Bilmes Two Kinds of Conversational Meaning

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Discourse Processes
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Why that now? two kinds of

conversational meaning
Jack Bilmes
Department of Anthropology, University of

Hawaii, Porteus Hall 346, 2424 Maile Way,
Honolulu, HI, 96822
Available online: 11 Nov 2009
To cite this article: Jack Bilmes (1985): Why that now? two kinds of
conversational meaning , Discourse Processes, 8:3, 319-355
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DISCOURSE PROCESSES 8, 31^-355 (1985)
Why That Now?" Two Kinds

of Conversational Meaning*
JACK BILMES
Downloaded by [Institutional Subscription Access] at 14:56 04 September 2011
Department of Anthropology
University of Hawaii
In conversational analysis, the meaning of an utterance-in-conversation is the hearing

given to the utterance by the participants, as displayed in their responses. This orientation to participants is very clear in conversational analytic studies and quite consistent
with an interactional approach. What is perhaps less clear is that there is another way,
within the framework of conversational analysis, of arriving at interpretations of
utterances. These latter interpretations are referred to here as "conversationally
grounded analyst's interpretations," and they may be quite distinct from participant
hearings. An exchange during a family therapy session is examined in detail to
illustrate the notion of an analyst's interpretation. Finally, the usefulness of such a
concept in the analysis of conversation is discussed.
Given the fact that you confront some data, and given the fact that the rest of
us confront the same data, how do you handle the data in any way that differs
from the way the rest of us handle data?
Theodore Anderson to Harvey Sacks in
Hill and Crittenden (1968, p. 43)
PARTICIPANTS' AND ANALYSTS' INTERPRETATIONS

If one were searching the literature for similarities or precedents to conversational analysis (CA), one might look to Erving Goffman's and Harold Garfinkel's sociologies of everyday life, focusing as they do on discursive, interactive events; to structural linguistics; to the studies of nonverbal behavior carried out by Ray Birdwhistell and others; to Pittenger, Hockett, and Danehy's
(1960) detailed study of a small piece of verbal interaction; and even to J. L.
Austin's work on illocutionary acts (Turner, 1970). In other words, Harvey
*I would like to thank the following persons for their aid and comments on an earlier draft of this
paper: Stephen Boggs, Charles Goodwin, Alan Howard, Patricia Lee, Anatole Lyovin, and Michael
Moerman. Most especially, I would like to thank Emanuel Schegloff. This paper, in its present form,
is a direct outcome of my conversations with him, although the opinions expressed herein are my
own.
Correspondence and requests for reprints should be sent to Jack Bilmes at the Department of
Anthropology, University of Hawaii, Porteus Hall 346, 2424 Maile Way, Honolulu, HI 96822.
319
320
BILMES
Sacks and Emanuel Schegloff did not develop CA in an intellectual vacuum. But
they did something that had not been done beforethey examined conversation
as a technical object from an interactional point of view. When I refer to "conversation as a technical object," I mean to point out that their interest was in
conversational mechanics as such. They did not generate data with interviews,
questionnaires, or experiments. They worked with transcripts of actual conversations in "natural" settings. Sacks's work in particular ranged widely into various
sociological and discursive aspects of conversation. However, the central concerns of CA have been with the formulation and sequential organization of
utterances-in-conversation.
Sacks, Schegloff, and their associates discovered that verbal interaction is
very finely structured, that participants in a conversation are sensitive to numerous and often minute occurrences which may go unnoticed by the participants
themselves as matters for explicit comment. Conversation is, in Garfinkel's
phrase, an "artful accomplishment." One distinctive aspect of CAthe one that
will primarily occupy our attention hereis the way in which it locates the
meanings of utterances.1 Although there are no authoritative texts on this matter,
the conversational analytic approach to meaning can be extracted from the studies done in this tradition. This approach is consistent with the emphases on
interaction and empirical evidence.
In CA, the meaning of interactive events is not located through the use of
some predetermined, exhaustive coding system, as it is in, say, Bales' Interaction Analysis. An event is what it is by virtue of the way it fits into the interaction. Discovering the meaning of an event is part of, not preliminary to, the
analysis. Nor is meaning, for the conversational analyst, a logical or esthetic
abstractionit is the "local" meaning of an utterance in a conversational context. The conversational analyst does not discover the analytically interesting
features of his data in terms of some a priori formal theory. It is of no intrinsic
interest to the analyst that an utterance is grammatical or ungrammatical, logical
or illogical. There is some superficial similarity between the insistence in ethnographic semantics on native categories and the conversational analyst's practice of discovering meaning within natural settings. But the ethnosemanticist has
typically relied on what natives told about categories and on elicited usages, and
the product has typically been an abstract and uncontexted semantic analysis of
lexemic sets. In CA, meaning is discovered in the way utterances are used. The
analyst is interested only in features as they are displayed in interaction rather
than as they are explained by members. And the discovery of meaning is not an
1
I do not wish to make this an occasion for a lengthy excursion into the meaning of "meaning."
My intent in this paper is analytical, not theoretical or definitional. Let it then suffice to define the
meaning of an expression roughly as its place in a social-semiotic system, the pointings and paraphrases which may be substituted for it.
TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING
321
end in itself, but a means to understanding the workings of conversation as a

system of interaction.
The conversational analyst is not concerned with what speakers "really
mean." The analyst's object is not the "actual" intention or motivation of the
speaker. For the analyst, given his or her interactional interests, the meaning of
an utterance is the hearing given it by participants, including the speaker. It is
this meaning-as-participant-hearing that is consequential in conversational interaction, since each participant must act on his or her own interpretation of what
has been said.
In fact, participant reaction is a crucial index of meaning. To say that an
utterance is heard by participants in some particular way is not necessarily to
claim that they are conscious of such a hearing or that they could, if called upon
to do so, give a definitive description of their hearing. The participant's hearing
is to be found in his or her reactions. This does not, however, make meaning
merely a characterization of participants' reactions. Although the meaning of an
utterance as, say, an invitation is located on each occasion by the particular
response it elicits, an invitation may elicit many different responses. Not only do
acceptances and refusals point to invitations; so also do any other responses that
indicate the relevance of acceptance/refusal. So, by using the device "invitation," we get from the actual response on a particular occasion to an infinitely
large, but not all-inclusive, set of possible alternative responses. (Of course,
virtually any behavior might follow an invitation, but only certain behaviors will
be recognizably responsive to the invitation.)
It is, however, an oversimplification to claim that participant hearings of an
utterance can be analytically located solely by the responses to that utterance.
(The oversimplification, I should add, is in my own previous discussion, not in
CA, see Schegloff & Sacks, 1974.) In practice, the prior utterance defines its
responses even as it is defined by them. If we recognize that a participant hears
utterance X as a question, by virtue of the fact that the response is Y, an answer,
we similarly recognize that Y is an answer by virtue of our identification of X as a
question. We cannot, for example, decide whether "It's six o'clock" is an
answer unless we know the nature of the preceding utterance(s). We seem to
have reached an impasse. We need to know whether Y is an answer in order to
know whether its speaker heard X as a question, and we need to know whether X
was heard as a question in order to know whether Y is an answer. This is where
the analyst's mastery of natural language comes in. This competence is a resource, but rarely a topic for the conversational analyst, whose attention is
focussed on conversational interaction. Using his or her mastery of natural language, the analyst sees what is there for any member to see. The analyst may see,
for example, that utterance X could be taken as a question and that, if it were, Y
would constitute an answer to that question. On this basis, (s)he can reach the
conclusion that X was, in fact heard as a question. Thus, meaning is located in
322
BILMES
interaction by the analyst through the use of his or her linguistic competence. The
fact that an utterance, X, has a limited range of possible meaning also allows us
to recognize that a following Y is not responsive, although Y may still be sequentially meaningful as, say, a snub.
Let me be clear. When an utterance is spoken it may have, for participants, a
clear and specific meaning. Participants, after all, must base their responses to
the utterance on their understanding of it. For the conversational analyst, however, an utterance has a horizon of possible meanings. The analyst does not, as a
participant would, decide what the utterance means. Rather, he or she waits to
see what it comes to mean in the conversation. It is not that the utterance does not
mean anything until it is responded to; but its specific meaning for the participants in a particular conversation is located by the analyst's observation of their
responses.
Given that the meaning of any utterance may be ambiguous and thus subject
to controversy, the reply to that utterance constitutes a claim as to what the
utterance meant. That is, the reply indicates what kind of hearing the interlocutor
gave to the utterance. As Gumperz (1982, p. 154) writes: "One indirectly or
implicitly indicates how an utterance is to be interpreted and illustrates how one
has interpreted another's utterance through verbal and nonverbal responses." B's
acceptance, for example, is a claim that A has issued an invitation. Moreover, a
speaker may make a claim as to the meaning of his or her own previous or
forthcoming utterance. Claims made by speaker or interlocutor can be explicit or
implicit. In the following example, claims are made explicitly (such claims or
parts thereof are bracketed by arrows):
FTC
6 A:
* The central question is, < can we make the case, assuming the witnesses pan out as we want them to, can we
make a case without getting documentary evidence. . . .
34 R:
. . . > you keep saying we need more < and I'm not
certain what more is. You, you're saying more is *
35 A:
I, I didn't say that, I you

know I raised it as a question. <
In this fragment, claims are made as to whether or not # 6 is to be heard as a

question, and they are made explicitly. (I will have to ask the reader to take my
word that # 6 is the only utterance that could plausibly be referred to by #34 and
#35. The full text of the conversation, and a discussion of this particular point, is
available in Bilmes, 1981.) The "force" of # 6 is the topic of the bracketed talk.
This is, of course, not the only aspect of meaning that can be dealt with through
claims. One can, for instance, do a paraphrase to make a claim regarding the
proper understanding of the content rather than the force of a previous utterance.
Most claims are implicit. Schegloff (1978) provides us with a particularly
interesting and subtle analysis of the following fragment:

