Elaine W. Vine

Multiple Discourse Analyses of a Workplace Interaction

This article explores the contributions that five different approaches to discourse analysis can make to interpreting and understanding the same piece of data. Conversation analysis, interactional sociolinguistics, politeness theory, critical discourse analysis, and discursive psychology are the approaches chosen for comparison. The data is a nine-minute audio recording of a spontaneous workplace interaction. The analyses are compared, and the theoretical and methodological implications of the different approaches are discussed.

“My Partner”: A Five-Year-Old Samoan Boy Learns How to Participate in Class Through Interactions With His English-Speaking Peers

Abstract This article investigates opportunities for learning English as a second language (ESL) available to Fa’afetai, a five-year-old boy from Samoa, in a mainstream New Zealand classroom. It examines spoken one-to-one interactions between Fa’afetai and his English-speaking peers in class. The methodology involves multiple video, audio and observational monitoring of both individual and class activity during a nine-hour social studies curriculum unit of study. A close analysis of the interactions between Fa’afetai and his peers about working “with a partner” in class activities shows how Fa’afetai has opportunities for learning the “partner” aspect of the class languaculture as he and his peers negotiate “partner” status and process. The analysis also provides evidence that Fa’afetai takes up opportunities and constructs an understanding of this aspect of the languaculture which enables him to participate as a member of the class, even though the limitations of his resources in the domain of the content of the social studies curriculum unit hamper to some extent his efforts to participate in some activities. The analysis also shows how he reconstructs some such activities as ones he can participate in more fully, such as physical contests with peers.

CA and SCT: strange bedfellows or useful partners for understanding classroom interactions?

Understanding classroom interactions is a complex process. This article explores what conversation analysis (CA) and sociocultural theory of learning (SCT) can contribute to that process. The exploration is carried out through analyses of interactions between Brian, a five-year-old boy, and Ms Nikora, his teacher, during a nine-hour social studies curriculum unit in a New Zealand classroom. CA and SCT may appear to be strange bedfellows, in that the former concerns itself with language use (how participants organize and manage conversations), while the latter concerns itself with language as mediation (how learning occurs), but they turn out to be useful partners. The analyses reveal at least three perspectives from which participants need to be understanding what is going on in classroom interactions in order to participate in them appropriately and learn through them: how people organize conversations, institutional talk, and how teachers and learners jointly construct learning opportunities.

We love to hate each other: mediated football fan culture

We Love to Hate Each Other begins with an Introduction by the editors, followed by two chapters which frame central concepts: football fans (Ch. 1, Hognestad) and sports media (Ch. 2, Boyle). The o...

Hospital: A Five-Year-Old Samoan Boy's Access to Learning Curriculum Content in His New Zealand Classroom.

Previous research suggests that young ESOL learners in mainstream English-medium classrooms are afforded limited opportunities to engage with curriculum content. This paper reports on a study of a five-year-old boy from Samoa who was just beginning to learn English in a mainstream New Zealand classroom. Interactions between the boy and his teacher and English-speaking peers are analysed for evidence that he was learning ‘hospital’, a central concept in a social studies curriculum unit. The analysis shows that, while this was a language and resource rich classroom, affordances of ‘hospital’ were not consistently accessible to the boy. He did begin to attend to the word ‘hospital’, but there is little evidence that he engaged with the concept. However, noticing the word is a step towards learning its meaning, and it was in interactions with his teacher that he attended to the word, not in interactions with his peers.

Fighters, girls and other identities: sociolinguistics in a martial arts club

of the interesting sections in this regard include the debate on the origins of Shaolin Kung Fu, the ways in which exclusion laws in the US impacted the waves of immigrants to Hawaii and California (and the integration of martial arts), and the influence of street fighting culture, gangs and tongs on the increasing popularity and relevance of martial arts in the US. On the other hand, however, there are tangents that unnecessarily draw the reader away from the core of the text and seem to be extraneous information more so than significant details that add depth to the story. Examples in this regard include the details on the history of the development of Oakland as a thriving city (ch. 7), the Cassius Clay and Sonny Liston rivalry (ch. 11), and the stardom of Hong Kong movie star Diana Chang Chung-Wen (ch. 13). While interesting in their own regard, rather than take the reader away from the central storyline, a footnote would suffice in these instances. Focusing on a period of great racial tension in the US, Russo makes an interesting juxtaposition of the US exclusion acts with the martial arts exclusion codes, both of which denied equal access or privilege to the other into their inner circles. He illustrates the challenges of racial exclusion (in both their enforcement and their acceptance) in both instances, then highlights a parallel movement towards breaking down racial barriers and promoting more inclusive practices. Bruce Lee himself was of mixed race; the ethnicity of his maternal grandmother is unknown, though it is generally accepted that she was European. Consequently, the idea of racial exclusion was a ‘nonissue’ for Lee and he accepted Chinese and non-Chinese students alike in his school, letting down the gates that were otherwise carefully protected within conservative, traditional circles of kung fu and other martial arts. This is consistent with the more modern, progressive attitude that Lee embraced and sought to impart within martial arts circles; not only did he accept non-Chinese students, he also taught female students interested in learning kung fu. On a whole, Striking Distance is an interesting and informative read about the growth and significance of the martial arts community in San Francisco’s Chinatown and the surrounding Bay Area in the time of Bruce Lee’s rise to fame. Though separating fact from fiction, myth, and legend is neither a goal nor objective, the book provides a little bit of each, noting the unavoidable mystique which, in the US, has always surrounded martial arts and its origins as much as it has the talent and persona of Bruce Lee.

The plot unit approach to story structure: An exploratory study of its application to stories written by four children from kindergarten to fifth grade

Abstract This article examines what plot unit theory might contribute to our understanding of the development of story structure in childrens writing. It reports on an exploratory study of how childrens use of plot structure in their writing grows and changes. The plot unit structures of fictional stories written by 4 children over 6 years, from kindergarten to fifth grade, were examined and compared. Each story was analyzed with the aid of PUGG (Plot Unit Graph Generator), a computer program which identifies plot units from a “map” based on the coarse affective structure of the story, and then graphs the interrelationships among those plot units. Using longitudinal data allowed for observing the development of plot structure within each childs writing, as well as for finding similarities and differences in the use of plot structure across children as they develop. Trends towards increasing story length and plot connectivity across the grades are apparent in the data, together with weaker trends towards increasing plot complexity. However, within those trends there is considerable variation in the patterns of development shown by the individual children across the 6 years of the study. The children differ in their areas of strength in the process of plot structuring. As well, the stories written by any one child in each year of the study show considerable variation in the plot structures used. It is argued that plot unit analysis has advantages over methods of analysis of story structure which have previously been used in the study of childrens stories.