Pre-opening

Encyclopedia of Terminology for CA and IL: Pre-opening
Author(s):	Philipp Hänggi (University of Basel, Switzerland) (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8062-2541) & Julia Schneerson (University of Basel, Switzerland) (https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7244-0804)
To cite:	Hänggi, Philipp, & Schneerson, Julia. (2023). Pre-opening. In Alexandra Gubina, Elliott M. Hoey & Chase Wesley Raymond (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Terminology for Conversation Analysis and Interactional Linguistics. International Society for Conversation Analysis (ISCA). DOI:

The term pre-opening refers to the sequential environment in and through which the conditions for an imminent entry into mutually ratified, jointly focused social interaction are achieved. Pre-openings entail various multimodal practices that are preliminary to and preparatory for the publicly accountable opening of an encounter (see below).

In phone calls, the act of calling, or the displayed number of an incoming call during the ringing can give would-be interactants an indication of who to expect at the other end of the line, allowing for a recipient-designed organization of the opening (Zimmerman 1992). Individuals orient to features of the pre-opening to make sense of possible reasons-for-the-call and its intelligibility. They perform projective work that is ratified (or not) during the identification/recognition sequence of the opening (Mondada 2008, 2010; Schegloff 1979, 1986; cf. the “summoning phones” exercise by Garfinkel & Wieder 1992: 192–201).

While phone conversations are characterized by relatively easily recognizable beginnings and closings -- with “summons-answer” sequences as part of the opening (Schegloff, 1968, 1986) --, the organization of co-present face-to-face openings is less straightforward. During the pre-opening of face-to-face interaction, based on reciprocal visual accessibility, individuals continuously monitor the potential prospective co-participant’s conduct, and organize their next actions accordingly, thereby displaying their expectations concerning activities, identities and categorizations involved in the imminent interaction (Mondada 2009). For instance, pre-opening preparatory work may include the establishment of mutual gaze (Goffman 1963), head tosses, waves, or eyebrow flashes (Kendon & Ferber 1973), alignment and coordination of trajectories and bodies (Mondada 2009; Mortensen & Hazel 2014) and displays of (non)availability (Harjunpää, et al. 2018; Mondada 2022).

Someone’s entrance into a space can already project an incipient interaction (Heath 1986; Oloff 2010; Pillet-Shore 2018; Harjunpää, et al. 2018). Outdoors, participants’ walking trajectories, likewise, are part of the gradual move into an encounter, observable in embodied micro-sequential mutual adjustments during the approach (Mondada 2022). These publicly available practices are all constitutive features of an imminent social encounter, enabling would-be interactants to identify, categorize or recognize each other very early on (De Stefani & Mondada 2018), relying on “inspectables” such as “appearance, voice sample, and behavior” (Schegloff 1979: 64).

This is illustrated by the following example, showing Anne (ANN) walking her dogs, and coming across her acquaintance Lisa (LIS), who has just stepped out of her garden and is standing up after lifting two watering cans from the ground. Informed consent was obtained by both participants visible in the data presented.

Anna and Lisa gaze at each other when they are still at a distance, and yet too far from each other to greet (line 1). This appears to occasion Anne’s gazing down, described by Kendon and Ferber as an “act of withdrawal” (1973: 182)—a practice of momentary gaze avoidance while approaching each other, until a certain proximity has been reached (see also Goffman (1963: 84) on “dimming of lights”). Subsequently, Lisa smiles at Anne, thereby displaying her recognition of the acquaintance and projecting an opening (line 2). This is acknowledged and confirmed by Anne with a head toss (fig. 1 & fig. 2). What follows is the realization of the opening in the form of a mutual, slightly overlapped verbal greeting and explicit recognition display by verbalizing each other’s first names (3–4).

This example illustrates how individuals’ pre-opening practices pave the way for and project an upcoming opening. The categorization work and display of mutual recognition is manifested as they approach, gaze, smile and nod at each other. The boundaries between “pre-opening” and “opening” are thus permeable as would-be interactants gradually transition into more explicit co-participation based on reciprocal micro-sequential adjustments.

