When the Mess Is the Message: Simultaneous Signing in an ASL Multiparty Interaction
Saved in:
| Title: | When the Mess Is the Message: Simultaneous Signing in an ASL Multiparty Interaction |
|---|---|
| Language: | English |
| Authors: | Alysson Lepeut, Emily Shaw |
| Source: | Sign Language Studies. 2024 24(3):722-763. |
| Availability: | Gallaudet University Press. 800 Florida Avenue NE, Denison House, Washington, DC 20002-3695. Tel: 202-651-5488; Fax: 202-651-5489; Web site: https://gupress.gallaudet.edu/Journals/Sign-Language-Studies |
| Peer Reviewed: | Y |
| Page Count: | 42 |
| Publication Date: | 2024 |
| Document Type: | Journal Articles Reports - Research |
| Descriptors: | Deafness, American Sign Language, Total Communication, Interpersonal Communication, Dialogs (Language), Interaction, Data, Video Technology, Group Dynamics, Interpersonal Relationship |
| DOI: | 10.1353/sls.2024.a928061 |
| ISSN: | 0302-1475 1533-6263 |
| Abstract: | This article presents the results of a microanalysis of sequences when two or more deaf signers overlap. This contribution focuses on "cooperative overlap" - which consists of extended moments of turn-exchanges that move along the unfolding discourse while cohering interlocutors in relation to each other. This aspect of signed interaction has received little scholarly attention but appears to be one crucial part of the "enchronic glue" (Enfield 2022) of language binding interactions (and interactants) together. Little is known about the specific underpinnings of these seemingly messy interactive moments. We seek here to understand how such extended overlaps are achieved by deaf coparticipants where the outcome results in a forward move of the interaction. A total of thirty-three instances of collaborative overlapping signing were identified, accounting for approximately seven out of the seventy-five minute multiparty interaction between four American Sign Language (ASL) signers. Out of these, specific interactional sequences were analyzed using techniques from ethnomethodology and conversation analysis to answer the following question: What embodied practices are used to negotiate overlaps while maintaining interactional synchrony? In addition to lexical repetition strategies identified in earlier work, these closely timed sequences of overlap are successful because they engage multiple articulators coordinated across signers. Further, it appears that these practices that are symbolic of the joint coordination of co-constructed discourse are a behavior that signers both willingly engage in to achieve specific interactive tasks, namely clarification-seeking, confirmation, and coordinated depiction. Results do not only account for how deaf signers achieve collaborative overlaps but also reveal the interactive reasons why signers engage in these seemingly messy moments of interaction. |
| Abstractor: | As Provided |
| Entry Date: | 2024 |
| Accession Number: | EJ1427428 |
| Database: | ERIC |
|
Full text is not displayed to guests.
Login for full access.
|
|
| FullText | Links: – Type: pdflink Url: https://content.ebscohost.com/cds/retrieve?content=AQICAHj0k_4E0hTGH8RJwT4gCJyBsGNe_WN95AvKlDbXJGqwxwFLRav8Z1myOO-pSllR86XxAAAA4zCB4AYJKoZIhvcNAQcGoIHSMIHPAgEAMIHJBgkqhkiG9w0BBwEwHgYJYIZIAWUDBAEuMBEEDMM7BQTiE66lh5dj8QIBEICBm7faVIYntdVuIpw2-qM-Lub2DiP8k3_nR6r-Ox-HuneWHSm1k9qWJV6m3KEF5kqNdTMSP4sNpEh4gDnIHr9ipc_vqk_sWia_loVlmPETp4ShcvVk41MSIYc05enlGG3CJCzQxYGkiDvRLwXEpdD7L9ICRfP7QELhUSjrsHXC1N8gwK3w_VvIL8uIePOle83022AZfJbMcOrloCG6 Text: Availability: 1 Value: <anid>AN0177774407;ngu01apr.24;2024Jun12.03:29;v2.2.500</anid> <title id="AN0177774407-1">When the Mess Is the Message: Simultaneous Signing in an ASL Multiparty Interaction </title> <sbt id="AN0177774407-2">Introduction: Grounding in Language Interaction</sbt> <p>This article presents the results of a microanalysis of sequences when two or more deaf signers overlap. This contribution focuses on cooperative overlap —which consists of extended moments of turn-exchanges that move along the unfolding discourse while cohering interlocutors in relation to each other. This aspect of signed interaction has received little scholarly attention but appears to be one crucial part of the "enchronic glue" (Enfield 2022) of language binding interactions (and interactants) together. Little is known about the specific underpinnings of these seemingly messy interactive moments. We seek here to understand how such extended overlaps are achieved by deaf coparticipants where the outcome results in a forward move of the interaction. A total of thirty-three instances of collaborative overlapping signing were identified, accounting for approximately seven out of the seventy-five minute multiparty interaction between four American Sign Language (ASL) signers. Out of these, specific interactional sequences were analyzed using techniques from ethnomethodology and conversation analysis to answer the following question: What embodied practices are used to negotiate overlaps while maintaining interactional synchrony? In addition to lexical repetition strategies identified in earlier work, these closely timed sequences of overlap are successful because they engage multiple articulators coordinated across signers. Further, it appears that these practices that are symbolic of the joint coordination of co-constructed discourse are a behavior that signers both willingly engage in to achieve specific interactive tasks, namely clarification-seeking, confirmation, and coordinated depiction. Results do not only account for how deaf signers achieve collaborative overlaps but also reveal the interactive reasons why signers engage in these seemingly messy moments of interaction.</p> <p>Face-to-face interaction is accounted for as the core matrix for human sociality, evolution, and language ([<reflink idref="bib39" id="ref1">39</reflink>], [<reflink idref="bib69" id="ref2">69</reflink>]). One of the cornerstones of language is our human ability to effectively and jointly coordinate knowledge and behavior to build and maintain mutual understanding in conversation, a process known as grounding ([<reflink idref="bib10" id="ref3">10</reflink>]). Example 1 ([<reflink idref="bib16" id="ref4">16</reflink>]) and example 2 ([<reflink idref="bib15" id="ref5">15</reflink>]) below illustrate this process. However, while example 1 signals a need to reestablish mutual understanding in the form of a repair request (e.g. "What?"), example 2 signals ongoing attention and tracking in the form of a backchannel (e.g. "Yeah"):</p> <p> <bold>Example 1</bold>.</p> <p>Speaker A: The camera is filming you.</p> <p>Speaker B: <bold>What?</bold></p> <p>Speaker A: The camera is filming.</p> <p> <bold>Example 2</bold>.</p> <p>Speake A: Then you do an arch above it.</p> <p>Speaker B: <bold>Yeah</bold>.</p> <p>Speaker A: and you go towards the left.</p> <p>In conversation, participants jointly work together towards a shared interactional goal ([<reflink idref="bib4" id="ref6">4</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref7">9</reflink>]). In particular, they carefully coordinate, synchronize in time, and orient to each other's talk and bodies on a moment-by-moment basis to ensure that the ongoing contribution is sufficiently understood by everyone for the current purposes ([<reflink idref="bib12" id="ref8">12</reflink>]). This joint coordination between participants is part of one of the causal frames described for language, labelled by [<reflink idref="bib23" id="ref9">23</reflink>] as enchrony.[<reflink idref="bib1" id="ref10">1</reflink>] He notes that:</p> <p>In this frame, language users are coordinating their actions and interpretations, with openly shared mutual attention [...]. Each move responds to the previous move and gives rise to a response in turn. This gives enchrony its progressive quality [...], as the relations between moves drive our interactions ever forward.</p> <p>(<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref11">3</reflink>)</p> <p>Yet, this dynamic endeavor in interaction cannot be successfully conducted without previously assuming common ground, defined as the mutual knowledge, beliefs, and assumptions that interlocutors supposedly share together ([<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref12">9</reflink>]). Grounding is thus contingent on common ground. Therefore, when people interact, they not only coordinate on process, but they also must coordinate on content ([<reflink idref="bib12" id="ref13">12</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib10" id="ref14">10</reflink>]). In other words, participants aim to establish that what has been said has been sufficiently understood, that it forms "part of their common ground" ([<reflink idref="bib10" id="ref15">10</reflink>]).</p> <p>It is important to mention that common ground does not only exist prior to the conversational exchange. It is also updated on a moment-by-moment basis as the conversation accumulates over time and is co-constructed by all interlocutors. This type of common ground is known as incremental common ground, one of three categories [<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref16">9</reflink>] classifies. Personal common ground derives from the mutually shared knowledge between participants as a result of their prior common experience, while communal common ground is a result of "their cultural or sub-cultural communities" ([<reflink idref="bib38" id="ref17">38</reflink>]). But, in turn, common ground cannot be properly updated without grounding, that is, the constant online assessment of the participants' shared knowledge ([<reflink idref="bib12" id="ref18">12</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib10" id="ref19">10</reflink>]). Grounding is thus a crucial process enabling participants to update their common ground and to keep coordination on track so conversations can successfully be conducted.</p> <p>In the fields of cognitive sciences and psycholinguistics ([<reflink idref="bib58" id="ref20">58</reflink>]), mutual understanding has been perceived and treated as an internal process and a single achievement inside an individual's mind. In the present article, understanding is to be construed adopting an ethnomethodology (EM) and conversation analysis (CA) approach (commonly referred to as "EMCA"). CA is one research stream of ethnomethodology and concerns the close study of ordinary conversations as an aspect of social life ([<reflink idref="bib36" id="ref21">36</reflink>]). In this perspective, accordingly, mutual understanding is viewed as a "temporally-bound achievement accomplished through (and embedded in) turns at talk, as a collaborative, 'public' achievement ([<reflink idref="bib32" id="ref22">32</reflink>])" ([<reflink idref="bib66" id="ref23">66</reflink>]). It is jointly constructed, incrementally and iteratively conducted by participants, for all "practical intents and purposes" ([<reflink idref="bib32" id="ref24">32</reflink>]) to make conversations move forward. This notion of progressivity is central to the current theme of mutual understanding explored in this article, whereby participants "treat the absence of evidence of misunderstanding as sufficient to allow the interaction to progress" ([<reflink idref="bib1" id="ref25">1</reflink>]). Then, when breakdowns do occur, interlocutors have practical strategies to repair them and reestablish joint coordination as a basic requirement for successful interactions ([<reflink idref="bib16" id="ref26">16</reflink>]).</p> <p>The following section reviews three key grounding mechanisms working to (re-)establish mutual understanding in conversation, namely backchanneling, repair mechanisms, and repetition for achieving alignment in interaction ([<reflink idref="bib31" id="ref27">31</reflink>]).</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-3">Evidence in Grounding: Reestablishing Understanding from Head to Toe</hd> <p>Engaging in conversation is thus a collective and structured collaborative activity that requires the coordinated actions of all parties—speakers/signers and addressees—involved in a given communicative exchange. Participants commonly ensure understanding through a set of cues that are directly tailored to match the interlocutors' communicative needs. This online display of understanding is expressed, for instance, through the continued attention they pay to each other with mutual gaze ([<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref28">2</reflink>]). Participants can also explicitly demonstrate they understand each other through direct responses such as "Yeah, I understand," "Okay," "Right," among others, as well as through their bodies ([<reflink idref="bib26" id="ref29">26</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib56" id="ref30">56</reflink>]). This method of grounding information is known as backchanneling ([<reflink idref="bib72" id="ref31">72</reflink>]). Backchannels are recognized for their role in establishing and maintaining mutual understanding between fellow interactants while also steering the conversational exchange in a particular direction, for progression or ratification even of the line of action in progress ([<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref32">3</reflink>]).