Beyond Language Boundaries: Multimodal Use in Multilingual Contexts 9783110458817, 9783110456400

Table of contents :
Table of Contents
Introduction
First part: Multimodal Language Use
Notes for a Multilingual and Multimodal Functional Discourse Grammar
Actions as Sources of Gestures
Argument Structure Shift for German Dynamic Verbs gehen and kommen in Situated and Embodied Communication
Proxemics of Greetings and Farewells in Spanish and German
Gestures and Lexical Access Problems in German as Second Language
Analysing German Teachers’ Identities through Multimodal and Multilingual Use
Second part: Language Use in Multilingual Contexts
Co-Constructions in Multilingual Settings
Deictic Strategies as Expression of Identity
Use of Connectives and Argumentation in Catalan Parliamentary Debate
Language Attitudes and Identity Construction. A Case Study Among Two L1 Attritors
Crossing and Blurring the Language Borders. The Example of German-Polish Language Contact
“Yes we can! – Sí se puede!”. Speaking the Language of the Masses. Codeswitching for Creating Togetherness with a Foreign Audience in Political Speeches
Global English and Multilingual Luxembourg. A Case Study of Native English Speakers
Index

Citation preview

Beyond Language Boundaries

Beyond Language Boundaries Multimodal Use in Multilingual Contexts Edited by Marta Fernández-Villanueva and Konstanze Jungbluth

This volume was sponsored by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) with funds of the German Federal Foreign Office (AA), and supported by the Europa-Universität Viadrina (EUV) in Frankfurt (Oder) and the Universitat de Barcelona (UB). We proudly recognize the collaboration of the Study Group of Pragmatics and Discourse Analysis (GrEPAD), and the Study Group of Variation (GEV) at the Department of Catalan Philology of the University of Barcelona, together with the Faculty of Cultural and Social Sciences at the the European-University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder).

ISBN 978-3-11-045640-0 e-ISBN [PDF] 978-3-11-045881-7 e-ISBN [EPUB] 978-3-11-045654-7 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress. Bibliographic information published be the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at: http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2016 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Cover image: Maksymowicz/iStock/thinkstock Typesetting: jürgen ullrich typosatz, Nördlingen Printing: CPI books GmbH, Leck ♾ Printed on acid-free paper Printed in Germany www.degruyter.com

Introduction The fascinating topics of multilingualism and multimodality in language use overlap in a number of ways. Where native speakers and learners of the shared language are conversing, multimodal means – including gestures – are used frequently. Furthermore, co-constructions may be observed, even across languages. Distributed among one, two or even more speakers, they expand from one-word contributions of the interlocutor to complex constructions of bilingual talk that connects several turns. Our project funded by the DAAD (German Federal Foreign Office) as part of the Hochschuldialog mit Südeuropa brought together experts and young researchers from Barcelona and Frankfurt (Oder), research teams belonging to the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) and the European University Viadrina (EUV), along with experts from Italy and abroad. Catalunya provides an instructive example of Europe becoming multilingual, where citizens find ways to achieve competence in several languages, and to use and combine them in a natural way every single day. The readers may compare this case with other multilingual societies in Europe, younger ones such as on the German-Polish border or elsewhere, and with others in America which are discussed in this volume. Several of the involved researchers specialize in German, some in Romance Languages, some take a more theoretical approach, while others prefer to develop their theses from empirical data. These data have a multimodal nature, which is shown in the fragments of the included transcriptions. The context of trilingual Catalunya where Catalan and Spanish beside of English is spoken by most of its citizens today served as meeting place and background. The rich research developed on their language choices and multilingual practices there combined with the perspectives on language use in plurilingual societies in Europe and America unfolded in Germany triggered heated debates. Contrary to what one might think, the widely differing backgrounds among the researchers served to enrich our fantastic experiences during two years of joined research. We are happy to share with our readers the most exciting themes to follow in search of answers to hitherto open theoretical and empirical questions. The studies in this volume bring together three perspectives on the topic, and draw several links between them: research on multimodality, on second language (L2)/foreign language acquisition and on plurilingual language use performed by multilingual speakers. Some of the studies address the integration of gestures, language contact and multimodal aspects into grammar (Alturo, Clemente, Payrató, Tapia Yepes), while others unfold pragmatic aspects (Schmidt, Tessendorf, Zinkhahn Rhobodes). We remember that one of the foci is on language use and acquisition including code-switching, discourse markers and argument structure

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Introduction

(Isaeva, Mestre, Cuenca); finally, deixis, co-construction (Da Milano, Jungbluth) and acts of identity (Haid, Peters, Repiso) are discussed. The content is divided into two parts. The first connects the chapters on Multimodal Language Use and the other one the contributions on Language Use in Multilingual Contexts. The titles already indicate the theme shared by all of them. These chapters have also in common that they all draw on empirically collected corpus data of spoken language use. Alturo, Clemente and Payrató show how multimodal signs should be integrated into the model of Functional Discourse Grammar based on pragmatics. In doing so, multimodal signs – including prosody, facial expressions and gestures, and the combinations of (linguistic) signs belonging to different languages or varieties of a language used by multilingual speakers – can form part of one and the same grammar. Observing actions as sources of gestures, Tessendorf focuses on the example of the “brushing-away gesture”. Performed in Spanish and German conversations, among others, she discusses the capacity of this gesture to undergo metaphorical and metonymic transfer with the aim of expressing the intended meaning. Tapia, Schmidt and Isaeva build their research on corpora of German spoken language. The first of them analyses the multimodal use of the motion verbs kommen and gehen, intertwined with a shift of the underlying argument structure and the gestural deixis. While Schmidt’s primary interest is comparing the proxemics in greetings and farewells between German and Spanish and their implications for second language learning, Isaeva analyzes learners of German focusing on the use of their gestures when searching for lexical items in their L2. Repiso uses multimodal cues and language choices to explore positionings in discourse and identity construction of multilingual teachers of German in Catalonia to challenge the idealized native speaker paradigm. The second part is introduced by Jungbluth. Her multilingual data shows various kinds of co-constructions ranging from the lexicon to grammar, from input of single words by the interlocutor to the extension of already-completed sentences. The following two contributions analyse data embedded in the context of migration which urges the expression of identity. Da Milano observes, compares and interprets the deictic strategies found in her data rooted in migration contexts. Another consequence of migration may have been language attrition, which is the subject of Peters’ study. She shares with Da Milano her interest in the construction of social identity, investigating the language attitudes of two multilingual and multicultural L1 attritors. Mestre and Cuenca focus on the use of connectives and language choice in Catalan Parliamentary Debates. The contribution of Zinkhahn Rhobodes analyses language contact phenomena between German and Polish, a lesser studied language pair. Despite the fact

Introduction

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that the structures of the Slavonic and Germanic language do not have many aspects in common, bilingual speakers do create mixed expressions. They may be stylized or conventionalized by young people flagging their groupness. Similar functions are observed by Haid, who studies code-switching used in modern political speeches by Putin, Obama and Merkel. Finally, Collins describes convergence and divergence of Global English spoken by L1 speakers living in the multilingual society of Luxembourg. The outcome of the different perspectives is, on the one hand, a move toward answers to some important theoretical questions: How does one include multimodal signs in grammar? Does crossing blur language borders? How do migrants express their changing identities? On the other hand, the studies show the different strategies and forms of language use put into practice by multilingual speakers, explore their language attitudes, and examine plurilingual speech acts and identity constructions beyond language boundaries. We gratefully thank the two Universities and all the people involved at the academic and administrative levels for their engagement in this joint endeavour. Furthermore, without the strong commitment of our students Tininizka Zanger Montoya, Janosch Leugner and Lukas Wegenast, who joined our team at different points along the way, the aims of our project would not have been reached on time. Todd Ehresmann proofread some of the chapters, as did Maggie Peters. Last but not least, we felt warmly accompanied by Christine Henschel at all times, sharing ups and downs all along the way toward publishing our book. Konstanze Jungbluth, Frankfurt (Oder) Marta Fernández-Villanueva, Barcelona April 2016

Table of Contents Introduction

V

First part: Multimodal Language Use Núria Alturo, Ignasi Clemente and Lluís Payrató Notes for a Multilingual and Multimodal Functional Discourse Grammar Sedinha Tessendorf Actions as Sources of Gestures

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34

Eduard Tapia Yepes Argument Structure Shift for German Dynamic Verbs gehen and kommen in Situated and Embodied Communication 55 Sarah Schmidt Proxemics of Greetings and Farewells in Spanish and German

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Elena Isaeva and Marta Fernández-Villanueva Gestures and Lexical Access Problems in German as Second Language

93

Gemma Repiso i Puigdelliura and Marta Fernández-Villanueva Analysing German Teachers’ Identities through Multimodal and Multilingual Use 114

Second part: Language Use in Multilingual Contexts Konstanze Jungbluth Co-Constructions in Multilingual Settings Federica Da Milano Deictic Strategies as Expression of Identity

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153

Martí Mestre and Maria Josep Cuenca Use of Connectives and Argumentation in Catalan Parliamentary Debate

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Maggie Anne Peters Language Attitudes and Identity Construction A Case Study Among Two L1 Attritors 179 Dagna Zinkhahn Rhobodes Crossing and Blurring the Language Borders The Example of German-Polish Language Contact

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Janett Haid “Yes we can! – Sí se puede!” Speaking the Language of the Masses. Codeswitching for Creating Togetherness with a Foreign Audience in Political Speeches 221 Carly Collins Global English and Multilingual Luxembourg A Case Study of Native English Speakers Index

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First part: Multimodal Language Use

Núria Alturo, Ignasi Clemente, Universitat de Barcelona, and Lluís Payrató, Hunter College, City University of New York

Notes for a Multilingual and Multimodal Functional Discourse Grammar Abstract: In this chapter, we argue that Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG), with any adjustments that may be required, can constitute a useful model to explain grammatical phenomena associated with speakers’ multilectal and multimodal communicative competence. In particular, we present two working hypotheses of how multilingualism and multimodality may be articulated within a FDG grammatical model: (1) languages known by the speaker provide the language-specific primitives and operators that allow the language mixing and switching operations; and (2) speech and gesture share the same primitive frames and templates, and work together in an integrated manner, in the operations of formulation, encoding and decoding. Our evidence suggests that there is a high degree of integration of language systems (verbal grammars) and modes (verbal and non-verbal), and that the contrast between primitives (which may keep the specificity of the languages and the modes involved) and levels of representation (which are specific of each multilingual and multimodal grammar) is a promising perspective to consider in future research. Keywords: Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG), primitives, operators, levels of representation, multilingual grammar, multimodal grammar

1 Introduction

1

Formal linguistics has traditionally viewed grammar as a system with an ideal speaker-hearer, who is a member of a homogenous community, and who exclusively communicates verbally. Such view of grammar has resulted in a focus on speaker competence and in the neglect of multiple aspects of performance. Pragmatics has often become a “grammatical bin” in which multiple linguistic variation phenomena that are considered speech-related, not systematic enough, 1 We thank the comments of editors and reviewers of this volume, and also the kindness of Kasper Kok, who allowed us to read his work in press. Our work is part of the research projects FFI21011-25236/FFI2014-56258-P (Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación) and 2014SGR918 (Generalitat de Catalunya).

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and not worthy of attention, are thrown in. However, it is difficult to adhere to this view of grammar for a number of reasons. First, research on multilingualism has documented phenomena such as cross-linguistic transfer and code-mixing and code-switching competences, the development of an interlanguage among second language learners, and the creation of pidgins and creoles. Second, research on multimodal language use has revealed that meaning-making is not an exclusive verbal process, but a process that involves different modalities and communicative means that are used simultaneously with talk; for instance, prosody, facial expressions, and manual gestures. The goal of this chapter is to show that a pragmatically-based Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG) requires an architecture – understood as a structure of frames, figures, and constituents – that is broad enough to include multimodality, multilingualism, multidialectalism, and even the multilectalism that results from combining different registers. Although the grammatical model proposed by FDG restricts what is considered grammatical to those verbal aspects of a language that have systematic codification (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008), it acknowledges that communicative performance is nonetheless heterogeneous and variable: communicative interaction is the result of converging discourse modalities (e.g., verbal, vocal, and gestural), and grammars (e.g., languages, dialects, and registers). Thus, a general theory of communication should be able to explain a speaker’s pragmatic competence, that is, the set of competences that lies between a grammatical competence understood in a strictly Chomskyan sense, and a sociocultural and cognitive communicative competence understood in a wide-ranging sense. We believe that a functional grammar like FDG, with any adjustments that may be required, can constitute a useful model to explain grammatical phenomena associated with speakers’ multilingual and multimodal abilities. In the sections below, we suggest that FDG may provide an adequate framework to build a model of a multilingual and multimodal grammar. In particular, we introduce two working hypotheses of how multilingualism and multimodality may be articulated within a FDG grammatical model: (1) languages known by the speaker contribute the language-specific primitives that allow the language mixing and switching operations of Formulation, Morphological Encoding, and Phonological Encoding; and (2) while the separation between speech and gesture in grammar is limited to the primitive forms and operators available, speech and gesture share the same primitive frames and templates, and work together in an integrated manner, in the operations of formulation, encoding and decoding. With an exploratory goal, we present and discuss these hypotheses, which will need to be confirmed in subsequent empirical work.

Notes for a Multilingual and Multimodal Functional Discourse Grammar

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2 FDG as a model of grammar and levels of adequacy FDG has its origins in Dik’s Functional Grammar (Dik 1997a, 1997b). By the beginning of the 21st century, FG scholars began to discuss the limitations of the model, including its criteria of adequacy to psychological, sociocultural and most importantly discourse aspects. The result of those discussions was an advancement of FG and the adoption/development of a new model called Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG).2

2.1 FDG main features FDG is a functional, structural and typologically-based theory of grammar. As a functional grammar, it aims at explaining how the ideas and intentions of individuals are formulated and encoded through the grammar of a particular language. It deals, first of all, with pragmatics, semantics, morphosyntax and phonology in grammar; but it acknowledges that grammar cannot be adequately explained without considering its interaction with the non-grammatical aspects of human communication (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008; Keizer 2014, 2015). Thus, FDG is thought as the Grammatical Component of a wider theory of verbal interaction, where it interacts with a Conceptual Component, a Contextual Component, and an Output component. As Figure 1 shows, this is a top-down model, working down from the Speaker’s prelinguistic conceptual information and communicative intention to acoustic, orthographic, or signed output, including systematic gesture in speech and other nonverbal aspects of multimodal discourse. The basic unit of analysis is not the Sentence or the Clause, but the Discourse Act, that is, the unit that expresses the communicative intention. Besides, the model captures the role of discourse context and situational context (physical and social) in the production of a linguistic expression (Alturo et al. 2014; Connolly 2013; Connolly 2014; Cornish 2009; Rijkhoff 2008).

2 For a more detailed account of FDG see Hengeveld and Mackenzie (2008), Mackenzie and Olbertz (2013), Keizer (2015), and the monographic volumes on the Interpersonal Level (Van Staden and Keizer 2009), the Representational Level (Hengeveld and Wanders 2009), the Morphosyntactic Level (Hengeveld and Wanders 2009), and the interaction between context and grammar in FDG (Alturo, Keizer and Payrató 2014). More information and updated bibliography on FDG can be found at www.functionaldiscoursegrammar.info.

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Figure 1: General layout of FDG

FDG is, also, a structural model of grammar. It analyses the linguistic representation of Discourse Acts at all levels of grammar, which allows it to account not only for clauses and sentences, but also for units smaller and larger than the clause; that is, interjections, incomplete sentences and sequences of sentences. There are four levels of grammatical organization: two levels of Formulation (the Interpersonal Level and the Representational Level), and two levels of Encoding (the Morphosyntactic Level and the Phonological Level). Furthermore, the operations of Formulation and Encoding are fed by a number of primitives: a list of possible structures (frames, templates), forms (lexemes, grammatical morphemes, suppletive forms) and operators relevant for each level (interpersonal, representational, morphosyntactic and phonological operators). Primitives play a main role in our proposal, and they will be further commented in sections 4 and 6. The Interpersonal (IL) and the Representational (RL) levels are the outputs of pragmatic and semantic Formulation. The Morphosyntactic (ML) and the Phonological (PL) levels specify the exact way in which the pragmatic, rhetorical and semantic material is encoded. Each of these four levels is hierarchically organized

Notes for a Multilingual and Multimodal Functional Discourse Grammar

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in various layers. For instance, the structure of the IL is formed by a number of layers: Move, Discourse Act, Illocution, Participant, Communicative Content. These layers, as well as the layers of RL, ML and PL, have the general structure represented in (1), where α represents a variable that is restricted by a head, π an operator representing grammatical information, and σ a modifier providing lexical optional information. (1)

(π1 α1: [head] (α1): σ1 (α1))

A simplified representation of the hierarchical structure of the grammar levels is given in (2), which we explain below. Within a particular level, each layer has its own set of operators, functions, and potential modifiers, which are not considered in the example. (2)

Plou ‘it rains’ (Catalan)

Interpersonal Level (IL)

(M1: (A1: (F: DECL (F)) (P1)S (C1: (T1) (C1)) (A1)) (M1))

Representational Level (RL)

(p1: (present ep1: (e1: (f1: ploure (f1)) (e1)) (ep1)) (p1))

Morphosyntactic Level (ML)

(Le1: (Cl1: (Vp1: (Vw1: ploure-prs.ind.3.sg (Vw1)) (Vp1)) (Cl1)) (Le1))

Phonological Level (PL)

(U1: (IP1: (PP1: (PW1: (F1: (S1: /plɔw/ (S1)) (F1)) (PW1)) (PP1)) (IP1)) (U1))

The Move (M), at the Interpersonal Level, is considered the minimal free unit of discourse and the largest unit of interaction relevant to grammatical analysis (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008). Any Move may contain one or several Discourse Acts (A), which realize a communicative intention or Illocution (F) (declarative or informative in example 2), with at least one Participant3 (P) (the Speaker in 2), and the content that the Speaker wants to evoke (the Communicated Content, C). The term Communicative Content does no refer, in FDG, to the semantic content that the Speaker wishes to communicate, but to the sum of acts of Reference (R) to an entity and Ascription of a property (T) that are performed by the Speaker in a Discourse Act. At the Representational Level, the highest layer of the hierarchy is the Propositional Content (p), that is, the mental construct of the idea being communicated. By contrast to Communicated Contents, which are actions bounded by

3 Inner talk might be a case of one participant only; although, in general, the presence of at least a second participant is mandatory for the speaker to start or assume this role.

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the Speaker, Propositional Contents are meanings that can be attributed to any person belonging to the respective speech community. Each Propositional Content consists of at least one nuclear Episode (ep), which in turn consists of a number of States-of-Affairs (e) that are thematically coherent (in the sense that they share a particular time – present in (2) –, location, and the involved conversational participants/speech act participants). The abbreviation (f) in (2) refers to the Property characterizing the State-of-Affairs (e). The Morphosyntactic Level is also organized as a hierarchy of layers. The largest unit of analysis is the Linguistic Expression (Le), which consists of at least one other unit (either a Clause or a Phrase). Clauses (Cl) consist of a configuration of Words (Xw), Phrases (Xp), and other Clauses. Syntactic functions are assigned at this layer. The heads of Phrases are usually lexical elements, whereas the heads of Words at the Clause layer are grammatical elements such as, for instance, conjunctions or particles. The Phrase layer consists of a configuration of Words (Xw), other Phrases (Xp) and embedded Clauses (Cl). Several types of Phrases are possible: Verbal Phrase (Vp), Noun Phrase (Np), Adjective Phrase (Adjp), Adverb Phrase (Advp), and Adposition Phrase (Adp). Finally, the Word (Xw) layer consists of a combination of Morphemes (Xm), other Words (Xw), Phrases (Xp), and Clauses (Cl), which makes possible to account for polysynthetic languages. There is a clear distinction between Lexemes and Words: Lexemes belong to the Representational Level, whereas Words belong to the Morphosyntactic Level. Finally, the Phonological Level contains phonological representations of Discourse Acts. In parallel with the previous levels, the Phonological Level is organized hierarchically in several layers: Utterance (U), Intonational Phrase (IP), Phonological Phrase (PP), Phonological Word (PW), Foot (F) and Syllable (S). This hierarchical view of phonological structure follows the tradition of Prosodic Phonology (Auer 1993; Nestor and Vogel 1986). It is assumed that not all layers are necessarily relevant to every Utterance and that there can be languages lacking a particular layer. Recursivity is also allowed. Not all phonological information is introduced at the Phonological Level. It is the case, for instance, of proper names: proper names, which have reference but not semantic meaning, are introduced at the Interpersonal Level and take already there their phonological form. In the operation of encoding, at the Phonological Level, that information is inserted into an Utterance. On the other hand, lexical items introduced at the Interpersonal and Representational levels may be marked at the Morphosyntactic Level for phonological specifications of stress position, tone pattern and quantity indications, thus avoiding confusion between forms. The Phonological Level deals with meaning oppositions that are not discriminated at the Morphosyntactic Level.

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The third characterizing feature of FDG is typology. FDG theory is heavily grounded on extensive work on linguistic typology, and it offers an adequate framework for the comparison of languages and the explanation of linguistic universals at all levels of grammar. This allows accounting not only for morphological and syntactic typology (as it is mostly the case in linguistic typology tradition), but also for semantic and pragmatic typology. An example of this is given in (3). The first part of the example, (3a), shows that the Turkish interrogative particle mI can be attached to a Clause, to a Nominal Phrase, or to an interjection (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2010: 11). This contrasts with the interrogative particle que in some Catalan dialects, which according to Rigau and Prieto (2007) expresses pragmatic information related to proximity and low-cost interaction: as we show in (3b), the Catalan interrogative que can only be attached to a Clause (3b, instance a; and not in instances b and c): (3) (3a) Turkish interrogative particle mI, which displays vowel harmony (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2010) (1) Ahmet sinema-ya git-ti mi? Ahmet cinema-DAT go-PAST INTER ‘Did Ahmet go to the movies?’ b. Bugün mü? today INTER ‘Today?’ c. Tamam mı? OK INTER ‘OK?’ (3b) Catalan interrogative particle que a. Que vindràs demà? INTER come-FUT.IND.2.SG tomorrow ‘Are you coming tomorrow?’ b. *Que demà? INTER tomorrow c. *Que d’acord? INTER interjection:agreement

2.2 Levels of adequacy Functional studies have traditionally included three levels of adequacy: typological, psychological and pragmatic (Butler 1999). However, recent studies have shifted from psychological adequacy to cognitive adequacy (Butler 2009). In regard to typological adequacy, functional theory is expected to account for grammars of languages of any type, and to be a useful tool to highlight similarities

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and differences between languages. The functional model is also required to integrate cognitive or psychological adequacy. It must have explicative validity to account for creation and interpretation of psycholinguistic processes, and also provide clear information about the nature of conceptualization and of cognitive abilities. Furthermore, FDG is also able to assign pragmatic functions (e.g., topic, focus, and contrast), since as a functional grammar, it has pragmatic adequacy. That is, FDG allows the appropriate and coherent production4 of utterances in context. The foundational tenets of a functional grammar focus precisely on language use rather than on an abstract language capacity. Furthermore, these tenets align a functional grammar more closely with cognitive linguistics, since cognitive abilities tend to be grouped rather than to be separated modularly. Such consideration, as well as the need to consider discourse and contextual aspects (Butler 1999: 228), point to the evolution of the functional model and to its potential future: a functional grammar with a more comprehensive discourse/ pragmatic adequacy: To attempt to formulate an exhaustive model that has the capacity to include subordinate models, not only of subjacent/underlying semantics and of utterance formation/production, but also of discourse structure, as well as of the social and psychological contexts of language use and its complex meaning-form relationships. (Butler 1999: 241)

Discourse/pragmatic adequacy, according to Butler’s desiderata (1999: 256), is understood as (1) the construction of a model of the social contexts in which texts are produced and received, (2) the exploration of discourse models, and (3) the integration of these models in the grammar itself. In Butler’s words (1999: 256), such integration will generate “significant changes in the latter [the new integrated grammar] and will lead to the formalization of a global model of linguistic communication,” with the testing of predictions that this new integrated model will produce according to the interrelations between language and context. Indeed, this has been the evolution of FDG. Specifically, FDG has aimed to improve cognitive and pragmatic explanatory adequacies of discourse, which has been the general aim in the functional tradition (Butler 1999; Gonzálvez-García and Butler 2006). As for cognitive adequacy, the FDG grammar model reflects psychological evidence of speech production following Levelt’s model of lan-

4 FDG literature mostly takes a perspective of monological production. For a focus on dialogical discourse considering reception, see Giomi (2014) and Mackenzie (2014).

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guage processing (Levelt 1989), with the Conceptualizer, the Formulator and the Articulator modules corresponding to the Conceptual, the Grammatical and the Output Components in FDG. Furthermore, communicative intentions and acts, as they are described in the general functional literature (Nuyts 1989), generate (a) the formulation and encoding of conceptual and contextual information in the Grammatical Component, and (b) the feed from the Contextual Component to the Conceptual Component, as suggested by Keizer (2014: 418, figure 411). Within this theoretical framework, our proposal involves the integration and development of two types of speaker cognitive ability, as well as the representation of these two abilities in the model (grammatical and communicative): (a) An ability to use two or more languages (or two or more varieties of the same language), and the need of the model to account and explain specific phenomena related to multilingualism and multidialectalism, such as codemixing and code-switching. (b) An ability to coordinate verbal and nonverbal components of an utterance, and to produce and interpret multimodal messages that converge to create a joint and indivisible meaning.

3 Multilingual discourse The phenomena of code-mixing and code-switching have shown the very high degree of interrelation between two or more linguistic systems in a multilingual speaker’s mind. Romaine’s ([1994] 1996: 74) work greatly illustrates such interrelation, particularly because the instances that she collected come from different communities and languages, and from languages with significantly different typological systems: (4) a. b. c. d. e. f. g.

Kio ke six, seven hours te school de vic spend karde ne, the are speaking English all the time (Panjabi/English) Will you rubim of? Ol man will come (Tok Pisin/English) Sano että tulla tánne että I’m very sick (Finish/English) Kodomotachi liked it (Japanese/English) Have agua, please (Spanish/English) Won o arrest a single person (Yoruba/English) This morning I hantar my baby tu dekat babysitter tu lah (Malaysian/English)

In fact, the phenomena of code-mixing and code-switching occur regardless of the linguistic typologies of the languages involved. The alternation between Spanish and Catalan (languages that are close typologically) but also the alternation between Spanish and Basque (languages that are distant typologically) clearly

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illustrate this point. As an example of code-mixing, Romaine ([1994] 1996: 75) reports the following example between Spanish and English in New York City: (5)

But I use to eat bofe, the brain. And then they stopped selling it because tenían, este, le encontraron que tenía worms. I used to make some bofe! Después yo hacía uno d’esos [sic] concoctions: the garlic con cebolla, y hacía un mojo, y yo dejaba que se curara eso for a couple of hours.

A significant amount of linguistic research has documented the ability of bilingual speakers to coordinate two or more linguistic systems seamlessly. Research on bilingual speakers’ abilities has also resulted in the development of concepts such as multicompetence (Bassetti and Cook 2011; Cook 2008), and translanguage and translanguaging (García and Otheguy 2014). According to García and Otheguy (2014: 646), translanguage or translanguaging “refers to language practices by bilinguals that appear to be indifferent to the social adscription of some features to some language box and of others to another language box.” In this manner, multilingual speakers “do not have ‘languages’, rather, they have an interconnected whole, an ecosystem of mutual interdependence of possibly heteronamed linguistic features forming a single web, where translanguaging is the speech product generated by the web” (García and Otheguy 2014: 646). In a similar way, multilingual speakers’ abilities to coordinate two or more linguistic systems seamlessly are analogous to speakers’ abilities to coordinate functional varieties or registers from a complex functional repertoire. Thus, stylistic and functional variation in speakers’ performance shows an ability to coordinate sequences that belong to different registers. From an intralinguistic variation perspective, this ability is also observable in the performance of speakers who alternate, for example, between two different geographical dialects of the same language.

4 Multilingual discourse in Functional Discourse Grammar We believe that FDG may provide an adequate framework to build a model of a multilingual grammar. Our working hypothesis is that the languages known by the speaker contribute the language-specific primitives that feed the language mixing and switching operations of Formulation and Encoding (Morphological Encoding and Phonological Encoding), whereas the result of the operations of Formulation and Encoding in code-mixing and code-switching is a multilingual grammar with its own specific structure (see Jungbluth, in this volume, regarding

Notes for a Multilingual and Multimodal Functional Discourse Grammar

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the issue of whether code-mixing and code-switching are actually different). This is illustrated in Figure 2:

Figure 2: Primitives of the Grammatical Component in FDG

There are three kinds of primitives in FDG (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008: 19– 22; Keizer 2015: 30–31): (a) Structuring primitives (Frames for Formulation, Templates for Encoding): these primitives define the possible combinations of elements at each level; that is, the possible combinations of pragmatic and semantic units at IL (Interpersonal Level) and RL (Representational Level), the order of elements within a Clause or Phrase at ML (Morphosyntactic Level), and the possible intonation and stress patterns at PL (Phonological Level). (b) Forms: the relevant linguistic elements at each level; that is, the lexemes drawn from the lexicon at IL and RL, the elements expressing grammatical information at ML (unmodifiable elements such as auxiliaries, particles, and affixes), and suppletive forms at PL (e.g. irregular forms). (c) Operators: each level of representation takes its particular operators, which are used to represent interpersonal, representational, morphosyntactic and phonological information that is not fully predictable. For instance: the identifiability of a referent at IL, ‘real-word’ information about number or

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tense at RL, placeholders for forms or sets of forms at ML, and prosodic features such as a rising tone at PL. These three types of primitives are exemplified in (6), where we show a Communicated Content (C) frame, a Propositional Content (p) frame, a lexeme, and a politeness operator. These four elements are selected in the operation of Formulation as part of the task of grammatically formulating a conceptual representation in pragmatic and semantic grammatical representations. (6) Vostè és 2.SG.polite be. PRS.IND.3.SG ‘You are the first one’ 6a. 6b. 6c. 6d.

el primer the.M first.M

C frame of (6): (Π C: [(T) ɸ (R) ɸ]: Σ (C)) ɸ p frame of (6): (πp: (f1) (x1) (p)) φ Lexeme: Primer POLITENESS OPERATOR at R: +h (high politeness), encoded as vostè IL: (+h R: [-S, +A] (R))

Where: Π, π = ɸ, φ = T= R= f = x= Σ= S= A=

one or more operators the function of the linguistic unit a SubAct of Ascription (e.g. the adscription of being the first one) a SubAct of Reference (e.g. reference to the addressee) any lexical property an individual one or more modifiers at the layer of C Speaker Addressee

The complete pragmatic (IL) and semantic (RL) representations of (6) are shown in (7): (7)

IL: (A: (F: DECL (F)) (Pi) S (Pj)A (Π C: [(T) (+h R:[-S, +A] (R))] (C)) (A)) RL: (πp: (ep: (π e: [(f: primer (f)) (1x)]: σ (e)) ϕ (p) φ)

Note that suggesting language-specific primitives in a multilingual grammar does not assume that multilingual speakers keep the language-specific Formulation and Encoding of the grammar of their monolingual discourses in L1 or L25, which is a defining feature of (monolingual) Functional Discourse Grammar:

5 In the sense of Herdina and Jessner (2002).

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Although the model as a whole has universal validity, the primitives available at each level, and the representations resulting from the operations of Formulation and Encoding, are language specific. Each language can therefore be said to have its own FDG. (Keizer 2014: 40)

Instead, we are suggesting that only the primitives of a multilingual grammar keep separated the specificity of L1 and L2, whereas the representations resulting from the operations of Formulation and Encoding are specific of that particular multilingual grammar. This may change in time, as the multilingual grammar evolves into a new monolingual grammar with its own specific primitives (this would be the case for creoles and pidgins). In a multilingual grammar, the speaker would select primitives of all the available languages to perform a single (multilingual) task of building Pragmatic (IL) and Semantic (RL) representations of conceptual representations, as shown in (8): (8) Al seu despatx ens vam veure (.) dos o tres veces6 ‘We met at her office two or three times’ A-l

seu

At-the POSS. 3.SG

despatx

ens

vam

office

ACC.RECP. 1.PL

go.AUX.past. see. INF 1.PL

Catalan

veure

(.)

dos o tres veces

Pause

two or three times Spanish

IL: (A: (F: DECL (F)) (Pi) S (Pj)A (Π C: [(T) ɸ (R1) ɸ (R2) ɸ (R3) ɸ] (C)) ɸ (A)) ɸ RL: (πp: (pastep: (π e: [(fi: [(fj: veure (fj)) (mx) (l: despatx (l))] (fi))] [(fk: (q: -dues o tres vegades- (q)) (fk))] (fi))]: σ (e)) ϕ (p)) φ Where: l = location m = more than one q = quantity

If we adjust the model to reflect a speaker’s multilingual and multilectal characteristics, we will obtain the model proposed in Figure (3), which is a programmatic proposal that needs to be subject to future verifications. 6 Fragment from a response by Maria Victoria Álvarez in the Parliament of Catalonia during a session of the Investigation Committee on Fraud, Fiscal Evasion, and Political Corruption (April 10, 2015, recording by Televisió de Catalunya) http://www.ccma.cat/324/victoria-alvarez-josezaragoza-i-alicia-van-decidir-gravar-me-en-unes-estones-doci-relaxat/noticia/2656072/

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Figure 3: Multilingualism and Multilectalism in FDG

Each operation involves the selection of the relevant L1 or L2 primitives. In (8) above, for instance, the formulation of each semantic entity takes a lexeme from one particular language: Catalan or Spanish. Thus, at the Representational Level lexemes for quantity are selected from Spanish (dos o tres veces, ‘two or three times’), whereas for location (al seu despatx, ‘at her office’), individual (more than one individual or (mx)) and configurational property (ens vam veure, ‘see each other’) the speaker selects Catalan lexemes. We can now apply this model to the formal analysis of the grammatical formulation and encoding of occurrences of code-mixing and code-switching. This is illustrated in (9), which shows the operations, primitives, and level representations involved, (IP, RL, ML, PL), in a multilingual communicative act performed by Maria. L1 (Spanish) is given in bold, whereas L2 (Catalan) is given in roman capitalized letters: (9) Laia: Què li passa, al Joan? (lit. ‘What happens to John?’) (lit. ‘I believe that [John] is ill’) Maria: Creo que está MALALT (Spanish) (C ATALAN )

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5 Speaker multimodal ability Speakers display a clear multimodal ability, that is, an ability to generate meaning using different codes – primarily verbal and gestural – that are coordinated and complementary. Speakers are not just verbal or linguistic codifiers and decodifiers, but communicators who produce messages with different modes and relying on different channels. The ability to combine different modes and channels has long been recognized, but particularly has been taken into consideration during recent years. Without going too further back in time – otherwise one would need to include classic and medieval rhetoric – Birdwhistell’s work may constitute a first modern analysis of the complementarity and integration that is observable in the use of linguistic and gestural systems. Birdwhistell collected his most important work in a book appropriately entitled Kinesics and Context. Essays on Body Motion Communication (Birdwhistell 1970), in which he also included many studies published in his previous 1952 book. Birdwhistell constructed a detailed and systematic series of bridges between the use of linguistic elements and bodily elements (i.e., posture and gesturality). Birdwhistell’s innovation was to transfer the theoretical apparatus of North American linguistic structuralism of his time, mainly distributionalism, to the analysis of bodily conduct and movement. His theoretical transfer ultimately failed, illustrating that a simple transfer of a linguistic theoretical apparatus to the analysis of bodily conduct cannot capture the complexities of nonverbal

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communication. Thus, his work shows that the complexity that is required to develop a notation system for the transcription of nonverbal sequences, or the complexity of speakers’ ability to generate meaning with their bodies and unequivocally couple it with a verbal component, goes beyond a simple adaptation. After Birdwhistell, Poyatos (1994, inter alia) constitutes a second modern attempt to integrate linguistic and multimodal systems. In his work since 1970s, Poyatos underscores the need of a human communication model with a threefold structure: verbal, paralinguistic and gestural. Similarly, Arndt and Janney’s “InterGrammar” proposal (Arndt and Janney 1987) present another attempt of linguisticmultimodal integration. Although Arndt and Janney follow to some degree Birdwhistell’s research, they ground their proposal in Potayos’ three-level distinction. As illustrated below, Arndt and Janney’s examples of “InterGrammar” can only be understood within a three-level structuralization (Arndt and Janney 1987: 367–373): (10) The potatoes are just right (smiling) (11) That’s a terrific dress you’re wearing (frowning) (12) I am very pleased to meet you (averted gaze)

While (10) illustrates a redundant patterning following and Jenney’s terminology, (11) illustrates a contrastive patterning with channel discrepancy, and (12) an incongruent patterning. The multimodal combination of gestural and verbal signs is widely recognized as fundamental in the interpretation of non-literal meanings, for instance, in teasing/mockery, irony, and sarcasm. Furthermore, this multimodal combination of signs is also equally fundamental – but less often recognized – in the production and interpretation of the more subtle aspects of phenomena such as politeness (and impoliteness). Even some components of the grammatical-pragmatic interface may require verbal complements so as to assign references adequately, as for instance, in the case of gestural deictics (Levinson 1983: 65–66). Kendon (2004) and McNeill (1992, 2000), in a vast number of publications, have also highlighted the close relationship between verbal and gestural elements. Moreover, McNeill has challenged the well-established verbal/ nonverbal dichotomy, questioning the degree to which gestures, particularly certain types of gestures, can be classified as “nonverbal”. In a similar manner, Payrató (1993) has emphasized that illocutionary force is an essential characteristic of emblems or emblematic gestures, which can be used autonomously without the need of supporting talk. Payrató has also argued that emblematic gestures need to be fully integrated in the structural framework of linguistic utterances. Slama-Cazacu (1976) had already described a comparable phenomenon in her proposal of a mixed syntax. More recently, Fricke (2013) has proposed that in the case of coverbal gestures, the gesture may occupy one of the slots set up for the

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grammatical component in the structure of an utterance. For FDG, we are proposing that speakers use both verbal and nonverbal primitives in the process of discourse formulation and encoding at all levels of grammar. The close gestural and verbal interrelationship, which is described as systematic and recurrent in a great number of studies, poses the question of how to represent this interrelationship in a functionally based grammar, for emblems or autonomous gestures as well as coverbal or co-expressive gestures.

6 Multimodal ability within a FDG framework FDG has been sensitive to the need of taking into account the relationship between verbal and nonverbal forms of communication involved in ordinary interaction. The importance of dealing with multimodality within FDG was first called to attention in relation to context. In his proposal of an Extended Model of Context (EMC) for FDG, Connolly (2007, 2014) incorporates both verbal and nonverbal context as part of the discourse context in multimodal discourse. Furthermore, Connolly (2010) introduces a first programmatic attempt to accommodate multimodality within FDG. He reviews the preceding work within Semiotics and Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), and he shows that gestures and other nonverbal semiotic systems may be analyzed from a pragmatic (interpersonal) and a semantic (ideational, representational) point of view in a FDG framework. More recently, Alturo and Payrató (2014a, 2014b) and Kok (in press) have examined the merging of manual gestures and speech in a (multimodal) grammar. Building on previous work on gestures (Alturo 2004; Cienki, Bietti and Kok 2014; Payrató 1993), these authors have independently outlined the need of a model that would account for the integration of gesture and speech in grammar, and all have explored the potential of FDG. In section 6.1, we argue that FDG is a good candidate to serve as the basis of a more developed analytic model of multimodal grammar. In section 6.2, we propose and examine the following hypothesis, which we plan to examine further in subsequent work: while the separation between speech and gesture in grammar is limited to the primitive forms and operators available, speech and gesture share the same primitive frames and templates, and work together in an integrated manner, in the operations of formulation and encoding.

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6.1 Why a multimodal FDG? There are two lines of argumentation that make FDG a good candidate to become a multimodal grammar: one line entails the general principles assumed by FDG, while the other entails its particular formalization. In regard to FDG general principles, a first principle is the assumption of a functional perspective, that is, “the belief that the properties of linguistic utterances are adapted to those communicative aims which the language user, in interaction with other language users, seeks to achieve by using those utterances” (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008: 26). Although FDG was originally meant to account solely for speech, it is acknowledged that FDG, within a general theory of communicative interaction, has to be able to account for other modes of communication. A second principle relates to the systematicity of the relation between form and function. FDG looks at systematic relations between functions and forms in grammar. However, this does not exclude the seemingly more variable gesture expression. In the same way that not all gestures are unsystematic, not all verbal expressions relate function and form in a systematic manner. As recent literature on gestures demonstrates, some types of gestures are highly conventional (emblems), and even spontaneous gesticulation may have some degree of systematicity (see Kok, in press, for a review of the relevant literature). Additionally, FDG acknowledges the variation in the linguistic expression of discourse acts, which is considered not free, but “limited by the (communicative rather than transportational) needs of users” (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008: 28). A third principle is language specificity: FDG is meant to be a model powerful enough to account for language specific features, since it considers generalizations but without claims of universality. This is also of interest to our purposes here, because of the well-known existence of culture-specific forms of gestural expression. Finally, FDG does not postulate any transformations and filters; there are no underlying structures that arise and are later discarded. This position limits the “possible hypothesis concerning the analysis of a linguistic phenomenon, which strongly enhances the testability of these hypotheses” (Hengeveld and Mackenzie 2008: 41). The implication for multimodal analysis is that the focus of the analysis is placed on the outward manifestation (verbal and gestural output) of the communication intentions and representations of the speakers.7

The second line of arguments supporting a multimodal FDG relates to its formal architecture. These arguments, with few differences, are given by Kok (in press). FDG provides, in the first place, a layered model that allows dealing simulta-

7 For a detailed review of the parallelism between verbal forms and gestures in linguistic analysis, see Kok (in press) and Fricke (2013).

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neously with interpersonal (pragmatic), representational (semantic) and formal (morphosyntactic and phonological) aspects of grammar. This is useful for the analysis of gestures, which in many cases perform several functions at the same time. Second, its basic unit of analysis is the Discourse Act, that is, a linguistic action rather than a grammatical form. This enables the analyst to focus on the functions of gestures in (multimodal) grammar. Third, it provides a structured formalism of analysis that requires a high degree of explicitness. Two examples of application of FDG to the formal analysis of gesture and speech in grammar are given in examples (13) and (14), both adapted for illustration purposes from Kok (in press). Example (13) shows at the Interpersonal Level (IL) a SubAct of Reference (R) and three SubActs of Ascription of properties to this referent (T1, T2, T3). At the Representational Level (RL), these acts of ascription are all given semantic meaning (entrance gate, blue, rectangular shape), but only the properties of being an entrance gate (f1) and being blue (f2) get later a verbal output, whereas the property of having a rectangular shape (f3) gets a gesture output. (13) A blue entrance gate IL: (R1: [(T1) (T2) (T3)] (R1)) RL: (x1: (f1: entrance gate (f1)) (f2: blue (f2)) (f3: rectangular shape of the entrance gate (f3)) (x1)) Output: A blue entrance gate + gesture tracing the rectangular shape of the entrance gate

Similarly, in example (14), the formal representation of the Discourse Act at the Interpersonal (IL) and the Representational (RL) levels allows to make explicit: (i) the interpersonal operator approximate (approx) (Hengeveld and Keizer 2011) at the Communicated Content (C) layer, which is encoded by means of both speech (kinda) and gesture (rotating hands), and (ii) the representational entity ten (quantity, q), which is also encoded by means of speech (ten) and gesture (hands raised with the palms faced towards the addressee). (14) You have to kinda go between through those ten trees IL: (approxC: [(T) (R) (R)] (C)) Output: kinda + rotating hands RL: (10 q1: [(f1: tree (f1)) (q1)]) Output: ten + hands raised with the palms faced towards the addressee

These theoretical reasons are supported by empirical evidence: many of the analytical units in FDG seem to have a corresponding output in the form of

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gesture, as shown by the preceding examples given by Kok (in press) and the additional examples below. In the following pages, we illustrate, in the first place, the gesture encoding of a variety of grammar units at the Interpersonal Level: moves (15), move modifiers (16), heads of illocutions (17) and subacts (18). Besides, we show that gestural structures may also encode the formal limits of grammar units such as State-of-Affairs (a RL unit) (19) and Phrases (at ML and PL) (20). In (15), the singer of a Catalan folk music group (Joan Enric Barceló, Els amics de les arts) greets the interviewer and the public of a television talk show with a head movement that is the nonverbal output of a Move (a unit at the Interpersonal Level), as shown by the abbreviated formal representation of (15) at IL below. In this example, there is no verbal expression of the Move: (15) Move IL: (M: —greeting to participants— (M)) Output: head movement (Divendres, TV3, http://www.ccma.cat/video/embed/3423670)

Photograph 1: Move: interactive gesture

In (16) the discourse marker per cert ‘by the way’ is co-expressed by a gesture as the output of a Move modifier: (16) Move modifier Vostès parlen del Consell de Transició Nacional, de creació d’estructures d’estat. PER CERT , han privatitzat, i malament, una estructura d’estat, una estructura d’estat, que és la privatització d’Aigües Ter Llobregat, i estan desmantellant una altra estructura d’estat, que és el Servei d’Ocupació de Catalunya. ‘You speak about the National Transition Committee, about the creation of state structures. BY THE WAY , you have privatized, and poorly, a state structure, which is the privatization of Aigües Ter Llobregat [water agency provider for 4.5 million people], and you are dismantling another state structure, which is Catalonia’s Employment Service.’

Notes for a Multilingual and Multimodal Functional Discourse Grammar

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IL: (M1) (M2: [. . .] (M2): per cert (M2)) Output: per cert + raising hands while pointing fingers  

 

(Pere Navarro, PSC Catalan Socialist Party or PSC leader, Plenary session, Catalan Parliament, 23 January 2013, http://www.parlament.cat/web/canal-parlament/sequencia/videos/index. html?p_cp1=6531956&p_cp2=6532822&p_cp3=)

Photograph 2: Move modifier: discoursive gesture

In (17) we show two examples of gestures that are the output of Heads of Illocutions at the Interpersonal Level: in (17a), an expressive gesture showing the joy of a group of people8 after building a castell ‘a big human tower’; in (17b), an interactive gesture by means of which Josep Guardiola says hello to the people at the football field: (17) Heads of Illocutions (ILL) a.

IL: (A: (F: ILL (F): Σ (F)) (PS) (PA)) (A)) Output: arms raised + facial expression of joy (http://www.fetatarragona.cat/2013/01/21/el-relleu-a-la-colla-jove-en-mans-de-le xperiencia/)

Photograph 3: Expressive gesture: [Hurrah!]

8 Colla Jove Xiquets de Tarragona: a group from the city of Tarragona that builds the popular Catalan human towers.

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b.

IL: (A: (F: ILL (F): Σ (F)) (PS) (PA)) (A)) Output: open hand facing participants + facial smile (http://www.revistagq.com/actualidad/deporte/articulos/guardiola-bayernmunich/17661)

Photograph 4: Interactive gesture: [Hello]

In (18) we see a gesture as the output of a SubAct of Ascription (T) at the Interpersonal Level and a property (f) at the Representational Level. The speaker is encoding by means of gesture the same type of grammar unit found in (13), that is, a SubAct of Ascription (T3 above), although here in (18) the encoding of (T) is coexpressed both by a gesture and by a verbal form. (18) SubAct of Ascription: Amb una gran capacitat With a big capacity ‘With great oratorical skills’

d’oratòria of.oratory

IL: (T) RL: (f: gran (f)) Ouput: gran + raising open arms and shaping a large circle (Oriol Pujol, Convergència i Unió. Plenary session, Catalan Parliament, 23 January 2013, http://www.parlament.cat/web/canal-parlament/sequencia/videos/index.html? p_cp1=6531956&p_cp2=6532877&p_cp3=6532803)

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Photograph 5: SubAct of Ascription: property gesture

Gestural structures may also encode the formal limits of grammar units; for instance, States-of-Affairs at the Representational Level (RL), or Phrases at the Morphological Level (ML) and Phonological Phrases at the Phonological Level (PL). This is shown in (19) and (20). In (19), we see that the speaker’s hands do not return to their initial position between the States-of-Affairs (e1) and (e2) of the same Episode (ep1), although there is a change in the facial gesture. Whereas the States-of-Affairs are verbally encoded by means of Intonational Phrases, this gesture of contention (i.e., hands not returning to rest position) encodes the fact that (e1) and (e2) belong to the same single episode (ep1). Only when the right hand displays the movement in (e2), following the verbal narration marker i (‘and’), the left hand changes to rest position. The example belongs to a narrative based on a Disney short movie (Donald Duck in the Beach), which the speaker is explaining to his grandson (Alturo 2004). In the story, Donald Duck is trying to escape from a bee. Manual gesture in (e1) displays the form of the tunnel made by Donald out of a pneumatic tyre. Manual gesture in (e2) displays the direction taken by the bee in its flight through the pneumatic tyre.9 (19) States-of-Affairs (e) and Episodes (ep) Fa Do-PRS.IND.3.SG.

com like

un túnel el a tunnel the

pneumàtic tyre

9 Bodily position is also relevant here. We see a nice example of gesture/speech polyphony: whereas speech shows the speaker’s perspective (shown in the (e2) to refer to the bee), the manual gesture shows the character’s perspective (the direction of the movement of the bee is displayed from the perspective of Donald, who sees the bee flying through the tunnel where he is sitting).

