17.493, Review: Discourse/Syntax/Semantics:Hakulinen&Salting(2005)

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LINGUIST List: Vol-17-493. Wed Feb 15 2006. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 17.493, Review: Discourse/Syntax/Semantics:Hakulinen&Salting(2005)

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1)
Date: 14-Feb-2006
From: Maria Averintseva < maria.averintseva at rz.hu-berlin.de >
Subject: Syntax and Lexis in Conversation 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Wed, 15 Feb 2006 21:33:47
From: Maria Averintseva < maria.averintseva at rz.hu-berlin.de >
Subject: Syntax and Lexis in Conversation 
 

EDITORS: Hakulinen, Auli; Selting, Margret
TITLE: Syntax and Lexis in Conversation
SUBTITLE: Studies on the use of linguistic resources in talk-in-
interaction 
SERIES: Studies in Discourse and Grammar 17
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
YEAR: 2005
Announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/16/16-3110.html 

Maria Averintseva, University of Tübingen, Deutsches Seminar

OVERVIEW

This book is a collection of 14 papers presenting current work at the 
interface of linguistics and conversational analysis. The papers are 
brought together by an Introduction by the editors, and divided into 
two subsections headed ''Syntactic resources in conversation'' (first 8 
papers) and ''Lexico-semantic resources in conversation'' (6 papers). 
As stated in the Introduction, the book ''aim[s] at a description of 
language or particular linguistic structures as resources in 
conversational interaction''. In particular, this book concentrates on the 
syntax and lexical semantics and their role for the interaction, as these 
linguistic fields have been so far underestimated by conversational 
analysis. The book shows, that 
(1) syntax and lexical semantics are important resources for 
interaction; 
(2) syntax and lexical semantics interplay in such manner, that it is 
sometimes difficult to assign a phenomenon to one of the both, as e.g. 
the paper by Couper-Kuhlen & Thompson demonstrates; and, most 
importantly, 
(3) the work at the interface of linguistics and conversational analysis 
is most promising, as it allows important insights in the way language 
is used for communication.

In the book, material from the following languages is discussed: 
English (Wootton, Schulze-Wenck, Drew, Couper-Kuhlen & 
Thompson), German (Selting, Auer, Scheutz, Günthner, Deppermann, 
Steensig & Asmuß), Swedish (Lindström), Danish (Steensig & Asmuß, 
Heinemann), Italian (Monzoni) and Finnish (Duvallon & Routarinne). 
The authors used audio/video data from natural interactions as their 
material. 

SYNOPSIS

The first part, ''Syntactic resources in conversation'', opens with a 
paper by Margret Selting ''Syntax and prosody as methods for the 
construction and identification of turn-constructional units in 
conversation''. She turns to the problem of the classical definition of 
the main unit in the conversational analysis, turn-constructional unit 
(TCU). Traditionally, a TCU is on the one hand explicitly stated not to 
be a linguistic unit, but is on the other hand defined with reference to 
syntactic units. Selting argues that a TCU is a genuine linguistic unit 
that is constructed in sequential context and is interactionally relevant. 
She shows that syntax and prosody play an equally important role in 
defining of a TCU. So, on the one hand, a TCU should be a possible 
syntactic construction in a given language. On the other hand, 
syntactically similar, but prosodically different utterances do perform 
different functions with respect to the storytelling under construction. 

The next five papers focus on phenomena that are often regarded as 
being marginal occurrences of the spoken language: parenthesis in 
Finnish, repair, pivot and non-temporal 'where'-clauses in German, as 
well as syntactically marked Italian constructions. In each case it is 
shown that these are (1) real linguistic constructions with distinct 
syntactic, prosodic and functional features, and (2) far from being 
deficiencies of the spoken language, they are in fact efficient and 
elaborated conversation strategies.

The second paper of the book, ''Parenthesis as a resource in the 
grammar of conversation'' by Outi Duvallon and Sara Routarinne is 
concerned with parenthesis in Finnish. The authors show that 
parenthesis is not a simple ''aside'', but a strategy used for 
manipulating the topic of conversation. A parenthesis temporarily 
suspends the progression of another syntactic construction or wider 
action sequence, and thus enables metatextual comments of different 
kinds without giving up the main story line. Syntactic and prosodic 
characteristics of the parenthesis in Finnish are introduced, and its 
several interrelated functions in the conversation are described. 

In his paper ''Delayed self-repairs as a structuring device for complex 
turns in conversation'', Peter Auer deals with the phenomenon of self-
delayed repairs, i.e. cases, when the speaker interrupts an emerging 
syntactic pattern, starts a new TCU, and then returns to the broken-off 
structure. Auer shows that this construction is used as an option to 
linearize complex and hierarchically structured units, e.g. when a 
speaker has several goals that he wants to achieve simultaneously. 
Auer distinguishes between self-delayed repairs and parenthesis, as 
the latter involves a continuation of the pre-parenthetical utterance, 
whereas self-delayed repairs entail a complex hierarchical structure. 
He argues that self-delayed repair is not a deficiency of spoken 
language, as sometimes claimed, but a highly efficient method of 
coping with the linearization problem.