IB:
2
3
4
5
A:
B:
A:
B:
323
He says, governments, an' you know he keeps- he feels about

governments, they sh- the thing that they sh'd do is what's right or
wrong.
For whom
Well he sayshe
^By what standax
That's what that's exactly what I mean.
In # 3 of this fragment, B (in effect) claims that # 2 was a request for information. He does this by offering, or beginning to offer, the information supposedly
requested. In # 4 , A (in effect) rejects B's hearing of # 2 . That is, he claims that
# 2 was not a request for information, but rather something else. He does this by
interrupting # 3 as soon as it has become clear that B has heard # 2 as a request
for information, and producing another utterance formally similar to # 2 , thereby
inviting a rehearing. B's response in # 5 , acknowledging a community of opinion
with A, indicates that he has achieved such a rehearing. The foregoing does not
capture the detail or subtlety of Schegloff's analysis but it is sufficient to indicate, in a general way, how participant hearings are located in conversational
interaction.
It may seem that, if we are to accept a view of meaning as a local, interactive
phenomenon, we are virtually forced to identify meaning with participant hearings. If the (specific) meaning of utterances is to be discovered in interaction,
and the interaction is based on how the participants interpret utterances, then it
would seem that participant hearings are the only (specific) meanings available to
be discovered. In the remainder of this paper, I will try to demonstrate the
existence of another kind of meaning, or, rather, another way of locating meaning, grounded in conversation and discoverable in ways that are methodologically consistent with CA as I have described it above. That is, we may find
interpretations that are useful and defensible within the frame of reference of CA
but that are not, or at least cannot be shown to be, participant interpretations. I
will call this kind of interpretation a "conversationally grounded analyst's interpretation" or, for convenience, simply an "analyst's interpretation." Admittedly, insofar as participants do not " h e a r " the analyst's interpretation, it can
have no consequences for the development of the conversation. However, as we
shall see, it nevertheless has significance for our understanding of the conversational system. The initial point, though, is that the analyst's interpretation of an
utterance, although grounded in conversational interaction, is not based on evidence of how the participants, including the speaker, heard the utterance.
An utterance-in-a-conversation has a conversational history. That particular
utterance occurred at that particular moment not by accident. An utterance may
be partly the product of personality, perception of the other, individual goals,
and so forth, but it is also the product of conversational structures and processes.
There is nothing novel in these observations. Schegloff and Sacks write that " a
324
BILMES
pervasively relevant issue (for participants) about utterances in conversation is

'why that now' " (1974, p. 241). 2 This is a question for the analyst as well as for
participants, and the usefulness of the analyst's answer does not hinge on a
demonstration that it is not really his or her answer but that of some participant.
What I wish to show is that the pursuit of an answer to this question may lead us .
to analytically defensible interpretations, based on conversational interaction, of
what particular utterances mean, interpretations that are not necessarily identical
with participants' hearings.3 To put the matter another way, I am claiming (a)
that it is possible, operating within the conversational analytic approach, to
discover interpretations that are not demonstrably participant interpretations, and
(b) that such analyst's interpretations may be indispensable in answering the
question "Why that now?". My demonstration of these points in what follows
will be quite elaborate in comparison to .the cursory treatment that I have accorded the notion of participant hearing in the preceding pages. The reason for
this is not that an analyst's interpretations are more interesting or more important
or more difficult to locate than participant hearings, but rather that the concept of
the analyst's interpretation, under whatever terminology, does not seem to be
well developed in CA, and may in fact seem unacceptable to many conversa2
Labov and Fanshel (1977, p. 24) write of Sacks and Schegloff: "These authors have been
searching out structural principles that may appear at any given point in a body of conversation, but
they do not make themselves accountable to any given body of conversation, so that it is not possible
for a reader to say, 'But you have not explained why X said Y here.' " Although this is rather oddly
expressed, I take it that Labov and Fanshel are claiming that Sacks and Schegloff do not try to explain
"why X said Y here." But, in fact, in addition to recognizing that participants are concerned with
"Why that now?", Sacks and Schegloff clearly show an analyst's interest in the question, as in
Sacks' observations on story prefaces (1974) and puns (1972a) or Schegloff s work on preliminaries
(1980). Their concern, though, and I think that this is what lies behind Labov and Fanshel's criticism,
is focussed on conversational mechanics and relatively small structural units of conversation rather
than on how some particular utterance is a product of the entire conversation-to-this-point. This is
precisely the direction in which I propose to extend CA in this paper. (Of course, Sacks and Schegloff
are also not concerned, nor am I, with speculation concerning motive or intent, except insofar as it is
the participants themselves who produce the speculation. Such speculation is (a) based on a particular
psychological theory, although one which is so prevalent and commonsensicalwhich is not to say
truethat it is generally unnoticed as such, and (b) vaguely and uncertainly related to behavioral
evidencean ingenious analyst can always come up with a motivational explanation for any line of
conduct, and usually with one more such explanation in addition to those which have already been
proposed (see Bilmes, in press, for a more extensive critique of motivational analyses).
3
This is not to say that there are two ways of locating meaningone in which the analyst is
involved and one in which (s)he is not. Participant hearings, like "analysts' interpretations" are
discoverable only through the interpretive work of the analyst. The distinction is between two ways
of arriving at an interpretation of some particular utterance. We may look at the utterance and
participants' reactions to the utterancethis is the "participant hearing" approach. Or we may look
at the utterance as an outcome of the conversational history, without consideration of what, if any,
reactions it provokes among participantsthis is what I have called the conversationally grounded
analyst's interpretation.
325
tional analysts. The remainder of this paper, then, is an attempt to contribute to,
or at least to clarify, and not merely to describe, the analytic capabilities of CA.
An assumption of this discussion is that speakers do not have the "real" or
"true" meaning of their utterances hidden in some mysterious form in their
heads. A piece of talk means whatever it means by virtue of what it is and when,
in what social and sequential context, it occurs. The analyst's goal, in interpreting an utterance, is therefore to discover what the utterance means, not what the
speaker meant by the utterance. That is, the analyst is not compelled to find the
meaning that the speaker would sincerely accept as the meaning intended, nor
does (s)he assume that the speaker has privileged access to the meaning nor even
that the meaning exists in some other form than the talk itself.
I shall now attempt to demonstrate, through an extended example, that an
analyst may find in an utterance, on good conversational grounds, meanings
which (s)he has no strong reason to suppose are heard or oriented to by participants.
"I THINK THEY'RE KIDS": SOME PRELIMINARY
CONSIDERATIONS
Conversations have textures both for laymen and analysts. Some parts may be
ritualistic, some banal, some awkward. Some may be emotionally flat, others
highly charged. Depending on the hearer's purposes, some parts may seem
interesting or important, other parts uninteresting or unimportant. The meaning
of some utterances will seem obvious and transparent, while certain other utterances will be enigmatic. From the analyst's point of view, some utterances will
perform relatively simple interactional jobs, but others will be interactionally
"dense," complexly determined. It may be that the dense utterances tend also to
be the enigmatic ones. Such at least is the case in the example under analysis
here.
We will focus our attention on a short fragment of conversation: "but I: (.7)
uh: () I think they're kids." This fragment is part of a larger utterance, embedded in a brief (see Figure 1) exchange which is itself part of an extended
discussion (see Appendix).4
The exchange shown in Figure 1 is drawn from a family therapy session
involving seven persons, all apparently Americans. There is a male therapist and
a family consisting of a father, Norman, a mother, Carol, two male children,
Bruce and Brian, and two female children, Sonya and Lisa. In the Appendix the
reader will find a transcription of the first 14 minutes of the discussion. It is
4
The family therapy session analyzed in this paper is included in a film, A Context Analysis of
Family InterviewsPart I, Adult Positions, produced by Jacques D. Van Vlack and Ray Birdwhistell. Although the session is on film, it was not staged or edited.
326
BILMES
#120
Therapist ...what you-(") seem to be running across here is

.1 iV&
that you don't realize how much these two are alike".
(1)
#129
Carol:
Which two.
(.7)
#130
Therapist:
#131
Carol:
#132a Norman:
That ((referring to Bruce)) and Son(ya)
r Oh
Hm. (.5) They are.
They're (") very much alike.
(1) I (admit that).

(.7) hh She says t h ' t she can see an awful l o t - hh
uh: (.5) that she is improved 'nd she's much better
but I : (.7) uh: O r
#133
Carol:
think they're kids.

No Sonya since I've gotten
her has improved a l o : t .

