then Like there is like two years of studying [˚and then˚ [ 17 S: [Siis tääl [PRT here → [Y’mean here 18 yliopisto-ssa vai. university-INE or → at the university or. 19 R: Joo. Yes. 20 S2 : Nii [Bordeaux’ssa ↓nii. Yes [in Bordeaux ↓ yes. [ 21 S: [Aijaa. [I see.

In the examples above, the candidate understandings consist of a noun phrase in a locative case ending. By adding the locative phrase, the speaker elaborates the entity which is being talked about. The need to clarify is more transparent in the office encounter (11): in order to be able to follow the institutional procedures, the client needs to know the scope of the secretary’s answer, whether it applies only to the one course or to both. In (12), the clarificatory turn by the NS can be looked at in light of the previous conversation: the NNS has expressed difficulty in explaining what deug is, and the participants are involved in trying to find an appropriate Finnish phrasing for the issue. By elaborating the other speaker’s description, the NS can participate in the search process; she displays her current understanding of the concept. It is worth noting that the speaker identities do not play a crucial role in the examples above. In (11), it is the NNS who produces the candidate understanding, and in (12) it is the NS.5 Further, it should be noted that in (12),

 Second Language Interaction

the negotiation about the concept is mainly carried out between the two native speakers of Finnish, who have a different access to knowledge about the issue that is being talked about. The elaborative character of uncertainty-marked candidate understandings is particularly well suited for conversations in which some terms and references may be unknown or obscure to the other participant, or for conversations where the accuracy of the information is important. Office encounters between a NS and a NNS fulfil both conditions: despite their asymmetry in the access to the language in use, both participants must also understand the details in the other speaker’s turn. The following example demonstrates a typical institutional use of the elaborative candidate understanding in the data: it is produced as a follow-up question in order to clarify the previous answer. (13) Office. The client wants to begin a course at the institution; she has studied somewhere else before. 01 S: Muista-t-ko mi-tä oppi-kirja-a [˚te-i-llä on˚ remember-2-Q what-PAR text-book-PAR [you-pl-ADE is Do you remember which text book [˚you have˚ [ 02 U: [>No joo< se on suomi [PRT yes it is Finnish [>Well yes< it is Finnish 03 ja .hh a (.) aa mm (.) ja Finnish for foreigners and .hh a (.) ah mm (.) and Finnish for foreigners 04 S: Yks [vai → One [or [ 05 U: [Ja a- j- juka ssi ja kaksi= [And a- o- one and two= 06 S: =Luit molem[mat kirjat =You read bot[h books [ 07 U: [J- joo [Y- yes

The secretary uses a candidate understanding to specify the client’s answer. The candidate understanding is a follow-up question that prompts further information about the issue which is being discussed. The secretary attempts to find out the student’s level of knowledge of the Finnish language by inquiring about the textbooks she has read. The candidate understanding (line 4) makes the inquiry by suggesting an alternative, that the book the student has named refers only to the first volume. In response, the client mentions the correct number of books.


Candidate understandings can thus be used not only to clarify unclear references, but also to set up a model for the type of information which is being sought. In the latter function, candidate understandings come close to the candidate answers studied by Pomerantz (1988). In conversations where the other participant is a non-native speaker, such candidate understandings can be functional: using a concrete example, the NS can demonstrate to the NNS the type of information or answer the NNS is expected to give. Moreover, such candidate understanding turns can be constructed as being linguistically rather simple. In (13), the candidate understanding by the NS is a single nominal phrase in the unmarked case. Also, the interrogative character of the turn is not marked morphologically. Instead, it is framed as being an interrogative by the utterance-final particle vai ‘or’ (cf. Raevaara 1993). Morpho-syntactically simple candidate understandings which show the recipient what kind of information the speaker is after can easily be seen as a useful conversational tool in institutional NS-NNS conversation. However, the strategy of offering a candidate answer is also exploited in other types of (asymmetric) interactions. Haakana (1999) has observed that doctors use candidate answers to define the parametres they want the patients to include in their answers. Exemplification is often a more economical way to define the target utterance than by trying to describe the factors which should be taken into account in formulating the answer. Using a candidate understanding as defining the relevant parametres can be seen as reflecting the professionalism of the speaker; in (13), the secretary manages to get the clients to produce the relevant information (the level of studies) rather efficiently, with an utterance which is grammatically and lexically easily understood. In sum, one typical usage for the uncertainty-marked candidate understanding is elaborating the prior turn. In other words, the speaker produces the candidate understanding in order to specify an utterance or to add more information to the prior utterance. This elaboration can, in turn, be used to accomplish various conversational goals. Elaboration can clarify unclear relations between turns and hence check the speaker’s interpretation of the prior. Elaboration can also be produced to prompt more information, especially when it functions as a model for the type of answer which the recipient is expected to provide. These usages can often be found in institutional conversation. In everyday conversation, candidate understandings that elaborate an utterance are more often used for interactional and interpersonal purposes. The speaker can display interest and involvement in the other speaker’s story by producing a more elaborate (but tentative) version of some chunk of the narrative. A request for elaboration indicates the speaker’s interest, not only in the



 Second Language Interaction

main line of the story, but also in the very details of it. Moreover, being able to produce an element of the other speaker’s story, albeit tentatively, demonstrates the participants’ co-operation and the non-problematic nature of the interaction. The joint construction of some description is a display of the shared knowledge between the participants; they are “on the same wavelength” (cf. Antaki et al. 1996; Kallikoski 2000). In addition to elaborating prior references, uncertainty-marked candidate understandings are also used to identify or deconstruct terms or concepts when the reference is unknown or unclear for the participant. In the following section, I will investigate such instances. .. Uncertainty-marked paraphrase as identifying a term There is one environment in the data which is particularly typical of the uncertainty-marked candidate understandings. This environment is the turn subsequent to a word search. Candidate understandings are produced after word searches particularly in cases where one participant has attempted to resolve the search by providing a term which the other has not recognised. The participant who did not recognise (or is not certain of) the suggested resolution produces a candidate understanding to have her understanding of the term confirmed (cf. Chapter 4). The examples mentioned in this section have one feature in common – their aim to resolve a word search. Thus, these examples have been identified on the basis of the activity the turns are involved in: the turns seek to find a Finnish word for a referent which the speaker has not been able to name in such a way that the recipient would have immediately recognised it. The speaker has, however, made an attempt at resolving the search; she has tried to make the referent recognisable by e.g. using loan words, or by describing the referent in Finnish. The candidate understanding is then produced in response to these resolution attempts. I will first discuss cases where the NSs produce uncertainty-marked candidate understandings to suggest a standard Finnish equivalent for the resolution. Some of the examples below have already been shown and discussed in Chapter 4 (on word searches), so they will not be analysed here in such detail.

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

(14) Friends talking about log cabins and other wooden houses. 01 J: Ka- kauan. (.) kauan sitten (0.5) ää on vain (.) ää Lo- long. (.) long time ago (0.5) eh there is only (.) eh 02 (.) >˚mitä˚< papet parpyh. (.) >˚what˚< papet parpyh. 03 (1.2) 04 S: Ymm on-k+se ny sitte selluloosa-a vai,= is-Q+it now then cellulose-PAR or → Ymm is it now then cellulose or,= 05 J: =˚Sellu˚ =˚Cellu˚ 06 (0.2) 07 S: Niiku ennen #e# semmo[-sta enne, ] mi-s[tä paperi-a PRT before that.ki[nd-PAR before] what[-ELA paper-PAR Like before #b# a kind of before, of what paper [ ] [ 08 J: [Enne (e) ] [pape- >joojoojoo< [Befor (e) ] [pape- >yesyesyes< 09 S: Se on selluloosaa= It is cellulose= 10 J: =Joo ˚>ja sitand thenpan-na< on pand you put-3 put-2 put-INF is .h An:d #a# you: (.) put:s (.) put (.) >to put< has p- (.) 02 (.) sinä (.) äää ole-n o↑le-t pan-nut (.) ääm: (.) paperi. you be-1 be-2 put-PPC paper you (.) ehm has ha↑ve put (.) ehm: (.) paper. 03 (1.0) 04 O: Ääm (.) mm th uth u ((osoittaa karttaa pöydällä)) täälä. (.) Eem (.) mm th uth u ((points to a map on the desk)) here (.) 05 ˚mitä se on˚ ˚what is it˚ 06 (.) ((S is looking at the point on the map)) 07 S: .hh Ää (1.0) ↓mm↓ tarkota-t-ko pesäpallomean-2-Q baseball → .hh Eh (1.0) ↓mm↓ do you mean the baseball08 O: Joo pesäpalloa. Yes baseball. 09 S: Joo .h joo laitoin sinne .h että: m- on pesäpallo-ot↑telu Yes .h yes I put down there .h tha:t there’s a baseball game

These examples differ from the prior ones in that the relation between the missing word and the disruption in the ongoing activity is not straightforward. When first looking at (16) and (17), it seems that a word search again disrupts ongoing talk: the NNS verbalises her failure to find some linguistic unit (‘what is it’; lines 2 and 5). However, in (16), the search is already finished when the NS produces the candidate understanding; the NNS finds the missing word (‘lighter’), i.e. the answer to her question herself (line 2). In (17), the NNS has difficulty in formulating a question about an ad for a baseball game which the secretary has posted on the notice board. Having struggled with the inflection of the verb panna ‘put’, the NNS relates the utterance to a specific location with the help of a map. Consequently, the final question, ‘what is it’ (line 5), need not be a verbalisation of a missing element but, instead, “the question part of the turn”. In other words, when the NNS has begun his turn by describing the secretary’s action and has then produced the relevant location, he demonstrates that his turn was a question by producing an interrogative. Hence, the candidate understanding by the NS is not an attempt to terminate a search sequence,

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

as it was in the prior examples; instead, the NS checks or confirms that she is correctly following the NNS’s speech. Thus, in (16) and (17), the candidate understanding by the NS is not directly responsive to the word search initiated by the NNS: the NNS has completed her turn before the NS produces the candidate. The intonation contour of the NNSs’ turns (lines 4–5 and 1–4) is terminal. However, these turns have included hesitancy-marking (hesitation sounds, pauses, restarts), followed by pointing hand gestures and deictic locative pronouns. In other words, the NNS has specified spatial relations by using pronouns that have referential meanings. The candidate understanding can be said to be responsive to these markers of referential meaning; it is an attempt to explicate the meaning at the particular moment and in the context that the interactants are involved in. The NNSs use gestures to specify the meaning of the pronouns tästä (Ex. 16, line 5) and tääl(l)ä (Ex. 17, line 4), ‘here’. Together with the “squeezing” gesture, tästä defines the object of the burning and gives a hint of the manner of the action (about iconic gestures, see McNeill 1992; Kendon 1997). The other proadverb tääl(l)ä and the accompanying pointing gesture provide the context for the NNS’s prior utterance. The location the NNS points to on the map – presumably the baseball ground – provides a modifier (“about what”) for the object of the secretary’s action in the utterance ‘you have put up a piece of paper (about a baseball match)’. Thus, although these candidate understandings do not replace the NNS’s attempts to resolve a word search as clearly as the identifying turns, they can still be understood as serving the same purpose: all candidate understandings in this section seek to produce an unambiguous version of the prior, in some way obscure or ambiguous, reference. When an entity or action is referred to with deictic pronouns and gestures, the candidate understanding is used to discover the context-specific reading of this combination: how does the particular gesture specify the referential meaning of the pronoun. In all the examples in this section, candidate understandings thus produce another “name” for entities or activities originally described by other means. When the candidate understandings identify a term, they also help to terminate a word search by offering either the standard version or a version which is recognisable to both participants. When identifying gestures and their relation to the ongoing talk, candidate understandings are not necessarily involved in resolving a word search. Instead, they provide a verbal conclusion on the basis of the prior, partly gestural, information. Still, their interactional function remains the same: to secure mutual intelligibility by replacing ambiguous references with references that both participants recognise.

 Second Language Interaction

This interactional function distinguishes the identifying candidate understandings from the elaborating turns. Whereas the latter can sometimes be produced to clarify a reference, the former do this by definition. Identifying turns are produced as a response to a problematic or ambiguous reference – a nonFinnish word or a gesture. Elaborating candidate understandings more often provide a specification to an already-identified utterance. In general, elaborating candidate understandings are used to specify the prior references, to modify them from general to more particular (‘what kind of → which levels, there are not many places → you mean in that computer course’). In identifying turns, in contrast, the direction of the modification is reversed. The participants identify specific terms by providing more general explanations or by using generally known names. Terms like kooli and papet parpyh are identified by producing the standard Finnish word (hiili ‘coal’ and selluloosa ‘cellulose’). Thus, although the boundaries of the categories are never clear-cut, the elaborating candidate understandings tend to narrow down the prior reference, whereas the identifying turns open it up. In addition to the types of uncertainty-marked candidate understandings discussed so far, there are turns which check the speaker’s interpretation of the prior and which are also marked as being uncertain, but which do not represent any typical instance of elaboration or identification. These turns present a conclusion on the basis of prior speech, and I will investigate this last group of uncertainty-marked turns in the subsequent section. .. Uncertainty-marked paraphrases as presenting a conclusion I have defined the third group of uncertainty-marked candidate understandings in relation to the two former categories; more precisely, as terms of their negation. Thus, in this section I will explore cases in which the candidate understanding turns are not involved in resolving a word search or where they do not provide more elaborate information of the prior reference. This group is more heterogeneous than the prior ones: a common feature of these examples is that they all present a conclusion on the basis of something the prior speaker has said. This criterion is not, however, unambiguously discriminating, since the identifications and elaborations can also be said to be speaker’s conclusions of the prior speech. However, the conclusive character of the turns is more prominent in the examples in this section; this is reflected by the fact that the candidate understandings do not necessarily provide an interpretation of the immediately preceding turn, as they have in previous examples. The conclusive candidate understandings can also refer to a turn or a sequence some

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

time earlier in the conversation, and they can produce summaries of larger stretches of talk. I will first discuss cases in which the candidate understanding presents a possible consequence of what the prior speaker has said. The following excerpts exemplify such a situation: (18) Office. The encounter is over and the client is about to leave. The secretary says that a written permission is needed for the video recording and hands a piece of paper to the client. After the client has begun spelling out the text in the paper, the secretary reads it aloud: 01 S: Että tää keskustelu on nauhote-ttu (.) ja että sä anna-t PRT this conversation is record-PPPC and PRT you give-2 That this conversation has been recorded (.) and that you 02 ↓hehh [ [ [anna-n. 05 J [Anna-n [give-1 [give-1 [I do [I do. 06 S: Tänää+o kolmaskymmenes [päivä. today+is thirtieth [day Today is the 30th. [ 07 J: [Pitäs: (.) allekirjoittaa >vai mitäor what ˚here˚ [



 Second Language Interaction 03 S:

04 T: 05 T: → 06

07 S:

08 T:

[Nii (.) sit sä voi-t v[arata paikka-a. [PRT then you can-2 r[eserve place-PAR [Yes (.) then you can be reserving a place. [ [Si[TheSis: (.) varma-sti ↓pääse-n. >siis on< enemmän ↓mahdollisuus PRT sure-ADV get.in-1 PRT is more possibility So (.) I get in ↓for sure. >I mean there’s< more ↓possibility [ainakin↓. [at least↓. [ [Enemmän mahdollisuuks-i[-a ky:llä? [more possibility-pl-[PAR PRT [More possibilities ye:s? [ [Mhm. ˚joo˚= [Mhm. ˚yes˚=

(21) Office. The client has inquired (in English) about the Finnish courses at the institution.