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i l’abella and the.bee

passa cross.PRS.IND.3.SG

per through

dintre. inside

‘He makes a tunnel with the tyre and the bee flies through it’ RL: (ep1: (e1: fa com un túnel el pneumàtic (e1)) (e2: l’abella passa per dintre (e2)) (ep1))

Photograph 6: State-of-Affairs (e1): iconic event gesture

Photograph 7: State-of-Affairs (e2): iconic event gesture

Finally, manual gestures can also be the output of Morphosyntactic (ML) and Phonological (PL) units. In (20) the Catalan politician Oriol Junqueras raises and lowers his right hand systematically while saying expressions such as és un fet ‘this is a fact’, la majoria ‘the majority’, a la normalitat ‘towards normalcy’, which are both the output of Phrases (P) at the Morphological Level (ML) and the output of Phonological Phrases (PP ) at the Phonological Level (PL). This seems to be Junqueras’ personal style of expressing the output of these grammatical units, that is, in a way that we can compare to how vocalics (e.g. prosody, intonation, pitch, and volume) contributes to verbal expression.

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(20) Phrases (at ML) and Phonological Phrases (at PL) La majoria The.F majority ‘The majority’ ML: (Np: (Gw: la (Gw)) (Nw: majoria (Nw)) (Np)) PL: (PP : /ləməʒu’ɾiə/ (PP )) (Oriol Junqueras, Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya. Plenary session, Catalan Parliament, 23 January 2013. http://www.parlament.cat/web/canal-parlament/sequencia/vi deos/index.html?p_cp1=6531956&p_cp2=6532811&p_cp3=6532803)

Photograph 8: Phrases (at ML and PL): phrasal gesture

6.2 The articulation of speech and gesture in a multimodal FDG Once we accept using FDG as a framework for multimodal grammar analysis, the problem arises of how to modify current FDG, primarily a speech model, to obtain a FDG model of multimodal grammar. In a multimodal grammar, we believe that it is plausible to consider that gestures build discourse with speech in an integrated and analogical manner. As it is argued above, gestures contribute to the communicative output/input of an interaction both in the Formulation of acts (at the Interpersonal Level) and semantic meanings (at the Representational Level) and in the Encoding of morphological and phonological units. Gestures contribute to these operations with their own primitive forms and operators. In addition, Formulation and Encoding also make use of a repertoire of possible structures (called frames for Formulation, and templates for Encoding), which seem to be neutral regarding speech and gesture modes. Our hypothesis is illustrated in Figure 4, where frames and templates stand as common ground for both verbal and nonverbal modes, whereas

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other primitives are specific to the verbal and nonverbal modes. Shared frames and templates may explain the combination of verbal and nonverbal in the structure of grammar, whereas separated forms and operators allow the separation of modes. Verbal forms are lexemes, grammatical morphemes and suppletive forms. Gesture forms may include, for instance, a gesture form of largeness, such as the one that the speaker in (18) encodes with a movement of raising open arms and shaping a large circle. Verbal operators are grammatical values acting on a particular way in each layer of grammar: for instance politeness as an operator of a SubAct of Reference, which triggers vostè instead of tu in the output of example (6), or morphosyntactic operators acting as placeholders for forms. Gesture operators may be conventionalized values acting on a particular way in each layer of grammar: for instance structuring gestures such as those in (19) and (20). Both the autonomy of verbal and nonverbal, and the nature of gesture primitives (forms and operators) are still under discussion.

Figure 4: Multimodal Layout of FDG (Alturo and Payrató 2014a)

A partially different proposal is given by Kok (in press). Following a general consensus in previous literature, Kok argues that an appropriate model of multimodal grammar should have “separate, but mutually interactive formulation and encoding operations for gesture and speech.” As a consequence, he adds to the architecture of FDG two gesture operations of Formulation and Encoding that are separated from the corresponding speech operations. This is shown in Figure 5.

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Figure 5: Kok’s proposal of a multimodal extension of FDG (Kok in press)

Moreover, Kok (in press) provides a multimodal FDG grammar with an additional Macro-planning operation, which is responsible of the division of labor between speech and gesture. He argues that this additional operation is supported by (i) the existence of fixed multimodal constructions in some languages, and (ii) the diverse nature of the conceptual material being activated, since conceptual material of a spatial-motoric nature is easier to express by means of manual gestures than abstract concepts. Further operations of Formulation and Encoding are implemented separately for speech and gesture, although there is a continuous interaction between speech and gesture during these operations, as reflected by the dashed lines in Figure 5. We agree with Kok (in press) on the idea that each modality “drawns on a separate set of primitives, with distinct structural features and levels of schematicity”. But as shown above, we disagree with his claim of separating speech and gesture in Formulation and Encoding and the need of an additional Macroplanning operation. If we consider grammar as multimodal, we should be able to integrate gestures in the architecture of grammar in a similar way as phonologists

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have been able to integrate intonation in Phonology in the last decades. Some possibilities to do this might involve, for instance, adding a Gesture Level as an additional output of the operation of Encoding, or through the notion of layer provided by FDG, whereas every level (Interpersonal, Representational, Morphosyntactic and Phonological) may work simultaneously in different layers (Move, Discourse Act, Communicated Content, SubActs. . . at IL). In any case, the validation of these – or other – proposals will require additional research.  

 

7 Epilogue and conclusions In this chapter, we have presented different arguments to support a Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG) that incorporates the following elements listed below, so as to improve the model’s psychological/cognitive and discourse/pragmatic adequacy: (a) Multilingualism and multidialectalism, because speakers’ linguistic repertoires are multilingual and multilectal, and because speakers use their ability, relying on their communicative and grammatical competence, to combine these varieties and to align one with the other. (b) Multimodality, since the process of producing communicative meaning is not exclusively verbal: prosody, facial expression, and gestures relevantly contribute to this process. In regard to reception, messages are never decoded as purely verbal, but are always inscribed in a multimodal structure. An adequate Functional Discourse Grammar should be able to account, then, for both multilectal communicative competence in different verbal grammars (multilingualism, geographical multidialectalism, and functional multilectalism) and multimodality. The evidence discussed so far suggests a high degree of integration of language systems (verbal grammars) and modes (verbal and nonverbal). Thus, we may think of multilingual Functional Discourse Grammar as a specific grammar (somewhat different of the particular discourse grammars of the languages involved), and we may also think of multimodal Functional Discourse Grammar as a specific grammar (involving not only verbal grammar, but also emblematic gestures and coverbal or co-expressive gestures). The issue still under discussion is how the FDG model is going to account for all this. Our work suggests that the contrast between primitives (which may keep the specificity of the languages and the modes involved) and levels of representation (which are specific of each multilingual and multimodal grammar) is a promising perspective to consider in future research.

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References Alturo, Núria. 2004. Hipòtesis sobre la representació multimodal (verbal i gestual) dels esdeveniments. In Núria Alturo, Lluís Payrató & Marta Payà (eds.), Les fronteres del llenguatge. Lingüística i comunicació no verbal, 141–153. Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona – PPU. Alturo, Núria, Evelien Keizer & Lluís Payrató (eds.). 2014. The interaction between context and grammar in Functional Discourse Grammar. Special issue of Pragmatics (Volume 24). Alturo, Núria & Lluís Payrató. 2014a. Bases per a una Gramàtica Discursiva Funcional (FDG) multilingüe i multimodal: Paper presented at the Vint-i-dosè Col·loqui Lingüístic de la Universitat de Barcelona (Europa-Universitat Viadrina and Universitat de Barcelona), University of Barcelona, 7 November. Alturo, Núria & Lluís Payrató. 2014b. Gestures and grammar units: the Nonverbal output of grammar: Paper presented at the International Conference on Functional Discourse Grammar, Universidad de Jaén, 17 September. Arndt, Horst & Richard W. Janney. 1987. InterGrammar: Toward an Integrative Model of Verbal, Prosodic and Kinesic Choices in Speech. New York: De Gruyter Mouton. Auer, Peter. 1993. Is a rhythm-based typology possible? A study of the role of prosody in phonological typology. KontRI Working Paper, 21: University of Konstanz. Bassetti, Benedetta & Vivian J. Cook. 2011. Language and cognition: The second language user. In Vivian J. Cook & Benedetta Bassetti (eds.), Language and bilingual cognition. 143–190. Hove, UK: Psychology Press. Birdwhistell, Ray L. 1970. Kinesics and Context. Essays on Body Motion Communication. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Butler, Christopher S. 1999. Nuevas perspectivas de la Gramática Funcional: los estándares de adecuación de la teoría. In Christopher S. Butler, Ricardo Mairal, Francisco J. Martín Arista & Francisco. J. Ruiz de Mendoza (eds.), Nuevas perspectivas en Gramática Funcional, 219–256. Barcelona: Ariel. Butler, Christopher S. 2009. Criteria of adequacy in functional linguistics. Folia Linguistica, 43(1). 1–66. Cienki, Alan, Lucas M. Bietti & Kasper Kok. 2014. Multimodal alignment during collaborative remembering. Memory Studies 7(3). 354–369. Connolly, John H. 2007. Context in Functional Discourse Grammar. Alfa 51(2). 11–33. Connolly, John H. 2010. Accommodating Multimodality in Functional Discourse Grammar. In Gerry Wanders & Evelien Keizer (eds.), Web Papers in Functional Discourse Grammar WP-FDG-83, Special Issue (Vol. 83). The London Papers II. Connolly, John H. 2013. Conceptual representation and formulation: a computational oriented approach. In J.Lachlan Mackenzie & Hella Olbertz (eds.), Casebook in Functional Discourse Grammar, 125–154. Amsterdam: Benjamins. Connolly, John H. 2014. The Contextual Component within a dynamic implementation of the FDG model: structure and interaction. Pragmatics 24(2). 229–248. Cook, Vivian J. 2008. Second Language Learning and Language Teaching. London: Arnold. Cornish, Francis. 2009. Text and discourse as context: Discourse anaphora and the FDG Contextual Component. In Evelien Keizer & Gerry Wanders (eds.), Web Papers in Functional Discourse Grammar WP-FDG-82. Special Issue: The London Papers (Vol. I, 97–115). Available at http://www.functionaldiscoursegrammar.info. (Accessed on 23 December 2015).

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Dik, Simon C. 1997a. The Theory of Functional Grammar. Part 1: The Structure of the Clause. Edited by Kees Hengeveld. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. Dik, Simon C. 1997b. The Theory of Functional Grammar. Part 2: Complex and Derived Constructions. Edited by K. Hengeveld. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. Fricke, Ellen. 2013. Towards a unified grammar of gesture and speech: A multimodal approach. In Cornelia Müller, Alan J. Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Sedinha Tessendorf (eds.), Body – Language – Communication: An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (1) 733–754. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. García, Ofelia & Ricardo Otheguy. 2014. Spanish and Hispanic bilingualism. In Manel Lacorte (ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Hispanic Applied Linguistics, 639–658. New York: Routledge. Giomi, Ricardo. 2014. Grammar, context and the hearer: A proposal for an addresse-oriented model of Functional Discourse Grammar. Pragmatics 24(2). 275–296. Gonzálvez-García, Francisco & Christopher S. Butler. 2006. Mapping functional-cognitive space. Annual Review of Cognitive Linguistics 4. 39–96. Hengeveld, Kees & Evelien Keizer. 2011. Non-straightforward communication. Journal of Pragmatics 43(7). 1962–1976. Hengeveld, Kees & J.Lachlan Mackenzie. 2008. Functional Discourse Grammar. A typologicallybased theory of language structure. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hengeveld, Kees & J. Lachlan Mackenzie. 2010. Functional Discourse Grammar. In Bernd Heine & Heiko Narrog (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Analysis. 367–400. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hengeveld, Kees & Gerry Wanders (eds.). 2009. Semantic representation in Functional Discourse Grammar. Special Issue of Lingua 119(8). Herdina, Philip & Ulrike Jessner. 2002. A Dynamic Model on Multilingualism. Perspectives on change in Psycholinguistics. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Jungbluth, Konstanze. 2016. Co-constructions in multilingual settings. (in this volume) Keizer, Evelien. 2014. Context and Cognition in Functional Discourse Grammar: What, Where and Why? Pragmatics 24(2). 399–423. Keizer, Evelien. 2015. A Functional Discourse Grammar for English. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kendon, Adam. 2004. Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. Kok, Kasper (in press). The grammatical potential of co-speech gesture: A Functional Discourse Grammar perspective. Functions of Language. Levelt, Willen J. M. 1989. Speaking: From intention to articulation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Levinson, Stephen. L. 1983. Pragmatics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mackenzie, J. Lachlan. 2014. The Contextual Component in a dialogical FDG. Pragmatics, 24(2). 249–273. Mackenzie, J. Lachlan & Hella Olbertz (eds.). 2013. Casebook in Functional Discourse Grammar (Studies in Language Companion Series 137). Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins. McNeill, David. 1992. Hand and mind: What gestures reveal about thought. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. McNeill, David (ed.). 2000. Language and Gesture. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nestor, Marina & Irene Vogel. 1986. Prosodic Phonology. Dordrecht & Riverton: Foris Publications.

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Nuyts, Jan. 1989. On the functionality of language. IPrA Papers in Pragmatics 3(1). 88–128. Payrató, Lluís. 1993. A pragmatic view on autonomous gestures: A first repertoire of Catalan emblems. Journal of Pragmatics 20(3). 193–216. Poyatos, Fernando. 1994. La comunicación no verbal. Madrid: Istmo. Rigau, Gemma & Pilar Prieto. 2007. The Syntax-Prosody Interface: Catalan interrogative sentences headed by que. Journal of Portuguese Linguistics 6(2). 29–60. Rijkhoff, Jan. 2008. Layers, levels and contexts. In Daniel García-Velasco & Jan Rijkhoff (eds.), The Noun Phrase in Functional Discourse Grammar. (Trends in Linguistics. Studies and Monographs 195). 63–115. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Romaine, Suzanne. [1994] 1996. El lenguaje en la sociedad. Barcelona: Ariel. [Originally published as Language in Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press]. Slama-Cazacu, Tatiana. 1976. Nonverbal components in message sequence: ‘Mixed syntax’. In William C. McCormack & Stephen A. Wurm (eds.), Language and Man: Anthropological Issues. 217–222. The Hague: Mouton. Van Staden, Miriam & Evelien Keizer (eds.). 2009. Interpersonal Grammar: A crosslinguistic perspective. Special issue of Linguistics 47(4).

Sedinha Tessendorf, Europa-Universität Frankfurt (Oder)

Actions as Sources of Gestures Abstract: That gestures are often bodily abstractions of everyday actions is not an expert observation, but rather a daily experience. This chapter will focus on hand gestures that have an everyday action as its source and lift this action onto a communicative level (see also Streeck 1994, 2011). We will focus on a certain class of hand gestures, namely recurrent gestures (Bressem and Müller 2014a, Ladewig 2010, 2014) that are conventionalized gestures with a stable form-meaning relation, which are not congruent with the more elaborated set of emblematic gestures (see Payrató 1993, 2004, 2014), but share their pragmatic functions. As an example, we will introduce the “brushing aside gesture”, a recurrent gesture that transfers the action scheme of brushing something aside, usually small and annoying objects in the immediate surrounding to the realm of communication in order to express a limited set of pragmatic functions. It is a recurrent gesture which is frequently used in Spanish everyday communication and has been investigated in Mexican Spanish (Montes 2003), Cuban Spanish (Müller and Speckmann 2002), Iberian Spanish (Tessendorf 2007, 2014) and in German (Bressem and Müller 2014a, 2014b). I will show how this special gesture is constructed on the base of the underlying action and how the different characteristics (form and function) of the action are transferred metaphorically and metonymically to the gesture and its use. We will then trace out how a similar analytic procedure has been made fruitful for the analysis of gesture families (Kendon 2004, Müller 2004, Payrató 2003, Bressem and Müller 2014, Fricke, Bressem and Müller 2014) and on gesture fields (Fricke, Bressem and Müller 2014). Bressem and Müller (2014a, 2014b) have established a repertoire of recurrent gestures which has been closely investigated by the example of so-called AWAY-gestures in German, including the “brushing aside gesture”. By integrating the findings of the use of the “brushing aside gesture” in Spanish into the category of AWAY-gestures in German, we might find some clues showing us a way towards further intercultural investigations of gestures. Keywords: action scheme, away gestures, brushing aside gesture, culture contact, embodiment, gesture families, gesture studies, interaction, metaphor, metonomy, pragmatic functions, pragmatics, proxemics, recurrent gestures, spoken language

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1 Introduction This chapter focuses on hand gestures that have an everyday or basic instrumental action as their source and lift this action metaphorically onto a communicative level (Müller 2004; Streeck 1994, 2009; Tessendorf 2014). We focus on a certain class of gestures, namely pragmatic or recurrent gestures (Bressem and Müller 2014a; Ladewig 2010, 2014; Payrató and Tessendorf 2014), which have a stable form-meaning relation and are semi-conventionalized. Although they share their pragmatic functions, they are not congruent with the more elaborated set of emblematic gestures (see Ekman and Friesen 1972; Kendon 1981, 1992, 2004b; Payrató 1993, 2004, 2014). Here we present one particular gesture, the ‘brushing aside gesture’, a recurrent gesture that transfers the action scheme of brushing something aside into the realm of communication. It is frequently used in Spanish everyday communication and has been investigated in Mexican Spanish (Montes 2003), Cuban Spanish (Müller and Speckmann 2002), European Spanish (Tessendorf 2014) and in German (Bressem and Müller 2014a, 2014b). The study shows how this gesture makes use of its base, the underlying action, and how the different characteristics (formal and functional) of the action are transferred to the gesture in its use. In so doing, we will show how metaphoric and metonymic (cognitive) processes are involved in the creation and the functioning of this particular gesture within communication. We will then trace out how a similar analytic procedure has been made fruitful for the construction and analysis of gesture families (Kendon 2004a; Müller 2004; Payrató 2003; Bressem and Müller 2014a; Fricke, Bressem and Müller 2014). Bressem and Müller (2014a, 2014b) have established a repertoire of German recurrent gestures which includes the so-called family of “away gestures”, including the German variant of the “brushing aside gesture”. By integrating the findings of the use of the “brushing aside gesture” in Spanish into the category of “away gestures” in German, we might find some clues showing us a way towards further intercultural investigations of gestures.

1.1 The gesture type: Recurrent gestures In the following we concentrate on gestures that are recurrent and act pragmatically (see Payrató and Tessendorf 2014; Ladewig 2014), as for example the “palm up open hand gesture” (Müller 2004; Kendon 2004a) that presents communicative or virtual objects on the open hand, the “cutting gesture” (Calbris 2003), where discourse is cut off, or the “precision grip” (Kendon 1995, 2004a) where, in short, the hand acts as if grabbing something and presenting it.

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These gestures can be characterized as semi- or partially conventionalized. Assuming a continuum (cf. the so-called Kendon’s continuum in McNeill 1992, 2000, 2005, and Kendon 2004a) which stretches from spontaneous or singular gestures or illustrators to fully conventionalized signs, we find recurrent pragmatic gestures between those singular gestures that are somehow created on the spot, and emblems, like the V-sign or the “thumbs up gesture”, clearly leaning toward the conventional side. Recurrent gestures are also similar to emblems because they possess a form-function stability: the semantic core (and basic function) of the gesture remains the same throughout different contexts and speakers (Ladewig 2010, 2014). Because of their conventionality1 they are able to form repertoires which are most likely to differ from one culture to another. While emblem repertoires can be found worldwide (cf. Tessendorf 2013; Payrató 1993, 2001 for an overview), systematic intercultural comparisons are scarce (exceptions are Efron [1941] 1972, and Morris et al. 1979). Since the idea of a category of recurrent gestures has emerged rather recently within the last 20 years (as a pioneer cf. Bavelas et al. 1992), the situation is worse. First attempts in creating so-called gesture families around one recurrent gesture have been made by Kendon (2004b) for “open palm gestures” in general; Müller (2004), Streeck (2009) for the “palm up open hand gesture”, Kendon (1995, 2004a), and Müller (2014) for the family of the “precision grip”, and Ladewig (2010, 2011, 2014) for the “cyclic gesture”. As to my knowledge, approaches toward a genuine repertoire of recurrent gestures2 have so far only been made within the research project Towards a Grammar of Gesture (2006– 2010), situated at the European University Viadrina at Frankfurt/Oder for German recurrent gestures (for an overview see Bressem and Müller 2014a, most recently Bressem, Stein, Wegner 2015 about “holding away gestures” in Savosavo.). Finally, recurrent gestures are most often used with pragmatic functions. Although the possibility to be used referentially constitutes an important argument for the establishment of a category of recurrent gestures (and not to subsume them under the notion of pragmatic gestures, see Ladewig 2014), their referential use is rather scarce. They take up different pragmatic functions, as described in Müller (1998, 2004), or Kendon (2004a), and they can be modal, discursive or parsing, speech-performative or performative (Tessendorf 2014). Kendon (1995) as well as Payrató (1993, 2014) argue that the fact that they express pragmatic functions is an important feature on their way to conventionality.

1 Payrató (1993, 2014) states that the illocutionary force of emblems is their most important characteristic. All others, conventionalization, stability of form, etc. derive from it. A similar view can be found in Kendon (1995). 2 For repertoires of emblems including recurrent gestures see Payrató (1993) for Catalan and Brookes (2004, 2005) for South African gestures.

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Whereas the referential content of utterances and therefore the referential content of gestures seems infinite, as Kendon puts it, the number of interactional moves is limited, which means that “a vocabulary of gestures marking these can be more readily established” (Kendon 1995: 275). How some of these functions come about will be shown in the examples outlined in this chapter.

1.2 The gesture’s forms and functions The aforementioned recurrent gestures are usually based on basic, instrumental actions, or “handlings” (Streeck 1994) which they display within the communicative realm3. When performing these gestures, the hand acts in an as-if-relation. This form of gesture creation differs semiotically, cognitively, and functionally from processes that Müller (1998, 2010) once had described as modeling or molding, drawing, and representing, in which the hand models a virtual object, molds it, draws the outlines of a virtual object or represents it by turning itself into a sculpture. The mode of acting can be used in two ways, either to iconically represent an action, e.g. the peeling of an apple or changing the gear in a car while telling a story, the object being acted upon (the apple that is peeled), or to enact the basic action. In the “brushing aside gesture”, the hand does not represent, neither an object nor an action, but enacts the underlying action (see Müller 1998; Müller and Haferland 1997; Tessendorf 2014). Streeck (2009: 201) indicates “the motor patterns are meaningful not by what they express, but by what they are; it is their own meaningfulness that is projected onto the moment’s communication.” Gestures are indexically linked to the material world, because the recipient needs to insert his or her background knowledge in order to understand them, therefore their construction naturally includes processes of metonymy and in addition, as in the case of recurrent gestures and others, of course metaphor. What it means is that actions such as presenting, holding, grasping, wiping, cutting or brushing aside, when being used as gestures, are not executed meticulously in the same way as the actions themselves. Within the gestures the hand acts as if it is doing something, displaying an abbreviated execution of the actual action, a kind of schematic reduction to the most salient properties, making use of the underlying motor pattern, where fundamental processes of metonymy come into play. 3 An exception is the ‘cyclic gesture’ where the hand performs a continuous rotational movement away from the body, expressing “cyclic continuity” (Ladewig 2014: 1605). Instead of using an action scheme, this gesture can best be conceptualized by constructing an image schematic idealized cognitive model (cf. Ladewig 2010, 2011, 2014).

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It also means that the meaning or function of the action is lifted from real-life purposes to communicative purposes. This seems to be done by metaphor. We will take a closer look at these processes when presenting examples of the “brushing aside gesture” in Spanish conversation.

2 The “brushing aside gesture” in Spanish conversation In this section we will introduce the “brushing aside gesture”, reconstruct the gesture’s meaning from the underlying action scheme and show how different aspects of the action lead to different functions.

2.1 Introducing the “brushing aside gesture” and its action scheme The “brushing aside gesture” is a recurrent gesture that is frequently used in Spanish everyday conversation. In our data, consisting of eight hours of videotaped everyday conversations of European Spanish (corpus Müller 1998 and Tessendorf 2005), the gesture was found 64 times. While the action is used to brush aside usually small, annoying objects like crumbs, dust or mosquitos from the immediate surrounding, the gesture is most often used to brush aside discursive objects. Since we claim that the gesture takes up the characteristics of the action and transposes them onto the sphere of communication, we take a closer look at the action scheme of brushing something aside. As we can see, the action of brushing something aside has an unpleasant situation as its starting point, where small objects that do not belong in the immediate surrounding are being noticed. The cause for the action are those annoying objects, which are conceived as disturbing. At this point the action begins: the fingers are slightly bent, dynamically unfolding into a relaxed open hand that – with a quick twist of the wrist – moves quickly away from the body, to the side, over the shoulder, over the head or towards the front. The movement is lead by the back of the hand and with a dynamic twist of the wrist these small objects are brushed aside. Because the back of the hand is used for the removal rather than the more sensitive palm, it supports the assumption that the objects are actually conceived of as annoying. Then the endpoint or goal is reached: the objects are gone and a neutral situation is recovered. Just as the direction of the action varies according to the objects and circumstances, the direction of the gestural

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Figure 1: The action scheme of brushing something aside

movement may also vary, whether it is performed to the side, upwards, to the front, the back or over the shoulder, excluding any downward movement, which has not been observed (Tessendorf 2005). The spatial execution of the gesture does not seem to be part of the basic functioning of the gesture, which means it is free to take up additional meaning, as we will see below in the first example.

2.2 From action to gesture In the process of sign formation from action to gesture, a process of formal reduction comes into play. The gesture performs the dynamic movement feature of the basic action: a quick, upwards twist of the wrist away from the body. The reduction is facilitated through semiotic-cognitive processes of metonymy, where the most salient formal feature of the action scheme is highlighted. Here we find our first basic metonymic relation, an internal metonymy in a pars pro toto ‘part for whole’ relationship (cf. Jakobson [1956] 1990; Gibbs 1994; Panther and Thornburg 2004 inter alia; for the fundamental role of metonymy in gesture creation, see Bouvet 2001; Mittelberg 2010, 2013; Mittelberg and Waugh 2014; Müller 2010, 2014). The quick and dynamic flick of the wrist stands for the action of brushing something aside, in Müller’s (2014: 1693) terms: the modulated action stands for the action itself. The gesture’s form is motivated and stays transparent, which certainly encourages its use in various contexts. As to the (basic) function of the “brushing aside gesture”, we have to recur on a different semiotic-cognitive mechanism: metaphor. As mentioned above, the gesture’s semantic core is transferred onto the realm of communication. In order

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to do so, the gesture acts on the basis of the conceptual metaphor IDEAS OR MEANINGS ARE OBJECTS (cf. Lakoff and Johnson [1980] 2003; McNeill 1992, 2005). In the case of the “brushing aside gesture”, this means that virtual or discursive objects are being brushed aside, which is its basic metaphoric relation4. Streeck (2009: 201) sees gestures that are based on the conceptual metaphor linking TALKING TO THE TH E TRANSFER OF OBJECTS as “practical metaphorizations (or construals): what is given to the speaker is a fluid repertoire of abstract, schematic actions of the hands, actions that are ‘uncoupled from real-world consequences’ and thus available for symbolic use.” And elsewhere he stresses the point that these metaphorical actions are not only meaningful for a recipient, but also for the speakers as they “visually conceptualize their conversational actions in analogy to instrumental actions” (Streeck 1994: 3). To sum up, we have seen that in the sign creation process two fundamental cognitive-semiotic mechanisms are at work: metonymy and metaphor. And since gestures are per se metonymic, “they still adhere to the general principle of metonymy first, metaphor second, or to say it in another way, metonymy, whether external (adjacency/contact) or internal (synecdoche), leads the way into metaphor” (Mittelberg and Waugh 2014 347).

2.3 Examples 2.3.1 O sea, que eran cuatro allí: ACTION FOR OBJECTS The “brushing aside gesture” is predominantly used with pragmatic functions. What function a gesture takes up relies on its form, semantic core and the communicative context, be it verbal or nonverbal. In example (1), taken from Tessendorf (2005), the speaker-gesturer talks about a former working situation that was not pleasant. When speaking about her bosses, she says that “they were four there who were getting everything and the others were there to provide them with whatever they needed”. (1)

o sea que [eran cUAtro] allí que se repartían el bacaLAO/ (-) y [los demás] eh (-) nt (-) estabamos ahí para alcanzarle a alguien eh=: a=algo (.) o sea que5

4 For a detailed account on the interplay of metaphor and pragmatic functioning in this gesture, cf. Tessendorf (2014), for a praxeological view, cf. Streeck (1994, 2009). 5 The transcription conventions follow Tessendorf (2005), here we find: (.)= short pause, (-)= slightly longer pause, .hh= audible breathing, ehm::=elongation, CAPITAL letters= vocal emphasis, [square brackets] =the beginning and end of a gesture phrase, |= the beginning of a new gesture within a gesture phrase, and bold faces= the gesture stroke.

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When referring to the four, saying cuatro, the speaker performs a right handed “brushing aside gesture” to the right at around shoulder height, then a “palm up open hand gesture” again with her right hand at the waistline when saying repartían. Shortly after, when she refers to the others, los demás, she performs a left handed “palm lateral open hand” that is moved back and forth in the center and shrugs, when saying the hesitation mark eh. She ends her gestural phase (Kendon 2004a) with another “palm up open hand” with the left hand as she says estabamos, also around the waistline. This example shows, firstly, a division of gestures performed with the right and with the left hand. The segregation between the bosses and the others is made visible by using a different hand for each group. What is also interesting is that she performs the “brushing aside gesture” way higher than all other gestures, at about shoulder height. We will focus on that after showing what exactly is brushed aside and what function this gesture has in this specific context. In order to do so we will recur to our action scheme.

Figure 2: The action scheme and the “brushing aside gesture” in the first example

When using the “brushing aside gesture”, the underlying action is not represented but enacted. This means that the use of the gesture works as a metalinguistic comment on what is being said: something is supposed to be or should be brushed aside. In the action scheme above we have highlighted the cause (for the action), those disturbing objects that are found in the immediate surrounding. What the speaker-gesturer does, when using this gesture, is qualifying her former bosses, the four there, as something that needs or deserves to be brushed aside, as small annoying objects (clearly a metaphoric process of seeing one thing in terms of another), and since these objects are referred to through the imitation of

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an action, we have another metonymic relation. The action that is performed by the gesture stands for the objects that are involved. The functional metonymic relation is thus ACTION FOR OBJECTS INVOLVED IN ACTION . In contrast to the basic, formational metonymic relation, which is based on a synecdochic relation, this one is based on external metonymy. The objects and the action are connected through contiguity, not in a pars pro toto fashion. After this link has been established, metaphor steps in seeing the bosses as small annoying objects that need to be brushed aside. Through temporal simultaneity the gesture is linked to the verbal counterpart: los cuatro allí, ‘the four there’. The function of the gesture here is modal. Coming back to our observation about the gesture space, not only does the gesturer use both hands to refer to two different groups, but she also reserves the upper gesture space on the right for qualifying the four bosses, which supplies the “brushing aside gesture” with an additional deictic feature. The contrast of left and right, but especially of up and down, is superimposed on the whole gesture phase. Together with the verbal context, the use of the gesture space is symbolic: it visualizes a hierarchy that is not made explicit within the verbal part of the utterance. There are four UP there, who take everything, and the other, DOWN here, whose job it was to provide them with what they wanted. The conceptual metaphor HAVING CONTROL OF FORCE IS UP , BEING SUBJECT TO CONTROL OR FORCE IS DOWN (Lakoff and Johnson [1980] 2003: 15), is expressed by an orchestration of speech, gesture form and the (symbolic) use of the gesture space.

2.3.2 si no sigue – si todavía no: ACTION FOR RESULT Example (2) shows the “brushing aside gesture” in a different context and with a different function. It is performed twice and embedded in a movie narration. The speaker-gesturer describes a situation from the movie The Hairdresser’s Husband in which the hairdresser finally responds to the wedding proposal of the hero of the movie that was presented to her some time ago. The speaker-gesturer takes up the role of the hairdresser and reenacts the answer, which is seasoned in both modalities, verbal and nonverbally, with word searches, hesitation marks, breakoffs, and reformulations. (2)

bueno (.) lo de la proposicION del otro día, si todaVIA sigue: (.) .hh dice [si NO sigue:: | (.) to=](.) si to= si todaVIA no::ehm (.) si la proposicION to=(.) ehm::(-) ya no: (.) ya no VAle/(-) pues nada lo_olvidamos.

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well, about the proposal from the other day .hh if (it) is still valid -she says- if it is not valid still if still if it is still (.) if the proposal is still=(.) ehm no longer: (.) no longer valid, then nothing, we’ll forget it.

The difficulties seem to be of two sorts: the conception as well as the formulation of the turn.6 According to our narrator, the hairdresser wants to carefully check if the proposal still holds, and if so, probably wants to accept it. Since it is a delicate matter, she hesitates, getting confused with the notions of something being ‘still (valid)’ and ‘not (valid) anymore’, todavía and ya no. On the gestural level, she uses a right handed “palm vertical open hand”, with the palm facing the recipient, that is gently moved back and forth in a protective way as if holding or keeping something away (cf. Kendon 2004a), when saying si no sigue. This gesture is interrupted by a sketchy “brushing aside gesture” which accompanies the verbal break-off (.)to=, followed by a full retraction of the hand. The speaker performs a second “brushing aside gesture” that starts on the hesitation mark ehm:: following through the micro-pause and ending on ya.7 This gesture is performed precisely and with great care at around shoulder height. At the end of the turn we will find another small “palm vertical open hand” that is moved back and forth when saying nada lo olvidamos ‘nothing, we’ll forget that’. If we take a look at the “brushing aside gestures” here, focusing on the second occurrence, we see that it is rather connected to the idea of ending something. It coincides with the end of the part in which the speaker uses todavia ‘still’ as a reference point, which has prevented her from continuing and ending her phrase in a logical (and also prudent) way. Here the gesture acts on the discourse structure, marking a change of perspective and thus opening up a projection space. The gesture does not only operate on the following ya no ‘not anymore’, but also in a prospective way on the rest of the utterance. Its connection to the semantic content of the verbal utterance is as follows: if the wedding proposal should not hold anymore, her whole discourse would be rather pointless, maybe even a bit awkward or embarrassing and should be brushed aside, as if it had never happened. This is exactly what the gesture does: the hand acts as if it was brushing something aside and thereby visualizes the desirable end of the conversation, if and only if the proposal has ceased to be valid. Coming back to our model of the action scheme, we find a shift from the objects involved in the action towards the effect or goal of the action. 6 The conceptual difficulties here may also stem from issues of face (cf. Goffman 1974). For a thorough analysis of this example, cf. Tessendorf (2005). 7 Gestures have often been observed as being prepositioned to their verbal associate (cf. McNeill 1992, Kendon 2004a, 2004b, inter alia.)

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Figure 3: The action scheme and the “brushing aside gesture” in the second example

We can see that the gesture in this particular context does not highlight or qualify the objects involved, but rather stresses the effect of the underlying action. By using the “brushing aside gesture” an unpleasant situation is finished and a neutral one recovered. Again, taking a cognitive-semiotic stance toward the function of this gesture, we find a new metonymic relation: the action that is performed stands for the result or effect of the action. The functional metonymic relation thus is: ACTION FOR RESULT .

2.4 Summary In this first part of the chapter we presented two instances of the “brushing aside gesture” with different functions. We have seen how a gesture can be reconstructed by using an abstract action scheme as a blue print. We have also seen that this action scheme can serve as a sort of toolbox. Choosing or highlighting certain aspects of the action scheme leads to a different functioning of the gesture. Besides the action scheme, the importance of the overall context (speech, other gestures, discourse type, etc.) has proven to be of great importance. The first “brushing aside gesture” was used modally to express a negative stance, or negative assessment towards somebody, exploiting the middle part of the action scheme: THE ACTION STANDS FOR THE OBJECTS INVOLVED . Metonymic mechanisms are fundamental in co-speech gesture, because they “[. . .] are pervasive embodied processes of association and signification, rooted in entrenched multisensory experiences of perceiving, interpreting, and communicating” (Mittelberg and Waugh 2014: 1749).  

 

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We have also demonstrated how smoothly the mechanisms of metonymy and metaphor work together in the construction process of the gestural sign, as well as, and even more so, in its use. The first example, especially, demonstrates the richness of gestural expression, which includes two different metonymic processes (formal and functional) and three metaphorical ones (action is seen in terms of communicative signs, human beings are conceived of as objects, and finally the gesture space is used metaphorically). The second example shows the “brushing aside gesture” with a different function: it was used in a discursive and speech-performative way (cf. Tessendorf 2014), that is, it acts upon the utterance. The functional metonymic relation at work is ACTION STANDS FOR RESULT OF ACTION , highlighting a different aspect of the action scheme. To conclude: gestures, like the “brushing aside gesture”, are potentially and actually multifunctional, mostly acting upon the verbal part of the utterance. We have tried to show how a schematic illustration of the underlying action may help to distinguish different gestural functions and that it is useful for the illustration of the complexity of a single gesture form.

3 The repertoire of recurrent gestures in German Within the research project Towards a grammar of gesture: evolution, brain, and linguistic structure (2006–2010), Bressem and Müller (2014a) established a first repertoire of German recurrent gestures with pragmatic functions. Since each and every gesture has a pragmatic function when it is used, the authors limited their focus on gestures that were used in a speech-performative manner, acting upon the utterance or fulfilling communicative actions and in a performative manner, aiming at the regulation of behavior. As mentioned above, these gestures appear to constitute a relatively closed group and “thus form repertoires characteristic of a particular socio-cultural community” (Bressem and Müller 2014a: 1576). The data consisted of 24 hours of videotaped material, covering a wide variety of different discourse types, such as game shows, everyday communication, political (and other) debates, academic lectures, etc., to account for diverse contexts-of-use. Overall, they detected 16 different gestures (including the “cyclic gesture”, the “swaying gesture”, the “ring gesture”, see Bressem and Müller 2014a: 1580–1584) used by 60 different speakers. The recurrent gestures were grouped in three different categories according to the quantity and quality of their variants and their connection to or dependence on speech, thus their conventionality: “The more a gesture can substitute for

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speech and the less it varies in form-function and in contexts-of-use, the more it is considered conventionalized” (Bressem and Müller 2014a: 1579). Besides a close description of each gesture’s form, variations, and functions, the relations of the members of the repertoire were analyzed. The authors discovered semantic overlaps in gestures that were concerned with refusal, rejection, and negation, a most prominent field for conventional gestures, be they recurrent or emblematic (cf. Kendon 1981, 1995; Payrató 1993, 2004; Tessendorf 2013, inter alia). With those observations, including changing the perspective from a semasiological to an onomasiological stance (cf. Fricke, Bressem and Müller 2014), the authors chose a different approach towards the construction of gesture families and introduced the family of “away gestures”.

3.1 The family of “away gestures” All gestures that belong to this family share the semantic core of exclusion: the “sweeping away gesture”, the “holding away gesture”, the “brushing away gesture”, and the “throwing away gesture”. This gesture family differs from others because their members do not share a particular hand shape and/or orientation, which is usually the starting point for the construction of a gesture family (cf. Kendon 2004a; Müller 2004, Ladewig 2010), but share a particular movement (away from the body, mostly straight)8, and of greater importance, the semantic theme of “rejection, refusal, negative assessment, and negation” (Bressem and Müller 2014a: 1597). All four gestures are based on mundane actions that move or keep things away from the body, but the actions are not the same. The semantic core of each individual gesture form is derived from its underlying action, just as in the example of the Spanish “brushing aside gesture”. What all members of the family have in common is the similar goal or effect of those actions, “that the body space is cleared of annoying or otherwise unwanted objects” (Bressem and Müller 2014a: 1596). In consideration of the above detailed action scheme, we see that this schematization is not only useful in order to reconstruct certain semantic notions or functions of one particular gesture, but helps in pinning down similarities of gestures that are used for similar purposes. When starting to look at a repertoire

8 The actions are connected by two underlying image-schematic structures CENTER-PERIPHERY and SOURCE-PATH-GOAL for the ‘sweeping away’, the ‘brushing away’, and the ‘throwing away’, and BLOCKAGE for the ‘holding away gesture’.

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of (recurrent) gestures from a functional point of view, the use of an abstracted action scheme might be helpful.

3.2 The four “away gestures” : “throwing away”, “holding away”, “sweeping away”, and “brushing away” The four “away gestures” are well-known in German face-to-face interaction, and their use within the repertoire makes for more than half of the encountered instances, that is 155 from overall 266 instances. The most commonly used “away gesture” was the “throwing away gesture” with 62 usages, followed by the “holding away gesture” with 46, the “sweeping away gesture” with 29, and finally the “brushing away gesture” with only 18 instances (Bressem, Müller and Fricke 2010). In the “throwing away gesture”, the hand acts as if it is throwing something away, while in the “holding away gesture” one or both hand(s) are used as a sort of barrier, as if holding something away, and in the “sweeping away gesture” (also known as the “cutting gesture” by Calbris 2003 or the “finished gesture” by Brookes 2004, inter alia) the hand(s), palm facing down, are moved outwards in a horizontal and lateral plain, often with a decisive movement quality. All four gestures of the family differ in their underlying actions, but all of them share the same intended effect. Although the “brushing aside gesture” exists in German, Bressem and Müller observe that Germans prefer the “throwing away gesture” for similar purposes. The German gesture of “throwing away” and the Spanish gesture of “brushing aside” functionally resemble one another “in that both gestures are used as negative assessments” (Bressem and Müller 2014b: 1599). They also state the German “brushing aside gesture” is often used with deictic functions, illustrating paths and directions, where the direction of the gestural movement is semanticized, a function that does not seem to be in the focus of the Spanish gesture. Another difference seems to be its use with or without speech. Whereas the Spanish gesture is used quite regularly without accompanying speech, there was no instance of its speechreplacing use in the German data. The authors thus suspect that the German “throwing aside gesture” which is also used quite frequently and the Spanish “brushing aside gesture” are two (functional) variants with a different distribution in German on the one hand and European and Cuban Spanish on the other.

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3.3 Linking the Spanish “brushing aside gesture” to the German “throwing aside gesture” The “throwing away gesture” in German is based on the action of throwing away a “middle sized roundish object, a rotten fruit, the core of an apple or a crumbled piece of paper” (Bressem and Müller 2014b: 1599). When using this gesture the lax hand, palm away from the body, is moved downwards by bending the wrist. It is used with speech, often with the German adjective egal ‘never mind’ and interjections like ach ‘alas’, but also speech-replacing. When comparing this gesture with the Spanish “brushing aside gesture” the biggest difference lies in the treated objects. Other differences can be found in the movement quality, which seems less dynamic in the German gesture, as well as the direction of the movement. Whereas the Spanish gesture ends an upwards movement with the palm away from the body, facing outwards, the German “throwing away gesture” ends its downwards movement with the palm facing down or towards the body of the gesturer. So, why do we still perceive these two gestures as two functional variants? A clue to a possible connection might be given by the German verbal co-occurring speech: egal ‘never mind’ and ach ‘alas’, which are both used as interjections, asking someone to stop caring about something, to forget it, and thus having the same notions of ending and stopping as the gesture. This hints at a special usage of the gestures, foregrounding the aspect of rejecting, removing and not so much qualifying the objects (as small or middle-sized), just as presented in the construction of the family of “away gestures”. The major difference between these two gestures does not play an important role, because it is not in the focus here. As for the German “throwing away gesture”, the notion of ending and rejecting seems to be the pertinent one, which might also hold for the “brushing aside gesture” in Spanish. To account for the differences of these two gestures one would have to focus on their modal use, where the treated objects are in the focus, and this may be a rather secondary function. Considering the data and the findings so far, we have to admit that although we can account for the notion that the two gestures outlined fulfill very similar functions in two different cultural and linguistic areas, we do not have a clear idea about why German speakers prefer to “throw” while Spanish speakers prefer to “brush things aside”. Precise intercultural studies including experimental data would be needed. But some more general observations about cross-cultural differences in conventional gestures might help us with some ideas for the moment.9

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4 Insights and Conjectures on intercultural differences Findings of intercultural emblem studies have shown that the use and spread of gestures can be influenced by language and/or culture contact. As De Jorio (1832] 2000) has already pointed out, and Fornés and Puig (2008) confirmed in detail, a variety of emblems used in Naples in the 19th century, and throughout the Western world nowadays, can be traced back to ancient times. Morris et al. (1979) found the use of the head toss as a sign of negativity, citing this gesture as the main sign for negation in Greece, that was commonly used in the area of Southern Italy, Greece, and Turkey, while absent in the rest of Europe, including Northern Italy. The gesture boundary, as Morris et al. (1979) termed it, lies between Rome and Naples, an area where the influence of the Greek settlement, which started around 690 B.C., ended. Although this cultural contact has ceased centuries ago, the emblem conserves this meaning and is perpetuated in this area through constant use (Morris et al. 1979: 247–259). Regarding the “brushing aside gesture” which is known to be used in Mexico and Cuba, it would be interesting to see whether it is also used in other countries of Latin America and in the neighboring countries of Spain, Portugal, France and the Mediterranean area to see the spread of the gesture. There are, of course, reasons that keep emblematic gestures from entering a repertoire in the first place. Following Morris et al. (1979: 263–265), the most important causes are ideological and religious barriers, geographical barriers, gesture taboos, and gesture obscurity, which means that a gesture’s meaning is known to few people and its use is unnecessary outside its original habitat, cultural prejudice barriers and linguistic barriers. Since the “throwing away gesture” and the “brushing aside gesture” are based on mundane actions and this relation is transparent in their use, and furthermore not directly connected to an idiom, the linguistic barrier does not seem to apply. Considering the cultural prejudice barrier, interesting and rather everyday observations have been made. When interviewing Spanish people, male and female, about gestures and showing them instances of the German “throwing away gesture”, they perceived the movement quality of a hand flapping down as effeminate. Provided with the (verbal) context, they were able to detect its function, drawing on the underlying action scheme, but they could not imagine using this gesture themselves.

9 Premises and requirements for a systematic comparison of emblem repertoires can be found in Payrató (2001).

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Two last factors, gesture niches and gesture replacements, can be seen in the context of these observations. Gesture niches mean that there is already a well known and accepted gesture for a certain communicative function in a certain community, so that there is no need to adopt a new one. Unless, of course, the newer or foreign gesture is chosen to replace it for reasons of prestige, fashion, or because of what it stands for. While emblems may carry cultural core concepts (e.g. being “clever” in South African townships as shown by Brookes 2001, or being “positive” in Brazil, cf. Sherzer 1991), recurrent gestures carry rather functional concepts. It is uncertain if any of the two variants may find its way into the other repertoire through growing cultural contact; that the German “throwing aside gesture” finds its way into the Spanish repertoire is rather unlikely, even more so, because gestures tend to be conservative. Summarizing their findings, Morris et al. (1979: 265) state “it must be admitted that many gestures have stood the test of time and have resisted the whims of changing fashions”.

