Direct reported speech in storytellings: Enacting and negotiating epistemic entitlements

Abstract

This paper presents a study of participants’ use of direct reported speech (DRS) in storytelling during dinner table conversation in French. Focusing on reported dialogues, the analysis corroborates earlier conversation analytic findings showing that speakers regularly use linguistic, prosodic and paralinguistic resources to stage the characters whose speech is being reported; thereby speakers display their stance on behalf of those characters and their conduct. Additionally, the analysis documents that speakers use DRS within reported dialogues as a powerful means for depicting their own adequate conduct in the face of a purportedly “deviant” conduct of a third party. In the specific context of our data, in which an au-pair interacts with her host family, such direct reported dialogues are used both by the mother and the au pair as a means to enact shared expectations about the appropriateness of a caregiver’s conduct in the face of the “deviant” conduct of a child. In light of these findings, the representation of past dialogues by means of DRS appears as a practical resource by means of which participants enact identities such as mother and caregiver and thereby reflexively construct and negotiate the related epistemic entitlements.

Evidentiality through reported speech: Pragma-linguistic factors affecting its reliability

“…When speakers include reported speech in their talk, whether in direct or indirect type 2 , they pretend to adapt the original previous speech of someone, among other things, to base their attitude or acts on something (as evidence/demonstration), give vividity and dramatization to their story, to show epistemic authority, enact identities, the highlight event of a story and for its rhetorical role in discourse (Larson 1977, Buttny 1997, Berger & Doehler 2015, Rae & Kerby 2007, Mushin 2014, Tannen 2007, Sidnell 2006 or may be interrelated with attitude to the information quoted, e.g. in Arizona Teha (Aikhenvald 2018:5).…”

“…The same contrast effect is when positive emotions or big enthusiasm take place. In excerpt below, though psycho-emotional state was defined only as relevant factor, sequence design cues, conversational implicature suggests that Blerta makes short-term declarations after receiving good news and is happy: (8) Context: L needed Blerta's notes to pass the exam L: Ble:rta e kish marr 10 ↑npsiko:logji, kshtu që ↓tha se mi ↑jep shënimet Blerta got 10 in psychology, so she said she will lend me now her notes F: Shfrytzo:je rastin me ia ma:rr kto ↓dit Use the opportunity to take them these days, hahaha F assumes that the happiness felt after taking the highest grade might have caused an impact on Blerta's statements, words chosen in that particular momentin this instance to show more generosity than randomly. The restriction of time when L can count on her help, expressed through construction these days, tells that her promises don't match with actions after long periods, indicating that it isn't a completely sustainable promise.…”

A question of time and place: student tutors’ narrative identities in for- and non-profit contexts in Sweden

“…Through telling this good-example story, Henrik positions himself as an experienced tutor in relation to the interviewer. Moreover, the repeated use of direct reported speech (Berger and Doehler 2015) to present the student's requests for tutoring -'there is a test coming and I don't understand this' or 'I need help with this now, do you have spare time?' -serves to position Henrik as an accessible tutor and as having had rapport with the student.…”

Connecting the Language Classroom and the Wild: Re-enactments of Language Use Experiences

“…In the analysis to follow, specific attention is paid to reenactments and reported speech as resources in the telling sequences. Different forms of reported speech, their functions and design features have been studied extensively in previous linguistic and conversation analytic research (see Holt 1996, Clift & Holt 2007, Couper-Kuhlen 2007, Berger & Pekarek Doehler 2015, Prior 2015, Kasper & Prior 2015. Direct reported speech and reenactments are closely related phenomena: both depict past events rather than describe them.…”