</p> <p>Among the bodily practices for backchanneling are head nods ([<reflink idref="bib26" id="ref33">26</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib56" id="ref34">56</reflink>]). Head nodding conveys different pragmatic functions, including confirming understanding, indicating following and attention, as well as acknowledging a response from the interlocutors who display their understanding this way ([<reflink idref="bib6" id="ref35">6</reflink>]). Other facial backchannel cues such as smiles, eye squints, and blinks also work as response tokens of addressees' understanding of speakers' utterances, therefore playing an important role in grounding ([<reflink idref="bib6" id="ref36">6</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib41" id="ref37">41</reflink>]). Furthermore, in Yélî Dnye (a spoken language from Rossel Island, off the eastern end of Papua, New Guinea), the use of certain facial expressions such as eyebrow flashes has become conventionalized and serves to express understanding by means of positive feedback (e.g. meaning "Yes, continue"; [<reflink idref="bib50" id="ref38">50</reflink>]). It is relevant to note that these facial signals can (and do) co-occur with other bodily expressions. For instance, eye blinks combining with head nods ([<reflink idref="bib41" id="ref39">41</reflink>]) or eye blinks with eyebrow flashes ([<reflink idref="bib50" id="ref40">50</reflink>]).</p> <p>Additionally, (and purposefully) participants (signers and speakers) in conversations also deploy other different manual actions, such as palm-up (henceforth PU) and pointing actions, to ground information ([<reflink idref="bib27" id="ref41">27</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib49" id="ref42">49</reflink>]). Interactive PU and pointing, whose forms have been attested in numerous spoken languages (henceforth, SpLs) and signed languages (henceforth SLs) alike, are commonly used to show positive evidence of mutual understanding. For instance, [<reflink idref="bib6" id="ref43">6</reflink>] found that not only do speakers monitor their addressees, seeking proof of understanding and attention, but addressees themselves also express understanding by means of different manual strategies, including these interactive PU and pointing actions, acting as backchannels ([<reflink idref="bib27" id="ref44">27</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib7" id="ref45">7</reflink>]). [<reflink idref="bib6" id="ref46">6</reflink>] have identified not just two steps (i.e. the speaker's contribution and the addressee's own indication of attention and following) but also a third step involved in the grounding process. This last step involves the acknowledgement of the primary speaker/signer towards the addressee via interactive PU forms, as a way of expressing "I see that you have understood me" ([<reflink idref="bib5" id="ref47">5</reflink>]). This moment in the management of the speaker/signer-addressee relationship is considered vital for conveying a shared understanding between parties. Thus, manual (e.g. pointing and PUs) as well as other nonmanual elements (e.g. head moves and facial expressions), along with their combination, play an important role in the grounding of information in face-to-face interaction ([<reflink idref="bib10" id="ref48">10</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref49">9</reflink>]).</p> <p>A related strategy that plays a role in grounding is conversational repair. While backchannels represent a positive source of signaling understanding, repairs are rather concerned with the interactional practices that signal and solve perturbations of "speaking, hearing, and understanding" ([<reflink idref="bib62" id="ref50">62</reflink>]) or in the case of SLs, of "signing, seeing, and understanding" ([<reflink idref="bib53" id="ref51">53</reflink>]). Speakers and signers can either use self-initiated repair strategies to solve their own hitches and glitches or addressees can express their misunderstanding by making a more or less explicit request soliciting clarification (as in example 2). This is known as other-initiated repair or OIR.</p> <p>People draw from a diverse repertoire of repair formats ranging from less (offering minimal information about the misunderstanding such as "Huh?") to more specific, explicit strategies (pointing to a specific part of the previous turn seeking confirmation as in "Who?" or "What?") to indicate the source of uncertainty and to clarify the problem to solve in discourse. In general, it seems that people will choose the latter, following the principle of the least collaborative effort in conversation ([<reflink idref="bib16" id="ref52">16</reflink>]). This suggests that people choose the most specific repair format over the weaker ones to issue more precise information in conversation, and therefore be more effective communicators.</p> <p>In addition to relying on different repair formats when the conversation goes awry, participants can and do make use of diverse bodily behaviors to reestablish common ground in interaction. For instance, research has shown that both speakers and addressees tend to perform more head nods to help restore or maintain the conversational flow in multiparty interaction contexts ([<reflink idref="bib35" id="ref53">35</reflink>]). In OIR sequences, interlocutors signal their misunderstanding using manual strategies such as holds (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib30" id="ref54">30</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib66" id="ref55">66</reflink>]) and/or nonmanual features such as gaze, head, and body leans (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib16" id="ref56">16</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib50" id="ref57">50</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib52" id="ref58">52</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib67" id="ref59">67</reflink>]). These elements can naturally combine into more complex composite signals to indicate conversational trouble.</p> <p>Previous research has underlined some interesting commonalities between SpLs and SLs regarding the formats and types of repair strategies ([<reflink idref="bib52" id="ref60">52</reflink>]), even in cross-signing contexts ([<reflink idref="bib8" id="ref61">8</reflink>]). For instance, [<reflink idref="bib29" id="ref62">29</reflink>] found that turn-final holds of several bodily articulators, including the head, face, torso, hands, and their combination, are recruited by Argentine Sign Language (LSA) signers and speakers of two unrelated SpLs (Italian and Cha'palaa) as part of signaling uncertainty and a need for resolution. They also found similarities in the timing and function of turn-final holds during the OIR sequences. This highlights the interactional dynamics of holds in that people do not disengage from this line of action until they have received the proper response elicited by the hold behavior ([<reflink idref="bib34" id="ref63">34</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib48" id="ref64">48</reflink>]).</p> <p>Another notable facet for repairing trouble and reestablishing mutually shared understanding is the key role of eye gaze, and in particular, the prevalent phenomenon of the freeze-look ([<reflink idref="bib52" id="ref65">52</reflink>]). The freeze-look is a type of response performed by addressees following a question they have been asked. Instead of providing a direct answer in the following turn, addressees maintain their gaze in the direction of the speaker to initiate repair, thereby functioning as an OIR device. In turn, following the freeze-look, the speaker/signer repeats or rephrases their initial question. This practice for OIR has also been attested in SpL interaction (see [<reflink idref="bib53" id="ref66">53</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib50" id="ref67">50</reflink>]).</p> <p>In addition to backchannels and repairs, there are other techniques that lead participants to achieve mutual understanding. Indeed, several studies from different disciplines have pointed out that, when face to face, individuals synchronize and align their communicative behaviors on the linguistic level (e.g. lexical and syntactic) as well as multimodally (e.g. from eye gaze to all moves of the body). This third component for grounding is found in the repetition of people's communicative expressions (see [<reflink idref="bib58" id="ref68">58</reflink>] for a review linking communicative alignment with cognitive alignment, that is, the alignment of mental representations underlying linguistic behavior). Repetition is a recurrent phenomenon in interaction, attested in different contexts (i.e. in naturally spontaneous conversations as well as more task-based conversations, [<reflink idref="bib31" id="ref69">31</reflink>]).</p> <p>Reusing someone else's behavioral cues is not only used for signaling sequential coherence between adjacent utterances in discourse but also to "anchor" ([<reflink idref="bib63" id="ref70">63</reflink>]) or tie co-present participants together at the interpersonal level, marking some sort of cross-participant affiliation or resonance ([<reflink idref="bib21" id="ref71">21</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib44" id="ref72">44</reflink>]). Thus, through repetition, the utterances are locally co-constructed by the participants to form an alignment between them. [<reflink idref="bib37" id="ref73">37</reflink>] discusses how people may use iconic depictions to signal understanding ([<reflink idref="bib40" id="ref74">40</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib59" id="ref75">59</reflink>]). For instance, [<reflink idref="bib40" id="ref76">40</reflink>] demonstrate how reusing an interlocutor's gesture "may be a particularly efficient form of grounding, and it is deemed intentional, thus differentiating this process from other forms of behavior matching such as foot tapping" ([<reflink idref="bib37" id="ref77">37</reflink>]).</p> <p>Concretely speaking, repetition has been shown to support joint problem-solving, in addition to coordination for reaching common ground (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib40" id="ref78">40</reflink>]). Additionally, reusing someone else's actions can either be produced at a later point in time in the conversation or "live," on a moment-by-moment basis. It is also important to note that reusing someone else's discourse implies that the speaker/signer specifically chooses certain parts "of the source to repeat" ([<reflink idref="bib65" id="ref79">65</reflink>]), thereby creating an "echoic use" of the repeated element. Lastly, the repeated aspects are not about conveying propositional, semantic content to interlocutors. Rather, the repeated elements are to be recognized as powerful interactional moves that participants deploy to make their intentions explicit and to mark the progressivity of the interaction ([<reflink idref="bib45" id="ref80">45</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib65" id="ref81">65</reflink>]).</p> <p>In summary, it becomes evident that people signal attunement and understanding by means of different interactional strategies and techniques. They can do so explicitly via backchannels, meaning "I understand," "Yes, keep going," and the like, that include bodily signals too. Next to backchannels, conversational partners can also resort to a set of various systematic—bodily—practices to restore mutual understanding when trouble arises, namely through repair. A third grounding mechanism that has been highlighted is when participants repeat each other's actions, thereby creating alignment with fellow interactants in conversation.