Another construction that is traditionally seen as a deficiency of 
spoken language is the subject of the paper by Hannes 
Scheutz, ''Pivot constructions in spoken German''. He analyses a pivot 
construction in German, i.e. a construction of the type A-B-C, where 
AB and BC are each grammatically correct, while A-B-C is actually 
incorrect, as in [[A that is] [[B something awful]AB] [C is that]BC]. He 
shows that although pivot construction is most often regarded as a 
syntactic break-off, it is actually a genuine syntactic structure with 
clear formal and functional properties. Thus, he contrasts pivot 
constructions with break-off and a new beginning as well as with 
parenthesis. Scheutz describes the main types and functions of the 
pivot construction in German. He argues that pivot construction is a 
means of establishing cohesion and shows, that as such this 
construction is found cross-linguistically in spoken language.

Chiara Monzoni deals in her paper with the so-called marked syntactic 
constructions in Italian, i.e. left and right dislocations and 
topicalization. After beginning with a short introduction into Italian 
syntax, she argues against the common assumption made by Italian 
linguists that syntactically marked constructions are, due to their 
frequency in informal speech, not pragmatically marked any more. In 
her study, based on a corpus of multi-person conversations, she 
shows that left dislocation, right dislocation and topicalization still 
display specific pragmatic and conversational functions. They serve as 
what she calls ''disconnected interjection'', i.e. producing a turn that is 
not connected with the immediately preceding talk (and most often 
also involves the change of the speaker). In this case, topicalization 
and left dislocation enhance the topic shift, whereas right dislocation, 
on the contrary, smoothes it.

Susanne Günthner in her paper ''Grammatical constructions in 'real 
life practices': WO-constructions in everyday German'' is concerned 
with the ''wo''-clauses ('where'-clauses) in German. She shows 
that ''wo'' initiates not only local, but also temporal, causal and 
concessive clauses. Still, there are no interpretation problems. 
Günthner shows that ''wo''-constructions have different interactive 
functions depending not only on the context but also on their position 
in the sentence (whether they precede or follow the main clause). In 
spite of the broad functionality of the ''wo''-construction, with particular 
inferences depending upon the context, there is one common 
characteristic: the interactive function of the ''wo''-construction is to 
provide evident, presupposed material.

The next two papers are concerned with the form requests may take 
in conversation.

Anthony Wootton investigates in his paper requests done by children 
and the connection between the grammatical form and the sequences 
in which requests occur, focusing on the ''can you...''-construction 
used by a 5-year-old child. He investigates in which environments this 
construction is used and in which it is never used, what other 
constructions the child uses for request in similar circumstances and 
what is the role the turn-initial ''please'' plays in this construction. He 
shows that ''(please) can you...'' is used when the child expects that 
what she is asking the recipient to do is a departure from the line of 
action projectable by her recipient. When this is not the case, 
imperatives or other constructions are used. ''Please'' is used to 
enhance the pleading aspect of the action. Thus, ''can you...''- 
construction is shown to be a distinctive interaction configuration, 
which also proves that the assumption that requests are sequence-
initial objects, coming out of the blue, is highly misleading, as the 
preceding sequences are defining for the from of the request. The 
analysis Wootton presents is very convincing, so that it would be 
tempting to test it on a larger corpus, with more than only one child 
involved.

Requests are also the subject of the next paper, ''Language as social 
action: A study of how senior citizens request assistance with practical 
tasks in the Swedish home help service'' by Anna Lindström. An 
important point Lindström makes is that whether an utterance is to be 
understood as a request or not must not be set in advance by the 
speaker, but can be a matter of negotiation between the speaker and 
the recipient(s). Lindström shows how different syntactic forms of 
requests - imperative, interrogative or declarative sentences - 
correspond to different contextual factors. Imperatives are used when 
the speaker believes himself to be entitled to request assistance, 
whereas questions are preferred when this issue is open. Declaratives 
are used as a means of negotiating a request with the recipient, 
especially if recipient is currently engaged in another action and his 
attention has first to be attracted.

The papers of the second part ''Lexico-semantical resources in 
conversation'' concentrate on the role the particular word selection 
and the semantics of lexical items play in a conversation.

