Multimodal membership categorization and storytelling in a guided tour

Abstract

This study examines multimodal membership categorization and storytelling in Japanese at an Okinawan culture center in Hawai‘i. Based on audiovisual recordings of a guided tour (112 minutes), it examines ways the guide and visitors use explicit and implicit means in constructing the membership category “immigrants of Okinawan descent in Hawai‘i” and terms of this category, such as “women of the first generation” and “children of the second generation.” The analysis focuses on visitors’ contributions to membership categorization and storytelling through posing questions, relating personal experience, and displaying stance in touching and handling objects. The findings show how practices of membership categorization and storytelling are co-constructed, and how participants draw upon multimodal resources including talk, the body, and objects in practices of membership categorization in situated interaction.