Talking into being Norms and Constraints of Broadcast Talk: A Conversation Analytic Study

This journal-style thesis uses Conversation Analysis (CA) to unpack how participants talk norms and constraints of the broadcast talk setting into being. The thesis consists of three strands of work focussing on question design, response design, and epistemics. The analyses report on and unpack four novel interactional phenomenon.

The first strand reports on a parallel phenomenon where interviewers disavow a question (Self-Referential Limits), or announce what interviewees should not talk about (Other-Referential Limits) prefatory to a question. The analysis shows that Self-Referential Limits enable interviewers to ward of the risk that accompanies asking a transgressive question, while Other-Referential Limits are a device for interviewers to ‘make a sequential mold’ (Stivers and Heritage, 2001). Both phenomena provide a window into how interviewers do being a competent professional and talk aspects of the setting into being. The second strand discuses instances of interviewees responding to a question with an initially playful then serious response to a question. The analysis shows that interviewees can respond to questions in this manner to display alternate ways they have heard a question. The phenomenon reveals interviewees use the device to simultaneously overcome the constraints of the news interview turn-taking system, and challenge a presupposition a question embodies under the guise of a playful response. The third strand focuses on the epistemic assertion “we all know”, showing that speakers mobilise the phrase to recurrently challenge a co-participant or strengthen a complaint by talking the audience's epistemic stance into being.

The findings of this study have implications on our understanding of the structures of broadcast talk, how participants do being competent professionals, and our knowledge of the interactional practices which shape - and are shaped by - the institutionality of broadcast talk.