Requesting in Social Interaction

Requesting in Social Interaction
Studies in Language and Social Interaction (SLSI)

Studies in Language and Social Interaction is a series which continues the tradition of
Studies in Discourse and Grammar, but with a new focus. It aims to provide a forum
for research on grammar, understood broadly, in its natural home environment,
spoken interaction. The assumption underlying the series is that the study of
language as it is actually used in social interaction provides the foundation for
understanding how the patterns and regularities we think of as grammar emerge
from everyday communicative needs. The editors welcome language-related research
from a range of different methodological traditions, including conversation analysis,
interactional linguistics, and discourse-functional linguistics.
For an overview of all books published in this series, please see
http://benjamins.com/catalog/slsi
Editors
Sandra A. Thompson Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen
University of California, Santa Barbara, USA University of Helsinki, Finland
Editorial Board
Peter Auer
University of Freiburg, Germany
Paul Drew
Loughborough University, UK
Cecilia E. Ford
University of Wisconsin, USA
Barbara A. Fox
University of Colorado, USA
Marja-Liisa Helasvuo
University of Turku, Finland
K.K. Luke
Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
Volume 26
Edited by Paul Drew and Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen
Edited by
Paul Drew
Loughborough University
Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen
University of Helsinki
John Benjamins Publishing Company

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Requesting in Social Interaction / Edited by Paul Drew and Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen.

p. cm. (Studies in Language and Social Interaction, issn 1879-3983 ; v. 26)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Socialization. 2. Social skills. 3. Social interaction. 4. Sociolinguistics. 5. Language
and culture. I. Drew, Paul, editor. II. Couper-Kuhlen, Elizabeth, editor.
P40.5.S57R47 2014
302.14--dc23 2014030878
isbn 978 90 272 2636 5 (Hb ; alk. paper)
isbn 978 90 272 6928 7 (Eb)
2014 John Benjamins B.V.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any
other means, without written permission from the publisher.
John Benjamins Publishing Co. P.O. Box 36224 1020 me Amsterdam The Netherlands
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Table of contents
Acknowledgement vii
Glossary of transcription conventions ix
Requesting from speech act to recruitment 1
Paul Drew & Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen
Human agency and the infrastructure for requests 35
N. J. Enfield
Benefactors and beneficiaries: Benefactive status and stance
in the management of offers and requests 55
Steven E. Clayman & John Heritage
The putative preference for offers over requests 87
Kobin H. Kendrick & Paul Drew
On divisions of labor in request and offer environments 115
Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen & Marja Etelmki
The social and moral work of modal constructions in granting remote requests 145
Jakob Steensig & Trine Heinemann
Two request forms of four year olds 171
Anthony J. Wootton
Orchestrating directive trajectories in communicative projects
in family interaction 185
Marjorie Harness Goodwin & Asta Cekaite
How to do things with requests: Request sequences at the family dinner table 215
Jenny Mandelbaum
On the grammatical form of requests at the convenience store:
Requesting as embodied action 243
Marja-Leena Sorjonen & Liisa Raevaara
Requesting immediate action in the surgical operating room:
Time, embodied resources and praxeological embeddedness 269
Lorenza Mondada
When do people not use language to make requests? 303

Giovanni Rossi
Requests and offers in orangutans and human infants 335
Federico Rossano & Katja Liebal
Subject Index 365
Name Index 369
Acknowledgement
The preparation of this collection has been made possible through the kind support of
the Center of Excellence for Research on Intersubjectivity in Interaction, at the Univer-
sity of Helsinki, Finland, during a period when one editor (EC-K) was on the faculty
staff and the other (PD) was a Visiting Fellow. The Centre provided other invaluable
technical and financial support. We are profoundly grateful to the directors of the Cen-
ter, especially Marja-Leena Sorjonen, for their support for this publication; and to all
the faculty and administrative staff of the Center for providing the stimulating and
congenial intellectual environment in which we could work on this project.
Paul Drew and Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen

June 2014
Glossary of transcription conventions
Authors have transcribed their data in considerable detail, according to the conven-
tions used in Conversation Analysis. These transcription symbols capture particularly
aspects of the timing of speech (e.g. overlapping speech, pauses within and between
speakers turns), and how things are said (including certain intonational and prosodic
features, emphasis, stretching of sounds and words). In some cases authors have used
other more specialised transcription symbols and conventions, to capture specialised
aspects of interactional conduct, such as non-vocal behavior and eye gaze; and to rep-
resent distinctive linguistic features of some of the languages included here, such as
case endings (e.g. in Finnish) and tones (e.g. in Lao). These more specialised conven-
tions and symbols are explained in the chapters concerned.
For the most part, these are the main transcription symbols that we use to repre-
sent speech in the chapters in this volume.
Temporal and sequential relationships

Overlapping or simultaneous talk is indicated by square brackets.
[ Separate left square brackets, one above the other on two successive lines with
[ utterances by different speakers, indicates a point of overlap onset, whether
at the start of an utterance or later.
] Separate right square brackets, one above the other on two successive lines
] with utterances by different speakers indicates a point at which two over-
lapping utterances both end, where one ends while the other continues, or
simultaneous moments in overlaps which continue.
= An equals mark links talk produced in close temporal proximity (latched
talk)
(0.6) Numbers in parentheses indicate silence, represented in tenths of a second.
Silences may be marked either within an utterance or between utterances.
(.) A dot (or stop) in parentheses indicates a micropause an audible silence but
less than 0.2 of a second.
Aspects of speech delivery
Encloses talk which is produced quietly

underline Underlining used to mark words or syllables which are given special
emphasis of some kind
Glossary of transcription conventions
CAPS Words or parts of words spoken loudly marked in capital letters

The up and down arrows mark sharp rises or falls in pitch within turn-
constructional units, or may mark a whole shift, or resetting,
of the pitch register at which the talk is being produced.
> < Talk between symbols is rushed or compressed
s::::: Sustained or stretched sound; the more colons, the longer the sound
cu- Cut-off word or sound
Stops, question marks, and commas are not used as punctuation
markers. Instead:
. A stop indicates falling intonation at the end of a turn-constructional
unit
? A question mark indicates a rising intonation
, A comma indicates a brief rising intonation
An inverted question mark indicates a rise weaker than a question mark
but stronger than a comma
.hhh Inbreath, the number of hs representing, in some approximate
fashion, the length of the inbreath (its sometimes said that each h
represents a tenth of a second)
hhh Outbreath, the number of hs representing, in some approximate
fashion, the length of the outbreath (its sometimes said that each h
represents a tenth of a second)
(hhenhh) Indicates laughter while speaking (aspiration)
Smiley voice
# Creaky voice
Miscellaneous
Les: Dr: Speaker names (pseudonyms) or labels (Dr = doctor)

(word) Parentheses indicate transcriber doubt
(this/that) Alternative hearings
((description)) Description of what can be heard or seen, e.g. ((shuffling papers))
Requesting from speech act to recruitment

Loughborough University / University of Helsinki
In this introduction we outline some of the background to and evolution of the

work on social action and requesting, then introduce some of the key analytic
themes in investigating requesting in talk-in-interaction. This sets the scene for
what is becoming a particularly significant perspective on requesting, which is
that in face-to-face interaction requesting should be understood as one of the
ways in which one person recruits anothers assistance in some matter. Seen in a
fuller spatial and corporeal context, it is evident that recruitment of the other(s)
assistance requires us to broaden our analysis, to understand how a fuller range
of linguistic and semiotic resources are deployed and engaged together with
gesture, bodily movement, gaze and so forth, in a physical setting to do what we
have traditionally and colloquially termed requesting.
1. Introduction
Requesting is one of the most basic and ubiquitous activities in social interaction.
Whoever we are and wherever we live, whatever language we speak, whatever work we
do, whatever our status or position in society, whatever domestic arrangements we
have and generally whatever our circumstances, almost every day in our lives we ask
someone to do something for us we make a request. Ask should be taken broadly to
include other ways of asking than speaking, or indeed using a language, such as sign
language. We might ask for a refill of coffee simply by pushing our empty mug across
the table towards someone who is holding a pot of coffee, perhaps while continuing
an unrelated conversation either with the one holding the coffee pot or with a third
person. The point is that throughout our daily lives, most of us request others to do
something for us, or request something of others. We do so very often, sometimes
for small things (the coffee), sometimes for large things (a significant financial loan).
Sometimes we do so as part of collaborative activities, such as cooking together in
the kitchen; sometimes we are acting alone up to the point when we need assistance
(writing a document on our computer when we run into a technical or other difficulty).
As well as being something that we do so frequently in daily life, requesting also
has a particular significance for our interactions, relationships and our associations
with one another. Requesting might be said to inhabit our various and different social
worlds the domestic world; the world of work; the world of children who might
use requesting to gain some measure of control over their lives (Ervin-Tripp 1982);
the world of people in later life, when it may become a necessity to ask for assistance
with those small things one could previously and would still rather do for oneself
(Lindstrm 2005). In all these and so many other worlds, requesting is at the very heart
of cooperation and collaboration in our social lives. Through requesting we seek the
help of others in doing or managing things that we could not do, or could not so easily
do, or would prefer not to do, by ourselves. When we make a request, therefore, we
inherently and usually implicitly convey that we have need of something we expose
ourselves, as it were, to being seen to be wanting in some fashion. Equally, when we
request someone to do something for us, when we enlist their assistance, we place on
them some kind of obligation, one that might require some degree of imposition or
even sacrifice (for instance, they may need to stop doing whatever they were doing,
in order to assist). As a consequence of the reciprocal connections between need and
obligation, between exposure and imposition, requesting is fundamental to the man-
agement of social cohesion and social solidarity in social interaction.
Requesting is in all these respects a social form, carrying with it implications of
need, of obligation, of imposition and constraint. But requesting is also a linguistic
form; there are in any language specific forms that are conventionally used in request-
ing, in English such forms as Could you ?, I wonder if you could ? or I need
you to (see e.g. Curl & Drew 2008). That is to say, requesting may be done through
characteristic grammatical forms, and through certain prosodic resources. The ways in
which the social forms of requesting combine with linguistic forms, and the complexi-
ties that can result including those associated with recognising whether a speaker
is requesting, or perhaps complaining or inviting or proposing will be considered a
little later. For the present, we want only to highlight that making a request is a basic
and ubiquitous activity in human interaction (and as we will see in Chapter 13, may
be apparent in interactions among other primates), that requesting is at the core of
how we manage social cohesion and solidarity, and that requesting combines social,
semiotic and linguistic forms.
Starting in the early 1960s, several of the human sciences took what Goffman
called a linguistic turn. In American sociology this was a probably associated with
the impact phenomenology was beginning to make, a consequence of which was that
sociologists began to explore interaction in more detail than hitherto. This trend in
sociology was somewhat paralleled in linguistics, as scholars began to identify quite
fundamental shortcomings in what had become the Chomskian orthodoxy. Around
this time, the 1960s, linguistics began to head off in different directions, including
Labovs development of variationist sociolinguistics, into the ethnography of speak-
ing, towards pragmatics, and into discourse. The field of psycholinguistics was also
being enlivened by more naturalistic, observational studies of language development

in young children.
These trends in sociology and linguistics towards investigating language in inter-
action were characterised by adopting more qualitative approaches to understand-
ing interaction, by microanalytic techniques, and above all by focusing on language
use that is, how we use language in our real-world dealings and interactions with
one another. Something else underpinned this turn towards investigating the use of
language, namely that language use is about social action that when we speak to oth-
ers, we are not so much describing the world as acting in it. We are doing things with
words; through whatever we say and however we say it, or do not say (as in remaining
silent after the other has made a remark with which one disagrees), we are acting in
some fashion we are engaged in some form of social conduct, and are designing or
constructing what we say in order to perform some action(s) within an interaction.
In short, social interaction was beginning to be understood as indeed inter-action, or
action between people.
2. The evolution of research into requesting speech acts
In a series of lectures given at Harvard in 1955, the ordinary language philosopher

J.L Austin set out a quite radical re-appraisal of language, captured in the title of the
published version of these lectures, How to do things with words (Austin 1962). Austin
demonstrated that language is not primarily descriptive, or as he termed it consta-
tive (to capture a broader class of utterances than descriptions); instead by saying
something, we do something we perform an action or actions, hence his term per-
formative. It is unnecessary to explain here the full import of his demonstration that
the traditional view that meaning rests on the supposedly factual nature of (descrip-
tive) statements, and on the truth or falsity of those statements, cannot apply. The
criteria for assessing what an expression like Would you like to come over for dinner
tomorrow evening? means do not concern the truth or otherwise of that utterance;
rather it will be understood as an invitation (or perhaps in certain circumstances as
an offer of dinner), about which the recipient may want to know whether its deux or
whether others are being invited, whether it is formal, what time one is expected and
so on. Austins view of words as actions was congruent with that of other linguistic phi-
losophers at the time, such as Bar-Hillel, who proposed that any description was con-
structed out of a selection from whatever might be said about what is being described;
and in that selection might be found the purpose or action for which this selection at
this moment in this context was being made (Bar-Hillel 1954). Hence even the most
neutral form of description was constructed to do some work. Garfinkel (1967) came
to a similar understanding as Bar-Hillel, that all descriptions are indexically tied to
their contexts of use in such a way that descriptions are always constructed to do some-
thing. How then analytically to map action onto descriptive or other language to
determine what action a particular form of words performed? Although Austin identi-
fied certain performative verbs that seemed straightforwardly to announce the action
being conducted, his inquiries led him to the conclusion that there were no certain
grammatical or lexical forms through which what he came to call illocutionary acts
were performed. He was content in the end to identify some general classes of what
Searle referred to as speech acts.
For Searle also predication is not an act which can occur alone, but can only
occur as part of some illocutionary act (Searle 1969:124); which is to say that descrip-
tion is always done in the service of some action. At the heart of what may be regarded
as Searles revision of Austins account of performatives or illocutionary acts is his
account of the conditions that must necessarily be fulfilled in order to perform a given
speech act successfully, or in Austins terms felicitously (in contrast to Searles defective
or Austins infelicitous performance of an action). In Searles view these conditions
resolved the problem of what precisely constituted an action such as a promise given
that it seemed not possible to specify these actions linguistically. He set out to define a
particular speech act, and to understand what it means to make a request, for example,
through specifying the necessary and sufficient conditions for doing that action. His
programme began from this objective: I want to analyse certain statements of insti-
tutional facts, statements of the form X made a promise, into statements containing
such notions as intentions, rules, and states of affairs specified by the rules (Searle
1969:56). Right away then Searle was stepping into something of a minefield, on two
counts. First, Searle was proposing that the felicitous performance of a speech act was
somehow subject to or governed by rules; in this respect he was adopting a view that
rules are constitutive properties of an institution (a game, a speech act), so that one
only plays the game, that game, or performs that speech act, if one acts in accordance
with the rules.
This was already becoming an outmoded view; for one thing, it was widely rec-
ognised that social forms games are a case in point are more than just a collection
of rules. Furthermore, Searle published Speech Acts a few years after the notion that
rules could underpin definitions had been discredited, largely on the grounds of their
open texture, by precisely those philosophers of language on whose shoulders Searle
might have regarded his work as resting (e.g. Hart 1961). At any rate a difficulty with
rule-bound definitions is that the meaning of rules dissolves as soon as one attempts
to define the terms that constitute the rule.
Before proceeding to consider the second difficulty, it is worth explicating a little
further Searles account of the conditions for requesting. He established from the con-
ditions for promising four general types of rule, namely (i) the propositional content
of an utterance, (ii) what he termed preparatory conditions, followed by (iii) sincerity
and (iv) essential conditions. For requesting, the propositional content involves a
future action; the preparatory conditions are that the recipient (hearer, in Searles
terms) is able to do the action requested, and that the speaker believes the recipient is
able to do what is requested. Furthermore it is not obvious to either that the recipient
would in any case do whatever is requested in the normal course of events of his own
accord. The sincerity condition is simple; the person making the request wants the
recipient to do it; and finally the essential condition is that the utterance counts as an
attempt to get the recipient to do something (for his schematic account of the condi-
tions of requesting, see Searle 1969:66).
It may be noticed that those conditions refer to what speakers believe about one
another, what each wants, and about what is obvious to both. Hence the other minefield
into which Searle strode is the difficulty associated with language and cognition. In a
quote reproduced above, in which he refers to statements containing such notions as
intentions, Searle seems explicitly to propose that the conditions for performing an
action are that a speaker has certain intentions. For instance, the expression of a prom-
ise only does promising, or only amounts to or counts as a promise (a promise is only
a promise) if the speaker intends to do the action proposed. In this, Searle would seem
to be referring to intentions as cognitive states possessed by the person performing the
speech act (preparatory conditions of promising being that S intends to do A and that
S intends that the utterance of T will place him under an obligation to do A; Searle
1969:60). However, in the course of explaining how his analysis of promising might
be extended to other speech acts, he says that Wherever there is a psychological state
specified in the sincerity condition, the performance of the act counts as an expression
of that psychological state. This law holds whether the act is sincere or insincere, that
is whether the speaker actually has the specified psychological state or not (Searle
1969:65, his emphasis). While his phrasing here is susceptible to various interpreta-
tions, this really is a case of having your cake and eating it! Notice that Searle limits
this caveat to the sincerity condition only, so that presumably the cognitive claims
(Sbelieves H is able to, it is obvious to both S and H that) in other conditions apply
without being mediated through attributing cognitive states on the basis of expres-
sions of those states.
However, even in its application to the beliefs and wants in Searles sincerity con-
ditions, this caveat is profoundly ambiguous, given that the attribution or recogni-
tion of cognitive states on the basis of the expression of those states plays no
further part in his analytic accounts of the illocutionary acts to which he refers. Nor
was it mentioned in the account he gives of the conditions for promising, on which
his subsequent analysis (generalising to requests etc.) builds. The conditions that H
would prefer, S believes and S intends to do A seem to be unqualified unmitigated
by the supposition that these are attributions by recipients. At best, then, Searle is
ambivalent about the role of cognition in performing speech acts; and this at a time
when philosophers were already hammering at the door of intentionality, and par-
ticularly the putative connection between intention and action (Melden 1961). They
and others, especially those studying language, were coming to accept that peoples
actual intentions (and other mental states) are unknowable, as is the matter of what
might have been in someones mind at the time of performing an action. Hence the
link between cognition, intention and action was broken; instead the focus was turn-
ing in a quite radically different direction towards the attribution of intention. In
contrast to which Searle does not formally or clearly provide a role in his analysis
for the attribution of intentionality; rather it seems that in his view intentions and
other mental states drive action. In this respect, one might note that in his account of
the presuppositions or felicity conditions underlying our understanding of sentences/
utterances, Goffman refers without any qualification to the cognitive presuppositions
as reflected in the syntax and prosody of utterances, adding later that these under-
standings can readily be seen as essentially cognitive in character (Goffman 1983:25&
28; his emphasis) (before proceeding to outline their additional normative features).
Referring explicitly to Austin and Searle, Goffman understands these conditions to be
cognitive presuppositions.
Finally one has to ask whether these conditions do indeed define or constitute
specific speech acts? This is particularly pertinent to Searles account of requests. It is
not clear how these conditions distinguish requesting someone to do something, from
proposing that they do something or inviting them to (do) something. Any of these
and perhaps other actions appear to fulfil Searles conditions for requesting. In some
respects he recognises this problem himself, in a brief section on the possible overlap
between conditions (6 p. 69) in which he allows that asking a question is a special case
of requesting. Moreover, scholars are beginning to realise that there are other dimen-
sions of actions that are not cognitive, that are or may be encoded in the language
through which they are conducted or performed, and which help to distinguish such
actions as offering, inviting, requesting and the like. Prominent among these dimen-
sions is the matter of who benefits (see Clayman and Heritage, this volume, Chapter3).
When A requests B to do something, A is the beneficiary; but when A invites B to (do)
something, then B becomes at least a co-beneficiary or perhaps the principal benefi-
ciary. At any rate, Searles conditions do not uniquely identify the actions for which
they are taken to be constitutive properties.
Yet counterbalancing all these difficulties and objections is the importance of Sear-
les enquiry into how it is that a form of words can be understood as doing requesting,
for example. He came to crystalize this objective when he considered indirect speech
acts, and more specifically, requesting, how a speaker may utter a sentence and mean
what he says and also mean another illocution with a different propositional content.
For example, a speaker may utter the sentence Can you reach the salt? and mean it
not merely as a question but as a request to pass the salt (Searle 1975:59/60). While
proposing that certain conditions (felicity conditions) are necessary for the perfor-
mance of the act, Searle was at the same time formulating inferencing rules, enabling
the inference to be made that the speaker is requesting. Given the supposed indirect-
ness of the relation between, on the one hand, the surface form and literal meaning of
some utterances, and on the other hand their illocutionary force as requesting, Searles
most significant contribution was to have suggested that there will be ways of inferenc-
ing which will enable participants to understand the request which is embedded in or
communicated through an utterance.
To summarise, Searle proposed that certain conditions must be met (rules) if a
speaker is successfully (felicitously) to perform a speech act; that those conditions are
essentially cognitive in nature intentions and states of belief and knowledge that,
even if we accept his caveat regarding sincerity conditions, are taken to drive action.
When those conditions are met, a speaker does the action thereby specified, and is not
merely perceived to do that action that is, the object of analysis is the part these con-
ditions play in performing an action, and not in the real-world attribution or recogni-
tion of action. These conditions are, however, best understood as inferencing rules,
connecting surface form and the action conducted or delivered through that form.
One thing further to note: this speech act tradition evolved through the analytic
scrutiny of sentences or utterances that is of language. In the world of our ordinary
face-to-face interactions we can, as we will go on to discuss later, construct requests
out of expressions that do not include performative verbs and that may be quite indi-
rect in their form (for instance, we may ask Whos got the milk? rather than I hereby
request that you pass me the milk). We can ask using half-spoken turns or manage
to indicate what we want even without speaking through gesture, body position, a
look in a certain direction hence as much through our non-vocal conduct as through
speech. Moreover this philosophical tradition considers sentences/utterances apart
from their interactional habitus and environment; it is assumed that a single action
maps on to a single utterance; and speech-act categories are restricted to those for
which there is a lexical term (in English). Austin, Searle and the other philosophers of
language took as the objects of their analysis fabricated examples of what they assumed
to be possible in the language. Their analytical purposes did not require them to record
and collect examples of speech acts, to examine empirically the variety of ways in
which given speech acts were performed, or how they were conducted in interaction.
Much of what we have summarised might appear as shortcomings or limitations
to Austins account of performative utterances and to Searles account of speech acts.
But it is important to recognise that Austins principal aim had been to show that lan-
guage was essentially performative and not descriptive. Searles aim was to develop
that theme contra the assumption of the link between description, truth and meaning.
While Searle explored the conditions which should be met in order to promise or to
request and so on, neither set out to explore nor was interested in how illocutionary or
speech acts map on to or are conducted through turns at talk in interaction. Through
the tectonic shift to viewing language as action, they laid the groundwork for a break
with linguistic approaches that viewed meaning in terms of truth conditions, and
established the bedrock of what we now understand as a given that language delivers
action. How it does so remained to be investigated.
3. Requesting in contexts of interaction
At about the same time as this speech act revolution was unfolding, others in the
linguistic, social and behavioral sciences were beginning to study how participants
did things to and with one another through words, in their natural habitat in ordi-
nary social face-to-face interactions. Requesting was an action that was of particu-
lar interest in these investigations, in part because, as we have explained, requesting
is so pervasive, so omnipresent and so important in our everyday social lives; partly
because requesting, in one form or another, seems to be universal across human
societies (and perhaps among other species; see Rossano & Liebal, this volume,
Chapter 13); because requesting is done through such a variety of linguistic forms
and non-vocal conduct; and because requesting plays such a significant role in our
collaboration and co-operation with one another, thereby contributing to social
cohesion.
Much of the relevant research in this period concerned requesting in inter-
actions with children and more generally with the ontogenesis of speech acts
(Bruner 1975). This strand of research was congruent with the burgeoning vitality
of the field of psycholinguistics at this time, and with a fresh interest in childrens
acquisition of language and social interactional skills, including turn taking (for a
review see Trevarthen & Aitken 2001). The interest in requests in interactions with
children most probably stemmed from the character of requests as a form of direc-
tive (Ervin-Tripp 1976a & b), and the role that directives play in controlling oth-
ers and hence in certain asymmetries between parents and children in this regard.
Recalling our earlier observation that requesting fuses linguistic form with social
form, directives are defined linguistically as a class of grammatical constructions,
including imperative, interrogative and declarative request forms; directives are a
social form insofar as they are a means to attempt to get someone to do something,
and in that respect they may be considered to be ways of controlling another person
(although this is a pretty loose sense of controlling). Quite a substantial part of ones
time (and energy) with young children is spent trying to get them to do things (put-
ting on clothing, eating vegetables that they wished were ice cream, putting away
toys, avoiding drawing on a table with indelible markers, and the like). Equally, some
of their efforts are directed at pushing against or testing the boundaries of parental
control by trying to exert a measure of control themselves, for instance by requesting

permission to do things, to ask for a desert at a point when they figure they have fin-
ished their main course, by asking for an ice cream, asking if they can watch TV or
play on the computer. So the interplay between parental control and childrens test-
ing the limits of that control, and their own attempts to exert a measure of control
over their lives, gives a special prominence to the role of directives in general and
requests in particular, in adult-child interaction. So it was that Ervin-Tripp came to
focus on the verbal strategies used by children for controlling the actions of oth-
ers, including a range of speech acts that include offering, promising and requesting
(Ervin-Tripp 1981 & 1982).
This research on family interactions, or at least adult-child interaction, amounted
to a form of developmental pragmatics (Ochs & Schieffelin 1979, 1983), focusing par-
ticularly on such themes as the different kinds and grammatical forms of directives,
the grammatical shapes of requests in particular (e.g. Garvey 1975; Wootton 1981a,
1984, 2005), responses to requests (Garvey 1975; Wootton 1981b), and why it was
that requesting seemed often to be done rather indirectly or, as Ervin-Tripp put it,
with concealed intent (Ervin-Tripp 1981). At the beginning of their chapter in this
volume (Chapter 8), Goodwin & Cekaite outline some further themes in this research
on directives and requesting in adult-child interactions.
However, not all the research into requesting in its natural environment concerned
adult-child interactions. Labov and Fanshel fused speech act analysis with interaction
analysis in a study of psychotherapy seen as a form of conversational interaction
(Labov & Fanshel 1977, ix). Influenced more by linguistics than by the philosophy of
language, they regarded requests as a form of directive, and were interested in how a
speaker could get someone to do something (for them). Note still, a speaker so focus-
ing on speech events in which we use spoken language to make requests for action
(Labov & Fanshel 1977:77). Labov and Fanshel retained a Searlian framework of what
each participant believes about the other and Searles view that requesting is bound or
defined by rules requesting is considered in the context of the rules of discourse.
Nevertheless these rules or conditions of requests are not themselves cognitive states,
nor even cognitive states attributed to speakers. Instead their rules consist of needs,
abilities, obligations and rights (Labov & Fanshel 1977:81); their rules or conditions
for a valid request are that:
The action requested needs to be done.

That it would not be done in the absence of a request.
That the recipient of the request has the ability to do what is asked.
That the recipient of the request has the obligation to do it.
That the speaker has the right to tell the recipient what to do.
(Labov & Fanshel 1977:78)
While it is immediately apparent that these conditions might apply more readily to
certain kinds of directive, especially commands, and perhaps imperatives more gener-
ally, the language in which they are cast may be too strong for our ordinary sense and
uses of requesting. For instance, one might not usually regard the person whom one
requests to do something as being obliged to do so; nor usually do we consider that
we have the right to tell someone what to do. And quite routinely one may not be sure
that the other has the ability to do what is asked. But this is a significant advance in
addressing the complex relationship between speech actions and utterances, insofar as
these conditions are more socially ascribed than cognitive in character.
Furthermore, Labov and Fanshel began to explore the different forms in which
requests may be made, including the use of mitigating phrases such as Would you mind.
More significantly, finding that direct request forms were rarely used in their therapeu-
tic interactions, they identified a set of rules that capture the indirect relationships
between surface structure and underlying speech acts (Labov & Fanshel 1977:8284).
This is inspired by and closely resembles Searles enquiry into indirectness; we have
noted that Searles conditions are best understood as inferencing rules, enabling us to
find the speech action that is mobilised through the surface form of an expression. So
too Labov and Fanshel are quite explicit that the conditions they propose will connect
speech actions to the surface (linguistic) forms through which they are conducted.
While it is unnecessary to describe these here, their rules for indirect requests also are
social in character, and refer largely to the physical and temporal context in which an
observation, for instance, might, with different degrees of transparency, be made with
the purpose of encouraging the other to do something. They further note that aspects
of requests that relate to needs and abilities are generally mitigating, while by contrast
those that invoke rights and obligations are aggravating insights that also informed
and were developed in politeness theory.
Earlier in this introduction we noted that requesting mobilises social forms
involving implications of need, of obligation, of imposition and constraint; and does
so through linguistic forms that, in the contexts in which they are being used, work as
directives of one kind or another. From this brief account it will be apparent that Labov
and Fanshel contributed to our understanding of the fusion between linguistic and
social forms in requesting, a fusion that other researchers, notably Ervin-Tripp (1979),
Wootton (1981), Blum-Kulka (1987) and Ochs and Schieffelin (1979), were exploring.
Perhaps the most influential contribution in this respect was the study of politeness in
requesting, by Brown and Levinson (1978, 1987). Following Goffman (1967), Brown
and Levinson propose that politeness, deference and tact, embodied in language and
linguistic forms, underpin the orderliness of social interaction, and therefore are part
of the foundations of human social life and interaction. (Brown & Levinson 1987:1).
Brown and Levinson explain that that a request is a face threatening act: it threatens
the others negative face, their need to be free from imposition. Speakers can select
from among a range of forms for doing a request, from bald-on-record strategies
to maximally indirect ones, the latter being more polite because they pay respect to
the others negative face. In the extreme case, they may even avoid doing the action
altogether (Brown & Levinson 1987:131) Right away one can see how this account
is complemented by the suggestion by some conversation analysts that requests are
a dispreferred action, and that being offered what might otherwise be requested is
preferred; this is a claim that is examined closely by Kendrick and Drew in their con-
tribution to this volume (Chapter 4).
Brown and Levinsons account of politeness is too well known to bear repeating
in detail here; but it is worth highlighting the fact that it is the only perspective that
truly attempts in any systematic fashion to account for the production of a request form
(in contrast to the focus on how inferences may be drawn about actions intended or
implied by a literal meaning; Watts 2003). While one might be cautious about their
claims that certain lexico-syntactic forms are intrinsically polite, or more or less polite
than others, nonetheless Brown and Levinson explored the social dimensions system-
atically underlying the selection of one from among the available linguistic forms for
requesting, in a given language.
This was a considerable achievement though one that left interaction largely out
of the picture. One of the striking limitations of their study is that Brown and Levinson
analyse examples that are both abstracted from any interactional context and which are
often fabricated; they develop a notion of the universals of language use through exam-
ples that seem to be invented for illustrative purposes and that may or may not have any
empirical basis. Moreover, like many of their contemporaries, who also used invented
examples (see e.g. Clark 1979; Francik & Clark 1985; Ervin-Tripp 1976a and Upadhyay
2003) they analyse utterance forms that are stripped from their interactional contexts.
Yet Watts (2003), in particular, demonstrated that the same form or construction of
request can have different implications as regards politeness when considered in dif-
ferent interactional circumstances and in different sequences of interaction so that
it is not possible to assess the intrinsic (relative) politeness of various lexico-syntactic
forms abstracted from the interactional and sequential contexts in which those forms
are used.
During the initial phase of empirical research into requesting then, the ten-
dency was to abstract the [forms of] requests from the sequences of interaction in
which they occurred. In this period up to the mid-1980s Woottons research into the
request forms used by young children stands out as being genuinely interactional.
Rather than looking for sociological correlates (age, topic, situation) for the selec-
tion of a particular request form, Wootton explored instead the (different) sequen-
tial positions in which different request forms were used. Woottons study was thus
a notable and rare exception at the time, which is why we reproduce it in this collec-
tion (Chapter 7).
Let us now summarise where this evolution of the study of requesting had brought
us, up to around the beginning of this century. These are perhaps the most salient
aspects of this research tradition:
It was now understood that language was not primarily descriptive; language was
used to conduct social actions, including requesting.
There was no single or restricted form of words through which requests are made.
While there are conventional lexico-syntactic forms, other expressions can easily
serve to request the other to do something. There is no restriction on the form of
expressions through which one may request another to do something, in a given
context.
Certain conditions for requesting were proposed conditions under which a form
of words can count as a particular action (felicity conditions).
At times, it seems that these conditions are considered to be cognitive so that,
it is supposed, a speaker really does believe that the recipient is able to do some-
thing, and really wants him/her to do something.
Those conditions might best be considered rules of inference enabling us to
understand (recognise) the action from some surface form of words.
In general, the field is concerned with how to map actions onto linguistic expressions.
The assumption was generally that a single action was performed in a single
utterance.
Inquiry into requesting came to focus on linguistic form; as a consequence the
verbal conduct of action was privileged over non-vocal conduct, or the embodied
character of talk-in-interaction.
Speech acts were restricted to those actions for which there is a vernacular
vocabulary one of those being requesting.
Requests were understood to be one among several linguistic forms known col-
lectively as directives.
As the field progressed, an understanding of the social aspects of requesting came
to be fused with analysis of linguistic forms hence our understanding of requests
as linguistic and social forms.
With only rare exceptions, requests were not studied in their interactional con-
texts; they were abstracted from the sequences in which they were conducted.
This sets the scene for what we regard as the renewal of research into requesting, in
which a considerably more interactional approach is adopted.
4. Contemporary studies the interactional turn
We have seen that up until about the mid 1980s research into requesting was concerned
predominantly with two principal questions: What are the constitutive properties of
requests? and how could the speech action of requesting be mapped on or attributed
to linguistic forms? With some exceptions, therefore, even though researchers were
focusing on requests that were made in some social and interactional context, never-
theless the utterances in which requests were made (or performed) were abstracted
from those contexts; they were treated as somehow independent of the contexts of
their production.
After something of a hiatus in research in this area, a little way into the new cen-
tury saw a renewed interest among those studying conversation and talk-in-interaction
in action formation and recognition how turns-at-talk are designed to be recognisable
as implementing a particular social action (e.g. Levinson 2013). The discussion has
centered around two distinct but related issues: (1) Based on what understandings
does a speaker select a specific linguistic form, among all those a language has to offer,
for implementing a specific action (here requesting)?, and (2) How does a recipient
come to interpret a particular linguistic form as implementing a specific social action
(here a request)?
For both these perspectives it is becoming increasingly clear that the nature of
what is being requested is consequential for the selection of an appropriate request
form and/or for the provision of an appropriate response once the action has been
recognized as a request:
Is the targeted action immediate, i.e. to be fulfilled in the here and now, or is
it deferred, to be fulfilled at some later point in time? (See Lindstrm 1999
and Schegloff 2007 for discussions of how this impinges upon the form that a
complying response is expected to take.)
Is the targeted action low-cost or high-cost? (See Rossi 2012 and Rossi frthc for
how this distinction plays out in the choice of linguistic forms for requesting in
Italian.)
Is the targeted action bilateral, i.e. integral to an already established joint proj-
ect between requester and requestee, or unilateral, i.e. in the self-interest of the
speaker as an individual (Rossi 2012; also Wootton 1997)?
Is the targeted action a practical one, involving the transfer of a concrete object
(Rossi 2012; Keisanen & Rauniomaa 2012), or instead a more abstract one, e.g. the
provision of a service (Vinkhuyzen & Szymanski 2005)?
A number of principles have emerged from the recent discussion in the literature as
relevant for the selection of a specific request form:
Sequential placement. In a longitudinal study on the development and use of lin-