S: And probably you (.) want to start in the ↓basics (.) S: ↓Very beginning (.) ↓ I: No I have- [have studied, S: [WaS: ↑You ha[ve studied↑ I: [the basics=[yes S: [Okay. (.) good. I: ˚(For the advanced) co[urse˚ S: [Mhm. (1.8) I: (But you have also) Eng↑lish (.) course (some time) S: ↑Yes↑ ˚yeah˚ (1.5) S: Eahh: (1.5) S: Sitte #e# tarkoita-t nä-i-tä jatko (.) taso-n oletthen mean-2 this-pl-PAR advanced level-GEN is-2 → In that case #e# you mean these advanced (.) levels you are18 puhu-t varsin hyv-i suome-a. speak-2 PRT good-INS Finnish+PAR you speak Finnish fairly well. 19 I: Ei (.) £ei hyvin.£ No (.) £not well.£ 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings  20 S: £Ei hy[vin.£ £Not w[ell.£ [ 21 I: [↓E- e- £ei£ [↓N- n- £no£

In these examples, the candidate understanding clarifies something in the prior turn(s) by looking at it from a new perspective. In (20), the client produces the candidate understanding (line 5) in order to change the perspective from the institutional regulations (what can be done) to her actual case (when she is guaranteed a place in particular courses). The secretary approaches the client’s issue from the point of view of the gate-keeper (cf. Erickson & Schultz 1982): she completes the client’s prior turn (line 3) by articulating the institutional right that the client is entitled to, under the conditions she has mentioned in her first turn (lines 1–2). By producing the candidate understanding, the client re-introduces the issue in her perspective; she focuses on the aim of the process (to become a student at the institution) instead of the means to achieve this aim. It is worth noting that the client modifies her candidate understanding turn from more absolute (‘I will get in for sure’) to more optional (‘more possibility’). That is, the change in perspective – from regulations to the desired goal – does not mean that the client would treat the achievement of the goal as being self-evident. With the candidate understanding, she merely shifts the focus to the issue which is most salient to her. In (21), the secretary uses the candidate understanding (line 17) to take a stand on the information the client has previously produced or, more accurately, on her interpretation of the implications of the client’s linguistic behaviour. This excerpt illustrates well how people, along with giving information, also give off information (cf. Goffman 1963; Kendon 1997). Clients can provide specific pieces of information about their language learning history but, even if they do not, their choice of language conveys something about their current language skills. Those who can speak Finnish usually speak Finnish in the offices.11 Since the client in (21) has only used English, the secretary assumes that he has not studied Finnish before (cf. lines 1 and 3). However, this (assumed) information is in contrast to the information the client provides in lines 4, 7, and 9. With the candidate understanding, the secretary acknowledges the new information and its consequences. She verbalises the new situation – if the student wants to study at an advanced level, he must be able to communicate in Finnish – and she acts on the basis of this conclusion: she changes the language of the interaction. Thus, the secretary both verbalises her conclusion in the candidate understanding turn (‘in that case – you speak Finnish fairly

 Second Language Interaction

well’) and modifies her own linguistic behaviour according to the conclusion, (about code-switching in conversation, see e.g. Auer 1998; Heller 1988). In all the examples above, the candidate understanding thus presents the speaker’s conclusion on the basis of information which has emerged during the conversation. The conclusive dimension can be said to be a part of the candidate understandings in general: the recipient has to have interpreted the prior turn(s) in some way in order to offer a potential reading of it. However, there are differences in the types of conclusions that the different uncertaintymarked turns present. That is, the degree or amount of reasoning behind the uncertainty-marked candidate understandings varies significantly. In general, identifying turns which replace foreign words or expressions with their Finnish counterparts are more straigthforwardly based on, and responsive to, the immediately preceding turn (or a specific term in the turn) than the conclusive candidate understandings, which can summarize information which has evolved during a longer stretch of the conversation. However, it should be borne in mind that the extent to which a turn is conclusive can be defined only insofar as the conclusion is displayed in the conversation. For example, it may require a fair amount of cognitive work and reasoning to figure out the reference of an unknown foreign or non-Finnish term but, if the speaker produces only the result (i.e. the translation in Finnish), the process of how she ended up with the word is not available to the researcher. Thus, although I have labelled the candidate understandings in this section as being ‘concluding’, this does not preclude other types of candidate understanding from presenting a conclusion on the basis of the prior speech. However, it is a typical feature of the candidate understanding turns in this section that they combine pieces of prior information and, on the basis of this, develop the proposition in the previous turn toward some new direction. In the first set of examples (18)–(19), this is done by finding a rationale for a reference. The mentioning of the date is interpreted in relation to a certain action (signing; example (18)), and the temporal reference (3 years) is assumed to display the scalar maximum (example (19)). In these examples, the candidate understanding reflects the speaker’s interpretation of why the prior speaker has uttered a linguistic unit or what she means in uttering it. In the latter set of examples (20)–(21), the candidate understanding turns also mark a change in the speaker’s perspective on the matter. Concluding candidate understandings are produced by both NSs and NNSs. In contrast to most of the prior groups, their distribution is almost equal. Concluding turns are not clearly combined with any particular conversational activity and, therefore, their distribution is somewhat scattered.

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

.. Uncertainty-marked paraphrases: Summary The uncertainty-marked candidate understandings in the data vary in form and function. They can consist of one noun phrase or multiple utterances, and they can be produced to elaborate the prior turn (e.g. by adding the location or making the object explicit), to resolve a word search or to provide a rationale for a reference. The feature they have in common is the interrogative element in the turns. This element can be the question morpheme kO, a question word, the turn-initial conclusive particle siis/ai ‘so, y’mean’, and the turn-final particle tai/vai ‘or’. All the interrogative elements occur in all three groups of uncertainty-marked turns. The most common construction of an uncertainty-marked candidate understanding is of the following type: conclusive particle + X (+ the particle ‘or’).

This pattern can be found in all three groups but the content of the X varies, somewhat group-specifically. When the candidate understanding is used to elaborate a reference, the X is very systematically a single (nominal) phrase. The X refers to a particular word or phrase in the prior utterance which is to be elaborated: e.g. ...opiskelua → siis yliopistossa vai Finnish for foreigners → yks vai ‘...studying → y’mean in the university or’ ‘Finnish for foreigners → one or’

In other words, elaborating candidate understandings can replace words having general references by more specific ones or they can add a location or other elements to the utterance. In contrast, when the candidate understanding presents a conclusion, the X in the above construction is systematically an utterance. As the conclusive turns present a potential consequence of selected pieces of prior information, they are more substantial (i.e consist of more linguistic units) than the turns which elaborate a specific prior reference. The shortest and most “compact” of the conclusive candidate undrstandings is the modal utterance pitäs allekirjottaa ‘it should be signed’ in example (18). In the other cases of concluding turns, the utterances between the initial and final particles are even longer and lexicosyntactically richer. Thus, the conclusions are not presented as a single phrase – what is functional and efficient when elaborating the prior might be robust and too direct when suggesting the potential consequences of, or the reasons for, the prior speaker’s talk. When the candidate understanding is used to identify a term, the X can be either an utterance or a single phrase. The clausal construction of the X can

 Second Language Interaction

be somewhat surprising, since the reference of the candidate understanding is usually fairly clear in these turns. In generally, identifying candidate understandings are co-referential with the non-Finnish term in the prior talk. Thus, the candidate understanding can sometimes be produced merely by replacing a noun with another (e.g. koolia → ai kajalia ‘y’mean eye liner’). A closer look at the turns in which the X consists of an utterance reveals that most of these turns are also clearly co-referential with the prior term. Namely, the utterances are characterizing clauses that introduce the new reference, with the copula as the verb: e.g. onks se nyt sitte selluloosaa ai se on pesukinnas ‘is it cellulose then’ ‘oh it’s the glove sponge’.

That is, instead of just providing the new reference, the speakers use (interrogative) clauses to introduce the terms. The uncertainty-marked candidate understanding can thus be illustrated by this construction: (conclusive particle/question word or morpheme) + X (+ the particle ‘or’/rising intonation).

Even though the first and the last elements are optional, one of them has to be present. The X-part is related to which type of candidate understanding it is: in the turns which are used to check or clarify a specific reference in the prior speaker’s turn (i.e. the elaborating and identifying), the X consists of a single phrase or a characterizing clause (co-referential with the term-to-be checked). When the candidate understanding is produced to present the speaker’s conclusion on the basis of selected parts of prior information, the X is an utterance. This distinction reflects the differences in the functions that the different candidate understanding turns accomplish. A short and compact turn is well fitted to the elaborating function: these turns specify a detail, mostly in the client’s answer (in institutional talk) or in the other speaker’s narrative (in everyday interaction). These turns are usually not projected by the prior speaker but are the recipient’s way to shift the focus to some part in the prior talk. A short and compact turn can also be used when identifying unknown terms. However, when used to identify terms, the candidate understanding is normally responsive to a word search. In short, the prior speaker has directed the search to the other speaker and, by doing so, has invited her to take the turn. Hence, a “slot” opens up for the other speaker to produce the candidate understanding. The new term can be presented in this slot with the (interrogative) clausal construction. Finally, more substantial utterances (verbs + arguments + adjuncts) are

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

used in instances when the speaker tries to clarify the implications of the other speaker’s turns. These turns are not projected by the prior as are the identifying turns, and they often involve a change in the speakership, instead of e.g. displaying being an “interested recipient” of the other speaker’s narrative. In general, uncertainty-marked candidate understandings shift focus to some stretch of prior talk. Being “backward-oriented”, they resemble formulations of gists rather than formulations of upshots (cf. Heritage & Watson 1979). However, the uncertainty-marked turns in the last sub-group – as presenting a conclusion – may have an element of progress and thus in some ways resemble formulations of upshots. This “transitional” sub-group reflects the flexibility of the boundaries between the backward-oriented and the forward-oriented candidate understandings. Next, I will investigate the last category of candidate understandings in my data: forward-oriented candidate understandings which more clearly resemble formulations of upshots. I will call these turns ‘completing candidate understandings’.

. Completing candidate understandings Not all candidate understandings in the data present a condensed version of prior talk. There are also turns (by both the NS and the NNS) which articulate something that has not been mentioned before. At the beginning of this chapter, I presented three examples of candidate understandings to show the variation of turns that occur under this label. The first example (1) represented an instance of a paraphrase, the second an instance of an uncertanty-marked paraphrase. In the third example (3), which is re-produced below, the speaker presents a conclusion on the basis of the prior speaker’s turn. (3) [replicated]. Office; The client (H) tries to persuade the secretary to write a note for him which would allow him to join a course which is already full. 01 H: =Mutta saisi-n-(ne-ko) but may-1-(?-Q) =But may I (you) write tämä(llais-i-a). (0.5) this.(kind-pl-PAR) (kind of thing). (0.5) 02 paperi-n. paper-GEN paper.

kirjoitta-a (0.5) ki- kirjoitta-a write-INF wr- write-INF (0.5) wr- write this mi- minä mukaan (.) leika-tu-n I- I with clip-PPPC-GEN I- I with me (.) a piece of

 Second Language Interaction 03 S: Että näytä-t o[pettaja-lle. PRT show-2 t[eacher-ALL → So that you show ((it)) to the teacher. [ 04 H: [(Jälkeen) joo [(After) yes kirjoita sellais-ta. 05 S: E- minä e-n n- I NEG-1 write that.kind-PAR No- I don’t write such a thing.

The turn in line 3 is a typical candidate understanding according to my definition: it articulates the speaker’s understanding of what the other speaker has said, it has a two-part format (particle + utterance) and it is a locus of a side-sequence, since it projects a confirmation as the next relevant turn. However, the turn differs from paraphrasing candidate understandings: instead of focusing on the core elements in the previous turn, it articulates the implied consequences of the prior speaker’s utterance. In this section, I will investigate candidate understandings such as the one found in the example above: turns which articulate something which has not been mentioned before, though it can be deduced from the prior talk. Compared with paraphrases and uncertainty-marked turns, completing candidate understandings are closer to the formulations studied in NS talk: instead of just rephrasing the old information, they move the conversation forward topically by introducing or making explicit unmentioned issues or information. This “forward-orientation” is the distinctive feature of completing candidate understandings; there is an element of progress which is lacking in paraphrasing candidate understandings. It is also because of the forward-orientation that I have labelled these cases as completing candidate understandings (or completions). It is important to note that completing candidate understandings need not be grammatical completions of the previous utterances; the term ‘completing’ refers to the topical forward-orientation rather than to the grammatical properties of the turns. The turns prior to the completing candidate understandings are often unfinished or overlapped in my data. Thus, although not grammatically continuing the prior, completing candidate understandings often continue or (develop further) the proposition in the prior turn. By producing a completion, the speaker can verbalise the upshot of what the prior speaker has said. Although all three main types of candidate understandings are produced both by the NS and the NNS, the NSs exploit these three main types more extensively than do the NNSs. In a collection of 21 completing turns (based on the previously mentioned sample of the data), the NSs produced 17 and

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

the NNSs 4 turns. There are two main activites in which completion turns are engaged in the data. Completions are produced in response to markers of difficulty or uncertainty, or as articulating a somewhat delicate or controversial issue. The turns in the former group begin typically with the particle chain nii et(tä), whereas in the latter cases, the initial particle is a single että. I will discuss these groups respectively below. .. Completion as a response to difficulty Completing candidate understandings which follow a display of difficulty are produced only by the NSs in my data. These turns can be said to be responsive to the markers of uncertainty by the NNS: they help her out of the troublesome situation by providing a possible completion of the turn. Instead of primarily presenting her own interpretation of the prior talk, the NS tries to find the relevant words on behalf of the NNS, the words she could have used to finish the problematic utterance. The NNSs exhibit their difficulty in formulating utterances mostly when they are involved in producing rather substantial turns with various lexical items and causal, spatial and temporal references. Such turns emerge, for example, when the NNSs are engaged in a narrative. Narratives by the NNS are more frequent in everyday conversation than in institutional interaction. Therefore, everyday conversation is also the environment where the completing candidate understandings are to be found. The following examples illustrate this type of case: (22) Telephone conversation. S and V are talking about studying and work. 01 V: Öö mutta: .h öö nyt öö #ö# (0.8) öö käv-i-n ööm (1.0) but now visit-PST-1 Eh bu:t .h eh now eh #e# (0.8) eh I went eh (1.0) 02 yliopi-ssah koska[: universi-INE becau[se to the university because[: [ 03 S: [˚Aha˚= [˚Uhuh˚= 04 V: =öö #ö# mh ja niin öö >voi mennä< (.) mh anteeksi ah .haa öm= and PRT can go sorry =eh #e# mh and so eh >can go< (.) mh I’m sorry ah .haa ehm= 05 S: =Ni aio-t mennä o:#- sinne suome-a opiskele-ma-an?, PRT intend-2 go ?sthere Finnish-PAR study-INF-ILL → =So you’re going to go to s:#- there to study Finnish?, 06 (1.0)

 Second Language Interaction 07 V: Joo. Yes. näh-nyt 08 S: Joo. .hh öö Anna kerto-i että (0.2) että Anna ol-i yes 1nameF tell-PST PRT PRT 1nameF is-PST see-PPC Yes. .hh eh Anna told that (0.2) that Anna had seen 09 sinu-ah? (0.4) siellä yliopisto-lla? you-PAR there university-ADE you? (0.4) there at the university?