FIG. 1.
"I think they're kids." 5
suggested that the reader become familiar with the material in the Appendix
before proceeding further.
Looking at #132b, perhaps the most obvious object for analysis is the reference of she, which occurs four times. Pronominal reference has been a major
topic in the literature on discourse analysis. I will merely note that in this case the
first two occurrences of she clearly refer to Carol, the second two to Sonya. More
interesting, for our present purposes, is the problem of how we identify the sense
5
Although I have shown the intonational contour, I do not intend to give it a great deal of
attention in my analysis. It appears to me that any analysis that might be done on the intonational
features of this exchange, although possibly productive of useful insight, would not contradict the
argument made in this paper. I have nevertheless illustrated the intonation so that readers may make
their own judgment. It will also be noticed that the transcriptions used in the text of the paper are
more detailed than that given in the Appendix.
327
of improved and much better. Out of context, these attributions are ambiguous.
They might, for example, characterize Sonya's health or her piano playing.
However, they don't, as anyone who reads the fragment in its conversational
context can easily see. To say that she has improved, in this context, is to say that
her behavior has changed in the direction of more closely approximating some
ideal that adults hold for children. More specifically, it implies that Sonya's
episodes of misbehavior are less frequent and/or less serious than formerly. We
know this because the major topic of the discussion is Bruce's misbehavior and
the immediate context for Norman's remarks is a comparison of Bruce and
Sonya. We have only begun to scratch the surface of this matter. The significance of "improve" is the key to interpreting #132b,c. In due course, we shall
have to return to this problem.
We come now to #132c"but I: (.7) uh: () I think they're kids." I will
begin with a brief discussion of the components of this utterance. The discussion
will cover only those matters which will serve as a basis for the contextual
analysis to follow. Certain other nonessential observations and speculations are
included in the footnotes.
We begin with the observation that the extent of the indirect quote in #132b,c
is not an issue for native speakers of English. That is, from #132b,c, we
understand that Carol said something like (a) Sonya is improved rather than
something like (b) Sonya is improved, but Norman thinks they're kids. There
appears, however, to be no grammatical reason for rejecting (b) as a proper
interpretation of #132b,c. More generally, the frame "A says thatX, but Y", is
ambiguous as to whether A said (something like) "X, but Y" or only " X " .
Junctural and intonational cues may resolve the ambiguity, but I do not think that
they are decisive in the present case. One could read #132b,c, without any
textual indicators of prosodie or paralinguistic features, one could be given
merely the words and still there would be little or no ambiguity about the extent
of the indirect quote. In the absence of a grammatical explanation for our refusal
(or inability) to hear #132c as part of the indirect quote, I suggest an interpretive
rule, what Sacks (1972b) calls a "hearer's maxim": For the form "A says that
X, but Y", when "K" consists of a proposition and an attribution of that proposition to someone other than A; if you can hear ' 'but Y' ' as not part of what A said,
hear it that way. What we will need to bear in mind is not the maxim as such, but
rather that the occurrence of but I in #132c is a clear indication that Norman is
no longer quoting Carol but is offering his own current opinion.6
6
This raises the broader problem of ambiguous closure. Sometimes we think that an event is over
when it isn't, or fail to recognize that it is over when it is. This occurs when markers of closure are
absent or ambiguous. A speaker may, for example, reach a point of "transition relevance" (Sacks,
Schegloff, & Jefferson, 1974) but resist attempts by other participants to actually achieve a transition.
That is, one participant may think that another has finished speaking when in fact he hasn't. (There
are, however, interactional practices that mitigate this problem [see Duncan, 1973]. See also Goodwin 11981, pp. 18-20] for a related discussion.)
328
BILMES
Norman having said "but I: (.7) uh: ()", Carol interrupts. I will defer
consideration of the nature and timing of this interruption in order to complete
the preliminary survey of the components of #132c.
The use of the word think in #132c presents an interesting problem for the
analyst. Gazdar (1979), writing in the tradition of linguistic pragmatics, points
out that, although it is the case that "I know thatX is true" entails "I believe (or
think) that X is true," the utterance of "I think that X is true" conversationally
(in Grice's [1975] sense) implies "I do not know (but merely think) that X is
true." From the conversational analystic point of view, think may indicate not so
much a lack of certainty as a recognition that the assertion to follow may be
challenged, that is, that it is arguable. Stress is also important here. "I think is
indeed an indication of uncertainty, whereas " / think" is used contrastively. In
the present case, the stress pattern suggests a contrastive interpretation.
From either the linguistic pragmatic or the conversational analytic point of
view, though, there is a surface anomaly in Norman's use of think. Norman does
not merely think that they are kids; he knows it, and the others know it, and each
knows that the others know it. There is, it seems, no reason to suppose that such
an assertion would be arguable. And yet I (as a native) have no sense that he has
spoken uncompetently in saying "I think." If "they're kids" is arguable, then it
must be something more than a simple assertion regarding how these creatures
are properly classified. But if think were there merely to inform us that "they're
kids" is not used as an assertion about proper reference, it would be redundant.
The ambiguous closure problem also arises for units within turns. While the onset of a unit, say, a
story or an indirect quote, may be very clearly marked (e.g. "Let me tell you a story. Once upon a
time . . . ", "She said that . . . " ) , the point when the unit ends is not always clear. It may not be
obvious at what point in the flow of speech a story has been concluded unless the speaker provides
unambiguous end-markers (e.g., "And they lived happily ever after." Perhaps children's stories
have clear end-markers because children are especially vulnerable to the closure problem). In the case
of an utterance such as, "Carol says that Sonya has improved, but she's still far from perfect," we
have an indirect quote with ambiguous closure. Does the quote end at improved or at perfect?
There are certain matters in English, such as time perspective, where the potential problem of
ambiguous closure does not in fact arise. Tense is marked each time the verb occurs. On the other
hand, there are languages, such as Thai, that use nonobligatory markers (in Thai these markers are
lexical) to express time perspective. This can lead to closure problems, such as the following:
a:thit thi: lae:w khaw hok lom cep kha: Khaw paj tham nga:n maj daj.
Last week he fell down and hurt his leg. He (can't) (couldn't) go to work.
The expression a:thit thi: lae:w ("last week") serves as a "past" marker, but the extension of this
time perspective is unclear.
If we had an obligatory grammatical inflection for verbs-in-stories, we would have no problem in
identifying where in the flow of speech the story had come to an end. Another possible solution to the
ambiguous closure problem is to have obligatory and unambiguous end markers. For example, it
might be obligatory to end all direct quotations with the words "end quote."
The discussion in this footnote owes a great deal to remarks made by Lloyd Anderson in a
conference on evidentials held at Berkeley in May, 1981.
329
At several points in the conversation, Norman says "they're children" rather

than "I think they're children," and it is perfectly well understood that he is not
offering information about their ages or how they may be classified. The use of
think in #131 has to do with the fact that Norman is doing a contrast"She says
X, but I think Y". "I think" locates the end of the indirect quote and differentiates his opinion from Carol's.
Norman's use of the plural, "they're kids," in #132c, instead of "she's a
kid," appears to be a constructional oddity. That is, #132c seems not to have
been properly matched to #132b. As we shall see in the contextual analysis, this
is a very misleading way to state the matter. For now, we merely take note of the
problem.7
Kids is the crucial word of # 132c. Like baby, kid may, according to context,
be used to refer to a person as a member of a family or as a member of an age
group. It belongs to two "categorization devices" (see Sacks, 1972b). It is used
in both of these ways in the therapy session. Moreover, within the "family"
usage, it may indicate either a genealogical or purely sociological relationship.
(Carol is Bruce's sociological, but not his genealogical, mother). For example,
in #101, kids is used in its genealogical sense. However, the primary sense of
kid (and child) throughout this conversation is as a member of the age device.
Child is contrasted in this device to adult, or, as in #182, older children. On the
other hand, age is not necessarily the only or even the primary matter of interest
when one uses child in this sense. The reason that such a category exists is that
persons of this loosely defined age group are assumed to have certain characteristics in common, although Norman and Carol and the therapist appear to
disagree on exactly what these characteristics are. 8
7
In this conversation, Norman never says merely that Bruce is a child, but repeatedly uses the
plural (#107, #119, #132, #134, #136, #182, #188). Pursuing this point for a moment, let us
look at #182. The preceding discussion has been about Bruce, in the singular. Norman abruptly
switches to the plural: . . . she thinks that- these are older children and they're not. They're an
eleven-year old boy and a and a- They don't understand what I'm saying. Why didn't he complete the
second sentence? I see this not as a lapse, but as an artful detail. He is managing simultaneously to
speak in the plural and maintain the singular topic focus on Bruce. The use of the plural may
underline that he is not talking about Bruce uniquely, but is presenting a theory of more general
scope. It is not that Carol has a particular blind spot regarding Bruce, but rather that her understanding of human nature is flawed. (The content of Norman's theory will be discussed below.) Whatever
meaning we may ascribe to Norman's use of the plural, the fact is that he uses it consistently.
8
The use of the category kid or child has additional conversational implications and possibilities.
Sacks (1972b) introduces the notion of "category-bound activities," by which he means to take note
of the fact that certain activities are seen by members as highly characteristic of or "bound to"
certain categories. The therapy session reveals some related phenomena. We find, for instance, the
category-bound violation: in #187-189, Carol complains that her ten-year-old son (Bruce) carries
matches constantly, and, perhaps more seriously, that he smokes. This can be cited as a violation
because it is a child that is doing it. We may say that if a person is carrying matches, or if he smokes,
and if doing so is taken to be a violation, then that person is a child. (Of course, there are special
330
BILMES
CAROL'S INTERRUPTION
We have completed the preliminaries and are ready to get on with the analysis. In
this section we will take up the matter of Carol's interruption. In #133, Carol
interrupts Norman to say "No Sonya since I've gotten her has improved a lot."
It is apparent that this is an interruption, not talk-in-turn.
Norman pauses in the middle of a syntactical construction. He gives no
intonational or other cue that he is relinquishing the floor (see Duncan, 1973).
The silence would have to become quite extended before a new speaker could be
counted as not interrupting. In addition, Norman fills part of his pause with uh:,
a clear signal that he is not finished speaking. It seems to me, though (and I
present this merely as a hypothesis), that certain parts of utterances are more
interruptable, that is, more likely to be interrupted, than others. An utterance is
more likely to be interrupted during a pause than during a steady flow of words,
and an "empty" pause is more likely as a point of interruption than a filled
pause. The occurrence of a pause in Norman's speech, even though it is a partly
filled pause, facilitates Carol's interruption; such at least is the hypothesis.9 But
this does not explain the interruptionwhy does it happen and why at this
pause?
We must begin from the fact that Norman has just formulated Carol's opinion
in #132b. (For discussions of formulation in conversation, see Bilmes, 1981;
Garfinkel & Sacks, 1970; Heritage & Watson, 1979. I am using "formulation"
in this paper in a somewhat broader sense than it has been used in these previous
studies.) Heritage and Watson (1979, p. 141) make the following statement:
An inspection of our data indicates not merely that formulations occasion
receptions and hence that they are oriented to in adjacent utterances, but also
that the character of their receptions is sharply constrained to confirmations
or disconfirmations or, more generally, decisions.
In this assertion they have surely gone too far. When I formulate my own
previous conversation with an utterance such as / mean . . . , my audience will
circumstances under which smoking may be a violation even when it is an adult who does it.) On the
other hand, stealing appears to be a category-mitigated violation: as Norman (#136) says, all boys
steal at some time or other. We can see the conversational implications of these facts by supposing
that, in response to A's mentioning some violation that C has committed, B exclaims "He's only a
kid!" If the violation were stealing, B's response might be heard as excusing or mitigating, but if C
had been carrying matches or smoking, such a response could be used to emphasize the unacceptability of C's conduct. Finally, control is a relation-bound activity. It is taken to be characteristic of
the relationship between parents and children that parents control their children and not vice-versa,
and the lack of such control may be (and, in this conversation, is) a matter for comment. And, of
course, some of the control techniques employed in the parent-child relationship may be more or less
specific to this relationship.
9
On filled pauses, see Sacks (1972c), Beattie (1977, 1980), Maclay and Osgood (1959), Ball
(1975), Lalljee and Cook (1969). See Sacks, Schegloff, and Jefferson (1974) for a general discussion
of gaps and pauses.
331
not ordinarily feel called upon to confirm or disconfirm my formulation. The

