Edelsky1981

Edelsky1981
BibType	ARTICLE
Key	Edelsky1981
Author(s)	Carole Edelsky
Title	Who's Got the Floor?
Editor(s)
Tag(s)	EMCA, Conversation Analysis, gender and language, qualitative research methodology
Publisher
Year	1981
Language	English
City
Month
Journal	Language in Society
Volume	10
Number	3
Pages	383-421
URL	Link
DOI
ISBN
Organization
Institution
School
Type
Edition
Series
Howpublished
Book title
Chapter

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Abstract

This study into the nature of "'the floor" actually began as an open-ended

inquiry into sex differences that might occur beyond the sentence level in
the multi-party interaction of five informal committee meetings.' Technical
difficulties prompted the trying out of several different transcription dis-
plays, most of which failed to capture the "feel" of the interaction and each
of which biased (in its own way) the perception of what had actually gone
on. The type of unconventional display eventually used was intended to
show the floor holder in the center of the page, flanked by co-occurring talk.
Because there were many episodes for which a single floor holder could not
be identified, the primary focus of the study shifted to the nature of the floor
itself. Questions about sex differences became a secondary and succeeding
focus.
In the analysis, "floor" and "turn" were distinguished on the basis of
'participant-sense'" rather than technical criteria. Two kinds of floors were
subjectively identified: FI, a singly developed floor; and F2, a collaborative
venture where several people seemed to be either operating on the same
wavelength or engaging in a free-for-all. The two kinds of floors were
differentiated objectively by such features as quantity and frequency of
participation, language functions, number of nonturn utterances, overlaps,
and pauses. There were indeed sex/language differences, but these were
related to the type of floor being developed. Men took more and longer turns
and did more of the joking, arguing, directing, and soliciting of responses in
FI's. Turn length and frequency differences were neutralized in F2's, and
certain language functions were used by women to a greater extent in F2's  than in FI 's

Notes