The pragmatics of monologue: interaction in video blogs

This study reports an in-depth pragmatic analysis of spoke monologues as they appear in video blogs (vlogs). Vlogs are videos of a person talking into the camera, which are edited and subsequently uploaded to video sharing websites such as YouTube, where they appear in a highly multimodal environment. Using methods situated in the fields of Conversation Analysis, Interactive Sociolinguistics and multimodality studies, the research presented investigates a wide range of speaker strategies. These strategies are studied with regard to their form, frequency of occurrence, how they are adapted to the specific context of language use and, where possible, what effect this has on vlog viewers. The strategies and phenomena under investigation are the openings and closings of monologues; repetition and involvement strategies; pointing gestures and video-comment coherence in the virtual online space. Comparison with another monologic genre, the TED Talk, reveals that the monologue setting itself is an influential variable that naturally shapes a vlogger’s or lecturer’s way of speaking compared to conversational settings. However, more specifically, the comparison also shows that the contextual differences between a stage monologue at a TED conference and a camera monologue as part of a vlog, can be significant in terms of their influence on the interaction that takes place.Diese Forschungsarbeit untersucht gesprochene Monologe wie sie in Videoblogs (Vlogs) vorkommen aus linguistisch-pragmatischer Sicht. Vlogs sind Videos von Menschen, die in die Kamera sprechen. Diese Videos werden nach der Aufnahme bearbeitet und dann auf Videoseiten im Internet, wie zum Beispiel YouTube, hochgeladen, wo sie im Rahmen einer multimodal komplexen Webseite einer breiten Öffentlichkeit zugänglich sind. Die Vlogmonologe werden mit Hilfe von Methoden aus der Konversationsanalyse, der Interaktionalen Soziolinguistik und Studien zur Multimodalität auf die Strategien der Sprecher beleuchtet. Diese Strategien werden untersucht im Hinblick auf ihre Form, Häufigkeit, wie sie an den spezifischen Sprechkontext angepasst sind und, wo möglich, was für einen Effekt sie auf die Zuschauer haben. Die Strategien und Phänomene, die hier untersucht werden sind Anfangs- und Schlusssequenzen; Wiederholungen und Involvement-Strategien; Zeigegesten und die Kohärenz zwischen Video und Zuschauerkommentaren im virtuellen Raum. Der Vergleich mit einer anderen monologischen Gattung, dem TED-Talk, zeigt, dass die Sprechsituation im Monolog eine einflussreiche Variable ist verglichen mit konversationellen Situationen. Der Vergleich zeigt aber weiterhin, dass die kontextuellen Unterschiede zwischen Vlogs, die vor der Kamera entstehen, und TED Talks, die auf einer Bühne vor Publikum vorgetragen werden, signifikant sein können hinsichtlich ihres Einflusses auf die stattfindende Interaktion

Discourse and organisation

Interaction on social media follows certain organizing principles and patterns, as does face-to-face oral conversation. Research has begun to apply and adapt methods developed from and for offline interaction, such as Conversation Analysis and Discourse Analysis, to the sites of interaction that have emerged with the advent of the Internet and mobile phone technology. Our chapter traces the results of this research, encompassing Internet Relay Chats, text-messaging forum interactions, emails, Facebook posts and comments, Twitter, Skype calls and video blogs. This varied range of both spoken and written data has received attention regarding the sequential organization of the users’ contributions in terms of both time and space, and it has drawn interest to its implementation of classic motifs in Conversation Analysis, that is, repair, openings and closings. The chapter presents an overview and synthesis of the results of these strands of research

Summary of "Culinary linguistics : the chef’s special"

Both eating and talking are universal human traits that are highly socially charged and culturally dependent. While Brillat-Savarin, one of the earliest food writer claimed “Tell me what you eat: I will tell you what you are” (1825), linguists could claim “Let me hear you talk: I will tell you who you are.” Since both food and language do more than cater for bare necessities, they represent perfect site for social studies. The present volume attempts to delimit the field at the interface between these two social phenomena, language and food, and contains a collection of original research articles revolving around the common theme of language and food, and the manifestation of the two within their cultural frameworks