</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-4">Locating Grounding in Conversation: Turn-Taking and Overlap</hd> <p>Now, to better understand how these practices for grounding emerge in conversation and observe how they are locally managed by individuals, we must look at the center-stage environment for operating this mode of communicative coordination, namely the turn-taking system, and its hierarchical organization into sequences ([<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref82">9</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib36" id="ref83">36</reflink>]). Sequence organization refers to the systematic and orderly arrangement of utterances within a conversation. It focuses on how participants structure their contributions and how these contributions are linked together in a coherent and meaningful way. Some key aspects of sequence organization include, for instance, adjacency pairs (i.e. pairs of related utterances that are sequentially connected such as question-answer sequences where the first typically generates a predictable, relevant response from another participant in the following turn).</p> <p>The turn-taking system is known as the basic organizational structure of face-to-face interaction ([<reflink idref="bib60" id="ref84">60</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib69" id="ref85">69</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib51" id="ref86">51</reflink>]). It is the machinery that coordinates how and when people are to take turns in conversation. From a CA perspective, how participants navigate the complex dynamics of taking turns is not random but orderly executed and mutually distributed in that all parties, including addressees, are actively involved in its organization. Participants do not simply wait for pauses to finish and start a new turn. Indeed, as laid out by [<reflink idref="bib60" id="ref87">60</reflink>], "participants construct turns in units called turn-constructional units, and they project turn-transitions at transition-relevance places at the end of these TCUs." It has been demonstrated that in coordinating this turn-taking system, people tend to typically follow the one-at-a-time principle, a normative rule under which one person holds the floor for a certain lapse of time ([<reflink idref="bib60" id="ref88">60</reflink>]). In this respect, gaps and overlaps are to be avoided, and something to be resolved (see [<reflink idref="bib61" id="ref89">61</reflink>] on the overlap resolution device). However, this smooth transition orchestrated between turns is not always straightforward and overlaps commonly occur in daily exchanges ([<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref90">14</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib61" id="ref91">61</reflink>]). Overlaps correspond to moments in the interaction when multiple (two or more) speakers talk and/or gesture simultaneously, and in the case of SLs, when two or more signers sign simultaneously ([<reflink idref="bib7" id="ref92">7</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref93">14</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib33" id="ref94">33</reflink>]). Therefore, overlap has often been considered a violation of the turn-taking rules ([<reflink idref="bib18" id="ref95">18</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib60" id="ref96">60</reflink>]).</p> <p>There are two main kinds of overlap that [<reflink idref="bib61" id="ref97">61</reflink>] classifies into "competitive" and "cooperative." On the one hand, competitive overlap is seen as problematic for the orderly nature of turn-management norms in that "speakers in overlap can abort production of TCU (turn-construction unit) before possible completion" ([<reflink idref="bib61" id="ref98">61</reflink>]). Competitive overlaps often involve competing for the floor. Overlapping individuals do so by interrupting the primary speaker's prior utterance to take over while the other person holds the floor. Competitive overlap is thus employed by an interlocutor as a way to maintain or regain control of the conversation. As a result, participants commonly orient to this type of overlap as troublesome and in need of repair. On the other hand, cooperative overlaps are not produced for floor competition but are more concerned with collaborative turn construction and sharing. They are ways for participants to signal their attuned intentions for the creation of meaningful utterances while at the same time, guiding the progressivity of interaction forward. For instance, a case in point is found in the use of backchannels to show continued attention and understanding (i.e. continuers such as "Yeah" or head nodding). Thus, overlap is a highly natural phenomenon that helps interlocutors manage their talk in progress ([<reflink idref="bib61" id="ref99">61</reflink>]) and does not systematically disrupt the turn-taking machinery ([<reflink idref="bib42" id="ref100">42</reflink>]).</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-5">Past Research on Signed Interaction and Overlap</hd> <p>Studies on the conversational aspects of how people manage conversations per se has been abundant in the literature on SpLs. Indeed, most of the work on interaction within a CA framework has been done on SpLs thus far, and alternatively less so on SLs.</p> <p>There are two main reasons that may account for the comparatively fewer number of analyses on interactional aspects of SL discourse. First, the field of linguistics has faced a common pitfall regarding its object of study, where only the most arbitrary and symbolic components of language were deemed relevant ([<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref101">28</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib57" id="ref102">57</reflink>]). As SLs were recognized as fully fledged, natural languages at a later stage with [<reflink idref="bib70" id="ref103">70</reflink>] work on the structure of American Sign Language (ASL), early SL studies mostly aimed at mapping SL structure to that of SpL. Therefore, work on SLs tended to focus less on discourse-related aspects of interaction, which were viewed as outside the realm of linguistics proper. Secondly, data-wise, research rarely relied on face-to-face, spontaneous dialogues but rather drew directly from elicited narrative material (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib54" id="ref104">54</reflink>]Frog Story) and/or monologues, usually sampled from a small number of signers. This lack of interactional data for conducting corpus-based research is also related to the fact that digital corpora for SLs took a long time to come to the surface. With the advent of technological advances and the growing availability of corpus projects, including a more diverse set of SLs (see [<reflink idref="bib25" id="ref105">25</reflink>]), more research on the actual language use of signers can be carried out.</p> <p>There are exceptions, however. And the research conducted thus far on the management of SL interaction has focused on the core principles of the structure of conversation orchestrated within the turn-taking system. These include, for example, how deaf signers organize turn transitions (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref106">2</reflink>]), optimize turn timing (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref107">14</reflink>].), and orient to potentially troublesome overlapping moments in the exchange (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib33" id="ref108">33</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib55" id="ref109">55</reflink>]). In particular, the issue of overlap in signing has been approached from two main views. On the one hand, some scholars (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref110">2</reflink>] for ASL, [<reflink idref="bib13" id="ref111">13</reflink>] for British Sign Language (BSL), and [<reflink idref="bib46" id="ref112">46</reflink>] for Austrian Sign Language [ÖGS]) have argued for the higher frequency (and tolerance) of overlapping signing due to the visual nature of SLs that "allow[s] interactants to sign and observe another's signs without a loss of understanding, whereas in oral languages, it is more difficult to hear another's speech while talking" ([<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref113">2</reflink>]).</p> <p>On the other hand, others have pointed out similar turn-taking mechanisms, including overlap, between SpLs and SLs, despite this primary distinction in their channel of expression. Such studies show that, just like speakers, signers also finely coordinate their turns following [<reflink idref="bib60" id="ref114">60</reflink>] one-at-time model in conversation (e.g. [<reflink idref="bib7" id="ref115">7</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref116">14</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib34" id="ref117">34</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib33" id="ref118">33</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib55" id="ref119">55</reflink>]). It appears even that signers do so around a transition relevance place (TRP), that is, around potential and relevant completion points for enabling turn transitions between signers ([<reflink idref="bib33" id="ref120">33</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib34" id="ref121">34</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref122">14</reflink>]; [<reflink idref="bib55" id="ref123">55</reflink>]).</p> <p>The picture that emerges from these studies depicts a complex and intricately monitored human system that is highly sensitive to moment-by-moment input by all parties in a conversation. It further highlights the orderly nature in the organization of SL conversation also established for SpLs. Although there is more research on the conversational aspects of SLs, there is still little research devoted to specific interactional elements of SL discourse such as grounding mechanisms, which furthermore capitalizes on EMCA approaches. Moreover, to the best of our knowledge, work on collaborative overlap as the locus for analyzing grounding mechanisms in situ in a SL multiparty interaction has never been the object of attention.</p> <p>The current analysis addresses these gaps and aims to further explore the ways signers, within the interactional dynamics of overlap, make use of their bodies as a resource for establishing joint understanding in an ASL multiparty interaction. Here, we draw attention to three specific interactional practices, namely, backchannels, repairs, and alignment through repetition used for grounding information by four deaf friends conversing in ASL.</p> <p>Our analytic focus to observe these emerging strategies will be on a specific sequential environment of the turn-taking system, namely, when signers overlap each other's turns, and more specifically, on cooperative overlap. As previously discussed, cooperative overlap consists of extended moments of turn exchanges that move along the unfolding discourse while cohering interlocutors in relation to each other (compared to competitive overlap where participants compete for speakership).</p> <p>By focusing on the specific environments in the interaction where overlap occurs, we will be able to shed light on different yet specific interactional moves that signers perform to coordinate their discourse and display their mutual understanding to one another. These phenomena will each be illustrated in the results section, followed by a qualitative discussion of how they act as key resources for signers to signal understanding, that, in turn, ensures the smooth organization of conversation.</p> <p>This research contributes to the growing body of work devoted to the interactional aspects of talk-in-interaction in relation to SLs. Additionally, through overlap, we will shed further light on the dynamics of SL interaction, and on overlap as a collaborative strategy revealing the progressivity of interaction. Ultimately, this research will provide new and further insights into how deaf participants collaboratively construct meaning, manage turn-taking, and negotiate the emergence of grounding in a multiparty conversation. Next, we describe the data collection and analysis.