(23) France. R is telling about the differences between different universities in France. 01 R: =#Mm# =#Mm# 02 vähän a bit 03 S: 04 R: 05 S: 06 R:

07 S: 08 R:

09

10

11 S: → 12

13 R:

.hhh mm Pariisissa phhh ˚se mhh .h (.) se˚ (.) se on .hhh mm in Paris phhh ˚it mhh .h (.) it˚ (.) it is (1.0) erilaista kosk[a: mm (1.0) different beca[use: mm [ [Mm: On monta (0.8) mt #ääm# (.) ↓mmh↓ .hh= There are many (0.8) mt #eem# (.) ↓mmh↓ .hh= =Tiedekuntaa vai, =Faculties or, Öö[h Ee[h [ [mitä. [what. joka on- (.) ˚nyt on Jo- m- mhh. mon-ta: #m# y#liopisto-a ye- mmany-PAR university-PAR which is now is Ye- m- mhh. many: #m# universities which is- (.) ˚now is joka on˚ (.) #ääm# ˚>mi-tä se onwhat is itnen et ne ei voi [niiku< some this.kind PRT they NEG can [PRT Some kind >of that they can’t [sort of< [ 10 S: [Ku- nii että kuka on [?Wh- PRT PRT who is → [Wh- so that who is 11 kiinnostu-nu. lähte-mä[-än vai. interest-PPC go-INF- [ILL or interested. in going or. [ 12 R: [Nii. kato ku nii-ll+onii-l [yes PRT because they-ADE+is they-ADE [Yes. see because they’v- they 13 ei oo vielä ne uude-t hinnasto-t. NEG is yet those new-pl pricelist-pl have those new price lists yet.

The arrowed turns continue the proposition in the prior turns. The completions are not, however, constructed as grammatical continuations: they are independent grammatical units. In (22), a direct grammatical continuation

 Second Language Interaction

would in fact be difficult, since the NNS finishes the turn with an apology (which also explicitly manifests her difficulty; line 4). The NNS has, nevertheless, already set up a few relevant factors for the interpretation of the turn: the agent (‘I’), the verb (‘went’) and the location (‘to the university’). The utterance which is left unfinished is the causal description (line 2). In her completing turn (line 5), the NS first reproduces the already-named elements (the agent, the verb and the location) and, only after that, goes on to explicate the new information, i.e. why V would go to the university. Examples (23) and (24) could more easily be grammatically coherent completions, since the NS begins both candidate understandings in overlap with the NNS’s turn. However, neither of the turns solely produce a grammatical completion to the utterance begun by the NNS. In (23), the NS repeats the subject (‘everyone’) and the verb (‘wants’) before producing the new information. In (24), the NS changes both the subject and the verb in her completion; she NS produces a relative pronoun (‘who’) and a verb phrase (‘is interested’) before the completion. By producing the candidate understandings as independent grammatical units, the NS can avoid being too direct in completing the NNS’s turn. It should be noted that the trouble turns (lines 1–2, 4; lines 8–10; lines 4, 7, 9) involve the NNSs’ descriptions about issues to which they have the primary access (cf. authoritative source of knowledge, Drew 1991): descriptions about their personal experiences or opinions. It could be felt to be patronizing if the other speaker adopted too knowledgeable a position and simply finished off the prior speaker’s descriptions about her plans and thoughts. By not straigthforwardly completing the turn, the NS avoids “forcefeeding” the NNS with her words. The self-repair in the NS’s turn in (24) is rather revealing in this respect. She cuts off the first word of the completion (kuka on kiinnostunut lähtemään ‘who is interested in going’) and restarts the utterance with the initial particles nii että. Raussi (1992) and Raevaara (1993: 41) contend that these particles (nii että) begin a conclusion on the basis of prior talk. Thus, the NS self-repairs her completion to be marked as a conclusion. Instead of producing a grammatical completion, the NS uses a completing candidate understanding, which creates an opportunity for the NNS to confirm the candidate. Completing candidate understanding is, indeed, a resource which is rather well fitted to the interactional and interpersonal dimensions of the situations in the examples above. When the speaker has displayed difficulty in utteranceformulation, she/he might hope for assistance. However, there is a risk of imposition if the completion is too direct; the NNS may feel that the NS forcefeeds him with her words or that she claims authority on issues to which the

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

NNS has primary access. Completing candidate understanding is thus a way to help the NNS out of the problematic situation, but it still offers him/her a (sequential) chance to accept or reject the completion. The NNSs can display the difficulty in the utterance-formulation in different ways and, as a consequence, the NSs can feel more or less obliged to participate in co-constructing the turn. In (22), the talk in progress is halted in an apology (line 4). By apologising, the NNS orients to the moral order of the conversation: the interlocutors should design their talk so that it is intelligible to the other. The apology demonstrates that the NNS experiences have failed in this fundamental respect: she has not been able to find the relevant words and to bind them together so as to form an intelligible utterance. In order to be able to continue with the interaction, the participants should overcome the failure so that a “normal” situation could be established. Moreover, there is a pressure to remedy the situation quickly. It has been observed that participants are likely to have a vested interest in keeping such states of “disgrace” to a minimum and in re-establishing the ‘ritual order’ as quickly as possible (Couper-Kuhlen 1992: 345). A completing candidate understanding is well suited to this function. By completing the problematic turn, a completing candidate understanding demonstrates that the turn has been intelligible, and it therefore functions as “counter-evidence” against the alleged breakdown in the mutual understanding. In (23) and (24), the talk is not disrupted by an apology. Instead, the NNS verbalises her failure to find some relevant word or phrase (‘what is it [now]’; lines 9 and 4). Making a word search explicit may not be similarly face-threatening (cf. Brown & Levinson 1987) as an apology; instead of orienting to the speaker’s incapability of producing intelligible talk, it orients to the speaker’s temporary inability to find a certain linguistic item. This problem does not prevent successful communication, as there are always alternative ways to describe something. In (23), the NNS begins to qualify an action which is connected with the missing word (presumably ‘popular’) (lines 8–10). In (24), the NNS first offers a word in her native language (Swedish) and then begins to describe the activity (line 9). In these cases, the completing candidate understanding can be interpreted to be a remedy for the interactional breakdown. Although an apology orients to a more severe breakdown than an exposed word search, the completing turn is produced to overcome both problems. In all examples (22)–(24), the completion functions as a demonstration of mutual understanding, framing the problem as being interactionally unimportant. However, in (23) and (24), where there has not been any fatal breach in intersubjectivity, the completing

 Second Language Interaction

candidate understandings can also be seen as “speeding up” the conversation: the NS anticipates where the NNS is going and articulates the turn for her. This phenomenon of “speeding up” occurs also elsewhere in the data; the NS sometimes articulates the turns on behalf of the NNS, even if the latter has not explicitly indicated difficulty in speech production. The completing nature of the candidate understandings occurring in this section stems partly from their sequential location (they are produced after or in overlap with incomplete utterances), but also from the features of the candidate understanding turns – in particular the initial particles. In all the examples above, the completing turns begin with the particle ni(i) which is, in (23) and (24), followed by the subordinating particle et(tä). These two particles – either one or a combination of them – are used to begin most of the completing candidate understandings in the data. Both particles are multifunctional in Finnish; for example the following functions have been defined for the particle ni(in): “tying a preceding subordinate clause to a following main clause”, “starting an independent clause and expressing conclusion by reference to something previously said” (Sorjonen 1997b: 22; ISK: 783). The particle että is described as a general conjunction, and it is described as marking the following utterance as a paraphrase or a conclusion on the basis of the prior speech (ISK: 984). Thus, although the completing turns are not constructed as direct grammatical continuations, the subordinating particles establish a grammatical link between the candidate understanding and the unfinished utterance. The binding element ni(i) and/or et(tä) demonstrates that the NS has followed and understood the NNS’s talk, so that the NS can continue the turn. Ni(i) and että could be described as prototypical initial particles in completing candidate understandings: there is the element of tying (completing) in their very meaning. The particles ni and et(tä) are also clearly forwardoriented: both are immediately followed by more speech in conversation, they are not produced as free-standing items. In the examples above, there are actually two variants of the particle niin, the shorter ni in (22) and the longer nii in (23) and (24). The shorter variant is more clearly the tying element; an utterance-initial ni is observed to construct a hierarchy between different parts of talk and a continuity over turns and sequences (Sorjonen 2001: 273). The longer variant resembles more the response token nii, which has been shown (among other things) to claim that the speaker of nii is in some ways knowledgeable of what the coparticipant is talking about (see Sorjonen 2001). The turn-initial nii-particles (preceding the particle että) have the same quality: they indicate that the speaker is knowledgeable of what the other speaker was going to say. In other words, nii frames the subsequent

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

utterance as following the prior speaker’s line of reasoning, as being a kind of completion she could have used herself. Thus, both particles nii and että bind the candidate understanding to the prior utterance. The particle nii shows that the NS has been following the NNS’s telling; despite the linguistic problems, there are no breaches in intersubjectivity. The particle että ties the completion quasi-grammatically with the previous utterance and, by doing so, remedies the interactional disruption caused by the markers of the trouble. Thus, when completions are produced as a response to some display of trouble, they address both the sequential and interpersonal side of the trouble. They remedy the sequential breach by completing an unfinished turn, and they thereby also mitigate the trouble. There cannot have been any fatal breach in intersubjectivity if the speaker is able to complete an utterance on behalf of the other. The joint construction of turns can be seen as a sign of a high level of shared understanding (cf. Antaki, Díaz, & Collins 1996; Tainio 2000). Completions as a response to hesitancy are mainly to be found in everyday conversation. The other group of completions can be more easily found in institutional interaction. .. Completion as articulating (revealing) the other’s position in a problematic sequence As the second group of completing candidate understandings, I will discuss cases in which the completion is used to articulate something which has been implied in the previous speech but not explicitly mentioned. These turns can be found in sequences which are somehow problematic; some tension arises between the speakers, a clash between what the speakers can and would like to do. In these situations, completions are produced to make explicit the other speaker’s aims or intentions, which the first speaker somehow finds problematic. Completions which articulate an unmentioned (problematic) issue occur in institutional talk in the data. This distribution reflects the different positions the participants have in different types of conversation. It is more likely that clashes between participants’ wishes and potential to act emerge in institutional interaction, since office encounters represent one type of gate-keeping situation (cf. Erickson & Schultz 1982): the secretary has control over something the clients aim to achieve (a place in the courses). Since the clients quite often would like to join a course even though it is full or it has already begun, a contradiction between the clients’ wishes and the task of the secretary-as-gatekeeper emerges. The subsequent excerpt illustrates such a situation:

 Second Language Interaction

(25) [3]. Office. The student (H) wants to join course late. The secretary has said that he has to wait until the next period begins (in approximately three weeks). H has said that he would like to see the teacher of the course and talk directly to her.12 01 H: Aaa: jos minä ööö >esimerkiksi jos< minä (joo) Aaa: if I ehm >for example if< I (yes) [ 02 S: [↑Mhm, 03 H: Jos hän sanoo (1.0) sopii If she says (1.0) it’s okay 04 S: Mm, 05 H: J[a: A[nd: [ 06 S: [↑No: [↑Well: 07 H: Aaa= 08 S: =Sitten. =In that case. 09 H: Sit(h) [ten. heh hh In tha[(h)t c(h)ase. heh hh [ 10 S: [Mm. (.) $En minä voi mi(h)tään si[(h)lle si(h)tten$ [Mm. (.) £I can’t do any(h)thing i[n that ca(h)se£ [ 11 H: [Hehe ei se [Hehe it doesn’t 12 mi(h)thään .h= mat(h)ter .h= 13 S: =Mm= 14 H: =Mutta sa-isi-n(-ne-ko) kirjoitta-a (0.5) ki- kirjoitta-a but may-COND-1sg/2pl?-Q write-INF write-INF =But may I (you) write (0.5) wr- write this 15 tämä(llais-i-a).(0.5) mi- minä mukaan (.) leika-tu-n this.kind-pl-PAR I I with clip-PPPC-GEN (kind of things). (0.5) I- I with me (.) a piece of 16 paperi-n. paper-GEN paper. 17 S: Että näytä-t o[pettaja-lle. PRT show-2 t[eacher+ALL So that you show ((it)) to the t[eacher. → [ 18 H: [(Jälkeen) joo [(After) yes

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

19 S: [E- minä e-n kirjoita sellai-sta. [ I NEG-1 write that.kind-PAR [No- I don’t write such a thing. [ 20 H: [(Jälkeen) luokka la- luakka >la- ho- ho-< ahuoneessa(h) hh [(After) classroom cl- clas- >cl- ro- ro-< in classroom(h) hh 21 S: Aa. (.) no tässä sinä nä:et (1.0) luokan A:h. (.) well here you see (1.0) the classroom 22 H: Joo Yes 23 S: Ja kerr[os. And the[ floor. [ 24 H: [˚Joo ( )˚= [˚Yes ( )˚ 25 S: =Opettajan nimi? =The name of the teacher? 26 H: Joo.= Yes.= 27 S: =Mutta minä en kirjoita enää ˚mitään lappua.˚ =But I don’t write any papers ˚anymore˚. 28 H: Ahaa. I see. 29 S: Koska minä en anna sinulle lupaa mennä, Because I don’t give you permission to go,