situation can be clarified in terms of Labov's (1972, p. 124) distinction between
A- and B-events.
Given any two-party conversation, there exists an understanding that there

are events that A knows about, but B does not; and events that B knows
about but A does not; and AB-events that are known to both. We can simply
state the rules of interpretation:
If A makes a statement about a B-event, it is heard as a request for
confirmation.
If A makes a statement about an A-event ("I'm sleepy"), it is not heard as
such a request
Extending this analysis, we might say that in formulating Carol's opinion, Norman (A) has made a statement about a B-event. This notation indicates that
although Norman may claim knowledge of the "event" (Carol's opinion), Carol's knowledge is more authoritative. When A formulates B's actions or opinions, confirmation or disconfirmation is made relevant, and silence on B's part is
heard as (tentative) confirmation. (The fact that Norman is addressing a third
person, and that Norman and Carol stand in a special relationship to one another,
complicates the situation, but this simple analysis will serve our present purposes.)
When A formulates (in B's hearing) B's actions or opinions, then, it is
expectable that B will comment on that formulation. That is, A has created a slot
for such a comment. If B does not do so, the absence of comment is noticeable,
and he is likely to be heard as accepting A's formulation. (So, for example, in
#4Iff, Carol seems, by not denying, to be acknowledging that she "screams and
hollers," and in #76ff we are left with the impression not only that Norman does
the things listed by Carol but that he has implicitly, by not objecting, acknowledged that he does them. If he denies them later, we will at least be somewhat
surprised, remembering that he did not object at the time when Carol originally
mentioned them.) Furthermore, although absence of a comment does not perhaps
become noticeable or "officially absent" until after completion of A's turn,
frequently the comment will be made interruptively, particularly if A's formulation is held to be false.10 But how does this explain Carol's interpretation and,
more specifically, its timing, since she seems to be agreeing with Norman?
Actually, Carol is simultaneously confirming Norman's formulation and dis-
l0
Sometimes the style and assertiveness of these interruptions (e.g., Now just hold on a minute . . . ) suggest a "right to interrupt." That is, the slot for a reply may be created and invocable
immediately upon the utterance of the (allegedly false) formulation. However, it may be that not only
a false attribution but any false statement may warrant an interruption. These matters deserve further
study.
332
BILMES
agreeing with him. To see the disagreement, we must note that the interruption
occurs after but I. The but could indicate that Norman is about to take exception
to Carol's opinion, but it could also be a continuation of his formulation of her
opinion. The /, however, makes it clear that Norman is about to take exception.
Carol is disagreeing with whatever it is that Norman is about to say. That
explains why her seemingly confirmatory utterance begins with No. (There is a
somewhat related use of prefatory No in #122.) She invokes the slot offered by
Norman's formulation to reaffirm a position that Norman is about to attack."
Having offered an interpretation of Carol's No, I want to digress briefly to
discuss the theoretical status ofthat interpretation. We have just had an encounter
with an analyst's interpretation. I do not know whether the therapist or Norman
or even Carol herself interpreted Carol's No in the way that I did, or, indeed,
whether they (again, including Carol herself) were even aware that she had
uttered it. And, of course, I do not claim to know what she "intended" by it.
The conversation provides no evidence that I can find on how the participants
heard Carol's utterance. My interpretation rests on (a) my understanding of the
conventional use of no in conversation, and (b) the sequential context of this
particular no in this particular conversation. But, if my interpretation does not
explain what Carol meant nor what the participants heard, then what does it
explain? It explains, to some limited extent, how Carol came to say no at this
particular point in the conversation. Furthermore, it tells us something of how
Carol heard Norman's previous utterance.
No is normally part or all of a rejection, refusal, or disagreement. But in # 133
it prefaces what appears to be a statement of agreement. This creates a structural
puzzle, a solution to which is provided in the hypothesis that Norman was heard
by Carol as citing her views as part of a disagreement with her and that his but I
projected a forthcoming statement ofthat disagreement. This analysis supplies us
with a participant hearing of Norman's but I (for Carol), but only an analyst's
11
It has been suggested to me that in #133 Carol is disagreeing with the therapist, contrasting
Sonya, who has improved, with Bruce, who hasn't. In #129, Carol uses a form that frequently turns
out to be a preliminary to a disagreement (see Pomerantz, 1975). After the therapist's response,
Norman takes the next turn. So, the argument goes, when Carol next speaks, in #133, she is
responding to the therapist rather than to Norman. This argument may have some merit, but it goes
too far. At most, we can say that Carol may be responding to the therapist as well as to Norman.
There are ways of relating current utterances to prior, nonadjacent utterances. When these means are
not used, the current utterance is normally heard as dealing with the last prior utterance, although it
may simultaneously deal with other earlier ones. That is, in the absence of special indicators,
positioning is criterial (Sacks, 1972d). If Carol's No disagrees with #128, then it more immediately
disagrees with #132a. #133 evidences a recognition that Norman is formulating her opinion in
disagreement with his own, and that his but I presages a reassertion of his conflicting view. So, in
disagreeing with #128 and #132a, her interruption is precisely placed to anticipate a reassertion, in
some form, of Norman's views. (See Jefferson, 1973 on precision timing of interruptions.) Of
course, "precise" is a relative term. I have accounted for the placement of Carol's interruption in
that pause, but not for its placement in a certain part of the pause.
333
interpretation of Carol's No. In a sense, the major point of this paper has already
been made. We have located a conversationally grounded analyst's interpretation
as distinct from what any of the participants can be said, on conversational
grounds, to have heard. However, the implications of the notion of an analyst's
interpretation separable from participant hearings cannot be fully appreciated
from such a rudimentary illustration. I will therefore continue with the analysis
of/ think they're kids.

"I THINK THEY'RE KIDS": WHY THAT NOW?
Our interpretation of # 132c must make it relevant to #132b in one of the ways
that is called for by the use of the conjunction but (see Lakoff, 1971, for a
discussion of what these ways are). There is, however, more than one interpretation that meets this requirement. The "local" meaning of this utterance is not
inherent in the utterance itself. The utterance, taken in isolation, is susceptible to
a variety of interpretations. One could imagine a context, for example, where the
husband, in making this utterance, is suggesting that the child, like all children,
is still in need of parental guidance. It would be tedious, and probably not very
useful, to try to assemble the various interpretations that this utterance might be
subject to in different contexts. My aim here is to discover a convincing interpretation of this utterance in this conversation.
If we expand our perspective slightly, to include #132a, we notice that
#132b,c is preceded by They're very much alike. I (admit that). From this
observation, we get a new slant on Norman's use of the plural in # 132c. It is not
odd at all, since he began his utterance in the plural. Instead, what needs
explanation is his use of the singular in #132b. With #132a in hand, and given
the format of #132b,c ("She says X, but I think Y"), we might expect her
alleged opinion to be or imply "They are different" and his to be or imply
"They are alike." Norman's view that they are kids certainly mentions a way
that they are alike, and Carol's view that Sonya has improved can be heard to
suggest that, in contrast, Bruce has not improved, thus mentioning a way in
which they are different. (Her stress on "Sonya" in #133 supports this interpretation.) Carol's opinion actually concerns Sonya and Bruce. This interpretation is, I think, correct, but it is incomplete. #132b and #132c are
related to each other in a more complex and subtle way. Norman is saying
something more than "She thinks they're different (in a certain way), but I think
they're similar (in another way)".
I will argue that the assertion that Sonya has improved contains a presupposition that Norman finds invalid. To see this, we must begin with an examination
of the notion of presupposition. Norman cannot attack the presupposition inherent in Carol's use of improved by simply denying that Sonya has improved. To
do this would be rather like denying that the present King of France is bald.
Although some philosophers would maintain that the assertion "The present
334
BILMES
King of France is bald" is false, it would be misleading to reply to such an assertion by

