This article is part 8 of the collection of articles on discursive cultural psychology. Go to the collection table of contents to read other articles.
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In what follows, we shall discuss discourse conceived mainly as conversational joint activity. The framework is mainly derived from studies in microsociology in general, especially in conversation analysis (Sacks, 1989; Garfinkel, 1967; Clark, 1994). We shall now try to identify elements involved in conversational joint activity. Clark (1994) has pointed out that there are four elements of discourse as joint activity: personnel, accumulating common ground, action sequences, and contribution. For our purpose however discussions about common ground and contribution will be conducted in one part, since the two are closely related to each other.
Personnel and Participation Roles
In order for a conversation to occur, it requires at least two participants that change their par-ticipation roles from one action to the next along the conversation. At one time, a participant may become a speaker and the other an addressee; and at other times the reverse. In conversa-tions involving more than two participants, one would have more participation roles than just speaker and addressees. Schematically, participation roles are described in concentric regions as follows:
In terms of this scheme, the interlocutors of work-groups above (including the experiment instructor L) play roles as speakers, addressees, or side participants at one time or the other; whereas discourse analysts who analyze the conversation through video-tape recordings or transcripts would play the role of eavesdroppers.
Accumulating Common Ground and Contribution
How is joint activity coordinated? For any joint activity to be coordinated, the participants must have rather strong assumptions about each other. When these assumptions fail, it would lead to breakdowns.
In conversations this may lead the addressees to ask what the speaker means by his utterance; or to bring the conversation to directions unintended by the speaker against which he may utter corrections. Participants take for granted or presuppose that they share certain knowledge, beliefs or desires, and they each presuppose that they presuppose them.
To these presuppositions one important element may also be added, that is what Searle (1990; 1992) has termed we-intentions or collective intentionality. This totality of presuppositions is called common ground. There are two parts of common ground. The first is communal common ground that represents all the assumptions that are supposed to be shared universally among members of particular community. In contrast, the second is personal common ground that represents the assumptions that the participants have inferred from personal experience with each other.
As presuppositions, common ground normally is not made explicit in conversations. It may come up to foreground however when there are breakdowns that lead the participants to reground their shared assumptions to recover the conversation; or when it is used for arriving at some conclusions. Transcript 8.1 below is an example of communal common ground about year-seasons that is made explicit and used for arriving at a decision.
The common ground knowledge about year-seasons and its relations to the production of mantels is made explicit in utterance 8.1.2-.5, and used for arriving at decision in 8.1.6.
The importance of common ground for comprehending a sequence of utterances has been shown also by Garfinkel (1967). He has pointed out that in conversations there are many matters that the interlocutors understand are understood on the basis not only of what is actually said, but on what is left unspoken.
To show his point, Garfinkel provided an example below. The left side column consists of what was actually said; and the right side is what the inter-locutors understood from the conversation, written by themselves.
Have we, as eavesdroppers not read the right side column that shows the unspoken back-ground, the wife’s utterances in 8.2.2 may seem to be incomprehensible and seem to be just like a discourse topic switch. Taken without its background, utterance 8.2.2 may seem to be irrelevant response to the husband’s utterance 8.2.1.
The conversation above illustrates also what Clark (1994) has termed accumulating common ground. Clark has pointed out that along the sequence of utterances more presuppositions are added on top of the initial common ground with every single action.
In the husband-and-wife conversation above, it starts with an initial personal common ground story about their son who could not yet put a penny in the parking meter by himself. First, on top of this common background the husband adds that now he is already able to do it (8.2.1).
Using their common knowledge about the matter, the wife comes to utter a question (8.2.2) to confirm her interpretation. Again the husband’s answer (8.2.3) adds more to the common ground story. So in each phase of the action sequence the common ground accumulates.
Accumulating common ground is made possible through what has been called the grounding process (Clark, 1994; Clark & Brennan, 1991). Grounding is a process whereby the partici-pants endeavor to get their knowledge, or beliefs shared among them. Common ground is said to have been accomplished if it has reached the grounding criterion.
This criterion consists of mutual beliefs that the participants have understood what the speaker meant to a point sufficient for current purposes. The grounding process is undertaken through what Clark has termed contribution to the conversation. In contributing normally a speaker begins with presenting a utterance for his addressees to understand; and then they would in turn give him evidence that they have understood enough for current purposes.
The first is called a presentation phase; and the second is an acceptance phase. In fact all meaningful conversations would involve contribution process such that they are inconceivable without it.
In the husband-and-wife conversation above, the husband’s utterance (8.2.1) is his presentation, asserting that their son succeeded in putting a penny in a meter without being picked up. The wife’s question (8.2.2) is her acceptance, providing a positive evidence that she has understood his utterance. The evidence lies in the fact that her utterance is not questioned and considered as relevant response, or in schegloff’s (1972) term, a relevant next turn.
Simultaneously the wife’s question (8.2.2) can also be considered as a presentation phase, to which the husband’s answer (8.2.3) is the relevant next turn that gives her positive evidence that he has understood her question. This process goes on as long as each utterance is considered relevant and understood.
There are cases however that an utterance is only partly understood. In such a case, interlocutor in the acceptance phase would give negative evidence of common ground.
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