guistic request forms by a young English-speaking child, Wootton (1997) claims
that the childs selection of requests forms is sensitive to, and reflexively indicative
of, understandings of what is going on in the current sequence and/or what has
gone on in a prior sequence or sequences. These understandings can concern,
e.g. whether the targeted action is situated within an offence sequence, i.e. one
in which the recipient is treated at being at fault for a course of events or not; in
non-offence sequences, whether the targeted action is projectably out of line with
what the recipient appears to be envisaging, or not (Do x!); and at a later stage in
the childs development, whether there is a sequential warrant for what the child
wants the recipient to do, or not (Can you X?), as well as whether requester and
requestee are taken to have a joint stake in a particular course of action (Shall
weX?). More recently, Rossis (2012) study of requesting in Italian conversation
has shown similar considerations to be relevant for the choice between Imp X! and
Mi X? (Will you do X for me?) when adults are attempting to bring about low-
cost, practical actions in the here and now.
Entitlement. Lindstrms (2005) investigation of requesting in the context of the
Swedish home help service for senior citizens was one of the first to foreground
the relevance of (perceived) entitlement for the choice of a request form. She
observed that when senior citizens used imperatives or imperative-like con-
structions to request the home-help provider to do something for them, they
were construing the task as something they were entitled to ask for, whereas
when they used interrogative structures, the implication was that they were not
entitled to request assistance from the home-helper for that particular task. In
a similar institutional context in Denmark, Heinemann (2006) found entitle-
ment to be relevant for senior citizens selection of a positive interrogative (Will
you X?), implying that the request was one the requester was not entitled to
make, as opposed to a negative interrogative (Cant you X?), which conveyed
that the task was something that should have been done routinely and that the
home-helper had neglected to do. Craven and Potter (2010) also find entitle-
ment to be an issue in the design of parental directives in family mealtime
interaction. They observe that directives, typically realized with imperative
forms, construe the speaker as highly entitled to direct the recipients behav-
ior. These forms project compliance, fully restricting the recipients optionality
of response. When a first directive is resisted, speakers react by reissuing the
directive and upgrading their entitlement through the avoidance of modulating
elements, the use of prosodic displays of insistence and urgency, and in extreme
cases, the deployment of physical force.
Contingency. In interaction between adults, studies such as the one by Curl and
Drew (2008) have emphasized the importance not only of entitlement but also of
contingency, a displayed awareness of, or orientation to, factors that could com-
promise the grantability of a request. Contingency is argued to be consequen-
tial for the choice between forms such as Can/Could you? and I wonder if:
Curl and Drew point out that with the modal construction Can/Could you?
a requester displays little orientation to contingencies that might affect the

grantability of the request, while with an I wonder preface the requested action
is construed as something that is only possibly an option, due to factors that
cannot be anticipated in advance. They conclude that in both institutional and
non-institutional contexts contingency emerges as the dimension that underlies
entitlements to ask (2008:149): displaying no awareness of possible contingen-
cies affecting grantability construes the speaker as an entitled requester, whereas
displaying awareness of such contingencies construes the requester as lacking
such entitlement. Nolan and Maynard (2013), however, find that contingency
operates separately from entitlement in the design of requests for participation
in telephone survey interviews. Whereas I wonder-prefaces, mitigators, and the
like display less entitlement to request participation, awareness of contingency
is displayed through whether the respondent is offered the option of doing the
interview now or later. The choice of one-option design formats as opposed
to two-option design formats for requesting an interview, they argue, is sensitive
to whether the interactional context is encouraging or discouraging (Maynard
etal. 2010; also Maynard & Hollander 2014).
As for the recognition of a particular social action based on a given linguistic form,
recent research has foregrounded at least two criterial factors:
Distinctive linguistic formats. Couper-Kuhlen (2014) argues that recurrent for-

mats for requesting as opposed to offering, proposing, or suggesting help
the recipient ascribe that action to the turn in question. Among the forms most
frequently used for requesting in her everyday English conversational data were:
imp X!, will/would you X?, can/could you X? and I wish/need/want X. With the
exception of imperatives, none of these formats was frequently used to implement
offers, proposals or suggestions. The conclusion appears to be that recipients can
often rely on the linguistic design of an initiating turn to determine which action
it is implementing. In cases where the form is ambiguous, as e.g. with an impera-
tive turn design, which is frequently used to implement not only requests but also
offers and suggestions, clearly other (contextual) factors must enter in.
Deontic status. Stevanonic (2011) makes a strong plea for recognizing the impor-
tance of a participants deontic status, their real-world rights to decide about the
future with respect to a particular domain of action, in ascribing action to an
initiating turn. She argues that this real-world status is in principle distinct from
how participants frame their deontic rights on actual occasions of requesting,
i.e. their deontic stance (see also Stevanovic & Perkyl 2012). Deontic status is
particularly relevant for action ascription, she observes, in the case of declara-
tively formatted turns, for instance those that make statements about the speakers
needs, inclinations, and deficiencies (I need a spoon, Id just go ahead and do it on
your own, I cant get this bottle open)1 or about the recipients and/or the speakers
future actions (youll make the arrangements, Ill speak to her now, well discuss this
matter). All of these declarative statements could come off as simple informings in
their context of occurrence; yet they can be treated as having deontic implications
for the recipients behavior in the future, Stevanovic argues, because the speaker
is understood to have the deontic status of someone with the right to make such a
decision concerning this recipient in the real world.
5. The visual turn: Requests as recruitments
The research we have reviewed above focuses primarily on linguistic forms for request-
ing. In retrospect, this focus can be seen to have been occasioned by the nature of
the data at hand (telephone conversation in the case of the studies by Curl and Drew,
Couper-Kuhlen) and/or by a declared interest in particular linguistic forms as used in
face-to-face interaction (e.g. the studies by Wootton, Craven and Potter, Heinemann,
Lindstrm and Rossi). Increasingly, however, scholars are recognizing that commu-
nicating face-to-face is first and foremost embodied interaction (Streeck, Goodwin&
LeBaron 2011). This means that visual and other non-verbal aspects of the context
in which a request is situated cannot be ignored; indeed, when taken into account, it
emerges that visual and non-verbal dimensions can shape the choice of a particular
linguistic form for requesting. For instance, in the following excerpt, what starts out
as a request formatted with an imperative (Pa-) gets broken off and re-done with an
interrogative (Can I have the gravy Ross?):
(1) [Goodwin Porch Dinner:4:45]2
e family are sitting around a table outside on the porch, eating dinner. Mat is a
Th
neighbor who happens to walk by.
1 Susi: Pass me the Wishbo[ne,
2 Kate:
[SHHHH WHA:T?
3 Dwayne: Oh
4 (0.7)
5 Mat: I: dont think anybody gonna, pick me up I:
think Ive been let down
6 Fran: NO:::::=
. Related to this are generic statements concerning necessity, e.g. The garbage needs taking
out (see also Zinken & Ogiermann 2011).
. This excerpt and all following excerpts have been transcribed using a Jeffersonian system
of notation (see, e.g. Jefferson 2004).
7 Kate: =UH HEH UH HEH

8 Fran: Well bring you dessert over Matt
9 (0.6)
10 Susi:
Pa- may >I have a< c- cn I have the gravy
Ross?
11 Fran: Boy everybodys really: hoggin [up things like
12 Susi: [Mother said to

sta[rt passing it=
13 Mark:
[ehYhheh
uh
huh
14 Ross: =[Hey look at the sa:lad.
15 Susi: =[Well you picked it up and you laid it back do:wn
To account for why in line 10 Susi launches what will likely be a request for the gravy
with an imperative but then re-starts her turn with a modal interrogative, the embod-
ied context must be invoked. Just as Susi begins her turn, Ross, her intended recipient,
passes with his left hand (which is closest to Susi) a salad bowl to someone across the
table, while simultaneously moving the gravy away from Susi with his right hand. The
contingencies have now changed the gravy is further away from both Susi and Ross,
whose (avail)ability to pass the gravy is impaired. Susi therefore recalibrates the design
of her request to reflect the fact that the object in question is now no longer within
easy reach. The new form she chooses is one that indexes an understanding that the
task is no longer easy or straightforward to accomplish, an understanding grounded
in the observable, material, and embodied context. (It is worth noting that Susi herself
acknowledges the change in these contingencies, when in her account in line 15 she
responds to Franks complaint about everyone hogging up the food.)
Extract (1) demonstrates that the embodied context may need to be taken into
consideration in order to explain the linguistic choices made in a request sequence.
Yet if we wish to account more broadly for all the ways in which someones help or
assistance can be enlisted without restricting ourselves exclusively to linguistic forms,
then embodiment must be viewed not only as providing the context for a linguisti-
cally encoded action but as enabling or affording the action itself. This broader way
of conceptualizing (embodied) attempts to enlist someones assistance, typically with
respect to an immediate, physical need, problem or wish, has been termed by Kendrick
(personal communication) recruitment (see Floyd et al. frthc). In the following we will
briefly explore the notion of recruitment and how it enriches the study of requesting
in social interaction.
We begin with the observation that a request can be quite overt but nonverbal
and we rely throughout the rest of this explication on examples taken from data
recorded by Rossi, used by the Interactional Foundations of Language group at the
Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen. Some of these examples of
recruitments were first identified by Kendrick. This is documented in Extract (2),
where two colleagues are sitting together at a table in their office. Andy has just poured
himself a cup of tea and is in the process of placing the teapot back on the table when
Beth moves her mug towards him (line 6):
(2) Teapot (Colleagues, 0:10)
Two university colleagues, Andy and Beth, are seated diagonally at a table in their
office.
1 Beth: s the tea been stewing long enough?
((leaning over her laptop to look at the teapot))
2 Beth: .hh (.) (hhh) (1.5)
((picking up her mug as Andy reaches for the
teapot))
3 Beth: give it a sukk- (ll do okay)
((watching as Andy pours himself tea))
4 (1.6)
5 Beth: leave the two tea bags in (you see/yourself)
6 (long enough)
((places mug on table near Andy as he moves to set
teapot down))
7 Beth: (almost be like three)
8 .hh (I dont know if thats )
((Andy lifts teapot and begins pouring tea into
Beths mug))
9 (0.8)
10 Andy: (ks) its fairly strong
11 Beth: yeah
While uttering line 6 Beth moves her mug from across the table and places it adjacent
to the teapot that Andy is holding; in doing so she makes visible an immediate need or
wish for tea, although the wish is not articulated verbally. This creates a publicly available
opportunity for Andy to assist in meeting Beths need or fulfilling her wish (see Figure 1).
Figure 1. Line 6 of Example (2)

Andy responds by transforming the movement he is currently executing, plac-

ing the teapot down on the table, into lifting it again and pouring tea into Beths
mug (line8). Thus, Beths nonverbal gestural display leads to successful recruitment
of Andys assistance without there being any trace of the transaction in the verbal
record.
The beauty of recruitments is that when they are successful, they enable one partic-
ipant to get another to do something for them without having had to ask. Often simply
the visible display of a problem will be enough to prompt an attentive co-participant
to help out. This is what happens in Extract (3), where the recruitment display is much
less overt than that in (2):
(3) Bowl (Risotto, 6:11)

Wendy and Harry are standing at the kitchen counter side by side, preparing risotto
together.
1 Wendy: but they were saying that thee (.) ehm (0.6)
((Wendy is cleaning vegetables))
2 that the venue was adding a-
((Harry is slicing a large squash on a small
cutting board))
3 a five percent (.) surcharge on (.)
((Wendy stops to look at Harry))
4 hhh for using a card I think it was
((Wendy resumes cleaning the vegetables))
5 (1.6)
((Harry arranges the slices on the cutting board))
6 Harry: (guess) thats a ()
7 s (.)
((Harry resumes slicing the squash))
8 Wendy: no I kno[w thats (xxx)]
9 Harry: [twenty pounds per (.) ] transaction
10 (1.4)
11 Wendy: well, yeah=
12 Harry: =that is with respect to the (kn)
13 ticket (.) value.hhh
14 Harry: ((clears throat))
15 (0.6)
((Harry takes the end of the squash and puts it
aside))
((He pushes the slices on the cutting board
together and begins to chop one into slivers))
16 Wendy: do you want a bowl for those
17 (1.3)
18 Harry: yeah. that is ( )
((Wendy opens the cupboard and takes out a bowl

which she places next to the cutting board))
Starting at about line 15 Harry begins to have a visible problem with processing the
squash on his small and overfull cutting board: this becomes publicly available when
he puts the end piece of the squash aside and clears a small amount of space on the
board for chopping the slices. Although she is not looking directly at the cutting board,
Wendy is clearly aware of the impending problem (perhaps through peripheral vision):
this is arguably what prompts her to offer Harry a bowl for the pieces he will be pro-
ducing (line 16). When Harry accepts the offer, Wendy provides a bowl and places it
near the cutting board. Although Harry may not have known that he needed a bowl,
he has made publicly available that he has a problem. The recruitment comes about
because Wendy is sensitive to his dilemma and offers a remedy for it.
In fact, as the following recruitment demonstrates, it may be not so much a ques-
tion of a participant intending to recruit help as of their co-participant attributing such
an intention to them:
(4) Door (Housemates II, 1:44)

rad, Carol and Danny are each busy fixing their dinners in the common kitchen.
B
Andy suddenly enters through a door on the left.
1 Carol: just to let you know

2 thats to record
((pointing to the camera))
3 (1.6)
((Andy backing out of the room))
4 Carol: *mhh hm heh heh.hh
5 just to let you know
6 Andy: whys that on record
7 Carol: because Rick- Rock: promised (.)
((Carol moving towards the door where Andy is
standing))
8 that hed do tha- (0.4) a few hours of record-
9 a few (0.4) minutes of recording last night
((Carol moving back to the counter where she was
working))
10 cuz the other ones fucked up
11 Brad: all he wants to know is like (.)
((Brad has moved to the door where Andy is standing))
12 the way we speak to each other? So
13 Andy: ah:::
14 Brad: just go b- forget your (search) totally natural
((Brad moving back to counter, Carol approaching
the door))
15 Andy: Ive got a phobia: of c(h)ameras

16 Carol: oh you do (you could go if-) (0.2)
((Carol standing at door))
17 listen the only thing he wants to: understand
18 is how we gesture: and speak in a:
19 native English langua- English
20 (0.3)
21 Andy: (oh he didnt-)
22 Carol: I mean with all the-
((Carol moving back to counter))
23 Andy: yeah yeah yeah
24 Brad: just act as natural as you can
25 (1.0)
26 Andy: kay
27 Carol: dywa- hhehh
28 Danny: (dyoure very) acting naturally standing there
((Danny pointing towards door))
29 Andy: huh huh huh huh
30 Brad: (xx xx xx xx xx) [peering through the door(its
really like-)
((Brad enacting peering through
the door))
31 Andy: [huh huh huh huh
32 (0.4)
33 Carol: dyou want me to get you something
((Carol turning towards door))
34 (0.5)
35 Andy: er: what did I want hh erm
36 naw: actually (.)
37 I can (just xx)
38 Carol: a what?
((Carol looking towards the door))
39 Andy: (fucking)
40 a plastic bag
((Carol moves to the table and opens the drawer))
41 Andy: there you go
42 thats all I need
((Carol takes a plastic bag out of the drawer))
43 (1.0)
44 Andy: uh cheers
45 ey (hope wont be) any offense
46 (0.6)
((Carol moves towards the door and gives the bag
to Andy))
47 Andy: thank you very much,
When Andy is warned that there is a recording going on, he backs away so as to be
off camera, asks for an explanation (line 6) and, from a position outside the door,
professes to have a phobia about being filmed (line 15). Although continuing to par-
ticipate in the conversation, he holds this position outside the door and off camera. It
may be this display that prompts Carols initial inquiry dy wa- (line 27), which, how-
ever, she breaks off when Danny and Brad begin to tease Andy about standing there
and peering through the door (lines 28, 30). Carol now relaunches her inquiry about
whether Andy wants something (line 33). Andys response is revealing: er: what did
I want hh erm (line 35). This wording displays that Andys behavior (standing in the
door) was not motivated by the intention to solicit help; instead, it is only when Carol
implies that he may have a need that he casts around for something that will plausibly
satisfy the requirement of being in the kitchen and out of his reach. In the event it turns
out to be a plastic bag.
The success of a recruitment, as we have seen, depends on a co-participant being
sensitive to the recruiters display of a problem, need or wish. Even when the display is
maximally overt, a co-participant may not take the hint. In fact, they may not be able
to, if it is not in their line of vision. In cases like this, we often find language being used
by way of verbal support:
(5) Cookie (Colleagues, 1:50)
Several minutes later in the same conversation as (2).
1 Andy: are you gon[na take the next couple of-
2 Beth:
[h. ah (xx)
3 Andy: a few we[eks-
4 Beth:
[bah
5 Ive gotta come back for that conference
((Beth and Andy gazing at each other))
6 I keep forgetting
7 (.)
8 Andy: back for a confe[rence
[on the ninth.hhh
9 Beth:
10 Beth: which is surprisingly (.) soon (.)
11 [so Im gonna sort out
((Beth turning to her laptop))
12 Andy: [(I see)
13 (0.6)
14 Beth: Im gonna have to (.)
15 ei write the paper and
((Beth looking in her diary))
16 bee get around to sorting it out
17 Andy: ye(h)ah hh the way these things d(h)o
18 Beth: whew hhh
19 Beth: hye(h)ahh uhm:

((Beth looking at her cell phone))
((Andy pointing to a box of biscuits on Beths left))
20 [which is uhm
21 Andy: [coo[kie
22 Beth: [biscuit?
((Beth picking up the box of cookies))
23 biscuits biscuits biscuits
((Beth placing the box on the table in front of
Andy))
24 Beth: mhm mm
25 Beth: shall I show you what I-
((Andy takes a cookie out of the box))
26 [what pictures Ive picked up
27 Andy: [yeah
28 Beth: cuz obviously it will be quite fun
29 to have something a little bit visual
Andys outstretched arm and point to the box of biscuits in line 19 is indicative of
an immediate wish and is maximally overt. He holds this position for long enough
so that Beth, if she were looking, could not miss it. Yet Beth is in the process of con-
tinuing her turn and is furthermore preoccupied visually with her cell phone (see
Figure 2):
When it becomes obvious that Beth has missed the attempted visible recruit,
Andy now resorts to verbal support by mouthing the word cookie sotto voce (line 21).
This is sufficient to attract Beths attention and she moves immediately to place the
biscuit box within his reach (lines 22, 23). Her biscuits biscuits biscuits (line 23) may be
an attempt to smooth over the (unintentional) misstep of having missed Andys only
too obvious (attempted) recruit.
In fact, there is evidence to indicate that when visible recruits are especially obvi-
ous but missed, the co-participants behavior (of not taking the hint) may become
accountable:
(6) Sunglasses (Cigarette, 6:30)
Two college-age female friends chatting on the campus green of a northern English
university.
1 Beverly: I remember watching come dine with me once
2 and this woman had a-
((Beverly gazing at Alice, Alice squinting back,
one eye shut))
3 oh no it wasnt come dine with me it was ehm:
4 (2.7)
((Beverly takes a puff on her cigarette))
5 it was:
6 (1.6)
((Alice looks away))
7 Beverly: hh
8 (3.1)
((Beverly exhales smoke))
9 Beverly: oh:
10 it was: ehm:
11 (0.5)
12 dinner date:
((Beverly gazing at Alice, Alice squinting back,
one eye shut))
13 (0.3)
14 Beverly: it was just this-
15 (0.1)
16 have you ever watched #it.
17 (0.5)
((Alice shakes her head laterally))
18 Alice: is it like come dine with me
19 (0.2)
20 Beverly: its hila:rious=
((Beverly gazing away))
21 Beverly: =its-
22 (0.6)
23 just
24 (0.3)
25 theres one guy:
26 (0.6)
27 and three women?
((Beverly gazing at Alice))
28 (0.6)
29 Beverly: and
30 (0.4)
31 he
32 (0.2)
33 takes it in turns to go round to their: h-
((Beverly gazing at Alice, Alice squinting))
34 (.) each of their houses n they cook him dinner?
((Alice reaches towards Beverlys head))
35 (0.2)
36 Alice: yeah
37 (1.0)
((Alice removes Beverlys sunglasses))
38 Beverly: sorry/thats alright I was so: (listening just)
((Alice puts Beverlys sunglasses on))
39 Beverly: I wasnt even wearing them
40 (2.5)
41 Beverly: ye[#ah
42 Alice: [he-
43 (0.4)
44 Beverly: [#n th-
45 Alice: [so-
46 sorry say that again
47 he::
48 Beverly: he takes it in turns like (.)
49 #each night #he goes round:
50 to have dinner #at their house
Alices problem here is that when she gazes at Beverly she is looking directly into the
sun. Already in line 2 she makes this problem publicly available to Beverly, when the lat-
ter looks her way, by squinting and holding one eye shut. In lines 12 and 33 Alice repeats
this display of discomfort, each time well within Beverlys sightline (see Figure3):

Beverly, however, does not pick up the hint. What Alice does now is to bring
about a remedy herself by reaching towards Beverlys head and removing the sun-
glasses that are propped up on Beverlys head. This gesture is sufficient to alert Beverly
to her inattentiveness: she gives an apologetic account (lines 3839) of having been
so absorbed in what she was saying she did not notice that Alice might have needed
them. The fact that Beverly treats the missing of Alices hint as accountable is indica-
tive of the normative import of overt recruitment displays despite their wholly
non-verbal character. Being oblivious to displays of discomfort and unease in ones
co-participants behavior might be regarded as withholding compliance in response
to a verbally implemented request.
As (6) demonstrates, the initiating behavior that gives rise to a recruitment can
be extremely subtle. In fact, some recruitment displays are actually so opaque that it is
only in retrospect that they can be seen to have been possible recruitments. This might
be said to apply to the following incident:
(7) Moisturizer (Cigarette, 16:50)

S ame conversation as (6). Here Alice is telling Beverly about her upcoming field trip
and how the instructors have tried to split the class into two separate groups, one for
Thursday and one for Friday, but everyone now says they are going on Friday.
1 Beverly: why is everyone not going on Thursday
((Beverly picking at a thread in the cloth shes
sitting on, Alice gazing away))
2 (1.0)
3 Alice: dont know
4 (0.5)
5 Alice: youd think theyd want to go on Thursday so
they could
6 (0.4) fuck off for the weekend
((Alice gazing towards Beverly, who is still
looking down))
7 (0.5)
8 Beverly: yeah is it- (0.3)
9 yeah
10 (0.2)
11 yeah
((Beverly gazing at Alice, while wiping her
upper lip with her forefinger))
12 (0.9)
13 Alice: yeah=I cant cause Ive got (a) presentation
((Alice looking away, Beverly holding her
forefinger to her lip))

14 (0.3)
15 Alice: in the morning

16 (2.2)
17 Alice: but uhm:
18 (0.6)
19 Beverly:
can I borrow a bit more of that (0.3) mu-
moisturizer.
20 (0.4)
21 Alice: m-hm
22 (1.4)
23 Beverly: well it- (0.1)
24 wherere you going anyway
25 (0.2)
26 Alice: Acomb Woodh,
Beverlys gesture of rubbing her upper lip with her forefinger (line 11) is not unam-
biguously a sign of discomfort or unease. Conceivably it might be part of a thinking
face (Goodwin 1987) in conjunction with her question (line 1), to which there has
been no ready answer (see Figure 4).
Yet Beverly holds this gesture well beyond the time required for a thinking pose.
In this sense, it has the potential to become more than merely a display of thinking
(for a similar consideration of the ambivalent possible understandings of thinking or
requesting, see Goodwin 1987:118). Moreover, as she holds the position of her fore-
finger against her lip, she makes small rubbing movements back and forth. However,
at this point Alice is already looking away (see Figure 5).
Thus, if what Beverly is doing is a recruitment display, the opportunity it creates
might be opaque given that it is not well coordinated with the gaze and therefore sight-
line of her co-participant. The upshot is that Alice does not notice Beverlys physical
need, or at least does not identify it for what it is, so that Beverly is reduced to asking
for the loan of some lip moisturizer verbally. This puts her need and her request on
record. Yet significantly, Alice does not treat Beverlys on-record request as revealing
an inattentiveness for which she might be held accountable. In contrast to (6), she does
not respond with an apologetic account; instead, she treats the request as an ordinary
move in the course of ongoing events.
To summarize our argument so far: Recruitments at their most explicit involve
making an immediate physical need, problem or wish overt and publicly available,
thereby providing an opportunity for a co-participant to assist in meeting the need,
resolving the problem, or fulfilling the wish. The more transparent the display of a
need is, the more it assumes an on-record character that is accountable (see, e.g.,
Example(6)). Pointing gestures are, for example, more or less transparent and account-
able. Yet even if overt and noticeable, recruitment displays are not likely to succeed if
they are not within the sightline of the co-participant (see, e.g., Examples (5) and (7)).
The more opaque a display is, the more fallible it is, because it provides merely the hint
of a recruitment opportunity, which can be entirely missed or ignored by the other,
without any accountability ensuing.
Recruitment displays that do not get immediate uptake are sometimes followed
by more explicit verbal means to solicit assistance, e.g., a request form such as Can I X?
in Example (7), or by pre-emptive (conscriptive) moves, e.g., reaching and taking as in
Example (6). This indicates that they are in some ways like (verbal) requests in being
deliberate attempts to achieve a particular goal with the help of a co-participant. How-
ever, at the same time recruitment displays do not need to be deliberate or intentional
in order to function as recruitments. As Examples (3) and (4) teach us, what is crucial
is that a co-participant attributes intentionality to the display.
What does the notion of recruitment add to the discussion of requesting? In
one sense, the denomination of recruitment is narrower than that of a request.
Recruitments require that the targeted object or action must be concrete; linguistic
information and permission to do something cannot be recruited, although they can

be requested. And recruitments require that the object in question must be in the
common domain, meaning that participants must have equal access to it and know
what it might be. In this sense, recruitments might be thought of as a specific kind of
request. But on the other hand, the notion of recruitment can be said to be broader
than that of traditional linguistic requesting, because it places verbal requests in the
larger, ethological framework of using a wide range of semiotic means to achieve a
goal with the help of a co-participant. In this sense, verbal requests might be thought
of a special kind of recruitment.
How do recruitments relate to offers? Just as pre-requests can (but need not) have
as their outcome pre-emptive offers (Schegloff 2007), so too recruitment displays can
lead to offers of objects purported to help a participant who is visibly in need. The
offer of a bowl in Example (3) is a case in point. In such instances a participants need
might be said to be educed (see Curl & Drew 2008 for the use of this term), e.g.,
through linguistic forms such as Do you want X? (as in Example (3)) or Do you want
me to X? (as in Example (4)). However, not all successful recruitments necessarily
terminate in offers. The more overt and transparent a recruitment display is, the more
it is obvious exactly what is needed in order to remedy the problem. A co-participants
provision of this is not a pre-emptive offer but instead a form of compliance with the
silent request (see, e.g., Example (2)).
In conclusion, we believe that the notion of recruitment will repay closer investi-
gation in the future. These are some of the (interconnected) dimensions of recruitment
that will require exploring:
What kinds of gestures constitute recruitment displays? How big must they be?
How transparent?
When does a recruitment display require verbal and/or prosodic accompaniment?
How long must a gesture be held in order for it to be communicatively relevant
as a recruitment display? Must it be overdone or exaggerated (and what might
constitute a gesture as overdone)?
How does the co-participants sightline and/or peripheral vision impinge upon
the success of a recruitment display?
What kinds of bodily orientation can serve as recruitment displays?
How are recruitment displays coordinated with the ongoing sequence or activity?
Under what circumstances do they surface in the conversational record?
It is our hope that the collection of articles presented in this volume, by tracing the
development from requests as speech acts through requests as verbally implemented
social actions to requests as (non-verbal) recruitments, will pave the way to a deeper
and richer understanding of requesting as a species-specific activity.
6. The organization of this volume
This volume consists of thirteen chapters, each of which is an original study of request-
ing in a natural social setting (only the chapter by Wootton has been previously pub-
lished, as explained earlier). These chapters focus on a variety of contexts, settings,
and aspects of requesting. Rather than, as is the convention, attempting to position
the chapters into different thematic sections, with all that that implies, we have opted
in favour of a more organic approach reflecting transitions based on family resem-
blances between one paper and the next.
Thus, chapters are connected with one another within an overall trajectory.
The volume opens with chapters that take a more conceptual approach to request-
ing (Enfield, Chapter 2) and to those dimensions that underlie requesting, and thus
differentiate requesting from other social actions, particularly offers (Clayman and
Heritage, Chapter 3). The close association between requesting and offering continues
to be the focus of the chapters by Kendrick and Drew (Chapter 4) and Couper-Kuhlen
and Etelmki (Chapter 5). This latter chapter, Chapter 5, considers aspects of the lin-
guistic construction of requests, and offers, exploring some of the principles underly-
ing speakers selections of specific forms used to request or offer, principles that have
much to do with the likely divisions of labour between participants to the talk.
In Chapter 6 Steensig and Heinemann continue the theme of the linguistic con-
struction of action, but focussing on the response by a recipient to a remote-action
request. They show particularly that through the linguistic construction of responses
to requests, recipients may encode the recipients commitment to doing what they
have been asked to do, but at the same time may convey, for unilateral requests, the
recipients perception of the relevance of the requested action. This relates back to
the more conceptual issues in earlier chapters, and indeed introduces a new con-
ceptual aspect or distinction, namely between complying out of obligation to the
requester as opposed to complying as a concession to the requester. We noted earlier
that Wootton was prescient in focusing specially on the linguistic form or construc-
tion of requests this at a time when many researchers, especially in Conversa-
tion Analysis, were focusing almost exclusively on responses to initial actions (for
instance, preferred and dispreferred responses to invitations, requests and the like)
and had not much explored the construction of those initial actions. We reprint his
paper as Chapter 7.
Wootton considers requesting in family settings, in talk between parents and
young children. This context of family interactions continues through the chapters
by Goodwin and Cekaite (Chapter 8) and Mandelbaum (Chapter 9), both of which
are studies of requesting in everyday family settings, in interactions with children
though in some instances, especially in Chapter 9, the children are adults. These
chapters have, though, a more significant commonality. Both are based on video
recordings of face-to-face interactions; while previous chapters have also included
data from face-to-face interactions indeed all Woottons examples are from face-
to-face family interactions the video record of holistic and embodied aspects of the
interactions do not play a part in those previous chapters. Here in Chapters 8 and 9 we
see a transition in this volume to studies that now situate linguistic form in an embod-
ied frame, either taking account of peoples movement and position in the environ-
ment, as in Chapter10 by Sorjonen and Raevaara; or relating linguistic form to very
fine details of the manipulation of objects in a space surgical instruments within
the body of a patient as Mondada does in Chapter 11. In each of these chapters
the analysis of requesting pays close attention to non-vocal conduct, including gaze,
gesture, body position, and the location of action in a spatial environment. Such non-
vocal, kinesic or embodied aspects of action take centre stage in the final chapters by
Rossi (Chapter12) and Rossano and Liebal (Chapter 13); in the interactions they have
studied, requesting is managed entirely non-verbally, without words being uttered
to accompany conduct designed to recruit the others assistance (in Chapter 12) or to
solicit or offer food (Chapter 13). In the latter case, the non-vocal character of request-
ing is of necessity this is, as far as we know, the first research documenting that apes
can and do request food from and offer food to one another.
In very broad scope, then, the continuum along which these chapters are positioned
begins with those that focus on conceptual aspects of requesting, transitioning to the
linguistic construction of requests, then relating linguistic construction of requesting to
non-verbal conduct and spatial aspects of face-to-face settings, then finally to interac-
tions in which requesting is managed entirely non-verbally. This organization follows
the trajectory we have set out in this introduction, from conceptual issues associated
with the constitutive properties of requesting to focusing on linguistic form, finally con-
necting linguistic form more closely with the embodied context in face-to-face interac-
tions. With this ordering we do not mean to suggest any progression towards a fuller
or more advanced perspective; we mean rather to give equal weight to the full range of
conceptual, linguistic and embodied aspects of the conduct and management of what
is surely a key form in the collaborative, co-operative socialities of our everyday lives.
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to Kobin Kendrick for sharing with us some of the ideas that have
inspired the discussion of recruitment in the second half of this chapter; and to
Giovanni Rossi, for collecting and making available to us the video recordings that we
have used in that discussion.
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Human agency and the infrastructure
for requests
N. J. Enfield
The University of Sydney & Max Planck Institute Nijmegen
This chapter discusses some of the elements of human sociality that serve as
the social and cognitive infrastructure or preconditions for the use of requests
and other kinds of recruitments in interaction. The notion of an agent with
goals is a canonical starting point, though importantly agency tends not to
be wholly located in individuals, but rather is socially distributed. This is well
illustrated in the case of requests, in which the person or group that has a
certain goal is not necessarily the one who carries out the behavior towards
that goal. The chapter focuses on the role of semiotic (mostly linguistic)
resources in negotiating the distribution of agency with request-like actions,
with examples from video-recorded interaction in Lao, a language spoken in
Laos and nearby countries. The examples illustrate five hallmarks of requesting
in human interaction, which show some ways in which our manipulation of
other people is quite unlike our manipulation of tools: (1) that even though B
is being manipulated, B wants to help, (2) that while A is manipulating B now,
A may be manipulated in return later; (3) that the goal of the behavior may be
shared between A and B, (4) thatB may not comply, or may comply differently
than requested, due to actual or potential contingencies, and (5) that A and B
are accountable to one another; reasons may be asked for, and/or given, for the
request. These hallmarks of requesting are grounded in a prosocial framework
of human agency.
1. Flexibility in the pursuit of goals
In the opening pages of his Principles of Psychology, William James (1890) notes the
special flexibility of cognizant behaviour. Iron filings, he notes, will be drawn to a
magnet, but they cannot choose how they reach that goal. If a paper card covers the
magnet, the filings will just press against the card. Thinking beings are different:
Romeo wants Juliet as the filings want the magnet; and if no obstacles intervene
he moves towards her by as straight a line as they. But Romeo and Juliet, if a wall
be built between them, do not remain idiotically pressing their faces against its
N. J. Enfield
opposite sides like the magnet and the filings with the card. Romeo soon finds
a circuitous way, by scaling a wall or otherwise, of touching Juliets lips directly.
(James 1890:7)
This means-ends flexibility is our forte. We try to reach a goal, and if this is frustrated,
we seek or invent new means. The pursuance of future ends and the choice of means
for their attainment are thus the mark and criterion of the presence of mentality
(James 1890:8). A certain mentality is always involved in the pursuit of goals, but that
is not our point of interest here. I want to focus on what results from this mentality:
namely, our enhanced flexibility in selecting means to ends.
To see how we refine and elaborate our choices of means for ends, just look at
the instruments and tools of human technologies (cf. Zipf 1949; Suchman 1987; Lave
1988; Norman 1988; Clark 2008). But possibly our most important, and most ancient,
means toward ends celebrated in this book are other people. Rather than doing
everything ourselves, or even doing things just with the help of tools, it is often other
people that we use to help us reach our goals.
This should not be taken to mean that people are solely interested in exploiting
others for their own ends. Situations in which one person uses another as a tool are not
based in selfishness alone. One reason is that we are apparently just as willing to offer
ourselves as tools to serve others individual goals. We hold doors open for strangers.
We alert people when we notice they have dropped their keys. We give away our spare
change on the street. We open doors for people when we see their hands are full. Another
reason is that we share goals with others. Then, when I behave in a way that looks like its
for you, it may in fact be for us. Michael Tomasello (2008) argues that this is the mecha-
nism whereby altruistic behaviour can evolve in a selfish world. Once individuals are
able to share a goal, a behaviour that is for us is thereby, ultimately, also for me.
2. Language+ as a tool for mobilizing others
We do not manipulate people in the same direct way that we grasp a hammer or a pen.
If we are going to get others to do things for us, we need the mediating tools of com-
munication. As Leonard Bloomfield (1933) put it, when a stimulus evokes a response
(e.g. when Jane sees an apple on a tree and wants to pluck it), language can be used as a
sort of tool of transference, to elicit that response in another person (she tells Jack that
the apple is there, and asks him to pluck it for her). We influence other people by tak-
ing the tools provided by our language and culture and using them to convince those
other people to willingly act on our behalf. This is the essence of what we are doing
when we make requests.
Humans have by far the most complex communication systems of all creatures.
Our languages are generative in nature, meaning that we can combine words and
constructions to produce entirely novel utterances at will. These verbal utterances
Human agency and the infrastructure for requests
may be further creatively combined with accompanying visible bodily behaviour. We