saying "The present King of France is not bald," or "It-is not true that the
present King of France is bald," for the denial contains the same presupposition
as the original assertion, namely that there is presently a King of France.
But how does this apply to Norman? It is certainly not a problem for him that
if he says "Sonya has not improved" he is reaffirming Sonya's existence. The
problem is that the predicate itself contains a presupposition. Bateson (1955)
speaks of a "proper ground" for a class; for example, the proper ground for the
class chairs would be the class of proper not-chairs. Table is a proper not-chair;
tomorrow is not, even though tomorrow is doubtlessly not a chair. The mention
of any object or any attribute or perhaps anything at all brings with it a ground of
proper alternatives. So,iflsay "It's a chair" and you reply "No, it's not," you
have not in effect said that it may be anything at all from a baseball game to the
5th century B.C. Similarly, when you reply to "The house is white" with "It is
not white," you have conceded not only that the house exists, but also that it can
be characterized if not as "white" then as some other color, some proper notwhite. This seems a small enough concession when we are talking about the
physical attributes of things. The (intracultural) presuppositions that we make in
this area are usually sound, at least to the extent that they raise no problems for
our audience. But to say that Sonya has improved is a rather different matter than
saying that the house is white. There is nothing in the physical motions of the
child that can be called "improvement." Rather, "improvement" is constituted
by the imposition of a normative judgment on the child's behavior. Without the
imposition of such a judgment, the improvement is not there to be seen. When
we say that Sonya's behavior has improved, then, we are creating the very fact
that we are describing. It is in this way that talk is constructive of cultural reality.
Although we may argue about whether the description is true, whether she has
"in fact" improved, it is the description itself which creates the conditions for a
discussion of her improvement as possibly factual. And for Norman to reply to
Carol by saying that Sonya has not improved is for him to accept the presupposition of a normative world in which it makes sense to say of children that they
have (or have not) improved. By directly rejecting the attribute, he would accept
its proper ground.
This, then, is the interpretation that I will try to support: Norman is denying
not merely the validity of Carol's assertion; he is rejecting the way of seeing the
world and the style of discourse upon which her assertion is based. He is
rejecting, for present conversational purposes, "improved" and its ground of
proper non-improveds. We can become ensnared in the presuppositions of an
utterance ("When did you stop beating your wife?"). We escape by in effect
ignoring what it explicitly proposes and commenting instead on the presupposition, by denying (in a way) that the utterance is sensible. This is what Norman
does. He does not directly reject the factuality of Carol's categorization of Sonya
as "improved," but rather denies the possible applicability of such a categoriza-
335
tion to any case of this sort. "Improved," he is claiming, is simply not a way to
describe a child's behavior.12
Just as we need #132b to interpret #132c, so #132c clarifies for us Norman's understanding of #132b. That is, by presenting they're kids as an exception to Carol's assertion about Sonya, Norman tells us what he understands the
presuppositions of that assertion to be. The two parts of the utterance are mutually elaborating. This phenomenon is closely related to Garfinkel's (1967, pp.
77-79) "documentary method of interpretation" (see also Bilmes, 1976). The
meaning of/ think they're kids is evidence of a certain understanding of Carol's
views, but that understanding is itself a precondition for / think they're kids
12
There is another argument for the notion that Norman, in #132b,c, is denying a presupposition.
I find the argument interesting enough to be worth presenting, but too problematic to include in the
text, so I have relegated it to this footnote.
#132b and #132c are ordered, and this order is not arbitrary. It would be queer at best for
Norman to have said "I think they're kids, but she thinks that Sonya has improved." The rule here is
clearly not that what I think must always come last. There is nothing wrong with "I think it's going to
rain, but she thinks it's going to snow." Consider, however, the following:
(1) John thinks that Aztec cannibalism was ritualistic, but I don't think the Aztecs
practiced cannibalism (at all).
(2)*I don't think the Aztecs practiced cannibalism (at all), but John thinks that Aztec
cannibalism was ritualistic.
The problem with (2) is not that the negative proposition precedes the positive. We can say "He
thinks it won't rain, but I think it will." Rather, the applicable rule seems to be that when a sentence
is to contain two propositions, and when one of the propositions contains a presupposition that is
denied by the other, the proposition that makes the presupposition must precede the one that denies it.
If this rule is valid, the fact that Norman's utterance is nonreversible can be taken as evidence that he
is indeed denying a presupposition inherent in the proposition attributed to Carol. (It is worth noticing
that although there might appear to be an equivalent, or even preferable, phrasing for (1) viz., "John
thinks that the Aztecs practiced ritual cannibalism but I don't think that the Aztecs practiced ritual
cannibalism (at all)"this alternative is not really equivalent in meaning. Unlike (1), it does not
suggest that John considers only the form, not the existence, of Aztec cannibalism to be an issue, it
does not suggest that he takes for granted that the Aztecs were cannibals.)
I have said that there are problems with this argument. I will mention only one. Would it really be
so odd to say "I think they're kids, but she says that Sonya has improved"? Might not # 132b,c seem
just as odd if we had not seen in the transcript that Norman actually said it, if, that is, it were
presented as a purely hypothetical utterance? And notice that if we put the reversed version of
#132b,c back in its context of #132a, it seems less odd. I think they're kids seems to follow quite
naturally and directly from They're very much alike.
The use of invented constructions is frowned on in conversational analysis for at least two very
good reasons. The first is that, while actual expressions-in-a-conversation appear in a sequential
context and are interpreted accordingly, invented expressions are not. (Or rather, they do appear in a
sequential context, as invented expressions, and are interpreted accordingly.) The second is that there
are utterances that are grammatical and intelligible which might, nevertheless never appear in an
actual conversation, and others that are ungrammatical and even unintelligible in "isolation" which
do occur and are interpretable in conversation. Although I think that there are good arguments for a
limited, disciplined, and prudent use of invented constructions, the example above nicely illustrates
the need for a cautious approach.
336
BILMES
having that particular meaning. The reasoning involved is admittedly circular,

but this is the essential nature of interpretive reasoningthe key notion is not
entailment, it is coherence.
Now, what I want to do is to ground this interpretation in the conversational
context. There is no evidence that any of the participants necessarily interpreted
# 132b,c as I have, nor does the structure and content of the utterance itself force
this interpretation upon us. We are in pursuit of a conversationally grounded
analyst's interpretation. We can follow through the conversation the development of the meaning of children and kids in Norman's discourse. In #96, he says
that he does not think that any child could be perfectly obedient. This is not
spontaneous but in reply to a hypothesis that the therapist is developing. A point
that I wish to stress is that his statement in # 132b,c does not merely have roots in
what he has said earlierit has interactional roots. The developing point of view
emerges further in #107 when he says that's children, implicitly evoking the
maxim that "children will be children." That's children, as we might suspect
from the fact that it is grammatically anomalous, is itself an idiom, glossable as
"that is the kind of behavior that one might expect from children."
There is another way in which #107 is important in the history of #132b,c. In
the preceding talk the therapist has been developing a hypothesis that reaches its
culmination in #101. Although one familiar with this therapeutic approach can
see what the therapist is doing, it seems to be done ineptly. Efforts to develop the
hypothesis (starting from #71) are marked by digressions and failures (or refusals) of uptake. The notion that they do not really want Bruce to obey because
they do not behave like Nazis is silly and gets no uptake aside from a possible
predisagreement from Carol (#86). Final development of the hypothesis in #101
is so filled with qualifiers and mitigators that one gets the impression that even
the therapist finds it hard to believe. And the responses to it, including #107,
seem to miss the point, yet another failure of uptake. And yet, in a very profound
way, there is uptake. In #97, #99, and #101, the therapist raises the question of
how Brace's behavior may affect their marriage. In # 107, Norman picks this up,
mentioning interactions with Carol centering on the children, what he said to
Carol and what she said to him, and for the next few utterances Norman and
Carol continue in this vein. The contrastive format of # 132b,c (She says . . . but
. . . I think . . . ) has its roots in the earlier conversational interaction.
It may be worthwhile to look more closely at #107 and what precedes it. (see
Figure 2.)
I have already suggested an explanation for the sudden introduction of the
she'll say . . . I'll say format and commented on its formal resemblance to
#132. And, as in #132, it is not immediately clear how Norman's statement in
#107 about Carol and himself relates to what came before. After analyzing
#132, it occurred to me that #107 made sense under a similar interpretation.
Norman is rejecting the presupposition underlying "better behaved" and "worst
behaved," and rejecting as well Carol's assertion that everybody has those
problems, in the same way that he rejected the presuppositions of improved in
337
#101 Therapist: ...For example there's asumpm very funny
that would come up-(.8) an1 that 1s: that you

would suddenly discover: that (*) there was
more problem about whose kids were being better

behaved- (1) than whose.
#102 Carol:
(Everybody has those) problems t H l - ( l ) l e t ' s
-facTt, t7=
#103 Norman:
#104
Carol:
L
You don1 have 'em no:w
#105 Therapist:
because yours 1s the worst uh behaved

#106 Carol:
#107
Norman:
in:
-r
r(
Mo: a lot a times I say this C ) I say this

'No: a
to her er: different times she'll say sumpm

t' me an' I'll say w'll that's children.
FIG. 2.
"Well that's children."
#132. (Notice the use of prefatory No in #107.) In #132, he is repeating, in

large part, what he has already done in #107. In the case of #107, we see that
subsequent interaction may help us to answer the question "Why that now?" by
suggesting possible interpretations of earlier utterances.13
13
The question of how far we can go in using #132 as evidence in the interpretation of #107, or,
more generally, using any subsequent utterance in the interpretation of any prior, raises some difficult
problems. #132 is evidence at least in the sense that it demonstrates that a particular mode of
expression is in Norman's repertoire, that he can talk in that way and therefore that he might have
been talking in that way in #107. Beyond this, it seems wisest at present to take a conservative
position holding that evidence for the analyst's interpretation of # 107 must be found in the utterance
itself and in its conversational history. (Note the contrast with participant hearings, which are found
in the interaction subsequent to the utterance.)
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BILMES
Continuing with the development of Norman's notion of children: In #119,

