Stability and visibility in embodiment: The ‘Palm Up’ in interaction

Clift, Rebecca

doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2020.09.005

Cited by 9 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…They represent a recent shift to multimodal corpus research that adopts a mixed methods approach (Lin & Chen, 2020). Whereas numerous qualitative studies from various fields such as pragmatics (Kendon, 2004) and conversation analysis (Clift, 2020) have convincingly demonstrated that language and communication are inherently multimodal rather than monomodal, systematic multimodal corpus research provides statistical evidence of the patterned uses of speech and other modes of expression, such as hand gestures, gaze and facial expressions (Feyaerts et al, 2022). The present study adds further evidence to this research agenda by establishing the lexico-grammatical patterns associated with the circular gesture.…”

Section: Towards a Multimodal Unit Of Meaningmentioning

confidence: 50%

Towards a corpus-based description of speech-gesture units of meaning

Chen

Adolphs

2022

IJCL

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The theories and methods in corpus linguistics (CL) have had an impact on numerous areas in applied linguistics. However, the interface between CL and multimodal speech-gesture studies remains underexplored. One fundamental question is whether it is possible, and even appropriate, to apply the theories and paradigms established based on textual data to multimodal data. To explore this, we examine how CL can assist investigating lexico-grammatical patterns of speech co-occurring with a recurrent gesture (i.e. the circular gesture). Sinclair’s (1996) unit of meaning model is used to describe the co-gestural speech patterns. The study draws on a subset of the Nottingham Multimodal Corpus, in which 570 instances of circular gestures and their co-occurring speech are identified and analysed. We argue that Sinclair’s unit of meaning model can be extended to include speech-gesture patterns, and that those descriptions enable a more nuanced understanding of meaning in context.

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Section: Towards a Multimodal Unit Of Meaningmentioning

confidence: 50%

Towards a corpus-based description of speech-gesture units of meaning

Chen

Adolphs

2022

IJCL

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“…Maitlis's conduct in the wake of her eye roll continues the visible display of dissent, as she circles something on her notes and scribbles vigorously on them, as she shakes her head. After a verbal repudiation, in a hearably smiling voice, of Gardiner's assertion at lines 12-13 with a highly agentive repetition of his words "It's not made up at a::ll" (lines 15-16), opening her hands out into a "palm up" gesture (Clift, 2020), Maitlis goes on to clarify, with an "I mean" preface (Maynard, 2013) with a vivid idiomatic display of exasperation: "people are literally pulling their hair out tonight" (lines 17-19), thus verbally underscoring a stance already indicated by the eye roll. This exchange thus makes particularly clear what is evident across all the cases so far: that the eye roll is by no means the initial or the only indication of disagreement or resistance from a participant, forming part of a constellation of embodiments that collectively display dissent.…”

Section: The Eye Roll In Interactionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Embodiment in Dissent: The Eye Roll as an Interactional Practice

Clift

2021

Research on Language and Social Interaction

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This article investigates a recognizable embodied practice for displaying dissent: the "eye roll," whereby the eyes are rolled up or sideways in their sockets as a response to something said or done. On a corpus of videoed interaction, it shows that: (a) the eye roll may be only the most salient-visible-element of a constellation of practices embodying dissent; and (b) it can be quite specific in its selection of recipients and can be used to pursue affiliation with another party. Investigation suggests that the eye roll is in fact a protest in response to someone going too far. As an expression of stance that may not be visible to the party whose action it targets, the eye roll is collusive for those who witness it: In its ambivalent status lies its value as an interactional object. Data are in British and American English.At the G20 summit in Hamburg in 2017, what attracted the most news coverage was not the official business but something that happened in an interval between meetings and lasted less than half a second: German Chancellor Angela Merkel's eye roll in response to something said by Russian President Vladimir Putin (Figure 1). 1There is no indication that Putin registers it-he is not looking at Merkel as she produces it-so the fact that it was spotted and brought to the attention of the world's media gave its production a collusive quality, apparent to all but the person to whom it was a response. Such indeed was the tenor of the news coverage that followed, which took the eye roll to be a glimpsed expression of Merkel's "real," clearly negative,

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