The problematic nature of the activities in this example stems from the fact that the student tries to persuade the secretary (lines 14–16) to do something contrary to the regulations of the institutions and also contrary to the previous denials by the secretary. Before the segment, the student has asked the secretary several times to let him join the course and each time the secretary has refused. Despite her rejections, the student tries to find a way of achieving his aim (i.e. to begin the course immediately). He plans to contact the ultimate decision-making body in the gate-keeping process (the teacher) to see whether her decision concurs with that of the secretary’s (lines 1 and 3). By juxtaposing the two institutional bodies (secretary and teacher), the student emphasizes their different rights of control (i.e. that the secretary’s decision-making is subordinate to that of the teacher’s) and, with an if -clause (line 3), creates a (hypothetical) situation in which these rights are competing with each other. Thus, by introducing an alternative controlling body, the student challenges the secretary’s position as a gate-keeper. The laughter in the turns where the priorities of control are made explicit (lines 9–12) supports the idea that something problematic is occurring. It has been observed, in medical contexts in particu-

 Second Language Interaction

lar, that laughter tends to occur in turns where the speaker presents a position which is in conflict with the prior speaker’s position (cf. Haakana 1999). The “trouble turn” (i.e. the turn to be completed by the secretary, lines 14–16) follows the laughter-framed sequence where the potential conflict between the secretary and the teacher is established. The turn in lines 14–16 is rather fragmentary and the reference of the turn is left very unspecific. Using a deontic modal verb (saada ‘may’), the NNS asks the secretary whether it is possible for her (or whether she is willing) to perform a certain action. This action is described as involving writing, and the result is that the client has a note that he then can take with him. In other words, the action is something the client would profit from. However, the NNS does not specify what it is he wishes the NS to write. The entity is referred to with a pronominal construction tämällaisia ‘this kind of ’ (accompanied with a hand gesture pointing to the papers on the secretary’s desk). The indefinitess in the reference could be explained through the speaker status of the NNS: being a learner in the language, he might not be able to produce a more exact description of the reference. This interpretation, however, ignores the location and the function of the turn. The client asks the secretary to do him a favour, a favour which would be in conflict with the regulations of the institution. Such an activity is rather controversial or delicate, and the self-repairs and indirectness can also be seen as signs of this delicacy (cf. Linell & Bredmar 1996). The completing candidate understanding (line 17) is produced to clarify the unspecified reference in the NNS’s turn. However, instead of qualifying the item which was referred to, the completion clarifies the purpose of the item. The secretary does this by naming the target of the action, the teacher. The action’s relation to the teacher is important from the secretary’s point of view, since she and the teacher are “on the same side”: they represent the institution and are responsible for institutional procedures. The client, however, treats the secretary and the teacher as having separate and different rights of control by establishing the competition (lines 1–12). The NNS asks the secretary “to join his party” and give assistance in persuading the teacher to extend the rules. The completion by the secretary seeks to clarify these relations; after the client has confirmed her assumption, the secretary can refuse to “change the side” or act against the institution (line 19). The next example is another case of completing candidate understandings which are used to clarify indirect or indefinite references in problematic or delicate sequences:

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

(26) The clients (T and P), who are university students, would like to begin to study at the institution. The courses are full. The secretary has described the registration system for the courses. (That is, the students who already study at the institution have priority in getting into a course, and the new people get the places which are left over.) 01 P: Kysyn (.) mä halusin >siis+ko< (.) me ollaan niinku sen (.) I ask (.) I’d like to >I mean< (.) we are y’know like (.) 02 yliopiston degree students 03 S: Jo[o? Ye[s? [ 04 P: [Aineopinto-↓opiske˚lijoi˚13 [At the ↓univer˚sity˚ 05 S: Joo:? Yes:? 06 P: Siinä ei ole mitään etuuksia ei. There are no privileges no. 07 (0.5) 08 S: Meillä.= At us.= ((i.e. here)) 09 P: =↓(Tähän). =↓(Here). 10 S: Mm, 11 P: Ei. No. 12 S: Tark[otatko bussialennuksia tai: Do y[ou mean reduction in the bus tickets or: [ 13 T: [(Mutta se on)- (.) mh [(But it is)(.) mh 14 P: @E:i e[:i@ ku- e:i ku## @No: n[o:@ like- no: like## [ 15 S: [Ei? [No? 16 S: Ni [YLIopistolle korvaavuut↑ta Yes [the credits at the univer↑sity [ 17 P: [(Tästä), [(Here), 18 (.) 19 P: Ei. No. 20 S: Ei? No?

 Second Language Interaction

21 P: Ku #öö# sit ku te sano-i-tte sii-tä että (.) (tämä) ( ) PRT then PRT you.pl say-PST-2pl it-ELA PRT this When #eh# like you said about that (.) (this) ( ) is (1.0) 22 on me-i-dän (1.0)öö koulu-n (.) niiku tämä-n koulu-n is we-pl-GEN school-GEN PRT this-GEN school-GEN eh our school’s (.) I mean the student at this school has 23 opiskelija-lla on se etuus et (0.5) ne voi (0.5) tä-hän student-ADE is it privilege PRT they can this-ILL the privilege that (0.5) they can (0.5) get in to this 24 englanni-n alkeis-kurssi-lle↓ päästä niinku##↓ English-GEN beginner-course-ALL get PRT English introductory course ↓sort of###↓ 25 S: ˚Helpommin˚?= ˚More easily˚?= 26 P: =˚Helpompi˚= =˚More easy˚= 27 S: =Mm:? 28 P: Ja jos mä olen niinku- mä teen yliopistolla And if I am y’know- I do at the university 29 S: [ 30 P: [Aineopiskelija [Degree student 31 S: Just joo Yes right 32 T: (Venäjä[llä) (In Rus[sia) [ 33 P: [(Koska mä (voi ) opiskel-la oikeu[stiede-ttä) [because I (can) study-INF law-P[AR [(Because I (can) study la[w) [ 34 S: [£Nii:£ [£Yes:£ 35 S: Et jos se autta-is asia-a.= PRT if it help-COND thing-PAR → So if that would help.= 36 P: =Joo. =Yes. 37 S: Mmm. [no eipä Mmm. [well no [ 38 T: [Voiko se aut˚taa˚ [Can it he˚lp˚


39 P: Ei-kö NEG-Q It doesn’t 40 S: En £usko eihän se£ I £don’t think so it doesn’t£

The overall conversational situation is similar in (25) and (26). In both cases, the client tries to find out whether there is any flexibility in the rules of the institution. Thus, the reason for the problematic or delicate character of the sequence is the same: the secretary has denied the clients’ access to the courses but, instead of accepting the refusal, the clients begin to seek ways to achieve their purposes which, in some manner, are in conflict with the regulations of the institution. The secretary is more clearly involved in the process in (25), where the NNS asks the NS to write a note for him, thereby indirectly asking the NS to take his side against the teacher. In the excerpt above, the client (P) formulates his inquiry (lines 1, 2, 4, 6) so as to be seeking information about the institution’s general practices with respect to the group he represents, (a university student majoring in Finnish). Despite the more “subtle” nature of his inquiry, the student is undertaking a similar activity as the NNS in the previous example: attempting to find out whether the institutional rules could be stretched. However, the reason for, or the justification of, such behaviour is different. In (25), the student wished to plead to another authority (teacher) whereas, in (26), the student(s) refer to the treatment of their category members (as degree students). With his inquiry (lines 1, 2, 4, 6), the NNS re-defines the situation that the secretary has set up with her utterances earlier in the conversation. The secretary has described the registration system of the institution with the utterance Oppilaat jotka opiskelevat meillä jo voivat varata uusille alkeiskurssille etukäteen ‘Students who already study here can advance register for a place in new introductory courses’. Her perspective is clearly institutional: she introduces a relevant category (“old students”) and, with a modal verb, expresses what is permitted for that category. In his inquiry, the NNS changes the perspective from the regulations to the treatment of different categories. Instead of the rather neutral modal verb (voida ‘can’), the NNS uses the more value-loaded noun etuus ‘privilege’ (lines 6 and 23). With this selection of words, the NNS re-defines the description as being not about the regulations, but about the (unequal) treatment the institution grants to different groups. Since the institution has granted one category (old students) a privilege, other groups could perhaps get it as well. Following this line of reasoning, the NNS introduces another category (aineopinto-opiskelijat;



 Second Language Interaction

lines 4 and 30), to which he and his friend belong, as a candidate group for being favourably treated. As in the previous example, the completing turn (line 35) can be said to articulate the aim behind the client’s previous utterance(s). This is done by clarifying the reference(s) in the client’s turns which are, again, rather unspecific. The secretary does not recognise the reference of the term ‘privilege’ (cf. lines 12 and 16), after which the NNS explains what he means by it (lines 21– 24). The client’s explanation, together with the subsequent self-identification (lines 28 and 30), juxtaposes the two categories in such a way that the secretary recognises the client’s initial question: she displays having understood the meaning of the comparison (lines 29 and 31), after which she produces the completing turn (line 35). As in example (25), the ambiguity in the references of the client’s turn can be seen as reflecting the delicacy of the activity rather than the non-nativeness of the speaker. The client (P) is fairly fluent in Finnish, and he would probably have no difficulty in asking directly whether he could join the course because he is a student at the university. This would, however, be conversationally a “clumsy” activity, since the client has just been denied access to the course, precisely because of his status (as a new student at the institution). Thus, an indirect way of formulating the question gives the NNS an opportunity to construct a situation where the different categories are relevant since they are given different rights, after which it is legitimate for him to inquire about the entrance to the course again. The completions which articulate the other speaker’s position can thus be said to clarify the references in prior turns and, by doing that, verbalise the aims of the other speaker and her activities. Such turns occur in sequences which are problematic, i.e. in sequences where the participants produce activities that are counter to the position of the other. The examples in this section illustrated a situation where the client does not accept the secretary’s refusal but tries to find a way to cancel it. The clients come up with alternative procedures, but the turns are implicit with broad unspecific references (kirjottaa tämällaisia ‘write this kind of thing’, mitään etuuksia, ‘any privilegies’). The completion is produced to clarify what was meant by the ambiguous and indirect utterances, to spell out the “hidden purposes”. The problematic nature of the hidden purpose is reflected in the continuation of the conversation: the first turn by the NS, after the NNS has confirmed the completion, is a negation (line 19 and line 37 in the examples). In other words, the NS spells out the intention of the NNS in order to be able to refuse it. In the examples in this section, the NSs do not produce completing candidate understandings to bring unfinished utterances to a grammatical com-


pletion. However, the candidate understandings are continuing (and spelling out) the prior speaker’s line of reasoning. The subordinating particle että ties the completing turn to the prior, so that the speaker can continue the other’s utterance (by revealing its aims), even though the first speaker has not overtly sought assistance in the turn construction. By constructing the candidate understanding as a continuation of the prior, the speakers can make explicit the controversial issues that the prior speaker has been describing and, by doing so, emphasize what their stance is to these issues and what is important from their point of view. .. Completing candidate understandings: Summary Completing candidate understandings are produced to accomplish at least two kinds of functions. In the disagreement or conflict sequences, they can be used to reveal the other speaker’s position in order to refuse implicit suggestions and/or to underline aspects which are important to the speaker. Completing turns performing this function are to be found in institutional interaction. The other environment in which the completing candidate understandings occur is the turn subsequent to a display of difficulty. In these cases, the prior turn has been left unfinished, so that the completing candidate understanding brings the turn to the semantic and/or grammatical completion. In this environment, completing turns are produced only by the NSs. These completions can mostly be found in everyday conversation. The function of completing candidate understanding as a response to uncertainty-marking is that of a remedy. As mutual understanding is the target of and a pre-requisite for interaction, (an exposed) failure to produce intelligible talk is a severe threat to the intersubjectivity of the participants. Producing a completion is an efficient way to remedy the situation: it moves the conversation forward from the difficulty and, by so doing, demonstrates that there have been no fatal breaches in intelligibility. Since the recipient is able to complete the turn on behalf of the speaker, the recipient has been able to follow the speaker’s talk. The completion functions as counter-evidence against the alleged inability of the other speaker; the temporary difficulties do not threaten the speaker’s competence as an interactant, as a sensible, understandable person. In addition to the interactional purposes, completing candidate understandings responsive to uncertainty-marking serve also interpersonal purposes. Being able to complete the turn on behalf of the other demonstrates high involvement in the ongoing talk and a fair amount of shared knowledge (cf. Antaki et al. 1996; Tainio 2000). However, if a speaker completes

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 Second Language Interaction

the other’s talk extensively, this can also create interpersonal problems. Generally, the current speaker has the turn (“the right to speak”) until the next transition relevance place (cf. Sacks, Schegloff, & Jefferson 1974). The speaker who continuously comes in before the current speaker has finished the turn constructional unit can easily be experienced as being intrusive. This risk is minimized when the completion is done only after the first speaker has clearly indicated being in trouble. On the other hand, extensive trouble-marking can also pose problems especially in NS-NNS interaction, as Kalliokoski (2000) has pointed out. Because of the linguistic identities of the speakers, the NNS’s cutoffs and hesitations can be associated with her non-nativess. Kalliokoski talks about a paradox: the NNS’s “cut-off ” turns which are completed by the NS can be seen as signs of incomplete language skills, whereas from the perspective of conversational interaction, ratified collaborative turn completion sequences provide the most concrete evidence of the participants’ mutual understanding and involvement in each other’s talk during the conversation (ibid.: 13–14). Despite these risks, completion seems to be a resource which is suited to, and used in the conversation when the participants have unequal access to linguistic resources. It can be exploited in speeding up the conversation, and it offers the participants an opportunity to extend their interactional ability by combining their respective vocabularies: the speaker with larger lexical knowledge can complete, and can be asked to complete, the other’s turn. The common function of all candidate understandings is that they display the speaker’s understanding of the prior talk. Completing candidate understandings differ from two previous groups (paraphrases and uncertaintymarked turns) in that they demonstrate the speaker’s understanding of the implications of the prior speech. The completing turn seeks to answer the question “What does it mean that you said that?”, whereas the (uncertainty-marked) paraphrases could be seen as answering a question which can be formulated as “Is this what you are saying?”. The completions verbalise an upshot of the prior stretch of talk, whereas the (uncertainty-marked) paraphrases confirm the understanding by e.g. using full nouns instead of pronouns, or by replacing the deictic or temporal references with other, co-referential elements (cf. Sorjonen 2001: 58). There is an element of progress in the completions which is lacking in (uncertainty-marked) paraphrases; instead of just reformulating something which has already been mentioned, completions focus on what arises out of the already-mentioned.