he says they're children and then does a gloss (starting with / mean) suggesting
that children do not necessarily respond as desired to "continuous correction."
(With this in hand, we may trace the beginnings of his viewpoint back to #70,
where he wonders if they may be picking on Bruce too much.) Now we have a
basis for interpreting #132b,c. She is improved is a sample of discourse from
Carol's view of the world, according to which children are subject to normative
judgments and responsive to corrective reinforcement. / think they're kids asserts
a different view of the world, according to which children obey the puerile
imperatives of their own natures and are imperfectly socialized creatures not yet
subject to normative judgment. We have here a confrontation of two culturally
plausible theories of child behaviorCarol's "reinforcement" theory versus
Norman's "innatist" theory.
We have so far been able to offer an answer, however sketchy, to the question
"Why that?" We have found a conversational history for the format and concepts of #132b,c. (The fact that we can find such a history for a particular
interpretation is an argument for the superiority of that interpretation over competing ones.) We have yet to deal with the question "Why now?" Looking at the
most immediate context for #132, we note that it is said in reply to #128/130,
more specifically to you don't realize how much these two [Bruce andSonya] are
alike. This assertion is more or less equivalent to "you don't realize that Bruce
and Sonya are very much alike." A linguistic pragmatic analysis would find that
this sentence consists of an assertion ("you don't realize X") and a presupposition ("Bruce and Sonya are very much alike"). (See Kiparsky & Kiparsky,
1970.) This makes for a problem of sorts: Norman, by agreeing with the presupposition is, in effect, denying the assertion. By saying that Bruce and Sonya are
very much alike (and saying it not in the manner of "You're rightI hadn't
noticed that before"), he is also saying that he does realize that they are alike.
Are we to hear him as agreeing or disagreeing with the therapist? From a purely
linguistic standpoint (or an extension thereof), I think we would have to argue
that he was disagreeing. A presupposition, by virtue of being presupposed, does
not call for a response. Therefore, if we can hear Norman as responding to the
assertion, we should hear him that way. But, as a native, that is not the way I
hear it. It seems to me that Norman is agreeing with the therapist. When one
speaks in the format "You don't realize X", X may be technically presupposed,
but it is presented as news, not as something that we already know in common.
The question of whether Norman is agreeing or disagreeing is to be answered not
solely through an examination of the content of his response, but by noticing how
he responds. He might have said, for example, "Well, actually, I do realize that
they are alike." Although this would convey the same information as #132a, it
would be heard as a disagreement. The fact that he is doing an agreement is of
interactive importit is part of a move by which he aligns himself and the
therapist against Carol.
339
At any rate, #132b,c appears where it does as part of a response to the

therapist's comment. That is, it fits into that context. But why is it there at all,
and why in that form? In #122/124, Carol makes an attribution about Norman.
(There is good reason to hear it as an attack on Norman, but it is not necessary to
make that argument here.) During the course of her utterance, Norman tries,
unsuccessfully, to contradict her (#125). On his second try (#126), he succeeds
momentarily but is interrupted, first by her and then by the therapist, who
changes the subject. Norman's projected correction of Carol thus remains a piece
of unfinished business. He was presumably going to point out that, far from
wanting her to discipline Lisa the way she disciplines Sonya, he believes that
discipline is useless since they're children and they will behave like children,
regardless of discipline. When the therapist changes the subject, Norman has
seemingly lost his chance to reply to Carol. In #132b,c, he very artfully turns his
response to the therapist into a simultaneous reply to Carol's attribution. Whereas she believes in "improvement," he thinks that they're kids. Whereas she
finds the age difference between Sonya and Lisa to be crucial, to him the
overriding fact is that they (and Bruce as well) are kids. The observation that
there is unfinished interactional business helps us to select among competing
interpretations of #132b,c. It also helps us to understand why #132b,c appears
"now." Norman's reply to Carol comes, as it turns out, at the first possible
moment, that is, as soon as he can find a space in which to talk. He delays it only
long enough to establish its relevance to the immediate work of responding to the
therapist.
THE INTERPRETATION OF UTTERANCES

IN CONVERSATION
1 A:
2 B:
3 A:
You professors sure have flexible work schedules.

Don't kid yourself. We put in long hours.
I wasn't criticizing you.
In this (invented) exchange, A achieves and displays a hearing of # 2 by

seeing how it might have been produced in reply to # 1 . That is, A sees that this
is the sort of thing that B might say if B had heard # 1 as a criticism. An
utterance-in-conversation is produced through some course of work, and a hearing by a participant of the utterance is based on a reconstruction of that course of
work, together with an assessment of the speaker's intentions and competence.
This process, it should be noted, is not equivalent to the encoding-decoding
processes of so-called "communication theory" or of Chomskian grammar. In
these models, an "encoder" or "speaker" starts withX, information or meaning, and through series of steps produces Y, a "message" or (a phonetic representation of) a "sentence." A "decoder" or "hearer," having received Y,
reverses the steps and arrives at X. In conversation, a speaker constructs his or
340
BILMES
her utterance by reference to the conversation-so-far. The resulting utterance,

however, is not entirely predictable from'a knowledge of the conversation-so-far.
And the audience uses both the utterance and a knowledge of the conversational
context in arriving at a hearing. (Of course, other contextual elements may also
be significant here.) As I have already discussed, the meaning of an utterance is
reflexive to its context. Moreover, it is negotiable.
In doing a hearing of an utterance-in-conversation, a participant (including the
speaker himself) may fail to see or to adequately analyze the conversational
evidence and so fail to recognize some of the ways in which the utterance is
designed to be intelligible within that conversation. From an empirical point of
view, the question is not what the audience "really" heard, but what it demonstrably heard, or what it can be taken for granted (on grounds of conventional
meaning) to have heard. In discussing #133,1 was able to say something about
Carol's interpretation of #132b,c. Beyond this, though, I cannot claim that the
participants' hearing of #132b,c was identical to mine. In fact, participants may
have only a vague sense (if even that) of an utterance's intelligibility, which they
cannot easily explicate. This vague sense, however, may be based on the same
sorts of considerations that produced my analysis. On the other hand, their
hearings might contradict mine. My interpretation is not based on their reactions
to #132b,c but on evidence provided in the prior course of talk.
To speak of "evidence" presupposes some form of analysis by virtue of
which certain phenomena constitute evidence. I will list four heuristic principles
that guided my analysis. These are, I believe, the same principles that guide
participants in their hearings, although they may use others in addition. The way
in which utterances are interpreted must surely be a major (although not the only)
factor in the way they are produced (i.e., in how they are designed), since they
are produced as things to be interpreted. Therefore, if an analyst's interpretation
of an utterance is to speak to the question of how the utterance came to be
produced, his or her interpretation must be arrived at through the same procedures used by the persons for whom the utterance was designed. If the analyst's interpretation turns out to be different from, or more detailed than, the
participants', this may be not because (s)he uses a different form of analysis but
because (s)he is more careful and orderly, more impartial, and works with a
permanent record. The assumption here is that some utterances are "overproduced," that is, they are produced in such a way as to be interpretable by
hearers' standard procedures, but they require a greater degree of subtlety or
detail in the application of those procedures than will actually occur. The empirical warrant for this assumption is that it allows us to account for features of
certain utterances that would otherwise remain mysterious. (Of course, doing
interpretations of utterances is only one part of a conversational analyst's work.
It should not be supposed that all analyst's procedures are identical to, or elaborations of, participants' procedures.)
341
Here, then, are four interpretational criteria:

1. Consistency criterion. Preference is to be accorded to an interpretation that
makes the utterance "actively" consistent with (i.e., supportive of) the speaker's previous propositions over interpretations which are merely neutral in this
regard, and neutral interpretations are to be preferred over inconsistent ones. (Of
course, we are limited to interpretations that are plausible from a semantic point
of view.)
2. Internal relevance criterion. When interpreting X, a part of an utterance,
preference is to be accorded to that interpretation which makes X relevant to
some or all of the rest of the utterance.
3. External relevance criterion. Preference is to be accorded to that interpretation which makes the utterance topically relevant to previous utterances in the
conversation. Furthermore, in the absence of special markers, relevance to recent
utterances is preferred over relevance to more distant ones.
4. Structural relevance criterion. Preference is to be accorded to that interpretation which makes the utterance structurally relevant to previous utterances in the conversation. This instructs us, for example, to hear a response to a
question as an answer if it can be so heard, since a question makes an answer
structurally relevant. Similarly, if A makes an accusation directed at B, and B's
reply can be heard as a defense or countercharge, then hear it that way. Again, as
with the external relevance criterion, there is a preference ordering in terms of
recency.
These four criteria do not autonomously create interpretations. Other kinds of
contextual knowledge, for example, knowledge of the relationships among participants, are brought into play. Furthermore, and this is putting the matter with
overmuch rigidity, the criteria are merely selectionalthey select from available
hearings within the parameters set by linguistic and other cultural resources. I say
that this statement is overly rigid because there is some degree of reflexivity
between the interpretational criteria and our cultural resources. We do not, in
computerlike fashion, list all possible interpretations and then select the best one.
The interpretational criteria are influential in the formulation as well as the
selection of interpretations.
In order to see how #132b,c came to be produced, and how it came to be
produced at that particular moment, we have to give it an interpretation. The
conversational history that we have uncovered is, in large part at least, a history
of this utterance under this interpretation. But the evidence for this interpretation
is precisely that such a history can be found for it. This circularity troubles me
not at all. The range of possible interpretations is limited by the linguistic
properties of the utterance and the way in which it is uttered. If, from among
these possible interpretations, one can be found to be historically grounded in the
conversation-so-far, then that is the preferred interpretation. If no solution, or
more than one equally compelling solution, is discovered, we must accept this
342
BILMES
philosophically. There is no law that says that every utterance must have one and
only one preferred interpretation.
I have tried to demonstrate the availability of what I have called "conversationally grounded analyst's interpretations." But to the extent that the analyst's
interpretation is not identical with participant hearings, why should the conversational analyst be interested in it? Conversational interaction proceeds on the basis
of what participants, not analysts, hear. The first response to this objection is that
the analyst's interpretation is part of the answer to the question "Why that
now?" If we want to determine how a participant came to produce a particular
utterance, we have to search out a conversationally grounded analyst's interpretation. It is not that first we find one and then we are able to find the other.
Rather, to discover how an utterance came to be produced is to find an analyst's
interpretation, and this is all very different (at least for the analyst) from discovering what the speaker "meant." The kind of meaning located by an analyst's interpretation is systemic. It arises within the setting and the system and is
not the result of imposing outsider categories on events. On the other hand,
neither is it to be sought in participants' interpretations. It is an attribute of the
system itself.
Moreover, even if we are interested exclusively in participant hearings, we
are led to analyst's interpretations as instrumental to that interest. Suppose, for
example, that A produces some utterance, X, to which B replies with another
utterance, Y. We look to K to determine the participant hearing of X. But there is
no evidence of how Y itself was heard by the participants. By determining the
analyst's interpretation of Y, we can arrive at some conclusion regarding how X
was heard. This is precisely the argument that I made earlier in connection with
#133. Carol's No, whether or not she or the others were aware of it, evidenced
her hearing of #132b,c as a disagreement. It is part of the competence of the
speaker to have made that particular utterance at the particular moment even if
she is not aware of what she has done.
Finally, the notion of analyst's interpretation can be part of an approach to the
analysis of extended stretches of conversation. This has been a problem for CA.
Conversational analysts have been able to deal with openings (Schegloff, 1968,
1979; Turner, 1972) and closings (Schegloff & Sacks, 1974) and relatively short
stretches of talk in between, but larger conversational structures have remained a
problem. This may be because the attempt to characterize overall structure has
usually been approached through the concept of topic. The analysis of topical
organization presents special difficulties partly because the boundaries between
topics are frequently unclear. We may begin talking about X and eventually find
ourselves talking about Y without at any point having accomplished a structurally
identifiable "change of topic".
My suggestion for dealing with the larger scale aspects of conversational
organization offers only a partial solution. It avoids the problem of topic al-
343
together. It does not lead directly to statements about the organization of conversation in general. Rather, it is a general approach for discovering aspects of the
particular organization of any particular conversation. The suggestion is to do the
sort of thing that I have been trying to do in this paperchoose an utterance-ina-conversation and ask seriously "Why that now?" Trace its origins back
through the conversation. This can be done in however much detail is desired for
the purpose at hand, for the roots ramify outward in all directions. This approach
will have immediate uses for the "applied" conversational analyst, who employs CA to pursue an interest in a particular set of interactive events. The
analyst would choose an utterance that (s)he considered especially significant in
terms of his or her interest (say, in psychotherapy or in decisionmaking) and
investigate how it happened to occur in that particular form at that particular
moment. I trust that ultimately the information gained from these applied analyses will advance our technical knowledge about the organization of conversation.
APPENDIX
Special Notation Conventions Used in Transcript
I have used the notation system outlined in Schenkein (1978; pp. xi-xvi). Some
important features of this system:
Brackets between lines, " [ " , are used to indicate the onset of overlapping
talk.
Equals signs, " = " , are used at the end of one utterance and the beginning of
the next, when the utterances do not overlap but neither is there a normal gap
between them. The same signs are used to link lines of a single speaker's
utterance when the lines have been separated on the transcript by an attempted
interruption, but the flow of speech is nevertheless continuous.
A number in parenthesis indicates a pause. The length of the pause in seconds
is expressed by the number.
A short pause (less than one second) is indicated by a hyphen followed by a
space. (This differs from the notation in Schenkein.)
A colon after a sound or syllable indicates extension of that sound.
Periods, commas, and question marks indicate the intonations typically associated with those punctuations.
Italics indicate stress.
Double parentheses, "(( ) ) " , are used to enclose the analyst's remarks.
When the transcriber thinks he has heard certain words but is not certain, he
places them in single parentheses.
Empty parentheses indicate a stretch of unintelligible talk. (The amount of
empty space gives an approximate notion of the amount of talk lost.)
344
BILMES
TRANSCRIPT OF FIRST 14 MINUTES

OF A FAMILY THERAPY SESSION
1 N:
2 T:
3 N:
4 T:
5 N:
6 T:
7
8
9
10
N:
T:
C:
N:
11 T:
12 N:
13 T:
14
15
16
17
18
N:
T:
N:
T:
N:
19 T:
20 N:
21
22
23
24
25
26
C:
N:
T:
N:
T:
N:
27 T:
28 N:
(Morning) I don't know (

) I'd better introduce (ourselves)
(
) forgetting it
Sure
Uh (2.0) name, I'm Norman,
Urn
This is Bruce,
Urn
This is Lisa, this is Sonya, this is Carol, and this is Brian
Hm. Now I don't know anybody's name.
((laughs))
Well I thought maybe you might (
) you want me to go
over =
[
]
(yes)
it again? =
No. (1) Uh, no, the main thing isn't so much the names as it is the
problem. I don't, see I've been deliberately not told what you
know the the problems you had so I wouldn't get somebody =
[
]
(uh huh)
else's ideas canned.
Yeah. Well, ah (1) we were ah having trouble with (1.5) Bruce,
Urn hm
and uh (1.5) uh (
) understanding and uh: listening to
anything,
Hm
and, uh (
) causing quite a lot of uh: aggravation I think
uh: =
[
Brian ((Calls to Brian))
with uh: Carol here,
Urn hm
and uh: one thing you better know, this is a second marriage,
Urn hm
(
) two children, Bruce and Sonya Sonya are from
uh (you're) from my first marriage. And uh Lisa's from Carol's, and Brian's from ours.
Urn hm
And uh quite a (fluctuation) here but
29 T:
345
Uh what the French call menage

((laughter))
The
household uh
30 T:
((to the girls)) (Now) we're going to have a little more under31 N
standing. Give me the (pamphlets) (3) Please, ok
(2)
32 T: Now now this gets a little bit ah on my nerves
33 N, Oh I understand that
[
34 C:
Yeah, well, they don't know how they can't
keep still very long.
35 N: They they can (
) not sit still very long =
36 C: = (
)
37 N: If you let them go we wouldn't uh: we wouldn't get nothing
(done).
38 S: hhh:: ((sighs))
(We wouldn't even be) able to understand the problem.
39 N
40 T: Uh, what what do you two differ on about how uh Bruce
(should) be handled.
(1.5)
41 N
Well uh I tell her not to scream and holler so much to to act
42 T: Um hm
43 N
and uh when he does something uh:
44 C: (
) just have some authority
45 T: Um hm
46 C: And I try it and it doesn't work (3) Brian ((calls to Brian))
(1)
47 T:
((to Bruce)) Did you know you were such a problem before you
got (caught at it)?
(3)
Whataya mean?
48 B
49 T
I mean had you ah decided that you were supposed to be the
problem in the family? (2) Or did it just happen.
50 B
Happened.
51 T
Um hm (4) Do you find your your new mother harder to obey
than your old mother?
(3)
52 B
Yeah.
53 T
Um hm (1) That's kinda natural, isn't it.
54 B
What?
55 T
That's kind of natural (2.5) And besides you expect to be not
obeyed as well, don't you.
56 C:
Yeah, I w eh, like I was saying before, I was out working
346
BILMES
57 T:
58 C:
59
T:
60 N:
61 C:
62 T:
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
and (
) and I guess I w:, all of a sudden I had four children,
so it was an adjustment for me too.
A big one.
And uh: they're all ((4 second blank on tape)) In the beginning I
had them on weekends, (you know), and oh everything was
great, heh heh You know, I figured it would be real easy, heh heh
But it just didn't turn out as easy as I thought. (2.5) And like
Norman says, I'm high strung.
Hm. (1) H how does uh Lisa strike you as as uh in comparison
with (blondie) ((Lisa is the blond one))
(1)
Oh, you mean Sonya and uh Lisa
I Sonya and Lisa, as far as temperaments

[
]
N:
they're
N: Oh as far as temperaments. She had a temper. (1) But uh and
she'll flare up and let hers go, but not very much I mean she's
usually quiet and uh uh much more timid.
T: Urn hm
N: Where Sonya, I mean uh, she don't I don't think Sonya has as
much of a temper.
C: Yes she does.
N: Well I've never seen her
[
C:
He's not around (
) =
N: One thing I do know uh she she'll talk you leg off and uh
other than that uh I don't see uh where Sonya's too much of a
problem I mean It's just the idea of (our) problem is he will
not obey anything. And uh I think now that we: this is
coming to a: a standstill and we might be picking too much I
mean every everything in our aggravation to try an' bring him
down a little bit off his uh (hobby horse).
T:
Wellwhat strikes me as odd is you know youyou obviously
are a pretty strong fellow and you're obviously a good bit bigger
than than this over here ((referring to B)) and uh uh if
uh you know if it were simply a matter of his obeying you
would uh just pulverize him.
C:
Oh he does =
N: = Oh I do every once in a while
[
C:
But it doesn't do any good
347
75 T:
But uh =
76 C: = I've seen him talk totry and talk to him (
) I had a nickel
for every time he'll say Bruce, now I'm not gonna yell at you,
I'm not gonna hit you, we'll sit down and I w I'm trying to
understand you. Let's have a talk.
Um hm
77 T
78 C
Well I'd like to have a nickel for every one of them. I'd like to
have another nickel for everytime he (
) him
79 T
heh Well you you
[
80 C
But he doesn't seem to get anywhere
[
81 T
You've seen pictures of
people w who have been in concentration camps maybe
you've even known some and uh you know what they look
like =
Yeah =
82 N
83 T: uh, you wanted to really fix him so he would obey you
know, it could be done.
84 N; Oh, I know it could be done
85 T: (
) What strikes me is that that the first problem I see in
the family is that uh you don't quite (want Bruce to obey). (1)
Cause y you could do it if you wanted to.
86 C: We could?
87 T: um hm, Yeah
88 C: Well one thing we had is I think we've conquered. Uh we had a
big problem with him stealing.
89 T: Um hm
90 C: I mean he stole: and I think that got on the wrong side of me.
Cause he well in the beginning when I first got him (
)
and then we went to my sister's house one time and he (stole a
silver dollar out of my little nephew's bank)
91 T: Um hm
92 C: and all these things sort of: I guess stuck with me, you know?
And uh he was stealing right and left from us. And I think just in
the last (
) it was only recently
93 T: Um hm
94 C: that we caught him stealing again. Couple of weeks ago. But I
think it's starting to (
) That's one problem I think
95 T:
But what would you think of of hm like this. This is just a theory
I'm testing out on you. Uh what would you think if Bruce were
348
BILMES
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
very obedient and: did everything exactly the way both of