shall use the term language+ (pronounced language plus) to refer to the enriched
set of semiotic resources that includes not just words and grammatical constructions
but intonation, gestures, facial expressions and more (Kendon 2004; McNeill 2005;
Enfield 2009).
Now while the set of semiotic means we have for getting others to do things is,
in principle, infinite, in fact we often use recurring and readily recognized strategies
in making requests (Could you pass the salt?, Could you open the window? Could you
shut the door?). We now consider some of the types of strategies that recur in a single
language community. The following cases are taken from video-recordings of conver-
sation among speakers of Lao, the national language of Laos (Enfield 2007, 2013). Here
are three simple examples of ways in which people use language+ to get others to do
things for them, or to help them, in Lao.
In the first example, two women are in a kitchen, where one of the women needs
some leaf extract that the other has been preparing. The first woman says grab (it and)
come (here), meaning bring it here:
Extract 1. INTCN_030731b_192570_0:03:131
1 A qaw3 maa2
grab come
Bring it here (referring to a bowl of leaf extract)
2 B Slides bowl with extract in direction of A
In this case, the requester uses a stripped-back linguistic construction that does noth-
ing more than refer directly to the action being requested. The action to fetch some-
thing is idiomatically expressed in Lao as a combination of grab and come. The
object being referred to the leaf extract is understood from the context.
A second example shows the common strategy in Lao of adding a softening
sentence-final imperative particle n1 to the basic action being requested (see
Enfield 2007:66 and passim for description of a paradigm of particles whose mean-
ings code imperative illocutionary force). In addition, the speaker makes a pointing
gesture in the direction of the thing she is asking for:
Extract 2. INTCN_030731b_196430_0:03:16
1 A qaw3 qan-nii4 n1
grab clf-this imp.soft
Grab this thing (for me; referring to prepared food in a sieve; pointing in
direction of the food that she is asking B to pass)
. The orthographic conventions used in the Lao transcriptions follow Enfield (2007:37);
note that a numeral at the end of a Lao word represents the lexical tone of that word.
N. J. Enfield
2 B Turns to reach out for the food, grabs it and passes it to A
In a third case, the speaker is busy with food preparation in the kitchen. She uses a
circuitous or indirect strategy, with more embellishment of the basic request being
made than we saw in the last two examples. She addresses the requestee explicitly (call-
ing him father he is her father), and rather than stating the action she wants him to
carry out (i.e. pass her the knife), she asks whether the knife is behind him:
Extract 3. CONV_020723b_RCR_970010_0:16:10
1 A ph1 miit4 thaang2 lang3 caw4 mii2 b3
father knife direction back 2sg.p have qplr
Dad is there a knife behind you?
2 B nii4 nii4
here here
Here, here (finds a knife behind himself, passes it towards A)
It is clear that she doesnt simply want to know whether there is a knife behind him.
The question makes sense in terms of her current goals. She is asking because she
wants the knife, and so he hands it to her.
Now look at what these three cases have in common. Person A wants to get hold
of some entity that is nearby but out of reach. Rather than go and get it herself, Person
A says something to Person B, with the result that Person B gets the thing and passes
it, thus carrying out a bit of behavior that Person A would otherwise have had to carry
out herself. In this way, A has recruited Bs help.
Such moves as those shown in the A lines of the above examples are not always
about a requester getting a requestee to act physically in her stead. Sometimes the issue
is getting permission. In the next example, a girl wants to use the knife that her older
brother is holding and playing with. She leans over to take it out of his hand (illustrated
in Figure 1; A and B in the foreground of the shot). Just when her hand comes close
enough to take the knife herself, she produces an imperative construction identical in
form to the one shown in Extract 1, above:
Extract 4. INTCN_030731b_730407_0:12:10
1 A qaw3 maa2
grab come
Bring it here (pulls knife out of Bs hand)
2 B Allows A to take knife that B is playing with
The requestees response here is not to do anything at all, but merely to allow the
requester to take control of the object in his hand.
Figure 1. INTCN_030731b_12_12
Here is another case. The requestee, B, is visible at the left of frame in Figure2,
in the background. She is holding a knife and playing with it, using it to whittle away
at some piece of stem or similar object. The requester, A, in the centre of the frame,
reaches down to take the knife out of Bs hand, and as she does so, she issues a less
elliptical version of the request in Extract 4, saying not just grab and bring (it here)
but more explicitly grab the knife and bring it here to give me:
Extract 5. INTCN_030731b_0:11:43
1 A qaw3 miit4 maa2 haj5 khj5
grab knife come give 1.pol
Give the knife to me (pulls knife out of Bs hand)
2 B Allows A to take knife
Again, the effect of the words that A uses is not to get B to act in any way, but
rather to allow A to take the knife out of Bs hand, which A immediately does.
Notice that the linguistic construction of this last example contrasts with the
request in Extract 1 in two ways. First, there is explicit mention of the object that is
being requested. It is not clear why this is being added (similarly with the addition of
N. J. Enfield
a.
b.
Figure 2. INTCN_030731b_0:11:43
reference to the object as this thing in Extract 2). Second, the requester is explicit that
the request is for her. A possible motivation for this addition of self-reference is that
it allows the speaker to select from among a set of personal pronouns, here choosing a
more polite form than she would normally use for this addressee, presumably helping
to soften the request.
These examples give us a simple look at the kind of role that language+ plays in
manipulating the behavior of others in order to get them to contribute to, or comply
with, our own goals. The examples show that different formulations are possible. And
they show that such cases are not only about getting others to act on our behalf, but
may also be about getting others to desist from some behavior that then allows us to
proceed with our goal. Either way, B complies with a low-cost imposition.
3. The distribution of agency
The request-like cases we have just considered reveal a defining feature of human soci-
ality, namely the distributed nature of our agency (Enfield 2013:115 and passim; cf.
Kockelman 2013; Gell 1998). This is related to the notion of distributed cognition,
familiar from research by authors such as Jack Goody (1977), Lucy Suchman (1987),
Jean Lave (1988), Donald Norman (1988), Edwin Hutchins (1995, 2006) and Andy
Clark (2008), who have all shown ways in which tools and artifacts can be extensions
of the human body and mind (see also Enfield 2009, Chapter 6). Students of language
have long argued that language is a kind of tool for getting others to do things. Some,
including Zipf (1949), have gone further, saying that other people are tools for us as well
(see also Goodwin 2006 on this point in relation to language+). Along these lines, Mark
Pagel has recently compared language to a remote control device (Pagel 2012:2756):
When you speak, you are using a form of telemetry, not so different from the remote
control of your television. Just as we use the infrared device to alter some electronic
setting within a television so that it tunes to a different channel that suits our mood, we
use our language to alter the settings inside someone elses brain in a way that will serve
our interests..
Sometimes it appears as if this were really true. In the following example, one
person uses speech to get another person to turn the television on, just as she might
otherwise have used a remote control device to do from a distance:
Extract 6. INTCN_111204t_818990_0:13:39
1 A peet5 tholathat1 beng1 m4
open television look imp.unimpd
Turn on the television (for us) to watch
2 B peet5 b daj4 tii4
open neg can qplr.presm
It doesnt work (it cant be turned on), I think
N. J. Enfield
3 A daj4 caw4 ka peet5 beng1 tha m4

can 2.pol tlnk open look pcl imp.unimpd
Yes it works you turn it on and see
4 B Moves towards the television and reaches and switches it on
Then half a minute later:

Extract 7. INTCN_111204t_850175_0:14:10
1 A mt4 mt4 la m4
turn.off turn.off prf imp.unimpd
Switch it off, switch it off.
2 B Moves towards the television and reaches and switches it off.
It is an inviting analogy: asking someone to do something for us is like pressing but-

tons on a remote control device. But like all analogies (as Pagel of course knows), it
is imperfect. As we shall now see, its imperfections are instructive. The rest of this
chapter considers the ways in which the analogy between words and remote control
devices breaks down.
4. Hallmarks of requesting
What is the difference between using a person and using a device as a means to get
something done? The answer: With people, both parties are goal-driven and socially
accountable beings, and there is a social relationship between them. Here are some
features of the interpersonal manipulations shown in the above examples that are not
observed in the use of an electronic remote control device:
1. Even though B is being manipulated, B wants to help.

2. While A is manipulating B now, A may be manipulated in return later.
3. The goal of the behavior may be shared between A and B.
4. B may not comply, or may comply differently than requested, due to actual or
potential contingencies.
5. A and B are accountable to one another; reasons may be asked for, and/or
given.
There are of course other differences. But these will serve as points of focus for us to
consider the hallmarks of requesting in humans, within the simple framework of goal-
directed social agency that was outlined in the above sections.
4.1 B wants to do the requested action

A remote control device is a robot. It responds to instruction but it doesnt offer to help
you or otherwise independently anticipate your needs. People, by contrast, may want
to help. Think about the above examples. In no case would we want to say that some-
one was being coerced or seriously imposed upon. The requestees cooperate without
any resistance or comment. People are so willing to help that we often see them offer
assistance without their having to be asked.
Consider an illustration of the kind of situation in which a person needs some-
thing to be done for them, and gets the help they need from another person without
having to ask for it or otherwise signal the need. Figure 3 shows a panel of three stills
from a video-recording, taken in quick succession. Our focus is the man in the white
T-shirt seated in the background at the left of the image as we view it. This recording
is taken in the kitchen verandah of a Lao village house. The floor of this space is raised
high above the ground of the village compound. To get up into the house, one walks
up a steep galley-style ladder. The man in the white T-shirt is sitting where one of these
ladders provides entry onto the raised floor of the house. The area where the ladder
provides entry onto the floor is blocked by a low gate, designed to prevent toddlers
from falling down the ladder. In Figure 3a, the leftmost panel, we see that the gate
is ajar, just in front of the man in the white T-shirt. While the gate is not completely
closed, it is closed enough so as to hinder entry for somebody who does not have a free
hand with which to open the gate. At the moment illustrated in Figure 3a, another man
is at the bottom of the ladder, about to go up into the house. This man is just visible
(though partly obscured by the banister) in the bottom right corner of the image, with
two stripes across his T-shirt. He is holding a large plastic laundry basket full of clothes,
which he is about to bring up into the house. Figure 3b shows the point at which he is
reaching the half-closed gate at the top of the ladder, and where one can thus foresee
that his way may be hindered. It is at this moment, as can be seen in Figure3b, that the
man in the white T-shirt reaches forward with his right hand and pushes the gate open
enough to allow the other man to walk up into the house unhindered. In Figure3c, we
see the silhouette of the man with the large laundry basket walking through the now-
open gate and onto the raised floor of the house.
Extract 8. INTCN_111203l_243630_0:04:04
1 A begins walking up ladder approaching closed gate with washing basket
in hand (FIG 3A)
2 B reaches out to gate as A comes to top of ladder (FIG3B) and pushes
open gate for A to walk through unhindered (FIG 3C)
This is not a request sequence, rather it can be seen as an instance of the more gen-
eral action of recruitment: a sequence in which a first move by A occasions a helping
action by B. Like in request sequences (see the above examples), As behavior makes it
clear that he needs help, and then B helps accordingly, in line with a general coopera-
tive stance in human interaction. But in this case As behavior, which makes it clear
that he needs help, cannot be said to have been an intentional manipulation of B to
N. J. Enfield
a.
b.
c.
Figure 3. INTCN_111203l_03_56, INTCN_111203l_04_08, INTCN_111203l_04_10

help A in achieving his goal. Here, person B stepped in to help A upon anticipating a
potential problem. The point here is that request sequences all presuppose the more
general prosocial, cooperative orientation and desire to help that is sometimes simply
volunteered in cases like this one.
4.2 Roles may be reversed

In the kinds of social contexts we spend most time in i.e. informal social interaction in
familiar environments with people we know well the kinds of things we ask others to
do are the kinds of things we are willing to do for them. I expect you to pass me the salt
when I ask, just as when you ask for the salt, you can expect that I will pass it. Obviously
there are asymmetries, especially when interactions are more formalized, but the gen-
eral principle is reciprocity. This is obviously not the case with remote control devices.
4.3 The goal may be shared

The requests we have considered so far in this chapter involve situations in which
person B is asked to help person A with something related to their current goal. But
many things that we might want to call requests occur in contexts where both people
involved are jointly committed to the same goal. Rossi (2012) compares two kinds of
request sequence in Italian interaction. In one kind, A has a goal, not currently shared
with B, and asks B to help (e.g. Pass me the chewing gum). In another kind, A andB
currently share an overarching goal, and A asks B to do something that they have
effectively already committed to within that overarching goal (e.g. Deal the cards).
The idea of joint commitment, and everything that implies (Clark 2006), is clearly
irrelevant to the relationship between people and remote control devices.
The fact that people make joint commitments to goals means that, similar to the
gate at the top of the ladder example above (Extract 8), cooperation can be assumed,
and may be offered without having been prompted. And when there are shared goals,
it can become impossible and in fact irrelevant to say whether a sequence involved
a request or an offer (Sidnell & Enfield 2014).
In the following example, we are interested in the two people at the back of
the image (most clearly visible in Figure 4b, the man standing stooped over, the
woman with her left hand on her head). They are cooking a dish together. The man
has been heating jugged fish on the fire, and at this moment the jugged fish needs
to be strained. In Figure 4a, the man (crouched down at the left back of image, but
mostly obscured) has just emerged from the fireplace with the pot of heated jugged
fish, and he is getting another pot, into which to strain it. Seeing this, the woman at
the back of the image on our right extends her arm forward with the sieve that she
has in her hand (see the centre of the image in Figure 4a). Next, the man walks over,
holds the empty pot underneath the sieve, and pours the jugged fish into the sieve,
thus straining it.
N. J. Enfield
a.
b.
Figure 4. INTCN_030731b_04_31, INTCN_030731b_04_33

Extract 9. INTCN_030731b_267220_0:04:27
1 A Holds out sieve for straining jugged fish (FIG 4A)
2 B Brings and places jugged fish and pot for jugged fish to be strained into
(FIG 4B)
In this instance we cant say whether this sequence involves an offer or a request
(nor do we need to; Sidnell & Enfield 2014:422ff). The terms offer and request pre-
suppose that the relevant behaviour is for one or the other of the two parties. If A
offers to do something, its for B. If A requests that B does something, its for A. But in
many cases like this one, the behaviour being precipitated is a sub-part of a routine to
which both parties are already committed, and thus share as a goal.
4.4 B need not comply

If a piece of technology is in working order, it will do what you want. A person, on the
other hand, may ignore your request, refuse to comply, or do something other than
what you asked. The lives of people are full of contingencies, actual or potential, which
often intervene (cf. Curl & Drew 2008).
In the following example, a husband and wife are in a kitchen, skinning catfish.
They have been doing this for a while, and the husband has one more fish left to skin,
but complains that his back is sore from sitting and working. He holds the fish out
towards his wife for her to take and skin:
Extract 10. INTCN_111203l_689141_0:11:29
1 A cp2 qw3 lw4
hurt back prf
My back hurts
2 bt2 diaw3
a moment
(It will only take) a moment.
3 qaw3 qaw3
grab grab
Here take it (holding out fish for her to take).
4 B mm2
nope
Nope
Her refusal is not surprising. The couple, who in this culture are of equal standing
in a setting like this one, have each been working for the same amount of time doing
the same task. The wifes back is no doubt also sore from sitting and working, and
she treats the request as unwarranted. Theres no good reason why she should do it
for him.
N. J. Enfield
While the B speaker did not give a reason for her refusal in the last example, often
a reason is given, or at least implied. In the next example, two sisters are involved in
preparations for lunch. One of the dishes they will eat is green papaya salad. They
have already prepared the papaya by julienning it, and it is now ready to be pounded
along with other ingredients to make the salad. Speaker A asks Speaker B to go and
get the mortar and pound the salad. Normally, this salad is eaten immediately after
it has been pounded and tossed, and so it is too early to proceed, since various other
dishes are not yet ready. Speaker B does not comply with As request, instead saying
Dont rush:
Extract 11. INTCN_030731b_695170_0:11:35

1 A paj3 qaw3 khok1 ma tam3 paj2
go grab mortar come pound imperative
Go and get a mortar to do the pounding.
2 B qoo4 jaa1 faaw4 thq2
Oh dont rush pcl
Oh, dont rush
Speaker B is not declining to do the requested behavior. She is declining to do it at the

moment asked. By effectively giving a reason for not complying, she makes it clear that
she is not simply being uncooperative.
4.5 O
ne may need to give B reasons why B should
do the requested action
A remote control device never needs or wants to know why you want it to do some-
thing on your behalf, but a person often does. We saw in the last section that people
who are asked to do things may give reasons for refusal or delay in complying. Here we
shall see that people who ask others to do things will sometimes give reasons as well.
(We saw a case where the man reasoned that because his back hurt, his wife should
finish his task.) This happens, for example, when a person is asked to do something
but delays their response, or otherwise resists. Giving a reason for a request is a way to
pursue, strengthen, or help make sense of what is being asked.
Let us look at an example. Here, Speaker A starts by issuing a directive to a
group of three people (two are her children, one is her daughter-in-law) who are
preparing food in the kitchen of her house. She asks them to toss the rice. This is
a procedure in the preparation of glutinous rice. When rice has been steamed and
is now cooked, because of the shape of the steamer used it will be cooked more in
some spots and less in others. Tossing the rice is a way of evening out the texture of
it before serving:
Extract 12. INTCN_111203l_425170_0:07:05

1 A suaj3 khaw5 m4 suu3
toss rice imp.unimpd 2pl.b
Toss the rice you lot
She uses the second person plural pronoun suu3 in formulating this request. This means
that she does not select any one person to do the job. As it happens, none of the three
young people in her immediate vicinity volunteer to act upon her request. It is clear that
they are fully occupied with other duties. She then calls out to a fourth person her son-
in-law whose name is Nyao to come and do it instead. At this moment, Nyao is away
from the scene, doing something else in the compound outside the house, but within
earshot. Her move (shown in Extract 13) begins with a somewhat elaborate request in
line 1: she selects him explicitly by name, telling him to stop what he is currently doing
and to come and toss the rice, adding also that its for her; she also uses the imperative
sentence-final particle m4, which implies that the addressee is unimpeded (often
implying Why arent you already doing it?; cf. Enfield 2007:63), and she immediately
adds two reasons: the first, why it has to be done, and fast (the pot will burn), and sec-
ond why he has to be the one to do it (the others are all busy here):
Extract 13. INTCN_111203l_427440_0:07:07
1 A bak2-aaw2 paq2 vaj4 han5 maa2 suaj3 khaw5 haj5
M.B- abandon put there come toss rice give
kuu3 m4
1.b imp.unimpd
Nyao, drop that and come and toss the rice for me
2 maj5 m5 dj2 ni khaw3 khaa2 viak4 met2
burn pot fac.inform tpc 3pl stuck work all
thuk1 khon2 ni
every person tpc
the pot will burn theyre all busy here
3 B Stops what hes doing and walks up the ladder into the food preparation
area, goes into the kitchen to toss the rice (it takes 13 seconds before he
reaches the kitchen)
Note that Nyao would otherwise not have been expected to be involved in the behavior
of tossing the rice, since he was, relative to four other people including the speaker, the
furthest from the place where the task needed to be done. It is by providing reasons
that Speaker A in Extract 13 is able to mobilize his help.
The drawing of attention to a reason for action alone has long been recognized
as an indirect way of requesting (cf. Its cold in here as a way of getting someone to
close the window). Here is a case in which Speaker A draws attention to a problem that
N. J. Enfield
needs fixing, namely the fact that some live fish in a pot dont have sufficient water to
keep them alive and fresh:
Extract 14. INTCN_111203l_601081_0:10:01

1 A paa3 man2 si b taaj3 vaa3 qaaj4 dong3
fish 3.b irr neg die qplr.infer eB D
The fish, arent they going to die, Dong? (pointing in direction of large pot
with live fish)
2 B qan-daj3 (.) qoo4 qaw3 nam4 maa2 saj1 () maa2
what Oh grab water come put () come
saj1 m4
put imp.unimpd
What? Oh, put some water in there ( ) put some in
It is also often the case that a reason is given in combination with an explicit request.
Here is an example in which an imperative command is followed quickly by a reason.
Speaker A is sitting next to a large pot with live fish in the bottom of it. A fresh load of
water has just been poured into the pot, and the fish are splashing about so much that
water is spilling out of the pot and onto him:
Extract 15. INTCN_111203l_629110_0:10:29

1 A 4 nii3(.) man2 diin4 phoot4
lift flee 3.B jump too.much
Take it away theyre splashing too much (leaning back from the pot)
2 B Walks around behind A in direction of the pot, comes and picks up pot
and moves it away.
By providing a reason for the request to take the pot away, Speaker A helps to clarify
for B precisely what is being asked of her. There could be a range of reasons why A
wants her to take the pot away, and each would imply a different way of complying.
For example, how far away should she take it? Here, he makes it clear that he merely
wants the pot to be placed far enough away that the splashing water wont reach him.
5. Conclusion
The concept of agency has long been central to many lines of research that touch on
human interaction, in fields ranging from law and sociology to anthropology and lin-
guistics. Importantly, the word agency does not refer to a one-dimensional degree of
assertiveness or similar. Its use should reflect the nuances of empirical and theoreti-
cal findings of research in this multi-faceted and dynamic domain (Kockelman 2007;
Enfield 2013: Chapter 9; cf. Davidson 1963; Duranti 1990, 2004; Gell 1998; Ahearn
2001). Conceptual tools for understanding agency are central to the analysis of any
social action, not least requests and their ilk. The behaviour of doing things for oth-
ers is also supported by a set of psychological and interpersonal resources grounded
in human sociality, including the elements of social intelligence, distributed cogni-
tion, normative accountability, and cooperative motivations (Enfield & Levinson 2006;
Enfield 2013). These resources form part of a foundational infrastructure for social inter-
action (Levinson 2006; Enfield & Sidnell 2014). My aim here has not been to define ana-
lytic or conceptual tools, but rather to highlight some hallmarks of request sequences in
light of certain defining elements of agency and the infrastructure for interaction. In the
sequences we have examined, three of these elements come to the fore.
The first is that we assume people behave in accordance with goals that they are
pursuing. Their behaviour makes sense in terms of those goals and in terms of the
reasons that may be given for their behaviour. This is clear in any request sequence.
Second, there is a mismatch between the fact that in the physical realm people are
immutably distinct from one another (we have separate bodies), while on the other
hand in the realm of social accountability we may either be treated as inhabiting
separate units (such as when one person pursues a goal unilaterally) or as being
elements of a single, shared unit (such as when two people have made a joint com-
mitment to a shared course of action; cf. Clark 1996; Rossi 2012). Much of social
life involves tacking back and forth between different distributions of flexibility and
accountability of behaviour, in a process of fission-fusion agency (Enfield 2013:104
and passim). Requests always imply the sharing or distributing of action. And third,
thanks to the special prosociality of our species, we are motivated to help others,
and we tend to assume that others have the same cooperative motivations toward
us. Requests both presuppose and display these mutual prosocial motivations and
assumptions.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to the editors for their patience and input, and to my colleagues in the
Recruitments project at MPI Nijmegen, funded by the ERC as part of grant 240853
Human Sociality and Systems of Language Use.
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Appendix. Abbreviations used in glosses of Lao examples
1/2/3 first/second/third person

B bare (non-polite)
clf classifier
eB elder brother
fac.inform factive particle for informing
irr irrealis
m.b bare (non-polite) title prefix for males
neg negative
pcl particle
pol polite
prf perfect
qplr polar question marker
qplr.infer polar question marker, answer being inferred
qplr.presm polar question marker, answer being presumed
imp.soft imperative marker with soft tone
imp.unimpd imperative marker, no impediment assumed
tlnk topic linker
tpc topic
Benefactors and beneficiaries
Benefactive status and stance in the management
of offers and requests

University of California
The implementation and ascription of first actions has until recently been an
understudied area within conversation analysis. Recently, exploratory studies in
the domains of epistemics and deontics have led to a revival of interest in this
problem. This paper addresses the same issue through the lens of benefactives
and its relevance to the production of requests and offers. It argues that when
persons are confronted with a turn at talk that proposes some future action and
its agent, they parse this turn by reference to the distribution of benefits (if any)
that will accrue to speaker and recipient.
The paper identifies some of the key ingredients in the linguistic construction
of benefactive stance: reference to the agent and recipient of the future action,
reference to the interests that can be satisfied through the action, and action
formulations indexing costs and benefits. It is demonstrated that these features
can be mobilized in pursuit of an accepting response. The paper further develops
the argument that there will normally be a congruence between the benefactive
status of the action and the benefactive stance taken in and through the design
of the utterance that nominates the action. Correspondingly, in the case of
incongruency benefactive status trumps benefactive stance in the ascription of
the action and the interpretive determination of its social meanings.
1. Introduction
The relationship between specific language practices and key vernacular actions such
as requests has long been a central issue in linguistic pragmatics and in the broader
field of language and social interaction research. The issue was first problematized
by Austins (1962) distinction between locutionary acts and illocutionary force, and
by his recognition that successfully implementing any given action rests upon a con-
fluence of conventional procedures and contextual appropriateness. This approach
was subsequently formalized by Searle (1969, 1975) in terms of four types of felicity

conditions that differentiated and particularized speech acts of different kinds. Par-
ticularly suggestive were rules specifying the propositional content and preparatory
conditions required for the felicitous performance of a range of basic speech acts
(Searle 1979). The research of this period also documented that asking questions or
making assertions about these felicity conditions could be an indirect way of per-
forming speech acts (Gordon & Lakoff 1971), and that assertions about their non-
fulfillment could be a way of building rejecting or uncooperative responses (Labov &
Fanshel 1977:868).
Towards the end of the 1970s, this program of research came to a halt, hindered
by a paucity of empirical data, an element of conceptual rigidity, and an inade-
quate appreciation of the role of sequence and context in the process of interac-
tion (Levinson 1979, 1981, 2013). During this period, conversation analysts, who
had long championed the role of sequential context in the recognition of actions
(Schegloff 1984, 2007), contributed relatively little to the analysis of the first or
sequence initiating actions that the speech act theorists had labored to specify.
Indeed, with a few notable exceptions (Drew 1978, 1984; Pomerantz, 1978, 1984,
1988; Schegloff 1980, 1984, 1988, 2007; Wootton 1981a, b), CA largely stood aside
from the analysis of first actions in terms of syntax and presupposition (Levinson
2013), while adding observations about the significance of various paralinguistic
and nonlinguistic accompaniments of utterances (Couper-Kuhlen & Selting 1996;
Goodwin 1979, 1984, 1986, 2000, 2010; Goodwin & Goodwin 1987; Selting and
Couper-Kuhlen 2001).
While the traditional speech act approach had focused on the sentences that
delivered actions together with their associated conditions, research in the 1990s and
beyond highlighted the social and sequential contexts of utterances, together with the
role of prosody, gesture, and body position in the process of what has come to be
termed action formation. In Schegloff s (2007:xiv) words, action formation is con-
cerned with the following question:
how are the resources of the language, the body, the environment of the interaction,
and position in the interaction fashioned into conformations designed to be, and
to be recognized by recipients as, particular actions actions like requesting,
inviting, granting, complaining, agreeing, telling, noticing, rejecting, and so on
in a class of unknown size?
In this paper we will follow Levinsons (2013) terminology in referring to recipients

understandings of actions as action ascription in order to draw attention to the fact
that the recognition of an action is a complex process in which successive actions
interlock to function as ways of validating, adjusting or invalidating the actions to
which they respond. Thus in a sequence such as the following, we will speak of line 1
as initially designed as an invitation:
(1) [SBL 1:1:7R]

1 A: Why dont you come and see me some[times.
2 B:
[I would like to.
3 A: I would like you to.
Correspondingly we will treat line 2 as ascribing the action of inviting to line 1 by means
of accepting it, and line 3 as validating that ascription and reconfirming the original
action as intended. This standard conversation analytic treatment of actions-in-sequences
(Heritage 1984; Schegloff 1992) treats the formation and intersubjective apprehension of
actions as a temporally extended work-in-progress that is managed through the serial
interlocking of actions in a process of successive confirmation and specification.
In this chapter, we consider processes of action formation in the performance
of requests and offers. We begin from the framework developed by Couper-Kuhlen
(2014), who argues that requests, offers and related actions such as proposals and sug-
gestions all involve convergences on recurrent and sedimented action formats (Fox
2007), that are differentiated in terms of who is projected to be the agent of the future
action, and who is understood to be its beneficiary. Couper-Kuhlens analysis is sum-
marized Table 1. As this table indicates, while many actions embody a presumption
of a clear division of labor between the agents and the beneficiaries of future actions,
in the case of proposals (and, arguably, invitations) there is no necessary presumption
either or a singular agent, or a singular beneficiary, of the proposed activity.
Table 1. Offers, requests and related actions (Couper-Kuhlen 2014)

Agent of future action Beneficiary of future action
Proposal Self and Other Self and Other

Offer Self Other
Request Other Self
Suggestion Other Other
Couper-Kuhlen (2014) also documents the relevance of linguistic form in the for-
mation and ascription of these actions. For example, she shows that requests, whether
for objects, immediate actions or deferred actions, are most often implemented
through one of three linguistic formats: imperatives, e.g. Pass the wishbone, Give
him my best wishes; assertions of needs wishes or desires, e.g. I want you to phone
the clinic tomorrow; and questions about the ability or willingness of the recipient to
perform some action, e.g. Will you call him tonight for me? Correspondingly offers,
echoing Curl (2006), are most frequently implemented by questions concerning the
recipients needs and desires. e.g. Do you want/need X; second, a conditional format
if X, then [offer], and an imperative form Ill [do X].
The compelling significance of Couper-Kuhlens argument arises from her observa-

tion that there is relatively little overlap between the forms that implement these actions.
Thus grammatical formats of utterances are comparatively reliable as indicators of the
actions that the recipient is intended to recognize, and can be construed as routine solu-
tions to the action formation problem (see Thompson and Couper-Kuhlen 2005).
If this was the whole story of action formation and ascription with respect to offers
and requests, the picture would be relatively straightforward and amenable to analytic
control. However many complexities arise from the contextual features of utterances,
including the identities and other social characteristics that participants attribute to
one another. For example, in the case of offers, it may not always be the case that the
offer recipient will treat the thing offered as a benefit, as in (2):
(2) [NB IV:10, 41:1735]
1 Lot:-> Dont chu want me tih come dow:n getchu dihmorren
2 take yih dow:n dih the beauty parlor?
3 (0.3)
4 Emm: What fo:r I jis did my hair it looks like pruh- a
5 perfessional.
Other contextual difficulties may also create confounding puzzles. Over thirty years
ago, Susan Ervin-Tripp invited consideration of a situation in which you are cutting up
carrots with a large kitchen knife and a small child says Can I help? She continues:
If you consider yourself the beneficiary of the assistance of a well-trained
Montessori-taught carrot slicer, you may hear this as an offer. If you doubt the
skill or even safety of the help, you may consider it a plea for permission The
difference here is that in the case of permission requests the speaker, as principal
beneficiary, wants the action more than the hearer. (Ervin-Tripp 1981:1967)
Here what is putatively the same linguistic signal will be understood, and treated, as
an offer or a request depending on how the capacities of the speaker are construed.
To address these contingencies, we introduce a distinction between benefactive
stance and benefactive status. By the term benefactive stance, we intend the speakers
action encoded in the linguistic signal as described by Couper-Kuhlen (2014), so as
to convey a distribution of benefits and/or costs associated with a projected future
action. By the term benefactive status we refer to a complex of underlying conditions
for the action, including such matters as whether a service will be rendered that is of
actual benefit to its recipient, whether the performer of the service is able and willing
to perform it, whether the cost to the performer is high or low, and whether the service
is to be performed immediately (a proximal service) or at some later time (a distal
service). We argue that these elements of benefactive status may be, and frequently are,
indexed in the verbal construction of offers and requests so that benefactive stance and
status are aligned with one another. However we also examine cases where they are
out of alignment, and consider what speakers are doing when they select formulations
embodying ostensibly ill fitted relations between benefactive stance and status, and
how the resulting misalignment may get resolved or otherwise impacts the subsequent
development of the interaction.
2. Benefactive stance
When a sequence-initiating action nominating some proximal or distal future action

is being formulated, a variety of language practices can portray the nominated action
as having an asymmetrical distribution of benefits such that one party is cast as the
benefactor and the other the beneficiary. Configurations with the speaker as benefac-
tor and the recipient as beneficiary are commonly associated with offers, whereas the
opposite configurations are commonly associated with requests. As we have noted,
although enacted stance is a fairly reliable, if imperfect, indicator of intrinsic status as
it is available to the participants (Couper-Kuhlen 2014) the import of these enacted
stances whether the action actually comes off as an offer, or a request, or a request
dressed up as an offer, or a proposal being given an other-attentive or altruistic lamina-
tion, etc. is ultimately contingent on the benefactive status of the action and can only
be determined on a case by case basis. In this section, we focus on the stance side of the
equation and the recurrent language practices through which it is indexed within the
primary initiating action. Subsequently, in Section 4, we zero in on offers and requests
and consider more elaborated practices embodied in explicit accounts. The practices in
question vary in their emphasis on the burden of costs for benefactors, the payoffs to
beneficiaries, and the configuration of these vis a vis speakers and recipients.
2.1 Formulating participants interests in the nominated action

One set of practices involves reference to the participants needs or preferences for
the nominated action. Formulating such interests is one straightforward method of
constructing a distribution of benefits that the action will deliver. Typical instances
focusing on the recipients interests include:
(3) [NB I:1]
Guy: Would you like to get out?
(4) [Field Sep-Oct 88(1.1)]

Gordon: If you wanna come overn use it or play it, or if
you decide you want it you can pick it up any time.
These formulations tend to be embedded within interrogatives (as in 3) or if-clauses

(as in 4), thus embodying epistemic downgrading in deference to the presumption
that recipients know their own preferences and needs best. Correspondingly, they are
other-attentive and in context may endow the action with an offering import. In
some instances (as in 5 below), an if-framed assertion of recipient interest in the pro-
jected action, without any accompanying then- clause or indeed any explicit formula-
tion of the projected action, can in context stand on behalf of the offer itself.
(5) [F:TC]
Shirley: So if you guys want a place to stay
By the same token, there are practices that reference the interests of the speaker, which
again typically take the form of needs or preferences.
(6) [NB IV:11]
Emma: Id love to have you join us
(7)
[Holt SO88:1:3]
Gordon: Id like to see you again before I go

(8)
[NB IV:07]
Emma: Will you help me with this honey I need you

These are often embedded within the turn constructional unit containing the focal
action (as in Examples 6 and 7), but they may also appear as a separate unit that explic-
itly accounts for the action (as in 8). In both cases, they tend to be declaratively format-
ted in accordance with the presumption that speakers have authoritative knowledge
of their own experiences. Correspondingly, they are self-attentive and in context can
endow the action with a requesting import.
2.2 Formulating agents and recipients

Speakers also have the option of specifying who is to perform the nominated action,
and who is to receive the service it delivers. Thus, suggesting a get-together for coffee,
Ros references both herself as the coffee-provider and her interlocutor as the recipient,
thereby packaging the current action as an offer.
(9) [SBL 1:1:10R]
Ros: if youd care to come over n visit a little
while this morning Ill give you a cup of coffee.
Conversely, when Emma asks her daughter to call her estranged husband, she refer-
ences the daughter as the agent of the call (line 1), and after a minimal response she
adds an increment (line 3, and do me a favor) clarifying that such a call would con-
stitute a service for which she would be the primary beneficiary.
(10) [NB IV:07]
1 Emma: .hhhh Wouldju ca:ll Da::d tihni::ght,hh
2 Barb: Yea:h?
3 Emma: En do me a fa:vor,
It bears re-emphasis that explicit reference to the agent or recipient of a nominated

action or service is often optional, contingent on the granularity with which the con-
templated action is being formulated. The fully detailed action of providing coffee to
a visitor (Ill give you a cup of coffee) could in principle be rendered as a nominal-
ized activity (coffee) and indeed social activity invitations are frequently constructed
from such nominalized glosses (e.g. Why dont you come over for coffee/drinks/din-
ner; see Drew 1992). When these are unpacked so as to explicitly reference agents
and recipients, they claim a benefactive configuration that might otherwise have been
implicit, off the record, or obscure.
2.3 Benefactive rendering of the nominated action itself

The preceding observation about varying levels of granularity in the specification of
agents and recipients may be generalized to all aspects of future action formulation.
Action formulations can be compacted, glossing over the details of what will transpire
and thereby obscuring any service-related characteristics and the benefactive configu-
ration they would implicate; or they can be expanded, with benefactive details speci-
fied, elaborated, and thus foregrounded.
For a relatively expanded benefactive rendering, consider how Ilene asks Lisa,
who runs a dog breeding and kennel service, about collecting her dog from Lisas place
(line 1). Ilenes formulation of the activity in question (come over and get her) is
more elaborate than is strictly necessary for intelligibility.
(11) [Heritage 1:03]
1 Ile: =Well now look dyou want me tih come overn get her?
2 or wha:t.
Relative to more compact formulations (such as collect her, pick her up, or come
get her), Ilene includes additional detail that underscores the burden of costs to Ilene
and by implication constructs Lisa as the beneficiary of Ilenes generosity.
A more complex example with multiple renderings of the nominated action
follows, some of which are implicated in an offer to take a friend and her mother
to dinner. Here Emma launches what initially appears to be a proposal for a joint
activity (Why dont we in line 2), with the reference to shared agency implicat-
ing benefactive symmetry. However she aborts this formulation, and restarts in a
format portraying herself as sole agent and prospective benefactor (Why dont I
in line 3). The subsequent rendering of the action itself is expanded (take you n
Mom up there to Cocos someday for lunch) in a way that implicates distance and
effort in getting there (the restaurant is located on top of a hill), as well as picking
up the tab with explicit reference to Margie and her mother as beneficiaries. At this
point the type of benefactive relationship associated with an offer is relatively
transparent.
(12) [NB VII]

