Literacy Without Borders: The Fine-Grained Minutiae of Social Interaction That Do Matter (Also in Promoting Health Literacy)

Abstract

This paper explores the fine-grained interactional minutiae involved in promoting health literacy in medical interactions. More specifically, it explores the multimodal interactional resources (verbal and nonverbal) that health professionals and lay participants mobilize in order to make sense of fetal ultrasound images. We adopt the ethnomethodological perspective of Multimodal Conversation Analysis (SACKS; SCHEGLOFF; JEFFERSON, 1974; GOODWIN, 1981; 2010; MONDADA, 2018) to investigate 10 audio and video interactions that were recorded during fetal ultrasound exams that took place at a moderate and high-risk pregnancy ward in a public hospital in Brazil. Our aim is to ‘make visible’ the multimodal ethnomethods that interactants employ in order to render ultrasound images intelligible ‘texts’. Among the various semiotic resources mobilized to achieve intersubjectivity in this complex setting, special focus is given to the healthcare professionals’ use of similes, and the fundamental importance of the temporality in which verbal and nonverbal resources are mobilized in the process of making images intelligible. In that sense, we hope to bring to this special thematic issue the methodological advantages that a Multimodal Conversation Analytic perspective can afford to the discussion about multiliteracies and, in practical terms, to the advancement of health literacy. In medical contexts, health literacy can (and perhaps should!) be a concern ‘at all points.’ There might be no ‘borders’ to what constitutes a health literacy source or resource. Our claims, thus, are the following: (i) ultrasound images do constitute materials to be ‘read’ and understood - also by lay participants; (ii) healthcare professionals can (and perhaps should) promote health literacy among patients by employing efforts to make images ‘readable’; and, finally, (iii) social interaction is one of the constitutive loci for the promotion of multiliteracy events.

Presenting documents to clients in Social Work encounters

“…Multimodal EMCA provides important methodological and analytical contributions to research on document use (see Day and Mortensen, 2020), shedding light on the interactional organization of situated literacies (see Barton et al, 2000;Street, 1997) and revealing how, in institutional settings, its accomplishment is fundamentally oriented towards managing clients' concerns (see Ostermann et al, 2020). The present study aims to contribute to these lines of research by examining the multimodal organization of the document-presenting activity as it is carried out in Social Work encounters, showing its situated accomplishment as organized through a complex interplay between orality and literacy, i.e.…”

Letramento em saúde como estratégia de promoção da saúde: um estudo de revisão narrativa

“…Ademais, a categoria "A influência do LS na relação profissional de saúdepaciente" foi baseada nos estudos descritos a seguir(OLIVEIRA et al, 2018;OSTERMANN;FREZZA;PEROBELLI, 2020; PANELLI et al, 2020;PASKULIN et al, 2012;CAVALCANTE;BRITO;FRAGA-MAIA, 2020;ROMERO;SCORTEGAGNA;DORING, 2018).RESULTADOSOs artigos selecionados foram compilados em uma tabela do software Excel, de acordo com título, autores/ano, tipo de publicação e contribuição para o estudo, conforme ilustrado no quadro 2:…”