Workshop: Conversation Analysis and Laughter
Led by: Dr. Elizabeth Holt, University of Huddersfield, UK
8 – 9 December, 2015
Click here to apply for this Workshop
Analysing interaction
Conversation Analysis (CA) is an approach that originally developed in Sociology but has been influenced by other disciplines such as Linguistics. Starting from the understanding that interaction is highly ordered and tightly organized, it involves identifying the patterns that underpin talk-in-interaction. Thus, for example, early research explored the turn taking system and the way turns are constructed. Since its beginnings CA has explored both mundane and more formal interaction including a wide range of institutional environments. Such work often has practical implications such as improving doctor/patient consultations and counselling sessions.
This workshop provides an advanced introduction into Conversation Analysis. The methods and aims of using this approach are discussed and explored. In line with usual practice, participants will be given access to recorded, transcribed interaction. This will facilitate close analysis of the design of turns and the sequences to which they contribute. Thus, the central aim of CA regarding the identification of patterns that underpin sequences of interaction will be illustrated and explored. The data examined will support focus on a range of sequences and contributions depending on the interests of the participants. However, data will be selected that features laughter, since this has been the subject of my research over recent years. Analysis of laughter also involves consideration of the relationship between the laughter and its target or ‘laughable’ and related phenomena such as non-seriousness.
Preparatory reading
Sidnell, J. 2010. Conversation analysis: An introduction. Bloomsbury.
Readings on laughter
Glenn, P. and Holt, E. 2013. Studies of laughter in interaction. London: Bloomsbury
Holt, Elizabeth. 2011. On the nature of 'laughables': Laughter as a response to overdone figurative phrases. Pragmatics, 21(3), 393-410.
Holt, Elizabeth. 2012. Using laugh responses to defuse complaints. Research on Language and Social Interaction, 45(4), 430-448.
Holt, Elizabeth. 2013. 'There’s many a true word said in jest’: Seriousness and non-seriousness in interaction. In Studies of Laughter in Interaction, ed. by Phillip Glenn & Elizabeth Holt, 69-90. London: Bloomsbury.
Number of Participants
15 - 20