. Discussion In this chapter, I have investigated turns in which the speaker checks her understanding of some stretch of prior talk. I have called these turns ‘candidate understandings’. The class of candidate understandings is heterogeneous, and the boundaries between the different types are somewhat fuzzy. However, three main types can be distinguished, mainly on the basis of the turn-initial element. When the turns begin with the particle that displays regonition, understanding or newsworthiness of the prior talk (e.g. ahaa, aijaa, joo), the candidate understanding presents the recipient’s interpretation of what the prior speaker has said. These paraphrases typically only reformulate the prior speaker’s talk without developing the propositions further. Similarly backwardlooking are turns which begin with a conclusive particle (siis, ai) or with a question utterance. With these turns, the recipient displays being more uncertain about her interpretation of the prior; this is also indicated with the turn-final particle tai/vai ‘or’ which occurs frequently in the uncertainty-marked cases. The remaining type is, in contrast, forward-oriented and it is used to complete a turn (or a proposition) for the other speaker. The three main categories can be further divided into various sub-groups according to the typical activities the turns perform or to the types of turns they are responsive to. Despite the functions that the candidate understandings accomplish in the data – e.g. display interest and involvement, verbalise a problematic matter – all the turns have the task of checking recipient’s understanding of the prior. The candidate understandings are produced to clarify unclear references and implications of the prior speech. This function distinguishes them from the formulations investigated in the various types of NS-NS talk. In interviews and radio talk shows, for example, formulations are often used to “colour” the prior speaker’s utterance in some way – to highlight certain aspects of it and to downplay some others (cf. Heritage 1985; Drew 1998). In contrast, the candidate understandings in the present NS-NNS data can be produced as a response to some problem-marking by the other speaker, as an attempt to help her out of a linguistic difficulty or as an attempt to speed up the conversation. That is, in the NS-NNS talk, candidate understandings are mainly used to check (and remedy) mutual intelligibility. However, one function of the candidate understandings in the present data – setting up a model for the answer – has been found in institutional (medical) NS-interaction (cf. Haakana 1999). This usage of the candidate understanding can be seen as a strategy of information-seeking, similar to the candidate answers studied by Pomerantz (1988). The cases Pomerantz inves-

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 Second Language Interaction

tigated are initial questions containing a possible answer, but particular information can also be sought by elaborating the prior answer. Whereas the candidate answer may help to shape the speakers’ relationship as friendly and co-operative by offering a legitimate explanation for the other speaker’s behaviour (Pomerantz 1988: 372), the candidate understandings which elaborate the prior answer (in my data) show to the recipient what the expected level of accuracy is. It is economical to show the correct level through an exemplification – no separate explanations are needed, and the turn can often be grammatically rather simple. Therefore, this strategy is particularly well suited to the conversations where the other speaker has only limited linguistic resources. As candidate understandings can be used for various purposes, they are exploited differently by the different speakers, depending on the conversational activities they are typically involved in. Thus, elaborating candidate understandings that offer a model for the answer are produced by the representatives of the institutions (who are also the native speakers). However, since candidate understandings are used to check the speaker’s understanding of the prior, both the NSs and the NNSs produce them, depending on who experiences the prior turn as somewhat obscure and needs to clarify the turn. In general, the NSs produce more candidate understandings. Of the 94 instances in the data, 77 are produced by the NS. This distribution can partly be explained by the different participant roles and the typical activities combined with these roles. The secretaries have the institutional responsibility for filing the necessary information and providing the clients with the information they have come to obtain. Therefore, the secretaries (the NSs) may also assume greater responsibility in clarifying ambiguous references. The institutional roles do not, however, explain the whole distribution. In everyday talk, the NSs are also more eager to produce candidate understandings. This result is in line with that of Suni’s (1991) who reports the NS initiating clarifying turns much more frequently than the NNS (ibid.: 107). Reformulations have also been reported to be a typical NS strategy in other studies (Kalin 1995; Bremer & Simonot 1996); these studies, however, discuss the speaker’s self-reformulations as a response to a marker of difficulty. It is important to keep in mind that the candidate understandings in the present data are often responses to problem-marking or to obscure or ambiguous references. As mentioned in the introduction, the speaker has a variety of ways to display her uncertainty of the prior. She can produce a repair initiator, either open (cf. Drew 1997) or more specific, e.g. the repetition of the problematic item. Further, she could articulate her difficulty to understand or she could ask what the other speaker means. It is also worth noting that speakers exploit

Chapter 5. Candidate understandings 

these possibilities extremely rarely in the data, whereas speakers use candidate understandings frequently to clarify prior references. An illustrative case is example (17), when the secretary does not respond to the student’s turns in any verbal way before she is able to come up with a candidate understanding. Thus, the same tendency which was present in the corrections can also be found in candidate understandings: rather than asking the NNSs to modify their prior speech, the NSs produce the new version themselves. The NSs do not orient to the problematic utterances in such a way as to leave it to the recipient to do the reformulation. When the (native) speaker encounters a problem in trying to interpret the previous turn in my data, she produces a possible understanding of the turn, instead of encouraging the NNS to repair her own speech. That is, the NSs do not produce turns which would just initiate repair; the repair initiators by the NSs also include a possible repair. The powerful underlining tendency which shapes both the repair and clarification sequences in NS-NNS talk is to avoid emphasizing the problems, and the tendency to display understanding rather than non-understanding.

chapter 

Concluding discussion

The aim of this study has been to explore interactional understanding as it is displayed in the progressivity of conversation when the participants have unequal access to linguistic resources. I have therefore focused on three phenomena in which the participants’ orientation to understanding surfaces in interaction: other-correction, word search and candidate understandings. The distribution of these phenomena is related to the participants’ identities as native or non-native speakers. Linguistic other-correction is performed solely by NSs, whereas grammatical searches are produced only by NNSs and lexical searches more frequently by NNSs. Candidate understandings are less sharply divided; they can be found both in the talk by the NSs and the NNSs.

. Tendencies in NS-NNS interaction I would like to highlight some of the most general analytic themes which have emerged from this investigation of NS-NNS interactions. First, the speaker identites of the participants (NS/NNS) are not constantly relevant in interaction. When talking in interaction, speakers construct utterances to perform various activities; the fact that the NNSs sometimes experience difficulties in utterance-construction or end up with formulations that differ from the native speaker standard is not necessarily consequential for performing those activities. Traces of nativeness or non-nativeness cannot automatically be found in the sequential architecture of NS-NNS talk. Second, if the linguistic asymmetry between the speakers is made relevant, it is mostly a result of the NNSs’ activities. The NNSs orient to the restrictions in their linguistic knowledge by e.g. initiating grammatical searches or by otherwise displaying uncertainty with respect to some linguistic constructions or lexical choices. They direct the uncertainty-framed attempts to the NSs, thus crediting them with the authority to decide what the correct version is. The NSs, for their part, do not initiate moves that would activate the asym-

 Second Language Interaction

metry. Even though they initiate and manage linguistic corrections – an activity through which the participants’ different positions of knowledge become relevant – the corrections are manifestly made in an unobtrusive way. The corrections are either responses to the markers of uncertainty by the NNSs (in which case the NNS has already activated the asymmetry), or they are managed within other activities (in which case they can be treated as non-corrections). Third, when mutual intelligibility is at stake, the participants, in particular the NSs, produce turns which display understanding rather than nonunderstanding. There is not a single instance in the data where the NS solely articulates her inability to understand the NNS (e.g. ‘I don’t understand’, ‘I don’t quite follow’, etc.). In general, repair initiators which would project the NNS’s repair as the next relevant turn, are absent. If the NSs experience the previous talk as being in some way problematic, they either straightforwardly correct it, or they produce a possible understanding of the trouble turn. An outright correction and candidate understanding demonstrate that the recipient has (at least potentially) identified the meaning of the trouble turn, whereas repair initiators that project a repair only imply that the recipient has observed a problem in the speaker’s turn. Thus, when trouble occurs, the NSs produce turns which imply that despite the problem, they have been able to understand the NNS’s turn. As a consequence of the last two points (or tendencies), a discrepancy can be discerned in the orientations of the participants. The NNSs sometimes orient to their non-nativeness by displaying their difficulties in utteranceconstruction, whereas the NSs avoid adopting the role of linguistic expert. Rather than focusing on the linguistic details, they orient to the progress of interaction. For example, in the cases where the NNSs are involved in grammatical searches, the NSs can try to terminate the search by displaying understanding with affirmative particles (see Chapter 4). In addition, the NSs’ outright linguistic corrections can be seen as an attempt to orient to the content rather than to the form. An alternative to a straightforward correction would be a repair initiation, which is a means of shifting focus to the problem (cf. Schegloff et al. 1977). The linguistic corrections in the data mostly involve case endings and other suffixes, and they do not usually obscure the interpretation of the turn. Shifting focus to these minor mistakes would highlight their interactional salience. Moreover, there are indications that speakers can perceive morphosyntactic repairs as being about lexis or semantics (cf. Mackey, Gass, & McDonough 2000). Thus, shifting focus to a morphological mistake (that does not obscure the meaning of the utterance) could be perceived as indicating semantic trouble. These risks

Chapter 6. Concluding discussion 

are avoided and the prominence of the error minimized when corrections are directly performed by the recipient, without first pointing out the errors.

. Is there a “non-native fingerprint” in conversation? One aim of this study has been to determine if it is legitimate, in CA terms, to talk about NS-NNS conversation. By exploring if, and how, the speaker identities of the participants have procedural relevance (cf. Schegloff 1991), this study contributes to the discussion of the possbilities in the applied dimensions of CA (cf. Wagner & Gardner 2004; Egbert 2004; Mondada & Pekarek Doehler 2004; Richards 2005). As already mentioned, the NNSs in particular sometimes portray themselves as not-yet-competent e.g. by displaying uncertainty and by seeking help from the NSs. That is, the NNSs can temporarily emphasize their non-nativeness and demonstrate that it matters that they have a restricted access to linguistic resources. It is another question, however, whether the linguistic difficulties actually affect the structure of interaction. My study does not support the idea that NS-NNS interaction would in some fundamental ways be different from NS-NS interaction. Despite their linguistic background, the participants mobilise their linguistic resources in order to perform various activities, to interpret the other’s linguistic conduct and to respond to it in a relevant way on a turn-by-turn basis. However, within conversational organisations, the unequal linguistic positions of the participants may shape their contributions. For example, repair organisation is the speakers’ means of dealing with problems in hearing and understanding in NS-NNS (as well as in NS-NS) conversation, but there is a characteristic feature of repair different from what has been reported in NS-NS talk: outright correction is common, whereas repair initiators which serve as invitations to self-repair are rare (in the linguistic corrections by the NSs). This characteristic can be seen as reflecting the participants’ orientation to their linguistic identities: by not inviting the NNSs to self-repair, the NSs treat them as (possibly) not competent. Drew (1981) has addressed this issue when discussing correction in child-adult interaction; he notes that “the selection of a given form through which to initiate the correction can display recipient’s understanding of what kind of error prior speaker has made” (ibid.: 256). He suggests that in using an invitation to self-correct, the recipient may treat an error as an unintended slip, whilst the outright correction treats the error as something the speaker [the child] does not and could not know (ibid.: 256). In NS-NNS interaction, the selection of a repair can also be interpreted as accounting for the repairable

 Second Language Interaction

item and thereby reflecting the speaker’s idea of the asymmetries in the participants’ competencies. Shared knowledge cannot be taken for granted: the NSs do not know what the NNSs know about the grammar and hence, to be on the safe side, they do not invite the NNSs to self-correct. It is interesting that the NSs seem to underestimate rather than overestimate the amount of linguistic knowledge they share with the NNSs. The NSs cannot know whether the errors by the NNSs result from non-competence or whether they are slips of tongue, but they act on the basis of the former assumption. According to Günthner and Luckmann (2001), there is a preference for overestimating the amount of knowledge shared with the recipient in intracultural communication, probably because underestimating usually gives the appearance of “talking down” to the addressee (ibid.: 65). The authors go on to suggest that underestimation of shared knowledge might be more often used unwittingly in intercultural communication. My study gives support to this suggestion: the NSs choose to repair in a way which does not assume shared linguistic knowledge. The notion of ‘competence’ or ‘competent member’ seems crucial to the speakers’ resources and techniques for managing repair and construct their turns. If the preference for inviting the other to self-repair in NS talk is based on a need to treat her as a competent member (to avoid ‘talking down’), the prefence for outright linguistic correction in NS-NNS talk can be based on the same principle. When the NNS is not invited to do repair, she cannot be “caught as being incompetent”. In other words, the absence of invitations to repair makes it possible for the NNSs to act as competent members, regardless of the details in their grammatical knowledge. So, and perhaps somewhat paradoxically, the NSs manage repair in a way which does not reveal the NNS’s potential incompetence, but it is this very way of doing repair (since it differs from that in NS talk) that reflects the at least potentially asymmetric competencies between the participants. In addition to the prevalence of outright other-correction, there is another feature which seems typical of NS-NNS talk: the occurrence of affirmative particles in the repair sequence. Both the corrections by the NSs and the post-correction repeats by the NNSs are often accompanied by the affirmative particle joo. There is no mention in the literature about affirmative particles in repair sequences in NS-NS interaction; the only linguistic element that is taken up is Y’mean, which exemplifies uncertainty markers that typically downgrade the “confidence scale” of other-correction (see Schegloff et al. 1977: 378). In NS-NNS data, grammatical corrections do not usually have tentative elements. The most common particle in the correction turns is the affirmative

Chapter 6. Concluding discussion 

joo. This can be explained both through the characteristics of the particle, as well as through the sequential location of the correction turns. The particle joo has been observed to function as a continuer, to claim understanding of the prior talk, in particular in environments where the prior talk contains a recognitional reference (Sorjonen 2001: 250). Within a longer turn, both the turn-initial and the turn-final joo have been reported to frame the turn as displaying understanding (cf. Raevaara 1993: 48). Furthermore, joo as a confirming device can be closing-implicative (Sorjonen 2001: 86). As discussed in Chapters 3 and 4, the speaker can thus take a stand towards the prominence of the repair turn by producing the affirmative particle joo after the correction. Correction format [grammatical subsitution + affirmative particle] implies that, despite the error, the recipient (NS) has understood what the speaker (NNS) has meant and does not treat the repair sequence as worthy of more attention. While straightening out the anomalies in the NNS’s utterance, the NSs simultaneously suggest closure of the repair sequence. Thus, the NSs neither display hesitancy when doing correction, nor expect an acceptance of the correction from the NNSs. Corrections are produced as something which need not be negotiated, as the NNS is merely informed about the new form. The affirmative particle orients to the asymmetric positions of the participants: the fact that the speaker (NS) suggests closure of the repair sequence even before the recipient (NNS) has reacted to the correction displays the NS’s epistemic authority over the issue. In the repair sequences in NS-NNS talk, affirmative particles not only occur in the repair turn, but also in the subsequent turn, in the acknowledgement of repair. When being overtly corrected, the NNSs repeat the correction. This repetition may be preceded or followed by the particle joo.1 Again, the particle can be seen to reflect the participants’ speaker statuses. When acknowledging the correction by both repeating and confirming it, the speaker accepts it without question, as a “received form”. This correction is not challenged and no proof or explanation for it is requested. The affirmative particle after the repetition can be seen as signalling the speaker’s epistemic status: by adding joo in the repetition, the speaker displays that the modified form was what she intended, it was the form she should have been using. The affirmative particle indicates that the speaker could, or perhaps should, have known the correct form; the correction is not displayed as being new information to the speaker, (as would be the case if the repeat would be preceded e.g. by a change-of-state token). Thus, with the particle joo, the NNSs can receive the correction as the right form and display familiarity with the Finnish grammar, since correction is not received as news. Also, by producing the closing-implicative particle joo,