1 Marg: = Wl haftuh do tha[t more]o[:ften.]
2 Emma: [.hhhhh] [Wul
w]hy dont we:
3 Emma: uh-m: =Why dont I take youn Mo:m up there tuh:
4 Cocos.someday fer lu:nch.Well go, buzz up there
5 tu[h,
6 Marg: [k Goo:d.
7 Emma: Ha:h?
8 Marg: Thats a good deal. .hh-.hh=
9 Emma: =Eh Ill take you bo:th [up
10 Marg: [No:::: wil all go Dutch.=
11 =Bt [lets do that.]
12 Emma: [N o : we wo:n]t.
However, Emma goes on to produce a second rendering of the activity (Well go, buzz
up there in 4), one that is more compact, shifts back to joint agency, and includes
an idiomatic expression (buzz up there) that minimizes what will be involved. This
version pushes against the prior, obscuring the benefactive asymmetry that was previ-
ously exposed. Correspondingly, Margies responses (lines 6, 8) do not clearly register
that an offer is in the works. This in turn prompts Emma to provide a third and more
expanded version of the activity (Ill take you both up in 9), one that resurrects her
unilateral agency and clarifies her intent to take them both out for lunch. At this point
the benefactive asymmetry is foregrounded once again, prompting Marge to resist
with a counterproposal to all go Dutch (line 9).
3. Benefactive appreciations
How is the benefactive stance encoded in an initiating action, and the sense of
service that it embodies, consequential for what subsequently transpires? Here we
focus on cases where stance is essentially congruent with status, and on various
practices through which beneficiaries register and display appreciation of the ser-
vice that is being performed or projected. For the benefactive stance associated
with offers (speaker/benefactor, recipient/beneficiary), displays of appreciation
tend to follow the offer in second position, and they may be present in both accep-
tances and rejections. For the stance associated with requests (speaker/beneficiary,
recipient/benefactor), they tend to appear only after the request is granted and
hence in third position. While some forms of appreciation appear to be restricted
to certain action environments, others are remarkably similar across environments.
And in general, such responses often validate and sustain the benefactive relation-
ship previously in play.
3.1 Explicit appreciations

Explicit appreciations take the familiar form of conventionalized expressions such as
thank you, I appreciate that, etc. This instance appears in response to an offer to share
a newspaper.
(13) [NB IV:5]

1 Glad: =An now Ive got (.) tuh wash my hair en get the
2 goop out v itn evrything?.hh n ah have the
3 paper here I thought chu might li:ke tih have it.
4 .hhhh[h
5 Emma:
->
[Tha:nk you.
The next example occurs in response to the granting of a request. When Emmas
daughter Barbara agrees to call her mothers estranged husband (lines 23), Emma
acknowledges this with a term of endearment (line 6).
(14) [NB IV:7]

1 Emma: [nYeah,.t.h W[illyuh HELP M]E OU:TTA[THI:S:, ]
2 Barb:
[O k a y.]
[Yeah ah]ll
3 call im tihni:ght,hh
4 (0.2)
5 Barb: [En you cn] call] [me]
6 Emm: [A:RIGH ] DEA:]R [.h][h.hh]
[You] call me et n:ine
7 Barb:
8 tihmorrow mo[rning.
9 Emm: -> [.t Arighdarling ahPPRECIATE *IT.
Subsequently, after an arrangement-making intervention from Barbara, (lines 78),

Emma reissues her acknowledgement with a new endearment together with an explicit
appreciation (line 9).
3.2 Appreciative assessments

A second method of registering a prior service involves appreciative assessments, some
of which are targeted specifically at the service being rendered. For instance, when Ros
invites Bea over and offers coffee (lines 12), Bea provides an appreciative assessment
of the gesture (well thats awfully sweet of you).
(15) [SBL I:1:10]

1 Ros: And uh th*e: if youd care tuh come ovuh, en visit u
2 little while this morn^ing Ill give you[cup acoff*ee.
3 Bea: [khhh
4 Bea: -> Uhhh-huh hh Wl thets awflly sweet of yuh I dont

5 think I cn make it this morning, hheeuhh uh:m (0.3)
6 tch Im running en a:d in the paper nd an:d uh hh I
7 haftih stay near the pho::ne,
And a similar assessment follows this offer of assistance to a husband whose wife has
been immobilized by a back injury.
(16) [Heritage I-3]
1 Edg: Oh hh lord an we were wondering if theres anything
2 we can do to help
3 Mic: [Well thats
4 Edg: [I mean can we do any shopping for her or something
like that?
5 (0.7)
6 Mic: -> Well thats most kind Edgerton.hhh At the moment no:
7 because weve still got two boys at home.
Other more generally favorable assessments e.g. That would be wonderful/lovely/

etc. are also recurrent in this sequential environment. For instance, when an offer
to pick up the recipient is elaborated with a question about timing (lines 14), the
recipient first answers the turn-final question (yes) and then offers a brief favorable
assessment (lovely).
(17) [Holt Christmas 95:9]
1 Car: [Thats okay, .hh Yeh Ill pick you up Let about:
2 what- time shl we say
3 (0.6)
4 Car: Bout ten to eight?[(quarter to)
5 Les: ->
[Yes lovely
Such generically favorable assessments are less clearly targeted at the service per se,
and hence are somewhat ambiguous as to whether they are meant to be understood as
service appreciations specifically or as expressing a broadly favorable attitude toward
the activity in general.
In the cases examined thus far, appreciative assessments of the unambiguous ser-
vice-targeted sort exhibited in excerpts 15 and 16 are limited to the environment of
offer rejections. None have yet been observed in offer acceptances, or in response to
the granting of requests.
3.3 Reciprocations
The final appreciative response to be considered involves a gesture of reciprocation.
Here the beneficiary of a service promises to perform a service for the benefactor,
which may be understood in context as motivated by or compensation for the ser-

vice previously rendered. Reciprocations validate the current benefactive relation-
ship, while simultaneously projecting a reversal of that relationship in a subsequent
transaction.
For instance, in a segment of conversation between Ilene (a dog owner) and Lisa
(a dog breeding and kennel service), further discussed below, about the return of
Ilenes dog from the kennel, the eventual outcome is an offer by Lisa to return the dog
to Ilene at her home, which Ilene accepts. As they are finalizing arrangements for the
delivery of the dog, Ilene reciprocates with an offer of hospitality (arrowed).
(18) [Heritage 13]
1 Lis: Right. Well zuppose we get tih you about half past
2 three.
3 Ile: -> Thats fine.[Thats lovelyn have[a cup atea=
[(Yeh)
4 Lis: [(Alright.)
5 Ile: -> =n a piece aca[ke.
6 Lis: [l: Love( )
When Lisa suggests half past three as a timeframe for her arrival with the dog, Ilene
accepts this (thats fine) and offers a generically appreciative assessment (Thats
lovely), and then without delay she proceeds with an offer to serve Lisa a cup atea
and a piece a cake (arrowed). Ilenes offer is not explicitly framed as a compensatory
gesture for Lisas delivery of the dog, but it clearly can be heard as such. And in this
connection it is noteworthy that Lisa appreciates the tea-and-cake offer with an assess-
ment term (lovely) identical to the one used by Ilene to appreciate the timing of the
dog delivery.
In this section, we have focused on the framing of future courses of action in
terms of benefactive stance: formulations of the distribution of benefits from bene-
factors to beneficiaries. In the next, focusing primarily on requests, we examine the
formulation of costs and benefits so as to influence the likelihood of acceptance.
4. In pursuit of acceptance: A felicific calculus
In 1789, Jeremy Bentham introduced the concept of the felicific calculus as a method
of determining the moral qualities of actions. According to Bentham, felicific actions
are those for which the personal benefits of an action exceed its personal costs. Where
more than one individual is involved, felicific actions are those for which the aggre-
gate benefits to the collectivity exceed their aggregate costs. While Benthams ideas
may have limitations as political philosophy, they resonate with practices that speakers
deploy in the context of requests and offers. Speakers who wish to forward a request
can manage its presentation to either maximize the benefits of the request to them-
selves, or minimize the cost of the request to others, or both. In the case of offers,
speakers may minimize the costs to themselves, while maximizing the perceived ben-
efits of the action to their recipients. In both cases, they can also adjust or manipulate
the presentation of costs and benefits in pursuit of acceptance.
4.1 Maximizing benefits

The description of benefits to the requester is a basic characteristic of the accounts
that, as Curl and Drew (2008) have noted, accompany many if not most requests in
non-institutional contexts. Whatever other functions these accounts may have, they
fundamentally work to establish the intrinsic benefits to the requester, or the request-
ers needs, that compliance with the request would fulfill.
In the following case, Gordon calls his mother to request that she bring a letter
with her when she visits him shortly. The format of his request Could you X (lines7
and 8) does not display particular entitlement (Curl & Drew 2008) or benefits, though
his formulation when you come up, (line 10) clearly presupposes a pre-existing plan
for a visit and thus indexes a lower burden to his mother than would have been the
case if the visit were not anticipated. However his subsequent account the letter is
essential for his access to funds for the university term (lines 2022) underscores the
substantial payoff he will reap from a relatively low-cost action from his mother.
(19) Field SO88:2:8:1
1 Les: Hello:?
2 (0.3)
3 Gor: Its Gordon.
4 Les: .hhhh oh Gordon. Shall I ring you back darling,
5 Gor: Uh:: no I dont think you can,
6 (0.3)
7 Gor: But uh: just to (0.3) say (.) could you bring up a
8 letter.
9 (.)
10 Gor: When you come up,
11 Les: heeaawh
12 (0.2)
13 Gor: U[h:m
14 Les: [w
15 (0.4)
16 Gor: Its: its the one which will say that the: County
17 council will(0.3) pay: for m:e to have tuition.
18 (0.7)
19 Les: Oh:. Yes.
20 Gor:-> I need it before I get any money out. Ignnaaf to

21 -> go overdrawn at the moment cuz Im uh (0.6) Im out
22 -> of money.
23 Les: hOkhay,.hhhh
A similar benefactive accounting is visible even in cases where the request is for the
return of a loaned item, as in (20):
(20) Field SO88II:2:4:2

1 Les: .hh okay.hh if you could (.) let me have that book
2 u-so[me:
3 Dan: [yeah
4 Les:-> (.) back sometime because I promised it to- to:
5 Harold.
6 (0.5)
7 Dan: Oh yea[h.
8 Les:-> [uh::: becuz hes looking up colleges as well.
Here Lesley portrays herself as subject to another obligation regarding the book.
The relationship between accounts specifying benefits to the speaker and the pro-
duction of requests is so strongly patterned that it easily allows initial benefit state-
ments to be understood as prefatory to the request itself. In the following case, the
caller (Don) describes a stalled car and an urgent need to open a bank in Brentwood
(1112/14).
(21) [MTE: Stalled]

1 Don: (Guess what.hh)
2 Mar: What.
3 Don: hh My ca:r is sta::lled.
4 (0.2)
5 Don: (n) Im up here in the Glen?
6 Mar: Oh::.
7 {(0.4)}
8 Don: {hhh }
9 Don: A:nd.hh
10 (0.2)
11 Don:-> I don know if its po:ssible, but {hhh}/(0.2)}
12 -> see I haveta open up the ba:nk.hh
13 (0.3)
14 Don:-> a:t uh: (_) in Brentwood?hh=
15 Mar: =Yeah:- en I know you want- (_) en I whoa- (_)
16 en I would, but- except Ive gotta leave in about
17 five min(h)utes. (hheh)
Although Don never explicitly asks for a ride to the bank, the expression of this need
is sufficient for his recipient to understand him as requesting it (lines 1516). And
in (22), a description of need (lines 56) is again sufficient to allow its recipient to
pre-empt a likely upcoming request with an offer (lines 78) that is presented as
re-invoking an earlier promise:
(22) ST (Schegloff, 1980:112)
1 Fre: Oh by the way((sniff))I have a bi:g favor to ask ya.
2 Lau: Sure, gohead.
3 Fre: Member the blouse you made a couple weeks ago?
4 Lau: Ya.
5 Fre:-> Well I want to wear it this weekend to Vegas but my
6 -> Moms buttonholer is broken.
7 Lau: Fred I told ya when I made the blouse Id do the
8 buttonholes.
9 Fre: ((sniff)) but I hate ta impose.
10 Lau: No problem. We can do them on Monday after work.
Note that Freds response But I hate ta impose. (line 9) clearly makes reference to the
cost-benefit orientation that is presented as underlying this exchange.
4.2 Minimizing costs

An alternative requesters practice is to work to minimize the apparent costs of the
request (see Kendrick and Drew, this volume).1 For example, the request may be
implemented using verbs (such as nip or hop) that connote the minimal nature of
the action being requested:
(23) [JH:FN]
Ann:->
Can you just nip down to Whole Foods for some orange

juice.
(24) [Stew dinner: Mother to child, after dinner]

1 Mom:-> Okay, why dont you hop yourself in the shower and then
2 well read
3 (0.4) ((Child starts to respond))
4 Mom: Thank you.
. Similar minimizing practices are described in Drew and Walker (2010) in connection
with calls for assistance to the police, and in requests for permission to depart from the topics
set by questions in broadcast news interviews (Clayman & Heritage 2002:260261).
Verbs like nip, hop, and pop convey the brevity of the action requested and thereby
a minimization of the imposition associated with the request, regardless of the other
activities their recipients may be otherwise engaged in and may have to abandon.
In yet other cases, a request may be framed as minimally burdensome by for-
mulating the requested action as involving a minimal departure from routine. In the
following case, Skips use of the expression coming past the door, (line 5) which
implements a request for a ride to work conveys that Skips house is fully on the way
to their shared workplace:
(25)
1 Skip: Good morning Ji:m,
2 (0.5)
3 Skip: Uh its Skip.
4 Jim: Hiyuh,
5 Skip:-> You coming past the doo:r,
6 Jim: Certainly?
7 (0.8)
8 Jim: What time wouldju like the car Sah.=
9 Skip: =Uh well ehhh hhehh hhhehh hhehh.hh Oh thats
10 m:ost unexpected of you hhh::: n(h)o its v(h)ery
11 nicev you to offer huhh uh-heh heh-u-hu-.ehhh
12 Thanks very much.
In this case, Skips line 5 hovers between a request and a pre-request and may indeed
index a pattern of routine ride-sharing between the two colleagues. Jims responsive
offer done as a parody of a chauffeurs response (line 8) is acknowledged by Skip
in an equally tongue-in-cheek fashion with a fulsome appreciation of his kindness
(lines 912).
A more elaborate case is the following. Here Jane has called to ask permission
to retrieve a book from Edgertons house. The request is delicate because Jane knows
from an earlier call that Edgertons family does not want company:
(26) [Heritage:0I:Call 14]
( Jan called earlier to invite Edgerton and his wife over for Christmas drinks.
Edgerton declined; theyve only just returned from another drinks party and his wife
(Ilene) is tired and wiped)
1 Edg: Hello:?
2 Jan: Hello Edgerton.hh
3 Edg: Yes[().
4 Jan: [Its ME ag(h)ain.h.h[hh
[Yes.=
5 Edg:
6 Jan: =Uhm.hh look I left a book.h (.) uh:m in the
7 dra:wing room..hh Uh::,hh yihknow the (luh si:ne)
8 book. Dju think I could js pop overn comen

9 -> get it.
10 (1.0)
11 Edg: Yes why not?
12 Jan:-> Yes you sure?h
13 Edg: Mh?
14 Jan:-> Ehz ed- (0.7) I mean Ill be inn out. 0kay?
15 Edg: Ye:ehkay,
16 Jan:-> Uh- Margos gunnuh drive me bt Ill tell her tstay
17 in the car s[: <I(h)lene [wont have to[worry.
18 Edg: [Righto,= [Right[Ri:ght right
19 right right.
20 (.)
21 Edg: Ri[ght.
22 Jan: [O:khay? ((Straight to closing))
Here it is noticeable that Jane frames her requested action (line 8) as popping over,
deploying a syntactic frame (Do you think I could just) that indexes low entitlement
(Curl & Drew 2008), and hedges her request with numerous assurances of its brevity
(lines 14, 1617).
Just as minimization practices in requesting are designed to increase the likeli-
hood of acceptance, so offers may incorporate minimization to the same end. In (27)
Gordon and Dana sometime boyfriend and girlfriend are arranging to meet for
a drink, at Gordons initiation. Gordon does not drive and, after deciding to meet on
Sunday, Dana offers to come to him:
(27) [Field SO88:1:3]
1 Gor: [How bout Sunday.
2 (0.3)
3 Dan: Yeh
4 (0.3)
5 Gor: .h[hhhhh]hhh h- (0.2)[(Right/Great)
6 Dan: [Sure] [(),
7 (0.2)
8 Gor: Oka[y.
9 Dan:-> [Ri:ght so Ill poh- eh wl- (.) Dyou wan
10 Dan:-> [me t pop over.
11 Gor: [.p.hhhhhh
12 Gor: Please.
13 (0.3)
14 Dan: Okay, bout what ti[me.
Here Dana twice uses the term pop to characterize her offered action, thus reduc-
ing the burden of the offer. In this case, the formulation may be influenced by other
factors: as the jilted party in the relationship, Dana may not wish to seem over-eager
or too accommodating in making the arrangement, and her Ill poh- (the putative
beginning of Ill pop over) in line 9 is revised to the more circumspect Dyou wan
me t pop over. (lines 910).2
And a minimizing practice that is a direct reciprocal of (25) above is visible in
the following case, in which the non-driving Gordon is asking for a ride to a nearby
town. While Gordon minimizes the imposition on Ken by proposing that his father
can drop me over (line 6), Ken rebuts this with the claim that he will be going past
the door:
(28) [Field: Sept-Oct: Side 1: Call9]

1 Gor: .hh Youre not ah- I dont spose going into Yeovil
2 .hhhh hUh:m.pl.k.tch (0.3) this afternoo:n
3 (0.3)
4 Ken: As a, matterv fact: I- (0.5) jus said to Mum, I
5 think I will go into Yeo[vil this afternoon cz Ive g]ot
6 Gor: [.h h h h h h h h h h h h h h]
7 Ken: nothing be[tter to[do
8 Gor: [hh [hh
9 (.)
10 Gor: Ah:. Uhm (0.2) cd I, accompny you by any chan[ce,
11 Ken: [hhwh[h
12 Gor: [W
13 -> [that be possible] Ill Ill] get me-] Dad tdrop me=
o o ]
14 Ken: [ U h ::m]::]
15 Gor: =over if: uh
16 (0.3)
17 Ken:-> I should think so yuh-uh no d- oh eet wouldnt worry
18 -> about that cz [Im going p]ast the door,
19 Gor:
[Oh-:-:-:-:. ]
20 Gor: .hhh[hhh
21 Ken: [But uh
22 Gor: hh-.hh-hh
23 Gor: Thats very generous of you.
. Similar formulations are readily observable in offers of assistance during out of hours
calls to a family doctor (Drew 2006). In cases where the doctor is offering to visit a sick person
at night, formulations such as okay Ill pop in Ill be with you in about twenty (0.2) minutes
to half an hour, are highly frequent.
And a similar minimizing pattern is present in (29). Lesley has accepted a ride to a
meeting with Carol and, in an apparent effort to minimize the imposition on Carol,
offers to get her husband to drive her to Carols house. In her response, Carol rebuts
the offer as too costly to the offerer (not worth the rigmarole [lines 3/5]). In tan-
dem, Carol minimizes her own costs with Wl while Im in the car it doesnt makeny
differe:nce, (line s 89), while maximizing her portrayal of the costs to Lesleys hus-
band with Ts not worth him turning out again. (line 13).
(29) [Field Xmas 1985: Call 5:1228]
1 Les: .hh Well- (.) Is it alright if my husband brings me as
2 far as your hou:se.
3 Car: Well I cd pick you up its not [worth the whole]=
4 Les: [n N O::::]=
5 Car: =[riga[m a r o: l e,]
6 Les: =[::.[N o its alri]ght hell bring me
7 (0.2)
8 Car:-> Wl while Im in the car it doesnt makeny
9 differe:n[ce,
10 Les: [Dzni:t
11 Car: No:::.
12 (.)
13 Car:-> Ts not worth him turning out again.
14 (0.3)
15 Les: Oh alright then.
Here Benthams felicific calculus is fully displayed as part of the request-offer process.
Finally, requesters may attempt to balance the costs to recipients by offering recip-
rocal benefits, even when, as in the following case, the benefits are hypothetical. Here
teenaged Virginia is attempting to recruit her brother Wesley in a bid to get her mother
to raise her weekly allowance. In an exchange in which she effectively implores her
brother for help, she twice invokes the possibility of reciprocal assistance, albeit in
irrealis (hypothetical) mood:
(30) [Virginia: 886900]
1 VIR:-> Plea:se try tuh help me talk Mom (intot.) please?
2 -> <Id do it for you,
3 (0.4)
4 WES: EHHHH! [hih| heh huh| uh!| huhhuh ] (.) uh
5 PRU:
[A h| h a h |hah h|uhhuh huhhuh]
6 VIR: Plea::se.
7 (0.9)
8 ???: ((sniff))
9 PRU: uh hhh
10 (0.4)
11 WES: eh-uh:: (.) Ill think about it.

12 VIR: uhh!
13 WES: eh huh huh huh (hm)
14 (0.5)
15 VIR: -> Go::lly Id do it fer y:ou:.=
At lines 12, Virginia latches her hypothetically reciprocal offer to her request that
Wesley help her talk Mom into it. Subsequently, after Wesley defers his response
(line11), she renews the offer, and by implication the request it is mobilized to advance,
at line 15.
As we have described it here, the design of requests and offers manifests a general
preference for the minimization of costs and the maximization of benefits. Specifically,
to an extent consistent with the facts on the ground, a beneficiary should strive to
provide for the least burden of costs to the benefactor, while maximizing the projected
benefits of the projected action. Correspondingly, a benefactor should strive to mini-
mize the burden of costs that the projected activity imposes, and with it any burden of
reciprocal obligation that the beneficiary may incur. A departure from this preference
by benefactors, especially one that inflates the burden of cost that the benefactor faces,
may contribute to a perception that the offer or request acceptance is reluctant or less
than sincere.
Consider two cases involving benefactor-initiated departures from this preference
and the felicific calculus it embodies. The first occurs in the course of a request accep-
tance (arrowed below), and involves an expanded characterization of the requested
action. The exchange begins when the matriarch at a family dinner comments on the
heat of the evening, and makes a generalized offer of more iced tea to the assembled
family members (lines 12).
(31) [Virginia: 360371]

1 Mom: =hhh Whooh! It is so hot tuhnight. *Would somebody

2 like some more ice tea.
3 (0.8)
4 Wes: Uh(b)- (0.4) I(ll) take some more ice.
5 (.)
6 Mom:-> hhhh Well, (2.0) let me: get up an *go get some.
7 Vir: Whynchya get it yourself.
8 (.)
9 Pru: ehhh!
10 Mom: Thats a good idea.
11 P/V: eh[hh- huh huh ]
12 Mom: [Get it yoursel]f, boy.
In place of a straightforward acceptance, her son Wesley (line 4) counters with a

request for some more ice something that was not initially offered. Perhaps in
response to the rather entitled manner of this request, the mother acknowledges it
with a verbal formulation that notably expands the course of action involved: [get up +
go + get some]. That this expanded form is heard as a rebuke to Wesley is evidenced in
his sister Virginias response Whyncha get it yourself (line 7), seconded a moment
later by Mom herself (lines 10/12). In general, within request acceptances, expanded
action characterizations that maximize rather than minimize the portrayal of costs
may come across as insincere or resistant, and extract greater recognition of the bur-
den being undertaken.
The next case involves a similarly expanded action characterization mobi-
lized in the context of an offer. Ilenes offer to collect her dog (line 56), which is
apparently at variance with a previous arrangement, invites the recipient (Lisa) to
acknowledge a benefit (with Do you want), identifies herself as the agent of
that benefit (Do you want me), and describes the projected course of action.
Notwithstanding Ilenes ostensibly altruistic benefactive stance, her offer is rebuffed
as entirely self-interested with -Well please yerself dea:r and this is followed by
an invocation of the previously arranged plan (lines 89), and a final response
component (but youre very welcome) that apparently grants Ilene the right to
comeover.
(32) [Heritage 1:03: 5067]

1 Lis: [Yeh ah Ill tell you Ill give you chaptern verse,
2 Ile: Right.
3 Lis: ehh heh heh[heh he-]hh=
4 Ile: [U h : m]
5 Ile: -> =Well now look dyou want me
6 ti[h come overn get her? or wha:t.
7 Lis: [()
8 Lis:-> Well please yerself dea:r we- we were gnna
9 -> t-bringer back bt youre very wel[come
10 Ile:
[No well
11 whenr you whenr you going to bring her ba:ck.=
12 Lis: =.hhh Uh well you said wait til a:fter the New Yea:r.
13 (0.2)
14 Ile: Yeh.well ah mean you-you:- you choose the da:y.
15 (0.2)
16 Lis: Oh: ah mean tmorrow will do ez far ez
17 Im [concerned]=
18 Ile: [Tmorrow ] Thats fi[:ne.
19 Lis:
[She gets me up et six
20 evry morning she- p- (.) welcome tih go::?
A re-examination of Ilenes offer, however, indicates some features that are discrepant
from the benefactive preference for offers. First, the offered action come overn get
her is, as previously noted, in an expanded rather than a compact form (such as col-
lect her) thus conveying the burdensome nature of the offer rather than its minimi-
zation, and putatively undermining the apparent sincerity that may be attributed to its
production. Second the turn is concluded with or wha:t. Or-final conclusions of turns
are generally designed to reduce the preference for acceptance or agreement to the
matter proposed in the previous clause (Lindstrm 1997; Drake 2013) and, in this case,
may index a reluctance to follow through on the offer. Moreover turn-final or what
in the context of interrogatives may also index underlying aggression or even the exas-
peration of the questioner (Clayman & Heritage 2002). This final element of turn con-
struction, thus, may also indicate a less than full-hearted offer from a well-motivated
benefactor. It is in this context that Lisas -Well please yerself dea:r response may be
best understood. That is, at no point in this sequence does Lisa seriously entertain the
notion that she has been the recipient of a bona fide offer. The inappropriate form of the
offer, the expansion of the burden that the utterance depicts, the final tag, and the pre-
existing arrangements between the two women all conduce to undermine the notion
that this is to be understood as a sincere offer that a recipient could sincerely accept.3
5. Benefactive status and stance: Congruence and departures
With the possible exception of requests that forward a joint and on-going project
(Rossi 2012), requests are burdensome in that they require the diversion of the request
recipients time, effort, or material resources to serve the interests of the requester.
Benthams felicific calculus is much in evidence in the ways requesters work to display
the benefits of requested actions and their gratitude for these benefits, or alternatively
to reduce the perceived impositions that their requests place on recipients (Brown&
Levinson 1987; Curl & Drew 2008). Similarly offerers may work to downplay the bur-
den of offered actions, thereby reducing the perceived debt that an acceptance of the
offer may engender. As we have depicted them so far, however, all of these maneu-
verings are conducted within a framework in which there is a broad congruency
. We recognize that communicating reluctance to perform a service and insincerity in its

proposition are in various ways distinctive, and that the ascription of insincerity in an under-
taking to perform a service can have many grounds. Nonetheless inflation of the burdensome
nature of a service in the very course of offering it may be one of a family of practices through
which insincere offers are communicated and recognized.
between benefactive stance and benefactive status. Requesters, no matter how much
they attempt to reduce the magnitude of an imposition, are nonetheless understood to
be requesting something that will actually benefit them and will involve at least some
imposition on the recipient. Likewise offerers are undertaking at least some burden in
the interest of providing something that they believe will benefit the recipient.
Fungible status, optional stances

An exception to this pattern is to be found in a different category of action: propos-
als. Earlier we noted, following Couper-Kuhlen (2014) that the anticipation of future
actions does not entail a necessary presumption either of a singular agent, or a singular
beneficiary, of the anticipated action. For the case of proposals, a defining characteris-
tic is that both parties will participate in a future course of action and that both parties
will share costs and benefits from the activity. As first noted by Couper-Kuhlen (2014),
proposals can readily be formulated in first person plural terms (we and us) that
reflect this relationship. Shall we X and Lets X are perhaps prototypical forms. This
is the form in which Hyla, who is going to a play with her friend Nancy, proposes an
additional component of the evenings entertainment:
(33) [HGII:957965]
1 Hyl:-> =.hh Maybe we cn go out fer a drink tnight.
2 (.)
3 Nan: Ye::ah. That soun- Yeh I owe ya dri:nk.
4 (.)
5 Nan: Ah wanna buy ya dri:n[k.
6 Hyl: [Aow. Ari[:ght,]
7 Nan:
[Oka:
]y So we
8 will fer sure.=
9 Hyl: =Ari[ght.]
10 Nan: [A f
]ter, (.) the play,
As Couper-Kuhlen also notes in connection with this example, Hylas proposal is

swiftly countered by her friend with an undertaking to bear the costs of the outing, an
undertaking that takes the form of an offer to which Hyla acquiesces.
This we form for proposals is preserved even when a third party is framed as the
motivating force for an activity, as in (34):
(34) [Rah 11:4358]
1 Jen: Wl lisn eh:m (.) Vera wantss tih go down fcoffee.
2 (0.3)
3 Ann: O[h:.
4 Jen: [Val is the:h,
5 (0.2)
6 Ann: w- ih-
7 Jen: e-[( )-
8 Ann: [Yih su:re.
9 Jen: Yes positive Im just about ready tih go. Can[you sortv
10 Ann:
[Eyuh-
11 (.)
12 Ann: [Let me-
13 Jen: [ptta comb through yha[ih.
14 Ann: [Thats it. Ahll put me cleaner=
15 Ann: =trousers on en ahll be with you.(fi[:ve? minutes)
16 Jen:
[Okay-
Here, though it is Vera who wants us to go for coffee (line 1), the action sustained
across the sequence remains one of proposal and acceptance.
The fact that the underlying benefactive status of proposals involves a sharing of
agency, costs, and benefits creates a distinctive affordance for would be proposers: the
proposal can be designed either to thematize the benefit accruing to the proposer or to
the recipient of the proposal, or both.
The following two proposals contrast in just this respect. The first of these focuses
on the payoff to the proposal recipient. Here Ida has called Jenny to propose a joint
outing to Middlesborough, and the framing of her proposal (lines 67) references her
recipients interest in the trip (Would you like to).
(35) [Rah 16:917]

1 Ida: Hello Jenny.
2 (.)
3 Ida: [Its me:.
4 Jen: [Oh hello there.
5 ?JE: .hhh
6 Ida:-> Uhm Ive rung to ask uhm.hh wouldju like a run up to
7 Middlesbr in the morn[ing.
8 Jen:
[.hh kHey thats funny I wz gonto
9 ask you the same thing.
Jenny, in response, validates Idas imputation of interest (lines 89), indicating that she
had been contemplating such a trip herself. Here while both parties would ostensibly
accrue at least some benefit from this sociable outing, only the payoff to the recipient
is indexed in the initial proposal, which in consequences has some of the benefactive
elements of an offer.
By way of contrast, the following proposal (arrowed) is designed with some of the
benefactive elements of a request. Here Gordon, who will be leaving town, proposes
a get-together with Dana, his ex-girlfriend, and his proposal is framed exclusively by
reference to his own interest in the encounter (I thought Id like to see you).
(36) [NB IV:11]

1 Gor:-> But uh:m: (.) u (0.2) I thought Id like tsee you
2 again bfore I go,
3 Dan: Ye:s, ye[s.
4 Gor:
[.t.hhhhhh S:o:- (.) if you:re (.) not doing
5 anything.hhhhhh u (0.2) d-uh::m: some time one
weeke:nd?
Correspondingly, after receiving an initial token of acceptance from her (line 3), he moves
the proposal forward while still avoiding any reference to her possible interest in seeing
him, referring instead to possible contingencies that might affect her participation.
The alternate benefactive stances evident in these two excerpts are not mandated
by the intrinsic benefactive nature of the activity being put forward, which in both
cases is a sociable event to which both parties will contribute and from which both
will ostensibly reap at least some benefits. It is this benefactive abundance, a defining
attribute of activity proposals, that enables the adoption of varying and even diametri-
cally opposing benefactive stances in the formation of such proposals. As we shall, see
the degree of pragmatic choice is more constrained for actions that are accountable as
services with a determinate benefactor-beneficiary asymmetry.
Infungible status, manipulative stances

Returning now to request and offers, we consider cases in which the congruency
between benefactive stance and status is strained or fractured. A precondition for this
possibility is that benefactive status here lacks the kind of fungibility that is charac-
teristic of proposals. Given this lack of fungibility in offers and requests, any manifest
discrepancy between benefactive status and the stance expressed in the overt design of
turns at talk becomes questionable or disingenuous, and may trigger special inferences.
Consider, first, cases in which an offer of actual benefit to the recipient is out-
wardly framed as a request. In the following case, Ron has called Marcias house in
search of Marcias daughter Gina, but ends up talking with Marcia instead. Marcia
recollects explicitly that Ron is a television scriptwriter, and when asked about herself
she discloses that shes doing drug counseling down in Venice: (lines 67) and volun-
teers that she is producing a play with the people shes working with. At this point, Ron
requests permission to attend the play. He uses a canonical request format (Can I)
indexing moderate entitlement (Curl & Drew 2008) and, with the possible exception
of the use of the word go, is clearly centered on Rons perspective:
(37) [MDE-MTRAC:601/1:4763]
1 Ron: How ydoin.
2 Mar: h- Wl I:m doing ril[ly well.
3 Ron:
[(Gina) said you were goin tuh
4 schoo:ul?
5 Mar: Ye:h I I wa:s, (_) en n:ow Im take- I have taken a leave

6 en Im: uh (0.2) t Im doing drug counseling down in
7 Venice:.
8 (0.2)
9 Mar: which I really (0.6) m crazy abou:t end as a matter fact
10 (0.3) we hev written a pla:y, en we er putting that on un
11 the tenthv December.
12 (0.2)
13 Ron:-> Can I go see it?
14 Mar: Love tuh s:- Oh: thatd be great.
15 (0.3)
16 Ron: Keh tell me where itll be en when.
17 Mar: Et the Venice Library. Uh:: December tenth et seven
18 thirdy.
However such a theatrical production is to be regarded, a Hollywood scriptwriters

attendance de haut en bas, as it were may be more readily construed as an offer
of primary benefit to Marcia, than a request in which Ron would be a main benefi-
ciary. And this is entirely how Marcia seems to view the situation (Drew 1984:1413),
responding enthusiastically and treating it as of great value (Oh: thatd be great.) with
the tacit understanding that she will reap the benefits of Rons attendance. Here then
the underlying benefactive status of Rons action at line 13 trumps the benefactive
stance expressed in its design, and this underlying reality rises to the surface through
Marcias registering of it at line 14.
The next case involves a similarly incongruous framing. Here Jenny and Ida are
near neighbors, and Ida calls to tell Jenny that some long-awaited dining room fur-
niture has been delivered (lines 79). After an initial response that simply treats this
announcement as news (line 10), Jenny asks to come round (line 12), using a canon-
ical request frame (Can I) similar to the previous example.
(38) [Rah:12:1:ST]
1 Jen: Hello?,
2 (0.5)
3 Ida: Jenny?
4 (0.3)
5 Ida: Its me:,
6 Jen: Oh hello I:da.
7 Ida: Ye:h..h uh:m (0.2) ahv jis rung tih teh- eh tell
8 you (0.3) uh the things ev arrived from Barkern
9 Stoneou[:se,
10 Jen: [Oh:::::.
11 (.)
12 Jen:-> O[h cn ah cm rou:nd,h[h
13 Ida:
-> [An
[Ye[s please[thats w]t=
14 Jen:
[haha[.a: h]
15 Ida:-> =I wantche tih come rou:nd.
16 Jen: Im just having tea now [ahm::
17 Ida: [No well yo[u have]
18 Jen: [Is Dez] ho:me?
Idas initial response at line 13 (Yes please) is, by contrast, a virtually canonical form
for the acceptance of an offer. Her continuation (thats what I want(che)) appar-
ently reconfirms that her initial announcement was intended as an invitation (or a
pre-invitation) for Jenny to visit. In its final form (line 15) the utterance proclaims
her desire to have Jenny visit (I wantche tih come rou:nd), and its high degree of
explicitness seems designed to counter the benefactive relationship implicit in Jennys
framing. In this sequence, then, an announcement triggers a formatted request to visit
that is in turn treated as an offer. Who is the benefactor here, and who is the ben-
eficiary? Each of the two friends has finessed the benefactor-beneficiary relationship,
producing a sequence in which a mutual coincidence of wants emerges from a flurry
of other-attentive actions.
Another set of cases involves the reverse form of incongruity: a request of actual
benefit to the speaker is outwardly framed as an offer. In both instances that we shall
examine, the offer is resisted and unmasked as disingenuous. The following straight-
forward instance occurs during a dinner table conversation and involves the fathers
offer-framed request to pass down the string beans (line 1).
(39) [Dinner Table (Mandelbaum, this volume)]
1 Dad: You wanna pa:ss [dow:n the: stir:ngbea:ns
2
[((Tim looks over))
3 (.)
4 Tim: [No.
5 [((Mom looks at string beans))
6 (0.3)
7 Dad: [Well do it anyway please,
8 [((Mom unfolds arms, reaches for string beans}}
9 Tim: No:.
10 ((Mom picks up string beans and passes to Dad.))
11 Dad: *Tha:nk you.=very much.*
The surface altruism conveyed in the conventionalized declarative and contracted

design of Dads initial request (You wanna) runs directly contrary the funda-
mentally self-interested nature of the action it delivers. The transparent falseness of
the action frame, and the entitled stance that it conveys, may prompt Tims resistant
response, which specifically targets and exploits the frame as a resource for resistance.
Dads subsequent re-doing of his request as an imperative may further accentuate his
communicated entitlement, with similar results.
While the discrepancy between self-interested status and altruistic stance was
transparent from the outset in (39), in the next case it emerges gradually. Lottie first
offers to pick up her sister Emma for a trip to the beauty parlor (Emma does not drive).
The initial offer is overly granular (as in 34 above), highlighting a burden to the offerer
(and perhaps implicating a reciprocal burden of gratitude to the recipient). It is also
framed as a negative interrogative, pressing for a positive response (Heritage 2002),
which in the context of requests is an entitled format (Heinemann 2006). It is robustly
rejected (lines 45).
(40) [NB IV:10, 41:1735]