you wanted
[
N:
Oh I don't think that any child can do that.
T:
Well just imagine. And suppose he could. I gr I agree. It would
be rare. But suppose he did that. Wouldn't it suddenly: put a
strain on the marriage.
(2)
C:
I don't see how it (would) strain on the marriage, no.
T:
It's funny but I think it would.
C:
I w I don't think I'll ever be faced with the situation heh I don't
think I'll have to worry.
[
T:
heh heh. But just in a in a funny kind of way,
it's possible that that uh you could get an approximation of that
that (if he got) much more obedient. (1.5). For example there's
something very funny that would come up and that is that you
would suddenly discover that there was more problem about
whose kids where being better behaved than whose. =
C: = (Everybody has those) problems till lets face it, till =
[
Ohl(
)
N:
C: = they're grown up (
)
[
T:
You don't have them now, because yours is the
worst behaved =
C: (
)
= [
N: No: a lot of times I say this, I say this to her er at different times
she'll say something to me and I'll say well that's children. =
C: = Yeah well I realize mine are gonna get bigger, and I told him
[
N
And she'll say something to me and I'll
mention it to him
C: = as soon as she's older and she pulls the same thing I'm gonna do
the same thing to her because I (tried to tell him) like I love
Brian he's a he's (
) I love him as much as I love
Lisa but if he ever does any you know, it's gonna be the
same difference
N: Yes, but uh: I
[
C:
And even now I'm starting to di I starting to
349
discipline her. The trouble is, the children were never disciplined by their mother their first mother. Like if Norman
would say something I heard this from Dr. Fichy
h- =
113 T:
114 C:
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
And like if she wo if he would discipline them, there would be

a big fight,
T: Um hm
C: and the children knew this, and they w they thought they were
going to do the same thing with me. Like if I would go against it
all the time
N: But she never goes against (me)
T: Um hm.
N: Uh: (
) I think isuh: (1) (
) (2) know how to express
it They're children I mean she says they're gonna get the same
thing I mean uh she's liable to uh do the same thing
Lisa and she's liable to correct her and what's gonna happen that's what I was trying to bring out. What is gonna happen when this result doesn't (bring anything). (1.5) Are you so
definitely sure that this result of correction can continuous correction with Lisa might bring the result you want. Because I've
seen
[
C:
(
) not, there's no guarantee
N: (
) my father would knock me in a corner with his fist
and the result is what happened. I just walked right away from
him. =
C: = No, but I meanbut he thinks I should disci discipline her like
123 N:
124 C:
125 N:
126 N:
I mean that's
I discipline Sonya, and there's almost five years difference. Now
I can't expect (
) Why should I punish her now, =
[
]
(Oh no:)
No. I was even mentioning (
)
127 C:
128 T:
Uh, you see the uh it seems to me

that happens that that that you you're trying to do your best.
350
129 C:
130 T:
131 C:
BILMES
And this is difficult to begin with because anybody that's trying is
worse off than somebody that's just being spontaneous. (1.5)
Uh but you can't help but try, that's all you can do. But in
your trying, what you seem to be running across here is that
you don't realize how much these two are alike.
Which two.
That and Sonya
Oh.
132 N:
Hm. They are. They're very much alike. I (admit that). She says
that she can see an awful lot uh: that she is improved and she's
much better but I uh: I think they're kids.
133 C:
No, Sonya since I've gotten her has

improved a lot.
I think they're kids that uh in most ways that it like =
134 N:
135 C:
(
)
136 N: = the stealing. That I don't think is the uh kids uh something like
that because / stole. I mean I think all boys steal at some time or
other.
137 T:
(
)
138 N:
139 C:
140 N:
141 T:
142 N:
143 C:
144 N:
145 C:
146 T:
147 C:
It's the idea (
But not continuously.

Not continuously, after you're uh forewarned maybe a couple
of times.
Urn hm
And uh this is what I'm getting at that I can't control. Then
cause I've talked with him, I've uh hit him, I've deprived him of
uh of quite a few things, and uh never done any good, but then
I noticed lately that he hasn't taken anything and he's been
fairly =
well that way.

The other problem he had and I tried to tell him, he would lie
continuously to use.
Um hm
He got to the point where he (was supposed) to be at a football
game, and he gave me a blow by blow description of how he
351
(played there) and he wasn't even at the game. You know he

(was supposed to be) in there and he didn't even g and he's
really giving me a vivid description you know And I (
)
148 T:
149 C
150 T
151 C
152 T
153 C:
Are you able to

openly criticize your husband when when you feel like it
(
)? You know, just right off the top of your head, or do
you have to prepare for it and sort of build up to it.
(2.5)
I don't know what you mean.
Well: you got some gripe. We all have gripes about (
)
[
Oh no I come
right out with my gripes =
Right out, right out. Same day, you don't even have to think
about it just
No: maybe that's one of my =
154 N:
We don't have
155 C: = faults I (
)
156 N:
157 T:
158 N:
159 C:
160 N:
161 T:
162 N:
163 T:
164 N:
We don't have too much argument uh She and I together don't have (any) arguments.
Do you think you argue enough.
(1)
Oh: we argue enough enough, I mean
Enough to make up heh heh
But it's not like uh: I think uh like I said to the other doctor
before (these) uh I mean it was continuous argument which
was never anything developed out of it but ar more argument
Um hm
And no uh that way we got further away than where some
families wh if they argue they might get closer together in
some way. But a continuous argument I mean on everything
you do, everything you say, and then I I realize this
today; through other uh therapy: and the help Dr. Fichy gave
me in uh
Um hm
in my second (uh) first marriage. (3) Sonya, would you sit over
there like your father said.
352
BILMES
165 C:
183
184
He might want to ask you some questions. And if you're patticaking you're not gonna know what he's talking about, ((to the
girls))
(2)
T:
Well, d, i the difference in in my approach to some other people's
is and you've already had three people see you
N: Hm
T: is that I think when kids are this age, the parents have an awful lot
to say about what happens to them.
N: Hm
T: It's also true of other things too like school, they (get) physically
(sick) the doctor So I can't get very excited about uh kids this
age misbehaving because I don't think they're lost yet.
C: Well now Norman says he is
T: Yeah
C: Norman feels like Bruce I can't we can't do nothing more
because (
)
[
N:
I just uh (
)
T: Urn hm
N: Wh: I think that I er that all the trouble
[
C:
He feels like (
) it's not gonna
change
N: He'll have to change himself. That's the way I feel. That he'll
have to change himself. And sooner or later when he gets out in
the world or he gets a little older and he gets the bumps and the
knocks and things, it's gonna come out of him one way or the
other.
T:
Well you you make him about ten years older than he is then.
N: No
C: Some ways he does and some ways (
)
[
N:
That's what That's what I was telling her.
She depends she thinks that these are older children and
they're not. They're an eleven-year-old boy and a and a They
don't understand =
[
C:
Na
N: = what I'm saying. That's what I'm getting around to. She says to
185
C:
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
t
(
186 N:
187 C:
188 N:
189 C:
190 N:
191 C:
192 T:
193 C:
194 N:
195 C:
196 N:
197 C:
353
me do this, why did you do that why did you do this why did you
do that =
Well if you had a ten-year-old son that carried matches constantly, =
[
They're children
and always had matches in his pockets and you knew it was
(smoking), what would you do.
Well how many times have I done sto
[
(He just)
[
I have a ten-year-old son
that doesn't smoke. It seems I'm stuck. I can't tell you.
[
Yeah:
Yes, but what would you do.
[
No then but he just says well that's I can't do
nothing about it.
Because I'm always cracking him. And if that don't do no
good I can put him in his room that d he goes right behind my
back and does it.
[
(
on fire
I
198 T:
Well there's one thing that made

me have you ever asked Bruce what to do.
(14 min.)
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Bilmes Two Kinds of Conversational Meaning

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This article was downloaded by: [Institutional Subscription Access]

On: 04 September 2011, At: 14:56

Why that now? two kinds of

Department of Anthropology, University of

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

DISCOURSE PROCESSES 8, 31^-355 (1985)

Why That Now?" Two Kinds

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In conversational analysis, the meaning of an utterance-in-conversation is the hearing

PARTICIPANTS' AND ANALYSTS' INTERPRETATIONS

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TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

end in itself, but a means to understanding the workings of conversation as a

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I, I didn't say that, I you

In this fragment, claims are made as to whether or not # 6 is to be heard as a

TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

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He says, governments, an' you know he keeps- he feels about

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pervasively relevant issue (for participants) about utterances in conversation is

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TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

Therapist ...what you-(") seem to be running across here is

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That ((referring to Bruce)) and Son(ya)

They're (") very much alike.

(1) I (admit that).

think they're kids.

her has improved a l o : t .

"I think they're kids." 5

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TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

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TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

At several points in the conversation, Norman says "they're children" rather

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TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

not ordinarily feel called upon to confirm or disconfirm my formulation. The

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Given any two-party conversation, there exists an understanding that there

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TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

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of/ think they're kids.

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King of France is bald" is false, it would be misleading to reply to such an assertion by

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TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

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having that particular meaning. The reasoning involved is admittedly circular,

TWO KINDS OF CONVERSATIONAL MEANING

#101 Therapist: ...For example there's asumpm very funny

that would come up-(.8) an1 that 1s: that you

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more problem about whose kids were being better

(Everybody has those) problems t H l - ( l ) l e t ' s

You don1 have 'em no:w

because yours 1s the worst uh behaved

Mo: a lot a times I say this C ) I say this

to her er: different times she'll say sumpm

"Well that's children."