The first paper of the second part, ''The interactional generation of 
exaggerated versions in conversation'' by Paul Drew is concerned with 
the cases, where a claim turns out to be an exaggeration. Drew shows 
on English material that the ''exaggerated'' version is produced to fit 
optimally in the sequential environment where it is produced, and is 
formulated so that it can optimally perform an action required in this 
environment (confirmation, disagreeing, reporting etc.). After 
achieving this action the speaker minimally adjusts the exaggerated 
version to the real situation. This is apparently done in a planned way. 
This enables the speaker first to achieve his action in the best 
possible way, and then to give an accurate description of the state of 
affairs. Thus the paper shows that ''descriptions are shaped by the 
action sequences in which they are produced'' in that they are 
produced conforming to the requirements imposed by the previous 
speaker, even if the claim thus made is not quite correct.

Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen and Sandra A. Thompson in their paper ''A 
linguistic practice for retracting overstatements: 'Concessive repair''' 
are concerned with the same phenomenon as Drew, and even use the 
same corpus. They show, that 'concessive repair' has emerged from 
the common interactional task of retracting overstatements and has 
grammaticized into a certain lexical-grammatical pattern construction. 
Thus, the paper illustrates clearly that there is no strict division 
between syntactic and lexical phenomena, but that syntax and lexical 
semantics interplay by the production of conversation. So, this paper, 
which belongs to the second part of the book, would as well suit in the 
first one.

Arnulf Deppermann argues in his paper ''Conversational interpretation 
of lexical items and conversational contrasting'' that contrast in 
conversation is not something holding context-free, but emerging from 
participant's work (i.e. speaker's intention and hearer's interpretation). 
He shows how lexical items that do not inherently build a contrast can 
be provided with a local (i.e. valid only in a certain context) meaning 
inducing a contrast. He describes two general strategies for the 
interpretation of contrasting items: 'frame-based interpretation' leading 
to a pragmatic opposition within a frame, and 'maximization of 
contrast', according to which the hearer recognizes that the speaker 
intends to contrast two words and thus interprets them so as to 
maximize their contrast in meaning. Deppermann argues that local 
contrasting interpretation achieved in this way might then become 
available independent of the activity of contrasting. This is evidence 
that routine interactional activities might get grammaticalized as 
linguistic structures also at the level of the semantics.

Stephanie Schulze-Wenck concerns herself with a group of lexical 
items sharing certain features: the so-called ''first verbs''. This is a 
term for a certain use of verbs like ''wanted to /tried to'' etc., indicating 
that sequentially for this turn another TCU with another verb will come. 
She claims that ''first verbs'' pragmatically project further talk, i.e. they 
are a linguistic resource for producing of multi-unit turns. She 
describes morpho-syntactic, lexico-semantic and pragmatic features 
of ''first verbs'', as well as their interactional purposes. So, first verbs 
might be for example a resource for storytelling, being a take-off for a 
(next component of) a story, or for justification / explanation, 
complaining / criticizing as well as for counter-suggestion.

The following two papers concentrate on dispreferred responses in 
conversation and their linguistic form.

The first one is ''Notes on disaligning 'yes but' initiated utterances in 
Danish and German conversations: Two construction types for 
dispreferred responses'' by Jacob Steensig and Birte Asmuß. They 
show that ''yes but''-initiated sentences occur after turns which call for 
agreement or acceptance, and are thus dispreferred responsive 
actions. They distinguish between two variants of ''yes, but''-
responses, which are used for actions differing in their social 
character. In the 'integrated version', ''yes but'' is produced 
prosodically as one token. Thus, nothing in the format shows any of 
the features normally associated with dispreference, although a 
dispreferred action is still implemented. 'Integrated ''yes but''' is used 
preferably for correcting and updating the prior speaker's knowledge. 
In the 'non-integrated version', ''yes'' and ''but'' are produced as two 
tokens, and show certain design features associated with 
dispreference (e.g. pause, hesitation etc.). This variant is used for 
disputing and opposing an assertion by casting doubt on the rationale 
in it, which is clearly a more socially problematic action. Thus, 
grammatical features of a certain construction are shown to be 
responsible for the social character of an action performed by this 
construction.

The last paper, ''Where grammar and interaction meet: The 
preference for matched polarity in responsive turns in Danish'' by 
Trine Heinemann, describes the phenomenon that in Danish the 
negative response particle ''nej'' (no) is not only used for dispreferred 
actions like disagreement, but also, and even preferably, for preferred 
actions like agreement, confirmation or acceptance. The latter is the 
case when the utterance responded to was negatively framed. That 
means that Danish has a grammatical preference for having a 
response mirror the polarity of the prior turn. Heinemann argues that 
grammatical preference for having the negative polarity mirrored in the 
response is a tendency that might be observed in other Indo-
European languages as well.

The part of the title of the last paper, ''Where grammar and interaction 
meet'' might be chosen as the subtitle for the whole book, as it shows 
convincingly, how linguistics and conversational analysis can profit 
from one another. 

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Maria Averintseva is a research assistant in the Department of 
German Linguistics at Tübingen University. She is working on a Ph.D. 
project about German right dislocation and its function in discourse. 
Her research interests are lexical and formal semantics, syntax, and 
especially discourse and text linguistics.





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