5 Summary and outlook In this chapter we started with the description of gestures that are based on mundane, everyday actions. Using an abstracted action scheme has proven to be very useful for the analysis of the functions of the Spanish recurrent “brushing aside gesture” as well as for the analysis of a gestural repertoire. Distinguishing between an action and its goal might be a good starting point for further categorizations. Together with the linguistic methods of gesture analysis, this differentiation supported the detection of an interrelated group of gestures, the “away gestures”, a family that is based on the same effect of the underlying action schemes of its members and a common movement feature. The theoretical implications of using an onomasiological as opposed to a semasiological approach towards gesture repertoires have been addressed elsewhere (cf. Fricke, Bressem and Müller 2014), showing that both approaches have their own right within gesture research. But, as has been shown here, it seems that structural relations can be discovered more easily when beginning with the functions of gestures and grouping them around common themes. This might be useful for the comparison of repertoires of conventional gestures of different culture and speech communities. Questions of cultural preferences in the use of gestures with similar functions are much harder to address. For the German “throwing away” and the Spanish “brushing aside gesture” we can resume that each community expresses the notions of negation, refusal, and objection perfectly by using its own gestural means.

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References Bavelas, Janet Beavin, Nicole Chovil, Douglas A. Lawrie & Allan Wade. 1992. Interactive Gestures. Discourse Processes 15. 469–489. Bressem, Jana & Cornelia Müller. 2014a. A repertoire of German recurrent gestures with pragmatic functions. In Cornelia Müller, Silva H. Ladewig, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, David McNeill & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1575–1591. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Bressem, Jana & Cornelia Müller. 2014b. The family of Away gestures: Negation, refusal, and negative assessment. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication / An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1592–1604. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Bressem, Jana, Nicole Stein & Claudia Wegener. 2015. Structuring and highlighting speech – Discursive functions of holding away gestures in Savosavo. Proceedings of the GESPIN 2015 Gesture Conference, September 2015, Nantes, Frankreich. Brookes, Heather. 2001. The case of the clever gesture. Gesture 1(2). 167–184. Brookes, Heather. 2004. A repertoire of South African quotable gestures. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 14 (2). 186–224. Brookes, Heather. 2005. What gestures do: Some communicative functions of quotable gestures in conversations among Black urban South Africans. Journal of Pragmatics 32. 2044–2085. Bouvet, Danielle. 2001. La Dimension Corporelle de la Parole. Les Marques Posturo-MimoGestuelles de la Parole, leurs Aspects Métonymiques, et leur Rôle au Cours d’un Récit. Paris: Peeters. Calbris, Geneviève. 2003. From cutting an object to a clear cut analysis: Gesture as the representation of a preconceptual schema linking concrete actions to abstract notions. Gesture 3(1). 19–46. De Jorio, Andrea. [1832] 2000. Gesture in Naples and gesture in classical antiquity. A translation of La mimica degli antichi investigata nel gestire napoletano (Fibreno, Naples 1832), with an introduction and notes by Adam Kendon. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Efron, David [1941] 1972. Gesture, race and culture. The Hague: Mouton. Ekman, Paul & Wallace V. Friesen. 1972. Hand movements. Journal of Communication 22. 353–374. Fricke, Ellen, Jana Bressem & Cornelia Müller. 2014. Gesture families and gestural fields. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill, & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication / An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1630–1640. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton Gibbs, Raymond. 1994. The poetics of mind: Figurative thought, language, and understanding. New York: Cambridge University Press. Goffman, Erving. 1974. Frame Analysis. An Essay on the organization of experience. Cambridge, M.A.: Harvard University Press. Fornés Pallicer, Maria Antònia & Mercè Puig Rodríguez-Escalona. 2008. El porqué de nuestros gestos. La Roma ayer en la gestualidad de hoy. Barcelona: Editorial Octaedro. Jakobson, Roman. [1956] 1990. Two aspects of language and two types of aphasic disturbances, in Linda R. Waugh, M. Monville-Burston (eds.), Roman Jakobson, On Language, 115–133. Cambridge/London.

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Kendon, Adam. 1981. Geography of gesture. Semiotica 37 (1–2). 129–163. Kendon, Adam. 1995. Gestures as illocutionary and discourse structure markers in Southern Italian conversation. Journal of Pragmatics 23. 247–279. Kendon, Adam. 2004a. Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kendon, Adam. 2004b. Contrasts in gesticulation. A British and a Neapolitan speaker compared. In Cornelia Müller & Roland Posner (eds.), The semantics and pragmatics of everyday gestures. Proceedings of the Berlin conference, April 1998, 173–193. Berlin: Weidler. Ladewig, Silva H. 2010. Beschreiben, auffordern und suchen – Varianten einer rekurrenten Geste, In Irene Mittelberg (ed.), Sprache und Gestik. Sonderheft der Zeitschrift Sprache und Literatur, 41(1). 89–111. Ladewig, Silva H. 2011. Putting a recurrent gesture on a cognitive basis. CogniTexte 6. http://cognitextes.revues.org/406 (accessed 30 June 2015) Ladewig, Silva H. 2014. Recurrent gestures. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1558–1574. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Lakoff, George & Mark Johnson. [1980] 2003. Metaphors We Live By. With a new afterword. Chicago: Chicago University Press. McNeill, David. 1992. Hand and Mind. What gestures reveal about thought. 2nd edition. Chicago: Chicago University Press. McNeill, David. 2000. Introduction. In David McNeill (ed.), Language and Gesture, 1–10. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. McNeill, David. 2005. Gesture and Thought. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Mittelberg, Irene. 2010. Interne und externe Metonymie: Jakobsonsche Kontiguitätsbeziehungen in redebegleitenden Gesten. In Irene Mittelberg (ed.), Sprache und Gestik. Sonderheft der Zeitschrift Sprache und Literatur, 41(1). 112–143. Mittelberg, Irene. 2013. The Exbodied Mind: Cognitive-Semiotic Principles as Motivating Forces in Gesture. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Sedinha Tessendorf (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.1), 750–779. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Mittelberg, Irene & Linda R. Waugh. 2014. Gestures and metonymy. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication / Körper – Sprache – Kommunikation. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1747–1766. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Montes, Rosa. 2003. “Haciendo a un lado”: gestos de desconfirmación en el habla mexicano. IZTAPALAPA 53. 248–267. Morris, Desmond, Peter Collett, Peter Marsh & Marie O’Shaughnessy. 1979. Gestures. Their Origins and Distributions. New York: Stein and Day Publishers. Müller, Cornelia. 1998. Redebegleitende Gesten. Kulturgeschichte – Theorie – Sprachvergleich. Berlin: Berlin Verlag. Müller, Cornelia. 2004. The Palm-Up-Open-Hand. A case of a gesture family? In Cornelia Müller & Roland Posner (eds.), The Semantics and Pragmatics of Everyday Gestures. Proceedings of the Berlin Conference, April 1998, 233–256. Berlin: Weidler.

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Müller, Cornelia. 2010. Wie Gesten bedeuten. Eine kognitiv-linguistische und sequenzanalytische Perspektive. In Irene Mittelberg (ed.), Sprache und Gestik. Sonderheft der Zeitschrift Sprache und Literatur 41, 37–68. München: Fink. Müller, Cornelia. 2014. Ring gestures across cultures and times: Dimensions of variation. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1511–1522. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Müller, Cornelia & Harald Haferland. 1997. Gefesselte Hände. Zur Semiose performativer Gesten. Mitteilungen des Deutschen Germanistenverbandes 44 (3). 29–53. Müller, Cornelia & Gerald Speckmann. 2002. Gestos con una valoración negativa en la conversación cubana. DeSignis3. Buenos Aires: Gedisa. Panther, Klaus-Uwe & Linda L. Thornburg. 2004. The Role of Conceptual Metonymy in Meaning Construction. metaphorik.de (06). 91–116. http://www.metaphorik.de/de/journal/06/ role-conceptual-metonymy-meaning-construction.html (accessed 30 June 2015). Payrató, Lluís. 1993. A pragmatic view on autonomous gestures: A first repertoire of Catalan emblems. Journal of Pragmatics 20. 193–216. Payrató, Lluís. 2001. Methodological remarks on the study of emblems: The need for common elicitation procedures. In Christian Cavé, Isabelle Guaitella & Serge Santi (eds.), Oralié et Gestualité: Interactions et Comportements Multimodeaux dans la Communicacion, 262– 265. Paris: Harmattan. Payrató, Lluís. 2003. What does ‘the same gesture’ mean? A reflection on emblems, their organization and their interpretation. In Monica Rector, Isabella Poggi & Nadine Trigo (eds.), Gestures, Meaning and Use, 73–81. Porto: Fernando Pessoa University Press. Payrató, Lluís. 2004. Notes on pragmatic and social aspects of everyday gestures. In Cornelia Müller & Roland Posner (eds.), The Semantics and Pragmatics of Everyday Gestures. Proceedings of the Berlin Conference, April 1998, 103–113. Berlin: Weidler. Payrató, Lluís. 2014. Emblems or quotable gestures: Structures, categories, and functions. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1474–1480. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Payrató, Lluís & Sedinha Tessendorf. 2014. Pragmatic gestures. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1531–1539. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Sherzer, Joel. 1991. The Brazilian Thumbs-Up Gesture. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 1(2). 189–197. Streeck, Jürgen. 1994. “Speech-handling”: The metaphorical representation of speech in gesture. A cross-cultural study. Unpublished Manuscript. Streeck, Jürgen. 2009. Gesturecraft. The manu-facture of meaning. Amsterdam: Benjamins. Tessendorf, Sedinha. 2005. Pragmatische Funktionen spanischer Gesten am Beispiel des “gesto de barrer”. Unpublished M.A. thesis, Free University Berlin. Tessendorf, Sedinha. 2013. Emblems, quotable gestures, or conventionalized body movements. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Alan Cienki, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Sedinha Tessendorf (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.1), 82–100. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Tessendorf, Sedinha. 2014. Pragmatic and metaphoric – combining functional with cognitive approaches in the analysis of the “brushing aside gesture”. In: Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki,

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Ellen Fricke, Alan Cienki, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Jana Bressem (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1540–1558. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.

Eduard Tapia Yepes, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya

Argument Structure Shift for German Dynamic Verbs gehen and kommen in Situated and Embodied Communication Abstract: The present study investigates variation in motion events in situated communication from a multimodal approach. The main goal is to look for interrelations between the propositional and interactional level, represented in this study respectively by the argument shift and (non-) verbal deixis. For this purpose, a methodological strategy based on a multimodal-interactional analysis is developed, and the uses of German dynamic verbs gehen and kommen from the multimodal VARKOM-Korpus are analysed. Results show that gestural deixis and argument shift in motion events are strongly related. Keywords: motion event, argument structure, perspective, variation, deixis, gesture, pointing, multimodality, language use, German

1 Propositional and interactional variation from a multimodal approach Communication is a multimodal process. There are indeed several channels, including gesture, video, sound, proxemics, etc., humans can use to express themselves. In relation to spoken language, deixis is an interesting phenomenon because of the nonverbal aspect. As Cienki (2010: 48) states, “Gestures provide easily accessible manifestations of image schemas”. The close relationship between gesture and the cognitive processes of text or discourse production is also highlighted by Kendon (1980: 208) and Müller (1998: 71). The authors also treat deixis phenomenon as gestural, an aspect which emphasizes the already existing relation between deixis and situated and embodied communication. Grammatical description of motion events provides interesting theories. On the basis of lexicalization patterns, Talmy (1985) defines satellite-framed (S-framed) languages, whose motion events express path, and manner of motion, in a “grammatical category of any constituent other than a nominal or prepositional-phrase complement that is in a sister relation to the verb root” (Talmy 2000: 222). German is an S-framed language, as it presents satellites in the form of verb prefixes (hin-, her-, ein-, aus-. . .), which are deictic and therefore represent the  

 

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multimodal relationship between situated and embodied communication, i.e. the interactional level on one hand, and the propositional level on the other. In this sense, the framing event “determines [. . .] the overall spatial framework where a physical setting is involved [. . .]. Further, the framing event determines all or most of the argument structure and semantic character of the arguments overall within the macro-event” (Talmy 2000: 219). When using dynamic verbs gehen ‘to go’ und kommen ‘to come’, variation can take place on propositional and interactional levels on the basis of argument structure shift and (non-) verbal deixis. As mentioned above, these two variation levels are interconnected. The speaker takes one concrete perspective on the communicative means of argument structure shift, by which he positions himself in the sentence frame in a subjective manner. The status of gehen und kommen as un-accusative verbs, is the main condition for the argument structure shift when using motion predicates. This phenomenon is described in detail by numerous studies (Polenz 1988; Wunderlich 1993; Conti 2004; Sadziński 2006), however, lack in the reference of dynamic verbs. Thus, the consideration of argument structure alternation in the un-accusative dynamic verbs gehen und kommen is based mainly on the works on sentence semantics by Dowty (1991), Primus (1999) or Blume (2000) and their proto-roles theory. When the un-accusative dynamic verbs show an agent1 which not only displays protoagent features, but proto-patient features as well, this agent can be encoded as a case form, which does not match with the casus rectus, according to the first corollary of Primus’ linking principle (Primus 1999: 63). Thus, the single landmarks or path phases, i.e. elements that arise one after the other when going or coming, can be encoded as a nominative complement. Through these inanimate semantic entities, one perceives inductively the associated simultaneous motion activity of the agent, which is implicitly responsible as a trigger for such a dynamic. On the other hand, the existence of such implicit entities as a reference point indicates an intrinsic reference frame in terms of a “view while exploring” perspective according to Taylor and Tversky (1996: 376, 383) and Tappe (2000: 77). In this case, the speaker/hearer, as an element of the production context, takes part directly in the motion event by getting (verbally or nonverbally) pointed at. As mentioned above, the treatment of argument structure variation is therefore connected to the interactional variation on the basis of the deixis phenomenon in  

 

 

 

1 This concept regards exclusively motion events. Talmy’s Figure as “the object which is considered as moving or located with respect to another object” (1972: 13), does not exclude static configurations.

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gehen and kommen. The main aim here is to see the relationship between the above mentioned propositional and interactional variation, when using the dynamic verbs gehen and kommen. This aim leads to the formulation of two more specific objectives. The first objective is to describe at a propositional level the performed alternation in the argument structure for gehen and kommen on the basis of the associated morphosyntactic and semantic analysis units, including sentence structure (Satzbauplan) and the semantic roles constellation. The second objective is the description of the deictic alternation at an interactional level through the multimodal analysis of performed deixis, as well as the analysis units associated to the deictic performed with gehen and kommen realisations: deictic dimension and deictic multimodal encoding.

2 Corpus description and method of analysis The pursuit of the above mentioned objectives implies an empirical analysis. The data selection (subcorpus) for this study was extracted from the spoken corpus VARKOM (Fernández-Villanueva and Strunk 2009). Oral productions were elicited among L1 German speakers, in a semi-formal register and through narrative, descriptive and argumentative tasks, prompted by the researcher through instructions and visual stimuli. All productions were recorded in video format (full body recording). For the present study, the spoken productions of seven female speakers (German Studies students) between the ages of 25 and 30 with German as first language were selected. They had been produced offline, i.e. never simultaneously in view with the observation of the respective stimulus materials, following the researcher’s instructions to elicit a narrative, a descriptive and an argumentative thematic development in different tasks (Fernández-Villanueva and Strunk 2009: 68). The mean duration of the oral productions per speaker was 00:20:14,569, while the mean of produced tokens was 1.970,28. The transliterated tasks were lemmatized and marked up with TreeTagger (Schmid 1994) and Lexic Tools (Strunk 2008) for word category disambiguation. All localized gehen and kommen realisations reached a high appearance (157 and 121 tokens respectively) in the oral productions. All of which correspond to realisations where the root contains either -geh- or -komm-. Deictic separable verb prefixes such as hinaufgehen ‘to go up’ or herauskommen ‘to come out’ were also considered, which are particularly useful for an analysis on an interactional level in which deictic expressions play a crucial role.

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The description of argument structure shift was possible by means of a syntactic-semantic two-stroke analysis, as can be seen in the form pattern in Table 1 for the nominative complement position (NomE) in (1). (1)

Wir gehen wieder raus we go again out ‘We go out again.’

Table 1 contains the considered analysis units according to Polenz (1988), Goergen (1994) and Schumacher et al. (2004), where it was filled in for each performed complement in the 278 gehen and kommen tokens (as predicate nucleus). Table 1: Syntactic-semantic (two-stroke) analysis (pattern) showing analysis units for NomE in (1) Primary analysis units

Wir ‘we’

Syntactic function

Semantic role

nominative complement

agent

Subrole

Secondary analysis units Grammatical form

Categorical meaning

Root category

pronominal group

person

living being

According to an “intrinsic frame of reference” (Taylor and Tversky 1992: 263), the context-reference during the oral production was identified through the analysis of the speaker/hearer-reference, i.e. the use of verbal and nonverbal person and local deixis. For that purpose, the deictic word lists by Zifonun et al. (1997: 316– 337) and Fricke (2007: 70, 99) were used. In addition to the analysis above, gestural deixis were also observed and analysed within the context of this multimodal study. Kendon (2004) and Fricke (2007; 2014) assign a certain focus-function to the concrete form of the hand gesture with G-form gestures and palm lateral open hand gestures (PLOH), signalizing static deixis (pointing to an object) and directive deixis (pointing in a direction) respectively. According to Kendon (2004: 199), these pointing gestures are usually performed “with the hands, but they may also be done with the head, [. . .], by a movement of the elbow, in some circumstances even by the foot”. Drawing the same conclusions, Fricke (2014: 1819) states, “it turns out that the complete set of deictic relations may be instantiated either by the speaker’s body or by his gestures”. Despite the complexity of hand gestures, such statements point out the strong necessity of a complete visual concerning gesture performance. It therefore seems quite necessary that all oral productions from which the data is extracted are available in video format and show a full body recording.  

 

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3 Results 3.1 Propositional variation: Agent blockade in the context of argument shift In absolute figures, the nominative and adverbial complement sentence structure (2 NomE AdvE), with 50,36% i.e. 140 of 278 realisations, as well as the semantic role constellation agent location, with 32,73% i.e. 91 of 278 realisations, can be considered as the prototypical use of gehen and kommen. In the analysis of all gehen and kommen realisations concerning their dynamic meaning (i.e. gehen and kommen as motion events), the occurrence of the agent in the nominative complement position (NomE) proved to be definitional. The determination of the semantic roles on the basis of the morphosyntactic analysis facilitates the identification of those predicates in which an argument shift took place. Accordingly, the 278 analysed argument structures were classified by the criterion whether shown as agent in the first complement position (E1) or not. Among the 74 realisations, 17 (6,11% of all analysed realisations) do not show any agent in the nominative complement position (NomE), and were identified as dynamic actions, as predicate class in the sense of Goergen (1994: 18–24). Since argument shift in the gehen and kommen predicates represents one possible diathetical perspective of a motion event, these 17 occurrences offer a good basis for variation on a propositional level. The concrete explanation of these motion events can be found in table 2, showing the corresponding sentence semantic combination. The non-agentive semantic entity in the nominative complement position (NomE) is given particular consideration.

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Table 2: Meaning explanation, distribution, sentence semantic combination and semantic filling of NomE for the motion events with argument shifting Meaning explanation Distribution

Sentence structure Semantic role assignment Semantic filling of NomE

Example

‘to have its place somewhere in a sequence’ (7 realisations)

2 NomE AdvE location location NomE: location (space, geographic place, concrete object)

wenn man vom Schlafzimmer aus auf der rechten Seite eine Küchenzeile ‘When leaving the bedroom, on the left side comes [i.e. appears] a kitchenette.’

‘something leads somewhere or from somewhere’ (6 realisations)

2 NomE AdvE path location NomE: path (concrete object)

da dann auch ne Treppe hoch ‘And then stairs also go up there.’

‘one gets from somewhere to somewhere else’ (4 realisations)

2 AdvE1 AdvE2 location (source) location (goal) NomE: location (space)

Und von dem Wohnzimmer ins Bad Das Bad is auf der rechten Seite ‘And from the living room it [i.e. the path] goes [further] to the bathroom. The bathroom is on the right side.’

Argument shift cases in gehen and kommen show two-argument predicates (13 of the 17 predicates, i.e. 76,47%) that are clearly filled with nominative and adverbial complement sentence structure (NomE AdvE). From a strictly qualitative point of view, the predicate frame of the applicable realisations experienced a syntactic argument shift, which on this level represents no difference to the common passive sentences. In this sense, not a single identified argument structure shift example showed an agent appearing in the nominative complement position (NomE), and not once in the form of a casus obliquus. Concerning the 17 cases with argument structure shift, not only an agent deactivation occurs, but an agent blockade is also observed, see (2) and (3) as well as their a-variants. (2)

da geht dann auch ne Treppe hoch there goes then also a stair up ‘And then stairs also go up there.’ (2a) *da geht dann auch ne Treppe hoch von mir/dir. . . ‘And then stairs also go up there by me/you. . .’  

 

 

 

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(3)

wenn man vom Schlafzimmer aus kommt auf der rechten Seite eine when one from the bedroom out comes on the right side a Küchenzeile kitchenette ‘When leaving the bedroom, on the left side comes [i.e. appears] a kitchenette.’ (3a) *wenn man vom Schlafzimmer aus kommt auf der rechten Seite eine Küchenzeile von/ durch man ‘When leaving the bedroom, on the left side comes [i.e. appears] a kitchenette by/ through one.’

As the above comparisons demonstrate, the agent is – even if implicit – morphosyntactically unrealizable. This leads to the assumption that the semantic agentive entity was shifted to the range of the background information. As already mentioned, the entities encoded as the nominative complement (NomE) are non-living entities. They imply categorical meanings such as concrete object, geographic place, space or abstractum (es ‘it‘ in sublemma “one gets from somewhere to somewhere else” is seen here as a path in a figurative sense). However, the dynamic aspect does not disappear here, i.e. the motion factor is always present. These non-living and static nominative complements (NomEs) are only points of orientation, landmarks or path phases, which the implicit agent exclusively comes across in a ‘view while exploring’-perspective, through motion generated by himself. Indeed, these semantic entities are part of the semantic field of a motion event (location, path, mode of motion/transport, etc.). On the basis of the individual landmarks or path phases, which arise one after another when going or coming, the simultaneous associated motion activity of an agent can be inductively perceived. Agent is thus implicitly responsible, as a trigger, for this dynamics. In this context, (4) and (5) are illustrative. (4) da siehst du dann rechts so ein Kino und danach kommt dann there see you then right so a cinema and after it comes then ein Friseurladen a hairdresser ‘Then you see there on the right side a cinema and then, after it, comes [i.e. appears] a hairdresser.’ (5) Treppe runter oder hoch das habe ich hoch nee geht eine kleine Treppe hoch stair down or up this have I up no goes a small stair up ‘Stairs up or down, I have this. . . Up. No, a small flight of stairs goes up.’  

 

Regarding (4), the local complement danach ‘after it’ marks the distance between the Kino ‘cinema’ and the Friseurladen ‘hairdresser’, which can only arise when a certain motion is given from the Kino to the exact point from which the Friseurladen can be seen. In (5) Treppe ‘stairs’, one can exclusively go up or down if there is an actual goer who uses it. The actual direction, i.e. the going up or down

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depends of course on the decision of the agentive entity, who is therefore crucial for this motion event. In other words, motion is not interrupted despite the morphosyntactic non-occurrence of the agent. Rather, this motion dictates the basis of the actual spatial positioning of the non-agentive semantic entities. This observation is closely linked to the question regarding the deictic use of gehen and kommen. Therefore, it is linked to the construction of an intrinsic reference frame in terms of a ‘view while exploring’-perspective.

3.2 Interactional variation from a multimodal approach: Identified verbal and gestural performed deixis in gehen and kommen All analysed motion events – whether they show argument structure shift or not – yield a context-reference in the form of reference to the actual speaker/hearer by means of deixis, with a total of 84,93%. Thereby deixis – apart from its dimension or multimodal encoding – becomes the norm in the realisation of the analysed motion events. The non-deictic events (15,07%) are understood here as non speaker/hearer-related. In other words, they are seen as dynamic verbs, which represent a context-free realisation, regarding the deixis use. Only in the case of kommen, this percentage is slightly higher (22,22%). However, deixis occurrence becomes the normal trend, which is evident in graphic 1 below, which visualizes this distribution.

Graphic 1: Distribution of motion events according to deixis use in absolute terms (in %)

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Graphic 1 clearly demonstrates the percentage of non-deictic events as more frequent for the kommen-realisations (22,22%), in comparison to gehen + kommen (15,07%) and gehen (10,08%). Di Meola’s remarks on the deiktische Grundbedeutung ‘deictic basic meaning’ of kommen as a dynamic verb, confirms this distribution. Therefore gehen requires deixis more often as a supporting means in order to complete its motion event due to a lack of deiktische Grundbedeutung (Di Meola 1994: 30). The findings regarding distribution of the identified deictic dimension, as well as the performed multimodal encoding are presented in the following graphics.

Graphic 2: Distribution of deixis dimension (in %)

It is worth mentioning in the case of graphic 2, that person deixis in absolute figures has only a few realisations (15,05%). Local deixis as well as the simultaneous occurrence of both deixis dimensions (person and local deixis) are the prototypical case concerning the analysed realisations.

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Graphic 3: Distribution of multimodal encoding (in %)

In graphic 3 only a quarter (24,73%) of all identified deictic realisations present exclusively verbal encoding. This trend can be individually verified for both gehen and kommen productions, whereby this value remains constant with 24,73% for the total deictic production, 24,14% for gehen and 25,71% for kommen. On the basis of graphic 3 it is evident that verbal deixis occurs more often with simultaneous gestural deixis (verbal-gestural deixis). This combination is therefore the prototypical multimodal encoding for all deictic events (54,30%). Thus, the multimodal character of this analysis makes the above outlined contrast between the exclusively verbal and the verbal-gestural performed deictic motion events evident. Without the consideration of nonverbal communication, realisations of the ‘verbal-gestural’-variable should have been counted among the ‘verbal’-variable. In accordance to this framework, verbal performed deixis would have yielded 79,03%. On the basis of the multimodal observation of gestures, gestural performed deixis can also be examined. Although exclusively gestural performed deixis is not strongly represented overall (20,97%), the increasing percentage for the kommen realisations (32,86%) demonstrate not only a stronger relationship between Di Meola’s deictic basic meaning of kommen, but a gestural deixis performance in this motion event as well. This percentage strengthens the idea that a multimodal analysis regarding the observation of nonverbal communication is not only justified, but necessary. An analysis with no video recordings – i.e. only on the basis of the transliterations of oral productions – would have only covered 79,03% of the deictic

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realisations. Nonverbal communication (20,97%) would have been therefore disregarded. In relation to the 140 exclusively gestural and verbal-gestural performed deictic events (graphic 3), gestures were mainly made with the hand (95% of the cases; 133 of the 140 realisations). However, 7 realisations were detected for which gesticulation was not performed with the hand, but with another part of the body, see (6) and (7). (6) wir gehen jetzt wenn wir draussen stehen rechts gehen gehen gehen gehen we go now when we outside stay right go go go go ‘Once we are outside, we go now to the right: go, go, go, go. . .’ (7) man braucht lange bis man zur Arbeit kommt one needs long time until one to the work comes ‘It takes a long time to come to work.’  

 

As figure 1 shows, even the full body was used in (6) to perform the typical ‘going’-body movement (as seen particularly in image on the right).

Figure 1: Images regarding the body movement when performing the four gehen-realisations in (6)

The image to the left represents the body position before the first gehen is pronounced. The image to the right demonstrates how the speaker performs/plays the actual ‘going’-body movement. Such play extends over the four gehen-realisations in a row from (6). In (7) however, the speaker gesticulates only with her head (see explanatory figure 2). In this case, the speaker performs a slight head movement to her right side. Her hands remain in the same position. Thus, it is exclusively on the basis of this head movement – neither towards speaker nor hearer – that one figures out where the ‘workplace’ from (7) might be.

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Figure 2: Images regarding the head gesture when performing (7)

As a remark to the analysed gestures, it can also be mentioned that these occur in all gehen-realisations in the far range of the speaker, i.e. away from the speaker. In the case of kommen just the opposite was to be observed, since the final destination of this motion verb coincides mostly with the close range (gehen in terms of ‘away from the speaker’ vs. kommen in terms of ‘up to the speaker’). However, in the analysed data this a priori logical distribution was not observed for the performed gestures when kommen events were used. Of the total 52 kommen realisations which were performed with deictic gesture, only 13,46% (7 of 52 realisations) were accompanied by a ‘gesture towards the speaker‘. These 7 realisations belong mostly to the group of the exclusively gestural deixis, see (8). (8) aber sie wollen nicht dass jemand zu ihnen kommt but they want not that somebody to them comes ‘But they do not want that somebody comes to them [i.e. to their home country].’

What is remarkable about all realisations with a ‘gesture towards the speaker‘ is the fact that these were extracted from text productions in which the subjects should provide an objective exposition regarding the situation of non-EU citizens in Europe. Combined with ‘gesture towards the speaker‘, kommen signalizes an identification of the final destination, as a semantic role of the motion event (understood as immigration country), with the origo as the place of residence or habitual residence of the speaker. This perspective, i.e. the identification in the form of deictic speaker-reference as can be seen in (8), is very strong. Indeed, apart from the third person performed as a prepositional group (zu ihnen ‘to them’), this motion event is performed with a ‘gesture with both hands towards the speaker‘ (see figure 3). Almost all gehen and kommen realisations showing an argument structure shift were performed (16 out of 17 cases) either with exclusively gestural deixis or

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Figure 3: Images regarding the ‘gesture towards the speaker’ in the moment of its performance (8)

with verbal-gestural deixis. Deictic gesticulation represents a prototypical feature of the realisations showing argument structure shift. With this in mind, it can be mentioned that up to 7 of all 17 documented realisations with argument shift (41,17%) show exclusively gestural deixis. This ratio is significant because this type of multimodal deixis encoding reaches the lowest distribution (20,97%) regarding all observed deictic performed motion events (see graphic 3). The above mentioned percentage increased to double figures in the cases of argument structure alternance, which, as stated before, suggests a strong correlation between gestural deixis and argument structure shift. When observing the identified deictic cases, one can also refer to wheather the respective origo coincides with the same speaker (speaker-reference), or this space-referential entity is identified with the context figure of the hearer (hearerreference). In the 186 realisations showing deixis, speaker-reference was preferred in the normal case by the speaker (109 of 186 deictic realisations, i.e. 58,60%). In contrast, hearer-reference was documented in 64 of 186 deictic realisations (34,40%), whereas only 13 of these realisations (6,98%) show an inclusive form for speaker and hearer. In all analysed cases, not only hearer-reference, but also this inclusive form was exclusively verbally encoded. The chosen form for hearerreference is in all cases of the pronominal group du (‘you’ second person singular), see example (9). The pronominal group wir (‘we’ first person plural), as well as the use of the possessive article (also in the first person plural) in a prepositional group (zu unserm Department ‘to our department’) indicate the inclusive speakerand hearer-reference, see correspondingly (10) and (11). In any case, the inclusive phenomenon to simultaneously point at speaker and hearer using verbal deixis is therefore not at all prototypical, quite infrequent (6,98%). Furthermore this inclusive reference was exclusively observed in one single speaker. Since the total number of analysed subjects is rather low, this phenomenon can be seen as quite restricted.

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(9) und dann der nächste Gang der kommt den gehst du nach rechts and then the next corridor which comes it go you to right bis bis fast ans Ende until until almost at the end ‘And then next corridor which comes, you go it [i.e. you take it] to the right until until almost the end.’ (10) dann kommen wir durch das durch das andere Tor then come we through the through the other gate ‘Then we come through the, through the other gate.’ (11) die Stiege die wir zu unser zu unserm Department gehen the stair which we to our to our department go ‘The stairs we go [i.e. take] to our, to our department.’

In all observed gestures, the speaker who is performing them is the starting point, i.e. she is origo of the deictic performed events. Graphic 4 shows that speaker-reference appears mainly for local-deixis (see point pattern and diamond pattern on the left bar), whereas hearer-reference, as well as the inclusive deixis variant (for speaker and hearer), primarily coincide with the simultaneous use of person- and local-deixis in one and the same motion event (see black on both central and right bars).

Graphic 4: Distribution of the combination of deixis dimension and deictic multimodal encoding regarding speaker- or hearer-reference (in %)

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On the basis of the graphic above, it can be shown that the coincidence of two deictic dimensions (person- and local-deixis) in one and the same motion event – gestural or verbal encoded – is directly linked to the hearer-reference or the inclusive form for speaker- and hearer-reference, i.e. independently from the factor multimodal encoding (black and white on both central and right bars). However, in the case of speaker-reference (left bar), exclusively gestural local-deixis (32,11%) as well as verbal-gestural local-deixis (26,61%) were primarily used. In contrast to the speaker-reference, in which the relation deixis dimension and multimodal encoding of deixis is rather inconsistent (see left bar in graphic 4), both feature hearer-reference and the inclusive deictic speaker- and hearer-reference are varying less often in relation to the two observed deictic analyse units (see central and right bar). Such minor varying relation leads to an absolute incompatibility between hearer-reference as well as the inclusive deictic speaker- and hearer-reference on the one hand, and the gestural encoding of deixis on the other. In other words, the identification of the origo with the hearer or simultaneously both interview participants, occurs in 100% of the cases on a verbal basis. And hereby more than three quarters of this total correspond to the verbal-gestural deixis (see central and right bar in graphic 4).

4 Restricted argument structure variation and prototypical reference to the production context through verbal and gestural deixis The identification of the indicators for subjective alternation on the basis of argument structure shift (propositional level) and the use of deixis (interactional level) lead to the following observations outlined below. In light of the presented findings, it can be stated that argument structure alternation occurs scarcely (only 6,11% of the cases). However, when argument shift is observed, agent deactivation does not exclude an implicit agent. In this sense, the motion event for the gehen and kommen realisations with shifted argument structure is not interrupted despite the morphosyntactic non-realisation of the agent. Rather, dynamics is here to record on the basis of the exact spatial positioning of the non-living semantic entities in the motion event (path, location, space, geographic place, etc.). Nevertheless, it must be acknowledged that a very strong relation between restricted propositional variation and the interactional variation exists due to all identified shifted argument structures performed with verbal and/or gestural encoded deixis, without exception. With this in mind, the direct reference to the actual production context, i.e. embodied communication, when argument struc-

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ture alternation occurs, becomes evident, which itself contributes to the creation of an intrinsic reference frame in terms of a subjective ‘view while exploring’ perspective when using the analysed dynamic verbs. Likewise, the multimodal approach of this study has made an analysis of nonverbal deixis possible. In the observed motion events, gestures were prototypically performed with the hand and in the far range of the speaker. Here the realisations with argument structure shift with exclusively gestural performed deixis demonstrate up to 41,47% of the observed sample. The mentioned percentage regarding this kind of multimodal encoding of deixis is twice as high in the case of the 186 observed deictic performed realisations (29,97%). Therefore, exclusively gestural deixis and argument shift show a relevant relationship to each other. With this in mind, an analysis regarding only the verbal level would have led to the classification of almost 30% of all gehen and kommen realisations with exclusively gestural deixis within the group of the non-deictic motion events, i.e. of the non speaker-/hearer-related motion events. Apart from the argument shift factor, verbal and/or gestural person- and/or local-deixis was documented in 84,93% of the cases. The high number of observed deictic realisations, which were not in a few cases (41,38%) whether hearer-related or simultaneously speaker- and hearer-related, indicates an evident coincidence of the realised gehen and kommen realisations with a subjective participation of the elements of the production context in the actual motion event. In other words, an intrinsic reference frame regarding the actual space-referential perspective was chosen in each case by the speaker. On the basis of the present study one can therefore verify the important role of situated and embodied communication for the analysed oral productions. This allows to reinforce the importance of the communicative approach in the context of foreign language acquisition. In addition to that, the nonverbal communication should not remain hereby disregarded, because close to a quarter of the information coming from a speaker, to be decoded by his/her hearer, occurs on a gestural basis. Which specific role should assume gesticulation in the context of foreign language teaching, is a question that clearly needs to be further investigated and defined.

References Blume, Kerstin. 2000. Markierte Valenzen im Sprachvergleich: Lizensierungs- und Linkingbedingungen. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Conti, Carmen. 2004. Valores diatéticos de los marcadores instrumentales y comitativos: enfoque tipológico. Revista Española de Lingüística 34/1. 97–126.

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Cienki, Alan. 2010. Gesture and (cognitive) linguistic theory. In Rosario Caballero & María Jesús Pinar (eds.), Ways and Modes of Human Communication (Colección de ESTUDIOS 129), 45–56. Cuenca: Ediciones de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha: Asociación Española de Lingüística Aplicada. Di Meola, Claudio. 1994. Kommen und gehen. Eine kognitiv-linguistische Untersuchung der Polysemie deiktischer Bewegungsverben (Linguistische Arbeiten 325). Tübingen: Niemeyer. Dowty, David. 1991. Thematic Proto-Roles and Argument Selection. Language 67(3). 547–619. Fernández-Villanueva, Marta & Oliver Strunk. 2009. Das Korpus Varkom – Variation und Kommunikation in der gesprochenen Sprache. Deutsch als Fremdsprache 46. 67–73. Fricke, Ellen. 2007. Origo, Geste und Raum. Lokaldeixis im Deutschen. Berlin: De Gruyter. Fricke, Ellen. 2014. Deixis, gesture, and embodiment from a linguistic point of view. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Sedinha Tessendorf (eds.), Body – Language – Communication. An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction (HSK 38.2), 1803–1823. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Goergen, Pascal. 1994. Das lexikalische Feld der deutschen inchoativen Verben. München: Iudicium Verlag. Kendon, Adam. 1980. Gesticulation and Speech: Two aspects of the process of utterance. In Mary Ritchie Key (ed.), Nonverbal communication and language, 207–227. The Hague: Mouton. Kendon, Adam. 2004. Gesture. Visible Action as Utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Müller, Cornelia. 1998. Redebegleitende Gesten. Kulturgeschichte – Theorie – Sprachvergleich. Berlin: Berlin Verlag. Polenz, Peter von. 1988. Deutsche Satzsemantik. Grundbegriffe des Zwischen-den-Zeilen-Lesens (Sammlung Göschen 2226), 2nd ed. Berlin & New York: De Gruyter. Primus, Beatrice. 1999. Cases and Thematic Roles. Ergative, Accusative and Active (Linguistische Arbeiten 393). Tübingen: Niemeyer. Sadziński, Roman. 2006. Diathesen und Konversen. In Vilmos Ágel, Ludwig M. Eichinger, Hans Werner Eroms, Peter Hellwig, Hans Jürgen Heringer & Henning Lobin (eds.), Dependenz und Valenz. Ein interaktionales Handbuch zeitgenossischer Forschung (Handbücher zur Sprachund Kommunikationswissenschaft 25.2), 963–973. Berlin & New York: De Gruyter. Schmid, Helmut. 1994. TreeTagger – a language independent part-of-speech tagger. http:// www.ims.uni-stuttgart.de/forschung/ressourcen/werkzeuge/treetagger.html (accessed 15 March 2015). Schumacher, Helmut, Jacqueline Kubczak, Renate Schmidt & Vera de Ruiter. 2004. VALBU – Valenzwörterbuch deutscher Verben (Forschungen des Instituts für deutsche Sprache 31). Tübingen: Narr Verlag. Strunk, Oliver. 2008. Lexic Tools: Una herramienta integrada para el etiquetado gramatical y el trabajo con concordancias. In Carmen M. Bretones Callejas & José R. Ibáñez Ibáñez (eds.), De la lingüística aplicada a la lingüística de la mente: Hitos, prácticas y tendencias. XXVI Congreso Internacional de la Asociación Española de Lingüística Aplicada (AESLA), 236–237. Almería: Universidad de Almería. Talmy, Leonard. 1972. Semantic Structures in English and Atsugewi. Berkeley: University of California dissertation. Talmy, Leonard. 1985. Lexicalization patterns: Semantic structure in lexical forms. In Timothy Shopen (ed.), Language typology and semantic description. (Grammatical categories and the lexicon 3), 36–149. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Talmy, Leonard. 2000. Towards a Cognitive Semantics, vol 2. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

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Sarah Schmidt, Universitat de Barcelona

Proxemics of Greetings and Farewells in Spanish and German Abstract: In a comparative analysis of two television series with a national flavour and which can be considered at least partially representative of German and Spanish populations, we will demonstrate existing cultural differences in the extent and type of physical contact in the situations of greetings and farewells, with the aim to confirm Hall’s hypothesis of the existence of “contact” and “noncontact” cultures (Hall 1963). Especially in intercultural communication, it is important to be aware of differences in cultural nonverbal behaviour in order to avoid misunderstandings and communication breakdowns. However, despite the importance of nonverbal communication, we will show that there is a considerable lack of empirical studies in proxemics, particularly in the field of physical contact. We will also point out the necessity of including nonverbal communication in Spanish foreign language learning. Keywords: multimodality, nonverbal communication, intercultural communication, cultural differences German/Spanish, cultural misunderstanding, proxemics, physical contact, greetings and farewells, Spanish as a foreign language

1 The importance of nonverbal communication A competent speaker of a foreign language not only displays a mastery of verbal and nonverbal codes in his or her first language, but also displays competence with a differing set of codes within their second language. The aim of this study is threefold: (1) to review how nonverbal communication, particularly proxemics, contribute to fulfill this communicative competence; (2) by means of a comparative analysis, the use of physical contact as a concrete proxemic element in situations of greetings and farewells in a German and Spanish television series; and (3) identifying the existing differences in the typology and the quantity of physical contact in German and Spanish Culture. Greetings and farewells are particularly interesting to analyse as they are primarily automatic and culturally coded forms which may vary from one culture to another. Greetings open and guide an encounter. When we direct a conversation incorrectly because of a misguided nonverbal cue, it may be difficult to get on well with our interlocutor or even continue a conversation with him or her.

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According to Calsamiglia and Tusón (2007: 201), this can occur since “those involved in an interaction turn to frameworks, schemes or norms which are partially or totally different” to the speakers’ first language and may assign “values of different senses to certain verbal or nonverbal contextualising indicators” (translation: S.S.). Additionally, it is important to know how people intend to end a conversation in a particular culture, as well as which signs are used in order to avoid possible misunderstandings. It may be that in one culture the farewell is relatively quick, whereas in another people talk for a quarter of an hour before finishing a conversation.

1.1 Cultural differences in proxemic behaviour Intercultural differences in tactile behaviour, as a part of proxemics, are given in the extension and type of physical contact. To demonstrate the former, Jourard (1966) analysed the frequency of physical contact between different cultures, observing couples sitting in sidewalk cafés in different countries. In San Juan, Puerto Rico, the couples touched 180 times per hour; in Paris, 110; in Gainesville, Florida, 2; and in London, 0. Evidently, individuals in some cultures touch much more frequently than in others. Hall (1963) classified cultures into two categories: contact cultures and non-contact cultures (although it is over-generalised since there are important inter-group variations). These groups differ within their tactile behaviour, visual contact, and inter-personal distance in face-to-face conversations. Arabs, Latin Americans and Southern Europeans (including Spanish) occupy the former group, displaying increased visual contact, while North Americans, Asians, Hindus, Pakistanis and Northern Europeans (including Germans) occupy the latter, displaying increased inter-personal distance. In a contrastive analysis of speech acts and politeness in Spanish and German, Siebold (2008) concluded that the students interviewed displayed greater distance among German interlocutors than Spanish. Furthermore, they stated Spaniards often exceed the limit of usual inter-personal distance in German culture, placing themselves within close proximity of their interlocutors, so that they were able to touch them if appropriate (Siebold 2008: 41). Different cultural behaviours can lead to misunderstandings or even communication breakdowns (Burwell 1999). Once nonverbal rules are internalized and processed, speakers may not be aware of them until they are violated, or until they find themselves in strange situations, which occur quite frequently in intercultural communication. A classic example can be found in specialist proxemics literature, such as Watson (1972), where during face-to-face conversation, an Arab, as part of a close-proximity contact-culture, gets too close to a North-American, who con-

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stantly tries to keep a certain distance while avoiding direct eye contact. Besides feeling uncomfortable because of the other’s strange behaviour, these individuals may tend to avoid another encounter. This lack of knowledge of cultural differences is also a source of stereotypes. Despite growing interest and studies in multimodal communication since 2004 with several specific journals and publications (see Müller et al. 2013 for the state of art), there are relatively few studies related to proxemics, with most currently focusing on kinetics, and to a lesser extent, paralanguage. The studies on proxemics focus primarily on the use of space regarding physical contact, while relying heavily upon observations of North American culture regardless of possible cultural differences (e.g. the studies of Hall 1963 and Watson 1972).

1.2 The necessity of including proxemics in foreign language learning Both the Council of Europe (2002: 118) henceforth CEFR, and the Plan Curricular del Instituto Cervantes (Instituto Cervantes 2001) include nonverbal communication as educational content in foreign language teaching as students have to acquire multicultural competence, including cultural and communicative competence (Hymes 1995), in order to become more native-like in the target language (see also Goodenough 1957, Tusón 2009, Saville-Troike 1989), as well as achieving “cultural fluency” (Poyatos 1994). There is a considerable body of research in business and healthcare communication (see Ambady and Rosenthal 1998) as well as training materials in the field of English for Specific Purposes or Intercultural Communication in Business. However, nonverbal communication is usually used in a tangential way in Spanish with foreign language teaching, as we will see when discussing the implications for language use in multilingual contexts and second language acquisition.

2 Comparative analysis of the use of physical contact Technical progress in multimedia has permitted us to access material in a multimodal way, using video to analyse how different verbal and nonverbal codes are articulated in discursive construction. In our analysis we therefore used Spanish and German television series, both representative of their respective culture, in order to show differences in the use of physical contact.

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The Spanish series Aquí no hay quien viva (henceforth ANHQV) has been a success on Spanish television since 20031. The series narrates the life of a peculiar community of neighbours in Madrid’s centre, displaying a typical daily life marked by scrapes and conflicts, as well as friendships and romantic relationships, while including characters from three mid-class generations, while depicting several Spanish stereotypes. The German series Unter Uns (from now on UU) serves as the corpus of contrast as it is broadly similar to ANHQV, regarding the exit, the plot, the communicative event and the interactional place. Both contain daily dialogues between neighbours, couples and friends with complaints and flirts, which take place within a flat, in the entrance of the building, on the street or an external place, such as a video-club or a baker’s shop. In terms of age, gender and relationships of characters, there are similarities between both series. However, unlike the Spanish series, UU does not include bisexual, homosexual or transsexual characters. However, there is a single 28-year-old who claims to be gay in order to be accepted in a women’s commune and to be closer to a girl he admires. In UU there appears to be more variety of relationships between relatives but for the purpose of analysis we are only analysing the relationship between mother and child. In 71 records, with 28 from ANHQV and 43 from UU, we capture the decisive moments of a physical contact in film frames, noted down by season, chapter and minutes, as well as the context of the scene and other details such as the relationship between the interlocutors, the position they take to each other, and the verbalizations that proceed, accompany, or follow the physical contact in order to analyse greetings and farewells (complete overview in Schmidt 2013). The following table illustrates the number of records for each of the situations, including the relationship (couples, friends, known people, unknown, mother-child), the age (A=10–15 years, B=16–20, C=21–27, D=28–39, E=40–59 and F=60+), and the gender (m=masculine, f=feminine) of the participants as well as the type of physical contact observed. These categories are made according to the data collected and the number of participants per age. The category “Others” include other relatives, which we do not take into consideration.

1 Antena 3. 2010. Aquí no hay quien viva. San Sebastián de los Reyes, Madrid. http://www. antena3.com/neox/series/aqui-no-hay-quien-viva/sobre/aqui-hay-quien-viva_2010060300331. html (accessed 25 October 2011).