 Second Language Interaction

the NNSs go along with the minimal orientation towards the repair that the NSs put forward. Both the NSs and the NNS display willingness to close the repair sequence without topicalising the error or the correction, and without further negotiations about the issue. With the help of the affirmative particle, the new form is produced and accepted as given, and the participants display being ready to move on in conversation. Other-correction is not the only type of repair where the linguistic positions of the participants can be detected in the design of the sequence. The participants’ orientation to their nativeness or non-nativeness can also be seen to shape their contributions in word searches. Although both the NSs and the NNSs engage in searches where they invite the other speaker to join the search, the invitations and the status of the sought-for items are different. The crucial difference in the targets of the search is that the NSs address the NNSs only in searches where the NNSs is the knowledgeable participant about the information that is being searched for (cf. B-event by Labov & Fanshel 1977). On the other hand, the NNSs can also seek help from the NSs when describing their own experiences or other events to which they have the primary access (cf. Aevent by Labov & Fanshel 1977). As Goodwin (1987) has shown, inviting the recipient to join the search credits her with the status of a knowing participant. Since the NS cannot be the knowing participant with respect to the content of the NNS’s turn (the description of the A-event), the invitation is more likely to concern the form of the turn – the linguistic means which are chosen to describe the A-event. In other words, rather than being offered an opportunity to be a co-teller in the story, the NS is credited with the status of a linguistically knowledgeable participant. There is also a slight difference in the NSs’ and the NNSs’ ways of initiating word searches which involve the recipient. Although both speakers can begin the search with an interrogative, the NSs tend to use focused and the NNSs unfocused interrogatives. The NSs direct the interrogative to the recipient using their gaze and specify what the target of the search is (‘what was the name of that previous guy’), whereas the NNSs produce the unfocused interrogative (‘what is it’) as a general word search marker: it is prosodically different from the surrounding speech and uttered without gazing at the recipient. This difference – that the NSs can immediately address the NNSs when faced with a problem, whereas the NNSs turn to the NSs only after a self-directed phase – can be seen as reflecting the participants’ linguistic identities. The NS is known to be a competent speaker and, hence her failure to find a word is likely to be interpreted as a temporary and context-bound problem. However, the NNS’s linguistic difficulties can be related to her non-nativeness, in which case they

Chapter 6. Concluding discussion 

can become signs of incompetence: a failure to find a word might not be an occasional shortcoming but evidence of the NNS’s inability to formulate utterances and to take care of her contributions in conversation, i.e. to function as an interactant. By not immediately addressing the NSs when facing a linguistic difficulty, the NNSs can indicate that they are potentially able to resolve the situation themselves, they retain the responsibility of their own contributions. That is, the NNSs show that they are competent as interactants, even though they might not be competent speakers of the particular language. The NSs do not have a similar need to display their linguistic competence: signs of trouble do not threaten (as easily) their membership in the category of competent interactants. In sum, the participants’ linguistic identities can be seen to shape the repair sequences (on linguistic matters) in NS-NNS conversation. The NNSs initiate word searches, the NSs correct the grammatical deficiencies by the NNSs and the NNSs accept the corrections in a way which takes into account the (potential) asymmetry in the linguistic competencies of the participants.

. Is there an “institutional fingerprint” in conversation? Since the data for this study consist both of institutional and everyday interaction, this has given me the opportunity to explore the implications of different types of conversations. This study has not been set out to define the “script” of office encounters or even to explore the distinction between institutional and everyday conversation; rather, I have used different kinds of data to get as complete a picture as possible on interactional understanding. However, some tendencies or features of institutionality emerged while examining the interactional phenomena. In general, the phenomena that were investigated in the study – othercorrection, word search and candidate understandings – were closely linked to the conversational tasks that the turns in which they occurred were performing. Different tasks or activities are typical of different conversational settings so that, for example, narratives occur mainly in everyday conversation, whereas question-answer sequences are the hallmark of office encounters. Narratives, in turn, are the “home-base” of e.g. lexical searches: the teller can have difficulty in finding words, since she needs to initiate information about different entities and events. In contrast, in question-answer sequences, the client can often exploit the grammar and lexicon of the first pair parts when producing the second pair parts. Instead of providing opportunities for lexical searches,

 Second Language Interaction

question-answer sequences offer a plenty of locations where prior talk can be modified within the next relevant activity, that is, in extended answers or modified repeats. The third-turn repeat is one environment that is dependant on the type of conversation and it surfaces in different activities. As shown in Chapter 3, the NSs produce a native-like version of the deficient formulation by the NNSs, particularly if the deficiencies occur in an answer to a question by the NSs. This is true both in institutional and everyday conversation, but typically these post-answer repeats accomplish different functions in different conversations. In office encounters, question-answer sequences form the skeleton of the encounter. The secretary needs to gather exact information about the client, which is essential partly for the institutional record and partly for her to be able to fulfil her institutional task: to take care of the matter that has brought the client to the office. The modified third-turn repeats in office encounters are involved in an activity which serves these institutional purposes: by repeating (her interpretation of) the answer, the secretary registers the information. This registration is done overtly so that the information can be further checked and confirmed. In everyday conversations, the third-turn repeats are not usually involved in registering or (double-)checking the accuracy of previous information. Rather, they could be regarded as echo exclamations (cf. Quirk et al. 1985; Sorjonen 1996) or expressions of ritualized disbelief (cf. Heritage 1984b). Partial repeats of the answer display the unexpectedness or newsworthiness of the answer, and they solicit further talk by reference to the news more or less strongly according to the syntax of the repeat and to the particles in the turn (Heritage 1984b: 339–344; Jefferson 1981: 62–66). A typical particle in these turns in the data is the news receipt token ai, which cannot be found in the third-turn repeats in institutional interactions.2 Thus, a third-turn repeat is a typical location for corrections, even if the repeats perform different activities in different types of conversations. One linguistic category which seems to be sensitive to the distinction between institutional and everyday talk (or perhaps to the distinction between neutral and affective) is particles. Certain particles seem to favour certain settings (i.e. are involved in activities typical of certain settings). For example, the principle of neutrality in institutional interaction seems to omit changeof-state tokens in particular sequential locations. The change-of-state tokens can be replaced by the “more neutral” particles, such as joo in Finnish (or yes or certainly in English, cf. Heritage 1984b: 339 [Atkinson 1979]). As discussed in the previous section, joo occurs frequently in repair sequences in NS-NNS

Chapter 6. Concluding discussion 

talk. This is partly due to its understanding-displaying and closing-implicative character, but it is also due to its frequent position in institutional conversation, namely in the modified third-turn repeats. Joo in these locations can be seen as serving the purpose of institutional neutrality: it receives and registers the information without displaying any attitude towards it. The post-answer joo is often produced with a rising intonation. According to Sorjonen (2001: 250), a rise at the end of the particle joo is found especially in cases in which the recipient is receiving some routine information which needs to be written down. Sorjonen also mentions that this type of joo is used especially by the representatives of an institution. In sum, the neutral character of the particle joo makes it suitable for certain activities in institutional encounters. These activities, in turn, merge with corrections, resulting in the frequent occurrence of the particle in repair sequences. The particle joo can thus be found in certain practices in institutional encounters, but it is a multifunctional response particle and very common in everyday conversation (see Sorjonen 2001). There is another particle in the data that seems to be more “inherently institutional”, namely the particle eli(kkä) (e.g. ‘so’ or ‘in other words’). It occurs at the beginning of paraphrasing candidate understandings in the data, and it occurs only in institutional interaction. Paraphrases are well suited to the needs of institutional talk: they produce a condensed version of the prior talk and, hence, they can be used to check the relevant details in the prior turn. However, speakers also produce paraphrases in everyday conversation, but these paraphrases begin with different initial particles, (e.g. news receipt tokens or affirmative particles). Thus, eli(kkä) seems to be a particle which favours institutional settings. This observation supports the previous findings on the particle eli(kkä): Sorjonen (2000), who studied eli(kkä) in different sequential and turn-internal positions, suggests that it is used especially in institutional interactions which involve many (from the point of view of the professional) routine activities. A particle, or a particle chain, which has its home in everyday conversation according to my data, is ni or nii et(tä). These particles begin candidate understandings mostly in everyday talk, (there is only one occurrence of nii että in institutional interaction). Nii et(tä) are typical initial elements in candidate understandings which verbalise an upshot of the prior talk. They are often produced as a response to some uncertainty-marking by the NNS. Thus, after the NNS has displayed having difficulty in utterance-formulation, the NS can use a candidate understanding to indicate that the difficulties are not crucial for intersubjectivity: despite the markers of a problem, the NS is able to articulate the upshot of the previous turn.3 The fact that candidate understand-

 Second Language Interaction

ings with the initial ni or nii et(tä) are often used to remedy the interactional situation may explain their distribution in the data. Since the NNSs produce narratives and substantial turns more often in everyday conversation, they can also experience more trouble in constructing the utterances. Also, since the interlocutors in everyday conversations are friends, there might be a higher pressure to remedy the (potentially threatening) interactional problems and construct the conversation as symmetric and harmonious as possible. In sum, the institutionality of different linguistic elements or practices in the data can be explained through the activities which are accomplished by mobilising the practices. There are activities which are often performed through a particular linguistic structure. On the other hand, different activities are typical of different settings. As a consequence, there can be distributional differences in linguistic elements (such as eli or ni[i että]) between institutional and everyday conversation.

. Implications arising from the present study The results of the present study raise issues both within second language research and conversation analysis. The focus of this study has not been on language acquisition or learning (central to language teaching and second language research), and hence I cannot offer insights into the correction’s or candidate understanding’s effect on mastering a particular linguistic structure. However, this study contributes to the second language research by showing how meaningful the details of interaction are, and how a rough predefined categorization of utterances can do unjustice to the data by obscuring or hiding the systematicity or the richness of the participants’ ways to jointly construct conversation and manage various activities. For example, many studies examining the role of interaction in language acquisition process, talk about recasts (e.g. Mackey & Philp 1998; Long, Inagaki, & Ortega 1998) or feedback (e.g. Mackey, Gass, & McDonough 2000) as (potentially) facilitating or promoting learning. However, these labels lump together utterances which in real interaction are used to accomplish different functions and which also have different sequential projections. Thus, for example, recasts are defined as utterances which rephrase a child’s (the NNS’s) utterance while still refering to its central meaning (Long 1996: 434). They reformulate the ill-formed utterance by expanding it in some way without changing the central meaning of the utterance, and they occur subsequent to the ill-formed utterance (Mackey & Philp 1998: 341). However, these criteria cover different types of embedded cor-

Chapter 6. Concluding discussion 

rections, exposed corrections and candidate understandings. As I have shown through the analysis of the data excerpts, these conversational practices are different from each other: they manage different activities, and they also have different projections on the recipient’s participation and involvement in taking notice of the linguistic modification. Different kinds of ‘recasts’ thus make different participatory demands on the (non-native) speaker. The same is true with the notion of feedback. It seems that ‘feedback’ is used to refer to almost any turn which follows a non-target-like utterance by the NNS. It is therefore easy to agree with Mackey et al. (2000) when they write – having made what is indeed the very interesting observation that morphosyntactic feedback is often perceived as being about semantics – that “exploring the nature of feedback in more detail may shed further light on the findings” (ibid.: 490). Although my study does not provide insights into the language acquisition process, it provides evidence to appreciate the details of interaction and fine-grained analysis. As Drew (1981: 263) has put it: Just coding utterances as ‘repeats’ or ‘reformulations’ would not describe what interactional work they achieve in given sequential environments, or systematic aspects of their design for that work. It is this understanding of turns, and components within turns, as sequential objects – which is fundamental to our ability as speakers to fit what we say into orderly discourse.

The importance of detailed analysis can be illustrated through one further example. In communication strategy literature, one strategy, which is often labelled as ‘interactional’, is appeal for assistance (or authority) (see e.g. Tarone 1983; Faerch & Kasper 1983b; Yule & Tarone 1997; Kellerman & Bialystok 1997). ‘Appeal for assistance’ is exemplified with the utterances What is this or What called (Tarone 1983: 62; Larsen-Freeman & Long 1991: 127). Whinterrogatives were indeed common in my data in situations where the NNS had difficulty in finding a word. It is worth noting, however, that the interrogatives were almost uniquely not used to ask help from the NSs. The absence of gaze and the prosodic features of the interrogative frame it as being self- rather than other-directed. Moreover, it is not a co-incidence that the interrogatives by the NNSs are produced as “not seeking help from the co-participant”. The interrogative is one conversational feature where the participants’ linguistic identities surface in interaction; it carries a meaning sensitive to the speaker’s competence as a speaker and interactant. To conclude, I will consider the implications of the present study for conversation analysis. As this study, and other studies (e.g. Wong 2000a, b and c; Gardner & Wagner 2004; Richards & Seedhouse 2005) have shown, CA is a

 Second Language Interaction

viable method in studying conversation between native and non-native speakers. Its rigidity, empirical base and avoidance of pre-categorisations can offer new insights to the language-in-interaction between NSs and NNSs, and reveal the dynamic character of these acronyms: the interactional relevance of the participants’ nativeness or non-nativeness is alive to the conversational situation. However, combining CA and second language data is not totally unproblematic. CA relies on the notion of ‘membership’; it aims at studying members’ practices which arise from shared competencies. The shared practices (based on shared competencies) between the participants, and between the participants and the researcher, make the analysis possible – answering the crucial question “why this now”. However, this question should be asked and answered with some caution when it concerns NS-NNS data. For example, the affirmative response particles nii and joo in Finnish are different e.g. in what they claim about the epistemic status of the speaker (Sorjonen 2001). Thus, the speaker is doing a different act by using one or the other particle. For example, Sorjonen has demonstrated that an acceptance of a candidate understanding is typically offered through the particle nii in Finnish. Nii claims to remove the uncertainty conveyed by the candidate understanding through claiming agreement with the interpretation that the coparticipant has offered of the speaker’s utterance (Sorjonen 2001: 64). If the speaker accepted the candidate understanding through the particle joo, she would establish a different relation between the candidate understanding and the preceding turn. In my data, candidate understandings by NSs were mostly accepted by NNSs through the particle joo. However, answering the fundamental question, “why this now?” (i.e. what is the speaker conveying by choosing the particle joo) cannot be straightforwardly based on the insightful information Sorjonen has been able to provide about the epistemic differences of the particles. Since there are restrictions in the shared knowledge between the NNS and the NS (and the researcher), the researcher cannot be sure what the NNS’s system is in using the particles.4 It might for example be that the NNS does not know (i.e. has not yet learnt) the particle nii; its learning may be postponed because the need to be able to produce an affirmative particle is satisfied when one such particle (joo) is learnt. This is one potential explanation for the dominant use of joo in my data. In other words, the question “why this now” is relevant when the participants have choices (which have different implications). In NNS talk, however, it is not clear that the speaker has a choice, for example when she wants to confirm the candidate understanding.