1 Lot:-> Dont chu want me tih come dow:n getchu dihmorren
2 take yih dow:n dih the beauty parlor?
3 (0.3)
4 Emm: What fo:r I jis did my hair it looks like pruh- a
5 perfessional.
6 (0.3)
7 Lot:-> I mean uh: you wanna go d the store er anything over
8 et the Market[Ba:sket]er an]ything?]
9 Emm: [.hmhhh ].thhh]
.hhh.h]h=
10 =Wl HO[NEY]AH]
11 Lot: ->
[or ]Ri]chards?
12 (0.2)
13 Emm: Ive bou:ght EVrythai:ng?
14 (0.9)
15 Emm:=> If[you wa]nt ME TIH go t the beauty parlor ah wi:ll,
16 Lot: [Oh:.]
17 (.)
18 Lot: Wl I jus thought mayb we gd gover duh Richards
19 fer lunch then after uh get muh hair fixed.
20 Emm: Awri:ght.
21 Lot: Oka:y,
Subsequently however Lottie renews her offer through two more rounds proposing
other possible destinations in succession, and in the last round competing in overlap
(lines 1011) to forestall rejection (Davidson 1984). By line 14, when the two sisters
have reached an impasse, it has emerged that Lottie has more interest in having Emma
accompany her on this trip, than Emma has in going along. Emma finally breaks the
silence with an offer to accompany Lottie to the beauty parlor. Her utterance If you
want ME TIH go t the beauty pahlor ah wi:ll, is highly explicit in the inverted bene-
factive relationship it conveys, presenting herself as devoid of any interest in visiting
the beauty parlor except to comply with her sisters desire. Thus the initial benefactor-
beneficiary relationship put forward at lines 12 has been both unmasked and reversed.
Although Emmas offer is presented as an act of pure altruism, that it is so presented is

perhaps less than altruistic, though Lottie finesses the situation at lines1819 with a
lunch proposal to which Emma quite readily agrees.
Incongruities between benefactive status and stance are not particularly com-
monplace in ordinary conversation. Nevertheless, the cases examined here are at least
suggestive of the import and consequences that such incongruities can entail. When
an action with the status of an offer is packaged as a request, that framing downplays
the burden of debt and the pressure for gratitude or reciprocation that an acceptance
would otherwise engender. Correspondingly, in both of the cases we have examined,
the maneuver yields unproblematic acceptance as the outcome together with other
displays of interpersonal harmony and affiliation. By contrast, when an action with
the status of a request is packaged as an offer, it provides an altruistic veneer for an
essentially self-interested action. And in both cases we have examined, this maneuver
yields rejection as the outcome together with other displays of interpersonal discord.
Notwithstanding these various differences, a common thread may be discerned
across both sets of cases: These diverse outcomes and consequences are all premised
on an appreciation by the recipient (whether instantaneous or emergent) that benefac-
tive status and stance are indeed out of sync and that the actions essential nature is at
variance with its linguistic framing. Consequently, as we have proposed, it is bene-
factive status that trumps stance in action ascriptions involving offers and requests,
although stance can impart further laminations of social meaning and import.
6. Conclusion
The argument of this paper has been that when turns at talk projecting an expen-
diture or redistribution of time, effort, or material resources are in play, benefac-
tive stance and status are made relevant with varying degrees of self-consciousness
and explicitness. Other underlying dimensions of the action are also activated: in
particular, deontic stance and status (Stevanovic 2012; Stevanovic & Perkyl 2012)
are also mobilized and become more explicit as the arrangements for the fulfillment
of the request or offer are finalized (Thompson etal. frth, and Couper-Kuhlen and
Etelmki, this volume).
Benefactive stance is to some degree malleable. This is an important resource for
interactants who, facing actual or anticipated resistance to a nominated action, can
formulate the action in ways that emphasize the benefits and minimize the costs in
pursuit of an accepting response. At the same time, the malleability of stance occurs
within limits, particularly when benefactive status is oriented to by the participants as
determinate, asymmetrical, and mutually known.
Our proposal is that requests (and offers) are ordinarily characterized by a
basic congruence between benefactive stance and benefactive status, and that this
congruence is ordinarily sustained over the course of request and offer sequences
though its exact contours may be subject to adjustment and manipulation. This makes
turn design a broadly reliable indicator of benefactive status, albeit one that is not
infallible. Persons may appear to offer and request goods and services that cannot be
delivered, or that may not be beneficial to the putative beneficiary. Thus it is necessary
for participants to keep score of underlying benefits together with the potential for
their delivery as an element in the ascription of the actions of requesting and offer-
ing, together with other actions that are differentiated by reference to future activities
involving costs and benefits.
In considering the scope of different aspects of persons, resources, and actions
that speakers must keep track of in the process of action formation and ascription, it
is possible to hypothesize a hierarchy. Perhaps most pervasive is the epistemic ticker
argued by Heritage (2012) to be universally applicable when speakers produce or
understand declarative or interrogative utterances. The deontic ticker by contrast
may be relevant when the talk represents future (and perhaps some past) courses of
action. The benefactive ticker applies still more narrowly only to that subset of the
latter in which costs and benefits are relevantly apportioned, though the details of its
linguistic and sequential management remain to be explored.
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The putative preference for offers over requests

Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics / Loughborough University
Requesting and offering are closely related, insofar as they are activities associated
with someones need for assistance. It has been supposed (e.g. Schegloff 2007)
that requests and offers are not equivalent actions specifically that offers are
preferred actions and requests are dispreferred. We review the evidence for this
claim across a corpus of requests and offers and demonstrate that the empirical
evidence does not support the claim for a putative preference for offers over
requests. Further consideration of the often symbiotic relationships between
requesting and offering, particularly in face-to-face interactions, reveals a more
complex picture of the ways in which people recruit others to help, or in which
others are mobilized to help.
1. Introduction
There is anecdotal evidence that among the social niceties we are taught in our early
lives are certain norms encouraging or even mandating us, in particular circumstances,
to offer things without having to be asked. For instance American children are often
taught that they should not bring candy or cookies to school unless they bring enough
to offer around to others. Another, though perhaps rather extreme example is that in
British boarding schools students used to be, and perhaps still are, instructed that during
dinner they were always to take care to offer food, for instance by passing the vegetable
dish, to the person sitting to their right, so that no-one need ask request anything.
As we become adults we learn to offer people assistance when they are in difficulties,
to offer them a ride to an event to which both are going, to open a gate when someone
whose hands are full is trying to get in (see Enfield, this volume) and other such helpful
courtesies. There are no doubt many similar anecdotal accounts of circumstances in
which it appears that there is a social value attached to offering, or being offered some-
thing rather than having to ask for it; to put it another way, there may be evidence that
asking for something requesting might be normatively inhibited. As we sit writing
this introduction, the two authors have engaged in an exchange in which one rose from
the table to get himself a cup of coffee, and as he arrived at the coffee machine, asked the
other (just in the nick of time) if he too would like a cup of coffee. This being accepted
and the cup of coffee duly delivered to the one who remained seated, this other author
unscrewed the top of the milk container, poured himself some milk then without put-
ting the top back on the container passed the milk across the table to the one who had
poured the coffee. So this exchange consisted of two offers, one verbal and the other
made through a physical action; had each not offered the other, each would have had to
have asked for the substances they so urgently needed to continue this task of composi-
tion! Many of the minor and unnoticed interactions in daily life seem to be organised
in just such a way; we offer what we anticipate others might need, without waiting to be
asked. All of which might be related, in various ways, to the social solidarity principle in
social life, a principle promoting co-operation and social cohesion, and likewise inhib-
iting whatever might compromise or threaten that cohesion (Goffman 1955; Heritage
1984, 265269; Clayman 2002).
It is perhaps this [+] value associated with offering and [] value attached to hav-
ing to ask and note the connotations of the expression having to ask that lie
behind claims that offers are preferred in interaction and that requests are dispre-
ferred actions. Intimations of a putative preference for offering rather than requesting,
according to which requests are dispreferred, are to be found variously in Schegloff
(1979, 49), Levinson (1983, 343), Lerner (1996), Lindstrm (2005), and Robinson and
Bolden (2010), all of which can be traced back to Sacks (1992b: 207), who claimed
that [t]here is in general a difference between requests and offers, a preference for
offers over requests. However, the clearest statement supporting this claim is made
by Schegloff (2007, 8384), who argues that the evidence that offers are preferred over
requests is fourfold. First, requests tend to occur later in interactions than offers; sec-
ond, requests are accompanied by accounts, mitigations, excuses and other features
associated with dispreferred responses (Heritage 1984, 269273); third, requests often
appear to be withheld until they can be done as reciprocal actions (Sacks 1992b, 409);
and fourth, requests can masquerade or be disguised as other actions.1 Lerner (1996)
takes a similar view about the preference for offers over requests, adding a fifth piece of
evidence, that offers can be made in such a way as to pre-empt a speaker who it appears
might be leading up to making a request anticipating what the other might need, the
offer is made at just the point at which the request is recognisable.
. On the withholding of a request, Sacks says the following: having some request to make
of another you can, when you get into a conversation, hold off making that request under the
possibility that the other will ask you for something or you will end up doing something for
them, at which point your request stands as something they can do for you in exchange for
the thing that they just acknowledge that you just did for them (1992b, 409). Note that Sacks
formulates this as a possibility (you can), not a general propensity.
Plausible though this putative preference for offers over requests might seem, and
however well it accords with the kind of norms and patterns outlined above, the evi-
dence supporting these claims has not been systematically explored or tested against
large data sets. We will argue here that when we review the evidence held to support
this claimed preference, this evidence is equivocal at best, and significantly misrep-
resents some of the most salient dimensions of offering and requesting in ordinary
social life. In this paper we will review and assess the evidence that Schegloff proposes
as supporting this putative preference. We will then consider some of the more general
dimensions and factors associated with the relationship between offering and request-
ing, demonstrating that there is no straightforward or unitary preference privileging
offers in circumstances where a request could be made. Indeed we find ourselves con-
verging on a point that Sacks made in a lecture in 1970, that [o]ne wants then to
reconsider these objects offer, request, warning, threat not as though theyre a
series of different things, but to see them as sequential versions of something (Sacks
1992a, 331).
2. When do requests and offers occur in conversation?
As evidence in support of the status of requests as dispreferred actions, Schegloff makes

a general claim about the temporal position of requests in conversation, observing
that [r]equests appear disproportionately to occur late in conversations (Schegloff
2007, 83). The statistical nature of this claim allows it to be easily tested. We have
reviewed 58 offers and 39 requests in telephone conversations. An analysis of the tem-
poral position of these actions does not support Schegloff s claim. Requests are distrib-
uted in a bimodal fashion with the greatest frequency of occurrence near the beginning
of the telephone call, and a lesser frequency towards its end.
This likely reflects a bias towards the occurrence of requests in a reason for the
call position (Schegloff & Sacks 1973). In contrast, offers tend to occur later or towards
the end of calls, with a much lower frequency in the reason for the call position. In
short, the inverse of Schegloff s (2007) claim seems to hold in our data: requests dis-
proportionately occur early in the call, as reasons for the call, whereas offers occur
much later, as shown in Figure 1.
The graph below shows the distribution of offers (n = 58) and requests (n = 39) in
a sample of English and US telephone data. The x axis represents the temporal position
of the actions as a proportion of the duration of the call (0 = start of call; 1 = end of
call). The y axis represents the frequency of occurrence of the action. The peaks of the
density curves represent the most frequent positions of occurrence. The graph shows
that requests most frequently occur near the beginning of the call, whereas offers most
frequently occur towards the end.
Position of offers and requests in telephone calls
Density
offers
requests
0.0 0.5 1.0

Temporal position in call from start (0) to end (1)
Figure 1. Temporal distribution of requests and offers in telephone conversations
This pattern of distribution seems contrary to Schegloff s claim that:

Requests appear disproportionately to occur late in conversations, as late
topics or even as ostensible afterthoughts, i.e. done after the initiation of the
conversations closing, and seem especially problematic and unlikely to occur in
first topic position. For example, some phone calls which appear (in retrospect
upon their completion) to have been made specifically to do a request may have
several topics raised, and other sequences worked through, before the request is
articulated.(Schegloff 2007, 83)
Whilst Schegloff does not cite examples of such delayed requests, delayed even until
after the closing has been initiated, such delays do certainly occur. However, the distri-
butional claim that requests appear disproportionately to occur late in conversations is
not supported by the statistical evidence. Cases in which requests are made in first topic
position in calls occur quite frequently and unproblematically, as in these examples.
#1 [Field SO88:28]
1 Les: Hello:?
2 (0.3)
3 Gor: Its Gordon.
4 Les: .hhhh Oh Gordon. Shl I ring you back darling,
5 Gor: Uh:: no y- I dont think you can,
6 (0.3)
7 Gor: But uh: just to (0.3) say (.) Could you bring up a
8 letter.
9 (.)
10 Gor: When you come up,
11 ((lines omitted))
12 Gor: I need it before I=get any money out. Ignnaaf
13 to go overdrawn at the moment cz Im uh (0.6) Im
14 out of money.
15 Les: hOkhay,
#2 [Field SO88:19]
1 Gor: .tch Hi No:rm,
2 Nor: Hi Gordy,
3 Gor: .tch Eh:m (0.4) are you goin tonight,
4 (.)
5 Nor: Mm.
6 Gor: .hhh (0.2) Would you mind givin me a lif[t.
7 Nor:
[No thats
8 aright,
9 Gor: .hhh
10 (0.3)
11 Gor: Very kind of you.
In each of these examples, there is no evidence that the request is delayed by other prior
topics in such a way as to defer them, and certainly not until near the end of the call.
Moreover, it is worth observing that in Extract 1 the object of Gordons request (that
he wants his mother to bring him a certain letter) is not something that she might have
anticipated and hence offered before being asked. This matter of whether the recipient of
a request might have been in a position to anticipate what is requested, in a sense to have
anticipated the need, is perhaps a variable dimension of such sequences. For instance,
when in Extract 2 Gordon asked Norm if he was going tonight, Norm plainly knows
whats being referred to; and since this is evidently something to which Gordon is also
going, and perhaps knowing or guessing that Gordon might need transport to the event,
Norm might have stepped in and offered him a lift (a ride). We have examples of just
such sequences, in which an enquiry that looks as though it might be leading to making
a request elicits a response in which the recipient offers something. But the recipient
would need to be pretty sure why the other is asking; here for instance Norm would
need to be sure that Gordon is asking because he wants a lift, and not simply in order to
check which of his friends is going to the event, whether they might have a drink before
or after, or any of the many other matters that might be associated with an evenings
event. In certain respects the claimed preference for offering assumes that requesting
and offering are equally available and alternative actions, on a given occasion; which
is to say that a participant may anticipate what the other needs and hence offer before
being asked. But this is not uniformly the case; anticipation of need is contingent on
the details of the interaction, what one knows about the other and so forth. But for the
present our point is that Schegloff s distributional claim is not supported by the data.
3. The turn design of requests and offers
Schegloff suggests that requests are regularly accompanied by accounts, mitigations,

candidate excuses for the recipient, etc. which are done in advance of the request
itself (Schegloff 2007, 83). Here is the example Schegloff shows.
#3 [Post-Party:2:2729]
1 Ann: Marty she took my ma:tches[ k i n I]have a match,
2 Fre: [(door
locked)?]
3 Mar: Su:re, hmhh
Here in line 1, before asking for a match, Ann explains that Marty she took my
ma:tches. Schegloff observes that whilst by no means all requests are accompanied by
such accounts, the recurrent provision of accounts with requests is one of a constella-
tion of features pointing to its relatively dispreferred status (Schegloff 2007, 83). This
evidence of the characteristically dispreferred status of requests would seem to suggest
a contrast with offers; if these are the preferred alternatives to requests, Schegloff s
reasoning implies that offers would not be accompanied by accounts. In fact, one
finds that requests can perfectly easily be made without prefatory accounts, as the two
examples of requests in first topic position above indicate. Furthermore, very many
offers are accompanied by accounts, which is to say they are preceded by or led up
to through some form of explanation or account of the circumstances of making the
offer. Consider Gladyss offer to lend Emma her newspaper in Extract 4.
#4 [NB:IV:5]
1 Emm: oney=OH: I[M f:i::ne?hhh
2 Gla:
[(I-)
3 Gla: Well goo:d, ah:ll tell you I::.hh have a proposition:
4 uhm.t.hh u-Bill: uo:f course goes off on that uh
5 (0.2)tou:r: (.) Mondee< (.) i-his reguluh go:lf
6 ga:me.
7 Emm: Ye:ah:?=
8 Gla: =An now Ive got (.) tuh wash my hair en get the goop
9 outv itn evrything?.hh n ah have the paypuh here I
10 thought chu might li:ke tih have it. .hhhh[h
11 Emm: [Tha:nk you.
In lines 49 Gladys gives an account of why she doesnt need her newspaper (ending
with Ive got to wash my hair) and hence how it is available for Emma to borrow. Here
are two further examples of offers preceded by accounts a quite brief account in the
case of Edgertons offer in Extract 5 (lines 79), but more extensive in Leslies account
for offering Marys husband the address of a contact, in Extract 6 (lines 531).
#5 [Heritage:0II:2:4]
1 Steven: Woking four six five one?
2 Edgar: Stevn:?
3 (.)
4 Steven: Hullo:?
5 Edgar: Thiss Edgerton:.
6 Steven: Yes Edgi[ht[n.
7 Edgar:
[.h Steven look ah:: Im Im
8 phonin:g uh oh beha:lf v Ilene n myse:lf we
9 just heard abou:t poor um (0.4) Sondra.
10 Steven: Yes ma:dning isnt it.=
11 Edgar: =Oh:hh Lord. <An we were wondring if theres
12 anything we cn do tuh help-
13 Steven: [Well nats]
14 Edgar: [I m e a n ] cn we do ny shopping for her or
15 something like tha:t?
#6 [Holt:2:3:12]
1 Mary: One three f ive?
2 (.)
3 Leslie: Oh hello, its um: Leslie Field he:re,
4 Mary: Oh hello:,
5 Leslie: Hello,.tch I hope you dont mind me getting
6 in touch but uh- we met chor husband little while
7 ago at a Liberal meeting.
8 (0.3)
9 Mary: Ye:[s?
10 Leslie: [.hh And he wz: (0.3) he told us something
11 of whatd happen:ed,
12 (0.5)
13 Leslie: to him.hh An: I wondered haa- (0.2) he said he
14 m::ight have another position in vie:[w,
15 Mary:
[Mmhm,
16 Leslie: .hh (.) Uhm (0.3).tch Well I dont know how that
17 went,.h uh (.) Its just thet I wondered if he
18 hasn:t (0.3) uh we have friends in: Bristol
19 Mary: Ye:s?
20 Leslie: who:- (.) uh:m thet had the same experience.
21 Mary: Oh::.
22 Leslie: And they uhm:.t (0.2).hh He worked fr a
23 printing an:paper (0.9) uh firm [u
24 Mary: [Ye:s,
25 Leslie: uh[:- which ih puh- uh: partv the Paige Group.
26 Mary: [Yeh,
27 (.)
28 Leslie: .hh And he now has: ay:: um (1.1) I dont think
29 eez called it consultancy (0.2) They find
30 positions for people: in the printing n paper

31 (0.4) indus[try:,
32 Mary: [Oh I see:[:.
33 Leslie:
[.hh An: if: i-your husband
34 would li:ke their addre[ss
35 Mary: [Y e:: s,
36 Leslie: <As theyre specialists,
37 Mary: Ye::s?
38 (.)
39 Leslie: Uhm: my husband wd gladly give
Leslies offer is not made until lines 3339, before which she gives an extensive account
for making the offer, marked from the beginning as a slightly delicate matter (I hope
you dont mind me getting in touch, then your husband told us something of what
had happened which is that Marys husband has lost his job; note also lines 1317 in
terms of a certain awkwardness in making this offer). Leslies account covers not only
the difficulties that her offer addresses, but also the circumstances that make it possible
to offer assistance (at least by giving Marys husband a contact).
We have noted that Leslie begins her account in such a way as to indicate
that this might be an awkward or delicate matter. Note also that in addition to
the accounts accompanying (preceding) each of the offers in Extracts 4 and 5, the
offerer prefaces his/her turn with components (Ill tell you and Look Im phoning on
behalf of Ilene and myself, respectively) effectively delaying not only the offer but
also the account; in each case the offers seem to be designed to display an orienta-
tion to the delicacy of the matter of offering. Thus we may suggest that the delay in
the actual production of the offer is not a reflection of the status of the action as dis-
preferred as has been suggested for requests. Rather the prefatory work in these
examples orients to and serves to manage the delicacy or awkwardness of these
particular offers (of whats being offered). To put this differently, just as requests
may engender impositions and obligations on the other person, so too may offers
engender obligations on the other and may put the other in ones debt for even
small services (such as loaning them ones newspaper), and imply something about
their need for such assistance or services. The (negative) connotations that might
be found in or attributed to an offer can be every bit as awkward or face threaten-
ing as the risks of imposing on another by requesting their assistance (Brown &
Levinson 1987). The accounts that accompany offers may orient precisely to such
matters of obligation and debt.
That having been said, many offers are not accompanied by accounts. Each of
the offers in Extracts 46 are in first topic position in these telephone calls; indeed
the reason for the call is to make an offer and all such reason for the call offers are
prefaced with similar kinds of accounts or explanations for making the offer. However,
offers may be made in direct response to the recipients immediately prior description
of a trouble or a problem (Drew 1984; Curl 2006). Such interactionally generated offers
typically do not include accounts.
#7 [NB:IV:4]
1 Emm: Wl anyway tha:ts adea:l so I donknow wut
2 tih do about Ba:rbra.hhhhh (0.2) cz you see
3 she wz: depe[nding on:=
4 (L): [(Y*eh)
5 Emm: =hhim takiner in tuh the L.A. deeple s:- depot
6 Sundee so [e siz]
7 Lot:
[Ah:ll] takeer in: Sundee,
#8 [Rahman:II:6]
1 Ida: .. Bt the point is Jenny dont forget no:w..h
2 (0.3)
3 Ida: Eh:m
4 (.)
5 Ida: E wso: close t *Basil*wa:snte.=
6 Ida: =E wa[s v e r y::.]
7 Jen: [*Well thiss it]chu see[::,*
[An no[w hes go:ne.=
8 Ida:
9 Jen:
[Mm:,
10 Ida: =Anee thinks youre gnna go ez well yih s[ee:.
11 Jen:
[Well I
12 think thiss it [(But it- its)
13 Ida: [Well ih- So:h=
14 Jen: =Oh[::
15 Ida: [be patient with im cause we:: dont mi:nd,
16 Jen: But it gets me down a bit you know[ah: mean I ca:nt
17 Ida: [(Loo:k.)
18 Jen: I ca:nt mo:ve? yihknow ee[siz where yih goi:[n g,]=
19 Ida: [(What)[Well]=
20 Jen: =[(goin ot- we:y-)]
21 Ida: =[a hv to:ld j]u:.
22 (.)
23 Jen: Mm[:?
24 Ida: [Jis send im round here fer a couplev: hou:r:s
In Extract 7 Lottie offers to assist by taking Emmas daughter to the bus depot at the
end of the Thanksgiving holiday (line 7); and in Extract 8 Ida offers to help Jenny by
minding her young son for her (lines 2124). In each case, these offers are occasioned
by the others description of a problem, respectively Barbaras need for a ride to the bus
depot (I dont know what to do about Barbara), and the problems Jenny is experiencing
with her young son who is afraid of being left alone since the death of her husband
Basil (and now hes gone, line 8). These descriptions in the immediately prior turns
serve to provide an account for the subsequent offers. An account by the offerer is
therefore unnecessary in this position the offer relies on contiguity by trading off the
prior problem description/account.
So with respect to Schegloff s argument that part of the evidence for the dispre-
ferred status of requests is that they are recurrently accompanied by accounts, it is
apparent that the very same turn-constructional features are evident in offers. Hence
there is perhaps an equivalence between requests and offers, insofar as they both
exhibit similar turn design features.
4. One action masquerading as another
Schegloff observes that [o]ne evidence of the treatment of requests as dispreferred is

the masking of them as other actions often as ostensible offers (Schegloff 2007, 84).
Once again, this would seem to imply a contrast in which requests may be disguised to
appear to be other actions, whereas offering does not need to be disguised as anything
else what you see is what you get! Schegloff provides a single case in which, he argues,
a request is done in such a way as to masquerade as an offer. However that may be, it is
true that offers may also be done designed and managed in ways that are less than
explicit or on-the-record, and may even be disguised as other actions.
For instance, it is notable that in each of the following cases the speaker is offering
something to the recipient, and that the recipient responds in such a way as to make
it clear that they understand they are being made an offer. However, in each case the
offer is not made in a canonical or explicit form (on which see Curl 2006); rather, the
speaker informs the other (I have plenty of canned goods, and Where my husband works
theyre actually going to advertise one in the near future) or issues a directive (Just send
him round here for a couple of hours).
#9 [TCII(b):33:13/24-25]
1 Nancy: .hhh Gee: Id r:really l:ove to Jo but I cant
2 tomorrow uh Roger i(h)s finlly gitting some
3 money tihda:y,.hhh en I hevenbeen grocery
4 shopping in two weeks..hhh En there is n::othing
5 fhher mhhghe t(h)eat in this hou:se..hhh We
6 er dih- force -been force the las two days tih
7 eat ma:rgarine.
8 Jo: Goodne[:ss. ((breathily))
9 Nancy: [A:n ah we er even runneen outv tha:t. I:
10 r:rilly haftih go grocery shopping dihmorrow
11 Jo: .pt.hhhh
12 Nancy: I[:-
13 Jo: [Wl-
14 (0.3)
15 Jo: Nancy you dont need tuh live on margarine you
16 know I always have u-um hmr-whatd I say.hhhh
17 uh N::ancy, becuz I always have plenny of: can
18 good[s.
19 Nancy: [eh(h)Yea(h)h ha h[a hn.h [.h.hhhh
[I do:.[Seriously.
20 Jo:
21 If yih ever need tuh borrow any.
#10 [Field SO88:27]

1 Les: .hh Oh Im (.) Im sorry to bring you frm your
2 wo:rk.hhh Serena you know what you were telling me
3 about your father yesterday an how he wz: eventually
4 gointlook for- a-.hh store manager job
5 (.)
6 Ser: Ye:s,=
7 Les: =.hhhhmhhh.t u-We:ll, where my husband works: theyre
8 actually goin to advertise for one in the near future.

#11 [Rahman:II:6] (from #8)
1 Jen: But it gets me down a bit you know[ah: mean I ca:nt
2 Ida:
[(Loo:k.)
3 Jen: I ca:nt mo:ve? yihknow ee[siz where yih goi:[n g,]=
4 Ida: [(What)
[Well]=
5 Jen: =[(goin ot- we:y-)]
6 Ida: =[a hv to:ld j]u:.
7 (.)
8 Jen: Mm[:?
9 Ida: [Jis send im round here fer a couplev: hou:r:s
In just the same way that a shopkeeper may request a customer to put some produce on
the scales to be weighed by saying Wanna put that on the scale?, that is, through a turn
construction that is not explicitly a request format, so too the speakers in these exam-
ples are offering something without using explicit offer formats (again, Curl 2006). If
there was a simple binary in which requests are dispreferred actions and offers are pre-
ferred, offers would not be done through the kinds of indirect forms illustrated above,
but instead would be conducted only through explicit, unequivocal forms as is the
case for preferred responses which are delivered through simple and unvarnished
forms (Heritage 1984, 266).
In other cases, speakers do not merely construct their offers through indirect
forms; they go further, in disguising their offers in other ways, for instance by explic-
itly formulating their action as something other than an offer. In Extract 4, repeated
below, Gladys refers to what she is about to make as a proposition.
#4 [NB:IV:5]
1 Emm: oney=OH: I[M f:i::ne?hhh
2 Gla: [(I-)
3 Gla: Well goo:d, ah:ll tell you I::.hh have a proposition:
4 uhm.t.hh u-Bill: uo:f course goes off on that uh
5 (0.2)tou:r: (.) Mondee< (.) i-his reguluh go:lf
6 ga:me.
7 Emm: Ye:ah:?=
8 Gla: =An now Ive got (.) tuh wash my hair en get the goop
9 outv itn evrything?.hh n ah have the paypuh here I
10 thought chu might li:ke tih have it. .hhhh[h
11 Emm:
[Tha:nk you.
Gladys is, as we noted earlier, offering Emma the use of her newspaper, explaining
why for the time being she doesnt need it. Emmas response in the last line of the
excerpt indicates clearly that she understands Gladys as having made an offer, one that
she promptly accepts. But Gladys did not use one of the canonical forms for offering,
instead formulating what shes about to do as a proposition, and then using a construc-
tion which seems closer to making a suggestion (I have the paper here and I thought
you might like to have it).
We should make it clear that our point here is not to deny that requests may be
done in indirect or even disguised forms they clearly can be. However, offers may
equally be constructed through indirect forms or in ways that lay claim to be some-
thing other than offering. The relationship between the form that an action takes (its
mask, as it were) and the action itself is often not straightforward (Schegloff 1984).
This is true not only for requests that may be packaged as other actions, but also for
offers, as the examples above illustrate. The cases of offers that we have examined above
argue for an equality between offers and requests rather than the complementarity that
has previously been suggested. To argue for a preference of offers over requests would
require not only demonstrating that requests are dispreferred actions, but also show-
ing that offers are their preferred alternatives; this has not been done indeed the
thrust of what we have shown above is that offers can be just as awkward to make as it
can be to (have to) ask for something, in certain circumstances.
5. Do offers forestall requests?
In a paper that is not otherwise focused specifically on requesting and offering, but is
rather concerned with anticipatory completions a location which involves a prefer-
ence organisation for alternative actions Lerner (1996) argues that as a speaker is
articulating a preliminary component (about a problem of some kind) to what will
become a request, a recipient may anticipate where the speaker is heading and inter-
cept by making an offer, thereby saving the speaker the trouble of having to make a
request. Drawing on Sackss suggestion that [i]n the case of pre-requests, one thing a
pre-request regularly elicits is an offer. If you get an offer you need not make a request
(Sacks 1992a, 685), Lerner shows examples in which recipients seem to anticipate what
the speakers want and intercept with an offer. These are the two cases he shows as evi-
dence (Lerner 1996, 315).
#12 [Lerner 1996:315]
1 A: If for any reason you uh cant be there at ten
2 oclock [let me know.
3 B:
[I will call you
4 A: All right
#13 [Lerner 1996:315]
1 J: Okay, you c- I just uh thought if you uh-.hh en Ill take
2 the book in so we cn kindv exchange packages
3 P: .hhh Oh I have- I have yur book but if you dont mind
4 Id [like tuh keep it awhile,
5 J: [OH please. No if youd like to yer perfectly welcome
The evidence proposed in support of the preferred status of offers, and the dispre-
ferred status of requesting, is that in these cases the recipients, B and J respectively,
intervene before the speakers have completed their turns; and that they intervene to
offer that for which the speakers were seemingly going to ask. We should note that
these cases involve social norms and obligations of conduct that do not generalise to
all offers and requests. In the first case, speaker B has apparently already agreed to
meet the other at a specific time, an agreement that carries with it certain obligations
if it cannot be upheld. In the second case, the request to keep a borrowed book and
the offer to lend it involve pre-established norms of reciprocity. We can contrast this
with other perhaps more frequent requests, such as Gordons request in Extract 2 to
his mother to bring up a letter when she visits, in which no such social norm or pre-
established agreement enable the other to anticipate the request with an offer. The
complementarity of offers and requests that Lerners data seem to suggest may have
more to do with the specific activities in question than with a general preference for
offers over requests.
However, an additional feature of these examples is that in both cases the speakers
A in Extract 12 and P in Extract 13 continue their turns to completion, and in doing
so fully complete their requests, simultaneously as the recipients make their offers (see
their continuations after the overlap onsets in lines 2 and 4 respectively). But if offers
were preferred actions, then we would expect A and P to abort their turns, as soon as
it becomes clear that their recipients are intervening on their behalf by offering what
they had been going to ask. A similar case in our data is the following, though here
a speaker who is plainly in the course of making an offer is intercepted by the other
making a request.
14 [SBL 2:2:3]
#
1 Cla: Now waita minute Claire dont we need tallies?
2 (1.8)
3 Chl: (),
4 (0.5)
5 Cla: YEH wl whghy dun[I js]make ]up ]Why c-]
6 Chl:
[Wdju]bring]the]tallie][s?
[Why
7 Cla:
8 canI ds make those thin:gs up I made bef:::re.
9 Dz ithaftuh be so ni:[ce?
10 Chl: [e-Heavens n[o makeem
11 Cla:
[ hhhh
12 Chl: up.[h
13 Cla: [0ka:y.
Claire and Chloe play bridge (the card game) with a bunch of their friends, taking it in
turns to host each occasion. Chloe is hosting their next game; at the point this extract
begins (line 1), she realises that she doesnt have tallies (score sheets). In response to
this, Claire begins to offer to make up some tallies (line 5) the pattern here being
very much the same as the one we have shown in Extracts 7 and 8; when one speaker
talks explicitly about a problem or trouble they have, the other responds by offering
to assist. So Claire is offering a solution to Chloes problem (why dont I). But this
does not in any way inhibit Chloe from interjecting to ask Claire to do precisely what
Claire was offering to do (see the overlap between them in lines 5 and 6). Whilst
Claire persisted in making her offer over Chloes request (and note that Chloe right
away accepts Claires offer in lines 10 and 12, make them up), nevertheless Chloe had
no need to make the request in the first place (line 6); hearing that Claire was offer-
ing, if a request were really a dispreferred action, then she could easily have desisted.
These examples seem to demonstrate that something can perfectly well equally be
offered or requested; the data do not demonstrate any putative preference for one
over the other.
6. What is the relationship between offers and requests?
Thus far our approach has been to review the evidence proposed in the literature,
primarily by Schegloff (2007), in support of the preference for offers over requests;
we have shown that the evidence does not support that conclusion. We do not mean
to suggest, however, that there is no relationship between offering and requesting in

conversation (and for further consideration of some relationships between requesting
and offering, see Clayman & Heritage, this volume). Indeed, as we have already seen,
our data reveal a number of recurrent and relatively concrete relationships between
offering and requesting. These relationships, and the symbiosis between offers and
requests that they point to, derive in large measure from specific circumstances of
need, commonly but not invariably embodied in requests; these relationships derive
also from the possibility that one way of being solicitous is to anticipate the needs
of others, by offering assistance. This symbiotic relationship is one aspect of social
solidarity and social cohesion, but it is a contingent relationship, built upon particu-
lar circumstances, not a general preference for offers over requests. In this section
we describe, quite schematically, five recurrent and relatively concrete relationships
between offers and requests, which might be considered in lieu of a putative preference
for offers over requests.
6.1 Requests can occur in response to offers