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Table 1: Data for the situation of greetings Total

ANHQV

total

sa

da

UU sa

da

couples

4

4

0

3

3

0

mm

0

0

0

0

0

0

mf

4

4

0

3

3 (C)

0

ff

0

0

0

0

0

0

friends

3

2

1

2

2

0

mm

2

1 (B)

1 (A–D)

0

0

0

mf

0

0

0

1

1 (C)

0

ff

1

1 (D)

0

1

1 (E)

0

known

2

0

2

4

3

1

mm

1

0

1 (D–E)

1

1 (E)

0

mf

1

0

1 (E–F)

2

2 (C)

0

ff

0

0

0

1

0

1 (C–E)

Unknown

4

1

3

14

7

7

mm

3

1 (D)

2 (E–F)

3

2 (E)

1 (C–E)

mf

1

0

1 (E–F)

7

4 (C; E)

3 (C–E)

ff

0

0

0

4

1 ( C)

3 (B–E; C–E)

mother-child

1

0

1

2

0

2

mf

0

0

0

1

0

1 (C–E)

ff

1

0

1 (D–E)

1

0

1 (C–E)

others

0

0

0

8

0

8

14 total

33 47

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Sarah Schmidt

Table 2: Data for the situation of farewells Total

ANHQV

total

sa

da

UU sa

da

couples

5

4

1

0

0

0

mm

1

1 (D)

0

0

0

0

mf

4

3 (D; E)

1 (D–E)

0

0

0

ff

0

0

0

0

0

0

friends

4

1

3

3

3

0

mm

4

1 (D)

3 (A–D; D–E)

0

0

0

mf

0

0

0

2

2 (C)

0

ff

0

0

0

1

1 ( E)

0

known

3

2

1

1

1

0

mm

1

0

1 (D–E)

0

0

0

mf

2

2 (D–E)

0

1

1 (C)

0

ff

0

0

0

0

0

0

Unknown

2

1

1

1

0

1

mm

1

0

1 (D–E)

0

0

0

mf

1

1 (D)

0

1

0

1 (E–F)

ff

0

0

0

0

0

0

mother-child

0

0

0

2

0

2

mf

0

0

0

1

0

1 (C–E)

ff

0

0

0

1

0

1 (C–E)

others

0

0

0

3

1

2

14 total

10 24

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79

3 Analysis and results 3.1 Physical contact in greetings: Kiss, kiss on cheek, hug, shoulder touch, hand shake, hold hands, hip and arm touch The kiss is the most intimate of all physical contact, and specifically reserved for couples. Gender and age appear to be irrelevant, as well as the interactional place concerning the analysed data. The kiss on the cheek expresses not only a nonverbal greeting but happiness as well across both series. In ANHQV female friends group hug while jumping around and kissing the others happily on the cheek when their friend returns from prison. In another instance, a male kisses a woman he knows on the cheek to express his happiness. In general, it appears this type of physical contact is for all relationships except unknowns, independent of age. In UU however the physical contact is limited as it cannot be observed between knowns. The two scenes between friends are somehow unique, as can be observed in one scene, where a male friend claiming to be gay, kisses his female friend, which clearly cannot be misinterpreted as a flirt and is therefore acceptable. In another scene, two women have more than a simple friendship, as one is the ex-wife of the other’s brother and together they have gone through a difficult past. Here, the interactional place is also more intimate as the scenes take place at home, however in the Spanish series the interactional place does not influence physical contact. Couples hug to greet independent of age and gender, which is also usually accompanied by another kind of physical contact, such as a kiss in ANHQV, or a handshake in UU. The interactional place does not influence the nonverbal greeting, at least in the Spanish series. In other relationships, the hug seems to be the adequate nonverbal greeting, for instance between mother and child, while helping to share the emotion of the moment with happiness and proximity. In ANHQV the interactional place influences the tactile behaviour as mother and daughter greet in prison. In this series, the hug is also a valid touch between friends, independent of age and gender, in order to greet and express happiness. This can be observed with three girls hugging, while dancing and kissing the others on the cheek, or two male friends hugging after not having seen each other for years. The hug between two male friends is anything but unusual in the Spanish series. In addition, known people may also hug (see above Kiss on cheek). Not necessarily representative is the nonverbal greeting between two unknowns in the series UU, where two women are presented to be relatives, aunt and niece. This may be why the aunt feels inclined to hug her unknown niece. Furthermore, the interactional place also influences the physical contact, as the scene takes place within the confines of the aunt’s home.

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In our samples only knowns touch the other’s shoulder to greet. In one instance in ANHQV, it is accompanied with a handshake between two males of differing ages, most likely because the shaking of hands is not sufficient in this situation as one is surprised by his interlocutor’s visit and the touch creates a more familiar atmosphere, expressing certain levels of affection. In UU however, the shoulder touch can be observed as serving as flirtation. As the interactional place in both scenes is public, it would be interesting to analyse if this physical contact would be different in more private places. In UU known and unknowns shake hands to greet, independently of the gender or age of the interlocutors or the interactional place. In one instance, even after being presented as uncle and niece or aunt and niece, it is just the aunt who proceeds to hug her niece, after initially shaking hands. Here the interactional place is influential as the scene is at the aunt’s home. In ANHQV however, there is usually more physical contact between knowns, for instance knowns may touch their interlocutor’s shoulder, as it appears the handshake alone is too formal. The three situations between unknowns are not necessarily representative, as is the case with one nonverbal greeting taking place between a Spaniard who bows to a Japanese, thus greeting the way he supposes to be the correct Japanese way, or another nonverbal greeting between a neighbour and a doorman, with the situation being exaggerated since one wants to express formality as being a president of a high-ranking town property and therefore shake hands. In the Spanish series, male friends greet with a handshake which seems to be a typical masculine greeting between colleagues. In UU, holding hands is an intimate contact between couples and is accompanied by a kiss. It may also be used to serve as persuasion. In our samples, one particular scene between two female friends holding hands and hugging is not representative since they have more than a mere friendship, being the ex-wife of the other’s brother and rather close because of their complicated past as suggested earlier. In ANHQV two unknown males hold hands. Here, the contact serves as persuasion rather than as an expression of affection. The hip touch as a form of nonverbal greeting also appears to express happiness while implying a sense of affection. In UU it is reserved for more intimate relationships while in private interactional places (i.e. mother and son at home), displaying this contact in quite a short period of time. In ANHQV it is also used between friends and likely independent of gender and age (the samples only contain male-male friendship). Hip touches express a sense of happiness and are often proceeded by a hug. The interactional place is generally at someone’s home, thus displayed in rather intimate settings. Familiars greet with arm touches in UU, for instance a mother and daughter greeting can be observed with an arm touch, accompanied by a kiss on the cheek.

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Here the interactional place is intimate. In ANHQV however, the contact occurs on the street and is expressed with happiness when a woman greets her boyfriend nonverbally. Table 3: Physical contact in the situation of greetings ANHQV Type of physical contact & relationship

UU

Gender, age, interactional place, other physical contact, scene

Kiss Couple

m+f, 30, staircase, hug, 1_12_14.37 m+f, 30, home, hug, 1_12_51.59 m+f, 30, street, hug, 5_1_02.39

m+f, 22, street, kiss, 1_30_18.28

Kiss on cheek Mother-daughter 50–30, prison, hug, 5_1_21.35

40-22, home, take arms, 1_12_13.27

Friends

f+f+f, 30, home, hug, (happiness), 5_1_30.52

f+f, 40, hold hand, (special relationship), 1_13_10.59 m(gay)+f, 22, home, 1_50_02.32

Known

m+f, 50–30, hug, prison, 5_1_21.38

NP

Hug Couple

m+f, 30, staircase, kiss, 1_12_14.37 m+f, 22, home, hold hand, 1_42_22.30 m+f, 22, home, 1_50_15.33 m+f, 30, home, kiss, 1_12_51.59 m+f, 30, street, kiss, 5_1_02.39

Mother-daughter 50–30, prison, kiss on cheek, 5_1_21.35

NP

Mother-son

NP

40–22, home, hip touch, 1_1_04.30

Friends

m+m, 30, home, hip touch, 1_7_03.19 f+f+f, 30, home, kiss on cheek, (happiness), 5_1_30.52

NP

Known

m+f, 50–30, hug, kiss on cheek, 5_1_21.38

NP

Unknown

NP

f+f, 40–16, home, (relatives who get to know each other), hug, 1_1_18.17

m+m, 45–30, video club, handshake, 1_1_22.21

m+f, 22, staircase, 1_4_20.16

Shoulder touch Known

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Table 3: (continued) ANHQV Type of physical contact & relationship

UU

Gender, age, interactional place, other physical contact, scene

Handshake Friends

m+m, 30–12, video club, 1_12_06.38

NP

Known

m+m, 45–30, video club, shoulder touch, 1_1_22.21

f+f, 40–22, home, 1_12_17.06 m+f, 22, café, 1_29_12.28 m+m, 40, home, (almost amicable relationship), 1_50_17.46

Unknown

m+m, 65–50, entrance, (very formal), 1_12_06.10 m+f, 65–50, entrance, (very formal), 1_12_06.10 m+m, 30, home, (Spanish-Japanese), 5_1_12.43

m+f, 40–16, bakery, (relatives who get to know each other), 1_1_15.40 f+f, 40–16, home, (relatives who get to know each other), hug, 1_1_18.17 m+f, 40, home, 1_2_07.50 f+f, 40, staircase, 1_4_07.06 m+f, 22, street, 1_11_12.49 m+f, 40–22, home, 1_12_14.36 f+f, 40–22, home, 1_12_17.16 m+f, 40–22, home, 1_14_09.41 f+f, 22, door, 1_14_23.03 m+m, 40, home, 1_42_11.52 m+f, 40, home, 1_42_12.00 m+f, 40–22, home, 1_42_15.44 m+m, 40, hospital, 1_50.06.44 m+f, 40, hospital, 1_50_46 m+m, 40–22, home, 1_50_19.35

Couple

NP

m+f, 22, street, kiss, 1_30_18.28 m+f, 22, home, hug, 1_42_22.30

Friends

NP

f+f, 40, kiss on cheek, (special relationship), 1_13_10.59

Unknown

m+m, 50–30, video club, (persuade), 5_1_24.47

NP

Mother-son

NP

40–22, home, hug, 1_1_04.30

Friends

m+m, 30, home, hug, 1_7_03.19

NP

Hold hands

Hip touch

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Table 3: (continued) ANHQV Type of physical contact & relationship

UU

Gender, age, interactional place, other physical contact, scene

Arm touch Couple

m+f, 30, street, (happiness), 5_1_01.18.31

Mother-daughter NP

NP

40–22, home, kiss on cheek, 1_12_13.27

Analysis shows that nonverbal behavior is more limited in UU as the majority of friends greets only verbally or shake hands (see UU season 1, episode 2, minute 12.50 or season 1, episode 50, minutes 03.16 and 03.23), whereas in ANHQV, even male friends may hug, while also expressing a sense of happiness. Differences in visual behaviour can also be observed: in UU characters do not always make eyecontact whereas in ANHQV the characters almost always make eye-contact.

3.2 Physical contact in farewells: Kiss, kiss on cheek, hug, shoulder touch, pat on back, handshake, hold hands, chest, arm and cheek touch In ANHQV couples kiss independent of gender, age or the interactional place. In UU we can see the same results. A kiss on the cheek also expresses gratitude, as is the case in one scene in UU, where a daughter verbally thanks her mother for money, consolation or preoccupation. Here, the interactional place is irrelevant. In UU this physical contact is accepted between female or female-male friends of the same age where the latter is supposed to be gay, so that the kiss cannot be misinterpreted as a flirt. Couples hug to express farewells, independent of age and gender, which is usually accompanied by a kiss and/or shoulder touch, as can be observed in ANHQV. The same is observed for UU, where physical contact is also expressed, as in the instance of a mother wishing her son luck, or when consoling him. In this instance, it takes place at work, thus the interactional place is in a public setting. Interestingly, in ANHQV male friends, independent of age, also hug to express farewells, which is often accompanied by pats on the interlocutor’s back, and occasionally proceeded by a handshake. The interactional place is irrelevant.

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Couples may possibly touch their partner’s shoulder in order to express intimacy, as well as hug and kiss. In UU it is also used to express a wish of luck or serves as a consolation between a mother and son as is the case in one particular scene. In ANHQV this touch is often accompanied by a hug between male friends, independent of age and is also observed between knowns and unknowns, in order to express a farewell. For instance, this can be observed in a bedroom scene, where the doorman has fallen asleep on his neighbour’s bed and tries to leave quickly when being surprised by the new female neighbour. Whereas in UU, it is expressed within groups of friends and its function is to flirt. The interactional place is irrelevant. In our samples, only male friends pat on the back in ANHQV, which is almost always accompanied by a hug. In UU this physical contact is not observed. In UU the only nonverbal farewell between unknowns is to shake hands, whereas in ANHQV it could be accompanied by an arm touch, independent of age or the interactional place. It would be interesting to analyse if only male unknowns shake hands in the Spanish series, as only male friends greet nonverbally in this form, which seems to be a typical masculine farewell between colleagues, independent of age and usually accompanied by a pat on the back or a hug. In our samples, ANHQV displayed holding hands as an intimate and physical contact between couples, independent of age or gender; in UU, it is not observed. In UU, the touching of the chest is between relatives: for example, in one scene a father gives a punch on his son’s chest as a farewell but also to wish him luck. In one particular scene in ANHQV, the chest touch serves a different function, that of expressing hurry: a woman is in a hurry and a bit intoxicated and quickly wants to get away from her husband. Interestingly, in the Spanish series the touch also occurs between unknown males of different ages (50 and 30 approximately) and is accompanied by a handshake, an arm touch and an arm grab. Here its function is also to get attention and to express respect towards the other. All scenes take place in public places. It would be interesting to analyse if touching the chest is inappropriate in more intimate places. In addition, the arm touch/grab serves differing functions other than greetings, with the interactional place irrelevant. In ANHQV, couples use it to calm down the other, accompanied by a caress of the cheek or chin. Unknown males of different ages may also touch the other’s arm and shake hands or touch the chest to get attention and express respect towards the other. In UU the daughter expresses a farewell to her father by touching his arm while also expressing anger. Here the touch accentuates the irony of the verbal farewell. In another instance, two female friends, who have a close relationship, touch the other’s arm to express comfort or preoccupation; here the contact is accompanied by a kiss on the cheek.

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The caress of the cheek or chin is an intimate physical contact and is expressed independent of the interactional place. It is observable between couples and is also used to make others believe the couple has an affair. However, in ANHQV it also serves in order to diminish feelings of guilt and additionally is displayed between known people of different ages and genders. In UU caressing the cheek is not observed. Table 4: Physical contact in the situation of farewells ANHQV Type of physical contact & relationship

UU

Gender, age, interactional place, other physical contact, beginning of scene

Kiss Couple

m+f, 30, home, 1_7_15.15 m+f, 30–50, staircase, shoulder touch, hug, 5_1_39.26 m+m, 30, home, hold hand, 5_1_01.17.02

NP

Kiss on cheek Mother-daughter NP

40–22, street, (gratitude), 1_4_19.06

Friends

NP

m(gay)+f, 22, street, (gratitude), 1_42_22.22 f+f, 40, home, arm touch (comforting, preoccupation), 1_44_19.50 m(gay)+f, 22, home, 1_50_02.32

Couple

m+f, 30–50, staircase, shoulder touch, kiss, 5_1_39.26

NP

Mother-son

NP

40–22, bakery, shoulder touch (luck, comforting), 1_30_21.58

Friends

m+m, 30–12, entrance, handshake, NP pat on back, 1_7_39.55 m+m, 50–30, entrance, pat on back (also hierarchical relationship), 1_12_36.07 m+m, 30, entrance, 1_12_40.06 m+m, 30-12, street, shoulder touch, 1_12_40.12

Hug

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Table 4: (continued) ANHQV Type of physical contact & relationship

UU

Gender, age, interactional place, other physical contact, beginning of scene

Shoulder touch Couple

m+f, 30-50, staircase, hug, kiss, 5_1_39.26

NP

Mother-son

NP

40–22, bakery, hug (luck, comforting), 1_30_21.58

Friends

m+m, 30–12, street, hug, 1_12_40.12

NP

Known

m+m, 40–30, videoclub, 1_1_23.03

m+f, 22, entrance, (flirt), 1_4_20.16

Unknown

m+f, 30, home, 1_1_11.44

NP

m+m, 30–12, entrance, handshake, hug, 1_7_39.55 m+m, 50–30, entrance, hug, (also hierarchical relationship), 1_12_36.07

NP

Friends

m+m, 30–12, entrance, hug, pat on back, 1_7_39.55

NP

Unknown

m+m, 50–30, street, touch chest, touch arm, grab arm, 1_7_42.56

m+f, 60–40, home, 1_2_13.53

m+m, 30, home, kiss, 5_1_01.17.02

NP

Couple

m+f, 50, street, (drunk, hurry), 5_1_49.35

NP

Father-son

NP

40–22, bakery, (luck), (more a punch on chest), 1_30_21.58

Unknown

m+m, 50–30, street, handshake, touch arm, grab arm, 1_7_42.56

NP

Pat on back Friends

Handshake

Hold hands Couple Touch chest

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Table 4: (continued) ANHQV Type of physical contact & relationship

UU

Gender, age, interactional place, other physical contact, beginning of scene

Arm touch/ arm grab Couple

m+f, 30, prison, caress cheek/ chin, (calm down), 5_1_21.50

NP

Father-daughter

NP

40–22, home, (quick physical contact, angry, ironic), 1_42_08.35

Friends

NP

f+f, 40, home, kiss on cheek (comforting, preoccupation), 1_44_19.50

Unknown

m+m, 50–30, street, handshake, touch chest, 1_7_42.56

NP

Couple

m+f, 30, prison, arm touch, (calm down), 5_1_21.50

NP

Known

m+f, 50–30, prison, (sensation of guilty), 5_1_21.50 m+f, 50–30, staircase, (scene on purpose), 5_1_53.21

NP

Caress cheek/ chin

The results of the comparative analysis display differences in both type and quantity of physical contact. Touching is generally more limited and somewhat more distant in UU and occurs much less frequently. The only physical contact displayed and therefore accepted between known and unknowns is the shaking of hands, with 19 cases. Other scenes in UU are not necessarily representative due to the nature of the circumstances. Touching behaviour is also more limited, even in intimate relationships, such as parent-child, in comparison to ANHQV. Furthermore, touching expresses affection more than a simple goodbye. In ANHQV however, there seems to be a need to make physical contact with other individuals. Hugging between male friends seems to be nothing out of the ordinary, and even between known and unknowns, there is usually more physical contact than a handshake alone as can be observed in UU.

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Differences are also observed in visual behaviour, where in UU individuals tend to look less directly when they greet their interlocutor. As both series are somewhat representative of the German and Spanish population respectively, we can conclude that the results show a tendency in Spain to display increased physical contact while in Germany people limit their tactile behaviour. Table 5: Amount of physical contact in the two series

Type of physical contact & relationship

ANHQV

ANHQV

ANHQV

UU

UU

UU

Amount of instances greetings

Amount of instances farewells

total

Amount of instances greetings

Amount of instances farewells

total

Kiss Couple

6 3

3

Kiss on cheek

6

4 1

0

3

4 7

Mother-daughter

1

0

1

1

1

2

Friends

1

0

1

2

3

5

Known

1

0

1

0

0

0

Hug

12

5

Couple

3

1

4

2

0

2

Mother-daughter

1

0

1

0

0

0

Mother-son

0

0

0

1

1

2

Friends

2

4

6

0

0

0

Known

1

0

1

0

0

0

Unknown

0

0

0

1

0

1

Shoulder touch

5

3

Couple

0

1

1

0

0

0

Mother-son

0

0

0

0

1

1

Friends

0

1

1

0

0

0

Known

1

1

2

1

1

2

Unknown

0

1

1

0

0

0

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Table 5: (continued)

Type of physical contact & relationship

ANHQV

ANHQV

ANHQV

UU

UU

UU

Amount of instances greetings

Amount of instances farewells

total

Amount of instances greetings

Amount of instances farewells

total

Handshake

7

19

Friends

1

1

2

0

0

0

Known

1

0

1

3

0

3

Unknown

3

1

4

15

1

16

Hold hands

2

3

Couple

0

1

1

2

0

2

Friends

0

0

0

1

0

1

Unknown

1

0

1

0

0

0

Hip touch

1

1

Mother-son

0

0

0

1

0

1

Friends

1

0

1

0

0

0

Arm touch

3

3

Couple

1

1

2

0

0

0

Mother-daughter

0

0

0

1

0

1

Father-daughter

0

0

0

0

1

1

Friends

0

0

0

0

1

1

Unknown

0

1

1

0

0

0

Pat on back Friends

2 0

2

Touch chest

2

0 0

0

2

0 1

Couple

0

1

1

0

0

0

Father-son

0

0

0

0

1

1

Unknown

0

1

1

0

0

0

Caress cheek/ chin

3

0

Couple

0

1

1

0

0

0

Known

0

2

2

0

0

0

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4 Discussion of results and implications for intercultural communication Results show a tendency of touching behaviours in situations of greetings and farewells, which are quite distinctly across German and Spanish cultures as can be seen in the analysis above, despite the small sample. Moreover it must be noted that a few scenes in UU are not necessarily representative of the German population as a whole, as they are only single examples of determinate relationships. However, even in this limited analysis, the results depict a tendency in the data type of the present analysis. In regards to proxemics, the current literature focuses in such areas of kinetics and paralanguage. However, despite the importance of nonverbal communication and the existing cultural differences in nonverbal communication concerning touching behaviours, including the type of physical contact we have analysed, there appears to be a considerable lack of empirical research within this area. Concerning intercultural communication, it is important to know different nonverbal behaviour patterns in order to avoid misunderstandings and communication breakdowns. Differences in the use of physical contact are also sources for stereotypes. It is common knowledge that Spaniards and Germans have different touching behaviours. As a consequence, many Germans believe Spaniards may invade an individual’s personal space and demonstrate extreme physical contact. Siebold (2008: 41) mentions a Spanish student who explains how a German acquaintance blushed when taken by the arm, adding that she wants to lose the habit of touching German interlocutors in order to avoid misunderstandings. A German student studying in Spain expressed feeling uncomfortable when her Spanish female friends touched her when talking to her: “Man fühlt sich dann so unfrei, als wollten sie von einem Besitz ergreifen” ‘One feels so unfree, as if they want to take possession of you’ (Siebold 2008: 41). In contrast, Spaniards perceive German behaviour to be distant and somewhat cold. There is a considerable body of research in business and healthcare communication providing frameworks for intercultural conversation. Both the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (Council of Europe 2002: 118) and the Cervantes Institute Curriculum include nonverbal communication as educational content in foreign language teaching, or teaching Spanish as a foreign language, respectively. Nonverbal communication cannot be left outside the language classroom if our aim as teachers is for students to acquire necessary communicative and intercultural competence. However, concerning the teaching of Spanish as a foreign language, nonverbal communication is usually instructed in a tangential way, as we can see in

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Spanish language text books. Currently their teaching methodologies follow the CEFR, which include nonverbal communication in the description of educational content, however they seem to neglect some important aspects. An analysis and comparison of Planet@, Aula, and Gente, from the publishing companies Edelsa and Difusión show this need to revise, complete and improve materials for Spanish language teaching: 1. Out of 192 pages, Planet@ 2 only covers one particular topic of nonverbal communication: gestures, covering two pages in a very basic and superficial way (Cerrolaza et al. 2001: 96/97). Planet@ 3, with a total of 184 pages, does not explicitly dedicate a single page to nonverbal communication (Cerrolaza et al. 1999). (d) Out of 111 pages, Aula 2 dedicates only one page to nonverbal communication, briefly informing a few important aspects including a short exercise encouraging students to think about how people behave in their own cultures (Corpas et al. 2003: 75). Aula 3, with a total of 119 pages, only provides one exercise aimed at nonverbal communication (Corpas et al. 2004: 58). (e) In two out of 167 pages, Gente Nueva Edición 2 gives a decent overview and introduction to nonverbal communication (Martín et al. 2004: 22), while going into such details as silence, postures, visual behaviour, gestures, microexpressions, physical contact, etc. (Martín et al. 2004: 23). In 2 out of 171 pages, Gente Nueva Edición 3 covers in detail only one particular topic of nonverbal communication: emotions (Martín et al. 2005: 103). The lack of nonverbal communication appears to be a general tendency in foreign language teaching, as can be observed with the text books mentioned above.

References Ambady, Nalini & Robert Rosenthal. 1998. Nonverbal Communication. In Howard S. Friedman (ed.), Encyclopedia of Mental Health, 2. San Diego, California: Academic Press. http://ambadylab.stanford.edu/pubs/1998Ambady.pdf (accessed 25 December 2015) Burwell, Jim. 1999. May I Touch You? Haptics in the Multicultural Workplace. Gender Journal: Men and Women Working Together 10. 1–13. Calsamiglia, Helena & Amparo Tusón. [1999] 2007. Las cosas del decir: Manual de análisis del discurso, 2nd ed. Barcelona: Ariel. Instituto Cervantes. 2001. Plan Curricular del Instituto Cervantes. Presentaciones de la versión electrónica. http://cvc.cervantes.es/ensenanza/biblioteca_ele/plan_curricular/presentaciones.htm (accessed 1 October 2012).

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Cerrolaza, Matilde, Óscar Cerrolaza & Begoña Llove. 1999. Planet@ 3. E/LE, 3rd ed. Madrid: Edelsa. Cerrolaza, Matilde, Óscar Cerrolaza & Begoña Llove. 2001. Planet@ 2. E/LE, 3rd ed. Madrid: Edelsa. Corpas, Jaime, Agustín Garmendia & Carmen Soriano. 2003. Aula 2. Curso de español. Barcelona: Difusión. Corpas, Jaime, Agustín Garmendia & Carmen Soriano. 2004. Aula 3. Curso de español. Barcelona: Difusión. Council of Europe. 2002. Marco común europeo de referencia para las lenguas: Aprendizaje, enseñanza, evaluación. http://cvc.cervantes.es/OBREF/marco/cvc_mer.pdf (accessed 07 January 2010). Goodenough, Ward H. 1957. Oceana and the problem of controls in the study of cultural and human evolution. Journal of the Polynesian Society (66). 146–155. Hall, Edward. T. 1963. A system for the notation of proxemic behavior. Selected Papers in Method and Technique. American Anthropologist, 65 (5). 1003–1026. Hymes, Dell. 1995. Acerca de la competencia comunicativa. In Miquel Llobera (coord.), Competencia comunicativa: Documentos básicos en la enseñanza de lenguas extranjeras, 27–46. Madrid: Edelsa. Jourard, Sydney. M. 1966. An explanatory study of body-accessibility. British Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 5. 221–231. Martín Peris, Ernesto & Neus Sans Baulenas. 2004. Gente Nueva Edición 2. Barcelona: Difusión. Martín Peris, Ernesto, Neus Sans Baulenas & Nuria Sánchez Quintan. 2005. Gente Nueva Edición 3. Barcelona: Difusión. Müller, Cornelia, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Sedinha Tessendorf. 2013. Body-Language-Communication: An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction. (HSK: 38.1). Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Poyatos, Fernando. 1994. La comunicación no verbal, II. Paralenguaje, kinésica e interacción. Madrid: Istmo. Saville-Troike, Muriel. 1989. The ethnography of communication: An introduction, 2nd ed. Oxford: Blackwell. Schmidt, Sarah. 2013. Proxémica y comunicación intercultural: la comunicación no verbal en la enseñanza de E/LE. Barcelona: Autonomous University of Barcelona dissertation. Siebold, Kathrin. 2008. Actos de habla y cortesía verbal en español y en alemán. Estudio pragmalingüístico e intercultural. Frankfurt: Lang. Tusón, Amparo. 2009. El concepto de competencia comunicativa y la enseñanza del español como lengua extranjera. Didáctica Del Español Como Lengua Extranjera, 9. 223–235. Watson, O. Michael. 1972. Proxemics as nonverbal communication. In Samir K. Ghosh (ed.), Man, language and society: Contributions to the sociology of language, 224–231. The Hague: Mouton.

Elena Isaeva and Marta Fernández-Villanueva, Universitat de Barcelona

Gestures and Lexical Access Problems in German as Second Language Abstract: This study employs an interactional approach to explore the interplay between gestures in oral production in German as second language and lexical access problems. It looks at the principal gestural functions in communication and checks their possible relation to second language fluency and proficiency. For that purpose the interaction of 6 Spanish/Catalan native speakers performing an argumentation task in German as their second language was analyzed. When lexical access problems occurred, the sequence was analyzed in order to identify and classify the searched lexical items and the performed hand gestures. The findings support the Information Packaging Hypothesis and a rethinking of the traditional lexical compensatory function of gestures. The results show that lexical access problems mostly coincide with emphatic and pointing gestures that perform discursive and interactional functions in communication. Gestures that depict image and have referential functions are represented scarcely and decrease with an improvement in proficiency. No correlation is found between proficiency and other gestural types. An increase in speech rate negatively correlates with the lexical access problems that are produced without gestures, but is unrelated to gestural types. Frequency of silent pauses is strongly related neither to the amount of lexical access problems, nor to the type of lexical item, nor to the most frequently presented gestural types. Keywords: communication, embodied communication, fluency, gestural functions, gesture types, language development, multimodal communication, lexical access, German, proficiency, retrieval, Second Language Acquisition

1 Gestures in second language acquisition It should be noted that an approach to gestures as a part of multimodal communication is mostly prevalent in cognitive studies and is still scarce in the field of second language acquisition. Accordingly to Gullberg (2006, 2010), the research in second language acquisition is primarily focused on three main topics: gesture acquisition in connection with second language, possible impact of gestures on second language acquisition, and gestures as indicators of second language

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development. The present study is devoted to the latter field and explores the interplay between gestures and lexical access problems in German as a second language of participants with various levels of fluency and proficiency.

1.1 Multimodal communication The importance of multimodal interaction in science and cognition was defended by Rosch, Thompson and Varela (1992: 172–173) who noted that all human reactions and interpretations of the world depend on the body experience (embodied sensorimotor capacities), but the body experience itself is influenced by biological, psychological and cultural contexts. Accordingly to Norris (2004), the embodied communication is a complex and multimodal process, where at least two interlocutors perceive, exchange and interpret information with respect to their feelings, thoughts and previous experiences. In the same way, Poggi (2001: 2) notes that communication always contains information about the world (abstract and concrete events) and the speaker’s mind (goals, beliefs and emotions). From this perspective, gestures are one of the communication modalities (together with bodily, facial, lexical, graphic, and vocal modalities) and serve as “mind-markers”. Using gestures, the speakers indicate certainty or metacognitive information, communicative goals, or focus of attention. Norris (2004), in her study of multimodal interaction, also explores these modalities, and suggests that they may vary in “density”, i.e. the grade of importance and informativity, which depends on the situation and personality of participants. In relation to second language acquisition, it is important to explore if gestural density depends on proficiency and fluency of the second language, because until now, little research has been done on this topic. Graziano and Gullberg (2013) studied gesture production in fluent and disfluent first language speech by 33 Italian children and 11 Italian adults. They also analyzed gestures with regard to the second language production of 11 Dutch learners of French with low and intermediate levels. An adult instructor presided over each session, providing feedback and asking questions during the narrative task. The results for all tested groups show that gestures tend to occur with fluent speech and are completed and stop when the speech stops. It shows that disfluencies in speech do not necessarily provoke abundant gesticulation. Moreover, this study proves that speech coincides not only with referential, but also with pragmatic gestures that help to organize discourse. This discovery suggests a rethinking of traditional approaches that primarily describe the lexical compensatory functions of referential gestures (McNeill 1992) and shows the need to do more investigations of the interconnection between gestural functions and speech.

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1.2 Gesture typology Nowadays, many researchers understand the term of gestures in a broad way: besides hand movements, they suggest including gaze, head, leg and foot movements (Seo and Koshik 2010). However, in the current study we define gestures in a more traditional way, as with the movements produced by hands, arms or shoulders (McNeill 1992). We prefer to narrow the term as the principal aim of this work is to look at the gestural functions with regard to second language complexity and development. In the literature, gestural typologies are based on form or function criteria. The first systematic linear typology of gestures was offered by Kendon (1980). Like speech, gestures may be divided into minimal units, or phases. Each gesture has a stroke phase, which is the most significant, while helping to distinguish one gesture from another, and may be strongly related to the speech content. In this study we focus on the gestures that coincide in time with the lexical access problems in speech. The functional typologies depend on the role that gestures play in the interaction. In Table 1, we summarize various approaches and show how the criteria expand to cover the gestural functions empirically. Table 1: Main functional typologies of gestures Function Autostimulative

Interactional

Definition

Discursive

Term

Referential

Author

Concrete Abstract McNeill (1992)

iconic

represent images of concrete actions or entitles

metaphoric

depict abstract content

deictic

point time, objects and directions

beats

related to discourse

Graziano referential and Gullberg pragmatic (2013)

depict reference (size, shape, function) indicate speech acts, comment on speaking production, parse speech

+

+ +

+

+ +

+

.

+

+

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Table 1: (continued)

Concrete Abstract Cienki and Müller (2008)

referential

depict objects, attributes of objects or people, actions, behaviors and can refer to abstract and concrete entities

+

+

performative enact speech acts (e.g. requesting for information, forcing to do something) discourse

Lausberg pointing and Sloetjes (2009) depict motion depict object

Autostimulative

Function Interactional

Definition

Discursive

Term

Referential

Author

+

structure an utterance (e.g. beats, counting)

+

indicate a specific visible or non-visible location direction in space

+

+

depict image (motion; forms, objects; position with focus of reference)

+

+

+

depict space emphasis

help to make emphasis in discourse

emotional

show intrinsic emotional expressions

conventional depict unified meanings in the cultural society autostimula- indicate internal regulation tive

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

In the classification by McNeill (1992), only referential and discursive functions of gestures are taken into consideration, and they are based on the four functional types. Three of them are related to the speech content (deictic, iconic and metaphorical), and the fourth is related to discourse (beats). Iconic gestures

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represent concrete concepts, and metaphorical gestures represent abstract ones. Deictic gestures indicate directions, time and objects. Beats organize discourse and rhythmically coincide with the prosody in speech. In the typology by Graziano and Gullberg (2013), the distinction is made between the representational (oriented to reference) and pragmatic gestures. Pragmatic gestures are defined as those that help to organize discourse or indicate speech acts. It means that the authors expand discursive function and speak about the pragmatic role within one type. Thus, the interactional function is taken into consideration in their typology. The interactional function of gestures was first mentioned in the research by Fricke (2007). Following Bühler, she widened the concept of origo ‘reference point for deixis’ proving that deictic gestures may be oriented toward the speaker and toward the interlocutor. The interactional, referential and discursive criteria are also taken into consideration by Cienki and Müller (2008) who distinguish referential (represented as either abstract or concrete content), performative (represented as speech acts and having interactional functions) and discursive gestures (help to structure utterances). The typology by Lausberg and Sloetjes (2009), created for empirical studies of gestural behavior NEUROGES, consists of 3 modules. Module III illustrates the authors’ vision of gestural functions and is summarized in Table 1. Contrary to the previously mentioned classifications, the authors distinguish not only three, but four functional criteria of gestures, introducing the autostimulative gestural type, which indicates the “internal regulation” of the speaker while aiding in concentration (Lausberg and Sloetjes 2009: 844). Such gestures are usually produced on the body or any other surface, and differ from the beats in McNeill’s typology. They are related to the cognitive dimension, which has been neglected in previous studies of second language acquisition and deserves more attention. Lausberg and Sloetjes (2009) distinguish gestures that represent motion, object and space as different types, but in Table 1 we group them all as one single type that depicts image. It would make further data segmentation easier, as all these gestures are related to the referential function in communication. The emotional gestures can also perform referential function, as they can express content modalisation. Pointing and conventional gestures could be related both to reference or interlocutor, indicating a speech act, as in the typology by Graziano and Gullberg (2013). Emphatic gestures have a discursive function. The classification by Lausberg and Sloetjes (2009), expanded in Lausberg (2013), is chosen as a basis for the present research: as it takes into consideration the four functional criteria of gestures and is the most precise and appropriate for the analysis of gestures as a part of multimodal communication.

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1.3 Gestures and lexical access The role of gestures in oral production is traditionally observed in linguistics from one of the two main perspectives (Alibali, Kita and Young 2000), either based on the Lexical Retrieval Hypothesis or on the Information Packaging Hypothesis. According to Krauss, Chen and Gottesman (2000), the Lexical Retrieval hypothesis helps to form utterances and directly participates in the speech process. This was a fundamental concept for McNeill (1992), who focused on iconic gestures and underlined their ability to substitute the lexical item and, thus, aid in word retrieval. The Information Packaging Hypothesis states that gestures actively participate in problem solving and play a significant role in thinking and conceptualization. Empirical evidence for this hypothesis is provided by Alibali, Kita and Young. (2000). They tested 18 English native speaking children who were asked to use sand or play dough while speaking during the explanation and description tasks. Results indicated that the explanation task, which required more retrieval load and analytical thinking, provoked more gestures during lexical access problems. Moreover, such gestures were far more spontaneous and complex, and mostly related to conceptual planning, not to shape representation of words. Alibali, Kita and Young (2000: 16) concluded that gestures were involved in some other speech processes apart from retrieval. The experiment by Beattie and Coughlan (1999) was also aimed to check if any gestural types actively helped to retrieve forgotten words. For these purposes, 60 native speakers of English were observed at their tip-of-the-tongue state. The first group was allowed to gesticulate while the second one was totally immobile. The results proved, however, that iconic gestures rarely helped to resolve the tipof-the-tongue state, and occurred less frequently than beats and self-adaptors, i.e. autostimulative gestures in Lausberg and Sloetjes’s (2009) terminology. Such findings proved the need to focus more on the autostimulative and discursive roles of gestures during word retrieval. Recent neurological studies shed light on the differences in brain processes during retrieval of abstract and concrete words. According to Meteyard et al. (2012), concrete words have more “imageability”, and are much more dependent upon the context. Abstract words are significantly more related to some emotional, affective information. These affective components first help us to memorize such words, and later to retrieve them much faster than the concrete ones (Kousta et al. 2011; Vigliocco et al. 2014). Such findings suggest that the type of lexical item may affect the amount of gesticulation, and, thus, it is useful to make a distinction between the abstract and concrete words in the present analysis. In the field of second language acquisition, Graziano and Gullberg (2013) recently stated that not only referential, but pragmatic gestures may also be

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related to word retrieval. In the same way, Lucero, Zaharchuk and Casasanto (2014) proved that the most significant role in retrieval is played by the beats (discursive function) and not by the iconic gestures (referential function). These crucial results, however, were obtained experimentally and in a native speech of English participants: the authors used a word-naming task and instructed all participants to produce either iconic (group 1) or beat gestures (group 2) during the word searches. Such findings still need to be checked with regard to second language production. Moreover, the participants interactive production should be elicited in more natural situations and tasks, which mirror more closely multimodal communication. In addition, while dealing with lexical access problems in oral production, it is important to distinguish this process from the planning. Following Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva (2013), who analyzed lexical access problems in written production through think-aloud protocols, lexical access problems may be disclosed through linguistic (meta-comments, problem-indication, self-questioning and problem-solving, self-evaluation, paraphrasing) and paralinguistic indicators (long pauses and rising intonation). To sum up, there is still a scarcity of research focusing on multimodal communication in the field of second language acquisition. Some recent findings from the cognitive studies may be adapted and checked. Still, there is a discussion on how gestures are related to oral production and what kind of gestures may help in word retrieval. Still little is known about their possible interdependence with fluency and proficiency. Interaction in German as a second language also deserves more attention and seems a prospective source for new investigations.

2 Second language learners of German in interaction The main aim of the present study is to observe what kind of gestures occur with lexical access problems in German second language interaction and to check if the amount and type of gestures are related to fluency and proficiency factors.

2.1 Interactive argumentative sequences from the VARKOM Corpus To answer these research questions, we analyzed six videotaped interviews from the VARKOM corpus, compiled at the University of Barcelona to investigate variation in multimodal communication among learners of German as foreign

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language. The participants were videotaped while performing a set of oral tasks, while being interviewed in their first and second languages (German, Spanish, Catalan) by a native speaker (Fernández-Villanueva and Strunk 2009). For this study, we analyzed the oral production collected during the argumentation task, which allowed us to observe semi-spontaneous speech and the interaction between the learner and a native speaker. After a preliminary interview in German, the participants received pictures of older men and children as stimuli and were asked to answer the following question and defend one statement: Are older men better fathers than younger ones? The interviewer was instructed to defend the opposite point of view to actively prompt consecutive counterarguments. The resulting production was transcribed, segmented and video aligned in ELAN. To be able to look at the gestures with regard to language development, we selected the interaction of six Spanish/Catalan students from the University of Barcelona who had various proficiency levels in German and varied in gender (see Table 2). Proficiency was previously established using a vocabulary test and a C-test, and the chosen participants were between intermediate and advance levels. The instructor who interacted with the participants in the elicitation task was a German native speaker of the same age as the participants. Table 2: Participants and productions Participants

Speaker 1

Speaker 2

Speaker 3

Speaker 4

Speaker 5

Speaker 6

Gender

female

male

female

male

female

male

Proficiency

Intermediate

Intermediate

Upperintermediate

Upperintermediate

Advanced

Advanced

Total time of the task production (sec.)

231

300

295

145

186

348

Time spoken (sec.)

176

189

265

108

124

325

Number of words

353

375

453

194

296

841

To check the possible correlations between gesture types and fluency, the speech rate and frequency of silent pauses per minute were calculated as the criteria for utterance and breakdown fluency (see Table 3). Following De Jong et al. (2013), speech rate was calculated by dividing the number of syllables by total time. The

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audio material was uncut – false starts and filled pauses were included in the analysis. Frequency of silent pauses per minute was calculated by dividing the number of silent pauses by total time. A minimum threshold for the silent pauses was 250 msec. Table 3: Fluency of participants Participants

Sp.1

Sp.2

Sp.3

Sp.4

Sp.5

Sp.6

Female

male

female

male

female

male

Time spoken (sec.)

176

189

265

108

124

325

Number of syllables

500

594

660

289

405

1245

60

55

99

28

37

113

Speech rate (syll./sec.)

2,84

3,14

2,49

2,675

3,26

3,83

Number of silent pauses per min.

0,34

0,291

0,373

0,259

0,298

0,347

Gender

Number of silent pauses

During the data analysis the segments with lexical access problems were identified first and the involved lexical items (abstract or concrete words) were classified. Cases with non-identifiable items were excluded. Secondly, hand gestures that coincided with lexical access problems were disclosed, using the typology by Lausberg and Sloetjes (2009). Finally, the gestural functions in communication (referential, discursive, interactional, autostimulative) were identified (see Table 1).

2.2 Identification of lexical access problems and gestures To distinguish disfluencies in speech, we used the criteria from Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva (2013). However, some indicators, such as pauses, rising intonation, or repetitions, could be both related to lexical access problems or planning process. Below we show some of their functions that may help to identify lexical access correctly. For example, the disfluencies that coincided with discourse markers or connectors like und ‘and’, weil ‘because’ or ich meine ‘I think’, das stimmt ‘right’, were related to the planning process. In this case, the pauses and repetitions were typically followed, not by single word, but by the whole argumentation mode as in (1):

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(1)

ich entscheide mich mal für für für [pause] die jungere Väter ‘I decide in favor of of of [pause] the younger fathers’ Speaker 2 [00.00.00–00.03.51]

Moreover, rising intonation and repetitions were interpreted as emphasis, where all the utterances sounded smooth and lacked long pauses between the words, as in (2): (2)

Stell dir vor, man hat den ganzen Leben gespart, Geld gespart. ‘Imagine, you have been saving for all your life, have been saving money’ Speaker 6 [00.00.53–00.00.57]

The ambiguous cases which could be equally related to the lexical access problems and to planning processes were excluded (6 out of 60). Thus, 54 cases remained for further analysis. Later, we checked if abstract or concrete items were involved in the word searches. On this stage, three cases with non-identifiable words were excluded. As a result, only 51 utterances with lexical access problems remained for the final analysis. Hand gestures were classified following the typology by Lausberg and Sloetjes (2009: 842–845). Module I was used for describing kinetic characteristics of gestures, such as their trajectory and dynamics (phasic, repetitive, continuous, shift, stopped) and their relation in space towards the body and other objects (in contact or distant). Module II was used as a basis to define the spatial and functional relation between the two hands. Two hands in touch may act as a unit or on each other. Separate hand movements may have right-hand dominance, left-hand dominance or perform complementary, symmetrical, independent functions. Module III was used for description of gestural functions (see Table 1).

3 Gestural functions and second language development For the present study we observed gestural production that coincided with the lexical access problems in speech. Moreover we analyzed their possible relation to such factors, as second language fluency and proficiency.

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3.1 Gestures that occur with lexical access problems First of all, we explored the gestural functions that occurred during lexical access problems in speech across all of our participants. In total, 51 cases of lexical access problems in speech were identified. Mostly, they were related to the search of abstract words (73%) rather than concrete ones (27%). Such results coincide with the neurolinguistic findings by Meteyard et al. (2012). As we expected the majority of cases with lexical access problems (41 out of 51) was accompanied by gestures. These findings let us hypothesize that lexical access problems typically involve searches for abstract words and tend to coincide with gesticulation. Our next step was to calculate the amount of each functional gesture type. In all the 41 cases, the most frequently occurring types were the emphatic (28 cases) and pointing gestures (6 cases). The other types were represented very scarcely (only 2 conventional, 2 image, 3 autostimulative and 0 emotional gestures). Analyzing the role of gestures in speech, we discovered that the discursive function significantly prevailed in the cases with lexical access problems (28 cases). Referential function was represented scarcely (5 cases distributed between conventional, image and pointing gesture types). This result coincides with the findings by Lucero, Zaharchuk and Casasanto (2014). Interestingly, pointing gestures mostly performed interactional functions (5 cases out of 6) and not referential (1 case out of 6). In our data, all the identified gestures had either phasic or repetitive trajectory. In Table 4 we analyzed how this parameter may be related to the gestural type, and discovered that pointing gestures are mostly phasic (5 out of 6), while emphatic gestures are mostly repetitive (20 out of 28). Table 4: Trajectory and dynamics of each gesture type for 6 participants Image (n=2)

Emotional (n=0)

Conventional (n=2)

Autostim. (n=3)

Pointing (n=6)

Emphatic (n=28)

phasic (n=20)

2

–

2

3

5

8

repetitive (n=21)

–

–

–

–

1

20

Moreover, some relation between the trajectory and the start time of the gesture was found (see Table 5). Repetitive gestures mostly start before the target word, and phasic gestures tend to coincide with it in time.

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Table 5: Start time of gestures with regard to trajectory phasic (n=20)

repetitive (n=21)

5

20

WITH (n=15)

14

1

AFTER (n=1)

1

0

BEFORE (n=25)

Analyzing the parameter of time with relation to gestures and speech, we found out that image gestures never started before the target item. Thus, they did not aid in retrieval. Conventional gestures always occurred after the target word and coincided with self-evaluation comments. They showed the feelings of the speaker about the choice made, but did not aid in lexical access. For example, in (3) the speaker touches her temple and straightens her arm towards the interviewer, expressing her surprise (see explanatory figure 1). (3)

weil Kinder haben mehr Energie, mehr Zeit. No, nicht mehr Zeit, ja, mehr Zeit [pause, laughter] ‘because children have more energy, more time, no, not more time, yes, more time’ [pause, laughter] Speaker 1 [00.00.30–00.00.31]

Figure 1: Hand gestures when performing (3) . . .Ja, mehr Zeit. . ...  

 

 

 

[pause, laughter]

Autostimulative gestures coincided with silent pauses, had phasic trajectory and occurred before the target word. They helped to concentrate and, thus, may aid in retrieval. This hypothesis, however, should be confirmed with further large-scale research. During our analysis, many autostimulative gestures also coincided with the planning process (30 cases out of 33). Indicating that this gesture type may be a better indicator of a planning process, and the present three cases combine both lexical access and planning.

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Pointing gestures are the second most frequently used type after the emphatic gestures. They primarily coincide with the target word in time and have phasic trajectory. When pointing gestures had repetitive trajectory in our data, they combined two functions at once. See below (4) and (5) (see explanatory figures 2, 3): (4) weil die Kinder viel ausbrennen ‘because the children really burnt out’ Speaker 1 [Time: 00.00.52–00.00.55]

Figure 2: Hand gesture when performing (4)

In (4), rising intonation indicates the lexical access problem. The gesture is a hybrid of pointing and conventional types. We see a typical arm movement towards interviewer (pointing). The gesture coincides in time with the target word and is related to the interlocutor, while aiming to activate the feedback channel and prompt approval. At the same time, the repetitive hand movement resembles a conventional gesture for uncertainty. (5)

dein Kind muss ähnlich ähm ähnlich also solche Geschmackähnlichkeiten haben ‘your kid should have similar ahm similar well, such similarities in taste’ Speaker 3 [Time: 00.04.44–00.04.46]

Figure 3: Hand gesture when performing (5)

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In (5), the gesture is a hybrid of emphatic and pointing types. It is pointing to the interviewer and plays an interactional function (seeking approval). At the same time, its repetitive movements coincide with the prosody of the words and perform the discursive function. As the gesture starts before the target word, it may aid in word retrieval. According to our results, pointing gestures mostly play an interactional role in speech and are used to get a feedback from the interlocutor about the target word. See (6), where the speaker produces different mistaken words (Zeuge, zeugin, Zeugnis ‘witness’ ‘witness’ fem. ‘certificate’) starting with the same first syllable searching for the word Zeug ‘things’ with an interrogative intonation and pointing towards the interviewer to receive feedback during the word search (see explanatory figure 4). (6) ganz viele komische Zeuge; zeugin? no; Zeugnis? [micro pause] um die Kinder zu tragen ‘really many weird witness (.) witness? (.) no (.) certificate? (0.52) to carry the kids’ Speaker 1 [Time: 00.02.28–00.02.32]

Figure 4: Hand gesture when performing (6)

To sum up, if pointing gestures are produced before the target word, they may successfully aid in word retrieval (if the interlocutor provides feedback and doesn’t utter the desired word, as co-construction in the sense of Jungbluth in this volume). If pointing gestures coincide with the target word, there are two possibilities: they may serve as a request for help or approval of the solution made or just serve as an emphasis of the idea (and be irrelevant for word retrieval). Emphatic gestures are the most frequent type during lexical access problems in speech. Their trajectory could be both phasic and repetitive. Phasic emphatic gestures primarily coincided in time with target words. They do not aid in word retrieval, but parse speech and emphasize the final solution made. In the few cases when they do occur before a target word (Table 5), they coincide with a discourse marker or a false start with target words, and therefore may aid in retrieval.