Chapter 6. Concluding discussion 

However, the co-participant (the NS) is faced with the same problem as the researcher. This makes CA research on second language talk possible: the evidence of the analysis in CA should be based on what is shown in interaction. The researcher (or the NS) cannot know exactly what kind of conversational act the NNS is doing when producing a particular particle, but the NS (i.e. the co-participant) somehow has to deal with the utterance. Thus, it is the co-participant’s response and her interpretation of the utterance that is the resource for the researcher’s analysis. One further issue which has arisen from the second language data, and which is relevant to further development of CA, is the self-initiation of repair. In NNS talk, self-initiation of repair is common and the ways of initiation are varying (cf. 2.2.1). There are cut-offs, sound stretches and hesitation sounds (“uh”s), which are the perturbations mentioned by Schegloff et al. (1977) as initiations in NS talk. However, there are also other ways in NNS talk to initiate repair. For example, the NNSs may go through an inflectional paradigm in searching a right ending, or otherwise lay out her production process or her “mental path” towards the target utterance. And, as I argued earlier, it is not always clear where the initiation ends and the repair begins. From a linguistic point of view, these initiation phases can offer valuable information about language and about the learning process. However, so far in CA, repair initiation has been a more structural term (i.e. studied as a category with a particular sequential projection) than a focus of study itself (see however Laakso & Sorjonen 2005; Helasvuo, Laakso, & Sorjonen 2004). It is perhaps in this type of instances (e.g. repair initiations) where conversation analysis and linguisticaly oriented second language research could most fruitfully meet. The sequential analysis (the “horisontal” progress of conversation) could be enriched by focusing more on the relevant “vertical” instances, i.e. instances in which the progess of conversation is halted. By so doing, a link is established to an expanding body of language learning research – studies within the framework of sociocultural or situated L2 learning (cf. e.g. Mondada & Pekarek Doehler 2004; Young & Miller 2004). A detailed analysis of sequences where the speaker orients to linguistic details can shed light on the emerging syntax of the language learner, as well as on the linguistic and social practices in which learning is rooted. These issues and implications suggest new lines of study both in second language research and in conversation analysis, and offer information about NS-NNS interaction that may benefit teaching Finnish as a second language. In general, my study shows that the nativeness or nonnativeness of the participants is not relevant all the time in conversation; if the speaker identities are

 Second Language Interaction

made relevant, it is mostly a result of the NNS’s activities. The participants, in particular the NSs, avoid disrupting the progress of conversation. There are no verbalisations of non-understanding by the NSs and, when mutual intelligibility is at stake, the NSs deal with the situation by producing turns that display understanding rather than non-understanding. In sum, if the working hypothesis of the speaker in NS-NS talk is that the recipient understands what the speaker means (‘you understand me’), the (native) speakers act on the basis of the reversed order (‘I understand you’) in NS-NNS conversation. In NS-NNS talk, the participants cannot rely on intersubjectivity between the participants to the same extent as in NS-NS conversation. Uncertainty about, or the limitations of, intersubjectivity result in a need to demonstrate understanding more explicitly. By avoiding activities which would interrupt the progress of conversation and display non-understanding, NSs deal with the asymmetry between the participants and construct the interaction as demonstrating the existence of intersubjectivity.

Notes

Chapter 1 . In this section, I will mostly talk about the “mainstream” second language acquisition research, since there is a growing interest to find out the relevance of interaction in the acquisition process (see e.g. Long 1996; Polio & Gass 1998; Mackey 1999; Braidi 2002; Mackey, Oliver, & Leeman 2003). This focus leaves aside some lines of research that deal with second language speech. Such lines are for example research on bilingual interaction (see e.g. Auer 1998), studies on cross-cultural communication and misunderstandings (see e.g. Gumperz 1982a and b; di Luzio, Günthner, & Orletti 2000; House, Kasper, & Ross 2003) as well as research on speech act realization and interlanguage pragmatics (see e.g. Kasper & Blum-Kulka 1993). . SLA research has always been closely linked with language pedagogy. On the one hand, aspects of ‘teacher talk’ and classroom interaction have been investigated (see e.g. Chaudron 1988; van Lier 1988; Lyster & Ranta 1997; Liebscher & Dailey-O’Cain 2003; Oliver & Mackey 2003) but, also the very study of language acquisition is seen as beneficial for language teaching. As Corder puts it (quoted in Larsen-Freeman & Long 1991: 3): “Efficient teaching must work with, rather than against, natural process, facilitate and expedite rather than impedite learning.” . As early as 1978, Hatch saw the possibilities for an interactional approach within the field of SLA: “One possibility for a new method is discourse analysis and, in particular, conversation analysis. It is not enough to look at input and to look at frequency; the important thing is to look at the corpus as a whole and examine the interactions that take place within conversations to see how that interaction, itself, determines frequency of forms and how it shows language functions evolving (ibid.: 403). – I feel very strongly that only through discourse analysis can we answer the many questions that we have about second language acquisition (ibid.: 433).”

Chapter 2 . On repair in conversation see e.g. Schegloff (1979, 1987a, 1992, 1997, 2000); Jefferson (1987); Drew (1997); Kalin (1995); Sorjonen (1997a).

 Second Language Interaction

Chapter 3 . My thanks to Paul Drew for giving me access to this collection. . Linguistic simplification is a phenomenon which has been observed in the speech by language learners. This simplification often involves the omission of form words and affixes (cf. e.g. Meisel 1983; Ellis 1985). . Line 1 could be also analysed as a double bind structure that starts out as a question and finishes as a statement. The important point, however, is that the recipient treats the turn as a question. . Also example (3) is treated as a correction by the recipient (the client), even though the secretary frames it as seeking confirmation. . I use the terms ‘repair’ and ‘correction’ here, even though it is not clear whether the recipient registers the substitution (repairable → repair). There are, however, two adjacent turns of which the first contains a (grammatical) deficiency and the second the same linguistic item in the standard form. . It should be noted that the negation (ei oo joka vuos) is not a full sentence, since the subject has been ellipted. Because of this ellipsis, the utterance is grammatically dependant on the preceding turn. However, this does change the fact that the negation is “over-complete” by repeating the temporal expression. . It should be noted that prior speech can, but need not be, repeated in this location. The secretaries acknowledge the new information in the clients’ answer by repeating it or by producing an acknowledgement token. However, when the answers contain linguistic deficiencies, the secretaries choose the former alternative, i.e. they produce a (modified) repetition of the prior turn. . In another environment, in the context of second assessments, the format [repeat + affirmative particle] has been observed to signal the speaker’s epistemic authority on the matter being assessed (cf. Heritage & Raymond 2002). . This is aligned with what Heritage (1985: 98–99) has observed in news interview interaction: the objects through which recipiency to a report and affiliation with the reporter are established and maintained in conversation are massively absent. – Questioners characteristically avoid overtly responding to reports as news. (See also Heritage 1984b; Clayman & Heritage 2003.) . Due to the consonant gradation, there is alternation between n and t in different declinations of the word. The nominative case is englanti but the genitive case, which the speakers use in the example, is englannin. . There is only one grammatical correction by the secretary that does not fall in this category; it will be discussed in 3.3.2. . The particle nii is also continuation relevant (Sorjonen 2001), but the current database is not sufficient to make detailed conclusions about the differences between the two particles joo and nii in the repair turns.

Notes  . Another way of explaining the repetition (line 4) is to say that, by repeating the alternative version, the NNS demonstrates that what is being confirmed can be seen to have “planted”, or conveyed, in the preceding talk (Schegloff 1996b: 181). These explanations need not be mutually exclusive. . In the translation, there are homonymous occurrences of the word well. In lines 3, 5 and 15, ‘well’ is a dialogue particle (displaying some kind of transition), whereas in lines 11 and 12, it is the adverbial derivation of the adjective good. . The adverbial ending sti could be translated, with other adjectives than hard, with the morpheme ly in English, as in firm – firmly. The adverb kovasti can in principle mean both ‘harshly’ and ‘much’. . The utterance tulee maasta contains an elative case indicating that something is coming out of the ground or soil. The more accurate translation would therefore perhaps be ‘out of the ground’. I have used the same noun ‘countryside’ in the repair and the repairable to indicate that, in Finnish, there is only a morphological change in the repair.

Chapter 4 . The NS specifically translates the loan word, instead of e.g. completing the utterance on behalf of the NNS. The translation is in the base form (nominative); it is not inflected so that it would fit syntactically to the utterance where the loan word occurred. . It should also be noted that, with respect to loan words, the “native speakers” are no longer ‘native’. . I include the conversations between the beauty therapist and “the client” in everyday interaction. The interlocutors are friends and their interaction resembles, both in structure and in its content, an everyday conversation between friends rather than a goal-oriented institutional encounter. (For example, the duration of the facial treatment did not restrict the duration of the conversation; the participants continued talking after the treatment was finished.) . The translation of grammatical searches poses problems, since the focus of the search is on the word-final suffixes and on the variation they cause in the word stem. The gloss line provides a translation for the linguistic items where a standard native language form of the verb can be identified. The third line provides a rough English translation; the differences in typology and pronunciation between Finnish and English restrict the idiomatic translation. . In Finnish, the expression ‘a course organised by the employment office’ is one noun phrase where ‘course’ is the head preceded by all the modifiers. . This is a possibility which calls for a comparative study. As mentioned, when exposing their difficulty in utterance formulation, the NNSs in my data focus on morphology, particularly on inflectional morphemes. Brouwer (2000), in her study about everyday conversations between native and non-native speakers of Danish, found similar instances where the NNSs made an effort to produce correct language, but the domain that the NNSs focused on was pronunciation. The mother tongue of the NNSs in Brouwer’s study was Dutch,

 Second Language Interaction

which is typologically similar to Danish. In my study, the mother tongues of the NNSs who engage in grammatical searches are e.g. Japanese, Russian and French, which are typologically different from Finnish. It seems that there might be a phenomenon, ‘doing linguistic orientation’, i.e. the NNSs’ exposed attempt to produce correct talk, which can be found in different NS-NNS conversations, regardless of the source or target languages. However, the target and/or the source language can shape the characteristics of the phenomenon, so that it can be realised in interaction e.g. in ‘doing morphology’ or ‘doing pronunciation’. Examining NS-NNS interaction in a variety of languages could help uncover which aspects of a particular language are vital and not vital to spoken communication. . This is a derivational suffix which can e.g. be attached to some nouns to make them adjectives. An English equivalent would be -ful; i.e. colour → colourful, joy → joyful etc. . The final syllable -ton is a derivational morpheme which can be attached to nouns to mark the absence (of the noun). The closest English equivalent would be -less; e.g colour → colourless, end → endless. . Labov and Fanshel (1977) have divided events according to the statuses of knowledge the interlocutors have about them. In A-events, the speaker is the knowledgeable participant, whereas B-events are better known to the recipient.

Chapter 5 . In many second language studies, the turn which re-presents prior talk in a modified form is called a reformulation, whereas in the conversation analytic tradition, the term is a formulation. . B-events are such where the recipient (=B) has a primary access to knowledge, i.e. events which are better known to B than to A (=the speaker), (cf. Labov & Fanshel 1977). . This is rather similar to the modified third position repeats (cf. Chapter 3) which also can be seen as “double-checking” the information. . The term is from Jefferson, who has collected a few examples of this phenomenon. In the note attached to the collection, she suggests that a post-confirmation confirmation can be, for example, marking an unforthcomingness by a coparticipant. . However, there seems to be a difference in the reception of the (elaborating) candidate understanding. Native speakers and proficient second language speakers confirm the candidate with the affirmative particle nii, whereas non-native speakers who do not yet have much experience of the Finnish language use the other affirmative particle joo. Sorjonen (2001: 61) has observed that an acceptance of candidate understandings is typically offered through the particle nii. According to Sorjonen (ibid.: 64), nii claims to remove the uncertainty conveyed by the candidate understanding through claiming agreement with the interpretation the coparticipant has offered of the speaker’s utterance. Throgh the particle nii, the speaker accepts that the prior turn was not specific enough for the recipient and suggests a closure of the repair sequence.

Notes 

Example (12) is particularly interesting, since the NS2 changes the particle. The NNS first confirms the candidate understanding with the particle joo (line 19), after which the other NS produces a specification (line 20). This specification begins with and ends in the particle nii. In other words, the NS2 can be seen to specify not only the place reference (‘here at the university → in Bordeaux’) but also the implications of the different particles (joo → nii). By changing the particle from joo to nii, he constructs the candidate as legitimate and the sequence as closing-relevant. . For a more detailed analysis of this example, see 4.2.3. . P moves both hands towards S’s hair. . P holds her hands close to S’s hair and makes a “sqeezing” gesture. . P begins moving her hands away from S’s hair. . P moves her hands quickly back to S’s hair and withdraws them. . This is especially true in the conversations which are recorded at the institutions offering courses in Finnish. Even the clients who only have rudimentary knowledge of Finnish try to communicate in Finnish. This might be due to the special character of these situations: mostly, the clients try to get into the (Finnish) courses and, hence, it might be favourable to demonstrate one’s eagerness and commitment to learn and use the language to the secretary, who is in the gate-keeping position and controls access to the courses. The tendency to use Finnish whenever possible can also be seen in the secretary’s behaviour: as soon as she has reason to assume that the client can speak Finnish, she switches to Finnish (cf. ex. (21), line 17). . As examples in this section are rather lengthy, I have omitted the gloss line in other turns except for the target turn and the immediately preceding and following turn. . Aineopinto-opiskelija means a student who is majoring in a certain subject. The clients of this encounter study Finnish as their major subject at the university.

Chapter 6 . Svennevig (2004) has also observed that, in his NS-NNS data, repeats of the prior talk (which occurred e.g. after word searches, embedded corrections or formulations) were often accompanied by a confirming particle. . This is aligned with what has been found in the English institutional data: the (institutional) neutrality is maintained by e.g. avoiding the change-of-state token oh in news receipts (see e.g. Heritage & Greatbatch 1991). . It is interesting that it is the particle nii which prefaces the utterances that are used to remedy the potential breaches in intersubjectivity or intelligibility. Nii is a particle which displays that the recipient, the nii speaker, is in some ways knowledgeable of what the coparticipant is talking about (Sorjonen 2001: 280). Thus, the initial particle already indicates that mutual intelligibility prevails, and the subsequent utterance (the verbalisation of the upshot of the prior talk) functions merely as evidence of this.