A first relationship between offers and requests involves the occurrence of a request in
next position after an offer, either as a response to the offer or as a counter to it. The
sequence in Extract 15 come from an interaction between two university students out-
side a campus bar. As one gets up to get another beer, he offers one to his friend as well.
The design of the offer begins with a format that would have named a specific object
(e.g. do you want a beer? or do you want a Bulmers?), but this is self-repaired to a
format that leaves the object of the offer open.
15 [RCE15a 16:30]
#
1 Jam: Do you want- what do you want?
2 (0.3)
3 Wil: Uh can I get a Bulm- Bulmers please mate.
4 (0.2)
5 Jam: Bulmers.
In response to the offer, the recipient employs a request format (can I get an X?)
that accepts the offer and specifies the object. The function of a request format in
response to an offer, as an alternative to simply naming an object, is to treat the
exchange as contingent upon the first speakers acceptance, even though an offer has
just been made.
A request can also occur in next position to an offer as a counter to the initial offer
(on counters see Schegloff 2007, 1618). The sequence in Extract 16 comes from an
interaction between a mother and her young son as she prepares him for bed. After
the mother offers to read a book to her son, the son counters with a request to play a
game instead.
16 [RCE20 02:50]
#
1 Mum: Dy want to read a bookh?
2 (0.7)
3 Son: Uh (.) mom can we play air:planes?
4 Mom: We can play airplanes for a few minutes, and
5 then its bedtime.
The mothers initial offer of an activity provides a warrant for the son to make a request
for an alternative activity (see Goodwin & Cekaite, this volume).
6.2 Offers can occasion requests

A second relationship between offers and requests holds only in multiparty interac-
tion and presumably only for a specific class of shareable objects. Under such circum-
stances, an offer of an object to one participant can serve as an occasion for requests by
others. In Extract 17, drawn from a group interaction between five university students
on a campus lawn, the offer of a biscuit to one participant occasions requests by three
others. The sequence begins as Sarah notices Jessica eating a biscuit, which she had
discretely retrieved from her bag moments earlier.
#17 [RCE06 14:27]
1 Sar: What are you eating?=Where did you get that from
2 Mat: .hh Ye(h)ah I was thi(h)nk[ing the sa(h)me thi(h)ng
3 Jes:
[I had a chocolate bi:scuit
4 in my bag.
5 (1.4)
6 Mat: A single one.
7 (1.2)
8 Jes: I have some.
9 (0.6)
10 Jes: Do you want o(h)ne?=
11 Sar: =Its fi[ne
12 Dan: [Can I have one.
13 Jes: Yeah?
14 (.)
15 Dan: [Sweet.
16 Ash: [Please can I have one.
17 Sar: You have those in your room dont you[:(h) hehh
18 Ash:
[Yeh ((nods))
19 (.)
20 Sar: I love those.=[T h e y r e l i k e my fa:vo[rites.
21 Mat:
[Alright if you have that many [can I
22 have one.
23 Mat: [heh heh heh heh.hhh
24 Dan: [heh heh heh heh

25 Ash: Thank you.
26 Jes: Theyre a bit melted.
Although there is evidence that both parties, the offerer and the requesters, initially
withhold their respective actions, once an offer is made to Sarah (at line 10), requests
by Daniel, Ashley, and Matthew quickly follow (at lines 12, 16, and 2122). The first
request comes after Sarah refuses the offer (line 11) and is designed, with stress on the
first person pronoun I, to build a contrast between the current request and the previ-
ous refusal. Both the initial offer and the granting of the first request provide local
warrants for other participants to follow suit with requests of their own. The cascade
of requests that occurs in this sequence is also presumably contingent upon the nature
of the object. The properties and affordances that constitute the object in question as
shareable may include the status of the object as edible, the availability of the object
(e.g. whether there is a single biscuit or multiple), and the objects divisibility, which
affords relatively easy apportionment.
6.3 Requests can occasion offers

A third relationship between offers and request is the inverse of the second: a request
to one participant can serve as an occasion for an offer by another. Requests publically
display, and seek a solution for, the needs, desires, problems, etc. of speakers; and a
request for an object or service that satisfies one need may occasion an offer that satis-
fies a similar or related need. In the sequence in Extract 18, which is drawn from the
early moments of a family mealtime as the members of the family prepare the table, a
series of requests to one member of the family occasions an offer by another.
#18 [SLF 24:23]
1 Haley: ((sets two glasses of milk on table))
2 Brit: Haley can you get the salt and peppy?
3 Haley: Mm hm.
4 (2.8) ((Haley walks into kitchen, off-camera))
5 (H/M): Theres [still some
6 Brit:
[O:H, bring [( )
7 Dad: [Bring napkins too.
8 Haley: Okay.
9 Mom: You know what theres also uhm: (1.2) parmesan
10 cheese if anyone wants that on their soup.
After Haley sets two glasses of milk on the table, one at her fathers place at the table
and one at her own, her sister, who is already seated, asks her to bring salt and pepper
to the table (line 2). Similar to the previous case, in which an offer to one provided a
warrant for requests by others, here Haleys actions, having just delivered items to the
table, and her current position, having not yet sat down, create an opportunity for
her sisters request. Likewise, Haleys granting of this request (at line 3) and her move
to the kitchen to fulfil it provide an opportunity for her father to ask Haley to bring
napkins to the table as well (line 7). It is in this sequential environment, after multiple
requests that contribute to the activity of setting the table, that an offer is made by the
mother, who is also in the kitchen, an offer which similarly concerns provisions for the
meal (lines 910). The mothers offer anticipates a possible need or want, for an item
that she treats as unknown to the recipients, using a declarative format and a you know
what-preface, and hence is not requestable.
Here is another example in which Leslies request for a ride (lines 1314) is
responded to with Carries offer to collect her (line 15). (Leslies request for a ride
somewhat masquerades here as some kind of request for permission, though its trans-
parent that Leslie is asking Carrie to take her on to the event to which theyre both
going that evening.) They struggle for a few lines between Leslies request for a ride
from Carries home, and Carries offer to call by Leslies home to collect her; but in the
end Leslie gives way (line 27).
#19 [Holt C85:5]
1 Les: Leslie he:re,
2 Car: Ye(h)es,
3 (0.2)
4 Les: .hhh U[hm
5 Car:
[Got the message,
6 (0.2)
7 Les: Are you going tnight.
8 (0.3)
9 Car: Yes I left a message with Ka:th.
10 Les: [Yes thats]right.hh] Well-]
11 Car: [(
]Tuesday).](Well),]
12 (.)
13 Les: Is it alright if my husband brings me as far as
14 your hou:se.
15 Car: Well I cd pick you up its not[worth the whole]=
[n N O::::
16 Les: ]=
17 Car: =[riga[m a r o: l e,]
18 Les: =[::.[N o its alri]ght hell |bring me
19 (0.2)
20 Car: Wl while Im in the car it doesnt makeny
21 differe:n[ce,
[Dzni:t
22 Les:
23 Car: No:::.
24 (.)
25 Car: Ts not worth him turning out again.

26 (0.3)
27 Les: [ Oh alright then ]
28 Car: [So tha:ts that,]
These cases demonstrate that requests and offers can constitute complementary contri-
butions to an activity or course of action and, furthermore, that within the context of
an on-going activity, requests can occasion offers, just as offers can occasion requests.
6.4 Reports and displays of problems can elicit offers of solutions

A fourth relationship between offers and requests is associated with a pattern that
we have seen earlier, in Extracts 7, 8 and 14, and concerns not requests per se, but a
practice that might be regarded as an alternative to requesting: namely reporting and
displaying a problem, trouble, lack, or need. A report or display of a problem is an
alternative to a request insofar as problems establish the relevance of solutions, and
requests ask for solutions to problems whereas reports or displays do not. As Drew
(1984) and Curl (2006) have observed, reports of problems routinely occasion offers of
assistance. So as we saw for instance in Extract 7, repeated as Extract 20 below, Emmas
report of a problem, namely that she needs to get her daughter to the bus depot, estab-
lishes the relevance of an offer for help, which Lottie makes in next position.
#20 [NB:IV:4] (Drew 1984, p. 149)
1 Emm: Wl anyway tha:ts adea:l so I donknow wut
2 tih do about Ba:rbra.hhhhh (0.2) cz you see
3 she wz: depe[nding on:=
4 (L): [(Y*eh)
5 Emm: =hhim takiner in tuh the L.A. deeple s:- depot
6 Sundee so [e siz]
7 Lot:
[Ah:ll] takeer in: Sundee,
To claim that a report or display of a problem is an alternative to a request is not to say,

however, that a speaker intends to ask a recipient for help but recruits his or her assis-
tance through other means. The complementarity of reports of problems and requests
for solutions is a public phenomenon, independent from the private experiences of the
participants. The set of possible motives that a speaker may have to talk to others about
his or her problems is surely large and varied, but, insofar as problems need solutions,
reporting a problem is in principle an alternative to requesting a solution.
That said, speakers can and do use reports and displays of problems to elicit offers
of assistance. The sequence in Extract 21 comes from an interaction between a group
of friends as they prepare a barbecue in a public park. As one participant chops a head
of cabbage, she appears to encounter trouble her knife wobbles and her cuts appear
exaggerated and uneven. At this moment, she calls the name of her boyfriend, who
happens to be a professional sous-chef, using a hearably whining voice quality.
#21 [BBQ 1051330]
1 Ali: Ja:me:s ((in a whining voice))
2 (0.9) ((James looks up at Ali))
3 Jam: Do you need help?
4 Ali: Do you wanna:: help uh prep?
5 (0.5)
6 Ali: I-you kn[ow how much you love to pre[p
7 Jam:
[Sure
[Yeah
8 I do wanna prep
A summons or generic pre-sequence is one common practice through which speak-

ers manage the attention and alignment of a recipient prior to the production of a
base first pair-part of an adjacency-pair sequence (Schegloff 2007) (see the discussion
above of Gordons enquiry in Extract 2). Alis summons thus projects the relevance
of a base first pair part, one that she noticeably fails to produce after James redirects
his gaze to her. The hearably whining voice quality of the summons simultaneously
indexes a problem or trouble and projects that the base first pair part will pertain to the
problem. After the first pair part does not arrive, James must work out what relevance
the summons and the problem it indexes have to him. It is in this sequential environ-
ment that he produces an offer of help (just parenthetically, note that this is also an
example of the first relationship we outlined, in which an offer [line 3] is responded to
by a request [line 4]). Thus, in contrast to the previous case, in which Emma reports a
problem to Lottie, Alis problem-indexical summons appears to have been designed to
elicit an offer of help.
The formulation of a possible or actual absence is another practice to display a
problem, lack, or need for something. In Extract 22, Lisa picks up a bag of candy from
the table, one that has been shared between the members of the group, tips the bag
over, empties its contents into her hand, and sets the bag back on the table. Ben, who
has just seen this, inquires about the candies.
#22 [RCE22a 46:21]
1 Lis: ((picks up a communal bag of candy from
2 the table and empties it into her hand))
3 Ben: Are they all gone?
4 (0.5)
5 Lis: Have the last one.
6 ((sets a piece of candy in front of Ben))
Lisa has reason to believe that Ben already knows the answer to his enquiry in line 3;
hes just seen Lisa empty the bag. Hence she has grounds to analyse his enquiry as not
really a request for information (Heritage 2012) but rather as a complaint, or perhaps
a preliminary to a complaint. The reference to the candy as the last one in her offer
orients to grounds for a complaint, namely that she has taken the last piece of candy.
In this case, then, a question about a possible lack of an object serves as a preliminary
to a complaint and thereby occasions an offer that undermines the complainability of
the recipients actions. The formulation of an absence or lack of an object, while not
a request per se, can provide an occasion for an offer and therefore serve to effect an
object transfer.
The relevance of a solution upon the production of a recognizable report or dis-
play of a problem does not depend, however, on whether the report or display could
be understood by the recipient as having been made in the service of indicating that
the speaker wants something, and therefore that this is some alternative to a request.
In the next case, as two students sit on a bench on a university campus, one reports a
minor problem, her hunger, which elicits an offer of something to eat. The details of
the case suggest, however, that the report of hunger was not selected as an alternative
to a request.
#23 [RCE25 21:57]
1 Mol: I havent eaten all day and I am very hungry
2 (0.6)
3 Han: Mm (1.2) Yeah. I want to (0.8) have some food now but I
4 feel-
5 (0.2)
6 Han: [Well Ive got a couple of oatcakes ((looks at her bag))
7 Mol: [()
8 (0.4)
9 Mol: Oh.
10 Han: Do you want an oatcake,
11 Mol: No thats okay.
12 (0.9)
13 Han: Theyre very nutritious.
14 (0.2)
15 Mol: Im sure they are but Im gonna go home and (0.3) maybe
16 make (0.2) spaghetti.
Although the report of the problem provides an occasion for the offer, in this case, an
explicit request is not a locally-relevant or available alternative. Two arguments sup-
port this conclusion. The first is that the report is recognizable in context as a vehicle
for other actions. Prior to this extract, talk had turned to the time and the whereabouts
of the researcher, who has left the participants to talk but must return to collect the
equipment before the session can conclude. Within this context, Mollys report of hun-
ger is recognizable both as a complaint about the current situation and as a reason to
leave the session sooner rather than later. Although Hannas initial response orients to
this, insofar as it also cites eating as an alternative to the current activity (lines 34),
she abandons this TCU before it comes to completion and launches a new TCU, an
offer of oatcakes (line 6), which serves as a possible solution to the problem of Mollys
hunger, and perhaps her own as well. The second argument concerns the requestabil-
ity of the object in question. Given that the object of the offer, which the direction
of Hannas gaze suggests is hidden away in her bag, is not visible to the speaker, the
oatcakes are not themselves requestable Molly does not know of their existence. The
format of Hannas offer, an informing of possession, also orients to the status of the
object as unknown to Molly. Taken together, the evidence suggests that the report of
a problem in this case was not produced as, nor could be recognized by its recipient
as, an alternative to a request. The sequential relevance of an offer of a solution to a
problem thus appears to depend neither on the recognizability of the report as an
alternative to a request, nor on the requestability of the solution.
6.5 Ungrantable requests can occasion offers of alternatives

A fifth relationship between offers and requests involves the offering of alternative
objects after unsuccessful requests. A speaker who requests an object for a particular
task may find that the recipient is unable to grant the request. Under these circum-
stances, a third party may intervene with an offer of some alternative. The sequence in
Extract 24 come from an interaction between a group of university students in a com-
mon area of a university building. After Megan noticed that the battery on Rachels
laptop, which Megan has been using, is nearly out of power, she asks Rachel for the
laptops power supply.
#24 [RCE22a 54:01]
1 Meg: Rach do you have your:::
2 (0.6)
3 Rac: [Uhm [I do::
4 Mar: [char[ger,
5 Meg: [power supply.
6 Rac: e-Its just not (.) long enough to rea[ch there?
7 Con:
[Uhm,
8 hang on, you can use that one. ((unplugs the
9 power cord from his laptop, holds it out to Megan))
10 Meg: Ah thanks.
The response that Rachel produces details a specific circumstance that prevents her
from granting Megans (implied) request, namely that the power cord is not long
enough to reach from the outlet to the laptop; this amounts to a denial of the request
(Drew 1984). Upon the recognizable completion of Rachels denial, Connor reaches
for the power cord on his own laptop, which is the same make as Rachels, unplugs it
and hold it out to Megan, as he simultaneously produces a verbal offer. Although the
denial may technically complete the sequence, insofar as it constitutes a second pair
part in the request sequence, it nonetheless fails to resolve the speakers problem, and
the sequence remains incomplete until the solution is found.
A similar sequence emerges in the next case, which comes from the same bar-
becue preparations as Extract 21. Prior to this extract, Donna has gone off camera in
order to smoke marijuana, discretely. After her request for a pipe cannot be granted,
Carrie offers her an apple, which can be formed into an ad hoc pipe, as an alternative.
Similarly, moments later, a request for a knife to carve the apple receives an offer of a
pen as a workable substitute.
#25 [BBQ 149_8950]
1 Don: Kimmy.
2 (0.3)
3 Kim: What.
4 (0.8)
5 Don: Do we have a pipe?
6 Kim: e- (.) I dont.
7 (0.6)
8 Ell: You dont?
9 Car: We have an apple.
10 ((lines omitted))
11 Kim: Okay, give me a knife.
12 (0.3)
13 Ell: I got a pen.
In these examples, a request that a recipient is unable to grant creates a sequential

environment for an unaddressed recipient to intervene with an offer of an alternative,
but workable, solution to the speakers problem.
7. Conclusion
We have argued here that the evidence proposed in support of a preference for offers
over requests does not withstand close scrutiny. Insofar as properties that might be
associated with the dispreferred status of requests hold for offers as well, there is no
reason to conclude that offers are generally the preferred alternatives to requests. In
the place of a general preference for offers, we have identified and described an open
set of relatively more concrete relationships between offering and requesting in con-
versation. While we do not wish to replace one abstract relationship with another,
we do wish to highlight and further articulate a theme running through this set of
relationships and through many, but not all, of the cases that we have examined. That
theme is as follows: requests concern the need for assistance that speakers may have,
needs arising from problems, absences, desires and the like. Their requests for assis-
tance simultaneously index both their need (e.g. a problem) and a possible solution
that may be provided or rendered by co-present others (recipients). Seen in this light,
we are able to account for a range of phenomena associated with requesting, including
(i) a relationship between requests and reports and displays of problems, (ii) a relation-
ship between problems and offers of solutions, and ultimately (iii) the possibility of a
circuitous relationship between some offers and requests.
In many of the cases that we have considered, what is at stake for the one making
a request is a course of action that, without some form of assistance, cannot progress
beyond its current state. For example, in Extract 1, Gordon evidently needs a letter
from the county council in order to pay his tuition; in Extract 3, Ann apparently plans
to smoke a cigarette but lacks a necessary instrument, a match; in Extract 24, a low
battery threatens to disrupt Megans use of a computer unless she can find a power
cord. In such cases, the requester lacks a relevant object or is unable to perform a
relevant service that is necessary for a course of action one already set in motion by
the requester to progress beyond its current state, to completion. In other cases, a
request does not index a problem with the realization of a course of action, but rather
a relatively transient, and at times locally occasioned, want or desire, the fulfill-
ment of which is contingent on the actions of others (e.g. the request to play a game in
Extract 16 and the requests for biscuits in Extract 17).
Requests not only index problems, in this abstract sense of the term, but also
present recipients with possible solutions, which recipients are asked to provide. While
speakers problems may merely be indexed tacitly (unless an account is given), pos-
sible solutions are articulated explicitly in the request itself. The request in Extract1
(could you bring up a letter when you come up) explicitly formulates an action that the
recipient can perform to resolve the speakers problem; and the requests in Extract 3
(can I have a match) and Extract 24 (do you have your power supply) name objects that
could enable the courses of action to which the requests belong to move forward. This
account of requests, in which they are described in terms of contingencies and prob-
lems that arise in particular circumstances, and their possible solutions (assistance),
begins to shift the analytic focus away from the actions of the recipient who under a
more traditional account is directed (Searle 1976) or controlled (Ervin-Tripp 1976,
1982) by the one making the request and instead towards the circumstances in which
someone may make a request, or by indicating that they may need the others assis-
tance may recruit the other to assist; or indeed towards circumstances in which the
other may anticipate someones need for assistance.
While the act of requesting both indexes a speakers problem and presents a recip-
ient with a possible solution, these two elements need not occur together in the same
action. Indeed, as the cases presented in the previous sections demonstrate, an indi-
cation of a problem and an offer of a solution can be distributed sequentially across
two actions, by two different participants. The result is a sequence that can achieve
the same outcome as a request sequence (i.e. the resolution of a speakers problem),
but has a very different organization. A request creates a normative obligation for the
recipient to produce a response that accepts or rejects the request, frequently but not
exclusively through interrogative or imperative grammatical formats which set nor-
mative constraints on the appropriate forms of response (see also Couper-Kuhlen
2014). A request is, in other words, a first pair-part of an adjacency-pair sequence,
making a restricted set of next actions conditionally relevant (Schegloff & Sacks 1973;
Schegloff 2007).
In contrast, the sequences that can emerge through reports or displays of prob-
lems and offers of possible solutions in next position do not employ the machinery of
the adjacency pair, and thus embody a very different set of social relations between
speaker and recipient. Rather than establish a normative obligation for the recipient
to commit to the provision of assistance, a report or display of a problem creates an
opportunity for a recipient to offer assistance, as a sequence-initiating or first posi-
tion action. Heritage and Raymond (2005) have argued that first position carries a
tacit claim of independence and primacy, to which we add that first position is also
a locus for the expression of agency in interaction (cf. Heritage & Raymond 2012).
While a recipient who grants a request submits to the agency of the requester, agreeing
to implement a solution devised by the requester, the recipient of a report or display
of a problem finds him- or herself in a position to offer assistance voluntarily, and to
determine his or her own solution to the problem, thereby exercising a greater degree
of agency over the course of action.
The observation that indications of problems commonly elicit offers of assistance
suggests that there may be a normative, though not necessarily obligatory, relationship
between recognizable problems and offers of solutions in social interaction. To what
extent this is so remains an open question, one which we leave for future research.
But the significance of the question is clear. The propensity to help or assist others has
been proposed as a basic social motive and cited as a foundation for human coopera-
tion (Tomasello 2008). The documentation of this social motive, as enacted through
sequences of action, promises to ground theoretical claims such as these in the observ-
able conduct of participants in spontaneous interaction.
Taken together, these observations point to the possibility of a symbiotic relation-
ship between offering and requesting in conversation. A speaker who encounters a
problem in the realization of a course of action has available at least two alternative
actions through which assistance may be sought: a report of a problem, which may (or
may not) elicit an offer, or a request that presents a recipient with a possible solution to
accept or reject. In such cases, offering and requesting do not have a direct relationship;
but through the selection of problem reports or displays as alternatives to requests,

an indirect relationship between these actions emerges. Does this relationship con-
stitute evidence for a preference for offers? One could argue that this circuitous path
demotes requests, insofar as speakers do not produce them, and promotes offers;
but the availability of a path that bypasses requesting yet achieves the same outcome
is not itself sufficient evidence for a preference for offers. In sum, we have seen how
in particular interactional circumstances, someone lets it be known, somehow, that
they might need assistance; and someone else comes to anticipate that need before the
other has let it be known, or to discern that need, whether or not the other explicitly or
implicitly recruited them to assist.
Acknowledgements
A subset of the data used in this study came from the Language and Social Interaction
Archive (2014). We would like to thank Leah Wingard for this excellent resource.
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On divisions of labor in request
and offer environments

Dividing the labor for achieving a common goal is a routinized practice that is
found in both request and offer environments in English and Finnish everyday
conversations. There are specific linguistic resources deployed in the two
languages for this practice. Divisions of labor are typically proposed with a bi-
partite construction that consists schematically of a Request to Other to carry out
some action X, and a Commitment by Self to carry out a complementary action Y.
Where there is a possible chronological order for the actions X and Y, the request
and commitment are ordered accordingly.
Although in both languages there is a common schematic structure underlying
the linguistic constructions used in proposing divisions of labor, the attested
patterns vary in the degree of certainty that they express concerning the future
actions. In addition, the patterns in Finnish vary in the explicitness with which
the agents of the future actions are expressed. In neither of the languages are the
variant patterns interchangeable. Instead, the patterns have distinct sequential
home environments: the more certainty and explicitness the pattern expresses,
the later in the sequence it occurs.
Division-of labor proposals divide not only the labor, but also deontic primacy
(the right to decide) and responsibility. By construing the venture as a joint
one, they transform asymmetric actions such as offers and requests into more
symmetric ones. This may explain why divisions of labor typically occur in
request and offer sequences that are problematic and run the risk of miscarrying.
1. Introduction
Although the notion of division of labor may have its home in the world of eco-
nomic theory, social actors are confronted daily with practical situations in which it
can be opportune to divide the labor of getting things done in the social world. Not
only do joint social endeavors typically require organizing through talk-in-interaction;
as Huckleberry Finn teaches us, even individual tasks can be construed as part of a
common goal that involves sharing the work and responsibility. Participants have
practices1 for proposing divisions of labor on particular occasions in social interaction.

And as we will show, they have a set of specific linguistic resources for implementing
these practices. This chapter is a joint English-Finnish venture exploring the division-
of-labor phenomenon in everyday conversation, its linguistic underpinnings, its con-
texts of occurrence, and its rationale. In addition to cross-linguistic implications, the
study casts a revealing light on the extent to which human interaction is permeated
by concerns of sharing agency, responsibility and accountability in the planning and
execution of future action.
Our attention was first drawn to the division-of-labor phenomenon in talk-in-
interaction by the following fragment from a long-distance telephone conversation
between Emma and her grown daughter Barbara. The background is this: Following a
quarrel, Emmas husband Bud has recently walked out on her. Emma is now trying
to enlist Barbaras help in persuading Bud to come down for the planned Thanksgiving
dinner. Prior to this fragment, Emma has repeatedly asked Barbara would you call
Dad tonight and would you call him tonight for me, but Barbara has given only non-
committal replies. Now Emma reiterates her request (line 1):
(1) Barbara (nb025-3)2
1 Emm: [nYeah,.t.h W[ILL YOU HELP M]E OU:T OF [THI:S:,]
2 Bar: [O k a y.3] [Yeah I]ll call
3 him toni:ght,hh
4 (0.2)
5 Bar: [En you can] call] [me]
6 Emm: [A:LRIGHT] DEA:]R[.h][h.hh]
7 Bar: [You] call me at n:ine tomorrow
8 mo[rning.
9 Emm: [.t Alright darling I APPRECIATE *I[T.
10 Bar: :[Oka:y,
At least three things are worth noting about this fragment. First, Barbara marks
explicit compliance with Emmas request to help her out by replying in lines 23 yeah
Ill call him tonight. This response, through its conventionalized I will-format, acqui-
esces to the request and at the same time commits Barbara to calling Bud that evening
. With the term practices we refer to conventionalized ways of doing things in the social
world.
. This and all following transcripts have been transcribed according to the transcription
conventions first developed by Gail Jefferson (for a recent overview see Hepburn & Bolden
2013).
. Barbaras okay in line 2 is responsive to Emmas yeah in line 1 and thus contributes to
bringing the prior sequence to a close.
On divisions of labor in request and offer environments
(Thompson etal. In press). In other words, with it Barbara undertakes a commitment

to do something that will further her mothers agenda. Second, Barbaras delivery of
Ill call him tonight suggests through its slightly rising intonation more to come, and
after the briefest of pauses she launches another unit and you can call me. However,
this is virtually obliterated by Emmas simultaneous and loud alright dear (line6). In
lines78 Barbara now recycles the overlapped part of her turn: you call me at nine
tomorrow morning. The use of the imperative form here, together with the overt
subject you, is hearable as Barbara telling Emma to phone her the next morning in
order to find out what Bud said.4 It is these two units together Ill call him tonight,
and you call me at nine tomorrow morning, that create what we are calling a division
of labor proposal. Third, note that following Barbaras division-of-labor proposal and
Emmas indication that she will do her part, alright darling, followed by an appreciation
(line9), the sequence is brought to a close when Barbara now says okay, confirming
the deal (line10). In contrast then to a number of prior unsuccessful attempts in this
conversation to achieve agreement as to whether and how Barbara can help Emma, the
participants are able to bring this request sequence to successful closure by agreeing
on a division of labor and a sharing of responsibility in the pursuit of a common goal.
As might be expected, division-of-labor proposals are not restricted to English
conversation. Here is a comparable case in Finnish, where Sepe has called his friend
Simppas home in order to check whether he and his partner can come over for coffee.
It turns out that Simppa is not at home:
(2) Kahvi Coffee (Sg94_B01)
1 Sepe: =me ltiin tulos kahville
we be-pst-pas-4 coming-ine coffee-all
we were coming for coffee
2 sinnepin mut tota noin ni (.)
dem3.loc.about prt prt prt prt
there but
3 tytyy nyt oottaa ku se Simp:pa
have.to-3sg prt wait-inf prt dem3 Simppa
[one] needs to wait now until Simppa
4 tulee sielt takasi.
come-3sg dem3.loc back
comes back from there
. There has been talk earlier in the conversation suggesting that the cost of long-distance
telephoning could be a potential hindrance to Barbaras calling Bud. Emma has suggested
that once Barbara has spoken to Bud, Barbara should call her and reverse the charges, but
now Barbara is opting for an alternative plan, namely that Emma call her. This will mean that
Emma automatically bears at least half the cost of the telephoning.
5 Vera: nii tulkaa e illemmalla.

prt come-imp [2pl] evening-comp-ade
yes come later in the evening
6 (0.6)
7 Sepe: mno [soit:]tele< t (.) tnnepin sitte_ku<
prt call-fre-imp[2sg] dem1.loc.about then when
well give us a call here when
8 Vera: [(vai)]
(or )
9 (.)
10 Vera: joo:.
prt
yeah
11 Sepe: =ku se on paikalla ni m: (.) [me tul]laan.
when dem3 be place-ade prt we come-pas-4
when hes back and well come
12 Vera: [joo:. ]
prt

yeah
13 Sepe: [.jeh ]
yeah
14 Vera: [>selv<,]
okay
15 Sepe: tehn nin.
lets do it that way.
In line 5 Vera (apparently Simppas partner) suggests a solution for the get-together,
namely that Sepe and his partner come later in the evening. In lines 7 and 11 Sepe first
makes a request to Vera to let him know when Simppa is home: soittele tnnepin sitte
ku se on paikalla give us a call here when he is back. At the same time he links his
request to a commitment to come: ni me tullaan and well come. All in all, these two
jobs, giving a call and coming over divided up as proposed will lead to the success
of their project of getting together.
Despite the fact that (1) is from an English conversation, while (2) is from a Finn-
ish conversation, there are striking similarities between these two fragments. This
is what leads us to believe that we are dealing with a distinct and recurrent practice
across languages for divisions of labor in social interaction.
The following study is based on a collection of 54 examples of this practice taken
from audio-recorded telephone conversations and video-recorded face-to-face con-
versations in English (27 cases) and in Finnish (27 cases). The English examples come
from a moderately large assortment of everyday conversations in British and American
English. The Finnish examples come from the Finnish Conversation Data Archive at
the University of Helsinki.
2. The phenomenon
Let us first consider some of the ways in which the practices shown in (1) and (2)
above are similar:
a. In both cases a joint project is being proposed that involves coordinated actions
by the two interlocutors.
b. In both cases the joint project is encoded in two linked clauses: The agent of the
action in one clause is understood to be me (first person, singular or plural), or
Self. The agent of the action in the other clause is understood to be you (second
person, singular or plural), or Other.
c. In both cases there is a linking element between the two clauses:
(1) line 5: and
(2) line 11: ni(in) and/so/then.
d. In both cases the first clause projects the second clause. Although there are short
pauses between the two parts, in (1) there is continuing intonation at the end of
the first clause before the pause, and in (2) the linking element niin is attached to
the first clause and produced before the micro-pause.
e. In both cases, the Self-clause is pitched as a commitment to carry out some
action in the future, in the sense that the speaker agrees to doing something that
will benefit Other or Others agenda. The Other-clause is pitched as a request
for the interlocutor to carry out a complementary action in the future. That is,
Other is asked/told/instructed to do something that will benefit Self or Self s
agenda. The projected actions are complementary in the sense that, if executed
properly, their realization will lead to the achievement of a common goal (plan-
ning the Thanksgiving dinner appropriately, managing to get together that day
for coffee).
Yet there is also a difference between the division-of-labor patterns in (1) and (2): In
the English example (1) the Self action is mentioned before the Other action, i.e. the
order is me you, whereas in the Finnish example (2) the Other action precedes the
Self action, i.e. the order is you me. What should we make of this difference? Is
the order language-specific? We believe not. Indeed, if we expand our survey of such
forms in the two languages, it becomes apparent that the differing orders are merely
variants of one and the same practice.
One reason for claiming this is that the you-me order seen in the Finnish
example(2) is also documented in English:
(3) Deliver another day (Holt 1:3)
( Lesley has called her grocer Mr Bathwick to reschedule the order and delivery of
groceries originally planned for Thursday.)
1 Les: .hh Mister Bathwick (.) uh:m
2 I did ask if you could do me an order on Thu:rsday
3 if I came in and got it ready:,
4 Bat: (correct.)
5 (.)
6 Les: .hh uh this is Leslie Field h[ere,].hh]=
7 Bat: [yes ]yes]=
8 Les: =uhm (.) but you know Im a relief teacher
9 Ive been asked to teach on Thursda[y.
10 Bat:
[mmhm,=
11 Les: =.hh and (.) Im coming in tomorrow:
12 or I could pop in quickly on Wednesday,
13 I wonder.hhh
14 a:re you able to do: (.) deliver another da:y (.)
15 o:r: w-what dyou think.
16 (0.4)
17 Bat: It would be very difficult tdeliver another da::y,
18 Les: Yes.
19 Bat: Uh:m
20 Les: .hh Well if I could (0.2) is it possible for me
21 to leave an order with you.=
22 Bat: =Thats perfectly alright.=Leave the order with us,
23 well make it up and deliver it on Thursday.
24 Les: .hh Yes.
Here the grocer first proposes that Leslie do something (you), namely give him her
shopping order, and then commits to do something complementary himself (me),
namely to put it together and deliver it to her on Thursday.
Likewise, the reverse me you order seen in the English example (1) is also
documented in Finnish:
(4) Tukun rahaa Pile of money(Sg124_A03)
(Irja wants her daughter Sini to buy a long overcoat and has agreed to finance it.)
01 Irja: [ja ] tota<, ja asiahan on kyll niin ett
prt prt prt thing be-3sg prt so prt
yeah uh yeah the thing is you know that
02 mie en lhe siun/sen kans kauppoihin mihk

I neg go you-gen/dem3-gen with shop-pl-ill anywhere
I wont go with you/it5 to browse anywhere in the shops
03 kiertelem, = mie tuon sinulle
browse-inf-ill I bring-1sg you-all
tukun rahaa
stack-gen money-par
Ill bring you a pile of money
04 [ni sie saat menn ostamaan sen
prt you get to-2sg go buy-inf-ill dem3-gen
and you can go and buy
05 Sini: [nsh hh h hi hi
06 Irja: [takin.
coat-gen
the coat
In this conversation Irja, who wants her daughter to buy a proper winter coat, pro-
fesses to have little interest in traipsing around the coat shops. Instead, she first com-
mits to providing the money (me) and then suggests that Sini should go buy the coat
herself (you).
It would appear then that since there is typically a chronological order between
the first mentioned action (X) and the second mentioned action (Y) in this practice,6
the choice of a you-me or a me-you order essentially depends on how Self and
Other map onto the actions in question. If Other is the agent of the first mentioned
action, then the you-me order is used; if Self is the agent of the first mentioned
action, then the me-you order is called for.
In sum, in each language there is both a you-me and a me-you pattern.7 For
ease of reference, we will refer to these two patterns as Schema 1 (you-me) and
Schema 2 (me-you). The first action mentioned in either schema will always be
referred to as X, the second action as Y.
. On this reading it would refer to Irjas dog, who has been talked about earlier in the
conversation.
. Notable exceptions, of which there are very few, will be seen in (7) and (12) below.
. Intriguingly, the you-me order is more frequent than the me-you order in our data for
both languages.
2.1 Schemas 1 and 2

What we are calling Schema 1 has a second-person subject and/or verb form8 in the
first part (A), and a first-person subject and/or verb form in the second part (B). In
English, these are the patterns documented:9
Schema 1. ENGLISH10 11
Part A: you Link Part B: me
(pron2) imperative X (and) pron1 declarative modal will Y

why negative interrogative pron2 X and pron1 declarative modal will Y
Request or suggestion to Other Commitment by Self
(X precedes Y in time.11 X is an action to be carried out by Other, Y is an action to be carried out by Self.)
In other words, the you part is either (a) an imperative, with or without overt
expression of the subject: (you) do X, or (b) a negative interrogative introduced by
why, followed by a formulation of the action Other should carry out: why dont you X.
The me part is invariably a first-person declarative utterance with the modal verb will,
followed by a formulation of the action that Self undertakes to carry out: Ill Y.12 The
linking element is always and; this element may, however, be left out if Part A has an
imperative form (see, e.g. extract (3)).
In Finnish these are the patterns documented for Schema 1:
Schema 1. FINNISH13 14
imperative [2] X niin (pron1) declarative indicative-114 Y

declarative indicative-2 X niin pron1 declarative indicative-1 Y
(Continued)
. Or a zero-person form in Finnish.