A note on terminology: Some scholars appear to use the term “pre-beginning” (e.g., Kidwell 2018; Schegloff 1979) in reference to “pre-opening” defined above. A distinction between the two concepts is not always made in the CA literature, and generally accepted definitions are lacking (see also Pre-beginning). The distinction, however, may be endogenously relevant for the participants themselves, as Mondada (2010) has shown in her study of video conference calls. Whereas the organization of the pre-opening consists of, e.g., positioning oneself, rearranging the material environment, checking camera perspectives and other technical aspects, the pre-beginning is marked by informal chitchat before the actual (formal) meeting starts. This establishes an emic distinction between “pre-opening” and “pre-beginning”.

Additional Related Entries:

• Opening
• Pre-beginning
• Multimodality
• Sequence organization
• Participation
• F-formation

Cited References:

De Stefani, E., & Mondada, L. (2018). Encounters in Public Space: How Acquainted Versus Unacquainted Persons Establish Social and Spatial Arrangements. Research on Language and Social Interaction, 51(3), 248–270.

Harjunpää, K., Mondada, L., & Svinhufvud, K. (2018). The Coordinated Entry into Service Encounters in Food Shops: Managing Interactional Space, Availability, and Service During Openings. Research on Language and Social Interaction, 51(3), 271–291. DOI: 10.1080/08351813.2018.1485231

Mortensen, K., & Hazel, S. (2014). Moving into interaction: Social practices for initiating encounters at a help desk. Journal of Pragmatics, 62, 46–67. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2013.11.009.

Heath, C. (1981). Body Movement and Speech in Medical Interaction. Cambridge University Press.

Kendon, A., & Ferber, A. (1973). A Description of Some Human Greetings. In R. P. Michael & J. H. Crook (Eds.), Comparative Ecology and Behaviour of Primates (pp. 591–668). London: Academic Press.

Mondada, L. (2008). Using Video for a Sequential and Multimodal Analysis of Social Interaction: Videotaping Institutional Telephone Calls. Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 9(3), Art. 39.

Mondada, L. (2009). Emergent focused interactions in public places: A systematic analysis of the multimodal achievement of a common interactional space. Journal of Pragmatics, 41, 1977–1997. doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2008.09.019

Mondada, L. (2010). Eröffnungen und Prä-Eröffnungen in medienvermittelter Interaktion: Das Beispiel Videokonferenzen. In L. Mondada & R. Schmitt (Eds.), Situationseröffnungen (pp. 277­­–334). Tübingen: Gunter Narr.

Mondada, L. (2022). Adjusting step-by-step trajectories in public space: the micro-sequentiality of approaching and refusing to be approached. Gesprächsforschung - Online-Zeitschrift zur verbalen Interaktion, 23, 36–65.

Oloff, F. (2010). Ankommen und Hinzukommen: Zur Struktur der Ankunft von Gästen. In L. Mondada & R. Schmitt (Eds.), Situationseröffnungen (pp. 171–228). Tübingen: Gunter Narr.

Pillet-Shore, D. (2018). How to begin. Research on Language and Social Interaction, 51(3), 213–231.

Sacks, H., Schegloff, E. A., and Jefferson, G. (1974). A Simplest Systematics for the Organization of Turn-Taking for Conversation. Language, 50, 696–735.

Schegloff, E. A. (1979). Identification and recognition in telephone openings. In: Psathas, G. (Ed.), Everyday Language (pp. 23–78). Erlbaum.

Schegloff, E. A. (2002). Beginnings in the telephone. In J. Katz & M. Aakhus (Eds.), Perpetual Contact: Mobile Communication, Private Talk, Public Performance (pp. 284–300). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511489471.022

Zimmerman, D. (1992). Achieving context: Openings in emergency calls. In G. Watson & R. M. Seiler (Eds.), Text in Context: Contributions to Ethnomethodology (pp. 35–51). Sage.

Additional References:

Schmitt, R., & Mondada, L. (2010). Situationseröffnungen: Zur multimodalen Herstellung fokussierter Interaktion. Narr.