Albert2018

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Albert2018
BibType ARTICLE
Key Albert2018
Author(s) Saul Albert, Charlotte Albury, Marc Alexander, Matthew Tobias Harris, Emily Hofstetter, Edward J. B. Holmes, Elizabeth Stokoe
Title The conversational rollercoaster: Conversation analysis and the public science of talk
Editor(s)
Tag(s) EMCA, New Scientist Live, conversational rollercoaster, data session, applied conversation analysis, transcription, conversation analysis, Ethnomethodology, public engagement, science exhibits, talkaoke
Publisher
Year 2018
Language English
City
Month
Journal Discourse Studies
Volume 20
Number 3
Pages 397–424
URL Link
DOI 10.1177/1461445618754571
ISBN
Organization
Institution
School
Type
Edition
Series
Howpublished
Book title
Chapter

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Abstract

How does talk work, and can we engage the public in a dialogue about the scientific study of talk? This article presents a history, critical evaluation and empirical illustration of the public science of talk. We chart the public ethos of conversation analysis that treats talk as an inherently public phenomenon and its transcribed recordings as public data. We examine the inherent contradictions that conversation analysis is simultaneously obscure yet highly cited; it studies an object that people understand intuitively, yet routinely produces counter-intuitive findings about talk. We describe a novel methodology for engaging the public in a science exhibition event and show how our ‘conversational rollercoaster’ used live recording, transcription and public-led analysis to address the challenge of demonstrating how talk can become an informative object of scientific research. We conclude by encouraging researchers not only to engage in a public dialogue but also to find ways to actively engage people in taking a scientific approach to talk as a pervasive, structural feature of their everyday lives.

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