SP500 Qualitative methods conversation analysis

1
SP500 Qualitative methods conversation
analysis

• Week 1 Introduction
• Week 2 Selecting your files to transcribe and
  using PRAAT
• Week 3 Transcription
• Week 4 Analysis
• Week 5 Write up

Praat Praat is a program for speech analysis
and synthesis see http//www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/
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Discourse and power

• 1. Foucault (1972 1977) and discursive epistemes
  (knowledge discourses)
• The interdependence between discourse and power
• The relation between power and knowledge
  systems of power bring forth different types of
  knowledge, which in turn produces effects on
  people who then reproduce the original power
  relation

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Week 2 Selecting your files to transcribe and
getting used to using PRAAT

• (a) Power and talk thinking about institutional
  talk and role relationships
• (b) You are comparing examples so as to uncover
  any evidence that people use the structures of
  talk to exert or resist specific role-relations
  in context

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• Qualitative methods conversation analysis
  comparing non-institutional (informal) talk with
  institutional talk
• Informal talk
• (a) students talking
• (b) talk between mother and daughter
• Institutional talk
• (c) doctor-patient interaction
• (d) courtroom talk
• (e) classroom talk
• (f) police-suspect talk
• (g) radio phone-in talk
• (h) job interview
• (i) meeting

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Turn-taking rules

• RULE 1 This rule applies to the first transition
  relevant place of any turn
• (a) If the current speaker selects the next
  speaker during the current turn then the current
  speaker must stop speaking and the next speaker
  must speak next. And he/she must speak next at
  the first transition relevant place after this
  'next speaker' selection
• (b) If the speaker does not select a next
  speaker during a current turn, then anybody else
  present (other parties) can self-select and the
  first person to do this will gain 'speaker
  rights' at the next turn.
• (c) If the current speaker has not selected the
  next speaker and nobody else self-selects then
  the speaker can continue (although this is not a
  requirement). In doing so he/she gains a right to
  have a further turn-constructional unit.
• RULE 2 When rule 1 (c) has been applied by the
  current speaker, then at the next transition
  relevant pause, rules 1 (a) to 1 (c) apply again,
  and keep reapplying until speaker change is
  accomplished.
• The set of rules and the elements used by people
  to indicate transition relevant places are
  conceived of as a system - a system which is
  designed to faciliate the 'turn-taking'
  organisation central to conversation.
• How to do conversation analysis a brief guide

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• A turn-taking check-list (for observing and/or
  analysing recorded conversation). (Adapted from
  Sacks, Schlegoff and Jefferson, 1974).
• 1. Speaker-change recurs, or at least occurs
• 2. Overwhelmingly, one party speaks at a time
• 3. Occurrences of more than one speaker at a
  time are common, but brief
• 4. Transitions (from one turn to the next) with
  no gap and no overlap are common. Together with
  transitions characterised by slight gap or slight
  overlap, they make up the vast majority of
  transitions.
• 5. Turn order is not fixed, but varies
• 6. Turn size is not fixed, but varies
• 7. Length of conversation is not specified in
  advance
• 8. What parties say is not specified in advance
• 9. Relative distribution of turns is not
  specified in advance
• 10. Number of parties can vary
• 11. Talk can be continuous or discontinuous
• 12. Turn allocation techniques are obviously
  mixed (see rules above).
• 13. Various turn-constructional links are
  employed, e.g., turn can be projected one word
  long or they can be sentential in length
• 14. Repair mechanisms exist for dealing with
  turn-taking errors and violations, e.g., if two
  parties find themselves talking at the same time,
  one of them will stop prematurely, thus repairing
  the trouble.

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Guide for the practical

• http//www.kent.ac.uk/psychology/department/people
  /forresterma/c8MFx.pdf

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An example transcript
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SP500 Qualitative methods conversation
analysis

• Week 1 Introduction
• Week 2 Selecting your files to transcribe and
  using PRAAT
• Week 3 Transcription
• Week 4 Analysis
• Week 5 Write up

Praat Praat is a program for speech analysis
and synthesis see http//www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/