Interactional Linguistics - Current Issue

This special issue targets the relationship between language and the body, in cases where the local emergence of grammar and lexicon is embedded in trajectories of instruction. The contributions document how the body comes into use in sequences of verbal interaction, as well as how the language system systematically embraces the body. The natural habitat for grammar lies within a multimodal ecology of speakers engaging not only with each others’ mental spheres but also with each others’ bodies.

This paper analyzes how non-lexical vocalizations, understood as sounds and syllables without a coded lexical meaning, may be used to mark the accomplishment of an ongoing bodily action under scrutiny. In particular, a bipartite instructional format used in dance instruction in Argentine Spanish is considered. The first part of the format presents a verbal description of an embodied action (e.g. the leg goes first). The second part consists of a non-lexical vocalization (e.g. TAC) targeted to be produced in synchrony with an actual performance of the previously described action. Thus, the action description projects a bodily performance that is (expected to be) temporally coordinated with the vocalization. Depending on the instructional context, the bodily action is carried out by different participants. Whereas in ‘demonstrations’ the instructors perform the bodily action themselves, when used as a ‘local action directive’ the students are expected to perform it. The analysis will address differences in the multimodal realization of the format as well as specific functions in these two contexts. The general function of the vocalization — to signal the accomplishment of a currently focused action — will be argued to present a case of marking ‘aspectuality’ under the conditions of embodied interaction.

Research has demonstrated that the various types of vocal sounds that are not typically regarded as linguistic or meaningful can serve as a significant resource for interaction. This study draws on multimodal conversation analysis to investigate yoisho (iyoisho), an interjection in Japanese often produced when force or effort is exerted. The analysis of yoisho (iyoisho) in instructional settings involving the body movements of both instructors and students showed that yoisho (iyoisho) is precisely coordinated with accompanying body movements through its phonetic adjustment. When coordinated with the teacher’s body movements, yoisho (iyoisho) can highlight the movements most critical in instruction and express their temporality and kinesthesia at the same time. The phonetic features of yoisho (iyoisho) can also facilitate students’ synchronization of movements with the instructor and their peers. Furthermore, when coordinated with the students’ body movements, yoisho (iyoisho) can enact the physical efforts the students should be making in real time. The study revealed that the participants’ bodies and the nature of the activity they engage in are consequential for their employment of a vocal resource and its production.

In this article we conduct a multimodal conversation analysis of the use of OH directive constructions where police officers instruct citizens to step into a police van as the final phase of an apprehension. To perform the task, officers typically formulate a directive turn that uses an imperative clause (IMP), but in the examples analysed in this article, it is combined with ole hyvä (OH) — ‘please’. In the case of these OH directive constructions, the preferred next action by the citizen is to step into the van, which may either take place unproblematically or require verbal and embodied upgrading from the officers. We show that the sequential position of the OH directive construction can be (1) the first-pair part of a sequence initiated in a series of collaborative actions, (2) an upgrade to a previous directive in the effort to maintain a police-led project during a prolonged directive sequence, or (3) a response to a citizen’s turn which has bypassed the police’s directive. From the embodied action perspective, we suggest that the OH directive constructions allow the police to divide their attention between the van and the citizen, thus providing a strong orientation for the citizen to step into the van themselves.

This paper analyzes how language and body interact in boxing sparring sessions by focusing on the Japanese particle hai (lit. ‘yes’) as it occurs turn-initially in the first part of instruction-compliance sequences. Based on sequential and embodied analysis of 11 boxing sparring sessions, this paper examines: (1) in what sequential and embodied environments hai is used; (2) if hai responds to a focal moment, what constitutes that moment; (3) what actions do hai-prefaced instructions indicate? How do language and body interact when these actions emerge? This paper identifies three environments: (1) while a boxer is being attacked, the particle prefaces instruction to evade the attack; (2) after a first phase of combined boxing movements, it precedes instruction pursuing the second phase; (3) after a change of distance, the particle introduces instructions for punches which are suitable at that distance. In each environment, hai is used to identify the exact moment at which targeted shifts from a current body alignment to a different one should be implemented. Depending on the temporal order of language and body, hai-prefaced instructions express different actions, e.g., ‘late’ instruction can “acknowledge” (Mondada 2021) boxer’s independent initiations of the targeted action and, simultaneously, make their completions relevant.

This article examines multi-modal self-defence actions in personal safety training classes for girls and women. The actions have linguistic and embodied components. An example is shouting “back off” at an imagined attacker while assuming a self-defensive stance position. An additional distinctive aspect of the phenomenon of interest is that it is done collectively as a multi-person party. Our work builds on and extends prior research in multimodal conversation analysis which has shown the ways language and bodily actions fit together. Using a collection of 200 cases drawn from more than 50 hours of video footage, two broad kinds of recurrent practices are described that support the class to achieve the collective, co-production of multi-modal self-defence actions. One is the projective, embodied syntactic structures instructors use to demonstrate the action and co-ordinate its execution. The other is the grammar of the verbal component that scaffolds the timing of physical techniques, especially ones where there is a combination of moves. By examining how linguistic and embodied components of multi-modal self-defence actions are brought together and done by multiple participants at the same time, we find empirical support for the innovative theoretical idea that syntax can be emergent and embodied rather than predominantly hierarchical and psycholinguistic. Data is in New Zealand English.

This paper examines the instructions produced by photographers in photography studios. Drawing on ethnomethodology and conversation analysis, this study elucidates the instructive practices deployed by photographers in their work of designing photographable poses. This paper concentrates on the interactional aspects of how photographers arrange their clients’ bodies for individual portraits and group photographs. While organizing the individual portraits, the photographers instruct their clients by dealing with different bodily aspects, such as postures, head orientations and facial expressions, in a successive fashion, treating their bodies as disarticulated. When arranging group photographs, the photographers orchestrate intercorporeal contact between the bodies, often engaging in tactile instructions in which they use instructive utterances together with tactile practices such as touching and moving. The photographers’ instructive utterances notify and inform the clients about their projected touch and imply the relevance for them to adopt docile bodies. By way of producing tactile instructions, the photographers not only formulate the instructions but also perform the relevant instructed actions by manipulating the clients’ bodies. In this way, the photographers exhibit their entitlement to touch their clients’ bodies as part of their professional service and exercise a specific form of embodied agency. Participants in the data speak Turkish.