A search for specificity in understanding CA and context

Abstract

The conversation analytic view of context is often critiqued as being too narrow. In this article, we join the ongoing debate regarding conversation analysis (CA) and context by 1) synthesizing existing scholarly attempts at either conceptualizing or exploring the possibilities of combining CA and ethnography and 2) giving further considerations to whether or how resorting to talk-extrinsic data may be beneficial. We do so by providing four illustrative cases, with increasing complexity, from four different settings. In each case, an initial CA analysis is followed up with an informal ethnographic interview with the participants. By offering some specificity to this ongoing methodological controversy regarding talk-extrinsic data, we aim to begin building a useful framework within which further discussions on analysis, context, and cross-fertilization may proceed.

On the use of Conversation Analysis and retrospection in intervention for children with language impairment

“…Here, in contrast to the study by Waring et al (2012), comments generated in the retrospections have been used in their own right to focus on interactional behaviours and practices that are relevant for language intervention for the children with LI. They have not been used to confirm or disconfirm any observations made through the use of CA.…”

“…The main point of concern is the relationship between what practices can be demonstrably observed, and participants' retrospective, video-stimulated comments. Waring et al (2012) suggested that talk-extrinsic data may confirm CA observations, specify assumptions of why something takes place in interaction, disambiguate an earlier analysis, and correct an initial analysis. In response to this claim, Antaki (2012), Ford (2012) and Pomerantz (2012) stress that it is important not to make straightforward assumptions of peoples' underlying intentions for their interactional practises only based on their self-reports (Ford, 2012), as these are in themselves (re)constructions of a past event.…”

“…comments on interactional behaviour generated after an original recording, together with CA, has been thoroughly discussed and debated (cf. Antaki, 2012;Ford, 2012;Pomerantz, 2012 in a response to Waring et al, 2012). The main point of concern is the relationship between what practices can be demonstrably observed, and participants' retrospective, video-stimulated comments.…”

The Role of Teachers’ Future Self Guides in Creating L2 Development Opportunities in Teacher‐Led Classroom Discourse: Reclaiming the Relevance of Language Teacher Cognition

“…Combining CA with other approaches in a single study may present certain tensions arising from the incompatibility of the epistemological assumptions underlying each approach (although see Waring et al., ; Waring & Hruska, ). However, my ultimate analytical goal was to establish how the understanding gleaned from the multiple approaches could contribute to constructing the ecology of language learning in the classroom (van Lier, ) and inform the kind of teacher education interventions needed to help teachers harness opportunities for students’ language learning available in TLD.…”

5. Laughter as a “serious business”: Clients’ laughter in prenatal screening for Down’s syndrome

“…In particular, in our analysis we selectively draw on the information about participants' backgrounds that was obtained in the interviews with the participants prior to and after the consultations. Such an approach of combining the analysis of interactional data with ethnographic observations yields additional insights into the analyzed interactions (for the advantages of this method see Maynard 2003;Silverman 1999;Pomerantz 2005;Waring 2012). The approach also proves particularly useful in analyzing such complex phenomenon as laughter in all its instantiations so as to shed light on its various conversational functions, including both 'playful' and 'serious' ones.…”