</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-6">Methodology</hd> <p></p> <hd id="AN0177774407-7">Data Sample</hd> <p>The data analyzed within the current study stem from a larger dataset of video recordings of an informal multiparty interaction collected in 2012 as part of [<reflink idref="bib64" id="ref124">64</reflink>] PhD dissertation. That study was aimed at comparing the bodily practices hearing American English speakers and ASL deaf signers used while interacting and playing a Charades-like game called Guesstures. Two of the signers agreed to host a game night at their home, where the material was recorded. No modification to their home environment was made, so as to keep the interactions natural, and with as little obtrusion as possible. Except for the fact of playing the game, participants were not given any specific instructions regarding the research conducted. They were told, generally speaking, that the research involved looking at the ways hearing and deaf individuals communicate. The participants are four adult deaf signers (two couples) who have been using ASL as their primary language for most, if not all, of their lives. At the time of filming, the two couples were in their late thirties/early forties and were good friends.</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-8">Annotation Process</hd> <p>A total of thirty-three instances of collaborative overlapping signing were identified totaling approximately seven of the seventy-five minutes. Otherwise stated, just over 9 percent of the time, these interactants engaged in cooperative overlap. For this study, three sampled sequences (approximately one minute each) were selected from the larger dataset that illustrate some of the longest instances of overlapping signing, including a total of approximately three minutes. To identify which sequences to analyze using EMCA, we first reviewed the entire seventy-five minutes of the interaction for instances of overlapping signing that lasted more than one second (this length was determined to exclude the short overlaps that are known to occur between turns).</p> <p>We selected three sequences to analyze turn-by-turn according to the conversation analytic tradition because they showcase several of the cooperative strategies for grounding, namely providing feedback, signaling misunderstanding and repairing it, and reusing someone else's behavior for creating alignment. Annotation was first started in the ELAN software ([<reflink idref="bib71" id="ref125">71</reflink>]) after identifying the boundaries of the selected overlapping signing within the broader context of the interaction (e.g. when the signers overlapped signing while clarifying the number of days house guests visited, annotation of signs started when the topic was first opened). Each participant's left and right hands were ID-glossed based on [<reflink idref="bib43" id="ref126">43</reflink>] notation guidelines for SLs. Then, annotations were added to identify the bodily practices the four deaf participants relied on to keep the interaction on track and ensure mutual understanding.</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-9">Analysis</hd> <p>After annotations were complete, a modified approach to [<reflink idref="bib42" id="ref127">42</reflink>] transcriptions was employed. By annotating the selections in ELAN, we were able to capture the moment-by-moment transitions between interlocutors. Given that the ID-glosses correspond to English representations of ASL signs, we opted to then use clips of videos embedded in text documents to conduct the primary analysis of the overlapping signing. After identifying how the participants negotiated the sequences in the primary language, we then created screenshots of sequences to represent the turns. While this approach does not closely conform to the Jeffersonian textual transcription used for spoken discourse, we have found that it closely captures the simultaneity of overlapping bodily actions that are otherwise challenging to describe in written text.</p> <p>Additionally, we wish to note that [<reflink idref="bib60" id="ref128">60</reflink>] discussed how complex multiparty interactions can be with respect to turn-taking when there is less of a guarantee that people will hear what others are saying. While this cohort of interactants was not concerned with auditory disruptions, there was still a pressure to see co-occurring signed contributions. This particular multiparty interaction highlights some of the complexities of turn allocation when deaf interlocutors do not see each other and showcases strategies deaf people use to stay in sync with and engaged in the emergent discourse. We will discuss the three instances in the following sections.</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-10">Results</hd> <p></p> <hd id="AN0177774407-11">Sequence 1: timeaftertime (https://osf.io/7ue5f/)</hd> <p>We first zoom in on multiple actions the participants engage in to (re-)establish mutual understanding and reach common ground. In this first example, we draw attention to a moment in the interaction when participants incrementally work through what gestural forms are acceptable for use during the game. Recall, the players are all signing deaf people playing a gesture game, which means (we presume) they were actively suppressing what they deemed to be codified signs when they were performing the clues.</p> <p>The excerpt of interest here features grounding actions that were executed via multiple articulators, including PU by all participants. This case shows how interlocutors leverage visible demonstrations of mutual understanding as their common ground transforms.</p> <p>The four participants engage here in a twenty-five-second discussion about the form they call time and consider whether it is a legitimate expression to gesture for the clue "time" (pictured in figure 1 by Participant 04 [P04]). The issue at hand, here, is that the ASL</p> <p>Graph: Figure 1. P04 (bottom right) asks P02 (top left) about the sign time. Note. The [ ] in the transcript indicates something that was signed but not pictured in the screenshot.</p> <p>sign time is identical to the gesture that hearing people use to ask the time. The player who had just performed a clue prior to this exchange (P02) was questioning her use of a form—where she enacted milking a cow with both hands—as looking too similar to the ASL sign milk.</p> <p>As she returned to her seat (figure 1), still questioning her choice of the gesture for milk, P04 responds by signing time.</p> <p>P04 waves to get P02's attention and then launches into an utterance where he repeats the sign time four times, spells "time," and then signs time two more times before producing a PU with extended thumb and index finger, holding it for one second (What about time?) (figure 1). During P04's held PU, P02 mouths "time," lowering her brows indicating she does not understand what he means. This OIR signals a trouble source in the conversation and prompts P04 to give more information: "ix_1 fs (did) ix_1 time pu fs (time) time pu" (I gestured TIME) (figure 2).</p> <p>P02's repair initiation not only overlaps P04's PU but also repeats an aspect of his prior turn (thus pointing backward and forward; [<reflink idref="bib23" id="ref129">23</reflink>]). She extracted the semantic portion of his proposition—mouthing the English equivalent of the sign time—and repeated it with lowered brows, effectively marking the trouble spot as the</p> <p>Graph: Figure 2. Other Initiated Repair: P04 repairs the trouble source with a two-way overlap.</p> <p>meaning of the sign rather than its form. P04 recognizes the misunderstanding and says i "d-i-d" time, using the verb "did" to make the sign time an object of the verb, pointing out he performed the form.</p> <p>P02 finally understands what P04 means. She mouths "oh" (figure 2) then signs that pu public hearing (Well, that's general, hearing people), trying to explain that that sign (time) is a general form used by hearing people (figure 3). Just as she completes the sign public and begins to sign hearing, P04 breaks eye contact and turns to his wife (P03) to ask if his clue was "clock" or "time" (figure 3). P02 continues to sign and attempts to regain P04's eye gaze, but P04 and P03 share mutual gaze. So, while signing is overlapping here three ways, P02's proposition is not taken up until the question-answer sequence between P03 and P04 is satisfied. P03 signs time confirming that the clue was "time" while her husband repeats the sign time. P02 has caught on; she also signs time even though P03 and P04 are still not looking at her (figure 4).</p> <p>P02's signing is not seen by the other couple, yet she continues to repeat the sign until she gets eye contact with the others. The repetition</p> <p>Graph: Figure 3. Two-way overlap between P02 (top left) and P04 (bottom right).</p> <p>Graph: Figure 4. Three-way overlap between P02, P03 (bottom left), and P04.</p> <p>Graph: Figure 5. Four-way overlap with all participants.</p> <p>effectively keeps her engaged in the interactive trajectory of this exchange. Once P03 and P04 shift attention to P02, she begins her proposition that time is basically a gesture, but she forgets the word and begins to generate a cyclic gesture ([<reflink idref="bib47" id="ref130">47</reflink>]) as she searches for it (figure 5).</p> <p>This four-way overlap merits some unpacking. P01, seated to P02's left, complies with the word-search call, quickly replying, "gesture. gesture. gesture pu" (Gesture, it's a gesture) (figures 5 and 6). His proposition is expressed simultaneously with P03 and P04. P03 turns to her husband, having taken up the topic that the sign is widely used, then she signs "that hearing people, hearing people" (Hearing people- hearing people use that) (figure 6). P03's utterance overlaps her husband's talk though. P04 is replying to P02 and P01's claim "pu fs (guesstures) ix (points to box) word" (Well, we are playing Guesstures). P02 nods affirmatively with raised PU while her husband continues to repeat "gesture pu."</p> <p>Graph: Figure 6. Continuation of four-way overlap with all participants.</p> <p>Finally reaching common ground, the interlocutors engage in something like choral repetition of gesture and time replete with head nods and eye gaze checks (figure 7) cementing the four interlocutors together.</p> <p>Notice, they have only reached consensus about time counting as a gesture. They have not addressed P02's initial complaint that her gesture for "milk" was too similar to the ASL sign milk. Several strategies were deployed to maintain interactional synchrony during the cooperative overlap. The signers track each other visually to stay open for new information. They also repeat signs to be seen. Finally, the overlap is effective because there is resonance across signers in terms of the topic being discussed as well as the forms being expressed. The interlocutors were drawn into a series of turns, characterized by trouble sources and repairs, repetitions, and holds, that led to mutual understanding of only one part of a broader topic that seemed to diffuse from consciousness as time passed. What is remarkable in this</p> <p>Graph: Figure 7. Three-way overlap between P01, P03, and P04.</p> <p>brief exchange is the amount of repetition and simultaneous signing that the interlocutors manually express. When reading a written transcript of the glosses, very little propositional content is delivered via the hands. Most of the communicative work is carried out via other articulators, as well as via the timing of their expression. Shared eye gaze, lowered and raised eyebrows, and extensions, repetitions, and holds of signs are indicators of the human communicative competence and of the multimodal nature of human communication.</p> <p>Interactively, though, what did transpire in this twenty-second interlude? All four participants engage in cooperative overlap, ultimately coming to an agreement that some signs are also gestures that hearing people use. Their discussion is pushed forward by the repetition and simultaneous expression of signs. Multiple articulators are implicated in the utterances, namely eye gaze, facial expressions, and mouthing. The overlapping signing does not impede the flow and guarantees that the conversation transpires smoothly. Repeating utterances is doubly efficient since there are four different sets of eyes to manage; by repeating the same utterance, one is guaranteed someone will see it.</p> <p>Repetition also occurs across signers. In the first instance that we saw, the repetition of time (manually signed and mouthed) between P02 and P04 served as a request for clarification (P02 did not understand why P04 was bringing up time). The second instance, between P04 and P03, served as a confirmation (that P04 had used time to gesture the clue "time"). The third instance, between P04 and P02, opened a new, related topic that time is a general form that hearing people also use. Here, participants are stitching together their turns at talk via both timing and the mirroring of each other's expressions to get on the same page.