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Last update:
9 February 2010

© John Benjamins
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Grammar and Interaction

Pivots in German conversation

Emma Betz
Kansas State University

Studies in Discourse and Grammar 21

2008. xiii, 208 pp.
Publishing status: Available

Hardbound – In stock
978 90 272 2631 0 / EUR 105.00 / USD 158.00
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978 90 272 8993 3 / EUR 105.00 / USD 158.00
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This monograph provides a micro-analytic description of the structure and communicative use of syntactic pivot constructions in German. Using the methodology of Conversation Analysis, this work shows that pivots emerge in interaction in response to local communicative needs.

Exclusively found in spoken German, pivots allow a speaker to extend an utterance beyond a possible completion point in a syntactically and prosodically unobtrusive way. Speakers utilize this basic property to promote context-specific actions: managing boundaries of speakership, bridging sequential and topical junctures, and dealing with different types of interactional trouble.

Through a close examination of syntactic pivots as an interactional resource, this work shows that spoken linguistic structures can only be fully understood if we acknowledge the temporality of language and view grammar as usage-based and negotiable. This book thus contributes to a growing body of research at the intersection of grammar and interaction.

Table of contents

List of tables and figures
xi
Acknowledgements
xiii
Chapter 1. Introduction
1–11
Chapter 2. Preliminaries
13–38
Chapter 3. Pivot constructions as a syntactic resource for turn-taking: Managing overlap
39–68
Chapter 4. Pivots at sequential and topic boundaries: Steering the emerging direction of the talk
69–96
Chapter 5. Pivot constructions as a resource for managing repair: Searching for a word
97–135
Chapter 6. Pivot constructions in embedded self-correction: Changes in action and epistemic stance
137–168
Chapter 7. Concluding discussion
169–182
Appendix A. Transcription conventions
183–184
Appendix B. Abbreviations for grammatical descriptions
185
References
187–204
Name index
205–206
Subject index
207–208

“Insgesamt ist das Buch ein sehr lesenswerter Beitrag zur Erforschung von Grammatik und Interaktion des Deutschen. Methodologisch klar an den Prinzipien der Konversationsanalyse orientiert, ist das Verständnis der Analysen durch zahlreiche einführende Elemente und Literaturverweise in den einzelnen Kapiteln auch für mit diesem Rahmen weniger vertraute Leser gesichert. Die übersichtliche Einführung in die Syntax des Deutschen sowie die zahlreichen Hinweise auf aktuelle Arbeiten zum gesprochenen Deutsch machen dieses Buch zu einer empfehlenswerten einführenden Lektüre für alle, die deutschsprachige Interaktionen analysieren.”
Florence Oloff, ICAR-ENS LSH, France, in Gesprächsforschung, Ausgabe 10 (2009)

Subject classification

Linguistics
Germanic linguistics
Pragmatics
Syntax
Theoretical linguistics