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Repetitive emphatic gestures primarily started before the target words, and thus participated in word retrieval. Emphatic repetitive gestures are similar to the beats in McNeill’s typology and perform a discursive role in communication. To sum up, lexical access problems in second language speech coincide primarily with emphatic and pointing gestures. Pointing gestures mostly perform interactional functions (5 cases out of 6) and are used strategically to attract attention of the interviewer and ask for the ratification of the elicited word. Emphatic gestures in all our cases are related to discourse. It is important to distinguish between the emphatic phasic and emphatic repetitive gestures. Phasic emphatic gestures underline the target words and do not aid in retrieval. Repetitive gestures tend to start before the target word and help the speaker to keep their turn and may aid in retrieval. There are few cases of autostimulative gestures; they are phasic and always start before the target word in our data. They provide inner concentration, and, thus, may help to retrieve forgotten words, however, this preliminary finding should be further investigated with a wider range of participants.

3.2 Gestures, lexical access problems and proficiency To explore whether any gesture types are related to proficiency of second language, we calculated the total number of lexical access problems, the type of items involved and gestural function for each proficiency level. Then the Pearson’s linear correlation between proficiency and each of the mentioned parameters was checked (see Table 6). Table 6: Gestures and lexical access problems with regard to second language proficiency Distribution of items

Intermediate

Upperintermediate

Advanced

Pearson’s Correlation (r)

Total number of lexical items

24

15

12

–0,96

abstract items

18

13

6

–0,99

concrete items

6

2

6

0

Cases with and without gestures Cases with gestures Cases wihout gestures

22

7

12

–0,65

2

8

0

–0,24

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Table 6: (continued) Distribution of items

Intermediate

Upperintermediate

Advanced

Pearson’s Correlation (r)

Types of gestures Image

2

0

0

–0,86

Conventional

2

0

0

–0,86

Autostimulative

1

1

1

0

Pointing

3

1

2

–0,5

Emphatic

14

5

9

–0,55

The results show that word searches decrease with an increase in proficiency (r= –0,96), as do searches for abstract words (r = –0, 99). However, searches for concrete items are unrelated to proficiency. There is no strong correlation between proficiency and gesticulation. The emphatic and pointing gestures are the most frequent types for all levels of proficiency, but their correlations with proficiency are weak. Only conventional gestures, and gestures depicting an image strongly correlate with proficiency (r = –0, 86). Indeed, such gestures occur at the intermediate level, but do not appear in advanced speech. As there are only a few examples of such type in our data, a large-scale study is needed to confirm the possibility of a correlation.

3.3 Gestures, lexical access problems and fluency Finally, in order to investigate whether any gestural types correlate with fluency, we checked two fluency measures: speech rate and number of silent pauses per minute. The results are presented in Tables 7 and 8. Table 7: Gestures during lexical access problems and speech rate

Speech Rate Total number of lexical items

Sp 1

Sp 2

Sp 3

Sp 4

Sp 5

Sp 6

2,84

3,14

2,49

2,675

3,26

3,83

17

7

9

6

4

8

Pearson’s Correlation

–0,23

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Table 7: (continued) Sp 1

Sp 2

Sp 3

Sp 4

Sp 5

Sp 6

Pearson’s Correlation

Abstract items

13

5

9

4

3

3

–0,56

Concrete items

4

2

0

2

1

5

0,63

Number of cases with and without gestures with gestures without gestures

15

7

6

1

4

8

0,11

2

0

3

5

0

0

–0,78

Types of gestures Image

2

0

0

0

0

0

–0,2

Conventional

1

1

0

0

0

0

–0,07

Autostimulative

1

0

1

0

0

1

0,03

Pointing

2

1

1

0

1

1

0,1

Emphatic

9

5

4

1

3

6

0,23

There is a strong negative correlation between speech rate and lexical access cases without gestures (r= –0,78). Indeed, the speakers 2, 5, 6 (with the higher speech rate) always use gestures during lexical access problems (0 cases without gestures). Participants with lower speech rate do have cases without gestures. Speech rate, however, is not strongly related to lexical types. The direction is negative with regard to the abstract items, and positive with regard to the concrete items. Speech rate is unrelated to any of the functional gestural types, as the Pearson’s correlations are rather weak. It is negative with respect to conventional gestures and those that depict image, while positive with regard to autostimulative, pointing, and emphatic gestures. Table 8: Gestures during lexical access problems and number of silent pauses/min

silent pauses per minute

Sp 1

Sp 2

Sp 3

Sp 4

Sp 5

Sp 6

0,34

0, 291

0,373

0,259

0,298

0,347

Pearson’s Correlation

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Table 8: (continued) Sp 1

Sp 2

Sp 3

Sp 4

Sp 5

Sp 6

Pearson’s Correlation

Total number of lexical items

17

7

9

6

4

8

0,5

Abstract items

13

5

9

4

3

3

0,51

Concrete items

4

2

0

2

1

5

0,1

Number of cases with and without gestures with gestures without gestures

15

7

6

1

4

8

0,56

2

0

3

5

0

0

–0,19

Types of gestures Image

2

0

0

0

0

0

0,25

Conventional.

1

1

0

0

0

0

–0,04

Autostimulative

1

0

1

0

0

1

0,91

Pointing

2

1

1

0

1

1

0,6

Emphatic

9

5

4

1

3

6

0,58

Speakers 1, 3 and 6 have a higher frequency of silent pauses. However, such a parameter correlates neither to the number of lexical access problems, nor the type of lexical items. It is unrelated to the majority of the functional gestural types. However, Pearson’s correlation is positive and very strong with regard to the autostimulative gestural type. It is scarcely present in our data – that is why a more large-scale experiment is needed to confirm this correlation.

4 Conclusion on the relation between gestures and speech production and development As a result of our study, we state that lexical access problems are primarily accompanied by emphatic gestures which perform the discursive function. The

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second most frequent type is pointing gestures which perform an interactional function in the majority of cases and are used strategically to elicit information from the interlocutor, or to emphasize the final solution. Trajectory of gestures and its starting point helps to identify whether gestures aid in word retrieval or not. Emphatic gestures that aid in retrieval in our data tend to have repetitive trajectory and start before the target word. Pointing gestures produced before the target word seemed to have more potential for eliciting necessary information from the interlocutor and aiding in word retrieval. Gestures that coincide with the target word may not participate in word retrieval but just help to emphasize an item. Image, conventional and pointing gestures with referential function, are scarcely represented in our data and do not play a primary role in word retrieval. Autostimulative gestures signal concentration among speakers. In our data, they are phasic and start before the target word, and thus may aid in word retrieval as well. However, their nature should be investigated further, and may be a better indicator of planning process rather than lexical access. We also state that higher proficiency level predicts the decrease of lexical access problems in speech (r = –0, 96) and the decrease in searches for abstract items (r = –0, 99). Conventional and image-gestures decrease with the development in proficiency suggesting strong correlations, but having too few examples, further tests of this hypothesis are needed. No strong correlation is found between the other gestural types and proficiency. Regarding the relation between gesture types and fluency, we conclude that the correlation between speech rate and cases of lexical access problems produced without gestures is negative and quite strong (r = –0, 78). We hypothesize that when the speaker has enough fluency in the L2, he uses the gesture modality more expressively, which coincide with findings by Graziano and Gullberg (2013), who found that gestures primarily occur in fluent speech. However, speech rate is unrelated to the number of lexical access problems, lexical types and any functional gestural type. Frequency of silent pauses strongly correlates only with the autostimulative gestures, however new research with more examples of this type is needed to prove any potential relation.

References Alibali, Martha W., Sotaro Kita & Amanda Young. 2000. Gesture and the process of speech production: We think, therefore we gesture. Language and cognitive processes 15 (6). 593–613. Beattie, Geoffrey & Jane Coughlan. 1999. An experimental investigation of the role of iconic gestures in lexical access using the tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon. British Journal of Psychology, 90(1), 35–56.

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Cienki, Alan & Cornelia Müller (eds.). 2008. Metaphor and gesture. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: Benjamins. De Jong, Nivja H., Margarita P. Steinel, Arjen Florijn, Rob Schoonen & Jan H. Hulstijn. 2013. Linguistic skills and speaking fluency in a second language. Applied Psycholinguistics 34. 893–916. Fernández-Villanueva, Marta & Oliver Strunk. 2009. Das Korpus VARCOM-Variation und Kommunikation in der gesprochenen Sprache. Deutsch als Fremdsprache. Zeitschrift zur Theorie und Praxis des Deutschunterrichts für Ausländer 46 (2). 67–73. Fricke, Ellen. 2007. Linguistik Impulse & Tendenzen: Origo, Geste und Raum. Lokaldeixis im Deutschen. Berlin: De Gruyter. Graziano, Maria & Marianne Gullberg. 2013. Gesture production and speech fluency in competent speakers and language learners. Paper presented at Tilburg Gesture Research Meeting (TiGeR), Netherlands, 19–21 June. http://tiger.uvt.nl/pdf/papers/graziano.pdf (accessed 10 September 2013) Gullberg, Marianne. 2006. Some reasons for studying gesture and second language acquisition (Hommage à Adam Kendon). International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching 44 (2). 103–124. Gullberg, Marianne. 2010. Methodological reflections on gesture analysis in second language acquisition and bilingualism research. Second language Research 26 (1). 75–102. Kendon, Adam. 1980. Gesture and speech: Two aspects of the process of utterance. In Mary R. Key (ed.), Nonverbal communication and language, 207–227. The Hague: Mouton. Kousta, Stavroula-Thaleia, Gabriella Vigliocco, David P.Vinson, Mark Andrews & Elena Del Campo. 2011. The representation of abstract words: Why emotion matters. Journal of Experimental Psychology. General 14(1). 14–34. Krauss, Robert M., Yihsiu Chen & Rebecca F. Gottesman. 2000. Lexical gestures and lexical access: A process model. In David McNeill (ed.), Language and gesture, 261–283. New York: Cambridge University Press. Lausberg, Hedda. 2013. NEUROGES – A coding system for the empirical analysis of hand movement behavior as a reflection of cognitive, emotional and interactive processes. In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silvia H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Sedinha Tessendorf (eds.), Body – Language – Communication: An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction. Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science 38 (1), 1022–1037. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. Lausberg, Hedda & Han Sloetjes. 2009. Coding gestural behavior with the NEUROGES–ELAN system. Behavior Research Methods 41(3). 841–849. Lucero, Che, Holly Zaharchuk & Daniel Casasanto. 2014. Beat gestures facilitate speech production. In Paul Bello, Marcello Guarini, Marjorie McShane & Brian Scassellati (eds.), Proceedings of the 36th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, 898–903. Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society. McNeill, David. 1992. Gesture: A psycholinguistic approach. The Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. http://mcneilllab.uchicago.edu/pdfs/gesture.a_psycholinguistic_approach. cambridge.encyclop.pdf (accessed 25 September 2014). Meteyard, Lotte, Sara Rodriguez Cuadrado, Bahador Bahrami & Gabriella Vigliocco. 2012. Coming of age: A review of embodiment and the neuroscience of semantics. Cortex 48 (7). 788–804.

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Norris, Sigrid. 2004. Analyzing multimodal interaction: A methodological framework. New York: Routledge. Poggi, Isabella. 2001. Mind markers. In Isabella Poggi & Nadine Trigo (eds), Gestures, meaning and use, 119–132. Porto: Universidad Fernando Pessoa. Rosch. Eleanor, Evan Thompson & Francisco Varela. 1992. The embodied mind: Cognitive science and human experience. Cambridge: MIT Press. Seo, Mi-Suk & Irene Koshik. 2010. A conversation analytic study of gestures that engender repair in ESL conversational tutoring. Journal of Pragmatics 42(8). 2219–2239. Tullock, Brandon & Marta Fernández-Villanueva. 2013. The role of previously learned languages in the thought processes of multilingual writers at the deutsche Schule Barcelona. Research in the teaching of English 47(4). 420–441. Vigliocco, Gabriella, Stavroula Thaleia Kousta, Pasquale Anthony Della Rosa, David R.Vinson, Marco Tettamanti, Joseph T. Devlin & Stefano F. Cappa. 2014. The neural representation of abstract words: The role of emotion. Cerebral Cortex, 24(7). 1767–1777.

Gemma Repiso i Puigdelliura, University of California, Los Angeles, and Marta Fernández-Villanueva, Universitat de Barcelona

Analysing German Teachers’ Identities through Multimodal and Multilingual Use Abstract: This chapter puts forward multilingual and multimodal cues as useful and informing tools to analyze identity in discursive interaction, since they allow for a wider range of the speaker’s positionings tapping beyond the verbal and monolingual language use. Multilingual and multimodal cues are, thus, the main focus in this study and are codified following instances of code-switching and lexical inserts in the former case and gestures and facial expressions in the latter. Keywords: identity, foreign language acquisition, acts of identity, multilingualism, multimodality, German

1 Multilingual positionings in foreign language speakers and teachers and multimodal use The present contribution analyses teachers of German as a foreign language identities as unfolded in discourse to gain a deeper understanding of the factors affecting agency, legitimacy and identification in their teaching practices and their experiences as foreign language learners. At the centre of the study lies the use of multilingual and multimodal cues as informative tools for the exploration of identity in interaction. Qualitative interviews were conducted in order to explore identity work by providing instances of the nonverbal and para-verbal communication that shapes verbal speech in the teachers’ discourses in the interaction between the interviewer and the interviewee.

1.1 Multilingual use Multilingualism appears in this contribution as discourse in interaction and, thus, it taps into the speakers’ first language and second languages in the co-construction of identity. The speakers are able to perform identity work in semi-structured interviews guided by a recognized member of the teachers’ community.

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Riley (2011) suggests that multilingual discourse outlines the self and positions the speakers as social actors within an established set of values depending on the social context and the socially attributed characteristics of each language. Therefore, speakers engaging in multilingual interaction negotiate the adscription to certain positionings, subjected to different types of power according to the contextualised institutional discourse. Second language speakers can use multilingual discourse to bring out their competence in a foreign language – to position themselves as multilingual speakers, second language learners, second language competent speakers, non-native speakers, etc. For instance, second language learners might construct their language affiliation (Rampton 1990) associated with the fact of learning a second language in conjunction with their past experiences and their expectations. Differences in learning situations might also be raised in the negotiation of community identification, such as divergences resulting from having learnt a language in an instructional setting or in an immersion setting. Thus, a second language use cannot be uncoupled from cultural, social and personal factors linking learning contexts, social environment and cultural values. In the case of language teachers, the use of multilingual communication indexes their identity in two ways – their social identity as foreign language speakers and their professional identity as foreign language teachers. This interweaving of multilingual identities therefore necessitates a fine-grained analysis of sequences of interaction (represented in this study by instances of code-switching and role-playing stances) in the discursive narration of teaching practices and foreign language learning experiences. Additionally, multilingual use challenges the binary opposition between the native and non-native speaker in language teaching that primes monolingual discourse in the classroom. The native speaker is often presented as the ideal in language teaching, leading to a devaluation of the non-native speaking teacher (Selvi 2011). However, some scholars have argued against this idealized nativespeaker paradigm (Leung, Harris and Rampton 1997), a notion that appears to ignore classroom realities, in which students are encouraged to create multiple identities and affiliations (Leung, Harris and Rampton 1997). Similarly, Risager (2007) puts forward the transnational paradigm in language and culture pedagogy. This concept focuses on cultural complexity in order to uncouple native speakers from their national cultures. The aforementioned themes suggest that multilingual discourse is a complex phenomenon in identity work. The analysis of multimodal features in interaction enriches this picture.

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1.2 Multimodal use Multimodal interaction analysis has emerged from the need to explore new forms of data in digital form – recorded and videotaped material in order to develop an integrative methodology to describe physical reality, as suggested in Norris and Maier (2014). Multimodal use relies on the theoretical assumption that the meaning of signs is fashioned through the cultural and historical uses to realize social actions (Jewitt 2012). Multimodality is presented in this contribution by adopting Iedema’s (2003) definition considering multimodal use as an extension of discourse analysis, which in turn challenges language-in-isolation as the only source of meaningmaking in communication. Instead, a wide variety of semiotic dimensions are claimed to be involved in these processes and, hence, they provide a more complex and rich analysis of communication and representations. In addition, de-emphasizing the language as a centre point of analysis has implied a blurring in the different semiotic dimensions that allocated clear roles in every semiotic type. Geenen (2013) argues that multimodal meaning-making – acknowledged as a social practice in interaction – serves the analysis in the construction of identity by recognizing the multiple modes of semiotic systems to convey meaning. Similarly, Sekimoto (2012) challenges the symbolic construction of social categories to shape identity. The author brings out the constitution of identity from a multimodal approach in communication that examines the constitutive perceptual subjectivity and reflexive bodies by symbolic mechanisms of social construction. Likewise, Lafkioui (2013) points out the importance of multimodality in internet-based communication, looking at the multilingual expression of ethnic identities and linguistic diversity in French-based Amazigh websites interaction. Therefore, the research suggests a need to analyze discourse from a multimodal approach, taking into account the social nature of the different para-verbal and nonverbal features in communication. An expansion to discourse analysis would constitute a fine-grained analysis of multimodal use in interaction.

1.3 Semi-structured interviews in identity work Multimodality and multimodal use are explored in this contribution by means of narrated experiences in semi-structured interviews. These are interactions between an interviewer and an interviewee guided by open questions that leave the

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informants enough space to unfold their positions in the exploration of specific topics. Semi-structured interviews allow for two-way communication and engage the participant in a unique speech event, in which the researcher adjusts the questions according to the participants’ discourse on the narrated experiences as foreign language teachers and multilingual learners (Lazaraton 1995). Semi-structured interviews have also been used in SLA-identity work (Morita 2004; MenardWardwick 2004) as a tool for inquiry into participants’ retrospective experiences and experiences in real-life contexts (Deters 2012). As a matter of fact, the interviewer’s identity constitutes a relevant factor in co-constructing meaning in situated contexts (Taylor and Trujillo 2001). In fact, the power relationships between the participants and the interviewer might have an effect on the process of eliciting discourse in the interview’s interaction. Thus, the interviewer’s reactions and introduction of questions should be taken into account in the process of coding categories. Similarly, multimodal features in the interviewer’s questions and reactions provide meaningful insights into the acceptance or rejection of the raised positioning in conversation. An expected or non-expected laugh, a change in the gaze or in pitch could be paraverbal and nonverbal indicators of conversation management in situated interviews. In addition, the researcher takes an emic perspective by which the interviewer is identified as a member of the Spanish teachers’ community. This cocumbency allows for the creation of a safe space in which meaning can be negotiated beyond the attributed non-malleable roles of researcher – participant. Semi-structured interviews are addressed in this contribution in the inquiry into participants’ positionings as foreign language speakers and foreign language teachers by means of raising foreign language learning and teaching experiences in a multilingual communication.

1.4 Teachers of German as a foreign language in Barcelona The study analyses teachers of German as a foreign language in the situated context of a private language school in Barcelona. The present economic situation in Spain accounts for the increasing demand of German as a foreign language in Barcelona. As a preferred target country, Germany has experienced a constant increase in Spanish immigrants, 17% of Spanish immigrants in 2013 compared to 2012 according to official data (Migrationsbericht BAMF 2013). Young professionals’ mobility between Germany and Spain is encouraged by German-funded projects such as MobiPro –

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The job of my life. This is a program to involve students in practical training in Germany (MobiPro 2015 – German Federal Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs). German as a foreign language for adults is mainly taught in Barcelona in the following settings: Escola Oficial d’Idiomes (language official school), private language academies and the Goethe Institut. For the former, foreign language teachers need to hold a master’s degree in Secondary Teaching Education (Màster Formació Professorat Secundària) as well as a Catalan language certificate (Departament d’Ensenyament – Professors d’escoles oficials d’idiomes 2016). In private language academies, the Master’s degree is not required. In this case, other options can certify a teaching qualification such as the German as foreign language certificate, a Master’s degree in teaching German as a Foreign Language (Master Deutsch als Fremdsprache). Finally, the Goethe Institut, the German official institution that promotes German culture and language abroad, requires studies in German as a foreign language or similar, and a native level in German (Karriere – Goethe Institut 2016). These requirements lead to different teachers’ profiles. On the one hand, Catalan native speakers teachers are more likely to be hired in public language schools due to the need for a Teaching Master’s Degree and a certified level of Catalan. On the other hand, the less restrictive recruitment procedure in terms of teaching qualification in private schools might lead to hiring practices supporting the institutional discourse, which acknowledges the native speaker paradigm as a determining factor in hiring practices. The present contribution thus aims to analyse German teachers’ discourses in private language schools to explore how these preferences in hiring practices, particularly when taken together with the power of the institutional discourse, might have an impact upon their legitimacy and agency.

1.5 Conceptualizing identity Identity is operationalized in this contribution by a triangulation of instances that cover the teachers’ agency, legitimacy and identification with the community – factors which can affect the degree of engagement or disengagement in teaching practices and foreign language learning experiences. Duff’s (2012) focus on agency – applied to the social actors in foreign language learning and teaching – refers to the possibility of making choices supporting or rejecting the institutional discourse in the process self-identity formation as foreign language teachers and foreign language learners. The decisions are made with the aim of taking control of the processes of learning

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and teaching, as well as with the intention of self-regulating languages in interaction and pursuing goals that lead to personal or social transformation. Legitimacy is brought out in Tsui’s (2007) analysis of complexity of identity formation in language teaching. Legitimacy is understood as a key factor allowing for access to professional practice as language teachers, which at the same time depends on identification in the community. In this regard, legitimacy can be institutionally and socially given or recognized in the self. Thus, the institutional discourse should be taken into consideration to identify ratifications of selfidentity. The third instance analysed in this contribution is the identification with the different communities displayed in the interaction; such as Spanish or German communities, native speakers, foreign language teachers or second language learners. The identification process is negotiated in the discourses and classified by means of the emerging categories in the interview.

2 Analysis of multilingual and multimodal use in semi-structured interviews This contribution investigates the multiplicity of identities displayed as situated practices in human interaction based on Davies and Harré’s (1990) Positioning Theory and Sacks’ (1992) Membership Categorization Analysis. Davies and Harré (1990) see identity as a dynamic system of positionings, which shift in conversation across the different storylines in discursive interaction. These contextually embedded positionings create non-linear and contradictory autobiographies in speech that shed some light on the polyvalence of identity work. Positionings are thus not necessarily coherent because beliefs are not seen as a whole. Indeed the possible selves can be recognised as contradictory. Further, Davies and Harré (1990: 59) suggest that the social construction of the identity as a unit leads to problematic experiences as regards the recognition of multiple identities. In this sense, the binary opposition of the native and nonnative speaker might result as well in identity problems in the multilingual language teachers. Therefore, an analysis through changeable positionings would allow for identifying the multiplicity of identity in interaction. Two modes of positioning brought to the fore in Harré and Langenhove (1998) – self-positioning and other-positioning – are employed in this research to code the categories emerging from the data. Self-positioning refers to the stance inherent to the speaker – elaborated and attributed by the self in the

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discourse. The other-positioning indexes an attributed positioning to the self by the other – a positioning that is not identified as stemming from the speaker’s stance. The “other” might be the interlocutor in the interaction or an absent “other” in the interactional setting – that is, beliefs and conceptions contained in the institutional discourse or actors appearing in the narrated experiences. Further positionings can be steadily challenged by the interlocutors in the social interaction. Positionings in this study refer to the identification with the learners’ and teachers’ community of practice. Instances of affiliation or disaffiliation with the community are classified by means of Membership Categorization Analysis (Sacks 1992; Schegloff 2007; Watson 1978; Antaki and Widdicombe 1998). Membership categories are hence the instances that index the teachers’ positionings as regards their professional (e.g. German teacher, foreign language teacher, native teacher) or social identity (e.g. second language speaker, native speaker, foreign language speaker, Spanish native speaker). Membership categories reveal thus the relationships between social actors and the ways they are negotiated – these are lexical choices and use of pronouns in situated interactions. Along with it, the membership categories devices refer to the characteristics, actions, and activities perceived as being inherently linked to the categories – identified in lexical choices in verbs, adjectives and predicates (e.g. convey culture, teach grammar, closeminded, reliable). Both membership categories and membership categories devices need to be analysed from a context-dependent paradigm, in which the social actors interact.

2.1 Multimodal use in semi-structured interviews Multimodal use in semi-structured interviews is identified following Allwood et al. (2007) looking at the interviewee’s and interviewer’s gestures and facial gestures in the negotiation of identity in the narrated experiences as language teachers and language learners. The face-to-face nature of interviews allows for a co-construction through multimodal features (see Jungbluth in this volume), which are recognized in rejection or acceptance of the meaning conveyed. In this contribution, multimodal use is analysed from the positionings and membership categories appearing in the verbal discourse. Multimodality is hence discussed from the main theoretical framework embracing the study.

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2.2 Multilingual use in semi-structured interviews Multilingual discourse is analysed in this study by classifying the instances of code-switching in the passages presented that provide information on the categories coded as membership categories or membership categories devices. Identity work in code-switching has been found in this study to be mainly part of a change of footing in the interviewees’ discourse, i.e. when speakers reproduce someone else’s speech to convey their narrated experiences. Likewise, multilingual use appears in lexical inserts in the negotiation of categories and their characteristics.

2.3 Analysis of excerpts The selection of excerpts aims to provide instances of multimodal and multilingual use that index identity work with regards to membership identification, agency and legitimacy in the teachers’ narrated experiences in a semi-structured interview.

2.3.1 Ingrid: Multimodal use indexing cultural stereotypes Ingrid speaks German as her first language and has been teaching German as a foreign language to Spanish-Catalan bilinguals for three years. Spanish and German, which are shared between both the interviewee and the interviewer, are used as the languages of interaction during the interview. In the excerpt (1), Ingrid explains the differences in perception of her native country, Germany, which consists of a system of attributed cultural values before and after her experiences abroad. Thus, she is self-positioned as a member of the German community – coded as a membership category – and she attributes to it the membership categories devices quadratisch ‘close-minded’ and nativa ‘native’. The former is negatively connotated in her narrated experience within the country, and the latter is positively connotated and acknowledged as an advantage of her experience abroad. These devices are shaped by multilingual discourse and multimodal use. Multimodality appears in these two cases as a symbolic representation of the cultural stereotype – shared by the interviewer and the interviewee – and as a reinforcement of legitimacy.

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(1)

R:

¿Qué ventajas? ‘What advantages?’ T1: Ventajas, bueno yo creo que como nati:va aquí, dando clases en alemán (.) claro es (.) yo transmito (.) mucho, ¿me ves? mucho la cultura. (.)Por un lado, yo soy estereotipo alemana y ayuda mucho en las clases. ‘Advantages, well I think that as a nati:ve here giving lessons in German (.) of course it’s (.) I convey (.) a lot. do you see me? A lot the culture. On the one side, I am a German stereotype and this helps a lot in the classes’

This section analyses Ingrid’s positioning as a native speaker. The category native implicitly evokes the modifier German as being context-dependent in the situated interaction. The selection of native instead of German in conjunction with the fact that this is presented as an advantage in teaching a language brings out the native-speaker paradigm that idealizes native speakers, and directly affects teachers in their practices. It is similarly a source of legitimacy in the professional identity – native teacher. In this respect, the duties associated with teaching the language follow Ingrid’s discourse in the responsibility of transmitir la cultura – ‘conveying culture’, which is tied in with the fact of being native by the use of multimodality in the discourse. These multimodal features index and reinforce the teacher’s self-positioning as a native speaker. That is, the interviewee’s hand gesture over her face and body combined with the rhetorical question ¿Me ves? ‘Do you see me?’ – along with a downwards head movement and a gaze towards herself (1d) – brings attention to her physical appearance, which is claimed to be typically German. Further, the sequence of interaction in the form of a request – ‘Do you see me?’ – indexes the need for the interviewer’s recognition in the self-positioning. In fact, the inter-

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viewer’s laugh accepts and ratifies the interviewee’s self-positioning. Thus, the hand gesture adds a further characteristic in the membership category native, which is the embodiment of the membership identification in her physical appearance. Ingrid reinforces the multimodal personal deixis with the lexical choice estereotipo alemana ‘German stereotype’ – combining nativeness, culture and a stereotyped appearance. The fact of being a German stereotype entails a preestablished set of characteristics perceived as being useful in the classroom. The utterance ayuda mucho en las clases ‘it helps a lot in classes’ in reference to her physical appearance indexes a source of legitimacy stemming from the students’ positive perception of the native speaker and its – physical-attributed characteristics. She is hence other-positioned as a legitimate social actor in the teaching event – that is to say, the device associated to the native membership category brings up the privileged status of the native speaker perceived as a source of legitimacy in German as first language speaking teachers. Multimodal features shape and reinforce the self-positioning indicated by the membership categories native and German stereotype. Likewise, the interlocutor’s acceptance of the self-positioning has also been indexed in the multimodal use of laughter, as a “silent” co-construction (see Jungbluth in this volume). (2)

T1: creo que en 2006, a los veinte años, yo pensaba más ((eeeh)) Alemania, ¿no? una caca, somos muy cuadra (.) quadratisch. ‘I think that in 2006, at twenty years, I thought more like ((eeeh)) Germany, a shit we are very close (.) quadratisch (close-minded)’

Multilingual use and multimodality merge in the description of the membership category German narrated in her experience previous to the trips abroad. The devices used in (2) to qualify the category are caca ‘shit’ and quadratisch ‘closeminded’. The use of the former negatively connotates and reinforces the subsequent adjective in the discourse – quadratisch. At first, an attempt is made in Spanish (cuadra) to introduce the device used in this utterance. The interviewee inserts a request to elicit the proper word in Spanish, and she finally says it in German. This recognizes the multilingual character of the interview and acknowledges the multilingual identity of both interlocutors in the situated interaction. The German insertion relates to the use

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of a characteristic that shapes the German membership category. Thus, multilingual communication shapes identity by allowing for a wider range of terms to describe categories in the interviewee’s first language and second languages, which facilitates a more fine-grained use of the membership categories devices. Multimodal use appears in the nonverbal description of the term quadratisch when Ingrid is asking for the word in Spanish. The interviewee’s gestures model the adjective by representing the attribute in a square shape in front of her head, which accounts for an attribute symbolizing the German community’s character. This is shared with the interviewer’s preconceptions, and hence recognized in the symbolic gestures. Thus, multimodality allows the interviewee to convey the meaning that configures identity by means of not using the language as the sole source of communication.

2.3.2 Karin: Multilingual use in second language affiliation and creation of various spaces Karin speaks German as a first language and Spanish, English and Catalan as foreign languages. She has been teaching German for three years and holds a one-month teaching qualification in German as a Foreign Language. She has been living in Barcelona for twelve years. In (3), identity work is done by a linguistic explanation of the differences in pragmatics between Spanish and German requests. In this exposition, she creates the Spanish and the German space – designed as two communities of speakers and coded as two membership categories. (3)

R:

Inwiefern ist hier anders als in Deutschland? ‘To what extent it is in Germany different from here?’ T2: Hmm (.) Oft sind das einfach Kleinigkeiten aber:: wir sind verschieden. Das kann man nicht abstreiten und das möchte ich auch gar nicht abstreiten. Und das sind kulturelle Sachen. Zum Beispiel hier ist Spanisch sehr (.) eine sehr direkte Sprache (.) dieses Könntest du mir bitte? Jedesmal dass ich meinem Freund sage, sagt er: Was, was willst du von mir?(.) Wohingegen wenn ich mit meinem Freund, wenn wir meine Familie besuchen und ich meinem Freund sage “dame esto”, meine Familie ist immer total schockiert wie ich so unglaublich unfreundlich spreche, das ist nicht unfreundlich, so sprechen wir. ‘Hmm (.) Often there are minor details but we are different. This cannot be denied and I don’t want to denied it. And these are cultural things. For example here Spanish is a very, very direct language. This could you please? Every time that I say it to my boyfriend, he says: “What do you want from me? (.) Whereas when I

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and my boyfriend visit my family and I say to my boyfriend give it to me, my family is always shocked how can I speak so incredibly unfriendly, that’s not unfriendly, we speak like that.’

In (3), there is a multilingual use of language indexing the negotiation of the second language affiliation and the creation of different linguistic and cultural spaces within her relationship and her family. Two spaces are co-constructed for Germany and Spain, which are merged in Karin’s personal relationships. These two spaces are constituted in the narration of pragmatics use in German and Spanish, which results in different perceptions of speech and intentions in the requests that do not provide the expected perlocutionary effect. These two spaces are created first in the utterance wir sind verschieden ‘we are different’, the pronoun we includes the two different spaces – Spaniards and Germans or Germans implicitly opposed to Spaniards. The use of the plural form indicates the self, and the other recognised as being dissimilar. Thus, they are discursively situated as part of the sociocultural sets of values of the first language and the second language communities. The narrated distinction between the two membership communities taps into kulturelle Sachen ‘cultural things’ perceived as differences in the language pragmatics. The interviewee describes Spanish as sehr sehr direkte Sprache a ‘very, very direct language’ in the use of requests dame esto ‘give me this’ as opposed to German Könntest du mir bitte? ‘Could you please’. The difference in the two communities is exemplified in two misunderstandings that occurred in her personal relationships: within the couple dimension, she and her boyfriend; and within the family dimension, in which the social actors are wir ‘we’ (Karin and her boyfriend) and meine Familie ‘my family’. The former dimension takes place in a Spanish sociocultural environment, and it involves a member of the Spanish community, the boyfriend, and a member of the German community, Karin. In the boyfriend-Karin dimension, she self-positions as a German speaker, as she displays the German pragmatics forms in a request Könntest du mir bitte

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‘Could you please’. The narrated boyfriend’s reaction in the adjacent pair suggests a noncomprehension of the German pragmatics since he fails to adjust to the expected social norm, treating the request as confusing. Karin does not codeswitch to take her boyfriend’s voice. This adds a greater impact to the utterance Was willst du von mir ‘What do you want from me?’ in the situated interaction, since the formulation falls within the Spanish-designated pragmatics rules, yet it is uttered in German – a non direct language in Karin’s terms. Images (3a) and (3b) correspond to Karin’s change of footing when imitating her boyfriend’s response. Aside from the verbal discourse, the interviewee reproduces a facial display which adds a feeling of displeasure to the utterance in the non-understanding of Karin’s question. Multimodality hence accounts for a broader scope of possibilities to convey meaning in changes of footing to build upon membership categories in identity work. In the family dimension, there is a shift in positionings inferred from the use of pronouns. The change of spaces in the narration from Barcelona to Germany is described in the utterance wenn wir meine Familie besuchen ‘when we visit my family’. The subject – we referring to Karin and her boyfriend – and the lexical choice besuchen ‘visit’ signifies a move to Germany, and thus, to the attributed set of values of the German community. The example begins with Karin’s interaction with her boyfriend dame esto ‘give me this’ in the German-speaking family space. She code-switches into Spanish and changes the footing from narrator of a personal experience to active agent in the situation. Similarly, the use of multilingual discourse allows for a change of code to distinguish the interaction in the two spaces. The narrated reaction of her Familie ‘family’ as being schockiert ‘shocked’ by the direct use of the language suggests that either they understand Spanish or they have relied on the language intonation to perceive the utterance as shocking. The second option could be informative in the use of multimodality, since a paraverbal feature could have triggered the family’s response. Similarly, the utterance is accompanied by a nonverbal feature – a hand moving forward – which gives more force to the family’s reaction. Thus, multimodal use displays a more vivid picture of the clash between communities and the lack of mutual understanding stemming from differences in the social use of language. In the change of dimensions, there is a move in Karin’s self-positioning – from a self-positioning in the German community to a self-identification with the Spanish community. This indicates a negotiation of language affiliation that depends on the personal relationships, degree of intimacy – boyfriend and family – and the social context surrounding the speech event – location of the interaction.

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2.3.3 Ana: Multimodal use indexing compliance in the creation of the other Ana speaks Spanish as a first language and also speaks German and English, and holds a Master’s degree in Spanish didactics. She has taught German for two years in Barcelona, and Spanish for seven years in Austria. She has acquired her second languages in instructional settings (university and immersion) in Vienna. In this regard, her narrated foreign language learning experiences constitute an influential factor in her teaching practices. The following passage represents an instance of a process of building up the other in an interactional setting by means of multimodal use of the language. (4) R:

Und dann hast du noch in Österreich gewohnt, oder‘And then, you have also lived in Austria, haven’t you?’ T3: Und dann habe ich mein Studium fertig gemacht und bin nach Österreich gegangen, ich wollte nach Deutschland oder Österreich aber meine Bekannte und Freunde in Österreich haben gesagt, “bitte komm zu uns geh nicht zu den Deutschen(.)”. Und deswegen habe ich mich einfach, ja, entschieden, ich habe gedacht, da kenne ich Leute, es ist super, ich weiss wo ich gehen kann, wo ich bleiben kann am Anfang, und so hat sich alles entwickelt. ‘And then I ended my studies and I went to Austria. I wanted to go either to Austria or to Germany, but my acquaintances in Austria said to me please, come to us (.) don’t go to the Germans (.) Therefore I’ve just made the decision, I thought: I know people there, it’s cool, I know where I can go, where I can stay in the beginning, and this way has everything evolved.’

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The excerpt (4) presents a personal positioning taken up from the narration of previous experiences as a speaker of German as a second language in an immersion setting. The passage is introduced by the interviewer’s question, which prompts the expected narration. The participant takes the turn to continue the narration from the point suggested by the interviewer, her experiences in Austria. In this part of the interview, the language used is German, Ana’s second language. Ana presents her experience, starting from an instance of agency in her narration. In this regard, agency is presented in terms of two possibilities: the possibility of making the choice between Germany or Austria, which are restricted by the influence of relational factors, recognized in the membership category Bekannte ‘acquaintance’ and Freunde ‘friends’. The influence of her friends and acquaintances balances her decision towards Austria, which points out the importance of the affective and relational factors in her agency. The categories Germans and Austrians operate on two levels of speech: in the narrated past experience by Ana’s change of footing, and in the interaction between the interviewer and the interviewee in the process of assigning meaning to the categories. The former is constructed in an ironic move, and the latter in the multimodal feature of the interviewer-interviewee’s laughter of compliance in (4f). At the level of content, Ana accounts for the impact of the affective factors by a move into an ironic register that creates two separate spaces representing the German and the Austrian communities – identified in a change of footing when the teacher reproduces her Austrian friends’ speech in the request to go to Austria. The fact that Ana was speaking in German in this part of the interview may have allowed for an easier change of footing and identification with the Austrian community. Ana takes the footing of her Austrian friends, which accounts for a shift towards the Austrian community. The selection of the pronoun uns ‘us’ positions her as a member of the Austrian community. Further, the preposition zu ‘to’ accompanied by the motion verb kommen ‘come’ positions the speaker in the space of the Austrian community, outlining a movement from Ana towards the Austrian community. The multimodal feature of a hand gesture indicating the act

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of begging (4c), accompanying the request to go to Austria, takes a symbolic weight in the discourse that specially reinforces the discourse referential modifier bitte ‘please’. In addition, this indicates a strong affective move because the relational factors that lead to her decision are included in the interviewee’s nonverbal mode. The affective factors associated with the Austrian membership category are thus strengthened and reinforced by such multimodal cues. The pronoun uns is constrained by the incorporation of the negative proposition nicht zu den Deutschen ‘not to the Germans’. Deutsche is used as a membership category that is constituted as the other in the discourse. Firstly, the membership category is preceded by the preposition zu ‘to’ implying, as in the Austrian case, an affiliation towards the members of the community. Therefore, she builds up two separated spaces, the first one, the Austrian community, identified in the first person plural pronoun, and the second one appearing in the membership category German. She constructs the other by creating a distance between the two categories and positioning herself as member of one of those. In this regard, the deictic hand movement backwards gives a spatial symbolic value to the preposition zu referred to the German community and attributes to it the characteristic of farness from the speaker. In a nutshell, the teacher creates two membership categories situated in the space of the self, the Austrian identity, and in the space of the other, the German community. At the level of interaction with the interviewer, the laughter shared between interviewer and interviewee (4f) signals compliance in interaction and co-constructs the raised membership category’s attributions. This acknowledges a shared set of values between both parties, which appears to create a safe space to bring out a move into an ironic register related to the ascription of certain spatial and affective features to the membership category.

3 Conclusions This study has attempted to shed some light on German teachers’ identity work, going beyond the native speaker paradigm to look at their identities as second language speakers and foreign language teachers as part of a multilingual continuum. The following remarks sum up the main findings of the study.

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3.1 Membership categories related to the native language teacher The research on teachers of German as a foreign language positionings reveals that the native-speaker paradigm appears to still be present in the participants’ discourses. The reinforcement of the native speaker / non-native speaker dichotomy appears to be linked to a strong identification with German cultural stereotypes. This is the case in Ingrid’s discourse, in which she self-positions as a representative of German culture through her physical appearance. This idealization might be affected by the privileged status of the German speaker in the second language community, and the fact of living abroad, which could also be mediating their first language inheritance (Rampton 1990). This raises an unbalanced power relationship between German as a first language teachers and German as a second language teachers, which affects the process of identity formation in the second language. In fact, Karin seems to reinforce her German identity in the second language community and move to the Spanish identity when she is placed in the German community. She creates two different spaces defined by affective factors in which she takes different positionings with regard to language beliefs and stereotypes in pragmatics. In Ingrid and Karin’s discourses, culture appears to be brought up by taking a one-sided approach that embeds German culture in German language, excluding other German speaking cultures (Austrian and Swiss cultures) and further cultural realities existing in Germany. The term culture hence does not appear to be situated in the transnational paradigm (Risager 2007); rather, it takes the role of linking language and national stereotypes. This matches with Ghanem’s (2014) research on German teachers and culture, in which native German language teachers represented only one part of the German culture and positioned themselves as referents of the German culture. Thus, the transmission of the national stereotype was coupled with language teaching in a non-cross-cultural dimension. The multilingual paradigm appears to be mediated in Ana’s case by an affective negotiation of second language affiliation, when building upon the two membership categories, Germans and Austrians. Ana creates two membership categories by recalling her past experiences of her learning experiences abroad. This suggests a second language affiliation encouraged by relational factors.

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3.2 The importance of multilingual and multimodal use The present study has shown that it is not only verbal speech which shapes meaning in researching identity in discourse– categories are reinforced by the use of multimodal features and multilingual use. This section summarizes the results found in the analysis of identity as framed within multilingual and multimodal use. The analysis shows the effect of multimodal and multilingual use in coconstructing identities in semi-structured interviews. Several semiotic dimensions such as facial displays, hand gestures and changes in pitch were analysed and have provided useful information in the analysis of negotiation of language affiliation in interaction. The use of multilingual discourse during the semi-structured interviews has allowed for a deeper insight into the teachers’ meaning-making, since they have been given free space to negotiate their self-positioning in the preferred language. This has resulted in multiple positioning and prevented discourse imbalances in more and less proficient German speakers. Moreover, an interaction in their first language and second language has recognized the participants as foreign language speakers, rather than only as monolingual speakers. Therefore, monolingual-like positionings were not perceived as the sole option in interaction. Likewise, the interviewer is also acknowledged as a multilingual speaker, giving a broader range of possibilities to the interlocutors to use their first languages or second languages. Karin’s discourse in Spanish and German allows for a self-positioning in two spaces and a closer approach to real interactions in her change of footing. Positionings and membership categories are co-constructed from a closer approach to the multilingual speaker’s reality. Similarly, Ana’s discourse in her second language contributes to a greater connection between the interviewee and the intended change of footing because the discourse is reproduced in the same language as the intended speakers would have used. Multimodal use has been informative in the analysis of the semi-structured interviews in building up the negotiation of identities, and, thus, in displacing language-in-isolation as the sole meaning-making resource in spontaneous interaction (Iedema 2003). The passages account for the impact of multimodal use in modelling membership categories and self-positionings. The use of deictic hand gestures contours positionings in the co-construction of the self in the narrated experiences. In Ingrid’s discourse, deixis shapes the membership category native – negotiating the category in the self-positioning and reflecting on the embodiment of this category in form of deictic hand gestures.

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Deictic hand gestures are also used in the excerpts to construct the categories presented and create a spatial relationship between them. This brings membership categories closer to, or further from the interlocutors, indicating a higher or lower influence on their self- positionings. The incorporation of multimodal features in the analysis of situated positionings in interaction could provide deeper insights into the conceptualization of the membership categories, as revealed in the excerpts presented. Further studies should address teachers’ professional identities in line with the legitimacy in teaching practices, and the possibility of making choices by taking into account the wide range of features involved in the process of meaning-making. In this regard, multimodality appears to be a relevant feature for conveying meaning and shaping identity in foreing language classrooms. Hence, further research should focus on the teachers’ discourse in the classroom to identify native-like or multilingual-like positionings in multilingual use (first language and foreign language use in the classroom) and recognize the influence on the foreign language learners’ identity construction. In conclusion, multimodality and the engagement in multilingual discourse in research interviews allow for a deeper analysis in identity work, concretely in the co-construction of membership categories or the dynamic positionings of the participants.

References Allwood, Jens, Loredana Cerrato, Kristiina Jokinen, Costanza Navarretta & Patrizia Paggio. 2007. The MUMIN coding scheme for the annotation of feedback, turn management and sequencing phenomena. Language Resources and Evaluation, 41(3–4). 273–287. Antaki, Charles & Sue Widdicombe (eds.). 1998. Identities in talk. London: Sage. Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge. 2013. Migrationsbericht des Bundesamtes für Migration und Flüchtlinge im Auftrag der Bundesregierung. MobiPro “The job of my life” Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs http://projekttraegerundunternehmen.thejobofmylife. de/de/home.html (accessed 29 December, 2015.) Davies, Brown & Rom Harré. 1990. Positioning: The discursive production of selves. Journal for the theory of social behaviour, 20(1). 43–63. Deters, Ping. 2012. Identity, Agency and the Acquisition of Professional Language and Culture. London: Continuum. Departament d’Ensenyament. 2016. Requisits per a la incorporació, professors d'escoles oficials d’idiomes. http://ensenyament.gencat.cat/ca/serveis-tramits/borsa-docents/requisits-incorporacio/ (accessed 21 May 2016). Duff, Patricia. 2012. Identity, agency, and second language acquisition. In Alison Mackey & Susan M. Gass (eds.) The Routledge handbook of second language acquisition, 410–426. London: Routledge.