</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-12">Sequence 2: How many days? (https://osf.io/7ue5f/)</hd> <p>This next series of turns showcases two different actions that are accomplished by overlapping signing. The moments we will highlight include an instance where interlocutors mirror each other's content and engage in extended repair sequences intended to clarify. This sequence is initiated by P01, who opens the topic of the number of house guests P03 and P04 have had that summer, saying that their house has been like a hotel. P03 emphatically agrees. P01 states that P04's sister came to visit. Halfway through his execution of sister, P04 starts signing "since fs (June)" (figure 8):</p> <p>Graph: Figure 8. Two-way overlap between P01 (top left) and P04 (bottom right).</p> <p>Graph: Figure 9. Three-way overlap between P01, P03, and P04.</p> <p>P01 and P04 overlap while shifting between roles of signer/addressee. As P04 spells "june," P01 overlaps and repeats "june," and P03 joins in overlapping signing and signs two-weeks (figure 9) while looking at P03 then returning gaze to P01. Notably, P03 first extends her sign two-weeks close to P04 (presumably, so he can see in his periphery). P04 continues on a different trajectory, but this co-occurring move effectively delivers a co-constructed proposition (that they have had guests visiting since June and that their current guest has been there for two weeks).</p> <p>Now, a three-way overlap between P01, P03, and P04 is transpiring. P01 is the initial requestor of information, but he also seems to have some personal common ground before introducing the topic. He knew that P04's sister was visiting and that she was staying for two weeks. We can presume that this shared common ground engendered resonance that made it cognitively easier to tolerate overlap here, given that P03 and P04 are not exactly repeating each other's discourse. We might expect the couple to say similar things, given they directly experienced the events under discussion. Instead, we see exact repetition between P03 and P01—the questioner and the respondent. P03 first signs two-weeks then P01 echoes that with</p> <p>Graph: Figure 10. Two-way overlap between P01 and P03.</p> <p>her a second time while nodding in confirmation (figure 10). Then, P01 signs next-to which P03 echoes to identify the next visitor (figure 11).</p> <p>For P04, next-to did not signal a request for who came next but rather what came next, and he overlaps with the other two signing</p> <p>Graph: Figure 11. Three-way overlap between P01, P03, and P04.</p> <p>ix_1 vamoose fs (beach) vacation vamoose (We left for the beach) while his wife is formulating who came next and for how long. Two important points are worth noting in this example. First, P01 effectively feeds P03 what to say next. Her compliance (signaled by her simultaneous signing what he signed) not only moves the discourse forward in a way that keeps them on topic but also coheres the talk to each other. Second, P04 engages in overlapping signing that does not earn a turn despite the topical resonance between them. Both P03 and P04 simultaneously deliver two different propositions to P01 who can only attend to one of these at a time, showing that there are limits to overlap in sign. P01, based on eye gaze, selects P03 who continues with her talk while her husband abandons his.</p> <p>P03 names their next guest, signing at the same time P01 repeats the name and adds remember ix while nodding. This is a clear example of the addressee making it known that he understands who she is talking about—they have established common ground in this moment (he knows the person about whom she is speaking). As soon as his backchannel has been produced, she is able to move forward to discuss the length of time the visitor stayed. P03 says think i(umm) almost one-week (I think almost a week) as she signs almost while looking at her husband who is signing two-days two-days (For two days) (figure 12).</p> <p>Graph: Figure 12. Two-way overlap between P03 and P04.</p> <p>Graph: Figure 13. Two-way overlap between P03 (top left) and P04 (bottom right).</p> <p>P04's turn was an attempt at co-constructing the utterance that his wife initiated—he began signing two-days right as she completed almost—but his contribution was deemed incorrect immediately since she overlapped his turn with one-week. They sustained reciprocal eye contact at this point which allowed them to continue in an extended clarification sequence with bursts of overlapping signing interspersed with holds and repetition which we explicate here.</p> <p>The trouble spot is first signaled by the wife who shakes her head "no" while her husband signed two-days for the second time. She signs three. no- (figures 12 and 13) then begins to recount which days the guest had visited: "sunday. monday tuesday (~1s)" (figure 13).</p> <p>Two OIRs occur here—one by P03 and one by P04—but because they share personal common ground, these sequences of overlap are cooperative in that they are working together to determine first, how many days, and then which days, they hosted the guest.</p> <p>P03 holds tuesday while looking at P04 who shakes his head "no" and signs monday tuesday (figure 13). She takes up his</p> <p>Graph: Figure 14. Two-way overlap between P03 and P04.</p> <p>new proposition, repeating part of what he said ("monday") then stopping herself, signing "no. sunday" and nodding with certainty at this point (figure 14). Her husband begins to overlap her signing "sunday monday finish" (Sunday, Monday, that's it)—all interjected at exactly the same time as she signs then holds sunday and emphasizes (via finish) the number of days as two (not three). Then they both repeat, simultaneously, sunday, monday tuesday (figure 14). At this point, P03 then adds "postpone postpone postpone pu"—meaning the guest kept extending their stay beyond what was planned (figure 15).</p> <p>When she holds the pu, her husband adds "two night finish. two night two night two night" (Two nights, that's it. Two nights. Two nights), shifting his original claim (i.e. the guest stayed two days) to a new one that they had stayed two nights. By his third repetition, she repeats the sequence of days, this time adding how many nights the guest stayed over: "sunday night monday night tuesday all-day and-then ix-1 ds_c (group go to) ns (person's name omitted) home all-night morning"</p> <p>Graph: Figure 15. Two-way overlap between P03 and P04.</p> <p>(Sunday night, Monday night, then Tuesday all day. Then we all went to [person's] house and stayed all night until the morning.) (figure 16).</p> <p>It is worth mentioning here the length of time P04 holds the sign finish—a full two seconds while P03 recounts the number of days (three, not two) they had the guest. This conclusion of the length of</p> <p>Graph: Figure 16. Two-way overlap between P03 and P04.</p> <p>the stay is received with several prominent head nods of comprehension and agreement by her husband as well as signing and holding finish during her entire final sequence followed by right. They have reached common ground, and both are able to claim being correct (a very important outcome for a married couple). Interestingly, taken together, the two overlapping contributions depicted in figures 15 and 16 can be interpreted as a unit (i.e. our guest was with us Sunday night, Monday night, and all day Tuesday; then we all went to [that person's] house and stayed the night until the morning; that's all." Whereas initially, the couple were doing clarification work, by the end of the exchange, they were doing confirmation work. The difference between simultaneous signing that is clarifying versus confirming is signaled, perhaps not surprisingly, via facial expressions (lowered brows to signal disagreement, raised brows when agreement is reached), head shakes/nods (to signal trouble spots or continue, respectively), and also manual expressions (e.g. no, finish, right). There is also precise timing involved—one interlocutor's coexpression with the other necessitates close observation of the current signer's movements (both manual and nonmanual) for the signing not to be taken as a hostile interruption but rather a cooperative addition to the current talk. It is worth reemphasizing here how central the nonmanual articulators are to the success of these precisely timed interjections and overlapping talk. Without the mutual ratification, overlapping signing simply does not work (as we saw in P04's overlapping turn in figure 11 that failed).</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-13">Sequence 3: Heavy glasses (https://osf.io/7ue5f/)</hd> <p>We turn now to our final sequence of cooperative overlap that involves depiction. P01 and P04 begin their discussion of the release of an Avengers movie that P01 had recently seen. P01 first mentions that he saw the movie in the theater. P01 was not interested in the content of the movie, though, and instead wanted to tell P04 about the new captioning technology that this movie theater had provided. At the time of filming (in the early 2010s), movie theaters were experimenting with various captioning devices for deaf audiences. One of the approaches involved open captioning where certain movies would include English captions. P01 wanted to tell P04 about a new</p> <p>Graph: Figure 17. P01 introduces the topic of new captioning glasses.</p> <p>device which included captioning projected on eyeglasses that could be worn during any movie at any time. This sequence prompted both men to engage in overlapping depictive constructions that will be discussed here. P01 opens the discussion, asserting that this particular movie theater now has "new glasses" that replace Open Captioning (figure 17).</p> <p>P04 expresses surprise and interest at first (not pictured) which invites P01 to go on to describe how the glasses are convenient in that they allow Deaf people to see any movie at any time. P01 states "swell not have limit" (It's cool, there are no limits [to when you see a movie]) (figure 18). P04 waves for a turn just as P01 signs swell, repeats P01's sign for glasses while making an awkward facial expression, and then depicts words being projected on a screen right in front of his own face (figure 18).</p> <p>Determining whether this overlap is competitive or cooperative requires a closer look at the content of each signer's proposition. An alternate possibility, that P04 meant to interrupt P01 and was competing for the floor, appears to be backed up here given that he is proposing a distinct claim (that the glasses were not cool but annoying). P04's first move in this sequence, then, is decidedly competitive, not cooperative. However, P01 quickly redirects his stance from praising the convenience of the glasses to criticizing them due to the experience of wearing them. We will see next how the interlocutors work together in overlapping cooperative depiction to show this alignment.</p> <p>Graph: Figure 18. Two-way overlap between P01 and P04.</p> <p>P01 confirms that the device was harder to manage because it was both heavy (not pictured) and there were words streaming in front of his eyes (figure 19). While saying this, P04 points to him and nods, acknowledging that that experience was likely uncomfortable and aligns with him. Now, having entered an interactive moment when both are on the same page, the two begin signing simultaneously, depicting two different, yet related, scenes that are also overlaid with their aligned perspective that this new technology, while innovative and cool, is awkward and weird. P01 starts by depicting himself in the movie theater with the glasses on, moving his head away from the movie screen but still seeing the text displayed on the glasses (figure 19).</p> <p>P04 overlaps depicting the self wearing these heavy goggle glasses that push down on his nose. P01 signs look look look while showing how words follow wherever he turns his head, while P04 depicts the two lines of text following his gaze all over the place (figure 20). Here, the two are most in sync with their movements and the scenes they depict. They both profile the self—turning to look</p> <p>Graph: Figure 19. Two-way overlap between P01 and P04. Child's face is obscured by the white box.</p> <p>Graph: Figure 20. Two-way overlap between P01 and P04.</p> <p>Graph: Figure 21. Two-way overlap between P01 and P04.