Discourse and organisation

Interaction on social media follows certain organizing principles and patterns, as does face-to-face oral conversation. Research has begun to apply and adapt methods developed from and for offline interaction, such as Conversation Analysis and Discourse Analysis, to the sites of interaction that have emerged with the advent of the Internet and mobile phone technology. Our chapter traces the results of this research, encompassing Internet Relay Chats, text-messaging forum interactions, emails, Facebook posts and comments, Twitter, Skype calls and video blogs. This varied range of both spoken and written data has received attention regarding the sequential organization of the users’ contributions in terms of both time and space, and it has drawn interest to its implementation of classic motifs in Conversation Analysis, that is, repair, openings and closings. The chapter presents an overview and synthesis of the results of these strands of research

Editorial : participation framework revisited : (new) media and their audiences/users

Long before the wide-spread use of computer-mediated, electronically-based communication, Goffman (1979) pointed out that the denominations hearer and speaker are overly simplistic and not useful, based on the assumption that there are two parties only in talk, that both are fully focused on their neatly alternating roles, and that their main concern is the talk at hand. Hence, a dyadic model of communication with a speaker and a hearer has long since been replaced by such concepts as production format and participation framework with different roles which individuals may display in relation to a given utterance (Goffman 1979, Levinson 1988). Going beyond interpersonal dyadic faceto- face talk-in-interaction, the application of these notions still remains unsatisfactory. So, for instance, regarding classic mass media, there are ongoing discussions about the status of the television audience as overhearers (O’Keeffe 2006). Also, in studies on CMC (computer-mediated communication) often a rather superficial notion of multiple authorship is posited (cf. Landow 1994, Storrer 2008, Crystal 2011), even though the genuine interactivity of the web 2.0 seems to provide fruitful ground for an analysis in these terms. Because of these ongoing debates and unexplored fields, we find it timely to revisit the notion participation framework and describe how different reception roles are inscribed in different media or forms of communication, or, in other words, how different production formats allow their users and audiences to position themselves

Die Pragmatik des Monologs: Interaktion in Videoblogs

This study reports an in-depth pragmatic analysis of spoke monologues as they appear in video blogs (vlogs). Vlogs are videos of a person talking into the camera, which are edited and subsequently uploaded to video sharing websites such as YouTube, where they appear in a highly multimodal environment. Using methods situated in the fields of Conversation Analysis, Interactive Sociolinguistics and multimodality studies, the research presented investigates a wide range of speaker strategies. These strategies are studied with regard to their form, frequency of occurrence, how they are adapted to the specific context of language use and, where possible, what effect this has on vlog viewers. The strategies and phenomena under investigation are the openings and closings of monologues; repetition and involvement strategies; pointing gestures and video-comment coherence in the virtual online space. Comparison with another monologic genre, the TED Talk, reveals that the monologue setting itself is an influential variable that naturally shapes a vlogger’s or lecturer’s way of speaking compared to conversational settings. However, more specifically, the comparison also shows that the contextual differences between a stage monologue at a TED conference and a camera monologue as part of a vlog, can be significant in terms of their influence on the interaction that takes place.Diese Forschungsarbeit untersucht gesprochene Monologe wie sie in Videoblogs (Vlogs) vorkommen aus linguistisch-pragmatischer Sicht. Vlogs sind Videos von Menschen, die in die Kamera sprechen. Diese Videos werden nach der Aufnahme bearbeitet und dann auf Videoseiten im Internet, wie zum Beispiel YouTube, hochgeladen, wo sie im Rahmen einer multimodal komplexen Webseite einer breiten Öffentlichkeit zugänglich sind. Die Vlogmonologe werden mit Hilfe von Methoden aus der Konversationsanalyse, der Interaktionalen Soziolinguistik und Studien zur Multimodalität auf die Strategien der Sprecher beleuchtet. Diese Strategien werden untersucht im Hinblick auf ihre Form, Häufigkeit, wie sie an den spezifischen Sprechkontext angepasst sind und, wo möglich, was für einen Effekt sie auf die Zuschauer haben. Die Strategien und Phänomene, die hier untersucht werden sind Anfangs- und Schlusssequenzen; Wiederholungen und Involvement-Strategien; Zeigegesten und die Kohärenz zwischen Video und Zuschauerkommentaren im virtuellen Raum. Der Vergleich mit einer anderen monologischen Gattung, dem TED-Talk, zeigt, dass die Sprechsituation im Monolog eine einflussreiche Variable ist verglichen mit konversationellen Situationen. Der Vergleich zeigt aber weiterhin, dass die kontextuellen Unterschiede zwischen Vlogs, die vor der Kamera entstehen, und TED Talks, die auf einer Bühne vor Publikum vorgetragen werden, signifikant sein können hinsichtlich ihres Einflusses auf die stattfindende Interaktion