{"title":"Look At/Check X: An Attention-And-Approval-Seeking Device","authors":"Catherine L. Tam","doi":"10.1080/08351813.2022.2128006","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT In the home, parents and children are often co-present but engaged with different tasks. When children wish to engage their parents about something they have produced/are producing and to monitor their understanding of it, they need a means of obtaining both parental attention and understanding. I examine instances of children using the look at X directive (and its variant in South African English, check X) as an attention-and-approval-seeking device, where parents either respond by looking and approving or children pursue approval. By examining naturally occurring video-recorded interactions in the homes of two families with four-year-old children, I demonstrate that the directive sets in motion a pair of conditionally relevant responses of attending and approving. Through this practice, children monitor their own understanding of their production as an accomplishment and together parent and child (re)inforce normative expectations of children as apprentices and parents as knowledgeable authorities. Data are in South African English.","PeriodicalId":51484,"journal":{"name":"Research on Language and Social Interaction","volume":"55 1","pages":"350 - 375"},"PeriodicalIF":3.0000,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Research on Language and Social Interaction","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/08351813.2022.2128006","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"COMMUNICATION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
ABSTRACT In the home, parents and children are often co-present but engaged with different tasks. When children wish to engage their parents about something they have produced/are producing and to monitor their understanding of it, they need a means of obtaining both parental attention and understanding. I examine instances of children using the look at X directive (and its variant in South African English, check X) as an attention-and-approval-seeking device, where parents either respond by looking and approving or children pursue approval. By examining naturally occurring video-recorded interactions in the homes of two families with four-year-old children, I demonstrate that the directive sets in motion a pair of conditionally relevant responses of attending and approving. Through this practice, children monitor their own understanding of their production as an accomplishment and together parent and child (re)inforce normative expectations of children as apprentices and parents as knowledgeable authorities. Data are in South African English.
摘要:在家里,父母和孩子经常在一起,但要承担不同的任务。当孩子们希望让父母参与他们已经制作/正在制作的东西,并监督他们对它的理解时,他们需要一种获得父母关注和理解的方法。我研究了儿童使用look at X指令(及其在南非英语中的变体,check X)作为寻求关注和批准的手段的例子,在这种情况下,父母要么通过查看和批准来回应,要么孩子寻求批准。通过检查两个有四岁孩子的家庭中自然发生的视频互动,我证明了该指令启动了一对有条件相关的参与和批准反应。通过这种做法,孩子们监督自己对自己的生产作为一种成就的理解,父母和孩子一起(重新)强化了孩子作为学徒和父母作为知识权威的规范期望。数据采用南非英语。
期刊介绍:
The journal publishes the highest quality empirical and theoretical research bearing on language as it is used in interaction. Researchers in communication, discourse analysis, conversation analysis, linguistic anthropology and ethnography are likely to be the most active contributors, but we welcome submission of articles from the broad range of interaction researchers. Published papers will normally involve the close analysis of naturally-occurring interaction. The journal is also open to theoretical essays, and to quantitative studies where these are tied closely to the results of naturalistic observation.