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Geenen, Jarret. 2013. Multimodality and Identity Construction. In Carol A. Chapelle (ed.) The Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics. New Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell. Ghanem, Carla. 2014. Teaching in the foreign language classroom: How being a native or nonnative speaker of German influences culture teaching. Language Teaching Research 19(2). 169–186. Goethe-Institut. 2016. Karriere. https://www.goethe.de/de/uun/kar.html (accessed 21 May 2016). Harré, Rom & Luk Van Langenhove (eds.). 1998. Positioning theory: Moral contexts of international action. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Iedema, Rick. 2003. Multimodality, resemiotization: Extending the analysis of discourse as multi-semiotic practice. Visual communication, 2(1). 29–57. Jewitt, Carey. 2013. Multimodal teaching and learning. In Carol A. Chapelle (ed.) The Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics, 4109–4114. Oxford: Blackwell. Lafkioui, Mena. 2013. Multilingualism, Multimodality and Identity Construction on French-Based Amazigh (Berber) Websites. Revue française de linguistique appliquée, 18(2). 135–151. Lazaraton, Anne. 1995. Qualitative research in applied linguistics: A progress report. Tesol Quarterly, 29(3). 455–472. Leung, Constant, Roxy Harris & Ben Rampton. The idealised native speaker, reified ethnicities and classroom realities. Tesol Quarterly 31(3). 543–560. Menard-Warwick, Julia. 2004. “I Always Had the Desire to Progress a Little”: Gendered Narratives of Immigrant Language Learners. Journal of Language, Identity, and Education, 3(4). 295–311. Morita, Naoko. 2004. Negotiating participation and identity in second language academic communities. Tesol Quarterly, 38(4). 573–603. Norris, Sigrid & Carmen Daniela Maier (eds.). 2014. Interactions, Images and Texts: A Reader in Multimodality (Vol. 11). Boston /Berlin: de Gruyter. Rampton, Ben. 1990. Displacing the ‘native speaker’: Expertise, affiliation, and inheritance. ELT journal, 44(2). 97–101. Riley, Kathleen. 2011. Language Socialization and Language Ideologies. In Alessandro Duranti, Elinor Ochs & Bambi B. Schieffelin (eds.), The Handbook of Language Socialization, 493–511. Oxford: Blackwell. Risager, Karen. 2007. Language and culture pedagogy: From a national to a transnational paradigm. Tonawanda, NY: Multilingual Matters. Sacks, Harvey. 1992. Lectures on Conversation. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Schegloff, Emmanuel. 2007. A tutorial on membership categorization. Journal of Pragmatics 39. 462–482. Sekimoto, Sachi. 2012. A multimodal approach to identity: Theorizing the self through embodiment, spatiality, and temporality. Journal of International and Intercultural Communication, 5(3). 226–243. Selvi, Ali Fuad. 2011. The non-native speaker teacher. ELT journal, 65(2). 187–189. Taylor, Bryan & Nick Trujillo. 2001. Qualitative research methods. In Fredric M. Jablin & Linda L. Putnam (eds.), The new handbook of organizational communication: Advances in theory, research, and methods, 161–194. Thousand Oaks: Sage 161–194. Tsui, Amy. 2007. Complexities of identity formation: A narrative inquiry of an EFL teacher. Tesol Quarterly, 41(4). 657–680. Watson, Rodney. 1978. Categorization, authorization and blame-negotiation in conversation. Sociology, 12(1). 105–113.

Second part: Language Use in Multilingual Contexts

Konstanze Jungbluth, Europa-Universität Viadrina, Frankfurt (Oder)

Co-Constructions in Multilingual Settings Abstract: Observing action embracing language use, speakers and their interlocutors realize different forms of co-constructions. In a wider sense every conversation may be considered as co-constructed by speakers and their listeners. However, in a narrower sense, semantic, lexical and pragmatic co-construction have to be distinguished. Furthermore, echoing or talking in chorus are coconstructions where participants are voicing speech acts collaboratively. This kind of co-construction is used by professionals and laymen according to their purposes in specific ways. Finally, multimodal communication, namely embodiment, plays an important part in the fine-tuned coordination between the participants performing co-constructions. However, research on this topic is still scarce. Keywords: multilingualism, multimodality, biculturality, spoken language, discourse, discourse analysis, social interaction, code-switching, co-production, coconstruction

1 Doing co-constructions in the conversational dyad This chapter focuses on the verbal and nonverbal, e.g. the multimodal interaction between multilingual participants of conversation. At the same time, the purpose of this contribution is to bridge the first part on multimodal use, with the second one on multilingual contexts, both of which give insights into acts of communication going beyond language boundaries. I chose the omnipresent phenomenon of co-construction as a starting point as it shows the eminently interactive character of talking in informal contexts. To give an example I show part of a monolingual dialogue between Catalans sitting at the table and enjoying dinner together. ONI

què em poses what me give MAT Mira si Look whether

a to és is

mi [mama\] (. . .) posa}m aquella cuixe[ta\] serve me that [chicken] thigh me Mama (. . .) el que hi ha al damunt it that which is on top  

 

 

 

DIM small

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JOJ

[posa-me}n [serve me

aquell tallet that part

petit] a mi\ small] to me

Data 1: COC 19, 593–596; 411 (cf. Jungbluth [2005] 2011: 137; Nogué 2015).

The speech acts may be even shorter, sometimes encompassing just one word: NAT [jo també en] vu[:ll\] [I also it] wa[:nt] MER [aquest-] aquest\ [this-] this TON (..)quest i aquest (..)[th]is and this Data 2: COC 18, 1365–1369 (cf. Jungbluth [2005] 2011: 136).

The brackets show the simultaneous speech of two or more people, which may be considered already a form of co-production. I will come back to this point further on. The data shown in 1 and 2 belong to a context, namely serving meals, where speech acts jointly with looking at one another and at the food and drinks and other gestures form part of the ongoing social action (cf. Zinken and Ogiermann 2013). Perhaps it does not easily come to one’s mind, but speech acts can be even more downsized to utterances without a word. Co-constructions are not limited to speech acts transmitted by voices, but may be realized in silence. If this kind of communication is going on, they often take a multimodal form. Clark (2012) describes wordless questions and wordless answers as demonstrated in the following dialogue: STUD ((holds papers up and makes movements with one hand; with the other indicates toward a stacks of paper on a table)) PROF ((nods)) Data 3: Yes, there are silent communicative acts. Wordless questions, wordless answers (Clark 2012: 82).

The participants managed to understand each other without talking. With the silent permission of the professor, the student positioned her paper on the stack where the papers of the other students where already piled up. Reciprocal attention is important, the interchange of glances is loaded up with deictic force. To characterize the doubtless multimodal communication as an example of a question-answer sequence implicates the assignation of syntactic qualities to the performed co-production. The temporal sequence of question and answer is a basic pair in communication and a candidate to be considered as universal.

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[Projective pairs] like adjacency pairs, consist of two communicative acts in sequence from different people, with the first part projecting the second. The difference is that either part may be any type of communicative acts spoken, gestural or otherwise. The proposal here is that question-answer pairs are types of projective pairs, and so one or both parts may be wordless. (Clark 2012: 82)

When growing up in our culture, we learned that the nodding of one’s head may be understood to be equivalent to an affirmation and interchangeable with saying yes or ok or I allow you to do or a combination of these or similar utterances and gestures (cf. Fabra 1932, lemma “sí” where the famous Catalan lexicographer states, that this affirmative particle may be used to answer an expressed question or una interrogació sobreentesa ‘an act understood as a question’). We see that we have to interpret the speech act not as an isolated solely linguistic behavior but as multimodal performance embedded in interaction and its context, where verbal and nonverbal communication is intertwined and built upon shared attention of the interlocutors involved in the conversation. The hearer has to be seen as important as the speaker. The former assumes an active role of constructing understanding in the ongoing interaction. When we are standing or sitting face to face we are involved with our whole body, not only the face. Therefore, researchers sharing this stance talk about “embodiment” (cf. Müller et al. 2014) of the people engaged in conversation (cf. in earlier approaches named Leiblichkeit lit. ‘corporeality’, Weinrich 1988; Jungbluth 2005: 67, 2015; compare Hanks 1990 cited in the next chapter by Da Milano pp. 155–156). The very beginning of the activity of talking to each other in an open space starts with attracting attention through glance or gestures, possibly followed by a reciprocal awareness and selection, a bodily approach, in other words a movement towards each other (Müller and Bohle 2007), before the participants may form a shared conversational dyad, an inside space where the interacting people take their position in relation to each other (Jungbluth 2005).

2 Co-constructing in its wider sense Generally speaking one may understand every dialogue as a co-construction between speaker and her/his hearer(s). Authors like Hobbs (2012: 39–41) call the step by step process of determination achieved by the participants of conversation from turn to turn1 struggling to reach an intersubjective understanding of the

1 Turn refers to all utterances one speaker produces when it is “her/his turn”. Utterances are speech acts of one word or an interjection only but they may also consist of phrases or sentences. If

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intended meaning co-construction. Other authors, among them Greco, Renaud and Taquechel (2012), refer to the new words created in multilingual contexts by groups of interactors with different L1 with the same term. During discourse, participants are obliged to fill up the linguistic signs on both sides. The speaker is usually not aware that what she really said is less than what she had in mind and the hearer cannot help to understand more than what has been expressed (cf. Coseriu [1981] 1986; Dietrich 1988). Additions, embedding the acoustic event, take place on both sides. Humboldt ([1827–1829] 1907) created the metaphor of the endless circles visible in the water when a drop falls into it. This image is meant to represent the everlasting difference between the intended meaning expressed and the understanding achieved by the utterance. This will never be exactly the same as the experience and therefore the background of the involved participants which they inevitably are forced to connect with the expressions, is different for every individual. They never assign exactly the same meaning and what they imagine varies when a certain word or utterance is said. Of course, our conversational work (Mondada 2015) consists in minimizing the difference, intending to adjust the content of what the speaker had in mind and what the addressed people understood – while always being aware that they will never be exactly the same. Emphasizing this dynamic aspect I now turn to addressing adjustment between one another.

2.1 Co-constructing: Adjustment between one and another Hobbs exemplifies the process of co-construction analyzing a conversation between three interlocutors who intend to reach an accord with each other. He shows that the significant entities, called content segments or meaningful units, are usually the result of collaborative effort. The fragment listed under the heading Co-construction of content segments makes obvious that the participants contribute in an unequal manner. B C [B [C

So, if we could, break it up in the, in the following kind of way. I mean, i’, if all, if everybody’s gonna be at lunch. Right, then then the sounding out about current interest and available funds we could, that’s sort of a joint thing. Right. So it could be the three of us together.

characterized in this way, these utterances have to be considered as elaborated expressions showing a corresponding syntactic structure.

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B C B

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That’s right. And so I don’t know, a half hour or something on that during lunch. Right.

Data 4: Co-constructing: adjustment between one and another (Hobbs 2012: 39–40).

The conversational work is distributed among two speakers along six turns which may be resumed in a narrowing of the interactively developed result followed by the action of having lunch together: D1 all > D2 everybody > D3 joint thing > D4 the three of us together. We observe a step by step process of semantic determination which starts with the rather general and vague reference all, which is further elaborated by the first interlocutor using the indefinite pronoun everybody. The second interlocutor makes the next step first adding joint thing and finally resumes the jointly reached understanding in form of the phrase the three of us together (Hobbs 2012: 40). However, the collaborative process is not restricted to the two speakers but involves a silent third participant in this fragment as well. He implicitly ratifies the result by acting as expected. By doing so, the three interlocutors adjust between each other and build up a shared understanding which allows them to act as a group, e.g. adjust, control and synchronize the individual actions according to the confirmed goal as established between them before.

2.2 Co-constructing: Creating new words between interlocutors of different L1 As mentioned previously, Greco et al. (2012) use the term co-construction to refer to the neologisms created2 in multilingual communities where interlocutors with different L1s interact. Greco, Renaud and Tequechel (2013: 39) use the term ‘creativity’ in the context of multilingual language use where “creation, i.e. the co-construction of new linguistic forms, can be understood through the coexistence and co-contribution of each of the ‘repertoires’, resulting from the crossing of various language spaces and from hybridisation in the course of the interactions” (Zinkhahn-Rhobodes forthcoming).

This creative process of coining new bilingual words comes out of the contact between two or more languages being especially characteristic of a conventionalized multilingual usage (Jungbluth 2012). Out of the coexistence and co-contribution of different linguistic repertoires present in multilingual groups, which may

2 Cf. Coseriu’s distinction between energeia and ergon ([1981] 1986).

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meet temporally during the preparation of a performance, or in an international school, or more steadily forming part of a neighborhood during a certain lifespan, or for their whole life, there emerge forms which Zinkhahn-Rhobodes (forthcoming) qualifies as hybrid. They are the result of the co-presence of several languages spoken more or less simultaneously in the same space. The joy in combining parts belonging to different languages is well known as a cultural practice among adolescents. Rampton (1995) studied multiethnic groups in London and Barcelona and coined the term crossing to name the fact that the students not only use words of their own languages but of the languages of “the others” too. They cross the borders and go beyond the language boundaries by adjusting between one another thus creating a specific way of talking which may serve as an identity marker of their group. The latter is regularly observable when its use serves as recognition across their members while, at the same time, to communicate their difference from other (neighboring) groups. This practice has been attested in some quarters of Berlin (cf. Wiese 2012) and in other places as well (e.g. London, Barcelona, cf. Rampton 1995). However, this practice is not limited to adolescents. On the contrary, other international groups sharing an interest for sports, theatre, especially outdoor theatre and other kinds of performances show a similar behavior. Four years ago, a Catalan group organized as part of a group called “Fura dels Baus” prepared a big performance in Duisburg, Germany, named “Global Rheingold”. Professionals and amateurs formed part of the plurilingual group and were called “fureros”. Its members belonged to different speech communities: Spanish, Catalan, German, Dutch, English, among others, and some of them were competent in several languages to varying degrees. One of the responsible directors cried for participation in the following way: “¡La bola! We need the Kugelpeople now!” The first expression, underlined, is Spanish, followed by a sentence in English incorporating the German word Kugel ‘ball’ as part of the bilingual neologism Kugelpeople. In reality, Carlos intended to gather all the actors in a particular scene which was performed inside of a huge cage named bola ‘ball’. During the preparations and the repetitive exercising of the actions lasting weeks, the participants of the performance created a trilingual habitus that fulfilled their communication purposes in order to realize their shared finalities. The coined term Kugelpeople may serve as an example for co-construction in the sense of Greco et al. (2012). The fact that the “fureros”, who are plurilingual, managed to act as was expected, supports the interpretation of a term in the form of a keyword co-constructed by speaker and hearers alike. The multimodal collaboration of all the speakers in the group during several weeks was a prerequisite in order to invent routines of action (Müller and Bohle 2007; Jungbluth 2015) of which speech acts are a part of. Together they developed

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habitual patterns, repeated many times including obligatory sequences as well as facultative ones, that were introduced by a spoken keyword or a gest (Zollna 1994; Fricke 2007, 2014).

3 Co-constructing in its narrower sense However, many authors, among them Thörle (2012) and Burgos (2007), prefer to limit the scope of the term co-construction to those speech acts which are realized or distributed between two interlocutors (cf. Günthner 2015; Dausendschön-Gay/ Gülich/Krafft 2015). The co-production may be realized in different ways, such as a sentence started by one person and completed by the other or in form of a simultaneous voicing of one or several words similar to speaking aloud in chorus. Let’s start with semantic co-constructions, which are quite frequent in multilingual settings but observable in monolingual contexts too. Afterwards, I will discuss examples of grammatical co-constructions and finally some data will show speech acts produced chorus like together.

3.1 Semantic co-constructions The phenomenon of semantic co-constructions may be experienced in monolingual as well as multilingual contexts. All of us know situations where a speaker is searching for a word which for some reason does not immediately come to mind. This fact has to do with the spontaneous character of conversations in informal contexts, which are marked by the lack of proactive planning and the pressure of time (Koch and Oesterreicher [1990] 2011). The latter characterizes the realization of speech acts, sequentially ordered without pauses outside of their places, as defined by the utterance. Simultaneously the shared ongoing activity of conversation puts the current speaker and the participants involved under pressure to keep talking and to avoid long pauses apart from the intention of breaking off. The speaker, facing difficulties in finding the right word, may ask her interlocutor for help. The following fragment is embedded in a bilingual Spanish-English context giving insight into the interaction between people of Puerto-Rico: A

Le pusieron un . . . .3 como se dice? ..[un tutone] To him they delegated a How is it called? A tutone  

 

3 Helasvuo (2001: 33–35) insists in the value of the pause as [un] elemento que indica búsqueda de palabra ‘an element indicating a word search’ (Burgos 2007: 20).

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B

[un tutor?] a tutor?

Data 5: Co-construction suggesting a missing word. Fragment of a conversation between people of Puerto-Rico (Poplack 1980).

Speaker A starts the utterance and after a short break interrupts himself, going on with a question directed to his interlocutor before finally suggesting the missing part of the earlier started sentence. At the same time, answering and correcting his interlocutor, speaker B adds the correct form of the word searched for “tutor”. Leaving aside the inserted question, from a syntactic perspective both utterances have to be considered as elliptic. The underlying proposition, “le pusieron un tutor” isn’t uttered by anybody, with each interlocutor voicing only a part of it. Sometimes one finds either an explicit act of ratification, or a repetition of the word/s proposed by the interlocutor through the speaker who has been in difficulties expressing himself. But in Data 5, only the fact that the interaction is going on and turning to another point indicates the implicit ratification of speaker B’s contribution. By uttering the question, speaker A makes it obvious that he is in doubt about the correct form of the Latin based term for a co-instructor. Thirty years ago the use of tutor was not as widespread, however, nowadays this quasi inflationary used term is often uttered in institutional education. We know that both speakers are bilingual Spanish-English, but we cannot decide whether the speech act itself can be considered as bilingual as the term is not only frequent in English, but in Spanish as well. Albeit it seems as if the cultural practice of inclusion of tutors in the world of education has been introduced first in the US. Diachronic research based on corpora could shed light on the route the word followed (cf. ‘discourse trajectory’ and the postulated ‘hegemony of the English speaking world’ cf. Parreira and Schinelo 2014) and its spread in other cultures naming the new practice. Let’s turn to grammatical co-constructions now.

3.2 Grammatical co-constructions The co-construction of one single syntactic gestalt (Auer 1996, Helasvuo 2004, cf. Brenning 2004) by two or more speakers is an everyday phenomenon in spoken interaction (Mondada 2015). The collaborative completion has already been mentioned by Sacks (1992). Similar to the fragment taken from the Catalan corpus COC above (Nogué 2015), where the first speaker says vull ‘I want’ and the second and the third utter aquest ‘that’, implicitly take up the word of the first speaker. The following part of a dialogue in French also illustrates grammatical co-construction:

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1A

2B

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donc je sais à peu près comment il faut être vis à vis de telle ou telle personne donc euh je comprends well I know approximately how he has to be[have] vis-à-vis this or that person well euh I understand la méthode the method

Data 6: Co-construction by collaboratively completing a sentence distributed between two speakers and their utterances ordered in sequence (Jeanneret 1999: 122).

Co-constructions do not only appear when a sentence has not been finished by the speaker. Interlocutors are free to add a new part to any phrase uttered so far thus connecting one with the other. In the following data the Spanish particle y ‘and’ expresses continuation: A S:

4

es [it] is [ ]y [ ]and

que ella se va . . .el miércoles that she leaves. . .on Wednesday el jueves tenés que entregarle el cassette (Burgos 2007: 18) on Thursday do you have to hand him over the cassette  

 

 

 

Data 7: Co-construction by giving continuation to a sentence started before: the interlocutor sticks a facultative part on the grammatical frame already established by her previous speaker.

Burgos (2007: 28) assigns a syntactic function only to those speech acts which add an obligatory part to fill a gap of a so far incomplete phrase, whereas he considers the transformation of the structure of a sentence into a parataxis or a complex phrase with subordinate clauses as pragmatically motivated. I disagree with this perspective, a very much formal one, as language use in informal contexts does not always obey the rules of written language. First, many speech acts remain unfinished, and secondly, every contribution needs a pragmatic finality to be uttered at all. This holds even for those utterances which fill a syntactic gap left by the previous speech act. We will come back to this point at the end of the paper. In the following section, I will draw attention to different forms of co-productions.

4 The distances are introduced to maintain the correspondence between the data and its glossing in English. They do not represent pauses in the utterance. The latter are represented by points.

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3.3 Co-productions Investigating occurrences of co-productions, Thörle (2012) concentrates on the temporal sequence between them. Different kinds of overlapping – more or less extended from one turn to the next – may be observed. She proposes to distinguish between three kinds of co-productions: first those co-productions where one participant speaks in place of another, for example in the contribution of the word tutor in Data 5 or of la méthode in Data 6 above, both attributing a missed element to the utterance of the previous speaker. They do not break the rule that only one person is talking at the same time. However, this rule is not always respected as is evidenced by the second group she calls “pre-empting or saying something before the current speaker” (2012: 351). Televised political debates may serve as an example where we may observe how a member of the opposite party successfully achieves to add a further item to the list started by his/her interlocutor. BER5 [. . .] il regime precedente / quelle de Hoxha / era / un regime / autoritario / chiuso / dispotico/ [. . .] the preceding regime / that of Hoxha / was / an autoritarian / secretive / despotic regime BUT comu6 // commu BER che si diceva comunista // e non aveva / alcuna traccia / delle ragioni per cui siamo comunisti // [. . .] (C-Oral-ROM: imedts 03 porta a porta; cf. Thörle 2012: 352) which when you said communist // and there is no evidence for reasons why they should be communist  

 

 

 

 

 

Data 8: Co-constructions by talking in place and before of the speaker in charge, forestalling the intended contribution with the aim to mark a distance.

Cutting off the interlocutor by speaking slightly earlier is a form of competition which sometimes may end in getting the right to speak earlier than the stipulated moment. The character of the action may be confrontational as shown in the political debate just discussed. However, there are examples of ludic competition between friends. The third group consists of dialogues where two or more participants talk at the same time, chorus like. Thörle observes that some journalists regularly use

5 Fausto Bertinotti, at that time secretary of the communist party PRC (Thörle 2012: 352). 6 The syllables in pointed brackets show the simultaneously performed parts of the utterances.

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this form of co-production where they repeat the last or/and key words of the discourse of their interviewees. While demonstrating their attention and interest similar to other back channel interactions, they simultaneously aim to slow down the speed of the expert’s voice as a kind of pre-closure signal announcing the end of the ongoing dialogue, of the radio or television program, or focusing on the ongoing interaction of the turn itself. *VIR deja / al organismo / // Leaves the organism undefended BLA [completely English fluently speaking(.)foreign-kid< 292 and uh and that was a cool thing 293 because it really allowed me (. . .) 299 until what was acceptable or not 301 because you were always the foreign-kid 302 and everyone knows that you are the foreign-kid  

 

Luiz orientates himself positively in the process of immigrating and adapting to a new community with the use of the MC bilingual-foreign-kid, which implies a sense of prestige, thus providing self-esteem and confidence when faced with a new and unfamiliar setting in an American High School. By controlling his environment through his expressed language expertise, he reverts to the foreignkid MC, therefore able to separate himself from any given community, expressing self-driven stances and performing social acts, yet still accept and be accepted by any given community, while smiling at the interviewer towards the end of 293 with his success and accomplishment of creating his ideal MC. Again through the social constructions of identity, Luiz demonstrates a growing affiliation towards

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the MC bilingual-foreign-kid, perceived as more prestigious than immigrant, while implying a sense of superiority towards the L2 communities as well as continued loss of L1 affiliation. However, in contrast to Luiz, Marijeta expresses a great deal of epistemic attitudes towards the L2 as she displays her identity within an immigrant family in Germany, choosing to adopt those stances within the MC German: Excerpt 4: 163:MJ the compe-compensation was that I try to be as much German as possible (. . .) 167 I tried to wear clothes the same clothes as they WO-wore 168 I tried to set up the rules that they had 169 like>going uh to bed at 8 o’clock< 170 >having dinner at 7< 172 all those stupid German rules 173 (hahaha) (hahaha) 174:M (hahaha) (. . .) 190:MJ um so I tried to set up all those rules to>you knowand I never wanted to be like them< 196 I always wanted to be like the Germans like okay we have when we get home from school we have lunch 197 and then we um(.)sit right at our desk we do our homework 198 (. . .) 201 >you knowthat’s a difficult one< 487 because I don’t relate to any culture that well (. . .) 489:M (10.1)okay what is it that you relate then to each culture (. . .) 493:L (27.2)((exhale)) 494

495 (.) 496 (.) 497 (.) but I don’t I don’t know how to answer that 498 because I(..)I can’t really relate myself.  

 

 

 

 

 

Luiz positions himself as outsider of any national group, enabling him to successfully adapt to any context while using the analogy of his identity as a parasite, a quite negative connotation, therefore negotiating his identity with the interviewer by humbly downplaying his success and prestige of being the bilingual-foreignkid, an identity he has constructed that has positively worked for him. The interruption and hesitation in 485, and again in 493, while exhaling deeply, taking his gaze away from the interviewer and putting his fist to his mouth, concentrating in order to find within himself his positioning towards a MC, all clearly suggest avoidance to position himself against L1 inheritance and L1 affective affiliation by choosing a community he most belongs with, therefore putting further distance towards any language affiliations.

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3.2 Multilingualism With regards to L1 and L2(s) use within the domains of language use in daily life, Marijeta and Luiz feel competent in their different languages as displayed in the following excerpts. Although Luiz provides numerous accounts of his current difficulties in expressing himself in Portuguese, he finds one domain of life that has been unaffected by increases of L2 input in his environment: Excerpt 6: 831:M okay um what language would you prefer to argue in? 832:L English 833 cause I have a lot of practice on it 834:M (haha) 835 and how do you feel when you argue with your family if-if you’re speaking Portuguese? 836:L 837:M (haha) 838 so you can express yourself well if you’re arguing? 839:L >yes-yes< 840:M more so if you are doing casual speech? 841:L 100%

Although Luiz prefers to use English when arguing, concerning L1 use, this social act remains an intact linguistic feature due to exposure within the family, according to Luiz’ reported perceptions of having “practice” in this domain. Luiz demonstrates meta-communicative awareness with regards to his competence with arguing in Portuguese, later suggesting this be related to the “behavioral part of your brain”, implying it as an activity that is instinctual and emotional. Displaying both L1 and L2 expertise and affiliation to social acts of arguing, Luiz demonstrates the complexities of language use showing different competences across different domains of life. While Luiz almost always perceives L1 emotion words as more emotionally significant, Marijeta often demonstrates preferences in certain L2 emotional words because of a lack of emotional experience such as in the excerpt below: Excerpt 7: 1834:MJ yeah Croatian the word I love you I don’t>I don’t think of anything romantic< 1835 because I’ve never had a Croatian boyfriend 1836

1837 >because you knowand they don’t speak English< 454 and I know that I could just write to them in English 455 if I could just write to my grandma in English 456 I feel like I could just write her every day 457 because it’s so easy for me to express myself 458 and I’ve gone as far as writing her 459 and going to google translate 460 and translating it into Portuguese 461

462 completely different that 463

I hate it 464 465 it sucks 466 (. . .)so how do I feel about(.)being dominant in a language that’s not my original tongue? 467 it’s(.)it hurts my close relationships with my family  

 

 

 

Using a dispreffered turn-shape with a suggested MC of bilingual from the Interviewer, Luiz takes control of the Interview by requesting to change the question, reverting the MC “bilingual” to “dominant in the language that is not my original

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language” or in other words an L1 attritor. Expressing affective attitudes towards his language loss with the use of strong affective attitudes through emotion words of hate, bad, hurt and sucks, he elicits his dilemma of being an L1 attritor as having the most severe consequences of affecting the relationships he values most: family. While Luiz displays stronger L2 affiliation and expertise, he expresses struggles with accepting this due to strong L1 affiliation and inheritance. Alternatively, Marijeta doesn’t express the social consequences of what it means to be an L1 attritor, but displays affective attitudes in how it affects and threatens her personal and social identity with her MC of Croatian: Excerpt 9: 1931:MJ and plus it’s weird because I am Croatian 1932 I have a Croatian name 1933 I have a Croatian passport 1934 and then there is also a thing I feel anxious 1935 that I can’t speak it perfectly (. . .) 1948 I wish I could speak it perfectly 1949 I would feel  

 

Marijeta expresses negative affective attitudes towards her Croatian identity, incomplete without language expertise, while bringing her shame and anxiety. Finding L1 member stances as being competent in the language, Marijeta implies a feeling of being threatened to claims of her Croatian identity, as she would feel like a more competent member if she could “speak it perfectly”. By positioning her dilemma as displaying an external Croatian identity: her name, her passport, but not the language, she balances feelings of language affiliation due to inheritance, but because of a loss in language expertise she feels threatened to language affiliation. While both participants demonstrate feelings of being threatened by their L1 claims to identity because of their self-reported language loss, both express beliefs their permanence in L1 attrition is not constant, and with increased use or migrating back to the home country for a short period, they can overcome expressed feelings in their lack of language expertise as well as any accompanying threats to MC.

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4 The construction of identities in the multilingual L1 attritor While balancing distinct linguistic, cultural, and socioeconomic backgrounds, both participants use quite different means in the construction and negotiation of their identities, with Luiz controlling his environment by constructing an identity as bilingual foreign-kid, avoiding affiliation within any community, while able to express his individual identity, yet still accept and be accepted by any given community. In contrast, Marijeta continuously negotiates her individual identity, expressing a sense of inferiority and negative self-perception towards her inherited language community, thus making attempts to align with the majority community, adopting stances and values she finds superior to her L1, in order to create self-esteem while constructing a positive social identity, one with a successful future in Germany. As suggested above by Schmid (2007: 45), this is a common tactic among immigrants that feel “downgraded by members of the majority community”, where they may choose community status by adopting the values and stances of the majority community in order to distance themselves from the perceived inferior L1 stance to build self-esteem and social self-worth (Schmid 2011c). It is evident Marijeta has created substantial effort to obtain and express a multimodal identity, referring to her changes in dress, studies, and rules. The differences in the construction of identity across participants are clearly impacted by socioeconomic differences, with Luiz’ immigration the result of white-color job opportunities for his family, including attending an International American Private School, and being the bilingual foreign-kid, clear connotations of prestige, leading to the construction of a social identity with built-in selfconfidence and high self-esteem. In contrast, Marijeta’s immigration status was the result of war, with clear expressed perceptions as belonging to a community of Croatian immigrants that was socioeconomically inferior, so that she distanced herself to L1 affiliation, while adopting the superior L2 cultural ideologies she found prestigious, leading to the construction of a social identity that adopted and blended member values in order to build self-confidence and esteem. Through the lens of a poststructuralist perspective, both participants demonstrate different competences while being members of multiple linguistic, social, and cultural communities, despite language dominance, attitudes, and L1 attrition. Both report L2 expertise, but with expressed difficulties in L1 self-expression, with the areas furthest from being affected concerned with the use of affective attitudes or experiences. Sociocultural theories and the DMM align with perceptions and differences found across participants in respect to the expression of language affiliation and loss, and the construction of identity. As suggested

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earlier, language loss or retainment is directly related to the input received in specific domains of life as experienced and processed through social and psychological activities, as can be seen with Luiz’ reference of being able to express himself rather easily in the context of L1 arguing as it remains an intact linguistic feature. In contrast, Marijeta displays no affiliation to the word “love” in Croatian as anything romantic, while she reports developing much more emotional experience in her L2, a common characteristic found in speakers who elicit feelings of distance and detachment to emotional words in a less frequently used and thus less deeply encoded language (Dewaele 2011). Additionally, Dewaele and Pavlenko (2002) suggest that emotion words are culturally specific and thus variations in emotional significance can be explained by the multilinguals’ sociocultural and individual experience and whether the language was learned prior to or after adolescence, as is the case with Marijeta, a heritage speaker born to the host community, where she had much more variety of emotional experiences in her L2 than in her L1, while Luiz immigrated as an adolescent, having a great deal of emotional experience in his L1. Clearly, the age factor has played a large role in expressed differences of emotional experience as well as L1 expertise with Luiz spending a good majority of his developmental years in Brazil, including several years of immersion in L1 education, while Marijeta has not. In addition to lack of L1 expertise, Luiz displays feelings of having a lack of L2 affiliation and inheritance, finding difficulties not with the language itself, but with the “cultural side of it” as he demonstrated metacommunicative awareness in differences of interpersonal communication in his early L2 learning. As suggested by Dewaele (2008), the discourse of interpersonal communication is fundamental in the expression of affective experiences and topics in an individual’s everyday life. The importance of expression and conveying meaning while sharing affective attitudes and values is detrimental to the maintenance of interpersonal relationships, and both participants demonstrate these struggles, as they balance different competences from their multilingual and multicultural emotional experiences, finding ways to express multimodality through their language communities. Although Luiz reports much less Portuguese use in the last 2 years of University, in contrast to Marijeta, he seems to have much more outlets and communities where he can use the language, not only with his close relationships among parents and extended family, but friends as well. Alternatively, Marijeta almost exclusively uses Croatian to interact with her parents every few weeks, with high instances of code-switching among her brothers and sisters. By constructing an identity as bilingual foreign-kid, Luiz controls his environment and is able to retain more L1 affiliation, while Marijeta adopts stances of the host community, constructing a multimodal identity through adopting the norms of education,

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clothes, and house rules, while distancing herself at times from L1 affiliation. Of course it is this very idea that “a migrant who has a strong motivation to integrate into the host society will experience more attrition than someone who is comfortable remaining a foreigner and something of an outsider” (Schmid 2011c: 7). While this study cannot propose the severity of Marijeta and Luiz’ levels of attrition, and who is the bigger attritor, I suggest a collection of real measures other than shortened self-reports of L1 attrition to be considered in future research with regards to addressing severity. As suggested by Schmid (2012: 2), the view that the L1 is unchangeable and invincible is an extremely pervasive idea to monolingual and bilingual speakers alike, with ties that are so “intimately linked with early development, identity, cultural roots” that it’s “often perceived as threatening or shocking”. Both participants demonstrate this dilemma when contemplating their social identities and L1 MC, expressing implied feelings of being threatened to claims of identity due to their lack of language expertise. However, their lack of competence does not strip them of all claims to an L1 social identity as they position and orientate themselves throughout the interview as sharing stances and values they positively identify with, as well as balancing and expressing differences of emotional significance to certain emotion words and social acts from their emotional experiences across various domains of life. Luiz and Marijeta not only demonstrate identifying themselves as members of their L1 communities despite language difficulties, but also display the creation of hybrid identities, demonstrating the complexities of membership across multiple communities.

5 Conclusion When multilinguals are living across distinct linguistic and multicultural communities, changes of language use and dominance are obvious defining characteristics, thus changes in the construction and negotiation of identity through language expertise and affiliation, with stances, social acts, and MC, will also be expected, as can be seen in the analysis above. Even within the single instances of data extraction during the month Luiz and Marijeta participated in the study, the implications of “time and change”, and “then and now” were a constant part of the dialogue. As demonstrated above, stances, MC, and language attitudes are constantly in flux, exhibiting dynamic systems that grow and wane depending on a wide variety of variables, from immigration to L1 attrition, as multicultural and multilingual speakers not only adapt and negotiate their social and personal identities through the contexts and changes they face in life, but are also demonstrating how different competences and membership in multiple ethnic, social

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and linguistic communities are constructed. Future research should consider longitudinal case studies in observing what factors and variables may alter and affect perceptions of identity, especially observing those changes from the moment emigration takes place to the subsequent years thereafter.

References Baker, Carolyn. 2002. Ethnomethodological analyses of interviews. In Jaber Gubrium & James Holstein (eds.), Handbook of Interview Research: Context and Method, 777–795. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Block, David. 2007. Second Language Identities. London: Continuum. Day, Dennis. 1992. Membership Categorization Analysis. Kopenhagen: University of Denmark. Dewaele, Jean-Marc. 2005. Sociodemographic, psychological and politicocultural correlates in Flemish students attitudes toward French and English. Journal of multilingual and multicultural development 26. 118–137. Dewaele, Jean-Marc. 2008. The Emotional Weight of I love you in Multilinguals’ Languages. Journal of Pragmatics 40(10). 1753–1780. Dewaele, Jean-Marc. 2011. Self-reported Use and Perception of the L1 and L2 among Maximally Proficient Bi- and Multilinguals: a Quantitative and Qualitative Investigation. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 208. 25–51. Dewaele, Jean-Marc & Aneta Pavlenko. 2001–2003. Web questionnaire Bilingualism and Emotions. London: University of London. Dewaele, Jean-Marc & Aneta Pavlenko. 2002. Emotion vocabulary in interlanguage. Language Learning 52(2). 263–322. Jessner, Ulrike. 2003. A dynamic approach to language Attrition in multilingual systems. In Vivian Cook (ed.), Effects of the second language on the first, 234–246. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Herdina, Philipp & Ulrike Jessner. 2002a. A dynamic model of multilingualism analyzed. A dynamic model of multilingualism: Perspectives of change in psycholinguistics, 76–110. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Herdina, Philipp & Ulrike Jessner. 2002b. A dynamic model of multilingualism developed. A dynamic model of multilingualism: Perspectives of change in psycholinguistics, 111–143. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Jimenez, Antonio. 2004. Sociocultural approach to language attrition. In Monika Schmid, Barbara Köpke, Merel Keijzer & Lina Weilemar (eds.), First language attrition: Interdisciplinary perspectives on methodological issues, 61–80. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: Benjamins. Köpke, Barbara & Monika Schmid. 2004. First language attrition: The next phase. In Monika Schmid, Barbara Köpke, Merel Keijzer & Lina Weilemar (eds.), First language attrition: Interdisciplinary perspectives on methodological issues, 1–43. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: Benjamins. Ochs, Elinor. 1993. Constructing social identity: A language socialization perspective. Research on Language & Social Interaction 26(3). 287–306.

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Pavlenko, Aneta. 2002. Poststructuralist approaches to the study of social factors in second language learning and use. In Vivian Cook (ed.), Portraits of the L2 user, 277–302. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Pavlenko, Aneta & Adrian Blackledge (eds.). 2002. Ideologies of language in multilingual contexts. Special issue. Multilingua, 21(2). Schmid, Monika. 2007. Identity and first language attrition: A historical approach. Sociolinguistic Studies, 5(1). 41–58. Schmid, Monika. 2011a. Extralinguistic aspects of language attrition. First language attrition. 69–80. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schmid, Monika. 2011b. The language attrition website. http://www.let.rug.nl/ languageattrition/ (accessed 16 June 2014). Schmid, Monika. 2011c. Attitudes and identities. First language attrition. Cambridge University Press. 96–106 Schmid, Monika. 2012. Language attrition and multilingualism. In Carol A. Chapelle (ed.), The Encyclopedia of applied linguistics. Oxford: Blackwell Wiley. Schmid, Monika & Barbara Köpke. 2007. Bilingualism and attrition. In Barbara Köpke, Monika Schmid, Merel Keijzer & Susan Dostert (eds.), Language attrition: Theoretical perspectives, 1–8. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: Benjamins.

Dagna Zinkhahn Rhobodes, Europa-Universität Viadrina, Frankfurt/Oder

Crossing and Blurring the Language Borders The Example of German-Polish Language Contact Abstract: How can the language contact-induced processes of opening, crossing and dissolving of language borders be described and explained? What actually happens at the language border between two languages during language mixing processes, and what are the structural consequences of these dynamic phenomena? These and related questions will be explored using the German-Polish language contact situation as an example. The aim of the chapter is to propose an innovative framework that incorporates the theory of the border into linguistic analysis, with the goal of gaining interdisciplinary insight into the investigation of structural aspects of language mixing. In the following I will present an analysis model which integrates the term of the border with its three defining characteristics – durability, permeability and liminality – in an analysis of language mixing phenomena. This interdisciplinary perspective provides a theoretical framework for the investigation of the character of language borders at different structural points of language switches according to their durable, permeable and liminal qualities. Applying this analysis model I aim to show how theory on the characteristics of borders can be successfully combined with language analysis. Keywords: language contact, language border, German-Polish language mixing

1 Introduction To “mark”, “cross”, “move” or “suspend” (language) borders – these formulations are used in various disciplines such as language philosophy (e.g. Wittgenstein 1989), foreign language research (e.g. Duxa, Hu and Schmenk 2005), translation studies (e.g. Wolf 2008) or migration literature (e.g. Irsigler and Jürgensen 2011). The concept of crossing language borders has also been mentioned in the language contact literature as Sprachgrenzen überspringen ‘to jump over language borders’ (Hinnenkamp and Meng 2005), Überschreiten von Sprachgrenzen ‘crossing the language borders’ (Cunha et al. 2012: 13), or Pendeln über Sprachgrenzen

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hinweg ‘to commute over the language borders’ (Ehrhart 2002). Gogolin (1998: 75) calls the language mixing routine of multilingual speakers sprachliches Grenzgängertum.1 The concept of moving language borders is described by Erfurt (2003): Migrants cross the borders of dialects and languages. By massive migration, new spaces of multilingualism arise outside of the original distribution area of the language, whereby the borders of languages and varieties are moved or questioned (. . .). (Erfurt 2003: 6; translation: D.Z.R.)2  

 

An interesting approach can be found in the study of Greco, Renaud and Taquechel (2013), in which the authors analyse linguistic practices in multilingual workplaces taking a conversational analysis perspective. They consider the alternating use of two or more languages within one conversation as “border-crossing”, understood as “leaving one language space for another” (Greco, Renaud and Taquechel 2013: 36).3 Furthermore, Gardner-Chloros (2009: 34) mentions “fuzziness of the borders (. . .) between different types of contact languages”, and Winford (2003:13) discusses language borders becoming “blurred” in situations of structural convergence of languages in contact. However, in the aforementioned citations, the concept of the language border and the processes of its crossing and dissolution are considered mostly meta 

 

1 “‘Linguistic border crossing’, as one of the central results of our study, is a common feature of the linguistic practice of multilingual speakers. Blending of or switching between languages not only occur ‘out of necessity’ or unnoticed by the speakers itself [. . .]. It is rather, as it seems, a ‘stylistic device’ of multilingual people and often a result of a conscious choice.” (Gogolin 1998: 75, translation D.Z.R.). “Sprachliches Grenzgängertum’ so eines der zentralen Ergebnisse unserer Untersuchung, ist ein gewöhnliches Merkmal der sprachlichen Praxis Mehrsprachiger. Das Vermengen von oder Wechseln zwischen Sprachen geschieht keineswegs nur ‘der Not gehorchend’ oder als von den Sprechenden selbst unbemerkt vollzogene Routine [. . .]. Vielmehr ist es, wie es scheint, darüber hinaus ein ‘Stilmittel’ mehrsprachiger Menschen, nicht selten Ausdruck einer bewussten Wahl.” (Gogolin 1998: 75). 2 “Migranten überschreiten Dialekt- und Sprachgrenzen. Bei massenhafter Migration entstehen außerhalb des ursprünglichen Verbreitungsraumes der Sprache neue Räume der Mehrsprachigkeit, wobei die Grenzen von Varietäten verschoben oder infrage gestellt werden (. . .).” (Erfurt 2003: 6). 3 “Inspired by the tradition of dialectological investigations and by forming an analogy with the concept of ‘dialect variation areas’, we examined, in the ‘language space’ opened by any interaction, the implementation of phenomena we have called ‘border crossing’, which can signify on the one hand the limit reached by specific ‘ways of doing’, and on the other the anchoring of this process in a new ‘language space’ categorised and treated as referring to other ‘ways of doing’” (Greco, Renaud and Taquechel 2013: 34).  

 

 

 

 

 

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phorically. The actual character of the language border and its dynamic change during the “crossing”, “moving”, “blurring” or “suspending” has not been a direct object of systematic investigation. But what does it actually mean to cross, displace or suspend a language border? How can these hitherto figuratively regarded concepts be described and explained in a linguistic analysis? Which processes take place at the language border between two languages in contact, and what are the structural consequences of these dynamic phenomena? These questions will be discussed using the example of German-Polish language mixing. The language border is regarded here as the structural border between two language systems, mostly phonetically manifested as point of language switch. Following Greco, Renaud and Taquechel (2013), it can be interpreted from the dialectological tradition as the dividing line between two “language spaces” which can be crossed through moving from the use of one language to another.4 If the language contact is extensive enough that it leads to convergence and maybe fusion of morphosyntactic language structures, and in consequence to the emergence of hybrid language forms, it may even manifest in language borders dissolving. My proposal is a description and explanation of the concepts of crossing and blurring language borders based on the discussion of German-Polish language mixing data mainly from Frankfurt (Oder) and its twin-town Słubice. Thus, the term of the border is twice anchored in the study. Firstly, the empirical data are primarily collected along the German-Polish border; secondly, the language border character in the data itself is the main object of research. The data will be analysed based on the concept of the border from the perspective of cultural science studies (cf. Audehm and Velten 2007, Jungbluth 2012).5 In light of this analytical framework, the language borders will be discussed with respect to their durable, permeable and liminal characters. Applying this heretofore-underused approach in linguistics, I take a cultural-

4 “More in resonance with the viewpoints and ambitions of linguistic anthropology (Duranti 1997), we therefore finally converged on the dialectological tradition, on that is familiar with the concept ‘speech variety’ (fr. parler) and its problematic borders (Straka and Gardette 1973) and sensitive in its empirical approach to the organisation by the witnesses themselves of their day-today experience of linguistic diversity and its ‘borders’ or ‘discontinuities’, crossed in moving from one way of speaking to another as well as in the geographical traversal of a fragmented space (Walt et al 1973, Poche 1996)” (Greco, Renaud and Taquechel 2013: 44). 5 Further publications focussing on the concept of the border from the cultural and literary studies perspective are among others: Faber and Naumann (1995), Parr (2008), Kleinschmidt and Hewel (2011).

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science viewpoint in the investigation of structural aspects of language mixing. In doing so, I aim to contribute to the theory of borders from the linguistic perspective. The chapter is divided into five sections. After describing the object of investigation and methodology in section two, the approach for the incorporation of the concept of the “border” into linguistics will be presented in section three. The fourth section begins with the presentation of the analysis model, and is further dedicated to the analysis and discussion of some examples of GermanPolish language mixing. Section five summarizes the article with conclusions.

2 Methodology and research questions The object of my investigation is German-Polish language mixing, a contact situation which has been relatively little studied thus far. The language-mixing data of this Slavonic and German language belonging to two different branches of the Indo-European language family is a fascinating base for research on language borders. The analysis of the language border between a strongly inflected language like Polish, and the much less inflected German, which seems to be relatively durable and which is discussed as being “die härteste Sprachgrenze in Europa” ‘the hardest language border in Europe’ (Wilkinson 2009: 73, Matthiesen 2002), could offer valuable insight for the border theory from a linguistic perspective. The data collection was carried out across three investigation sites. The first two are both educational institutions situated at the German-Polish border in Frankfurt (Oder) and Słubice. The initial part of the empirical study took place at the European University Viadrina, where Polish students have established a German-Polish mixed speech, which is widely practiced as their common group code in their every day interactions. This language routine is called by its speakers Viadrinisch (from the name of the University) or Poltsch (from the names of the languages involved Polnisch/polski and Deutsch). All of the informants are Polish native speakers from different parts of Poland who learned German as a foreign language in secondary school. The second place in Frankfurt (Oder) where data were collected is the KarlLiebknecht-Gymnasium. The informants are pupils of the 10th and 11th grade who – like the students of the European University Viadrina – are Polish native speakers. They mostly come from Słubice or Polish villages and towns near the border region. The third investigation site is the Robert-Jungk-Oberschule in Berlin, which is also a secondary school, particularly known for its German-Polish educational

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profile (SESB – Staatliche Europaschule Berlin). Similar to the Karl-LiebknechtGymnasium, the interviewed pupils of Polish origin attended the 10th and 11th grade. However, contrary to the students and pupils in Frankfurt (Oder), they attended primary school, and some even went to kindergarten in Germany. The base for the qualitative part of the investigation is a series of audio recordings. The interviews were conducted with 36 informants and provided language material totalling 12 hours. During the interviews, informants were asked to describe their typical day at school or university, as well as their favourite subjects and hobbies. The audio recordings were conducted mostly on the school/university campus with groups of 2–5 Polish native speakers.6 This data dealing with German-Polish language contact phenomena will be analysed from the structural perspective. In particular, the following questions are relevant: Which processes occur at the language border during language mixing? Which linguistic structures seem to be more permeable than others – in other words – what is the degree of permeability of different linguistic structures? Finally, does Viadrinisch/Poltsch follow Polish or German grammar rules, or is there any evidence of the development of a new mixed variety with its own grammatical and lexical characteristics?