</p> <p>away from the screen—P01 signs look while P04 shows the two lines of text following the movement of his head (figure 21). Their movements also literally mirror each other, both sweeping from right to left.</p> <p>What can be said about this sequence that began as an informational exchange (P01 telling P04 about this new technology) and transformed into a sort of co-performance of the experience (actual in P01's case, hypothetical in P04's) that was also an evaluation of the technology itself? The depictive spaces invoked in this sequence were based on actual and imagined body-as-self scenes ([<reflink idref="bib22" id="ref131">22</reflink>]). Why would the signers engage in (or allow) extended expressions of these two overlapping, yet distinct, depictive spaces? Based on the evaluative markers happening (via nonmanuals), it appears as though they are both aligning stances on the technology. Once aligned, the co-expression of depictions becomes possible, it seems. At first, P01 proposes that this technology is novel in that it allows deaf people to watch movies any time. But that tone shifts when P04 proffers that the glasses are possibly cumbersome and the words visually intrusive. P01 quickly agrees with this proposition and enacts his own real experience as being bizarre (sick), seeing words everywhere he turned his head. Then the simultaneous depictions become a sort of play that the two engage in, not a competition to out-depict one another, but a show of visual prominence of the imagined scenes they were both in. Overlapping cooperative depiction, here, shows how one interlocutor can embody the experience that he has not lived. In this cooperative overlap, we see stances aligning minds and bodies ([<reflink idref="bib19" id="ref132">19</reflink>]).</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-14">Summary and Discussion</hd> <p>This article set out to explore how a group of deaf ASL signers jointly built and ensured mutually shared understanding during seemingly messy moments of simultaneous signing. Capitalizing on the techniques of EMCA, we adopted a framework that not only goes beyond the propositional content of talk but also emphasized a "socially contextualized perspective able to capture the detailed interactional and reciprocal embeddings of visual bodily signals" ([<reflink idref="bib37" id="ref133">37</reflink>].), thereby embracing the ethnomethodological aspect of CA. We asked two questions at the outset of this study: (<reflink idref="bib1" id="ref134">1</reflink>) What embodied strategies are used to negotiate overlaps while maintaining interactional synchrony? And (<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref135">2</reflink>) When extended overlaps occurred, what interactional joint actions do participants engage in? With respect to the first question, we observed a set of behaviors (backchanneling, repair, and repetition) that the interlocutors consistently used during overlapping signing to move the interaction forward. Repetition of lexical signs and even depicted scenes was observed. Nonmanual moves figured prominently during overlapping signing, including facial expressions, direction of eye gaze, and head moves. With respect to the second question, there were several types of actions these participants engaged in beyond merely cooperating during these overlaps. Interactants overlapped each other to clarify, confirm, deny, and take a stance.</p> <p>When negotiating these overlaps, the ASL signers draw from a set of interactional practices for grounding information in the here and now. These overlaps seem to both expedite mutual understanding (by allowing multiple signers to make moves simultaneously) and reinforce it once achieved. As a result, the interactants built and maintained interactional synchrony. We showcased three moments from the seventy-five-minute interaction, where interlocutors tolerated such extended overlaps. From this, we saw the interactants closely monitoring each other's moves—literally and metaphorically—and delivering content while attuning to their recipients' respective physical and social orientations. One of the sequences contained competition for a turn (the very first move before the synchronized depiction occurred), but the rest was acknowledged, accepted, and integrated into the sequential unfolding of the emergent discourse. For example, one signer extended her signing hand into her neighboring interactant's periphery while he was looking at his addressee across the table. Others repeated signs until they regained reciprocal gaze. These mechanisms are functionally efficient for the transmission of visual signals. We also saw instances of repairs embedded in cooperative overlaps that helped push forward the trajectory of the talk in progress. In one case, these extended repairs between one couple resulted in both "winning" an argument about how many days a guest had visited. Still another instance showed an interactant guiding his interlocutor to provide the next piece of information. We closed with several sequences of overlapping depiction where one participant enacted his own experience while the other simultaneously embodied it as he imagined it to be.</p> <hd id="AN0177774407-15">Limitations and Potential Future Avenues</hd> <p>This study showcased a detailed look at several moments in a single, multiparty interaction. Following the EMCA tradition, we are cautious in ascribing larger patterns to other interactional moments in different contexts with different individuals. The conversation we analyzed reflects the discourse practices of these four participants. Future work should expand these techniques to other SLs, dialects, and contexts to capture a more precise description of these overlapping practices among deaf signing people. However, we have set out to shed light on an interactional practice often overlooked in SL linguistics. Though we did not conduct a quantitative study of cooperative overlap (see [<reflink idref="bib7" id="ref136">7</reflink>] for such a study in VGT (Flemish Sign Language) and LSFB (French Belgian Sign Language), we see potential for this kind of qualitative analysis in corpus-based studies. There are still open questions as to whether or not deaf signers engage in more (or less) overlap than not only hearing speakers but also hearing signers. Here, we were less concerned with the frequency and more concerned with how they accomplished it when it did occur. Cross-modal comparisons of multiparty interactions between deaf and hearing cohorts in the same cultural context might reveal fruitful comparisons with respect to cooperative overlap and overlap more broadly. Additionally, it remains to be seen if fluent hearing signers in multiparty interactions might engage in similar types of overlapping signing. If fluent hearing signers exhibit different patterns than deaf fluent signers, then we might be able to make claims as to whether embodied practices may be unique to deaf bodies. Finally, our data contained a few instances of four-way cooperative overlap, but these moments did not last as long, nor happened as frequently, as the two-way and three-way configurations. It would be interesting to examine four-way overlapping moments more closely across different contexts to see how deaf signers negotiate the constraints of eye gaze in their efforts to maintain interactional synchrony.</p> <p>This study applies insights from EMCA to look at how deaf signers ensure grounding while engaging in overlapping signing. These practices are, of course, fully embodied and require visual attention to be taken up. In this regard, this study opens up avenues for more work at the crossroads between the fields of (SL) linguistics, cognitive sciences, interactional linguistics, and corpus-based studies. By focusing on how grounding is constantly established and re-updated in SL interaction through different interactional practices emerging locally as part of the turn-taking system, our current study complements prior work on SL interaction that has considered aspects of the turn-taking machinery like turn-timing ([<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref137">14</reflink>]) and turn transitions ([<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref138">2</reflink>]). It further provides a granular look at moments when the timing of turn initiations and transitions are occurring all at once. We also show, like previous work, that signers carefully attend to the tight organizational nature of conversation. These data nicely echo [<reflink idref="bib36" id="ref139">36</reflink>] claim that "human conduct could not be so coherent and meaningful, and in such subtle and nuanced ways, in the absence of such organization" (<reflink idref="bib235" id="ref140">235</reflink>).</p> <p>Taken together, these messy moments provide a glimpse into the enchronic glue [<reflink idref="bib23" id="ref141">23</reflink>] advises analysts to pay attention to. Overlapping signing here is only experienced as messy by the outsider's gaze. Looking closely at the unfolding turns shows these interactants did not experience the overlapping discourse as uncoordinated or adroit. Rather, they seem to comfortably adapt and respond to shifts developing topical resonance and interactional attunement. We set forth these data as a contribution to the broader discussion of how to reconcile EMCA and the field of cognitive science ([<reflink idref="bib19" id="ref142">19</reflink>], [<reflink idref="bib31" id="ref143">31</reflink>]). The aligning of two (or more) minds, as these data show, requires the aligning of two (or more) bodies in situ. Understanding how signers coordinate these messy moments of interaction can in turn inform us on speakers' multimodal constructions and how they negotiate understanding through their bodies (see for instance the freeze-look in SpL interactions, e.g. [<reflink idref="bib53" id="ref144">53</reflink>]). Understanding the relevant interactional practices such as backchanneling, repair, and repetition to signal (mis-) understanding, and how they work, is important for understanding the deeply social and cooperative nature of language regardless of its predominant channel of expression, signed or spoken.</p> <ref id="AN0177774407-16"> <title> Footnotes </title> <blist> <bibl id="bib1" idref="ref10" type="bt">1</bibl> <bibtext> Enfield (2022) lists a number of causal frames that are dynamic processes involved in shaping language as we know it and accounting for why languages are the way they are. In addition to the enchronic frame, these include the diachronic, phylogenetic, ontogenetic, and microgenetic frames.</bibtext> </blist> </ref> <ref id="AN0177774407-17"> <title> REFERENCES </title> <blist> <bibtext> Albert, S., and J. P. de Ruiter. 2018. Repair: The Interface between Interaction and Cognition. Topics in Cognitive Sciences 10 (2): 279–313.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib2" idref="ref28" type="bt">2</bibl> <bibtext> Baker, Ch. 1977. Regulators and Turn-Taking in American Sign Language Discourse. In On the Other Hand: New Perspectives on American Sign Language, ed. L. A. Friedman, 215–36. Cambridge, MA: Academic Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib3" idref="ref11" type="bt">3</bibl> <bibtext> Bangerter, A., and H. H. Clark. 2003. Navigating Joint Projects with Dialogue. Cognitive Science 27 (2): 195–225.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib4" idref="ref6" type="bt">4</bibl> <bibtext> Bavelas, J. B. 2022. Face-to-Face Dialogue: Theory, Research, and Applications. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib5" idref="ref47" type="bt">5</bibl> <bibtext> Bavelas, J. B., N. Chovil, L. Coates, and L. Roe. 1995. Gestures specialized for dialogue. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 21(4): 394–405.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib6" idref="ref35" type="bt">6</bibl> <bibtext> Bavelas J. B., J. Gerwing, and S. Healing. 2017. Doing Mutual Understanding. Calibrating with Micro-sequences in Face-to-Face Dialogue. Journal of Pragmatics 121:91–112.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib7" idref="ref45" type="bt">7</bibl> <bibtext> Beukeleers, I., and A. Lepeut. 2022. Who's Got the Upper Hand? A Cross-linguistic Study on Overlap in VGT and LSFB. In On the Semiotic Diversity of Language: The Case of Signed Languages, ed. A. Lepeut and I. Beukeleers, 212–46. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib8" idref="ref61" type="bt">8</bibl> <bibtext> Byun, K.-S., C. de Vos, U. Zeshan, and S. Levinson. 