. The following notation conventions are used in the tables below: (xxx) = optional element,
PRON+numeral = personal pronoun, = zero person, Verb form-2 = overt morphological
marker for second person, Verb form [2] = no overt morphological marker for second person.
. The description for English is given in terms of sentence type: declarative, interrogative,
imperative.
. Assuming there is a natural chronological order between X and Y.
. The first-person form can be either singular (I) or plural (we).
. The description for Finnish includes sentence type (declarative, interrogative, impera-
tive) as well as grammatical mood (indicative, conditional, etc.).
. In colloquial Finnish a passive form can be used with 1st person plural meaning (see, e.g.
extract (2)); we have included these cases under 1st person forms.
Schema 1. (Continued)

declarative indicative-3 X niin declarative indicative-1 Y
jos pron2 declarative indicative-2 X niin pron1 declarative indicative-1 Y
jos declarative conditional[3] X ja pron1 declarative conditional-1 Y
Request or suggestion to Other Commitment by Self
(X precedes Y in time.11 X is to be carried out by Other, Y is to be carried out by Self.)
In other words, in Finnish the you part can be either imperative or declarative. It
can also be framed as a jos (if ) clause, in which case both indicative and conditional
moods can occur. Imperative forms in Finnish always lack an overt subject pronoun;
in our collection the declarative indicatives that are not in jos clauses also have a non-
overt subject,15 and they can even have a so-called zero subject (Laitinen 1995, 2006).16
The jos clauses in indicative mood have an explicit second person subject pronoun; the
jos clauses in conditional mood have a zero subject. The me part is declarative and can
occur with or without an explicit subject; its verb can be in indicative or conditional
mood. The linking element is typically niin and/so/then, but in the case of jos + zero-
person may also be ja and.
What we are calling Schema 2 has a first-person subject and/or verb form in Part
A, and a second-person subject and/or verb form in Part B. In English, the following
patterns are found:
Schema 2. ENGLISH
Part A: me Link Part B: you
pron1 declarative modal will X and pron2 imperative Y

pron1 declarative modal will X and pron2 declarative modal can Y
why negative interrogative pron1 X and pron2 declarative modal can Y
Commitment by Self Request or suggestion to Other
(X precedes Y in time.11 X is an action to be carried out by Self, Y is an action to be carried out by Other.)
In other words, the me part is either a first-person declarative utterance with

the modal verb will: Ill X, or a first-person negative interrogative introduced by why,
. An explicit subject is not obligatory with indicative verb forms, because the subject is
marked in the verb conjugation.
. In zero-subject constructions the verb is always in the third person singular, and the
subject appears to be missing. The referent of a zero subject is non-specific and arbitrary, but
always human.
followed by a formulation of the action that Self proposes to perform: why dont I X.17
The you part is either an imperative form of the verb with overt subject: you do Y, or
a second-person declarative form with the modal verb can, followed by a formulation
of the action that Other is to perform: you can Y. The linking element is invariably an
explicit and.
In Finnish this is the pattern documented for Schema 2:18
Schema 2. FINNISH
Part A: me Link Part B: you
pron1 declarative indicative-1X niin pron2 declarative indicative-2 modal

(saada get to) Y
Commitment by Self Request or suggestion to Other
(X precedes Y in time.11 X is to be carried out by Self, Y is to be carried out by Other.)
In other words the Finnish me-part in Schema 2 is declarative and consists of a

first person pronoun and a verb in indicative form that expresses the action Self under-
takes to carry out (X). The you-part is also declarative and includes a second person
pronoun, a modal verb in indicative form, followed by a formulation of the action that
Other is to perform (Y). The linking element is invariably niin and/so/then.
What do we learn from these schemas? For one, they suggest that the practice in
each language has more or less grammaticized, in that there are binding, semi-fixed
forms in each part and a restricted set of connectives used to link them. In the follow-
ing we explore this observation more thoroughly.
2.2 Schemas 1 and 2 as constructions

Although the patterns represented in these schemas consist of two parts, the two parts
can be said to form a bipartite unit that is construction-like in the sense of Langacker
(2008) and Croft (2001). In other words, the patterns are to a certain extent con-
ventionalized form-meaning pairings, where meaning is associated also with social
actions. They represent a recurrent form associated with a particular function, namely
a proposal for division of labor. Their prosodic production supports a unit interpreta-
tion, because they can be produced in one intonation phrase or on one declination
line (see, e.g. extract 4). In cases where each part forms its own intonation phrase, the
second part is prosodically, syntactically and/or pragmatically projected. For instance,
. Once again, the first-person form can be either singular (I) or plural (we).
. Since our collection for this schema in Finnish is rather small, it cannot be excluded that
more variation might be encountered in a larger corpus.
the first part can end in continuing intonation, which creates a prosodic projection
of more to follow (see, e.g. extracts 1 and 3). Or the linking element can be rhythmi-
cally grouped with the first part, and that way syntactically project more to come (see
extract 2). In addition to these prosodic and/or syntactic projections, the first part
often projects the second part pragmatically (see, e.g. extracts 5 and 6 below): that is,
the first part on its own leaves open the question of why that now, and projects that
the answer to this question will follow.
Because of the occasional use of Finnish jos if in Part A of schema 1 and the
recurrent use of Finnish niin and/so/then as a linking element, it could be thought
that the division-of-labor construction is an instantiation of a conditional construc-
tion. Yet on closer examination of our Finnish and English collections from this per-
spective, we conclude that there is at most an affinity between what we are calling the
division-of-labor pattern and a conditional construction. We rarely found an under-
lying relationship of strong conditionality (if-and-only-if) between the two parts in
our division-of-labor data. Rather than an if-and-only-if conditional relationship, the
patterns instead tend to represent iconically the procedural order in which the two
actions X and Y need to be carried out in the real world (see, e.g. extract 2).19 Jos-ini-
tiated requests in the division-of-labor patterns are thus more related to independent
jos (if) clauses used as directives (see ISK 2004:1570; Laury 2012) than to hypotactic
conditional jos niin if-then clause combinations; the linking element ni functions as
a clause-combining element simply to express that there is more to come (see Vilkuna
1997), and not to introduce the apodosis of a conditional construction.
3. Activity context and rationale
As we have noted above, division-of-labor constructions often occur in request and

offer environments. In these environments, participants are negotiating procedures for
accomplishing a (concrete) project that will benefit one or the other of the participants
and that will require some kind of (concrete) action by one or the other participant. In
request environments, the speaker (Self) is typically the beneficiary of the project, and
in offer environments the recipient (Other) is typically the beneficiary (see Couper-
Kuhlen 2014, and Clayman and Heritage, this volume).
The initial request or offer can be accomplished implicitly or explicitly: for exam-
ple, a request may be conveyed by expressing a need, which is then responded to with
. This may explain why there are no cases in our division-of-labor collection of postposed
if or jos clauses, e.g. well put on the coffee if you come, where the recipients carrying out of
the second-mentioned action is a condition for the speakers carrying out of the first.
an offer. In addition to the initial request or offer, request and offer sequences often
develop into extended sequences that include subsequent requests and offers. In these
environments, the division-of-labor is used for negotiating procedures, and for distrib-
uting deontic primacy and responsibility, where deontic primacy refers to the locally
negotiated right to decide a future action (cf. deontic rights, Stevanovic & Perkyl
2012). A division-of-labor construction construes the project as a joint venture rather
than as the agenda of one individual only.
To see how this works, we now examine further instances of the division-of-labor
phenomenon, first in request and then in offer environments.
3.1 Request environments

Schegloff once proposed that the occurrence of one request may license the occur-
rence of others (2007:83). In other words, if A imposes on B with a request, this gives
B a license to impose on A in return. This is a recurrent phenomenon in our data: a
division-of-labor construction is frequently used by Self in response to requests made
by Other. For instance, in Example (1), Emma requests Barbara to help her out; in
complying, Barbara agrees to do so and to call Bud that evening. But she also makes
a reciprocal request of Emma, that Emma then call her the next morning to find out
what his response was.
We also find a division-of-labor construction being used in the following request
sequence, where Frank, who is at the beach on vacation, has called Al at work to ask
for a payroll check:
(5) Check (nb019-1)
1 Al: Thats one is: well I think thats one its ca:sh.
2 Fra: No:.
3 (1.3)
4 Fra: No I mean any payroll che:cks,
5 (1.5)
6 Al: We:ll (.) are you getting any payroll checks.
7 (0.4)
8 Fra: dYeh *I thought so:, two of them, hhh[hhh
9 Al: [Wl d-I thought
10 you were on that deal again with the Go:d damn union.
11 (0.2)
12 Al: Whe[r e [you uh ]
13 Fra:
[.tch[Well he] can take it out of my:: (0.4) my:
14 u-overage then.
15 (0.3)
16 Fra: But uh: I need a couple of che:cks,
17 (0.2)
18 Fra: .hmhh ((breathily)) To live on.
19 (1.3)
20 Fra: hh
21 (0.2)
22 Al: We:ll I tell you wha:t uh::: (.) uh:: (.) Well leave it
23 (0.6) w- I tell Why dont I bring it home with me.
24 (0.6)
25 Al: En: you can g-drop by my housen get it.
26 (.)
27 Fra: .t Oh ok*ay.
28 Al: Okay?
29 Fra: Ye:h.h
At the start of this recording, Frank clarifies that he is asking Al whether there are any
outstanding payroll checks (for him) (line 4), to which Al responds evasively by ques-
tioning whether Frank gets payroll checks in the first place (line 6). When it becomes
obvious that this tack will not be successful, Frank now produces in line 16 a rela-
tively straightforward expression of a need: I need a couple of checks. Since Al is Franks
superior and presumably responsible for dealing with such needs, Franks turn can be
interpreted as a request. Al, however, does not respond immediately, prompting Frank
to provide more motivation. This he does, after an audible inbreath, by adding on the
incremental to live on (line 18). Als response is once again delayed by more than a
minute; however, when it comes, it is framed as a proposal: I(ll) tell you what. Al now
launches, after some hesitation, what appears to be a sign of compliance and com-
mitment: well leave it (line 22). But this is broken off and the frame+proposal is now
recycled to I(ll) tell Why dont I bring it home with me (line 23). Despite the final
intonation here, this TCU is not enough to warrant a response from Frank. Instead it
projects pragmatically that Al will go on to explain how he envisages that the check
will get from his house to Frank. Franks withholding of talk in line 24 witnesses to this
pragmatic projection, which is only resolved once Al completes the construction with
and you can drop by my house and get it (line 25).
Als division-of-labor response to Franks request is in a way similar to Barbaras
in Example (1) above: the requestee agrees to comply with the request but carves out
a part of what is ultimately required to satisfy the requesters need and asks that the
requester do this part him-/herself. In other words, Self (here the requestee) indi-
cates willingness to go part way but insists that Other (here the requester) do their
part to contribute to a successful outcome. The division-of-labor Al is proposing
in(5) thus serves to construe Franks request for a check as a joint venture in which
they share the work, i.e. the agency, and the responsibility that accrue in realizing the
project. Seen another way, we might say that Al is not only complying with Franks
request to give him a check, but in return is exercising some deontic authority him-
self by telling Frank to pick the check up, giving him permission to come to his home
to do so.
Division-of-labor proposals are made not only as responses to requests by Other.

They can also be found as part of initiating requests by Self. Extract 6 is a case in point.
Matti has lent his excavator to Pekka, who needs it to remove some big stones from
his yard. Now, however, Matti has phoned Pekka to announce that he needs to get the
excavator back by Monday because he has sold it.
(6) Avaimet virtalukkoon Keys in the ignition (Sg94_A5)
1 Matti: no joka tapaukses se(.)te maanantaina tytyy
prt any case-ine dem3 monday-ess must-3sg
well in any case it needs to be picked up on Monday
2 kuitenki hakee se pois, ni saat toisen
anyhow pick up dem3 away prt get-2sg another-gen
so youll get another one to replace it
3 tilalle jos tarviit [(sit),]
instead if need-2SG (PRT)
if you need one
4 Pekka:
[.nhh]h >tota noin ni joo.
well yeah.
5 =katotaan sit nt h:
lets see now uhm
6 .hh s haet sen pois koska.h
when will you pick it up
7 Matti: [(-)]
8 Pekka: [>voit s ha]kee sunnuntainaki jos s haluut<.h=
you can pick it up already even on Sunday if you
want to
9 Matti: =:e:m min viitti [py-
no I wont bother
10 Pekka: [hh
11 Matti: ei si(i)t pyhn kato mirk- mitn virkaa
no use you see on a Sunday
12 sinne tlee: :y k- asiakas (.) maanantaina [(sinne.)]
the client will come on Monday
((20 seconds omitted, in which Matti explains that he has sold the excavator and

participants talk about its price.))
13 Matti: =okei [tota (.)]
prt prt
okay well
14 Pekka: [.mhhh]
15 Matti: jt maanantaiaamuna avai[met< (.)]
leave.imp[2sg] mondaymorning-ess key-pl
leave the keys on Monday morning
16 Pekka:
[mhhh]
17 Matti: siihen virtalukkoo.
dem3.ill ignition-ill
in the ignition
18 Pekka: [joo:.]
19 Matti: [ja ovi au]ki.
and door open
and the door open
20 Pekka: joo:.
21 Matti: ni min: (.)
tota haen piv[n mittaan.
]
prt i prt pick up-1sg day-gen along
and I will pick [it] up during the day
22 Pekka: [meneeksne
ovet]
go-3sg-Q-cli dem3.pldoor-pl
lukkoonki.
locked-cli
do the doors lock
23 Matti: >ei: tarvii ovia lukkoon laittaa
neg need door-pl lock put
no need to lock the doors
ku jtt avaimet
prt leave-2sg key-pl
just leave the keys
24 virtalukkoon vaa[n<. ]
ignition-ill just
in the ignition
Mattis initial request is formulated as an informing. By using a zero person form of the
necessive verb tyty (need) he expresses that there exists an objective necessity for the
request (cf. Polish trzeba, see Zinken & Ogiermann 2011). The need concerns picking
the excavator up on Monday (lines 12). This is followed by an offer to replace it with
another one, if Pekka has not finished his yardwork by Monday. Pekkas question about
the pick-up time and his offer to give up the excavator already on Sunday (lines68) are
compliant with Mattis underlying request to let him pick up the excavator on Monday.
In the project of getting the excavator back, Matti is the beneficiary, and since he
is the owner of the excavator and a professional who deals with excavators, he has both
deontic and epistemic authority over the procedures via which the machine should be
returned. Yet by using the division of labor construction, Matti relinquishes part of his
deontic authority and volunteers to do some of the work himself: min: (.) tota haen
piv[n mittaan I will pick it up during the day (line 21), if Pekka will do the other
part: jt maanantaiaamuna avaimet< (.) siihen virtalukkoo. ja ovi auki leave the
keys in the ignition and the door open (lines 1519). In doing so, Matti takes partial
responsibility for the success of a project that he himself has initiated. In this way he
construes the venture as a joint one, with shared agency and responsibility.
3.2 Offer environments

The division-of-labor construction can also be found in offer environments, for
instance, in responding to an offer, as in extract (7) below. In this telephone conver-
sation Claire and Chloe are making plans for an upcoming bridge party that Chloe
will be hosting at her house. On the occasion of Chloes last bridge party, Claire pro-
vided her with chairs. Towards the close of this conversation, Claire now suddenly asks
Chloe whether she should bring the chairs again:
(7) Chairs (sbl025-30)
1 Cla: hhhh Do you want me bring the: chai:[rs?
2 Chl:
[hahh
3 Plea::: (.) NO*: (0.2) Yah,
4 (0.3)
5 Chl: I:ve got to get ch*airs. Bringem one more t*ime.
(17 lines omitted))
22 Chl: [hh We:ll Ill keep sort of lookin
23 but bring em one more time
24 maybe by: next time I can get some.
Claires offer (line 1) is done with a do you want me to construction, a format that has
been shown to be used when the offer is being framed as a solution to an educed
problem or need, i.e. one that has not been made explicit in prior talk but is brought
about through the speaker proposing something which, so the implication, the inter-
locutor may want or need (Curl 2006). This may account for Chloes reaction, which
is an initial pleading plea:: and then becomes a loud and clear no (line 3), amounting to
an unconditional rejection of Claires offer (line 1). However, three-tenths of a second
later, Chloe reconsiders, acknowledging that she does still need chairs and then reluc-
tantly agreeing that Claire should bring hers one more time (line 5). After an interlude
in which Claire announces that she has recently seen some bridge chairs advertised for
sale and Chloe details how all of her own efforts to find chairs have so far been in vain,
Chloe now advances a division-of-labor proposal: she herself commits to continuing
her search for new chairs: Ill keep sort of looking and at the same time she requests
Claire to bring her own chairs one more time, adding the optimistic prediction that by
next time she will have found some herself (lines 2224).20
. We attribute the use of but rather than the much more frequent and in this instantia-
tion of the construction to the fact that the context implies incompatibility between the two
actions mentioned (if Claire looks for chairs and finds some, then Chloe will not need to bring
What does this division-of-labor proposal allow Chloe to achieve? We argue that
it allows her to accept Claires offer graciously by asking her to bring along chairs one
more time, but at the same time pledges to make her own contribution to resolving the
chair problem in the future. In other words, Chloe is not just on the receiving end of
the deal, she is committing to an active role herself in order to avoid any recurrence of
the problem in the future. This distribution of agency and responsibility constructs the
offer and its acceptance as part of a joint venture: the two participants will collaborate
in resolving the problem caused by a lack of chairs.
Divisions of labor can also be found in the initiation of offers. This is what hap-
pens in the next extract, where Vesa suddenly remembers he owes Saku a past salary
and offers to pay it the next day.21 The extract is from a telephone conversation in
which Saku and Vesa have agreed that Saku will help Vesa with a mailing task. Right
before the extract, Saku has asked how long the task will take. Vesa responds that it will
take a few hours but that he himself will have time to complete it the next day, so that it
is sufficient if Saku can help just according to his conscience. Vesa now self-interrupts
to produce a sudden remembering, indexed by ai niin oh thats right (Koivisto 2013),
about the unpaid salary (lines 3 and 5):
(8) Sun palkkas Your salary (Sg122_A10)
1 Vesa: .hhh nii tota- (.) m- (.) ei oo mit vlii.=
so I doesnt matter at all.
2 =tee iha: omantunnon mukaan se hetki ku mik-
do according to your conscience the time that
3 ai nii saatana se sun ### [no juu. ]
oh thats right hell your
well okay.
4 Saku: [mik.]
what
5 Vesa: .hhh nii se sun palkkas. h[hh
yes that salary of yours
6 Saku: [NIIi:::
yes
7 [rahaa rahaa. ]
money money
8 Vesa: [jo(h)oo se .h ot]appas
prt dem3.sg take.imp-cli-cli
yes that one listen bring
any). In the light of this assumption, Claire is basically denying this incompatibility by saying
Although Ill do my part, your part is still needed.
. It could be argued that this is not an example of a genuine offer, because Vesa has a prior
obligation to pay Saku his salary. However, if this example is analyzed locally in terms of
agency (Vesa) and beneficiary (Saku), it can be treated as an offer (see Couper-Kuhlen 2014).
9 kuule tilinumero muk#aa ni-#

prt account number with sp
your account number along and
10 Saku: joo[::.
11 Vesa: [m otan sen korvan taakse,
I take-1sg dem3-gen ear-gen behind
Ill put it behind my ear
12 jos m kyn vaik tos f
irmas huomenna,
if I visit the firm tomorrow for example
13 >ku ei o toi< webb:iyhteys
because the [home] web-connection hasnt
14 kauheesti toiminu mut.mhhh
functioned so well
The division-of-labor construction is on lines 89 and 11: ottapas kuule tilinumero

mukaa ni m otan sen korvan taakse listen bring your account number along and Ill
put it behind my ear.22 With this construction Vesa requests Saku to bring his bank
account number with him when he comes, and commits to remembering to pay his
salary if he goes to the office the next day. Vesas project is thus to get Sakus salary paid.
Yet, with the division-of-labor proposal he is giving some of the agency and responsi-
bility for the successful outcome of this project to Saku, and in that way construing the
project as more of a joint one.
3.3 The rationale

In request environments then, the division-of-labor construction occurs in turns
both complying with and making requests. If a request has been made by Other, as
in the case of (1) or (5), then a division of labor allows Self, in complying, to recip-
rocate with a request, thereby claiming some deontic primacy for Self and simul-
taneously assigning some agency and responsibility to Other. If a request is being
made by Self, as in the case of (6), a division of labor allows Self to propose to do
one part, thereby taking over some of the agency and responsibility involved in ful-
filling the need, while at the same time relinquishing a measure of their own deon-
tic primacy over the project. Seen more generally, making a request and complying
with a request are typically asymmetric actions: requesters impose deontic primacy
on requestees; requestees, in simply acquiescing, submit to the requesters display
of primacy. We maintain that the division-of-labor construction makes it possible
to transform such an inherently asymmetric situation into a more symmetric one
. This idiomatic expression in Finnish means roughly keep something in mind until it is
needed.
by distributing deontic primacy, agency and responsibility more evenly between

the participants.
As for offer environments, here too the division-of-labor construction occurs both
in making and responding to offers. If an offer has been made by Other, as in the case
of (7), a division of labor allows Self, in accepting the offer, to commit to doing one
part and in that way to share the responsibility for a successful outcome of the project.
If an offer is being made by Self, as in the case of (8), a division of labor allows Self to
commit to doing one part but at the same time to assign some agency and responsibil-
ity to Other. Here too, seen generally, what is a typically asymmetric situation can be
transformed through a division-of-labor proposal into something more symmetric. By
using a division-of-labor construction the offerer can assign some of the responsibility
to the offeree; an offeree who uses a division-of-labor construction can take over some
of the responsibility from the offerer for a successful resolution of the problem.
We submit that the transformation of an asymmetric into a more symmetric
interactional situation may be the rationale for the action combination /Request &
Commitment/ or /Commitment & Request/. The symmetry achieved with this action
combination expresses itself not only through a division of labor, i.e. a sharing of
agency, but also through a sharing of responsibility. It is the sharing not only of labor
but also of responsibility with respect to the outcome of the project that construes it as
a joint venture rather than as the agenda of a single individual.
4. Sequential position and distribution of forms
So far we have considered the division-of-labor practice with its two variants, as rep-
resented in Schemas 1 and 2, as a monolithic whole. In this section, we wish to draw
attention to the formal variation within each schema. For instance, judging from our
data, speakers of English, when implementing the request part of the action combina-
tion, have a choice between at least two formal alternatives for Schema 1: an impera-
tive ((you) do X) or a why negative interrogative (why dont you do X). Likewise, in our
Finnish data with Schema 1 a speaker can choose between an imperative (tee X doX),
a second-person or a zero person declarative with or without jos: ((jos) sin teet X (if)
you do X), or jos + a zero-person declarative with a verb in conditional mood (jos
tekisi X if would do X. What accounts for which form is chosen? Similarly, with
respect to Schema 2, English speakers, in implementing the commitment part of the
action combination, can choose between a first-person declarative with will (Ill X) or
a why negative interrogative (why dont I X)?23 Recall that in extract (1), Barbara says
. Given the small size of our Finnish collection, we have not yet encountered significant
variation in the realization of Schema 2.
Ill call him tonight (lines 2 and 3), while in extract (5), Al says why dont I bring it home
with me (line 11). Are these forms wholly interchangeable?
We wish to argue that the formal alternatives within single division-of-labor sche-
mas in English and Finnish are not freely interchangeable but instead are function-
ally distinct. Let us begin by considering the evidence for English. First, as ways of
implementing requests in English, the alternatives imperative x and why dont you X
lie at different ends of a continuum: imperative x has been said to present the oth-
ers compliance as a foregone conclusion and to treat the future action as self-evident
(Craven& Potter 2010). Negative interrogatives, by contrast, through their interroga-
tivity, allow for the possibility of Other weighing in on the advisability of the action.
The future action is thus presented as less certain of actually occurring.
Second, not only do these alternate forms represent differing degrees of certainty,
they are also distributed differently in extended request and offer sequences. In English
why dont you X is more likely to be found as part of a division-of-labor proposal early
in request and offer sequences. By contrast, imperative X is more likely to occur in
division-of-labor proposals that are used in closing down request and offer sequences,
once the particulars of each partys contribution have been worked out. For instance,
in the telephone call from which the following extract is taken, Gina has called her
friend Milly and listened at some length to Millys problems; she is now offering to
take her to the Bible group meeting that evening. This is how Ginas offer is launched:
(9) Go ahead Milly (sbl031-4)
1 Gin: [ hhh We:ll gee wil hh I tell you wha:t wu- (.)
2 eh-ihHe (.) You havent eaten yet?
3 Mil: No were just[now ]e a t ing. ]
[Well]why dont yo]u go ahead Milly hh
4 Gin:
5 (0.2)
6 Gin: En u-I:ll sto:p o:n my way down en: if you feel like (.)
7 coming with me fi:ne an:d if y[do:nt w h y ]
8 Mil: [Youre still go]*ing.
9 (0.3)
10 Gin: hh Yeh I think Ill go o:n.=
11 Mil: =Ah hah.
Like in (5), where Al frames his division of labor with Ill tell you what (line 10) pro-
posing that it will resolve Franks need, Gina in (9) introduces her offer as a remedy
to a problem: I tell you what (line 1). She then ascertains that Milly has not yet eaten,
and builds her proposed division of labor on this fact: why dont you go ahead Milly
(line4) and Ill stop on my way down (line 6). In other words, Gina is proposing that
Milly should first eat and that she (Gina) will then stop by and see if Milly wants to
come with her to the meeting. But her division-of-labor proposal is rather tentative in
that its you part is couched as a mere suggestion.
Several seconds later in the phone call, Gina again uses a /Request & Commitment/
construction in conjunction with her offer to take Milly to the Bible group meeting, but
this time she chooses a you imperative X form: you think about it (line6). This division-
of-labor proposal is positioned immediately after Milly has initiated closing of the call:
(10) Stop by (sbl031-6)
1 Mil: [THA:NK]S FOR C]AHLLING ME:[a n d u h]=
2 Gin: [(t)ALRIGHT]=
3 Gin: =We[ll then ^w]e:ll hh
4 Mil: [I really ]
5 (.)
6 Gin: We-:ll keep it y-y- (.) k You thin[k about]*it.
7 Mil:
[Y e: s. ]
8 (.)
9 Mil: [hh
10 Gin: [And uh
11 (0.2)
12 Mil: Well may[b e I can(w) ]
13 Gin: [Do you want me to] stop by:?
14 Mil: hh We:ll you ^better no:t may:be: uhm becuz I- I sort of
15 Mil: dou:bt I: think Jan has a lotta wo:rk=
16 Gin: =[0hh
17 Mil: =[en Im sort of uh t hhh MAYBE Ill ca:ll you if I
decide
18 I can go[: would that be] be[tter?]
19 Gin: [^ 0 k a: y ][Swel]l.
The second part of Ginas division-of-labor construction is left incomplete here: and
uh (line 10), but it can be projected that she is about to say something like if you want
me to, Ill stop by and pick you up. Evidence for this will be seen in line 13, where rather
than present her stopping by as a foregone conclusion, she inquires whether Milly
wants her to stop by or not.
What we note then about this and similar cases of English division-of-labor pro-
posals in extended sequences is that the why dont you X form occurs in the implemen-
tation of the request part when a speaker is proposing the division of labor for the first
time, whereas the imperative X form is used to confirm the deal when the sequence
is about to be closed down. It is evidence of this sort that leads us to conclude that the
two alternate forms for requesting in a division-of-labor proposal are not interchange-
able with one another but have their own sequential positions, or home environments,
in extended sequences.
In Finnish, the situation is in many respects comparable. Here, too, the imperative
form is found for the implementation of the requesting action when a division-of-
labor proposal is being used to close down a request or offer sequence. For instance, in
the following case, Simo and Ville have agreed that they will get together on Christmas
Day and are now trying to work out the modalities:
(11) Joulupivkahvi Christmas day coffee (Sg96_B4)
( It is Christmas Day and Simo and Simos brother-in-law Ville are organizing how to
get together for a visit.)
1 Simo: .hh kuule me ollaa nyt myhstytty ts
listen we be-pas-4 prt miss-pppc prt
listen we have now missed
2 monesta junasta perkkin jo,
many-ela train-ela one-after.the.other already
already many trains in a row
3 Ville: nii,
4 Simo: aina nukahdettu ja tllst ja,
always fall.asleep-pppc and dem1.adj-ela and
always fell asleep and such and
5 Ville: [joo:,
6 Simo: [s::itten oltu syvyksiss ja
prt be-pppc corrode-ppc [a pun, over-eaten] and
then we have over-eaten and been
vh juovuksissa ja, [.hhh
a bit drunk and
a bit over-drunk
7 Ville: [nii no/on i:tte kukin tss,
prt prt/be-3sg each of us prt

oh well [like] each and everyone
here
8 Simo: mut tota: mites jos s pistsit (.) kahvin plle
prt prt what-cli if you put-con-2sg coffee-gen on
but what if you would put (.) coffee on
9 jos me (.) pikasee pistydytts siel. hh
if we quickly drop.by-pas-con there
if we (.) were to quickly drop by there
10 (.)
11 Simo: niinku j-
prt
like
12 Ville: iha kuin[ka vaa,
anything goes/whatever
13 Simo:
[joulupivkahvilla,
Christmas day coffee
for a Christmas day coffee
14 Ville: mm,
15 Simo: pist kahvi tippuu nii
put.imp[2sg] coffee drop.inf-ill prt
put the coffee on and
16 me tullaa kym siel,
we come pas-4 visit-inf-ill there
well come over for a visit
16 Ville: joo,
yes
17 Simo: se:lv,
okay
Early on in this sequence, an embryonic division of labor can be identified in lines89

when Simo says mut tota: mites jos s pistsit (.) kahvin plle jos me (.) pikasee pisty-
dytts siel but what if you would put coffee on if we were to quickly drop by there.
The you part here is a mere suggestion: mites jos what if . Note also the use of jos if
and conditional verb forms in both parts of this structure, leaving it open to negotia-
tion as to whether the events will actually take place at all (see also Curl& Drew 2008).
In closing the conversation, however, Simo comes back to his division-of-labor
proposal, now constructing the request part with an imperative X and the commit-
ment part as a declarative with indicative verb form: pist kahvi tippuu nii me tullaa
kym siel put the coffee on and well come over for a visit (lines 1516). These
forms render the actions in the proposed division of labor more definitive and certain:
the coffee-making is now presented as the final solution and Simos coming as binding.
In Finnish, there is a further alternative form for implementing the request part
of a division-of-labor proposal: this is the zero-person form: jos declarative con-
ditional[3] X if would X. A zero-person form imposes the least amount of deontic
force due to the fact that its verb is in third person (referring to neither you nor me)
and its subject is missing; in other words, the form leaves open who exactly is to carry
out the action in question. In division-of-labor proposals, the zero-person construc-
tion is typically embedded under the conditional marker jos and also occurs with a
conditional verb form. Thus, it is uncertain whether the action will take place at all (see
also Couper-Kuhlen & Etelmki, Forthcoming). Extract (12) is a case in point. In this
telephone conversation two friends Vikke and Missu are organizing a housewarming
gift for a mutual friend of theirs. We join them as they are arranging how to include
their other friends in the financing of the gift.
(12) Lehmt Cows (Sg112_B2)

1 Vikke: voisikkohan s soittaa Liinalle?,
can-con-2sg-q-cli you call Liina-all
could you call Liina
2 Missu: .h voim m soittaa,h
can-1sg I call
sure I can call
3 (.)
4 Missu: .hh ja tota pitsk sit soittaa viel >#m#<
prt prt need-con[3sg]-q prt call still
and uhm should also call
5 Miialle ja Ninnulle ja,(.) Marialleki et mit
Miia-all and Ninnu-all and Maria-all prt what
Miia and Ninnu and (.) Maria to see what
6 ne om milt.
dem3.pl be-3sg mind-alt
they think
7 Vikke: mm, *.nii*
mm mhm
8 (0.3)
9 Missu: tai no jos sanos vaikka Mar:- tota: .hh
prt prt if say-con[3sg] for instance Mar- prt
or uhm if would tell for example Mar:- um
10 Miialle et soittais?,
Miia-all prt to call-con[3sg]
Miia to call
11 (3.8)
12 Missu: soittais vaikka #m# Marialle ja
call-con[3sg] for instance Maria-all and
to call for instance Maria and
13 m,(.) sanosin >Liinalle et soittais Ninnulle
I say-con-1sg Liina-all prt call-con.3sg Ninnu
I would tell Liina to call Ninnu
14 ni ei tarviit tss nii kauheesti;<=
so neg need prt so terribly
so (one) neednt now (have) so terribly [much]
15 Vikke: =mm,(.) no m voin soittaa kyl Miialle ja
prt prt I can-1sg call prt Miia-all and
well I can surely call Miia and
16 Mariall[e ku] oon menossa tihin ni.