3 Concept of the “Border” & Linguistics There are three main perspectives in the discussion of the concept of the “border” in cultural science and sociology. First are considered borders as an instrument of distinction and division between two orders or systems. As Bourdieu (1982) and Douglas (1985) have shown from the sociological and cultural perspective, difference is the inherent component of social structures. However, borders can be considered not only as barriers, but also as a site of transition and passage. They can have a permeable nature and may contribute to the crossing and connection between two entities or orders (cf. Foucault 1977).7 Finally, border crossings can

6 Data were collected during the time period 05.2012 – 03.2013. 7 “Transgression is an action which involves the limit, that narrow zone of a line where it displays the flash of its passage, but perhaps also entire trajectory, even its origin; its likely that transgression has its entire space in the line it crosses. The play of limits and transgression seems to be regulated by a simple abstinancy: transgression incessantly crosses and recrosses a line which closes up behind in a wave of extremely short duration, and thus it is made to return once more right to the horizon of uncrossable (. . .) The limit and transgression depend on each other for whatever density of being they posses: a limit could not exist if it were absolutely uncrossable and, reciprocally, transgression would be pointless if it merely crossed a limit composed of  

 

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lead to blurring and even suspending of borders and, in consequence, to the emergence of intermediate spaces of mixture and hybridity: Cultural borders are thus not only fixed structures and separate inside from the outside, the self from the foreign, but they are also permeable and passable, and what is even more, they bear their transgression already in themselves (Foucault). Borders divide while simultaneously connect and combine. They insist on purity, identifiability, difference, but they also enable mixture, contamination and creolization (Audehm and Velten 2007: 10; translation D.Z.R.).8

These three dimensions of borders – differentiation, transgression, and formation of border zones – provide the basis and point of departure for the elaboration of the three essential concepts for the language borders analysis – durability, permeability and liminality. In the following, these three qualities of language borders will be introduced. The schematic diagrams are simplified illustrations representing the concepts of durability, permeability and liminality. The three circles stand for the three levels of analysis in my corpus data: phonetic (P), morphological (M) and syntactic (S). Durability refers to the density and the stability of borders. Durable language borders are clearly identifiable; they are undoubtedly marked and evidently separate two language systems from one another. They constitute a rigid and impermeable barrier between two languages, which can figuratively be described as a dam. There is no reciprocal phonetic, morphological or syntactic influence between the languages in contact. Furthermore the language switch is often anticipated through flagging (cf. Poplack 1980); realised as pause, interjection, explicit metalinguistic commentary, laughing etc., which draws attention of the audience to the following switch. Permeability refers to combining and connecting qualities of borders. It reflects the concept of the border as the site of the transition and interaction. Permeable language borders are observable, but they are not rigid and impassable. They constitute a penetrable “threshold” or “membrane” which enables

illusions and shadows. But can the limit have a life of its own outside of the act of gloriously passes through and negates it?” (Foucault 1977: 33–34) 8 “Kulturelle Grenzen sind demnach nicht nur feste Strukturen und scheiden Innen von Außen, das Eigene und das Fremde, sie sind auch durchlässig und überschreitbar, mehr noch, sie tragen ihre Überschreitung bereits in sich (Foucault). Grenzen separieren, während sie gleichzeitig auch verbinden können. Sie beharren auf Reinheit, Identifizierbarkeit, Differenz, doch sie ermöglichen Vermischung, Kontamination, Kreolisierung” (Audehm and Velten 2007: 10).

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reciprocal phonetic, morphological and/or syntactic influence between two languages in contact.

Figure 1: Durability of language borders

Figure 2: Permeability of language borders

Dynamic processes of border crossing may lead to blurring and even dissolution of borders. The melting of borders can in turn cause the emergence of new spaces of “in-between-ness”: Transgressions make the border demarcations visible and open to experience; they can also move and transform those borders; they produce ambivalent threshold spaces in which the hybridisations become possible (Audehm and Velten 2007: 11; translation D.Z.R.).9

9 “Transgressionen machen Grenzziehungen sichtbar und erfahrbar; sie können jene Grenzen aber auch verschieben und ‘umfrisieren’; sie erzeugen ambiwalente Schwellenräume, in denen Hybridisierungen möglich werden”. (Audehm and Velten 2007: 11)

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I call these “ambivalent threshold spaces” liminal spaces, based on the concept of liminality. This term goes back to Turner (1964, 1998) and reflects the idea that borders are not simply lines, but that they also constitute border zones. These border zones can be considered as transition areas, overlap spaces, “lieux de passage” (Erfurt 2005: 19) or “grey areas” (Clyne 1987: 755; McCormick 2002).

Figure 3: Liminality of language borders

Border zones can also be understood as “third spaces” and “in-between spaces” according to Bhabha (1994). In these intermediate areas, transitions from one system to another take place; therefore, they have a high potential for change and innovation. Such overlap spaces can also arise at the border between two languages in contact, forming “neue Räume der Mehrsprachigkeit” ‘new spaces of multilingualism’ (Erfurt 2003: 6) or “der dritte Raum der Sprache” ‘third space of the language’ (Gugenberger 2005: 358). In these liminal spaces, syncretic and sometimes even autonomous language forms may emerge as a result of the reciprocal influence and blending of grammatical structures. Here, it is no longer clear where exactly the language border runs. The classification and allocation of linguistic elements to one language or the other becomes difficult. According to Földes (2005), such mixed forms cannot be analysed as a “mixtum compositum”, as a mere sum of the languages in contact.10 He calls the structural merging of languages “grammatische Zweisamkeit”

10 See also Auer and Muhamedova (2005: 52–53): “We wanted to argue for an approach to codemixing utterance as the starting point, rather than the monolingual ‘codes’ which these mixed utterances seem to refer to. Our examples demonstrate that often, there is no monolingual code which can be taken as the point of reference. This conclusion is also reached by Myers-Scotton in her 2002 theory with respect to the matrix language; here she insists that the matrix is not identical to any single ‘monolingual’ language but is just an abstract construct. [. . .] The conclusion, however, is inevitable: bilingual talk cannot be analyzed as a mixture of two monolingual codes”.  

 

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‘grammatical togetherness’ (Földes 2005: 332) and describes its “third-space-qualities” as follows: With this grammatical togetherness of German and Hungarian, it needs to be emphasized that the considered contact variety is no ‘Mixtum compositum’, i.e. it is not to be regarded as a mere sum of L1 and L2 (or L3); on the contrary, it offers other and qualitatively new possibilities (see Sjölin 1976). Rather, they often constitute [. . .] new, ‘third-space qualities’ (between the cultures), which bring numerous differences and seemingly incompatible aspects in a relationship as well as make boundaries between ‘inside’ (‘the own’) and ‘outside’ (‘the foreign’) displace and disappear (Földes 2005: 331; translation D.Z.R.).11  

 

Thus, liminal spaces develop through the blurring of language borders, which may lead to the formation of new, distinctive contact varieties with their own grammatical and lexical regularities. Such mixed language routines are called among others “Multisprech” (Erfurt 2003: 6), “Mixmax” (et al. 2002), “fused lect” (Auer 1999: 321), “mixed lect” (Backus 1996: 21) or “Kontaktvarietät” (Földes 2005: 64). These contact varieties often have a syncretic nature and constitute new, third codes: “It is rather a hybrid code and oscillation between two languages, continually presenting both the one language and the other, but at the same time, it is something independent, which constitutes something else: namely ‘speaking mixed’” (Hinnenkamp 2002: 136; translation: D.Z.R.).12 The following graphic summarizes the most important characteristics of durable, permeable and liminal language borders:

11 Bei dieser grammatischen Zweisamkeit von Deutsch und Ungarisch sei betont, dass die in Frage stehende Kontaktvarietät kein “Mixtum compositum” ist, d. h. nicht als blosse Summe von L1 und L2 (bzw. L3) anzusehen ist, sondern auch weitere, qualitativ neue Möglichkeiten offeriert (vgl. Sjölin 1976). Es geht also im Sinne von Bechert und Wildgen (1991: 3) auch nicht um ein simples Modell mechanischer Mischung, bei der sich das Redeprodukt restlos in Bestandteile der einen oder der anderen Varietät zerlegen lässt und bei der erwartet wird, dass diese Bestandteile klar erkennbar und den Herkunftsvarietäten ohne Weiteres zuzuordnen sind. Vielmehr konstituieren sich dabei oft, wie etwa die Belege 43–46 und 50 nahe legen, weitgehend neue, “DritteRaum-Qualitäten” (zwischen den Kulturen), die etliche Differenzen und scheinbar Unvereinbares in eine Relation bringen sowie Grenzen zwischen “Innen” (dem “Eigenen”) und “Außen” (dem “Fremden”) verschieben bzw. verschwinden lassen (Földes 2005: 331). 12 “Es handelt sich vielmehr um einen hybriden Code, um ein Oszillieren zweier Sprachen, immerfort sowohl die eine Sprache als auch die andere präsentierend, aber gleichzeitig etwas eigenes, drittes konstruierend: nämlich ‘gemischt sprechen’” (Hinnenkamp 2002: 136).

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Figure 4: Liminality of language borders

Finally, it should be noted that these three concepts – durability, permeability and liminality – are regarded as parts of a continuum with “fuzzy boundaries” (Lakoff 1987) between them. The ascription of the data to the one or the other category may not always be unambiguous, and some of the language contact phenomena may be ascribed to spaces between the discrete points on the continuum of increasing permeability of language borders.

4 German-Polish language mixing from a structural perspective 4.1 Analysis model The three qualities of language borders outlined in the previous section deliver a terminological and theoretical frame for the systematic analysis of the character of the language border at different sites of language switch. The model consists of two levels of analysis. In the first step, the examples of language mixing from the corpus are differentiated into four groups on the

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continuum of increasing impact on language structures. The starting point in the continuum is language switch at the clause boundary. The second group contains examples of language switch taking place at the intra-sentential level – at the phrasal boundary. In the next group, language switch affects the language structures even more – it occurs at the word boundary. And the last level includes examples with highest impact on language structures: the language switch at the grammatical unit of the morpheme boundary. Aside from the differentiation of language switch at different structural borders, the character of these language borders is analysed at each of the mentioned levels, applying the three introduced aspects of the border theory; namely, durability, permeability and liminality. Thus, language switch at each of four structural borders is discussed according to its durable, permeable and liminal characteristics. A two-dimensional model can be derived from results of this analysis, which can be resumed in the following matrix:

Figure 5: Analysis model

The focus of the following analysis is the discussion of the language switch at the morpheme border. Concerning the discussion of the remaining structural borders, I refer interested readers to Zinkhahn Rhobodes (2015), which concentrates on the analysis of the permeability across different levels of language switch – from clause, phrase, word to morpheme – as well as to my dissertation (Zinkhahn Rhobodes, forthcoming), where the complete model is presented, and each of its levels is thoroughly discussed showing various examples of the corpus.

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4.2 Durable language border In the first example, a student at the European University Viadrina formulates the following expression: Example 1: o Bescheinigung T.EUV.1013

Mówili o

Bescheinigung

[Translation]

They spoke about

confirmation

[Phonetics (data)]

[bəˈʃaɪ̯nɪɡʊŋ]

[Phonetics (Ger. norm)]

[bəˈʃaɪ̯nɪɡʊŋ]

[Morphology]

Bescheinigung-Ø

14

[Syntax]

[S [NP[PPER: (oni)]] [VP[VVFIN: mówili] [PP[APPR: o][NP [NN: Bescheinigung]]]]]

[Art and character of the language border]

morpheme border, durabel

In the example above, the speaker switches to German after the Polish preposition o and utters the German noun Bescheinigung. The sentence requires the locative case, which is governed by the Polish preposition o. As we will see in the following examples, the morphological integration of nouns in cases which require the use of a case marking morpheme is a very frequent phenomenon in German-Polish language contact. However, despite the required locative case, the German noun Bescheinigung does not receive the expected morphological ending –u; it has no case marking at all. Myers-Scotton calls such content morphemes, which lack the respective system morphemes from the Matrix Language, “bare forms” (Myers-Scotton [2002] 2010: 115).15 Auer and Muhamedova (2005) describe this phenomenon on the example of Turkish-Dutch language mixing as follows: “The dominance of the matrix

13 Abbreviations: T – first latter of the informants name, EUV – acronym of the school/university name EUV (Europa-University Viadrina), RJO (Robert Jungk Oberschule), KLG (Karl-Liebknecht Gymnasium), 10 – class/semester. 14 The data is annotated with the Stuttgart-Tübingen Tagset (see list of abbreviations). 15 Myers-Scotton defines bare forms as: “Embedded language content morphemes appearing in mixed constituents framed by the Matrix Language, but they are missing the Matrix Language system morphemes that would make them well formed elements in such frames” (Myers-Scotton [2002] 2010: 115).

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language is not sufficient to overcome the resistance of the embedded language against Turkish inflection” (Auer and Muhamedova 2005: 38). Thus, the language border in the analysed example is so rigid and durable that it resists adding the required flexion morpheme. There is no morphological integration and no influence between the two languages in contact. Using the terminology of Greco, Renaud and Taquechel (2013: 37), the German noun is transferred unaltered to the Polish “language space”. We observe merely a juxtaposition of language components which can easily be ascribed to the one or the other language. The German and Polish languages are clearly separated from each other, and the point of language switch is easy to identify. Let’s take a look at the position of the phonetic, morphological and syntactic borders in this mixed utterance. The phonetic border is situated at the point of the language switch between the Polish preposition and the German noun, just as the syntactic border. Thus, there is a co-occurrence of the phonetic and syntactic border. As there is no morphological integration, we can draw an imaginary morphological border at the place, where the expected morphological ending would be added: Coincidence of syntactic/morphological/ phonetic borders

Mówili o [S(NP)[P Bescheinigung] [M Ø ]]

An example of language switch at the morpheme border with a permeable character is the noun Tafelwerku shown in the following part.

4.3 Permeable language border Example 2: w Tafelwerku K.KLG.11

Wszystko jest w

Tafelwerku

[Translation]

Everything is in the

mathematical table

[Phonetics (data)]

[ˈtafɛl̩ ˌvɛrku]

[Phonetics (Ger. norm)]

[ˈtaːfl̩ ˌvɛʁk]

[Morphology]

Tafelwerk-LOC.SING.M

[Syntax]

[PP[APPR: w][NP[NN: Tafelwerku]]]

[Art and character of the language border]

morpheme border, permeable

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In contrast to the former example, the inserted German noun Tafelwerk received the Polish morphological ending –u, and is thus morphologically integrated into the morphosyntactic frame of the Matrix Language, Polish. The process of the assignment of this exact inflectional ending can be clearly traced back to Polish morphological rules. The three decisive aspects for the declension morpheme in Polish are gender, case and number. The gender assignment in Polish depends on the phonological criterion: the final sound of the lemma determines its gender (cf. Kreja 1989: 89). As the consonant ending is decisive for the masculine gender in Polish,16 the noun Tafelwerk receives the masculine gender.17 The locative case is determined by the preposition w and its case government. According to the Polish declination rules, a noun which ends with the consonant k acquires the –u ending in singular locative (cf. Tokarski 2001).18 Let’s consider the position of the phonetic, morphological and syntactic borders. The first phonetic border is situated at the language switch between the Polish preposition and the German noun, as well as the syntactic border. The second phonetic border lies between the German noun and the Polish morphological ending -u. The morphological border is also located at the same place. Thus, we observe that, at the point of language switch between the German noun and

16 Pohl (1987: 192–193) explains the gender assignment of German loanwords in Polish as follows: “This decision is usually not made according to the gender which the particular loanword has in German, but according to its morphophonemic representation. The final sound of the German noun plays a key role here. If the final sound is a consonant, the loanword will very probably receive the masculine gender (. . .)” (translation D.Z.R.). “Diese Entscheidung wird jedoch – in der Regel – nicht aufgrund der Kenntnis des Genus getroffen, das das jeweilige Lehnwort im Deutschen hat, sondern aufgrund seiner morphophonetischen Repräsentation. Dabei spielt der Auslaut des deutschen Nomens die entscheidende Rolle. Lautet das Lehnwort z. B. konsonantisch aus, so wird ihm – in der Regel – das Genus Maskulinum zugeordnet (. . .).” 17 This example confirms the mechanism of morphological adaptation of German nouns in Polish described by Laskowski (1987: 129): “(. . .) The foundation for the inflectional adaptation is the reinterpretation of the German noun in its first person singular form into the nominative form of the first person singular in Polish. The primary factor is hereby the phonological form of the final sound in the nominative singular in the source language, the gender of the borrowed noun plays merely a subordinate role.” (Translation D.Z.R.) “(. . .) istota mechanizmu fleksyjnej adaptacji sprowadza się die reinterpretacji niemieckiej formy mianownika 1.poj. danego rzeczownika jako formy mianownika 1. poj. w języku polskim, przy czym podstawowym czynnikiem determinującym kierunek tej reinterpretacji jest fonologiczna postać wygłosu formy N.sg. w języku źródłowym, podczas gdy rodzaj gramatyczny zapożyczonego rzeczownika odgrywa jedynie rolę podrzedną.” 18 This example can be considered as insertion according to Muysken (2000), as the noun Tafelwerk is modified morphologically, and embedded into the structure defined by Polish as the Matrix Language providing the case morpheme -u.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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the Polish morphological ending, the phonetic and morphological borders coincide. The language switch is thus double marked. It is important to bear in mind that the consonant ending of the German noun determines the masculine locative form of Polish suffix. So, there is a transfer of grammatical features between Polish and German beyond the phonetic border. The phonetic border is thus crossed. We notice the opening of the word boundary for the integration of the morpheme. The language border is still maintained, but it constitutes a penetrable and passable “threshold” or “membrane” which enables the morphological integration, and is an indication for the permeable character of the language border. Coincidence of syntactic/morphological/ phonetic borders

↷

w [S(NP)[P Tafelwerk] [M[P u]]]

4.4 Liminal character of language border Example 3: z offa M.EUV.3

Jutro mamy egzamin z

Offa

[Translation]

Tomorrow we have the test in

Public Law

[Phonetics (data)]

[ɔfa]

[Phonetics (Germ. norm)]

[œfn̩ tlɪçəs ʀɛçt]

[Morphology]

öff[entliches Recht]-GEN. SING.M

[Syntax]

[NP[NN: egzamin][PP[APPR: z][NP[NN: offa]]]]

[Art and character of the language border]

morpheme border, liminal

The Viadrinisch / Poltsch noun offa emerged through the convergence of the German and Polish languages at several structural levels. The noun is constructed originating from the German nominal phrase öffentliches Recht and signifies the subject “Public Law”. Firstly, the German noun Recht is omitted, and in the second step the adjective öffentliches is significantly abbreviated to a very short form öff. Aside from this deep interference in the morpheme structure, a further phonetic change was undertaken: the ö was unrounded to o in order to fit the Polish phonetic system. Lastly, the strongly altered form off received the Polish genitive inflectional morpheme –a.

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Another interesting point is that, along with the increased grade of language border violation, the degree of context-dependency also rises: for a person who speaks Polish and German, but who is not familiar with the Viadrina context, the term offa would be impossible to understand. The far-reaching consequences of multilevel transformations like the alteration of the base form (lemma) of a German word through abbreviation, as well as morphological and phonetic alteration, lead to the emergence of a hybrid German-Polish mixed form which I consider as liminal. It is no longer as clear as in the previous examples, where the language border is clearly defined: it appears difficult to unambiguously disassemble the noun offa into the two languages. Thus, through the blending of lexical and grammatical structures, the language border between German and Polish is dissolved, which is fascinating to observe, especially when one has in mind its attributed designation as “the hardest language border in Europe”. Finally, let’s proceed as we did in the previous examples and assign the syntactic, morphological and phonetic border in the discussed example. The syntactic border is – as in the previous examples – between the preposition and the noun. The morphological border lies between the noun and the morphological ending. But where is the phonetic border? Between the Polish preposition z and the noun? Due to the change in the spelling of o, the position of the phonetic border at this place becomes ambiguous. It is almost impossible to designate the phonetic border, as the word offa is an outcome of such far reaching phonetic and morphological alternations. Through the combination and the blend of phonetic and morphological patterns of German and Polish, a liminal space emerges and offers a frame for the development of this syncretic language form. Coincidence of syntactic/morphological/ phonetic borders

z [S(NP) [P? off][M[P? a]]]

5 Conclusion The aim of this chapter was to deliver an insight into German-Polish language mixing, and to propose a theoretical framework illustrating and explaining the language contact-induced processes of language border opening, crossing and blurring. The data analysis shows that a durable language border creates an impassable and rigid barrier, which is characterized by the lack of transfer of phonetic, morphological or syntactic features between two languages in contact. As we

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have seen in example 1, the language border is so rigid that it resists the adding of the Polish inflection, although the Matrix language, Polish, would require one. Furthermore, there is a coincidence of phonetic and syntactic borders. In the process of border crossing, however, the permeability of the language border enables transfer of grammatical features between the two languages in contact. We observed in example 2 the opening of the word boundary for the integration of the morpheme. The language border is still maintained, but it constitutes a penetrable “threshold” which enables the morphological integration. Furthermore, there is double co-occurrence of phonetic and morphological border and – as the consonant ending of the German noun determines the Polish flexion – the transfer of grammatical features crossing the phonetic border. Lastly, the resolving of language borders is observable in the emergence of transition and overlapping spaces enabling the formation of mixed liminal forms which cannot be unambiguously disassembled into the origin languages. The blurring of language borders manifests in grave interference in language structures, as for example the alteration of lemmas or phonetic interference. The phonetic border is very difficult, if not impossible, to detect. The analysis reveals that, along with the increasing permeability of language borders, there is also a rise in the grade of context-dependency. In particular, the dissolution of language borders gives a broad potential for creative formation of mixed forms, which, due to the multiple transformations at different structural levels, can become part of a new mixed code understandable only for insiders of the group who (established and) practice it. This final stage may be traced back to the universal principle of contact-induced language change and emergence of new varieties, an outstanding example being the formation of the Romance languages with regard to Latin (cf. Erfurt 2005: 18; Jungbluth 2012: 46, 48; Gugenberger 2004: 125). The results of this study underline the process-oriented and dynamic character of language which is not static (Ergon), but rather constantly undergoes permanent changes and development (Energeia) (cf. Coseriu 2002; Jungbluth 2012: 58; Földes 1996: 63). Furthermore, they strengthen the consideration of language mixing as a cultural resource and expression of creative language use, which can provide revealing insights into the dynamics of language contact, but also – as an “empirical window(s) on the structures of the language in general” (Myers-Scotton [2002] 2010: 5) – present a challenge for linguistic theory (cf. Milroy and Muysken 1995: 4; Clyne 2003: 1, Lüdi 2006: 18; Gardner-Chloros 2009: 4). The data analysis shows that the theory of the border can be especially fruitful and enriching for discussing language-mixing phenomena. This approach gives an innovative opportunity to bring together phonetic, morphological and syntactic aspects in the analysis, which so far have been rarely integrated into a

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single framework. Through the incorporation of the concept of the border into the linguistic analysis, I endeavour to gain an interdisciplinary insight into the investigation of structural aspects of language mixing, and to contribute to the theory of the border from a linguistic perspective.

List of gloss abbreviations ADV – adverb ADVP – adverbial phrase APPR – preposition GEN – genitive M – masculine NN – common noun NP – nominal phrase PP – prepositional phrase PPER – non reflexive personal pronoun SING – singular VP – verbal phrase VVFIN – full finite verb

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Hinnenkamp, Volker. 2002. Deutsch-türkisches Code-Mixing und Fragen der Hybridität. In Wolfdietrich Hartung & Alissa Shethar (eds.), Kulturen und ihre Sprachen. Die Wahrnehmung anders Sprechender und ihr Selbstverständnis, 123–143. Berlin: Trafo. Hinnenkamp, Volker & Katharina Meng. 2005. Sprachgrenzen überspringen. Sprachliche Hybridität und polykulturelles Selbstverständnis: Einleitung. In Volker Hinnenkamp, Katharina Meng (eds.), Sprachgrenzen überspringen. Sprachliche Hybridität und polykulturelles Selbstverständnis, 1–16. Tübingen: Narr. Irsigler, Ingo & Christoph Jürgensen. 2011. ‘Sprachliche Grenzgänge‘ – Überlegungen zu Formen und Funktionen sprachlicher Hybridbildung in transkultureller Literatur (mit Ingo Irsigler). In Christoph Kleinschmidt (ed.), Topographien der Grenze. Verortungen einer kulturellen, politischen und ästhetischen Kategorie, 213–225. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann. Jungbluth, Konstanze. 2012. Aus zwei mach eins: Switching, mixing, getting different. In Barbara Jańczak, Konstanze Jungbluth & Harald Weydt (eds.): Mehrsprachigkeit aus deutscher Perspektive, 45–72. Tübingen: Narr. Kallmeyer, Werner, Inke Keim, Sema Aslan & Ibrahim Cindark. 2002. Variationsprofile. Zur Analyse der Variationspraxis bei den Powergirls. http://www0.idsmannheim.de/prag/ sprachvariation/fgvaria/Variationsprofile.pdf (accessed 27 March 2014). Kleinschmidt, Christoph & Hewel, Christine (eds.). 2011. Topographien der Grenze: Verortungen einer kulturellen, politischen und ästhetischen Kategorie. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann. Kreja, Bogusław. 1989. Z morfonologii i morfotaktyki współczesnej polszczyzny. Wrocław: Ossolineum. Lakoff, George. 1987. Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind. University of Chicago Press: Chicago. Laskowski, Roman. 1987. Mechanismen der morphologischen Adaptation deutscher Nomina im Polnischen. In Alek Pohl & Andre Vincenz (eds.): Deutsch-polnische Sprachkontakte, 113–130. Köln: Böhlau. Lüdi, Georges. 2006. Multilingual repertoires and the consequences for linguistic theory. In Kristin Bührig & Jan D. ten Thije (eds.): Beyond Misunderstanding. Linguistic analyses of intercultural communication, 11–42. Amsterdam: Benjamins. Matthiesen, Ulf. 2002. “Härteste Sprachgrenze Europas”, URL: http://www.taz.de/1/archiv/ printarchiv/printressorts/digiartikel/?ressort=sw&dig=2002%2F05%2F22%2Fa0133&c Hash=a72e3033ed, 22. 05. 2002 (accessed 15 October 2014). McCormick, Kay. 2002. Language in Cape Town’s District Six. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Milroy, Lesley & Pieter Muysken. 1995. Introduction: Code-switching and bilingualism research. In Lesley Milroy & Pieter Muysken (eds.), One speaker, two languages: Cross-disciplinary perspectives on code-switching, 1–14. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Muysken, Pieter. 2000. Bilingual speech: a typology of code-mixing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Myers-Scotton, Carol. [2002] 2010. Contact Linguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Parr, Rolf. 2008. Liminale und andere Übergänge. Theoretische Modellierungen von Grenzzonen, Normalitätsspektren, Schwellen, Übergängen und Zwischenräumen in Literatur und Kulturwissenschaft. In Achim Geisenhanslüke & Georg Mein (eds.), Schriftkultur und Schwellenkunde, 11–64. Bielefeld: transcript. Pohl, Alek. 1987. Zum Problem des Genus deutscher Lehnwörter im Alt- und im Mittelpolnischen. In Alek Pohl & Andre de Vincenz (eds.): Deutsch-polnische Sprachkontakte, 191–205. Köln: Böhlau.

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Poplack, Shana. 1980. Sometimes I’ll start a sentence in Spanish y termino en Español: Toward a typology of code-switching. Linguistics 18. 581–618. Tokarski, Jan. 2001. Fleksja Polska. Warszawa: PWN. Turner, Victor W. 1964. Betwixt and Between: The Liminal Period in Rites de Passage. In Melford E. Spiro (ed.): Symposium on New Approaches to the Study of Religion, 4–20. Seattle: American Ethnological Society. Turner, Victor W. 1998. Liminalität und Communitas. In Ritualtheorien, 251–264. Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag. Wilkinson, Jane. 2009. Die haerteste Sprachgrenze Europas? Negotiating the Linguistic Divide in Theatres on the German-Polish Border. In Jenny Carl & Patrick Stevenson (eds): Language, Discourse and Identity in Central Europe: The German Language in a Multilingual Space, 73–95. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Winford, Donald. 2003. An introduction to contact linguistics. Oxford: Blackwell. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. 1989. Tractatus logico-philosophicus\Logisch-philosophische Abhandlung. Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Wolf, Michaela. 2008. Zur kulturellen Übersetzung der Migration: Theoretische Vorüberlegungen. In Michaela Wolf & Gisella Vorderobermeier (eds.): ‘Meine Sprache grenzt mich ab. . .’ Transkulturalität und kulturelle Übersetzung im Kontext der Migration, 21–36. Berlin: Lit. Zinkhahn Rhobodes, Dagna (forthcoming): Sprechen entlang der Oder. Durabilität, Permeabilität und Liminalität der sprachlichen Grenzen am Beispiel der deutsch-polnischen Sprachroutine, Frankfurt (Oder): EUV (Dissertation). Zinkhahn Rhobodes, Dagna. 2015. The permeability of language borders on the example of German-Polish language mixing. In Peter Rosenberg, Konstanze Jungbluth & Dagna Zinkhahn Rhobodes (eds.): Linguistic Construction of Ethnic Borders, 229–249. Bern & Frankfurt/Main: Lang.  

 

Janett Haid, European University Viadrina, Frankfurt (Oder)

“Yes we can! – Sí se puede!” Speaking the Language of the Masses. Codeswitching for Creating Togetherness with a Foreign Audience in Political Speeches Abstract: What is happening between the speaker and the audience while codeswitching in political speeches? In Germany and Austria a lot of research has been conducted on codeswitching (CS) between standard and dialectal varieties and its functions (e.g. Schwitalla 2006; Kaiser 2006; Unterholzner 2009; for codeswitching in political speeches see e.g. Holly 1990). However, CS between different languages in a political context has been rather disregarded by linguistic or politolinguistic research so far. By analyzing speeches of US-American, German, and Russian politicians speaking in front of a foreign audience the aim of this chapter is to focus on the pragmatic use of CS as a strategy of inclusion in political contexts. The means brought about by CS in conversations will be identified and the use of CS as exploitation of contrastive connotations of two varieties (e.g. we-code/they-code) will be shown (see Gardner-Chloros 2009: 10). Based on the assumption that CS is a linguistic strategy to create a common bond in a medial-public context this chapter wants to show how the communicative strategy of creating togetherness through the use of CS may be analyzed. Keywords: codeswitching, multilingualism, political discourse, pragmatics, language strategy, spoken language, culture contact, otherness, media discourse, openings, closings

1 Introduction “Ich bin ein Berliner!” Everybody knows these famous words that John F. Kennedy proclaimed on June 26th, 1963 in front of the town-hall of Schöneberg in Western Berlin. After this statement the crowd screamed enthusiastically. Why? What the people understood and should have understood was obviously: “I am firmly with you! I am one of you!”, not only due to what Kennedy said – but also or because he said it in German. He switched to the audience’s code. The literature covering codeswitching considers normally language or dialect-standard switches in everyday conversation. Most studies deal with bi- or

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multi-linguals and their common language use (e.g. Weinreich 1953; MyersScotton 1979, 2006; Poplack 1980; Gumperz 1982a; Heller 1988; Nomura 2003; Özdil 2010). This type of codeswitching can be described as mostly unplanned because it is more or less self-directed and thus it can be seen as an instrument for organizing one’s own conversation structure as it is psychologically and socially dependent on individual experiences and customized language use. However, this study will not focus on multilingualism in everyday life but in official or medial contexts. In this sense, it deals with another form of codeswitching – namely codeswitching as a consciously planned strategy in political speeches. Because of the nature of official speeches – being rarely produced ad hoc or spontaneous (see Reisigl 2008: 244) – it can be supposed that codeswitching in this context is also mostly planned and intended. Thus, codeswitching can be seen as a linguistic strategy, exclusively directed to the audience as well as a planned inclusion (and exclusion) of addressees. In Germany and Austria considerable research has been conducted on codeswitching between standard and dialectal varieties and its functions (e.g. Schwitalla 2006; Kaiser 2006; Unterholzner 2009; for codeswitching in political speeches see e.g. Holly 1990). However, codeswitching between different languages in political contexts has rather been disregarded by linguistic or politolinguistic research so far. By analysing speeches of an US-American, a German, and a Russian politician speaking in front of a foreign audience, the aim of this study is to focus on the pragmatic use of codeswitching as a strategy of establishing interpersonal bonds in political contexts. The analysis mainly focuses on the function of codeswitching and its purposes or intended effects; but the reaction of the audience will also be taken into account. Based on the assumption that codeswitching is a linguistic strategy to create a common bond in a medial-public context, this study analyses and demonstrates how the aim to create togetherness is being achieved by the communicative strategy of codeswitching.

2 Purposes of political speeches The first step in analyzing codeswitching in political speeches will be to focus on speeches as a special communication form always following an objective. What is a speech? A speech is a structured line up of words, divisible into coherent speech acts uttered by one person on a special social occasion for a specific purpose and it is addressed to a more or less specific audience (see Schmitz 2005: 698).

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It is information transfer on the one hand and the articulation of (political) interests on the other (see Holly 1990: 255). A politician has to fulfill a mediation and communication task while speaking to the audience. It is their aim to “speak to and say something for everybody” (Holly 1990: 255; translated J.H.). Looking at the aims and functions of political speeches, I will shortly present just a few aspects that are the most relevant for this topic (in the following see Reisigl 2008: 258): A speech can have (or in fact always has) the function of political advertising to acquire or maintain power, it can (or even has to) influence public attitudes, opinions and the public will through identity construction, manufacturing of consent and solidarity, and ratification or justification of political norms. Furthermore, it can be delivered for the organization of international or interstate relations. Political speeches are not just actions in a speech act theoretical sense, but interactional contributions to identity politics and accomplish the two political purposes of inclusion and exclusion (see Reisigl 2008: 251). On the one hand, inclusion can be described as “contributing to the formation of trans-individual identity and the foundation of group solidarity” (Reisigl 2008: 251), while on the other hand, exclusion is the idea of “fulfill[ing] disintegrative and destructive functions for example by mobilizing addressees to social exclusion (. . .)” (Reisigl 2008: 251).  

 

3 Codeswitching as strategic instrument in political speeches What is the problem of codeswitching (CS) as a linguistic notion? “CS is not an entity which exists out there in the objective world, but a construct which linguists have developed to help them describe their data. It is therefore pointless to argue about what CS is, because, to paraphrase Humpty Dumpty, the word CS can mean whatever we want it to mean.” (Gardner-Chloros 2009: 10‒11): In this study codeswitching will be described as “the use of two or more linguistic varieties in the same conversation or interaction” (Myers-Scotton and Ury 1977: 5), or in other words: the alternate use of two languages, which can be described as a pragmatic skill of selecting the language especially according to the interlocutor, the topic and the context (see Gardner-Chloros 2009: 11). As pointed out in the introduction, codeswitching will not be discussed as an unintentional act, but as a signal of “symbolic connotations such as authority, ethnic solidarity or identity, or strategic tactic to redefine boundaries among speakers” (Wei 2003: 141), as can be found in the works of Auer (1995) or Gal (1998).

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What is the role of codeswitching in political speeches? In the large quantity of research on code switching (e.g. Weinreich 1953; Poplack 1981; Gumperz 1982a; Myers-Scotton 1993; Bullock & Toribio 2009; Gardner-Chloros 2009), there are several functions codeswitching can fulfil. One important act is paraphrasing or repeating an utterance in another code for clarification purposes or to specify or emphasize it. Furthermore, codeswitching can be used for the specification of the addressee so that the speaker may signalize who the intended recipient of the utterance is. The speaker can also mark the modality of interaction by using codeswitching – for example by choosing another code to express ceremoniousness or humor implies evoking funny effects. Another function is the constitution of a relationship in marking closeness or distance by using the we- or the theycode (see Gumperz 1982b). Selting (1983) points out the strategic functions of codeswitching in institutional communication, such as decreasing the social and communicative distance between the speakers, ensuring cooperation or demonstrating professional competence and direct confrontation. Auer (1986: 112 f.) describes the functional motivation of codeswitching as a means of the constitution of a more personal and intimate interaction, which in political speeches can create a private atmosphere in an official context. In her case-study about codeswitching in Taiwanese campaigning discourse, Wei (2003: 143) points out “one of the great strengths in adopting codeswitching, apart from its being a useful conversation strategy where effective discoursal and rhetorical effects can be achieved, is in its strategic ambiguities”. She argues ambiguity and indeterminacy of codeswitching is inter alia due to the fact that neither the speaker nor the hearer has total control over the exact meaning of the codeswitch in this special context, thus, “the meaning of a codeswitch is negotiated indirectly in most cases”. Using metaphors or other “speech features”, the speaker is able to foreground something, to describe it in a more impressive way and to evoke special effects, but does not exactly know how the recipient might react, nor what associations might be evoked by using a special picture, metaphor or code. Consequently, Wei (2003: 143) proposes that codeswitching shall “be treated as an important indirect speech feature (. . .) and thus its study should make an important contribution to political communication”. Understanding the term multimodality as a combination of communicative signs (Fricke 2012; Norris 2013; Müller et al. 2013; Mondada 2015) with different medial backgrounds in the context of interaction, codeswitching as an indirect speech feature in political speeches can be seen as a linguistic strategy combining discoursal and rhetorical effects. Based on these facts, I act on the assumption that codeswitching in political speeches is a communicative strategy to create closeness and intimacy and to  

 

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construct a private atmosphere in a medial-public context. Here, inclusion or connecting oneself emotionally to the audience is negotiated indirectly between the speaker and the recipients. So, the question is: How can the communicative strategy, the functions and the pragmatic use of codeswitching in political speeches be described and interpreted? How is codeswitching used as an indirect speech feature and thus a persuasive instrument of inclusion (and exclusion) in political speeches? The strategy of exclusion will not be the main focus of this study, because – as it will be shown later – the most important role of codeswitching here is not a conscious exclusion of a certain part of the recipients but, rather a deliberately used strategy to create a sense of a common bond between the speaker and the audience.

4 Case studies For this purpose three case studies will serve to show and analyze the functions and aims of codeswitching in political speeches in front of a foreign audience: first the Russian president Vladimir Putin speaking German while addressing the German Bundestag ‘parliament’ on the September 25th, 2001; second the German chancellor Angela Merkel speaking a few words in Hebrew in her address to mark the 60th anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel on March 18th, 2008; and third US president Barack Obama switching to Spanish while addressing the National Association of Latino Elected Officials on June 22nd, 2012. All videos of the utilized speeches were either produced by the German Bundestag (Putin and Merkel) or the US government (Obama) and are available on their websites. Vladimir Putin’s speech at the German Bundestag (length 26:03 minutes) a. Codeswitching 1 Uvazhayemyy Prezident! ‘Dear Mr. President!’ Ich rede trotzdem auf Russisch. ’However, I am going to speak in Russian.’ (audience: laughter) Uvazhayemyy Prezident! Uvazhayemyy kantsler! Damy i gospoda! ‘Dear Mr. President, dear Mr. Chancellor, ladies and gentlemen!’ (minute 00:08–00:23)

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b. Codeswitching 2 Vot pochemu ya govoryu na yazyke Gete, Shillera i Kanta. Eto po-nemetski. ‘Therefore, I speak in the language of Goethe, Schiller and Kant, is to say in German.’ (audience: waiting until translation is finished, then applauding) Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren, soeben sprach ich von der Einheit der europäischen Kultur (. . .) ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I have just talked about the unity of European culture (. . .)’  

 

 

 

(. . .) so schlägt unter allem das starke und lebendige Herz Russlands, welches für eine vollwertige Zusammenarbeit und Partnerschaft geöffnet ist. Ich bedanke mich! (. . .) under all of it there is beating the strong, vivid heart of Russia which is open for fully-fledged cooperation and partnership. Thank you! (audience: applauding, Putin shaking hands with the chancellor and ministers)  

 

 

 

(minute 24:30–26:02)

Codeswitching first occurs in the beginning – shortly as an insertion – for evoking a humorous effect by saying in German that he will first speak Russian. The audience is reacting with laughter, so that it can be supposed that Putin reached the anticipated reaction. The second switch follows a few minutes later when Putin is announcing that he will deliver the rest of his speech in German. Note that what happens here can be called an “announced codeswitching” . Putin is announcing that he will switch to German in the next part of his speech. The video shows the audience waiting until the translation is finished (because Putin is announcing it in Russian) and an applause follows. On the content level it must be mentioned, that the speech is given to establish or strengthen the collaboration and partnership between Russia and Germany, which he expresses while speaking about cultural unity, particularly in the last sentence when Putin is expressing the preparedness and hope for being seen as a reliable partner on equal terms. Angela Merkel’s speech in front of the Knesset in Israel (length: 23:57 minutes) c.

Codeswitching 1

Sehr geehrter Herr Staatspräsident, sehr geehrte Frau Präsidentin, sehr geehrter Herr Premierminister, sehr geehrte Frau Präsidentin des Obersten Gerichtshofes, sehr geehrte Mitglieder der Knesset, sehr geehrte Damen und Herren,

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‘Dear Mr President, dear Mrs President, dear prime minister, dear president of the Supreme Court, dear members of the Knesset, Ladies and Gentlemen,’ Frau Präsidentin, ‘Mrs President,’ Anni modda lachem she-nittan li le-dabber ellechem kaan bebait mechubad se. Se kawwod gadol awurri. ‘Thank you for allowing me to speak to you here in the Knesset. I am very honoured to be here.’ (audience: applauding) Ich danke allen Abgeordneten der Knesset dafür. Ich danke allen, dass ich in meiner Muttersprache heute zu Ihnen sprechen darf. ‘Thanks to all the representatives of the Knesset. Thanks to all of you, allowing me to speak in my mother tongue.’ (minute 00:03–00:37) d. Codeswitching 2 In diesem Geist wird Deutschland Israel nie allein lassen, sondern treuer Partner und Freund sein. ‘In this spirit, Germany will never forsake Israel but will remain a true friend and partner.’ Masal-tov le-chaggigot shishim shanna le-medinnat Issrael. Shalom! ‘Congratulations on the 60th anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel! Shalom!’ (audience: applauding with standing ovations) (minute 23:29–23:57)

Here, codeswitching occurs in the beginning and at the very end of her speech. The speech acts she is performing in Hebrew are thanking, expressing the feeling of being dignified, congratulating and saying goodbye. One foregrounded function of the speech is a positive self- and other-presentation. Not only does she praise her audience by highlighting the anniversary of their nation in a positive way, but she also presents herself, the German government and her country in a positive light by showing solidarity and speaking about cooperation between the two states. This leads directly to the second function: the strengthening of the interstate relationship between Israel and Germany, which is the topic of her whole speech, but is resumed in her last sentence just before the last codeswitch (“We are always going to be true partners”).

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Barack Obama’s speech addressing the National Association of Latino Elected Officials (NALEO) (length: 27:40 minutes) e. Codeswitching 1 Thank you. Gracias! (audience: cheering) Thank you so much. Thank you. Everybody please have a seat. Ah, it is good to be back at NALEO. Qué placer estar aquí con tantos amigos. ‘What a pleasure to be here with so many friends.’ (audience: applauding and cheering) It is wonderful to see a lot of good friends from all across the country. (minute 00:03–00:20) f.

Codeswitching 2

But America was built by people who said something different – who said: “Yes we can!” Who said, “Sí se puede!” (audience: begins to applaud, applause increases until the end) And as long as I have the privilege of being your president I will be alongside you fighting for the country that we together dream of. Thank you NALEO! God bless you! God bless the United States of America! (minute 26:30–27:11)

The two cases of codeswitching again occur in the beginning and at the end of the speech. In the first case there is a Spanish utterance directly followed by a paraphrase in English (the exact translation of Qué placer estar aqui con tantos amigos would have been: ‘What a pleasure to be here with so many friends’). A similar thing happens while saying “Thank you! Gracias! Thank you so much!” The audience is cheering and screaming directly after the codeswitch. The second case of codeswitching in Obama’s speech can be defined as a kind of self-translation, too. He is translating his campaign slogan into Spanish (‘Sí se puede!’ has meanwhile become a battle call during soccer games). Although the speech goes on for another minute, the applause starts directly after the codeswitch and then continues and increases until the end of his speech. Not only does the speech demonstrate solidarity among his audience with a migrant background from Latin America, but is a kind of political advertising as well. In contrast to the

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examples of Putin and Merkel, Obama is speaking in front of people who are potential voters and therefore important for his campaign. Furthermore, contrary to the previous speeches, the audience perfectly understands the language Obama is speaking. Thus, the codeswitching in this case might have another function apart from only showing solidarity. This question will be discussed, inter alia, in the following sections.

5 Observations In this section the functions of codeswitching and the purposes and effects that might be intended are discussed. The following six aspects have been important for the observations and analysis: (1) What is the function of the speech? (2) At what point of the speech do the codeswitches happen? (3) What speech acts are performed in the other language? (4) What function does the codeswitching fulfill and (5) what are its purposes and effects? And last but not least: (6) How does the audience react? (cf. Table 1) Table 1: Use of code-switching in the politician’s speeches PUTIN

MERKEL

OBAMA

foregrounded function of the speech

– organization of interstate relations – positive self- and other-presentation

– organization of interstate relations – positive self- and other-presentation

– political advertising – influence on the formation of public attitude by showing solidarity

moment of codeswitching

1) beginning of the speech (one sentence)

1) beginning of the speech (two sentences)

2) after the first part until the end of the speech (long text)

2) end of the speech (two short phrases)

1) beginning of the speech (one short phrase and one sentence) 2) end of the speech (one short phrase)

1) joking

1) thanking, expressing 1) thanking, welcoming the feeling of being dignified 2) congratulating, 2) appealing (campaign saying goodbye slogan)

speech acts performed in the other code

2) addressing, representing

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Table 1: (continued) PUTIN

MERKEL

OBAMA

foregrounded function of codeswitching

– specification of the – marking closeness addressee – marking modality of – marking the modality interaction of interaction

purpose/effect

– creation of privacy by – (self-)inclusion of the – inclusion of the humor speaker by showing audience by creating – (self-)inclusion of the respect and agreement and speaker into the appreciation to the consent with the audience audience speaker’s opinion and objectives

reaction of the audience

1) laughter 2) applause

1) applause 2) standing ovation

– paraphrasing – specification of the addressee – marking closeness

1) cheering 2) applause, cheering

In Putin’s case, the functions of codeswitching can be described as a chance to address the audience, as with his first action of making the short humorous insertion, leaving the official situation for a moment and speaking more privately to the audience by excusing himself in German for speaking Russian. Thus, the (German) audience understands, without having to wait for the translation, that this short utterance is addressed directly to them. When Putin announces the switch to German to give his speech, he is marking the change of the modality of interaction. He is not only switching to another language but also to another mode of talking – he does the welcoming in Russian and then switches to German for delivering the official speech. The purpose of the codeswitching can be seen as Putin’s strategy of including himself into the audience by (first) creating an informal humorous atmosphere and (second) by showing “I speak your language! I am one of you!”. It can also be classified as cultural inclusion or the showing of cultural togetherness, as he is speaking about the unity of European culture as well as referring to the German language as cultural heritage – as ‘the language of Goethe, Schiller and Kant’ – and showing that he knows how to use this language. Regarding the political and historical backgrounds and contexts, this case of codeswitching and its intended purposes are surely more complex than can be described here, but at any rate it discuss the level of language use and linguistic strategy of including himself into the audience by using their (German) code in an eloquent and excessive way. Merkel’s strategy is similar to Putin’s but highlights a distinct historical background (referring to the German-Israeli relationship). She is marking closeness by directly addressing the Knesset in their mother tongue (or at least in one of the

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official languages of Israel), so that the audience is listening to her voice directly (without needing a translating voice to understand what she is saying). This can be described as stepping out of the official (translated) speech, and creating a more private atmosphere during the beginning and the end of her speech. Thus, she is marking the modality of interaction as she is addressing personal messages like thanking and saying goodbye directly to the audience or to the president. She also marks distinction across the more personal (in Hebrew) and official levels (in German) of her speech. Her aim is to show respect to the audience by speaking their language, at least in welcoming, thanking, congratulating and saying goodbye – which are important pragmatic aspects, especially for the constitution of relationships. Considering exclusion, Merkel is implying exclusion toward the Arabic speech community in Israel by speaking Hebrew, a side effect that is obviously not intended. But as shown before, it is rather evident that she uses codeswitching for creating togetherness and as a strategy of inclusion of her audience. Obama’s strategy is slightly different. The linguistic function of his codeswitching is primarily paraphrasing or translating what he just said in the other language. In doing so, he specifies the addressee or, to be more precise, highlights one part of the addressees (the Spanish speaking). Thus, it is also a strategy of marking closeness, because the Spanish language seems to be used as a private code between Obama and the audience (like Merkel and Putin marking the difference between the official code and the code for personal messages). This can especially be seen in the reaction of the audience. After Obama’s switching to Spanish, the audience is not politely applauding but reacting more emotionally by cheering and screaming. The strategy of codeswitching is not to include himself into the audience but to win them over to his side. It is like saying “We are on the same side!” or “We (together) are responsible for America!” But he is also implying “You are part of the history of the United States!” Thus, Obama is including the audience by creating agreement and consent with his own opinion and objectives. His strategy, by using planned codeswitching, is the inclusion of the audience.