2020. Repair in Cross-signing: Trouble Sources, Repair Strategies and Communicative Success. In Sign Multilingualism, ed. U. Zeshan and J. Webster, 23–80. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib9" idref="ref7" type="bt">9</bibl> <bibtext> Clark, H. H. 1996. Using Language. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Clark, H. H., and S. E. Brennan. 1991. Grounding in Communication. In Perspectives on Socially Shared Cognition, ed. L. B. Resnick, J. M. Levine, and S. D. Teasley, 127–49. Washington, DC: APA Books.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Clark, H. H., and R. Gerrig. 1990. Quotations as Demonstrations. Language 66 (4): 764–805.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Clark, H. H., and E. F. Schaefer. 1989. Contributing to Discourse. Cognitive Science 13:259–94.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Coates, J., and R. Sutton-Spence. 2001. Turn-Taking Patterns in Deaf Conversation. Journal of Sociolinguistics 5:507–29.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> de Vos, C., F. Torreira, and S.C. Levinson. 2015. Turn-Timing in Signed Conversations: Coordinating Stroke-to-Stroke Boundaries. Frontiers in Psychology 6 (268). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00268.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Dideriksen, C., R. Fusaroli, K. Tylén, M. Dingemanse, and M. H. Christiansen. 2019. Backchannel, Repair and Linguistic Alignment in Spontaneous and Task-Oriented Conversations. In Proceedings of the 41st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, eds. A. K. Goel, C. M. Seifert, and C. Freksa, 261 – 67. Montreal, QB: Cognitive Science Society.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Dingemanse, M. 2015. Other-Initiated Repair in Siwu. Open Linguistics 1: 232–55.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Dingemanse, M., and N. J. Enfield. 2015. Other-Initiated Repair across Languages: Towards a Typology of Conversational Structures. Open Linguistics 1: 96–118.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Dingemanse, M., and S. Floyd. 2014. Conversation across Cultures. In The Cambridge Handbook of Linguistic Anthropology, ed. N. J. Enfield, P. Kockelman, and J. Sidnell, 447–80. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Dingemanse, M., A. Liesenfeld, M. Rasenberg, A. Albert, F. K. Ameka, A. Birhane, D. Bolis et al. 2023. Beyond Single-Mindedness: A Figure-Ground Reversal for the Cognitive Sciences, Cognitive Science 47 (1). https://doi.org/10.1111/cogs.13230.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Dingemanse, M., S. G. Roberts, J. Baranova, J. Blythe, P. Drew, S. Floyd, R. S. Gisladottir, et al. 2015. Universal Principles in the Repair of Communication Problems. PLoS One 10 (9). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0136100.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Du Bois, J. 2007. The Stance Triangle. In Stancetaking in Discourse: Subjectivity, Evaluation, Interaction, ed. R. Englebretson, 139–82. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Dudis, P. 2011. The Body in Scene Depictions. In Discourse in Signed Languages, ed. C. Roy, 3–45. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Enfield, N. J. 2022. Enchrony. WIRES Cognitive Science 13 (4). https://doi.org/10.1002/wcs.1597.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Enfield, N. J. 2009. The Anatomy of Meaning: Speech, Gesture, and Composite Utterances. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Fenlon, J., and J. Hochgesang, eds. 2022. Signed Language Corpora. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Fenlon, J. A., A. Schembri, and R. Sutton-Spence. 2013. Turn-Taking and Backchannel Behaviour in BSL Conversations. Poster presented at TISLR 11, July 10–13, University College London.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Ferrara, L. 2020. Some Interactional Functions of Finger Pointing in Signed Language Conversations. Glossa: Journal of General Linguistics 5 (1): 1–26</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Ferrara, L., and G. Hodge. 2018. Language as Description, Indication, and Depiction. Frontiers in Psychology 9 (716). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00716.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Floyd, S. 2015. Other-Initiated Repair in Cha'palaa. Open Linguistics 1:467–89.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Floyd, S., E. Manrique, G. Rossi, and F. Torreira. 2016. Timing of Visual Bodily Behavior in Repair Sequences: Evidence from Three Languages. Discourse Processes 53 (3): 175–204.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Fusaroli, R., K. Tylén, K. Garly, J. Steensig, M. H. Christiansen, and M. Dingemanse. 2017. Measures and Mechanisms of Common Ground: Backchannels, Conversational Repair, and Interactive Alignment in Free and Task-Oriented Social Interactions. In Proceedings of the 39th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, 2055–60. Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Garfinkel, H. 1967. Studies in Ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliff, NJ: Prentice Hall.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Girard-Groeber, S. 2015. The Management of Turn Transition in Signed Interaction through the Lens of Overlaps. Frontiers in Psychology 6 (741). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00741.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Groeber, S., and E. Pochon-Berger. 2014. Turns and Turn-Taking in Sign Language Interaction: a Study of Turn-Final Holds. Journal of Pragmatics 65: 121–36.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Healey, P., M. Lavelle C. Howes S. Battersby and R. McCabe R. 2013. How Listeners Respond to Speaker's Troubles. In Proceedings of the 35th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, 2506–11. Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Heritage, J. 1984. Garfinkel and Ethnomethodology. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Holler, J. 2022. Visual Bodily Signals as Core Devices for Coordinating Minds in Interaction. Philisophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 377:20210094.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Holler, J., and J. Bavelas. 2017. Multi-Modal Communication of Common Ground: A Review of Social Functions. In Why Gesture? How the Hands Function in Speaking, Thinking and Communicating, ed. R. B. Church, M. W. Alibali, and S. D. Kelly, 213–40. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Holler, J., and S. C. Levinson. 2019. Multimodal Language Processing in Human Communication. Trends in Cognitive Science 23 (8): 639–52.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Holler, J., and K. Wilkin. 2011. Co-speech Gesture Mimicry in the Process of Collaborative Referring during Face-to-Face Dialogue. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior 35:133–53.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Hömke, P., J. Holler, and S. C., Levinson. 2017. Eye Blinking as Addressee Feedback in Face-to-Face Conversation. Research on Language and Social Interaction 50:54–70.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Jefferson, G. 2004. A Sketch of Some Orderly Aspects of Overlap in Natural Conversation. In Conversation Analysis: Studies from the First Generation, ed. G. H. Lerner, 43–59. Philadelphia: John Benjamins.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Johnston, T. 2010. Auslan Corpus Annotation Guidelines. Sydney: Centre for Language Sciences, Macquarie University.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Kärkkäinen, E. 2006. Stance Taking in Conversation: From Subjectivity to Intersubjectivity. Text &amp; Talk: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Language, Discourse Communication Studies 26 (6): 699–731.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Kimbara, I. 2008 Gesture form Convergence in Joint Description. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior 32:123–31.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Lackner, A. 2009. Turn-Taking und Dialogstruktur in der Österreichischen Gebärdensprache. Eine Gesprächsanalyse der Salzburger Variante. Das Zeichen 81:90–104.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Ladewig, S. H. 2014. The Cyclic Gesture. In Body—Language—Communication: An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction 38.2, ed. C. Müller, A. Cienki, E. Fricke, S. H. Ladewig, D. McNeill, and J. Bressem, 1605–18. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Lepeut, A. 2022. When Hands Stop Moving, Interaction Keeps Going: A Study of Holds in the Management of LSFB and Spoken French Interactions. Languages in Contrast 22 (2): 290–321.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Lepeut, A., and E. Shaw. 2022. Time Is Ripe to Make Interactional Moves: Bringing Evidence from Four Languages across Modalities. Frontiers in Communication 7. https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2022.780124.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Levinson, S. C. 2015. Other-Initiated Repair in Yelî Dnye: Seeing Eye-to-Eye in the Language of Rossel Island. Open Linguistics 1:386–410.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Levinson, S. C., and F. Torreira. 2015. Timing in Turn-Taking and Its Implications for Processing Models of Language. Frontiers in Psychology 6 (731): 10–26.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Manrique, E. 2016. Other-Initiated Repair in Argentine Sign Language. Open Linguistics 2 (1): 1–34.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Manrique, E., and N. J. Enfield. 2015. Suspending the Next Turn as a Form of Repair Initiation: Evidence from Argentine Sign Language. Frontiers in Psychology 6 (1326). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01326.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Mayer, M. 1969. Frog, Where Are You? New York: Dial.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> McCleary, L. E., and T. de Arantes Leite. 2013. Turn-Taking in Brazilian Sign Language: Evidence from Overlap. Journal of Interactional Research in Communication Disorders 4 (1): 123–54.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Mesch, J. 2016. Manual Backchannel Responses in Signers' Conversations in Swedish Sigh Language. Language and Communication 50:22–41.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Perniss, P. 2018. Why We Should Study Multimodal Language. Frontiers in Psychology, 9 (1109). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01109.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Pickering, M. J., and S. Garrod. 2004. Toward a Mechanistic Psychology of Dialogue. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 27 (2): 169–90.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Rasenberg, M., A. Özyürek, and M. Dingemanse. 2020. Alignment in Multimodal Interaction: An Integrative Framework, Cognitive Science 44:e12911.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Sacks, H., E. A. Schegloff, and G. Jefferson. 1974. A Simplest Systematics for the Organization of Turn-Taking for Conversation. Language 50 (4): 696–735.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Schegloff, E. A. 2000. Overlapping Talk and the Organization of Turn-Taking for Conversation. Language in Society 29:1–63.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Schegloff, E. A., G. Jefferson, and H. Sacks. 1977. The Preference for Self-Correction in the Organization of Repair in Conversation. Language 53 (2): 361–82.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Schiffrin, D. 1987. Discourse Markers. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Shaw, E. 2013. Gesture in Multiparty Interaction: A Study of Embodied Discourse in Spoken English and American Sign Language. PhD diss., Georgetown University, Washington, DC.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Shaw, E. 2019. Gesture in Multiparty Interaction. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Sikveland, R. O., and R. A. Ogden. 2012. Holding Gestures across Turns: Moments to Generate Shared Understanding. Gesture 12 (2): 166–99.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Skedsmo, K. 2020. Multiple Other-Initiations of Repair in Norwegian Sign Language. Open Linguistics 6: 532–66.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Stivers, T. 2021. Is Conversation Built for Two? The Partitioning of Social Interaction. Research on Language and Social Interaction 54 (1): 1–19.