 Second Language Interaction . It should also be noted that the particles and their usages are rarely discussed or illustrated in the textbooks on Finnish as a second language (cf. Sorjonen 1997b: 19–20). Since Sorjonen (1997b) was the first to exhaustively describe the functions of the particles, they cannot have been taught to learners of Finnish before her results were published.

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Appendix

Transcription symbols . falling intonation , level intonation ? rising intonation ?, slightly rising intonation ↑ rise in pitch ↓ fall in pitch ↑↑ stretch of talk uttered in high pitch ↓↓ stretch of talk uttered in low pitch Emphasis is indicated with underlining. JOO increased volume : lengthening of the sound ˚ degree signs indicate a passage of talk quieter than the surrounding talk # talk surrounded by #-signs is said with a creaky voice £ smiley voice @ animated voice talk inside is spoken at a slower pace than the surrounding talk >< talk inside is spoken at a faster pace than the surrounding talk h the letter h (or several of them) indicates an audible aspiration .h a period + the letter h (or several of them) indicates an audible inhalation .mt smacking sound he he laughter j(h)oo laughter within talk (.) a micropause less than two tenths of a second (0.5) silence timed in tenths of seconds = no silence between two adjacent utterances [ utterances starting simultaneously ] point where overlap stops () item in doubt (- -) indecipherable talk (( )) transcriptionist’s comment

 Second Language Interaction

Glossing symbols The morphemes have been separated from each other with a hyphen (-). The following have been treated as unmarked forms, not indicated in the glossing (except when there are special reasons for indicating the form): – – – – –

nominative case singular 3rd person singular active voice present tense.

Gaze and overlap are marked in the transcripts with respect to the original Finnish utterances. I have left out the overlap signs in the free translation in some cases where the sign would have been in syntactically different places in Finnish and English utterances.

Case endings NOM GEN PAR ESS TRA INE ELA ILL ADE ABL ALL ABE INS

nominative (subject) genitive (possession) partitive (partitiveness) essive (‘as’) translative (‘to’, ‘becoming’) inessive (‘in’) elative (‘out of ’) illative (‘into’) adessive (‘at, on’) ablative (‘from’) allative (‘to’) abessive (‘without’) instructive (various)

Others ADV CLI COMP COND INF NEG PASS PL POS PC PPC

adverb clitic comparative conditional infinitive negation (an auxiliary verb in Finnish) passive plural possesive suffix participle past participle

Appendix 

PPPC PRS PRT PST Q sg SUP 1 2 3

passive past participle present tense particle past tense interrogative singular superlative 1st person ending 2nd person ending 3rd person ending

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Index

A A-event , ,  activity of checking , , , , , , , ,  affirmative particle –, , , , , , , , –, –, , ,  affirmative token see affirmative particle agglutinative language ,  appeal for assistance ,  articulation ,  asymmetric conversation , , ,  B B-event , ,  C CA (conversation analysis) –, , , –, –, , – candidate answer , ,  category knowledge ,  change-of-state-token –, , ,  changing perspective ,  circumlocation  clarifying references , , , ,  co-constructing turns – see also joint construction collaborative completion  communication strategy , , , , , ,  competence , , , , ,  competent member , , , , , , 

compound construction ,  comprehension , ,  confirming particle see affirmative particle constructions of candidate understandings – context , , ,  co-operative activity , ,  principal of co-operation  correction , –, –, , –, –, , –, , – collaborative correction ,  confirmatory correction ,  corrective feedback  en passant correction , , , , ,  (outright) other-correction , –, , , , –, –, , , , –, –,  preference for self-correction , , , ,  self-correction , , , 

D deficiency see linguistic deficiency deictic expression  delicacy , ,  delicate activity –, , 

difficulty in utterance formulation , , –, ,  E echo utterance , ,  emic  en passant repair see correction epistemic authority , ,  everyday conversation , –, , , , , , –, –, , , , –,  F feedback ,  focused/unfocused interrogatives see specified/unspecified interrogative follow-up question  foreignize , ,  formulation , , –, ,  front desk encounter  full-sentence answer  G gate-keeping situation  gaze , , , , –, , , , , –, , –, ,  gesture , , –,  gist , ,  grammatical correctness ,  grammatical resources 

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 Second Language Interaction

I institutionality , ,  institutional conversation –, , , , , , , , , –, , , , – institutional neutrality , , ,  institutional orientation – institutional role , ,  intelligibility , , , , , , , ,  see also mutual understanding interactional approach –, , –,  interactionally-oriented search see substantial word search interpersonal purpose –, –,  intersubjectivity , –, , , , , , , ,  J joint construction ,  see also co-constructing turns K knowledge asymmetry of knowledge , , ,  see also linguistic asymmetry category knowledge ,  knowing participant see knowledgeable participant knowledgeable participant , , , , –, , , , , , –, , , ,  position of knowledge –, , , , –, , , ,  underestimating shared knowledge 

L language learning –, , –, ,  laughter , , , ,  lexico-semantic resources  linguistic asymmetry , , , , , , , , , , ,  see also position of knowledge linguistic deficiency , , ,  linguistic identity , , , , , , –, –, , , –, , – relevance of linguistic identities , , ,  M membership –, , , , ,  members’ competence , , , ,  modified self-repetition , , ,  mutual understanding , , , , , , , , , ,  tendency to display understanding , ,  N native , , , –, , –, , ,  , –, , , –, , , , , , , , , ,  negation , –,  non-native , , , , , –, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,  O office encounter see front desk encounter orientation backward orientation , , , 

discrepancy in orientations , , –, –, , ,  forward-orientation , , ,  minimal orientation to repair , –, , , –, , , –, ,  orientation to grammatical correctness , ,  orientation to the progress of interaction , , , ,  other-correction see correction

P particle eli(kkä) , ,  post-confirmation confirmation , ,  progress of conversation , , , , , ,  prosodically marked interrogative –, 

Q question-answer sequences , , , 

R recast , –, – reformulation ,  remedy for interactional breakdown  repair organisation , –, , , ,  minimal orientation to repair , –, , , , –, , , –, ,  prosody (of repair) , , ,  repair initiation –, , ,  avoidance of repair initiations –, –, , –

TSL[v.20020404] Prn:29/03/2006; 11:41

F: PB145IN.tex / p.3 (257)

Index 

other-initiation of repair –,  self-initiation of repair , –, ,  repairable , , , , , – S self-correction see correction semantic class –,  semantic knowledge see category knowledge sequential discretion see minimal orientation to repair

SLA (second language acquisition) –, –, ,  speaker identity see linguistic identity speaker status identity

see linguistic

specified interrogative  speech perturbations –, –, , ,  speeding up conversation ,  standard , , ,  , , , 

substantial word search , ,  T third-turn repeat –, –,  U understanding see mutual understanding unspecified interrogative ,  upshot , , , , 

In the Pragmatics & Beyond New Series the following titles have been published thus far or are scheduled for publication: 148 FLØTTUM, Kjersti, Trine DAHL and Torodd KINN: Academic Voices. Across languages and disciplines. Expected August 2006 147 HINRICHS, Lars: Codeswitching on the Web. English and Jamaican Creole in e-mail communication. Expected August 2006 146 TANSKANEN, Sanna-Kaisa: Collaborating towards Coherence. Lexical cohesion in English Discourse. x, 187 pp. + index. Expected July 2006 145 KURHILA, Salla: Second Language Interaction. 2006. vii, 257 pp. 144 BÜHRIG, Kristin and Jan D. ten THIJE (eds.): Beyond Misunderstanding. Linguistic analyses of intercultural communication. vi, 328 pp. + index. Expected May 2006 143 BAKER, Carolyn, Michael EMMISON and Alan FIRTH (eds.): Calling for Help. Language and social interaction in telephone helplines. 2005. xviii, 352 pp. 142 SIDNELL, Jack: Talk and Practical Epistemology. The social life of knowledge in a Caribbean community. 2005. xvi, 255 pp. 141 ZHU, Yunxia: Written Communication across Cultures. A sociocognitive perspective on business genres. 2005. xviii, 216 pp. 140 BUTLER, Christopher S., María de los Ángeles GÓMEZ-GONZÁLEZ and Susana M. DOVAL-SUÁREZ (eds.): The Dynamics of Language Use. Functional and contrastive perspectives. 2005. xvi, 413 pp. 139 LAKOFF, Robin T. and Sachiko IDE (eds.): Broadening the Horizon of Linguistic Politeness. 2005. xii, 342 pp. 138 MÜLLER, Simone: Discourse Markers in Native and Non-native English Discourse. 2005. xviii, 290 pp. 137 MORITA, Emi: Negotiation of Contingent Talk. The Japanese interactional particles ne and sa. 2005. xvi, 240 pp. 136 SASSEN, Claudia: Linguistic Dimensions of Crisis Talk. Formalising structures in a controlled language. 2005. ix, 230 pp. 135 ARCHER, Dawn: Questions and Answers in the English Courtroom (1640–1760). A sociopragmatic analysis. 2005. xiv, 374 pp. 134 SKAFFARI, Janne, Matti PEIKOLA, Ruth CARROLL, Risto HILTUNEN and Brita WÅRVIK (eds.): Opening Windows on Texts and Discourses of the Past. 2005. x, 418 pp. 133 MARNETTE, Sophie: Speech and Thought Presentation in French. Concepts and strategies. 2005. xiv, 379 pp. 132 ONODERA, Noriko O.: Japanese Discourse Markers. Synchronic and diachronic discourse analysis. 2004. xiv, 253 pp. 131 JANOSCHKA, Anja: Web Advertising. New forms of communication on the Internet. 2004. xiv, 230 pp. 130 HALMARI, Helena and Tuija VIRTANEN (eds.): Persuasion Across Genres. A linguistic approach. 2005. x, 257 pp. 129 TABOADA, María Teresa: Building Coherence and Cohesion. Task-oriented dialogue in English and Spanish. 2004. xvii, 264 pp. 128 CORDELLA, Marisa: The Dynamic Consultation. A discourse analytical study of doctor–patient communication. 2004. xvi, 254 pp. 127 BRISARD, Frank, Michael MEEUWIS and Bart VANDENABEELE (eds.): Seduction, Community, Speech. A Festschrift for Herman Parret. 2004. vi, 202 pp. 126 WU, Yi’an: Spatial Demonstratives in English and Chinese. Text and Cognition. 2004. xviii, 236 pp. 125 LERNER, Gene H. (ed.): Conversation Analysis. Studies from the first generation. 2004. x, 302 pp. 124 VINE, Bernadette: Getting Things Done at Work. The discourse of power in workplace interaction. 2004. x, 278 pp. 123 MÁRQUEZ REITER, Rosina and María Elena PLACENCIA (eds.): Current Trends in the Pragmatics of Spanish. 2004. xvi, 383 pp. 122 GONZÁLEZ, Montserrat: Pragmatic Markers in Oral Narrative. The case of English and Catalan. 2004. xvi, 410 pp. 121 FETZER, Anita: Recontextualizing Context. Grammaticality meets appropriateness. 2004. x, 272 pp. 120 AIJMER, Karin and Anna-Brita STENSTRÖM (eds.): Discourse Patterns in Spoken and Written Corpora. 2004. viii, 279 pp. 119 HILTUNEN, Risto and Janne SKAFFARI (eds.): Discourse Perspectives on English. Medieval to modern. 2003. viii, 243 pp. 118 CHENG, Winnie: Intercultural Conversation. 2003. xii, 279 pp. 117 WU, Ruey-Jiuan Regina: Stance in Talk. A conversation analysis of Mandarin final particles. 2004. xvi, 260 pp.

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A complete list of titles in this series can be found on the publishers’ website, www.benjamins.com

Second Language Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Impoliteness in Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Humor in Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

New Adventures in Language and Interaction (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Calling for Help: Language And Social Interaction in Telephone Helplines (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Rethinking Communicative Interaction: New Interdisciplinary Horizons (Pragmatics and Beyond. New Series)

Cognitive Semantics: Meaning and Cognition (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Programming Language Pragmatics, Second Edition

Programming Language Pragmatics, Second Edition

Programming Language Pragmatics, Second Edition

Mental Spaces in Discourse and Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

South Slavic Discourse Particles (Pragmatics and Beyond. New Series)

Cognitive Semantics: Meaning and Cognition (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Style Shifting in Japanese (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Constraints in Discourse 2 (Pragmatics and Beyond. New Series)

Youngspeak in a Multilingual Perspective (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Constraints in Discourse (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series, 172)

Recontextualizing Context: Grammaticality Meets Appropriateness (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Connectives As Discourse Landmarks (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Metapragmatics in Use (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Conversational Dominance and Gender: A Study of Japanese Speakers in First and Second Language Contexts (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Creativity and Convention: The pragmatics of everyday figurative speech (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Metalanguage in Interaction: Hebrew discourse markers (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Perspectives on Semantics, Pragmatics and Discourse: A Festschrift for Ferenc Kiefer (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Rethinking Sequentiality: Linguistics Meets Conversational Interaction (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Discourse Constructions of Youth Identities (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Social Roles and Language Practices in Late Modern English (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Discourse Constructions of Youth Identities (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Hedging in Scientific Research Articles (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

The Language of Business Studies Lectures: A corpus-assisted analysis (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Second Language Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Impoliteness in Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Humor in Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

New Adventures in Language and Interaction (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Calling for Help: Language And Social Interaction in Telephone Helplines (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Rethinking Communicative Interaction: New Interdisciplinary Horizons (Pragmatics and Beyond. New Series)

Cognitive Semantics: Meaning and Cognition (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Programming Language Pragmatics, Second Edition

Programming Language Pragmatics, Second Edition

Programming Language Pragmatics, Second Edition

Mental Spaces in Discourse and Interaction (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

South Slavic Discourse Particles (Pragmatics and Beyond. New Series)

Cognitive Semantics: Meaning and Cognition (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Style Shifting in Japanese (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Constraints in Discourse 2 (Pragmatics and Beyond. New Series)

Youngspeak in a Multilingual Perspective (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Constraints in Discourse (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series, 172)

Recontextualizing Context: Grammaticality Meets Appropriateness (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Connectives As Discourse Landmarks (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Metapragmatics in Use (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Conversational Dominance and Gender: A Study of Japanese Speakers in First and Second Language Contexts (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Creativity and Convention: The pragmatics of everyday figurative speech (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Metalanguage in Interaction: Hebrew discourse markers (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Perspectives on Semantics, Pragmatics and Discourse: A Festschrift for Ferenc Kiefer (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

Rethinking Sequentiality: Linguistics Meets Conversational Interaction (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Discourse Constructions of Youth Identities (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Social Roles and Language Practices in Late Modern English (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Discourse Constructions of Youth Identities (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

Hedging in Scientific Research Articles (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series)

The Language of Business Studies Lectures: A corpus-assisted analysis (Pragmatics and Beyond New Series)

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