6 Results and perspectives These three political speeches should serve as case studies for showing the processes, timing and functions of codeswitching in official and international contexts. Several similarities can be seen in the three cases. The timing of the codeswitching seems to follow a strategy of opening and closing a speech with switching to the other language. We find this strategy in every example, although Putin’s second codeswitch occurs after two and a half minutes, but also lasts until

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the end of his speech. In international contexts we find the purpose of the speech in the organization, establishment or strengthening of interstate relationships, while political advertising and the formation of public attitudes and opinion are not necessarily foregrounded. The main aspect and aim we find in all three speeches is the display of solidarity with the audience and their country, history, nationality or background. The speech acts performed in the instances of codeswitching are for the most part those which could be classified as expressives, meaning expressive speech acts where a speaker expresses his or her psychological state to the listener such as thanking, apologizing, expressing gratitude, welcoming and so on (see Searle 1976). This goes hand in hand with the function codeswitching fulfills in these examples, particularly to address the speech right to the audience and crossing the “linguistic border” from the official to a more private level. It can be summarized for these three case studies that codeswitching is a strategic instrument (politically and rhetorically) for showing solidarity, togetherness and respect to the audience, as can be seen in the inclusion of the speaker to the audience, exempliefied in the speeches of Putin and Merkel. Furthermore, codeswitching can be a communicative strategy for creating solidarity and sympathy with the speaker and/or the speaker’s interests and opinions, meaning the inclusion of the audience or winning them over on the side of the speaker, as seen in the example of Obama. However, codeswitching can also be used to specify the addressee and thereby, most likely unconsciously, excluding people who do not speak the language of the audience (meaning the exclusion of others/other speaker communities). Considering exclusion as a strategy in political speeches, it has to be emphasized that the exclusion in the cases shown here should not have an effect on the excluded community or speakers, but should affect the (included) audience as feeling even more appealed to as they are able to understand the language the speaker had just switched to. The presented cases are all examples of successfully-used codeswitching. In fact there are also cases of politicians not being familiar with the code or language they are using simply to fulfill the functions of inclusion and showing solidarity and thus accidentally making mistakes or creating misunderstandings. It can be a future task to analyze those cases in the same way to compare the aims and functions and to describe the factors of successful and unsuccessful codeswitching in official contexts.

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References Auer, Peter. 1986. Konversationelle Standard/Dialekt-Kontinua (Code-Shifting). Deutsche Sprache 1986/2. 97‒124. Auer, Peter. 1995. The Pragmatics of Code-switching: A Sequential Approach. In Lesley Milroy & Pieter Muysken (eds.), One Speaker, Two Languages, 115‒135. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bullock, Barbara E. & Jacqueline Toribio Almeida (eds.). 2009. The Cambridge Handbook of Linguistic Code-switching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fricke, Ellen. 2012. Grammatik multimodal: Wie Wörter und Gesten zusammenwirken. Berlin: De Gruyter. Gal, Susan. 1998. The political economy of code choice. In Monica Heller (ed.), Codeswitching: Anthropological and Sociolinguistic Perspectives, 245‒264. Berlin & New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Gardner-Chloros, Penelope. 2009. Code-switching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gumperz, John. 1982a. Conversational codeswitching. In John Gumperz (ed.), Discourse Strategies, 59‒99. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gumperz, John. 1982b. Language and social identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Heller, Monica. 1988. Strategic ambiguity: Codeswitching in the management of conflict. In Monica Heller (ed.), Codeswitching: Anthropological and Sociolinguistic Perspectives, 77‒97. New York: De Gruyter. Holly, Werner. 1990. Politikersprache. Inszenierung und Rollenkonflikte im informellen Sprechhandeln eines Bundestagsabgeordneten. Berlin: De Gruyter. Kaiser, Irmtraud. 2006. “Warum sagt ma des?”: Code Switching und Code Shifting zwischen Dialekt und Standard in Gesprächen des österreichischen Fernsehens. Zeitschrift für Dialektologie und Linguistik, LXXIII. Jahrgang, Heft 3. 275–299. Mondada, Lorenza. 2015. Deixis and social interaction, In: Konstanze Jungbluth & Federica Da Milano (eds.), Manual of Deixis in Romance Languages. 661–683. Berlin & Boston: Mouton De Gruyter. Müller, Cornelia, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Sedinha Tessendorf (eds.). 2013. Body – Language – Communication. Volume 1. Berlin & New York: Mouton De Gruyter. Myers-Scotton, Carol. 1979. Codeswitching as a ‘safe choice’ in choosing a lingua franca. In William McCormack & Stephen A. Wurm (eds.), Language and Society, 71‒88. The Hague: Mouton De Gruyter. Myers-Scotton, Carol. 1993. Social motivations for codeswitching: Evidence from Africa. Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press. Myers-Scotton, Carol. 2006. Multiple voices: An introduction to bilingualism. Maldan, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. Myers-Scotton, Carol & William Ury. 1977. Bilingual strategies: The social function of codeswitching. International Journal of Sociology of Language 13. 5‒20. Nomura, Maki, 2003. Bilingualism and multilingualism: A study of code switching. The Bulletin of the International Student Center, Kobe University. http://www.lib.kobe-u.ac.jp/repository/00523015.pdf (accessed 3 July 2015). Norris, Sigrid. 2013. Multimodal (inter)action analysis: An integrative methodology, In Cornelia Müller, Alan Cienki, Ellen Fricke, Silva H. Ladewig, David McNeill & Sedinha Tessendorf

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(eds.), Body – Language – Communication, 275‒286. Berlin & New York: Mouton De Gruyter. Özdil, Erkan. 2010. Codeswitching im zweisprachigen Handeln: Sprachtypologische Aspekte verbalen Planens in türkisch-deutscher Kommunikation. Münster: Waxmann. Poplack, Shana. 1980. Sometimes I’ll start a sentence in Spanish y termino en español: Toward a typology of code-switching. Linguistics 18. 581‒618. Poplack, Shana. 1981. The syntactic structure and social function of code-switching. In Richard Durán (ed.), Latino language and communicative behaviour, 169‒184. Norwood, NJ: Ablex. Reisigl, Matin. 2008. Rhetoric of political speeches. In Ruth Wodak & Veronika Koller (eds.), Handbook of Applied Linguistics. Volume 4: Language and Communication in the public sphere, 243‒269. Berlin & New York: Mouton De Gruyter. Schmitz, Thomas. 2005. Rede. In Gert Ueding (ed.), Historisches Wörterbuch der Rhetorik. Volume 7, 698–709. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Schwitalla, Johannes. 2006. Gesprochenes Deutsch. Eine Einführung. Berlin: Schmidt. Searle, John R. 1976. A classification of illocutionary acts. Language in Society, 5(1). 1–23. Selting, Margret. 1983. Institutionelle Kommunikation. Stilwechsel als Mittel strategischer Interaktion. Linguistische Berichte 86/1983. 29‒48. Unterholzner, Franz. 2009. Gesprächsstruktur und Sprachvariation bei Radiotelefonaten: Eine Analyse von Telefongesprächen im regionalen Salzburger Radio. Saarbrücken: VDM. Wei, Jennifer M. Y. 2003. Codeswitching in Campaigning Discourse: The Case of Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian. Language and Linguistics 4(1). 139‒165. Weinreich, Uriel. [1953] 1979. Languages in Contact: Findings and Problems. The Hague: Mouton.

Cited speeches Merkel, Angela. 2008. Speech to the Knesset in Jerusalem, Israel, March 18. http:// www.c-span.org/video/?203562-1/german-chancellor-address (accessed 7 July 2015). Obama, Barack. 2012. Speech at NALEO annual conference in Orlando, Florida, January 22. http://www.whitehouse.gov/photos-and-video/video/2012/06/22/president-obamaspeaks-naleo-annual-conference (accessed 7 July 2015). Putin, Wladimir. 2001. Speech to the German Bundestag (Parliament), September 25. https://www.bundestag.de/mediathek/?action=search&contentArea=details&offset Start=90&id=4024571&instance=m187&categorie=Sonderveranstaltungen&mask =search&lang=de (accessed 7 July 2015).

Carly Collins, University of Lleida

Global English and Multilingual Luxembourg A Case Study of Native English Speakers Abstract: In this chapter, I consider an alternative perspective of native and global English that has received little attention in linguistics research to date; that is, the extent to which a native command of the language can act as a hindrance to second language learning for its speakers due to its prevalence and global dominance today. A case study of Irish individuals, all of whom relocated as adults from Ireland to (officially trilingual) Luxembourg, serves as a context for the discussion. Firstly I relay some key conceptualizations of the terms transnational and expatriate. I then discuss a number of relevant strands of contemporary literature in light of global English, before briefly sketching the respective linguistic landscapes of Luxembourg and Ireland. Having done so, I proceed to look at how second language learning is intertwined with the transition from an expatriate in the host country to a lifestyle of a more cosmopolitan, transnational character, exploring how native English might play an influential role in the process. Keywords: multilingualism, language use, transnationalism, expatriate, English, Irish, global English, lingua franca English, second language learning

1 Transnationals, expatriates and second language learning The term transnational has come to be used much in linguistics research, often without concomitant definition. Jordan and Düvell (2003) consider that transnationals are those ethnic groups who have settled in new nation states while retaining and developing cultural and economic links with their homelands. Block refers to transnationalism as one (among other) migrant settlement options which “involves simultaneous, social, political and economic ties with two or more nation states” (2006: 19), emphasizing the aspect of simultaneous, coexisting ties, with both the homeland and the host country. Expatriates, on the other hand, are referred to as “individuals who have chosen to live abroad for an extended period of time, but who know that whenever they want, they can return home” (2006: 38). In order to evolve from the life mode of an expatriate, here deemed a “quasi tourist existence”, to that of a transnational, it is considered

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necessary for an individual to acquire a certain level of intercultural competence, otherwise referred to as cosmopolitanism. Drawing on the respective definitions of Held and Hannerz, Block posits that cosmopolitans are those who “move toward immersing themselves in local ways and practices” (2006: 39), thus allowing an expatriate to earn the title of transnational. In the present chapter I draw on the foregoing definitions of transnational and expatriate in a bid to illustrate how second language learning is integral to cultivating the intercultural competence which is said to facilitate a shift from an expatriate lifestyle to that of a transnational. A case study of Irish adults who had relocated to Luxembourg as adults serves as the context for the discussion. Taking into account the current dominance of English globally, I endeavour to show how for these individuals, having English as a first language and embodying the profile of native English speaker acts as a hindrance in the stakes of second language learning at a local level. This in turn affects the way in which their lives unfurl in the host country, contributing to whether they embrace lifestyles characterized by typically transnational or expatriate features.

1.1 Global English and the native English speaker. The other side of the coin The tendency for speakers of minor languages with lower communicative value to adapt to more widely spoken languages of higher communicative value is a discernible global trend (Zsuzsa 2007). De Swaan (2001) coined the term “Qvalue” to capture this notion of the communicative potential of a language in relation to simultaneously coexisting languages in a given collective repertoire, thus defining the Q-value of a language as “the product of its prevalence and centrality” (2001: 34). The English language, here referred to as “the pivot of the global language constellation” (2001: 17), beyond doubt has an unequivocally high Q-value in terms of a global language repertoire today. The “present, apparently unassailable position of English in the world” (Graddol 1997: 1) is attested to by the vast expanse of research which looks to its role as an international lingua franca (cf. Berns 2009; Seidlhofer 2005 etc). Numerous authors highlight the negative aspects of the inexorable spread of English throughout the world, a process which began around 400 years ago owing to British colonialism and perpetuated in recent decades by globalisation (cf.Breiteneder 2009; Pennycook 1998). The language is widely acknowledged in contemporary literature as being inextricably linked with the processes of globalisation (e.g. Blommaert 2010; Graddol 1997), while Block (2014: 115), drawing on

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the work of Skutnabb-Kangas, employs the apt analogy of English as the “beachhead of globalisation, and capitalism”. Elsewhere, scholars look to the problems associated with native speakers of English. For example, the prescriptive standards of native English is regarded as problematic by some (Cameron 1995; Phillipson 1992 etc.), while others call for a reconceptualization of English as a lingua franca as a variety in its own right, rather than as a defective variety of the native standard language (Scheuer 2010; Seidlhofer 2005). Christ (1997, cited in Ellis 2007: 177) maintains that inhabitants of monolingual developed countries whose language is a language of international communication are under the impression that “their own language is the normal case which speakers of other languages must adjust to”. Similarly, Alastair Pennycook in his often cited work devotes a chapter to discussing the rapid expansion of English as “natural, neutral and beneficial” (1994:7), a view which he argues is held largely by its native speakers. The foregoing accusations may plausibly correspond to an element of truth, particularly for native speakers who have resided for the large part of their lives in predominantly English speaking countries. However, the other side of the coin is how the prevalence and sheer ubiquity of English may in turn negatively impact prospects of second language learning for its native speakers. Apt circumstances in which to explore this phenomenon are those of native English speakers moving from a putative monolingual country to a host country where exposure to other languages is high. Thus, multilingual Luxembourg serves as a fitting context for this discussion of Irish migrants.

1.2 Setting the scene: Luxembourg, Ireland and language profiles A small landlocked country situated between France, Germany and Belgium, Luxembourg is an officially trilingual state. Despite this official Luxembourgish/ French/German trilingualism, Luxembourg’s linguistic diversity (both city and country) is complex, and far more multilingual in reality. Table 1: Language spoken by Luxembourg’s citizens (at work, home, or school). Languages spoken at work, home, or school

Respondent percentages

Luxembourgish

70.5%

French

55.7%

German

30.6%

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Table 1: (continued) Languages spoken at work, home, or school

Respondent percentages

English

21.0%

Portuguese

20.0%

Italian Other languages

 

6.2%

 

12.1%

Source: adapted from Luxembourg’s 2011 census report (STATEC 2013)

Figures shown in Table 1 are derived from a report published by Luxembourg’s national census office, Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques (STATEC 2013), whereby citizens were asked which languages they speak at home, work or school. Suffice to say that despite its official trilingualism, Luxembourg is a highly multilingual locale. Worthy of noting here is also that statistics published by the European Commission (2012) cite a far higher figure of 56% of the population as capable of speaking English.1 The language has a particularly unique role in the Grand Duchy on account of the country’s flourishing finance and banking sector. Weber (2009) notes that English has emerged as one of the most important languages together with French in the globalized employment market in recent years. In a similar vein, Kingsley (2009, 2010) notes the increasing numbers of banking and finance institutions in Luxembourg opting for English as their official working language. Contrarily to Luxembourg, Ireland’s primary spoken language is predominantly English, which has official language status in the country together with the Irish language, Gaeilge2. With regard to languages, Ireland ranks among the

1 The same EU survey carried out in 2006 indicated 60% of the population to be capable of speaking English. This decrease is perhaps more likely to be an effect of the relatively small numbers surveyed in the study rather than a decline in English speakers given global and European trends. In addition, it must be noted that the differences between national census figures and the EU figures are likely to be on account of two factors; firstly the smaller numbers accounted for by the EU surveys, and secondly the census research specifically having asked respondents which languages they spoke at work, school or with family. Also worth noting is that the STATEC census report does not take into account the very high percentage of cross border workers who commute from neighbouring countries France, Belgium and Germany daily to work in Luxembourg. 2 See Baker, (1988) for a more comprehensive discussion of Gaeilge in Ireland.

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lowest of EU countries in terms of ability to communicate in what is referred to as a foreign language, with 60% of the country’s population reportedly unable to speak any additional languages (European Commission 2012).

2 Methodology and participants Table 2 provides an overview of the participants in the current study, all of whom are of Irish nationality, native English speakers who relocated to Luxembourg at some point in their adult lives for the purposes of their careers in finance. The category outlining the individuals’ linguistic profiles entails a very simplified overview for reference purposes. All participants and third parties mentioned in their interviews have been assigned pseudonyms in order to protect their identities. Table 2: Participant profile overview Participant Age group name

Duration of stay in Gender Luxembourg

Linguistic profile

Niamh

25–30

1.5 years

Female

Beginner level French & Irish

Laura

25–30

1.5 years

Female

Beginner level French & Irish

Sinéad

35–40

14 years

Female

Intermediate level French & Irish

Liam

35–40

11 years

Male

Fluent Irish, Intermediate level German & Beginner French

Semi-structured, informal interviews of an ethnographic nature were carried out with the above four participants as part of a qualitative study at the University of Luxembourg. The four were chosen for the present discussion on the basis that the common theme of native English as a hindrance to second language learning emerged from the respective dialogues. In what follows, the focus is exclusively on interview excerpts from case studies that serve to underscore the topics invoked hitherto relating to native English. Following Preece (2006), I set out to explore those topics, and consider whether the four informants can be said to live their lives as transnationals, as referred to in 1.1 above.

2.1 Niamh and Laura – two Irish expatriates Niamh and Laura are two female participants of Irish nationality aged between 25 and 30, who had been living for 1.5 years in Luxembourg at the time of their

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interview. The women both worked in a global finance company where the official working language is English, and rated their expertise in French, the language they considered most useful in Luxembourg, as basic beginner level. Neither German nor Luxembourgish were mentioned during the interview. Both Niamh and Laura made it clear throughout the discussion that their daily lives in Luxembourg were lived for the most part via English. On occasions, this appears to be related to lack of investment in the target language (Norton 1995), as we will see in due course. On other occasions however, this English-mediated lifestyle is not portrayed as a personal choice, but as a result of the ubiquity of English, and often being replied to in English when attempting to speak French. In examples (1) and (2) below Niamh discusses her lack of progress in French: (1)

Ni: with the classes I know they’re not getting better and I actually can’t say anything even though I understand what’s going on do you know like then if I have to express anything that I want to say myself I just can’t. . .and I think that’s a practice thing but again even if you go to the shops like they’ll just respond to you in English anyway cos like obviously French is not my first language . . . so  

 

 

(2)

 

Ni: and but then sometimes also they have really bad English and I’m like my French is equally bad if not better than how crappy your English is in the first place. . .but I’m still like. . .they’re still replying in English when they’re not even good  

 

 

 

A sense of frustration is transmitted through Niamh’s use of the words I just can’t, conveying her inability to express herself in French, which shortly thereafter is linked to a general experience of being rebuffed in her attempts to speak French in local shops when interlocutors reply to her in English. A disparaging tone is discernible in example (2), as she considers her basic level of French as equal to, if not better than, the poor levels of English of those who quash down her attempts to practice, speakers who are allegedly still replying in English when they’re not even good. This is reminiscent of earlier discussions of Abram de Swaan’s (2001) Q-value theory, whereby speakers adapt themselves to a more widely spoken language. Although not an official language in Luxembourg, Niamh’s personal anecdote supports the claim that English is nonetheless very widely spoken, at least in the city. It also indicates that while the language may be more dominant in the finance sector, its use is not restricted to the international jobs market but is, as Breiteneder (2009: 256) frames global English “the language of bus drivers and scientists alike”.

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The women frequently employ the notion of being able to get by in English throughout the discussion, often linking it to a lack of incentive to engage in language learning during their sojourn in Luxembourg. This is well illustrated by the discussion on the topic of taking French lessons, in examples (3) and (4) below: (3)

Ni: I think it makes it easier like it would be easier if I could speak French but I don’t but you know that you can get by on English. . .and it’s probably different for us too because of our classes in work I don’t know if other businesses and stuff have it. . .but it obviously makes learning language that bit more available to us. . .  

 

 

 

 

 

(4) Ni: Ya like I wouldn’t have gotten French classes if they weren’t in work like no way I wouldn’t have bothered No I’ve never heard of it. I would like how cheap is cheap cos I wouldn’t mind doing that Ca: Around 100 euro a semester around 10 for twenty classes I think it’s really good Ni: Ya I might pay that for it now that you say it (laughs) . . .I wouldn’t have gone out of my way . . .ya no never heard of it  

 

 

 

In a somewhat contradictory outpour in example (2), Niamh follows the assertion that she doesn’t speak French with the generalization you know that you can get by on English, switching from personal pronoun I to you, seemingly referring to English speakers at large. Thus, her lack of competence in French is seen to be immediately linked to the perception of being able to survive with solely English. Admitting in example (4) that she would not have sought French lessons had they not been made available through work (free of charge), a considerable lack of investment is made clear when she declares no way I wouldn’t have bothered. The “sometimes ambivalent desire to learn and practice the target language” (Norton 1995: 17) is rendered visible in this utterance. While Niamh begins this turn by acknowledging how it would be easier if I spoke French, she quickly reverts to you can get by on English. A shift in mindset is evident again in example (4), where she appears to be coming around to the idea of reasonably priced French lessons saying she might pay that for it now since it has been mentioned, but adds in an offhand manner I wouldn’t have gone out of my way. Niamh’s apparent lack of investment in the target language, coupled with the ambivalence expressed here is intertwined with the perception of being able to get by with English in Luxembourg.

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Despite these generalizations about being able to survive in English, later in the interview the conversation turned to the problematic aspect of not having a sufficient command of any local language, in examples (5) and (6) below. (5)

Ni: ya our lease is in French and I haven’t a breeze La: our lease only came in German or French things like that anything official is not in English even in work if there was the tax d’abonnement all that stuff I have to get one of the others who speaks French to do it. . .ya it is an English speaking office but for any of the other official stuff usually it’s not English  

 

(6) Ni: we were laughing this morning about my Sephora nailvarnish (laughs) when I opened it it had all leaked out so there’s only half left so I would have to take it back and Laura was laughing like (laughs) so how are you going to explain that in French (laughs)

Although Niamh and Laura both work in an English speaking office, it is also made clear that getting by with solely English does not always suffice. There are times when not being able to communicate competently in any of the local languages leaves them dependent on French-speaking work colleagues for translations and explanations of important documents such a tax applications, as we see in example (5). Speaking of the apartment lease they signed upon moving to Luxembourg, Niamh chips in with an Irish colloquialism haven’t a breeze, meaning that she understands virtually nothing of the document’s contents. Equally, while making purchases may be relatively easy without a competent level of French, the inability to handle less run-of-the-mill events such as damaged goods is a source of amusement for the women in example (6). Despite being able to get by for the most part with English, such instances, it would seem, are bound to arise eventually when one resides in a multilingual environment with little knowledge of local languages. The excerpt thus provides a fitting example of the earlier mentioned “quasi tourist existence” (Block 2006: 38), characteristic of expatriate patterns, illustrating how second language learning is a necessary part of the said intercultural competence which allows a shift towards a more transnational lifestyle.

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2.2 Liam – a former bilingual Liam is an Irish male aged between 35 and 40 who had lived in Luxembourg for eleven years at the time of interview. Similarly to both Niamh and Laura, working in the finance industry in a largely English speaking company allowed Liam to maintain what is portrayed largely as an English-only mediated existence. In the following example Liam discusses his everyday use and knowledge of various languages: (7)

Li:

ya at home I speak English. . .in work I speak English. . .the only opportunity to try to learn French let’s say would be if I did classes. . .or when going to a restaurant etc but I can get by with my French in restaurants or in any outside activities I can get by but that’s the extent of my French because that’s the only time I use it I have a basic level. . .as it’s called I have restaurant French (laughs). . .ya it’s disgraceful I suppose if I go home and say I have been living in Luxembourg for eleven years and don’t speak French  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(8) Li:

 

 

I have some German but haven’t had the opportunity to speak it here. . .I had more German when I came out of University than I do now probably. . .and my Irish is getting worse (laughs) I would probably have to think a bit more now to say anything  

 

 

 

While in example (7) Liam reports having scant opportunity to practice what little French he has managed to acquire, a sense of shame about his self-proclaimed incompetence in the language is perceptible, as he harshly labels his own lack of French acquisition disgraceful. Interestingly, while Liam engages in generalizations about the monolingualism of Irish society as we will see shortly, he himself had a good command of Irish and German prior to relocating, both of which have been the object of language attrition during his eleven year stay in Luxembourg. Despite German being one of the three official languages in the country, Liam says he has had little opportunity to practice the language since moving to Luxembourg. Ironically, he now speaks it less well than he did upon leaving university, see example (8). He also deems his expertise in Irish to have deteriorated, to be expected given that Irish is not one of the spoken languages in Luxembourg. This offers an intriguing example of how the role of international English is likely to have functioned to eclipse local languages, also overshadowing a language of inheritance, with which Liam once had strong affinity and expertise (Leung, Harris and Rampton 1997) at an earlier time in his life.

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Similarly to Niamh and Laura in the previous section, Liam also speaks of being rebuffed in his attempts to use French in example (9) below: (9) Li:

Ya like if you. . .often if you do try to speak your limited amount of a language. . .the person behind the desk who has five languages notices that you have. . .that you’re not a native speaker. . .will answer you in English. . .then people just get. . .they don’t keep up the conversation in French. . .they just say it’s easier to speak in English  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(10) Li:

 

 

 

Foreigners probably think Irish people don’t ever speak another language but there are reasons

Drawing on an imagined typical scenario, in the above utterance Liam contrasts the person behind the desk who has five languages apparently with the native English speaker whom he considers is typically answered in English and tends to give up, saying it is easier to speak in English (9). Notably, Liam extrapolates in this turn (10) from his own personal experience to a general, depersonalized you, subsequently adding foreigners probably think Irish people don’t ever speak another language but there are reasons, inferring many things, among them, that he believes other Irish people to share in his experience. Elsewhere, the discussion also turned to the problematic aspect of not having learned any of the local languages: (11) Li:

I suppose English speaking people. . .there is a. . .I suppose we don’t really know anything about the news in Luxembourg like how. . .what is happening in Luxembourg. . .where things are. . .we just find out from experiencing it. . .there isn’t a tv channel let’s say that we would look at. . ..there isn’t a newspaper we could read. . .so. . .we have a very limited knowledge of what’s going on in the country. . .it’s often hard to find out about what’s going on in Luxembourg. . .I mean there are the magazines etc. . .often these are just monthly things and current affairs etc.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Referring to English speaking people in Luxembourg at large in example (11) above, Liam casts doubt on how well informed he and his compatriots really are about local news and events in the community, saying we don’t really know anything about the news in Luxembourg, what is happening, or where things are. He laments the perceived lack of English media in Luxembourg, adding that we have a very limited knowledge of what’s going on, portraying an experience of being somewhat disconnected from local community on account of a certain language

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barrier. While he has resided in the country for eleven years, Liam’s lifestyle, it could be suggested, is characterized by a considerably more expatriate nature given that he reports little involvement with the local community. This, in turn appears to be intertwined with his lack of engagement with local languages and the apparent heavy reliance on English in his daily life.

2.3 Sinéad – the transnational language advocate Sinéad is an Irish mother of two young boys both attending primary school in the Luxembourgish mainstream system. While she reports having a moderate level of French herself, Sinéad has ensured that both of her children are immersed in Luxembourgish, German and French, by choosing to place them in the Luxembourgish school system, and by enrolling them in French and Luxembourgish mediated extracurricular activities, such as boy scouts. Example (12) below conveys how on the one hand Sinéad deems herself to have acquired a sufficient level of French to communicate with others, yet retreats to the safety of English if the interaction allows: (12) Si:

I can hold a conversation but I’d be very careful with whom. . .I wouldn’t hold it with someone who can speak English because I’d be mortified but if someone has no English at all I can have a conversation with them no worries. . .. . .I’d never make an appointment or go to the dry cleaners and ask if they spoke English. . .  

 

 

 

(13) Si:

 

 

 

Your means of expressing yourself. . .I obviously express myself much better in English it’s obviously a lot better than my French. . .we have conversations in school in French so I can’t be me because my French is not good enough to be myself to communicate perfectly. . .fluently if you like Because the boys are in the local school a lot of their little friends are Luxembourgish so I would have to interact a hell of a lot more with Luxembourgish or German parents they speak English or sometimes French. . .  

 

 

 

 

 

 

(14) Si:

 

 

the only thing I get a bit under pressure with is Fionn’s parent teacher meetings and I’m dreading them as he gets older. . .I want them to know I am on their side but sometimes I think my French is so limited that I come across that I’m not  

 

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In examples (12)–(14) above, we see clearly how Sinéad’s “immigrant woman’s gendered identity as a mother is implicated with her investment in the target language and interaction with its speakers” (Norton 2000: 88). The mention of how she has to interact a hell of a lot more in (13) emphasises how she is compelled through her role as a mother to interact with other parents of diverse cultural and linguistic profiles, sometimes through French. The strongly loaded words a hell of a lot more denote that this is not necessarily always easy, and also imply comparison with a non-mother role, possibly with an earlier stage in her own life. Sinéad confirms in example (12) that she has a command of French which is sufficient to make an appointment or go to the dry cleaners, however admitting thereafter that she is willing to hold a conversation in French only with a person whom she thinks does not speak English. This admission depicts English as a kind of escape route used to avoid having to converse unnecessarily in another language. A certain level of anxiety at the prospect of conversing in French is also perceptible in (12), saying I would be very careful with whom, Sinéad justifies the tendency to revert to English by confiding that she would feel mortified, conveying a palpable sense of shame at the prospect of conversing in French with an interlocutor who also speaks English. The subsequent confession that she cannot be herself when speaking in French in example (13) further explains her difficulty embracing the role of a competent French speaker. The fact that her English is better than her French is said to be obvious, perhaps serving to justify and normalize this experience of not being able to communicate perfectly, fluently if you like for Sinéad, as an English speaker in the midst of multilingualism. Lastly, she confides in example (14) that holding parent teacher meetings at her son’s school in French are a source of anguish for her, given that she deems her command of French to be limited. This, she feels acts as a barrier to forming a good rapport with his teacher(s), admitting that the sense of dread is mounting rather than subsiding as her son becomes older. Hence, we become witness to how, for Sinéad, living in a multilingual environment where one can survive or get by largely in English, at the expense of not engaging oneself fully in local language(s), can become problematic to varying degrees. The excerpt of Sinéad’s interview presented here provides an insight into the various positionings she embraces with regard to languages, as an Irish, nativeEnglish speaker residing in Luxembourg. These positionings are permeated by her role as a mother throughout. She is seen to have embraced language learning to some degree, or what is at least clear here is that her role as a mother has impelled her to do so. Elsewhere in the interview, Sinéad is also seen to be actively retaining links with the homeland through activities that rekindle and

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sustain her Irish culture such as Saint Patrick’s Day at the boys’ school, and advocating the Irish language, also congruent with transnational characteristics. These elements, together with the desire she expresses for her children to become fluent trilinguals, contribute to a lifestyle which is of an ostensibly more transnational character than the participants discussed prior, Niamh, Laura and Liam.

3 Discussion For the Irish participants in this study, we observe how English is the dominant language mediating their professional lives, the result of which in some cases is a relatively low drive to learn any of the local languages, Luxembourgish, French, or German. In the case of Liam, Niamh and Laura, we see how English is virtually the sole language used in their everyday lives. Sinéad, on the other hand, has attained some degree of proficiency in French, partly it seems on account of her role as a mother. This competency permits her to use the language in many everyday interactions. Further progress in the language nonetheless appears to be marred by the possibility of resorting to English with those who speak her native language, particularly when anxiety about speaking French sets in. Even in cases where some motivation to engage in second language learning is expressed, for example in the case of Niamh taking French lessons, or that of already Liam having attained a certain level of proficiency in German prior to arriving in Luxembourg, the opportunity to practice the language is not always easy to come by despite official trilingualism and much multilingualism in the community at large. Furthermore, Niamh and Liam both report that efforts to position themselves as competent speakers of French are often rebuked by interlocutors who assign them an English speaker profile and reply in English, reminiscent of the widely evoked concept of ascribed or attributed identity (cf. Blommaert 2005; Pavlenko & Blackledge 2004), language identity in this case (Block 2006). Such circumstances no doubt rendered it difficult to persist in trying to practice an already less than competent level of French, evidencing a barrier to second language learning which can be retraced directly to being a native English speaker and the prevalence of the English language, both globally and in Luxembourg. In light of the discussion of immigration, transnationals and expatriates at the beginning of this chapter, the foregoing analyses point to the fact that the distinction between an expatriate and a transnational is not an easy one to make. While I posit that only Sinéad truly shows signs of a transnational lifestyle, there is nothing to prevent that all informants may have ongoing dealings both socially, economically and politically with both Ireland and Luxembourg. One key distinguishing factor however is the notion of living a “quasi tourist existence” (Block

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2006: 38), which depicts the way in which an expatriate can live their lives in a given host country without necessarily participating in local culture or community, and is well illustrated by the examples selected from interviews with Liam, Niamh and Laura. Based on the extracts relayed here, I would argue that Sinéad is the only informant who has truly moved beyond the latter expatriate existence. Both her role as a mother, and her intermediate level of competence in French appear to contribute to this lifestyle, despite the considerable stronghold of English in her life. While the informants portrayed their lives in Luxembourg to be largely English mediated, this was shown to be problematic on occasions. In the case of Niamh and Laura, it meant not being able to understand important administrative documents or communicate effectively beyond basic retail transactions locally, while for Liam it resulted in not feeling fully informed about local affairs. For Sinéad, her self-professed limited level of French meant feeling she could not create a good rapport with her son’s teacher at the local school. All of the above indicates how not learning the local language(s), even where English may be largely sufficient to get by can become problematic, proving a formidable barrier to accessing the enriching intercultural experiences allow expatriates to become transnationals (Block 2006).

4 Conclusion The data presented in this chapter suggest that the dominant role of English globally today, and its prevalence to varying degrees in Luxembourg, negatively impact second language learning prospects for the four Irish informants in this study. This, I would argue is owing to the sheer ubiquity of English in terms of second language speakers and also its current status which grants English prime position over other languages globally in terms of communicative value, or Qvalue to employ De Swaan’s (2001) term. The present contribution to literature on the topics of globalisation and native English offers a more sympathetic perspective than those espousing the view that native speakers are somewhat arrogant, expecting others to adjust to their language, holding it to high standards and benefitting from its current global dominance. Notwithstanding the fact that second language learning often does necessitate a concerted effort for adults, a command of native English can and may act as a hindrance to second language learning for its speakers, as I have endeavoured to show is the case for the informants in this study. While I have shown here that it is important for those who fly the supposed monolingual nest and find themselves in the midst of multilingualism, influencing to what extent they are willing and able to adjust

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their lifestyle to their local community, it remains to be seen whether it is likely to be an issue for native English speakers in various contexts globally.

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Pennycook, Alastair. 1994. The Cultural Politics of English as an International Language. London: Longman. Pennycook, Alastair. 1998. English and the Discourses of Colonialism: The Politics of Language. London: Routledge. Phillipson, Robert. 1992. Linguistic Imperialism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Preece, Siân. 2006. British Asian undergraduate students in London. In David Block (ed.), Multilingual Identities in a Global City: London Stories, 171–199. London: Palgrave. Scheuer, Sylwia. 2010. Can (an) ELF have a life of its own? Poznań Studies in Contemporary Linguistics 46(3). 331–347. Seidlhofer, Barbara. 2005. English as a lingua franca. ELT Journal 59(4), 339–341. STATEC (Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques). 2013. Recensement de la population 2011. Premiers résultats: Les langues parlées au travail, à l’école et/ou à la maison. [Population census 2011. Preliminary results: Languages spoken at work, at school and/or at home]. http://www.statistiques.public.lu/catalogue-publications/RP2011-premiers-resultats/2013/13-13-FR.pdf (accessed 19 December 2015) Weber, Jean-Jacques. 2009. Multilingualism, Education and Change. Frankfurt am Main: Lang. Zsuzsa, Hoffmann. 2007. English as a glocal panacea for quadrilingual Switzerland and multilingual Europe. Argumentum 3(2007). 54–64. http://epa.oszk.hu/00700/00791/00003/ pdf/hoffmannzs.pdf (accessed 19 December 2015).

Index adequacy 5, 9–10, 30 adjustment 140–141, 180 agency 22, 114, 118, 121, 128 argument structure 55–60, 62, 66–67, 69–70 argumentation 93, 100–101, 162–163, 165–168, 173 attitude 166, 180, 191 – affective attitudes 179, 181–182, 188, 193–196 – epistemic attitudes 181 attrition 179–185, 188, 194–195, 197, 243 biculturality 137, 148 bilingualism 12, 121, 162–163, 184, 187–188, 193, 208, 219, 243 Catalan 7, 9, 11, 16, 22–24, 26–27, 36, 93, 100, 118, 121, 124, 139, 142, 144, 156–157, 159, 162–166, 169, 172–174, 176 closings 221 co-construction 114, 120, 131–132, 137–146, 149–150, 179, 183 co-production 137–138, 143, 147, 149 code-mixing 4, 11–12, 16, 207, 219 code-switching 4, 11–12, 16, 114–115, 121, 137, 159, 196, 217, 219–232 communication 4–5, 10, 18–20, 34–35, 37–39, 45, 55–56, 64, 69–70, 73–75, 90–91, 93–94, 97, 99, 101, 107, 114–117, 124, 137–139, 142, 149, 155, 169, 196, 219, 222–224, 237 – communicative event 76 – embodied communication 93 – nonverbal communication 65, 70, 90 – theory of communication 4 community 3, 8, 45, 50, 76, 114–115, 117–121, 124–126, 128–130, 148, 159, 182, 184, 188–191, 195–196, 231–232, 244, 247–249 competence 3–4, 30, 73, 75, 90, 115, 192, 197, 224, 236, 241–242 connectives 162, 166 – binary connectives 162–164, 169, 175–176

context 5, 10, 19, 40–42, 44, 49–50, 56, 58–59, 61–62, 67, 69–70, 76, 98, 115, 117, 120, 122, 126, 138–139, 141, 143, 148–149, 153, 155–156, 159, 162–163, 191, 196, 215–216, 221–225, 235–237 conventionality 36, 45 conversation 38, 43, 73–74, 90, 117, 119, 137, 139–140, 143–144, 148, 153–154, 201, 221, 223–224, 242, 244–246 cosmopolitanism 236 Creole 4, 15, 148 Croatian 179, 185, 189, 191–196 cultural 45, 48–50, 73–75, 90, 94, 115–116, 121, 124–125, 130, 142, 144, 153–154, 163, 182–183, 195, 197, 202, 204, 216, 226, 230, 235, 246 – cultural misunderstanding 73 – culture contact 34, 49–50, 221 deixis 55–58, 62–64, 66–70, 97, 123, 131, 153, 155–156, 159 – deictic 42, 47, 55, 57–58, 62–70, 96–97, 129, 131, 138, 153, 155, 158 discourse 4–5, 7, 10–12, 19–20, 22, 27, 30, 35, 43–45, 55, 94, 96–97, 101, 106–107, 114– 123, 126, 129–132, 137, 140, 147, 149, 154, 156, 162, 164, 166, 168–169, 171–172, 175–176, 179, 183–184, 188, 196, 224 – discourse analysis 116, 137, 179, 184 – media discourse 221 – political discourse 162–163, 221 – spoken discourse 162 – written discourse 162 embodiment 34, 123, 131, 137, 139, 150 encoding 4, 8, 11, 16, 19, 22, 24, 28, 57, 62–64, 67–70 English 11–12, 75, 98–99, 124, 127, 142–145, 148, 154, 179, 183–185, 188–189, 192–193, 217, 228, 235–248 – global English 235–236, 240 – lingua franca English 235 – native English 235–237, 239, 247–249 expatriate 235–236, 239, 242, 245, 247–248

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face 43, 47, 74, 120, 139, 156, 197 – facial expression 23, 30 first language 57, 73–74, 94, 114, 121, 123–125, 127, 130–132, 179, 185, 236, 240 – L1 attrition 180–181, 197 fluency 75, 93–94, 99–100, 102, 108, 111 formulation 4, 6, 12–15, 27–29 frame 14, 56, 58, 60, 62, 70, 145, 149, 167, 209, 213, 215 French 94, 116, 144, 156, 179, 185, 237–238, 240–248 Functional Discourse Grammar 3–7, 9–16, 19–21, 27–30 functional theory 9 functional variation 12 German 34–36, 45, 47–50, 55, 57, 73–76, 88, 90, 93–94, 99–100, 114, 117–131, 142, 148–149, 179, 185, 187, 189–192, 200, 202–204, 208–209, 211–216, 220–222, 225–227, 230, 234, 237, 240, 242–243, 245, 247 gesture 4–5, 18–29, 35–37, 39–40, 42–46, 48–50, 55, 58, 66–67, 93–95, 100, 103–107, 111, 114, 122, 128, 149 – autostimulative gesture 98, 104, 107, 111 – away gestures 34–36, 46–48, 50 – brushing aside gesture 34–35, 37–50 – coverbal gesture 18 – discursive gesture 23, 97 – gestural deictics 18 – gestural functions 45, 93–95, 97, 101–103 – gestural structure 22 – gesture families 34, 36, 46 – gesture studies 34 – gesture types 93, 100, 103, 107, 111 – gesture families 46 – palm up 35–36, 41 – recurrent gesture 34, 36–37 – referential gesture 94 greetings 73 hearer 3, 56, 58, 62, 65, 67–70, 139–140, 149, 157, 224 identity 114–124, 126, 129–132, 142, 153, 155–156, 159–161, 179, 181–184,

188–189, 191, 193–197, 223, 239, 246–247 – acts of identity 114, 147–149 – individual identity 195, 223 illocution 7 interaction 4–5, 7, 9, 19–20, 27, 29, 34, 47, 74, 93–95, 99–100, 114–117, 119–123, 126, 128–129, 131–132, 137, 139, 143–144, 147, 153–154, 163, 179, 183, 201, 205, 223–224, 230–231, 245–246 – interactional place 76, 79–81, 83–85 – interactional variation 55–57, 69 intercultural 34–36, 48–49, 73–74, 90, 219, 236, 242, 248 – intercultural communication 75 interlanguage 4 interlocutor 73, 80, 83, 88, 97, 105–106, 111, 120, 123, 141, 143–147, 149, 223, 246 Irish 235–239, 242–248 language – language acquisition 75, 93–94, 97–99, 181 – foreign language acquisition 70, 114 – language affiliation 115, 124–126, 130–131, 179, 183, 188, 194–195 – language border 200–212, 214–216 – language community 130, 195 – language contact 156, 200 – language development 93–94, 100, 102 – language expertise 179, 183, 189, 194, 197 – language inheritance 130, 179, 183 – language loss 180–181, 185, 194, 196 – language mixing 3–4, 12, 200–204, 209, 211, 215–217 – language strategy 221 – language use 4, 10, 55, 75, 114–115, 132, 137, 141, 145, 153, 159, 179–183, 188, 192, 197, 216, 222, 230, 235 – spoken language 34, 55, 137, 221, 236, 238, 240, 243 – translanguage 12 legitimacy 114, 118–119, 121–123, 132 levels of representation 3, 13, 30 lexical access 93, 98, 101, 104, 109, 111

Index

– lexical access problems 93–95, 98–99, 101–103, 105–111 lexical retrieval 98 linguistic practice 201 linguistic universal 9 Luxembourg 235–244, 246–248 Luxembourgish 237, 240, 245, 247 membership category 121, 123–124, 128–129, 131, 184 – membership categorization 119–120, 179, 182 metaphor 34–35, 37–42, 45, 96, 140, 202, 224 metonymy 34, 37, 39–40, 42, 45 motion event 55–56, 59, 61–64, 66, 68–70 multicultural 75, 179, 182–184, 196–197 multilectalism 4, 30 multilingual 4, 11–12, 14–16, 30, 75, 114–117, 119, 121, 123, 125–126, 129–132, 137, 140–141, 143, 147–148, 150, 163, 166, 179–184, 196–197, 201, 237–238, 242, 246 – multilingual grammar 3, 12, 15 – multilingual identity 123 – multilingualism 3–4, 11, 16, 30, 114, 137, 156, 180–181, 184, 192, 201, 221–222, 235, 246–248 – dynamic model of multilingualism 179 multimodal 19, 28, 94, 114, 116, 120–121, 123–124, 127, 131 – multimodal communication 93 – multimodal grammar 3–4 – multimodal identity 183, 195–196 – multimodality 4, 19, 30, 55, 114, 116, 122–124, 126, 132, 137, 179, 183, 196, 224 native speaker 100, 115, 118–120, 122–123, 129–130, 244 nonverbal 5, 11, 17–19, 22, 27, 30, 55, 58, 64, 70, 73, 90, 117, 124, 129, 137, 139 openings 221 operators 3–4, 6–7, 13–14, 19, 21, 27–28 parliamentary debate 162–166, 169, 173, 176 particle 9, 139, 145

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perception 121, 123, 155, 188, 195, 241 performance 3–4, 12, 58, 64, 67, 139, 142, 180 – performative 36, 45, 97 person reference 153, 155 personal pronouns 153–154, 159 perspective 10, 12, 20, 25, 30, 43, 46, 55–56, 59, 61–62, 66, 70, 94, 117, 144–145, 153, 162, 174, 195, 200–204, 209, 217, 235, 248 physical contact 73–76, 79–80, 83–85, 87–88, 90–91 pidgin 4, 15 pointing 23, 55, 58, 93, 103, 105–109, 111 politeness 14, 18, 28, 74, 154 Portuguese 149, 156, 179, 185, 188, 192–193, 196 – Brazilian Portuguese 149 positioning 62, 69, 114, 117, 119, 122–123, 126, 128–129, 131, 188, 190–191, 194 poststructuralist 180, 182, 195 pragmatics 3, 5, 15, 34, 97, 124, 130, 156, 162, 221 – pragmatic functions 10, 34–36, 40, 45 primitive 3–4, 6, 12–16, 19, 27–30 proficiency 93–94, 99–100, 102, 107–108, 111, 247 prosody 4, 26, 30, 97, 106 proxemics 34, 55, 73–75, 90 quantity indication 8 recurrent 19, 34–38, 45–47, 50 register 57, 128–129 repertoire 12, 27, 34–36, 40, 45–47, 49–50, 236 retrieval 93, 98–99, 104, 106–107, 111 scheme 34–35, 37–41, 43–46, 49–50, 205 Second Language Acquisition 75, 93 – second language affiliation 124 – second language learning 235–237, 239, 242, 247–248 semantic core 36, 39–40, 46 semi-structured interview 121, 184 social identity 115, 120, 182–183, 188–189, 191, 193–195, 197

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Index

social interaction 120 Spanish 11, 16, 34–35, 38, 46–50, 73–76, 79–80, 84, 88, 90, 93, 100, 117, 119–121, 123–127, 130, 142–145, 148, 156–157, 159–160, 162–166, 169, 171–176, 179, 185, 220, 225, 228, 231 speaker 3–4, 7, 11–12, 15–16, 24–25, 28, 40–43, 56–58, 62, 65–70, 73, 94, 97, 100, 104, 106–107, 111, 114–115, 119–120, 122–123, 125, 128–131, 139–140, 142–146, 149, 153–155, 157–160, 169, 175, 179–182, 185, 188–189, 196, 211, 219, 221, 224–225, 232, 236, 244, 246–247 speech 3–5, 8, 10, 12, 19–21, 25, 27–29, 36, 42, 44–45, 47–48, 50, 74, 93–104, 106–111, 114, 117, 119, 121, 125–126, 128, 131, 137–139, 142–145, 148–149, 155–156, 164, 180, 183–184, 188, 191–192, 202–203, 217, 219, 222–232 stance 44, 46, 119, 139, 149, 162–163, 174, 191, 195 – affective stance 179–180, 188 – epistemic stance 179 strategy 55, 158, 221–224, 230–232

stress 8, 13 syntactic 9, 58, 60, 138, 140, 144–145, 149, 166–167, 205–206, 212–213, 215–216 template 4, 6, 13, 19, 27–28 tone pattern 8 topic 10, 91, 94, 137, 150, 159, 161, 164, 174, 223, 227, 241 transnational 115, 130, 179, 235–236, 242, 245, 247 transnationalism 181, 235 trilingualism 237–238, 247 typology 9, 73, 95, 97, 101–102, 107, 219–220 variation 3, 12, 20, 46, 55–56, 59, 62, 69, 74, 99, 196, 201 verbal 4–5, 11, 17–22, 24–27, 30, 40, 42–43, 45, 48–49, 55–56, 58, 62, 64–65, 67, 69–70, 73–75, 84, 114, 116–117, 120, 126, 131, 137, 139, 149, 154, 157, 217