The turn-by-turn unfolding of “dialogue”: Examining participants’ orientations to moments of transformative engagement

Burgsteden, Lotte van; Mölder, Holger; Raymond, Geoffrey

doi:10.1016/j.langcom.2021.11.002

Cited by 11 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Evidently, the scientist’s initiation of a retro-sequence (Schegloff, 2007) was the proximate impetus for the transformative moments that followed. Her query is “sailing against the interactional tide” (Van Burgsteden et al, 2022), as it reverses a projected move to a new topic by reopening the prior sequence. In doing so, the scientist also potentially risks upending the tenuous (if unstable) peace they have just achieved by inviting the resident to explicate the basis for his challenges, without knowing what these concerns are and whether they relate to research in general or this scientist in particular.…”

Section: Conclusion and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The case presented is from a larger corpus of data of recorded Dutch public meetings on livestock farming (Van Burgsteden and Te Molder, 2021, 2022; Van Burgsteden et al, 2022). The topic of livestock farming recurrently involves heated social debate in the Netherlands, and is characterized by a diversity of viewpoints, interests, and risk perceptions (Borlée, 2018).…”

Section: The Case Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In an earlier study (Van Burgsteden et al, 2022), we addressed many of the issues raised by dialogue scholars using an approach grounded in CA to examine occasions of transformative engagement. We demonstrated how analyses of sequences of action can lead us to expand the definition of transformation beyond what is assumed to be a “cognitive change” to include participants’ displayed transformation that emerges over interactional trajectories, through a series of steps or moves:…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Going against the interactional tide: The accomplishment of dialogic moments from a conversation analytic perspective

Burgsteden¹,

Mölder

Raymond

2022

Discourse Studies

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This article addresses a vital concern in current society by showing what participants themselves may treat as ways to transcend their differences. Actors’ shared understanding has been of longstanding interest across the social sciences. Conversation analysis (CA) treats the procedural infrastructure of interaction as the basis for participants to manage intersubjectivity. The field of dialogue studies has made occasions in which people transform their relationship by discussing their differences, central to their research project, and called them “dialogic moments.” This study draws on CA to investigate “dialogic moments,” but now through the eyes of participants themselves. Using single-case analysis, we argue that such moments require participants to go against normative orientations in talk promoting social solidarity and progressivity, by soliciting differences to understand and transcend them. This “going against the interactional tide” may explain both why dialogue is difficult to achieve and why it is appreciated by participants as dialogue.

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Section: Conclusion and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Case Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Going against the interactional tide: The accomplishment of dialogic moments from a conversation analytic perspective

Burgsteden¹,

Mölder

Raymond

2022

Discourse Studies

Self Cite

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“…Further research into what kinds of (inter)action citizens categorize as “being heard” may help to better respond to situations that seem purely procedural, but which can in fact impact the relationship between government and citizen more fundamentally. For instance, studies on real-life public meetings have addressed what citizens’ displays of “openness” and “listening” look like in the interactions (e.g., Sprain and Black, 2018; Sprain and Ivancic, 2017; Van Burgsteden et al, 2022). Future research could examine the interactional effects of such displays and whether they enable participants to transform the conversation in a more collaborative type of engagement.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Shelving Issues: Patrolling the Boundaries of Democratic Discussion in Public Meetings

Mölder

2022

Journal of Language and Social Psychology

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Democratic participation is widely viewed as a crucial underpinning of legitimate governance; however, little is known about how this participation is practically accomplished. This study contributes to a better understanding of what democratic citizenship encompasses in actual practices of public engagement. Using conversation analysis and discursive psychology, we analyze interactions between government officials and citizens in Dutch public meetings on the effects of livestock farming. We examine situations where citizens treat officials’ closing-implicative moves as “wanting to shelve” issues. We demonstrate how this uptake is preceded by officials treating citizens as not understanding what is within the scope of discussion, thereby challenging their democratic competence. Citizens subsequently turn the tables on the officials, treating them as not wanting to fulfill their democratic duties. We argue that these practices point to broader relational issues between government and citizens, transforming what seem mere agenda issues into negotiations about what constitutes good democracy.

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“…Conversation requires balancing two goals: to be understood and to be interesting. People must translate their thoughts into language their audience can understand (Wray & Grace, 2007) while also introducing new ideas and information (van Burgsteden et al, 2022). The former requires semantic convergence, which enables coordination, comprehension, and cooperation (Clark & Schaefer, 1989; Gonzales et al, 2010).…”

Section: Conversational Convergence: Becoming More Similarmentioning

confidence: 99%

People constrain their semantic associations when talking to both friends and strangers.

Tsang,

Lipson,

Snyder

et al. 2024

Journal of Experimental Psychology: General

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During conversations, people face a trade-off between establishing understanding and making interesting and unique contributions. How do people balance this when deciding which concepts to reference, and does it matter how well they know their conversation partner? In the present work, participants made stream-of-consciousness word associations either with a partner or alone-simplified versions of dialogue and monologue. Participants made semantically narrower and more predictable word associations with a stranger than alone (Study 1), suggesting that they constrain their associations to establish mutual understanding. Increasing closeness (Study 2) or having a prior relationship (Study 3) did not moderate this effect. Thus, even during a task that does not depend on establishing mutual understanding, people sacrifice being interesting for the sake of being understood. Public Significance StatementAcross three experiments, we find that people make narrower semantic associations with another individual, verses by themselves, suggesting that people seem to sacrifice variability in language to connect with a partner. Who the partner is, a friend or stranger, did not change the findings. People often accommodate each other in conversations, and this article suggests they do so in another way: by making smaller topic leaps.

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The turn-by-turn unfolding of “dialogue”: Examining participants’ orientations to moments of transformative engagement

Cited by 11 publications

References 42 publications

Going against the interactional tide: The accomplishment of dialogic moments from a conversation analytic perspective

Going against the interactional tide: The accomplishment of dialogic moments from a conversation analytic perspective

Shelving Issues: Patrolling the Boundaries of Democratic Discussion in Public Meetings

People constrain their semantic associations when talking to both friends and strangers.

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