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Stivers, T., N. J. Enfield, P. Brown, C. Englert, M. Hayashi, T. Heinemann, G. Hoymann et al. 2009. Universals and Cultural Variation in Turn-Taking in Conversation. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 106 (26): 10587–92.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Stokoe, W. 1960. Sign Language Structure: An Outline of the Visual Communication Systems of the American Deaf. Studies in Linguistics, Occasional Papers 8. Buffalo, New York: University of Buffalo.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Wittenburg, P., H. Brugman, A. Russel, A. Klassmann, and H. Sloetjes. 2006. ELAN: A Professional Framework for Multimodality Research. In Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC 2006), 1556–1559. Luxembourg: European Language Resources Association (ELRA).</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Yngve, V. 1970. On Getting a Word in Edgewise. Paper from the Sixth Regional Meeting of Chicago Linguistic Society. Chicago Linguistic Society, Chicago.</bibtext> </blist> </ref> <aug> <p>By Alysson Lepeut and Emily Shaw</p> <p>Reported by Author; Author</p> <p></p> <p>Alysson Lepeut is currently a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim working on conversational feedback in LSFB and Norwegian Sign Language.</p> <p>Emily Shaw is a professor in the Department of Interpretation and Translation at Gallaudet University, researching various aspects of interaction in ASL and spoken English using corpus linguistics, semiotics, and interactional sociolinguistics.</p> </aug> <nolink nlid="nl1" bibid="bib39" firstref="ref1"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl2" bibid="bib69" firstref="ref2"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl3" bibid="bib10" firstref="ref3"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl4" bibid="bib16" firstref="ref4"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl5" bibid="bib15" firstref="ref5"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl6" bibid="bib12" firstref="ref8"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl7" bibid="bib23" firstref="ref9"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl8" bibid="bib38" firstref="ref17"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl9" bibid="bib58" firstref="ref20"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl10" bibid="bib36" firstref="ref21"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl11" bibid="bib32" firstref="ref22"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl12" bibid="bib66" firstref="ref23"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl13" bibid="bib31" firstref="ref27"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl14" bibid="bib26" firstref="ref29"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl15" bibid="bib56" firstref="ref30"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl16" bibid="bib72" firstref="ref31"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl17" bibid="bib41" firstref="ref37"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl18" bibid="bib50" firstref="ref38"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl19" bibid="bib27" firstref="ref41"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl20" bibid="bib49" firstref="ref42"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl21" bibid="bib62" firstref="ref50"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl22" bibid="bib53" firstref="ref51"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl23" bibid="bib35" firstref="ref53"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl24" bibid="bib30" firstref="ref54"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl25" bibid="bib52" firstref="ref58"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl26" bibid="bib67" firstref="ref59"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl27" bibid="bib29" firstref="ref62"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl28" bibid="bib34" firstref="ref63"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl29" bibid="bib48" firstref="ref64"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl30" bibid="bib63" firstref="ref70"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl31" bibid="bib21" firstref="ref71"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl32" bibid="bib44" firstref="ref72"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl33" bibid="bib37" firstref="ref73"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl34" bibid="bib40" firstref="ref74"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl35" bibid="bib59" firstref="ref75"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl36" bibid="bib65" firstref="ref79"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl37" bibid="bib45" firstref="ref80"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl38" bibid="bib60" firstref="ref84"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl39" bibid="bib51" firstref="ref86"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl40" bibid="bib61" firstref="ref89"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl41" bibid="bib14" firstref="ref90"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl42" bibid="bib33" firstref="ref94"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl43" bibid="bib18" firstref="ref95"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl44" bibid="bib42" firstref="ref100"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl45" bibid="bib28" firstref="ref101"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl46" bibid="bib57" firstref="ref102"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl47" bibid="bib70" firstref="ref103"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl48" bibid="bib54" firstref="ref104"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl49" bibid="bib25" firstref="ref105"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl50" bibid="bib55" firstref="ref109"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl51" bibid="bib13" firstref="ref111"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl52" bibid="bib46" firstref="ref112"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl53" bibid="bib64" firstref="ref124"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl54" bibid="bib71" firstref="ref125"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl55" bibid="bib43" firstref="ref126"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl56" bibid="bib47" firstref="ref130"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl57" bibid="bib22" firstref="ref131"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl58" bibid="bib19" firstref="ref132"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl59" bibid="bib235" firstref="ref140"></nolink> |
|---|---|
| Header | DbId: eric DbLabel: ERIC An: EJ1427428 AccessLevel: 3 PubType: Academic Journal PubTypeId: academicJournal PreciseRelevancyScore: 0 |
| IllustrationInfo | |
| Items | – Name: Title Label: Title Group: Ti Data: When the Mess Is the Message: Simultaneous Signing in an ASL Multiparty Interaction – Name: Language Label: Language Group: Lang Data: English – Name: Author Label: Authors Group: Au Data: <searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Alysson+Lepeut%22">Alysson Lepeut</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Emily+Shaw%22">Emily Shaw</searchLink> – Name: TitleSource Label: Source Group: Src Data: <searchLink fieldCode="SO" term="%22Sign+Language+Studies%22"><i>Sign Language Studies</i></searchLink>. 2024 24(3):722-763. – Name: Avail Label: Availability Group: Avail Data: Gallaudet University Press. 800 Florida Avenue NE, Denison House, Washington, DC 20002-3695. Tel: 202-651-5488; Fax: 202-651-5489; Web site: https://gupress.gallaudet.edu/Journals/Sign-Language-Studies – Name: PeerReviewed Label: Peer Reviewed Group: SrcInfo Data: Y – Name: Pages Label: Page Count Group: Src Data: 42 – Name: DatePubCY Label: Publication Date Group: Date Data: 2024 – Name: TypeDocument Label: Document Type Group: TypDoc Data: Journal Articles<br />Reports - Research – Name: Subject Label: Descriptors Group: Su Data: <searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Deafness%22">Deafness</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22American+Sign+Language%22">American Sign Language</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Total+Communication%22">Total Communication</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Interpersonal+Communication%22">Interpersonal Communication</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Dialogs+%28Language%29%22">Dialogs (Language)</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Interaction%22">Interaction</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Data%22">Data</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Video+Technology%22">Video Technology</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Group+Dynamics%22">Group Dynamics</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Interpersonal+Relationship%22">Interpersonal Relationship</searchLink> – Name: DOI Label: DOI Group: ID Data: 10.1353/sls.2024.a928061 – Name: ISSN Label: ISSN Group: ISSN Data: 0302-1475<br />1533-6263 – Name: Abstract Label: Abstract Group: Ab Data: This article presents the results of a microanalysis of sequences when two or more deaf signers overlap. This contribution focuses on "cooperative overlap" - which consists of extended moments of turn-exchanges that move along the unfolding discourse while cohering interlocutors in relation to each other. This aspect of signed interaction has received little scholarly attention but appears to be one crucial part of the "enchronic glue" (Enfield 2022) of language binding interactions (and interactants) together. Little is known about the specific underpinnings of these seemingly messy interactive moments. We seek here to understand how such extended overlaps are achieved by deaf coparticipants where the outcome results in a forward move of the interaction. A total of thirty-three instances of collaborative overlapping signing were identified, accounting for approximately seven out of the seventy-five minute multiparty interaction between four American Sign Language (ASL) signers. Out of these, specific interactional sequences were analyzed using techniques from ethnomethodology and conversation analysis to answer the following question: What embodied practices are used to negotiate overlaps while maintaining interactional synchrony? In addition to lexical repetition strategies identified in earlier work, these closely timed sequences of overlap are successful because they engage multiple articulators coordinated across signers. Further, it appears that these practices that are symbolic of the joint coordination of co-constructed discourse are a behavior that signers both willingly engage in to achieve specific interactive tasks, namely clarification-seeking, confirmation, and coordinated depiction. Results do not only account for how deaf signers achieve collaborative overlaps but also reveal the interactive reasons why signers engage in these seemingly messy moments of interaction. – Name: AbstractInfo Label: Abstractor Group: Ab Data: As Provided – Name: DateEntry Label: Entry Date Group: Date Data: 2024 – Name: AN Label: Accession Number Group: ID Data: EJ1427428 |
| PLink | https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=eric&AN=EJ1427428 |
| RecordInfo | BibRecord: BibEntity: Identifiers: – Type: doi Value: 10.1353/sls.2024.a928061 Languages: – Text: English PhysicalDescription: Pagination: PageCount: 42 StartPage: 722 Subjects: – SubjectFull: Deafness Type: general – SubjectFull: American Sign Language Type: general – SubjectFull: Total Communication Type: general – SubjectFull: Interpersonal Communication Type: general – SubjectFull: Dialogs (Language) Type: general – SubjectFull: Interaction Type: general – SubjectFull: Data Type: general – SubjectFull: Video Technology Type: general – SubjectFull: Group Dynamics Type: general – SubjectFull: Interpersonal Relationship Type: general Titles: – TitleFull: When the Mess Is the Message: Simultaneous Signing in an ASL Multiparty Interaction Type: main BibRelationships: HasContributorRelationships: – PersonEntity: Name: NameFull: Alysson Lepeut – PersonEntity: Name: NameFull: Emily Shaw IsPartOfRelationships: – BibEntity: Dates: – D: 01 M: 01 Type: published Y: 2024 Identifiers: – Type: issn-print Value: 0302-1475 – Type: issn-electronic Value: 1533-6263 Numbering: – Type: volume Value: 24 – Type: issue Value: 3 Titles: – TitleFull: Sign Language Studies Type: main |
| ResultId | 1 |
