The Morality of Knowledge in Conversation (Studies in Interactional Sociolinguistics)

Cambridge University Press, 6/2/2011
EAN 9780521194549, ISBN10: 0521194547

Hardcover, 356 pages, 22.8 x 15.2 x 2.8 cm
Language: English

Each time we take a turn in conversation we indicate what we know and what we think others know. However, knowledge is neither static nor absolute. It is shaped by those we interact with and governed by social norms - we monitor one another for whether we are fulfilling our rights and responsibilities with respect to knowledge, and for who has relatively more rights to assert knowledge over some state of affairs. This book brings together an international team of leading linguists, sociologists and anthropologists working across a range of European and Asian languages to document some of the ways in which speakers manage the moral domain of knowledge in conversation. The volume demonstrates that if we are to understand how speakers manage issues of agreement, affiliation and alignment - something clearly at the heart of human sociality - we must understand the social norms surrounding epistemic access, primacy and responsibilities.

Introduction
1. Knowledge, morality and affiliation in social interaction Tanya Stivers, Lorenza Mondada and Jakob Steensig
Part I. Affiliational Consequences of Managing Epistemic Asymmetries
2. The management of knowledge discrepancies and of epistemic changes in institutional interactions Lorenza Mondada
3. Giving support to the claim of epistemic primacy
yo-marked assessments in Japanese Kaoru Hayano
4. Morality and question design
'of course' as contesting a presupposition of askability Tanya Stivers
5. Addressing epistemic incongruence in question-answer sequences through the use of epistemic adverbs Trine Heinemann, Anna Lindström and Jakob Steensig
6. The epistemics of make-believe Jack Sidnell
Part II. Epistemic Resources for Managing Affiliation and Alignment
7. Territories of knowledge, territories of experience
empathic moments in interaction John Heritage
8. The terms of not knowing and social affiliation Leelo Keevallik
9. Proposing shared knowledge as a means of pursuing agreement Birte Asmuß
10. Ways of agreeing with negative stance taking Auli Hakulinen and Marja-Leena Sorjonen
11. Epistemics and embodiment in the interactions of very young children Mardi Kidwell
Part III. Toward a Theory
12. Sources of asymmetry in human interaction
enchrony, status, knowledge and agency N. J. Enfield.