Maria-all while be-1sg go-inf.ill work-ill prt
Maria since Im going to work so.
17 Missu: [nii;]
yeah
18 Missu: .hhhhhh no joo. (.) ihan sama,
well yes. whatever.
19 Vikke: mhh otetaan se sitten_ni.
lets do it like that then.
Vikke initiates the sequence here by asking Missu to call Liina, who Missu knows better,
and include her in the gift-giving plan (line 1). Missu agrees to do this (line 2) and then
reciprocates by suggesting that their other friends, Miia, Ninnu and Maria, should also
be called to see what they think about the housewarming gift (lines 46). Vikke only
acknowledges this as a possibility with nii mm (line 7) (see Sorjonen 2001). Missu
now proposes an alternative plan to divide the labor by setting up a round robin of
telephoning: tai no jos sanos vaikka Mar:- tota:.hh Miialle et soittais?, soittais vaikka
#m# Marialle ja m, (.) sanosin >Liinalle et soittais Ninnulle or uhm if would tell
for example Mar:- um Miia to call? to call for instance Maria and I would tell Liina to
call Ninnu (lines 913).
In this formulation of the division of labor, Missus role is quite explicit: she is
proposing to call Liina and thereby initiate one part of the round robin. However,
Vikkes role is only implicit: Missu is merely suggesting that some unnamed person
should call Miia to initiate the other part of the round robin. Pragmatically speaking,
since Missu is making this proposal to Vikke, it can be inferred that the unnamed
person who should do the other part is Vikke herself. However, Missu does not make
this explicit. Theoretically, the zero-person form would leave room for Vikke to sug-
gest that some third party be assigned the job. Nevertheless, Vikkes response reveals
an understanding that she was the one meant: she commits to complying with Missus
request by saying no m voin soittaa kyl Miialle ja Marialle ku oon menossa tihin ni
well I can surely call Miia and Maria since Im going to work so (lines 1516).
The point we wish to make with this extract is that the division-of-labor proposal
is made only tentatively and early in the sequence, with forms displaying weak deontic
force and treating the future actions as hypothetical (jos, conditional verbs) as well as
leaving agency unclear (zero-person form). This allows for maximum negotiation over
what will be done and how the work will be divided. Once the task and the distribu-
tion of agency and responsibility between the participants has been determined, more
definitive formulations are used, as we see happening in line 19 of (12) above, when
Vikke initiates sequence closure by saying otetaan se sitten_ni lets do it like that then.
We conclude that in both English and Finnish, alternate forms for the imple-
mentation of the two social actions, request and commitment, in a division-of-labor
proposal are not interchangeable with one another. Instead, they represent differing
degrees of commitment as well as differing degrees of certainty concerning the future
actions, which in turn have their homes in distinct sequential positions in extended
request and offer sequences.
5. Comparison of English and Finnish constructions
So far we have seen that the underlying phenomenon of proposing to divide the labor
between participants in the service of a common goal is the same in both English
and Finnish. However, when we look at the linguistic structures through which this
is accomplished (see Schemas 1 and 2), although we do find some similarities, we are
struck by the cross-linguistic differences. The two languages not only provide different
grammatical resources for proposing a division of labor; they also use what are argu-
ably similar resources differently.
Grammatically, Finnish allows for more formal variation in division-of-labor
constructions than English due to its person system and its complex morphology.
Because Finnish finite verb inflection encodes person, an explicit subject (pronoun)
can be left unexpressed. Although neither Finnish nor English makes morphologi-
cally explicit whether a 1st person plural reference is exclusive or inclusive, in English
person expression is always clearly encoded as either 1st person or 2nd person. In
Finnish, person expression may be indeterminate through the use of a passive form,
which may or may not have 1st person plural reference. Through the use of zero-
form, person may even be left wholly unexpressed in Finnish. In addition to person,
mood is also encoded in Finnish finite verb inflection. As in English, there are lexical
verbs for expressing conditionality (e.g. can; voida can), but in Finnish condition-
ality can also be expressed by morphological verb endings, as e.g. in Example (12)
with sanos say-con[3sg] (line 9), soittais call-con[3sg] (line 12), and sanosin say-
con-1sg (line 13).
When looking at the grammatical forms found for dividing the labor in our Finn-
ish data, i.e. the various person-marking forms and the frequent use of conditional
constructions, the first impression is that Finnish speakers use more indirect practices
than English ones. However, the Finnish practices for dividing the labor can also be
understood not as more indirect but just simply as different from the English ones. Our
Finnish participants more frequently begin the negotiation from the fundamentals:
what is the labor, i.e. does this really need to be done, should the labor be divided at all,
and if so, how should it be divided? This is quite different from our English speakers,
who often propose a division of labor without having negotiated the fundamentals.
Sidnell & Enfield (2012) introduce the term collateral effects, by which they refer to
the side effects of the grammar of a particular language on the practices of accomplishing
social actions in that language. According to them, a social action that can be achieved
through social interaction may be given a language-specific spin by the specific lexico-
grammatical resources its speakers use to implement it. Indeed, the differences between
e.g. English and Finnish person-marking systems probably do have an impact on how
e.g. requests, commitments, and division-of-labor proposals are done in these languages.
However, it is not only that the two languages provide different grammatical resources
for accomplishing the task: even when they have the same or similar resources, they use
them differently. For instance, English makes use of why-negative interrogatives in both
parts of the construction, i.e. for requesting as well as for committing; Finnish has such a
resource but it is not typically used for either social action in division-of-labor proposals.
Finnish speakers, on the other hand, make greater use of jos (if ) clauses and conditional
verb forms than do English speakers for dividing the labor.
Why do Finnish speakers not use why- negative interrogatives and why do English
speakers not use if clauses more frequently for making division-of-labor proposals?
We suggest that one reason might be that differences in grammatical resources not
only produce differences in practices but also reflect differences in social organizations
and practices (by speakers of different languages). In other words, the differences in
the practices may not only be due to collateral effects arising from different grammars;
it may also be that there are differences in the social organization of contexts and prac-
tices, which then lead to different grammars.
6. Summary and conclusions
We began this study by examining a phenomenon that appeared to be similar in both

English and Finnish: the use of a bipartite clause combination with a me part and a
you part to propose a division of labor between co-participants who are negotiating
the outcome of requests and offers. We argued that this clause combination is con-
struction-like and that in addition to combining clauses, it provides for the combina-
tion of two specific social actions, request and commitment, that together implement
a division-of-labor proposal.
We also argued that the division-of-labor phenomenon is found in two specific
sequential environments, namely in the environments of requests and offers. Requests
and offers, albeit involving different distributions of the social roles of benefactor
and beneficiary (see Clayman & Heritage, this volume), are alike in that they con-
strue social situations as asymmetric. Generally speaking, in the case of requests, the
requester displays deontic primacy over the requestee in purporting to decide what
will happen in the future; a requestee who acquiesces to what is being asked goes along
with this construal of primacy. In the case of offers, an offerer pledges more commit-
ment than an offeree who simply accepts what is on offer. A division-of-labor proposal,
we have argued, allows participants not only to share the workload but also to con-
strue one individuals project (request or offer) as a joint venture, thereby distributing
agency and responsibility more equally for the achievement of a successful outcome.
A final question, however, remains. Why do not all request and offer sequences
culminate in divisions of labor? What is special about precisely those sequences where
such a practice is found?24 Upon careful consideration of our collection, we believe the
answer may lie in the fact that sequences where division-of-labor proposals are made
have not been straightforwardly successful as requests and offers but have instead been
in one way or another problematic (see also Drew 2013). In some cases the problem or
obstacle is explicit, as in (3), where Mr Bathwick has initially rejected Lesleys request
to deliver her groceries on another day, or in (4), where Irja has expressed reluctance
to browse the shops with her daughter to look for a coat. In other cases, the problem
or obstacle is implicit in a participants hesitation or lack of response to a request or
offer, prompting the co-participant to propose a division of labor as a second, alterna-
tive version. A case in point is (12), where Missus initial suggestion to call around to
other friends about the gift-giving is not immediately taken up approvingly by Vikke
but rather treated merely as one possibility among others (lines 78). It is arguably
Vikkes hesitation that prompts Missu to propose a division of labor as an alternative.
Divisions of labor thus provide participants with a way to pursue a successful outcome
of request and offer situations that are in danger of miscarrying.
In conclusion, we have argued that alternative formal realizations for the actions
of requesting and committing in division-of-labor proposals are positionally sensitive,
in the sense that more tentative forms are likely to be used for first versions of a divi-
sion of labor, while more binding forms are found on subsequent mention, in particu-
lar in sequence closing. Although we have stressed the similarities between English
and Finnish, this is not to be understood as claiming that there are no significant
differences between the two languages. On the contrary: we found that the Finnish
person-marking system and the morphological richness of verbs and verb forms in
particular provide for significantly more variability and subtlety in Finnish divisions
of labor than in English ones. These issues are explored in a separate study (Couper-
Kuhlen& Etelmki, Forthcoming.).
For the time being we would like to conclude by pointing out that division-
of-labor constructions blur the boundary between the actions of requesting, offer-
ing, suggesting and the like. They illuminate the fact that even though people in
. We are grateful to Paul Drew for encouraging us to consider this question and for sug-
gesting a possible explanation.
their everyday social lives do things such as requesting and offering, they also
negotiate joint projects and dimensions of social relationships such as agency and
responsibility that are involved in joint projects. We are struck by the prevalence
of means for sharing agency and responsibility as documented in the divisions of
labor described here.
Acknowledgements
Marja Etelmki wishes to thank the Kone Foundation for funding her part of the
research reported in this chapter. Both authors are especially grateful to Marja-Leena
Sorjonen and Liisa Raevaara for careful reading and discussion of the manuscript, and
to Paul Drew for opening their eyes to issues beyond linguistic form.
References
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Targeted Agents in Finnish Conversational Directives. To appear in Epistemics and
Deontics in Conversational Directives, ed. by Jan Svennevig, and Melisa Stevanovic. Jour-
nal of Pragmatics.
Croft, William. 2001. Radical Construction Grammar: Syntactic Theory in Typological Perspective.
New York: Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198299554.001.0001
Curl, Traci S. 2006. Offers of Assistance: Constraints on Syntactic Design. Journal of Pragmat-
ics 38: 12571280. DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2005.09.004
Curl, Traci S., and Paul Drew. 2008. Contingency and Action: A Comparison of Two Forms
of Requesting. Research on Language and Social Interaction 41 (2): 129153. DOI:
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Drew, Paul. 2013. Conversation Analysis and Social Action. Journal of Foreign Languages 37
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scription. In The Handbook of Conversation Analysis, ed. by Jack Sidnell, and Tanya Stivers,
5776. Malden MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
ISK = Auli Hakulinen, Maria Vilkuna, Riitta Korhonen, Vesa Koivisto, Tarja Riitta Heinonen,
and Irja Alho. 2004. Iso suomen kielioppi [Finnish descriptive grammar]. Helsinki: Finnish
Literature Society.
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Finnish ai nii(n) (Oh thats right). Research on Language and Social Interaction 46 (3):
277297. DOI: 10.1080/08351813.2013.810411
Laitinen, Lea. 1995. Nollapersoona [The zero person]. Virittj 99: 337358.
Laitinen, Lea. 2006. Zero Person in Finnish. A Grammatical Resource for Construing Human
Reference. In Grammar from the Human Perspective. Case, Space and Person in Finnish,
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Finnish glossing symbols
1 first person gen genitive

2 second person ill illative
3 third person imp imperative
zero person ine inessive
ade adessive inf infinitive
adj adjective loc locative
all allative neg negation verb
cli clitic particle par partitive
comp comparative pas passive
con conditional pl plural
dem demonstrative ppc active past participle
dem1 tm DEM1.PL nm pppc passive past participle
dem2 tuo DEM2.PL nuo prt particle
dem3 se DEM3.PL ne pst past tense
ela elative q interrogative particle
ess essive sg singular
fre frequentative
The social and moral work of modal
constructions in granting remote requests

Aarhus University / University of Helsinki
Previous research has established that participants in interaction distinguish

between those requests that can be satisfied immediately and those that are to
be satisfied at some point in the future. Whereas immediate requests can be
granted simply by the recipient carrying out the requested action, the preferred
and aligning response to a remote request is a full-clause response with which
the recipient commits to carrying out the requested action in the future. This
paper investigates the most frequently occurring forms of full-clause, complying
responses to remote requests in Danish interactions. We show that those full-
clause responses that contain a modal adverb differ in interactionally relevant
ways from those full-clause responses that do not contain a modal adverb. Full-
clause responses without a modal adverb are treated by participants as indicating
that the relevance of carrying out the requested action is a given and as such
something that both requester and recipient understand as an appropriate action.
Full-clause responses with modal adverbs, by contrast, are employed to indicate
that the requested action is not recognizably appropriate to the recipient, but will
be carried out specifically because it was requested.
1. Introduction1
In responding to requests, participants in interaction distinguish between those that

can be immediately satisfied in the here and now and those that are to be satisfied at
some point in the future, i.e. between immediate and remote requests (Houtkoop-
Steenstra 1987; Lindstrm forth).2 As they have shown for Dutch and Swedish,
. The authors are equally responsible for this chapter. We thank the editors for thorough
and inspiring reviews and discussions, which have improved our text and analyses consider-
ably. We are, of course, solely responsible for all remaining errors and flaws.
. Houtkoop-Steenstra and Lindstrm use the term immediate and remote proposals,
but many of their examples are requests. To prevent confusion, we here use immediate and
remote requests as we are dealing with requests.

immediate requests are typically granted by carrying out the requested action, some-
times preceded or accompanied by an affirming response such as yes. By contrast,
remote requests, for which the requested action cannot be carried out immediately,
receive verbal responses that consist of more than simple affirmation. The same pat-
tern applies in Danish, as is illustrated in the following two examples.
Extract (1) is an instance of an immediate request and comes, like many of these
naturally do, from a face-to-face encounter. Kirsten and her partner Gunnar are drink-
ing coffee during a break from their bike ride, when Kirsten produces a request for
Gunnar to pour her some coffee.3
(1) TH/S6/FF/6A More coffee
01 Kirsten: .mst Gir du lidt mere kaffe,
.mst Give youSG a_little more coffee,
.mst Can I have some more coffee,
02 (0.4)
03 Gunnar: e-Ja.
e-Yes.
04 (5.8)
05 Kirsten: Tak ska du ha.
Thanks must yousg have.
Thank you.
While leaning forward in her chair and holding up her cup (cf. Keisanen &
auniomaa 2012), Kirsten, in line 1, produces the interrogative construction Can I
R
have some more coffee, thus accomplishing her request both with and without lan-
guage (cf. Rossi this volume). The request is immediate since it can be granted instantly
and Gunnar does so, by responding with a confirming ja yes in line 3 and at the
same time reaching for the coffee pot at his end of the table. Kirsten clearly interprets
Gunnars actions as evidence for his intent to do as requested, as she moves her cup
further towards the centre of the table, to make it easier for Gunnar to pour coffee into
. For glossing abbreviations, see Appendix.

Granting remote requests
it (line4). In line 5 Kirsten thanks Gunnar, thereby treating the request sequence as
having been satisfactorily completed.
Extract (2), by contrast, is an example of a remote request. It comes from a
telephone call where a teenage boy, Mathias, has called his friend Niels. Nielss
mother, Conni, has answered the phone and informed Mathias that Niels is still
sleeping and Mathias has requested that Conni give a message to Niels. Resisting
this, Conni in lines 12 instead states what she will do, namely let Niels know that
Mathias has called. Conni then moves on to close the call producing the interroga-
tive Ska vi si: det Mathias Should we say that Mathias. This is a standard phrase
used when moving into closings in Danish telephone calls, something that is fur-
ther enforced by another common feature of pre-closings, an increase in speed
(Auer 1990).
(2) TH/S2/029 Ask him to wait

01 Conni:
[Jeg ka si te ham
I can say to him
02 du har ringet. [S ka han ringe dop ikk
yousg have called. Then he can call you upright
03 Mathias:
[Jerh-
Yes-
04 Mathias: >Jerh.<
Yes.
05 Conni: >Ska vi si: [det Mathias,<
>Should we say that Mathias<,
06 Mathias:
[.HHhh
07 Mathias: Mene:hm be ham vente te klokken cirka tolv.=
Butu:hm ask him wait till at around twelve.
08 =eller s noet ikke
or something like that right
09 Conni: Jo=jo. Det gr jeg.=
Jo=JO. It/That do I.
JO=JO. I do that.
10 Mathias: =>Jerh.< Hej=hej,
>Yes.< Bye=bye,
11 Conni: Hej=hej.
Bye=bye.
Rather than move immediately into closing the call, in response to Connis description
of what she will do Mathias adds the modifying conjunctional phrase Mene:hm be
ham vente te klokken cirka tolv. But uhm ask him to wait until around twelve, which
here serves as a remote request because the action that Conni is asked to do can only
be done after the call is over and Niels has woken up. Granting this remote request
is accomplished first through Conni responding with the reduplicated jo (yes2, cf.
Heinemann 2005), which here constitutes a strongly agreeing response. After this,
Conni nevertheless goes on to state her compliance with Mathiass request further by
producing a full clausal TCU in present tense, Det gr jeg That do I/I do that, thus also
committing herself to performing the requested action (Lindstrm forth; Thompson,
Fox & Couper-Kuhlen forth).
The distinction between remote and immediate requests exemplified in
extracts(1) and (2) appears to be entirely consistent: In our data remote requests such
as the one in extract (2) almost always receive a response that consists of a full clausal
TCU, either on its own or preceded by a token of affirmation such as yes or a variation
thereof. In the exceptional cases where the respondent produces only an affirmation,
we, like Lindstrm (forth), find speakers pursuing respondents commitment to do
as requested. An example of this is illustrated in the following, which comes from the
end of a call to a radio phone-in program on Danish national radio. Anita has called
in to tell about her difficult childhood and her worries about her younger brother.
The host, Lars, has recommended that Anita talk to a counselling service and get in
touch with a child psychiatric institution. Anita has agreed, albeit hesitantly, to follow
Larssadvice. Lars now adds another next action for Anita to do, requesting her to call
back to the radio programme, presumably so that he can follow up on how she has
dealt with his advice.
(3) Natteravn, Anita: 580595 Wont you promise

01 Lars: hhh O s ska du ri[nge heri]nd igen Anita,
hhh An thn have_to youSG ring here_in again Anita
hhh An then you have to/must call in again Anita,
02 Anita:
[hh
]
03 Anita: Jha:,
Yhea:h,
04 (.)
05 Lars: pt Ve du ikk love mig det
pt will yousg not promise me that
pt Wont you promise me that
06 Anita: Jo.
Yes.
07 Anita: Det *ve je* godt,hh
That will I ADV
I will do that,hh
Whereas Larss advice in the preceding talk has been framed as a suggestion with
the format I think you should (not shown) he now shifts to a more directive
format, focusing on the obligation or necessity of carrying out the action, and then
you have to/must (line 1). This is clearly a remote request, as the action of calling
back can only be carried out in the future, after Anita has sought the help rec-
ommended by Lars. Anita, however, responds only with a confirming Yhea:h,
(line3), which, due to its low volume and lengthening of the vowels, is even less
committed than other confirmations (cf. extracts 1 and 2). As a consequence of
Anitas lack of commitment, Lars pursues the matter in line 5 with Ve du ikk love
mig det Wont you promise me that. Now the focus is not on obligation or neces-
sity; instead Lars asks Anita if she is willing to make a promise. This promise can be
made immediately, but the request is remote because what Anita promises to do is
something that will be done in the future. The request is done by means of a nega-
tive interrogative focusing on Anitas willingness, ve du ikke will you not/wont
you. In Danish, negative interrogative requests are typically employed to indicate
a high degree of entitlement on behalf of the speaker (Heinemann 2006) and the
use of the verb of vil (will) further indicates that the only contingency (Curl &
Drew 2008) for granting the request is the recipients willingness. Anitas granting
response is fitted to these aspects of the request: It begins with a confirming Jo Yes
in line 6, which is fitted to the negative polarity of the request (Heinemann 2005).
After this, the clausal response, det ve jeg godt I will ADV do that, refers to the
requested action (by the anaphoric pronoun det that) and affirms Anitas willing-
ness to comply (ve jeg godt I will do).
Extracts (2) and (3) not only confirm Lindstrms (forth) findings about the
preference for remote requests to receive full clausal responses, but also illustrate
that such clauses can take different forms. In extract (2), Connis full clausal remote
request response was in the form Det gr jeg (literally, That do I), consisting of a
pronoun, det it/that, which refers anaphorically to the requested action, the pro-
verb gr, do, which refers anaphorically to carrying out the action, and finally a
subject, jeg, I, referring to the agent who is to carry out the requested action.4 In
extract (3), Anitas full clausal remote request response was in the form Det ve jeg
godt (literally, That will I well), where the modal verb ve will and the modal adverb
godt (literally well) specifically address and confirm the contingent factor of will-
ingness introduced in the request format. In both cases, the full clause formats con-
stitute confirming, committed responses to remote requests, whereas the variation
. Danish, like other Germanic languages (except English), exhibits verb-second order (e.g.
Holmberg & Platzack 1995), by which it is required that the finite verb always appear in the
second position of declarative main clauses. When something other than the subject precedes
the verb (as in this case det that, which is the object of the clause), the subject has to follow
the verb.
in the verb-form used and the absence or presence of a modal adverb are seemingly
employed by request recipients to orient to matters such as, for instance, entitlement
and contingency, in a way that fits how these matters are indicated (or not) in the
request format itself. In the remainder of this paper, we will consider how through
combining modal verbs and adverbs, Danish speakers calibrate their full clausal
responses to remote requests so as to specifically deal with such matters as are or
are not oriented to in the format of the preceding request. Specifically, we shall
focus on the two most recurrent response formats found in our data, det ska(l) jeg
nok (that shall I ADV) and det ka(n) jeg godt (that can I ADV). These responses
contain a modal adverb and will be compared to two other frequent response for-
mats that do not contain a modal adverb, det gr jeg (that doI) and det ska(l) jeg
gre (that shall I do).
Our analysis will show that all these response formats can be and are employed
to comply with remote requests. Participants use and treat these forms differently,
however: response formats that do not contain a modal adverb are employed to indi-
cate that the relevance of carrying out the requested action is a given, i.e. that this
action is something that both requester and recipient understand as an appropriate
next action. By contrast, the response formats ska(l) nok and ka(n) godt, which
do contain a modal adverb, indicate that the requested action will be done specifically
because it was requested by the co-participant. Considering each of the two latter for-
mats in turn, we will further establish the social and interactional differences between
the two. Whereas in producing ska(l) nok responses recipients ultimately accept the
requested action as appropriate, ka(n) godt responses can be used to indicate that
the co-participant is willing and able to carry out the requested action, purely on the
basis of this having been requested. As we shall further demonstrate, the range of avail-
able full clause response formats that speakers of Danish can employ to comply with
remote requests allows them to do delicate social, moral and interactional work in
finely adjusting and (re)calibrating their responses.
Before turning to our analysis of each of these forms, we will provide an overview
of the data used in our study and how we have selected the cases under scrutiny in the
analytic sections.
2. Data, method and formats
The data for this study consist of requests that are produced in and across a range of
different interactional contexts in Danish naturally occurring interactions, which have
been audio- or video-recorded. Based on 20 hours of such recordings, we have col-
lected a total of 83 request sequences. The working definition we have used for select-
ing these sequences is based on the notion of agency (who is to carry out the action),
where we categorize requests as actions through which a participant asks another to

carry out an action. Considering who stands to benefit, in contrast to Couper-Kuhlen
(2014), we include actions which, when carried out, may be of benefit not just to the
requester, but also potentially to the participant carrying out the action. We focus on
how the participants work out, on a case-by-case basis, who is to benefit from the
requested action, this being a negotiable and emergent property of the request, rather
than being something that can be determined a priori from the request format.
Of the 83 requests thus defined, 36 constitute remote requests that receive a pre-
ferred, ratifying response, committing recipients to carrying out the requested action
in the future. These 36 cases provide an overview of the basic variations in the full
clause response formats that are employed to ratify remote requests in Danish. Table 1
lists only the formats that we will describe and compare in the following, the selection
of which has been based on which forms are most frequent in our data.
Table 1. Four clausal response formats to remote requests

Format Anaphoric Finite verb Subject Modal Main verb
proterm adverb
Without modal adverbs det gr jeg

that do I
det ska jeg gre
that shall I do
With modal adverbs det ska jeg nok

that have to / I enough
shall
det ka jeg godt
that can I well
In Danish, there is a special relationship between the modal verbs ska(l) and
ka(n) and the rest of the clause, at least in responses to requests: These modal verbs
do not occur on their own, but are always accompanied by a main verb and/or an
adverb.5 As Table1 indicates and as our analysis will show, interactants distinguish
between the formats with and without modal adverbs, whereas it is less important
whether responses without modal adverbs contain a modal verb (det ska jeg gre, liter-
ally: that shall I do or not (det gr jeg, literally: that do I). Our analysis consequently
begins by examining full clause responses to remote requests that do not include a
modal adverb, but that may or may not include a modal verb (Section 3). For these
. This is true in our data, and fits with our intuition. It is not possible, of course, to establish
the non-occurrence of a structure in any definitive way.
formats we illustrate how participants use and treat such responses as full-blown
commitment, indicating unconditional acceptance of the appropriateness of carry-
ing out the requested action. In Section 4, we consider full clause responses that are
similarly employed to grant remote requests, but where the modal adverbs nok and
godt respectively accompany the modal verbs ska(l) (shall) and ka(n) (can). The
producer of these two types of remote request response indicates that the relevance of
carrying out the requested action is not immediately or independently accessible and
that the request will instead be granted out of obligation (ska(l) nok, Section 4.1) or
as a concession (ka(n) godt, Section 4.2).
3. R
esponses without modal adverbs: Committing to a requested action
as bilaterally relevant
Non-modal full clause responses with the pro-verb gre (do) are employed by
request recipients unproblematically to confirm that they will carry out a requested
action. This is evident in the following extract. Nivi, an employee at a small ferry com-
pany, has called the director of the company, Fie, to inquire whether she should call
in extra staff, as there are signs that the next days ferry will have so many passen-
gers that extra staff might be needed (because of security regulations). Fie and Nivi
have discussed the different indications of the number of passengers, and in line 1, Fie
begins an if-then construction, through which she ultimately ends up instructing Nivi
(lines47) to order Morits (another member of the staff) for the following day.
(4) TH/S2/021 Order Morits
01 Fie: [tch *Jah. *>hh< Men- gn- Hvis det
tch *Yeah. *>hh< But- gn- If its
02 samme mnster som i dag s[ syns jeg
(the) same pattern as today then I think
03 Nivi:
[Ja
Yes
04 Fie: a du ska bestille Morits te
that youSG have to/should order Morits for
05 i[morgen klokken ti, hhh [ s mske
tomorrow at ten, hhh an then maybe
06 Nivi: [te klokken ti. [(det gr jeg)
for oclock ten. (that do I)
for ten oclock. (I do that)
07 Fie: i morgen. s aflyse ham ida[g.
tomorrow. an then cancel him today.
[Jah.
08 Nivi:
Yes.
09 (0.2)
10 Nivi: De[t gr jeg Okay An[neSophie,=
That do I Okay AnneSophie,
I do that Okay AnneSophie
11 Fie: [Okay [Godt.
Okay Good.
Fies instructional request to order Morits is packaged as tentatively suggesting

(Ithink, line 2) what Nivi should do (youSG have to/should), if certain conditions
pertain (if its (the) same pattern as today, lines 12). Nivi, however treats Fies turn
as a firm instruction for her to carry out the requested action as the next relevant
step in her work. First, she produces a collaborative completion (Lerner 1991, 1996)
of Fies instruction (line 6), displaying an early understanding of what she should do.
Following this and at the point where Fies instruction is hearably complete, she then
produces something that can be heard as a full ratifying response I do that (line 6).
As it happens, however, Fies instructions were not complete when Nivi responds; after
Fie has further instructed Nivi also to cancel Morits appearance on the day of the call
(line 7), Nivi once more commits to doing as requested. She does so by producing a
confirming yes (line 8) in terminal overlap with Fies final part of the instructions.
This confirmation is followed by a short pause of 0.2 seconds (line 9) and perhaps for
that reason Fie initially pursues a more committed response from Nivi with the slightly
question intoned okay in line 11. In overlap with this okay, Nivi produces the fully
committed det gr jeg I do that (line 10), after which both Fie and Nivi orient to the
request sequence as completed. Fie acknowledges the response with godt good (see
also Lindstrm & Heinemann 2009 for this type of low-grade assessment as closing
implicative) and Nivi initiates the closing of the call, with okay AnneSophie (line 10).
As extracts (2) and (4) illustrate, non-modal full clause responses treat the
requested action as one that can be easily and unproblematically carried out by the
recipient and for which there are no contingencies (cf. Curl & Drew 2008) to take into
consideration, in terms, for instance, of whether the recipient is willing or able to carry
out the action, nor are there any issues of entitlement (cf. Lindstrm 2005; Heinemann
2006) with regards to whether the requester can relevantly make the request of the
recipient in the first place. Instead, what both requester and recipient appear to orient
to in these cases is that the requests are bilateral, i.e. the requested action is inte-
gral to an already established joint project between requester and recipient, rather
than being used for enlisting help in new, self-contained projects that are launched in
the interest of the speaker as an individual (Rossi 2012:428). Whilst Rossi originally
applied bilateralness in the context of imperatively formatted immediate requests,
extracts(2) and (4) suggests that bi- and unilateralness is also a relevant dimension
for participants making remote requests (see also Sections 4.1. and 4.2 for examples of
unilateral remote requests).
Extracts (2) and (4), moreover, illustrate that neither request nor response formats
are chosen through some sort of automatic calculus, in which specific syntactic forms
are used to implement certain social actions. In extract (2) Mathias uses the imperative
form ask him to wait to make a request of Conni, indicating that he is fully entitled to
make this request (Lindstrm 2005). Here, the orientation to the requested action as
bilateral is established interactionally: Conni has already offered to tell her son to call
back, and the request from Mathias in that context merely instructs or details the exact
contents of the message. In extract (4), the social, interactional establishment of bilat-
eralness is even more evident, since here the request format used is not an imperative.
In fact, Fies if-then construction addresses contingencies that should hold in order
for her request to be relevant (if its (the) same pattern as today). Though the format
of the request clearly asserts Fies authority (youSG have to/should) (Stevanovic &
Perkyl 2012), this is mitigated and downgraded with the expression I think. Theo-
retically, the recipient, Nivi, could treat Fies request as only a suggestion or expression
of opinion by replying, for instance, I think so too, or That sounds like a good idea,
thus orienting to Fie as less entitled (Curl & Drew 2008; Heinemann 2006; Lindstrm
2005) or lacking deontic authority (Stevanovic & Perkyl 2012). Nivis use of the non-
modal response form, however, treats these matters as irrelevant, orienting instead to
the participants roles as they have been established in the interaction leading up to the
request, where Nivi has actively sought Fies advice, as she ultimately has the author-
ity and responsibility for making this type of decision. Nivi thus treats the action Fie
requests as one that is integral to an already established joint project, i.e. a bilateral one,
and Nivis response format is thus fitted to the social situation created in and through
the request sequence, rather than to the syntactic format of the request itself.
Remote response requests that include a modal verb such as ska(l) (shall)
appear to be mere linguistic variations of the remote response requests delivered in
extracts(2) and (4). Though an additional ska(l) (shall) is present in responses like
det skal jeg gre (that shall I do), request recipients who produce such responses
appear to treat the request as unproblematic, and do not orient to or address con-
tingency or entitlement as relevant for the task-at-hand. However, det skal jeg gre
responses seem to occur mainly in a very particular context of requesting, namely after
greeting requests that occur within the closing sequence of telephone calls. Extracts
(5) and (6) below, are instances of such greeting requests followed by ratifying full
clause responses in the form of det skal jeg gre.
(5) LingAU, TRBTlf, Sygogjob:395398 Say hello to Stella
01 Beate: Hils Stella.
say_hello_to Stella
Say hello to Stella.
02 Claus: Ja det ska jeg gre

yes that shall I do
Yes I shall do that
03 Beate: Go:dt Hhej=
Goo:d Bhye=
04 Claus: =He:j hej.
=Bye: bye.
(6) LingAU, KJLB, Guitar:440447 Say hello around you

01 Alan: =A:men h (.) Vi snakks ve ikk o
=We:ll uh (.) We get in touch right
02 Benny: (>Ja<) det gr vi.
(>Yes<) we will.
03 Alan: Ha det godt,
Have a nice time,
04 Alan: Hils (a:) omkring dig.
say_hello (a:) around yousg
Say hello (a:) around you. ((to those you meet))
05 Benny: >Det ska jeg< gre,
that shall I do
>I shall do that<,
06 Alan: Okay.
Okay.
07 Benny: Ja () Hej Alan
Yes () Bye Alan
08 Alan: Hej=hej.
Bye=bye.
As these extracts illustrate, greeting requests in Danish are accomplished through the
imperative form of a single verb hils (greet, say hello to), followed (optionally) by
the identification of who is to be greeted. Such requests to greet seem to be entirely
unproblematic actions in which matters of entitlement and contingency are not rel-
evant for the participants, and the consistent use of the imperative form for this par-
ticular type of request clearly indicates that this is so (Lindstrm 2005; Velea 2013).
The routinized nature of greeting requests and their standard sequential position at the
end of telephone calls, in combination with the imperative format, moreover serves
to establish, interactionally, that the requested action is a next, logical and recogniz-
able step within a larger, jointly established activity (Goodwin & Cekaite 2013; Rossi
2012): Having thus signed up to the joint project of accomplishing a telephone call,
the participants can be said to have signed up also for all congruent behaviors that
are implied by it (Rossi 2012), which in a telephone call presumably includes closing
that call. In this way, greeting requests can be understood as bilateral requests that are
an integral part of an already established collectively owned project and the response
format det skal jeg gre concurs with this by constituting a response that unproblem-
atically almost automatically commits the respondent to do as requested after the
call has been ended.
In the specific context of greeting requests, the response format det ska(l) jeg
gre I shall do that thus accomplishes the same work as does det gr jeg I do that
in other sequential contexts, i.e. indicating that what the requestee is being asked to
do is a recognizably relevant action to do within a larger, jointly established activity
and as such entirely unproblematic and with no orientation to issues of contingency
or entitlement. The similarity between these two responses is evident also by the fact
that the format det gr jeg I do that can also be adequately employed as a comply-
ing response to greeting requests, though cases where this form occurs in that specific
context are less frequent.
Responses such as those in extract (2), (4), (5) and (6) appear in many ways to
be the most basic formats for responding to remote requests in Danish. In terms of
their form, such responses are the least structurally complex full clause responses,
constructed as they are with the three basic elements required to form a clause, i.e.
an object (representing the action to be performed), a subject (representing the agent
performing the action) and one or more verbs (representing the performance itself).
Semantically, the lexical items used are similarly simple, in so far as both the action
to be carried out and the carrying out of the action are represented by pro-terms,
rather than specified. Interactionally, these responses orient neither to issues of con-
tingency or entitlement, and they are treated, consequently, as basically committing
the producer to carry out the requested action. In responding to remote requests with
responses that simply commit to carrying out the requested action, participants thus
indicate that the appropriateness of the requested action is recognizable to them. The
sequential context in which these responses are produced serves to highlight this, as
they are typically given in response to requests that either concern ritualized actions
such as greeting requests (extracts 5 and 6), specifications of an action when the car-
rying out has already been offered by the recipient (extract 2), or instructions/advice
when that has been sought by the recipient (extract 4). This recognition is also evident
in other aspects of these responses, for instance that they are often produced in overlap
with the remote request itself (as in extract 4), produced quickly (as in extract 6), and
that there are other resources employed to indicate obviousness (as, for instance, the
multiple production of affirmation tokens in extract 2).
In the following sections we consider two other types of request response; by vir-
tue of employing modal adverbs such as nok and godt in combination with the
modal verbs ska(l) (have to/shall) and ka(n) (can/be able to), request recipients
indicate that the relevance of the requested action was not recognizable as being part
of a larger, jointly established activity and hence that they were persuaded to perform
the requested action.
4. R
esponses with modal adverbs: Committing to a requested action
as unilaterally relevant
The type of format we consider here is formed with a modal verb and adverb com-
bination, such as for instance the ve/vil godt construction employed in extract (3)
by Anita to confirm her willingness to do as requested by Lars. In addition to verbs
of willingness such as ve/vil (be willing to), remote request recipients frequently
employ the modal verbs ska(l) and ka(n), which are, respectively, verbs of necessity
and ability/possibility. As noted in Section 2, these modal verbs cannot stand alone
in clauses in Danish at least not in the context of responding to a remote request
and must be accompanied by a main verb or a modal adverb. But though any adverb
could in principle be used, only a sub-set of adverbs actually occur in constructions
that respond to remote requests, and within this sub-set, some adverbs consistently
co-occur only with particular modal verbs. The epistemic adverb jo, which appeals
to the recipient () to treat what is said as shared information (Heinemann, Lind-
strm & Steensig 2011:109) cannot be used in remote request responses (just as it can-
not be used in interrogative questions). By contrast, the adverb da, which is a marker
of emphasis and contrast (Heinemann 2009:182), can co-occur freely with any of
the modal verbs (often in combination with other modal adverbs) in such responses.
Most frequently used in modal responses to remote requests are the adverbs nok
(literally enough or probably) and godt (literally good/well). Nok co-occurs
with ska(l) (have to/shall) and godt co-occurs with ka(n) (can/be able to) and
ve/vil (see extract 3). These adverbs are thus constitutive members of a package of
modality, whereas other adverbs, such as da, contribute with additional, interactional
relevancies to remote request responses, just as they do to other types of constructions.
In order to be able to distinguish between purely modal features of remote request
responses, we have chosen here to focus on the modal packages, det ska(l) jeg/vi
nok I/we shall ADV do that and det kan jeg/vi godt I/we can ADV do that.
4.1 Ska(l) nok Committing to a requested action out of obligation

In full clause responses to remote requests the verb of obligation ska(l) have to/shall
combines with the modal adverb nok to form the response format: det ska(l) jeg
nok. As with most Danish adverbs, nok is difficult to translate into English. In other
contexts, it means enough (Jeg har fet nok Ive had enough), or probably (Det er
nok en ny jakke That is probably a new jacket). Together with ska(l) it can function
to strengthen a promise or a reassurance (DDO).6 In remote-request responses with
ska(l), however, the adverb is obligatory in so far as the response will be treated as
incomplete or awkward without it (and we do not find any instances of this). In this
context then it makes little sense to see the adverb nok as a strengthener, since it is
part of a larger, modal package for which a weaker version does not exist. Neverthe-
less, we have chosen to translate nok with certainly in our data, to indicate that the
commitment displayed by the speaker towards carrying out the requested action is not
hedged or mitigated in these responses.
The det ska(l) jeg nok response format occurs most prevalently in contexts where
the requester can be heard to persist in having a future action carried out. Correspond-
ingly, our analysis demonstrates that in responding to requests with the det ska(l) jeg
nok format, request recipients can be heard to treat the requested action as one that
was not recognizably appropriate as being part of a larger, jointly established activity,
but is nevertheless an action that the recipient will commit to carry out, because the
requester has asked for it.
Extract (7), taken from an institutional telephone call, is a first illustration of this.
Here, Fie has called a shop to inquire about a hard disc she has bought, which should
have been sent to her but which has not arrived. Fies request that the shop send her the
hard disc comes right after Torben has confirmed that the shop has both the hard disc
and the information required to ship it to Fie. The request is produced loudly, perhaps
because the beginning of it is overlapped; her request is prefaced by and then just, dis-
playing that this is a natural next thing on the agenda (Heritage & Sorjonen 1994) and a
matter of course (with just). The use of the infinitive construction (make sure that)
avoids mentioning the agent of the requested action. However, there is no doubt that
the request is directed at Torsten. And this is also the way Torsten understands it, as he
responds (line 4) with first a yestoken, and then the det ska(l) jeg nok construction.
(7) TH)M2)33) Fie & AZ make sure it gets sent

01 Fie: hrh >[ S LI SRGE FOR-< AT DEN
hrh >AN THEN JUST MAKE SURE-< THAT IT
02 Torsten:
[(S der ver-)
(Then theres wor-)
03 Fie: ihvertfald blir sendt ikks:?
at least gets sent right:?
04 Torsten: Jerh. >M det ska jeg nok,<
Yes. Bt it/that shall I ADV,
Yes. >Bt I shall certainly do that<
. Translated by the authors from til at forstrke et lfte eller en forsikring, DDO.
05 Fie: fordi:ehm:: (.) st nu (0.5)

because:uhm:: (.) st now (0.5)
06 mangler han den jo.
he misses it you know.
07 Torsten: >Jerh.<=
>Yes.<=
08 Fie: =Jerh.< [hhh Okay D[et godt,=
=Yes.< hhh Okay Thats good,=
09 Torsten: [Det gr jeg, [Fint
That do I, Fine
I do that, Fine
10 Torsten: =J[a hej.
=Yes bye.
Torsten clearly commits to carrying out the requested action, but by using the ska(l) jeg
nok format (line 4), he orients to this as something he will do by virtue of Fie having
asked, i.e. out of obligation. This orientation is accomplished partly through the use of
the verb of obligation ska (shall), which serves to indicate that a promise is being made
to perform an action in the future (cf. extracts 5 and 6), and partly also through the
adverb nok. Torstens ratifying response thus treats the requested action as unilateral,
whereas Fie (through the request format) has indicated that the requested action (send-
ing the hard disc) is a next logical step within a larger, jointly established activity. For Fie,
sending the hard disc is a given, not just at this point in the interaction, but also as some-
thing the shop has earlier agreed to do. The shop has thus in her view failed to live up to
their commitment. By indicating that he will now carry out the action requested because
Fie has asked him to, Torsten can be heard subtly to resist the implication that he and the
shop have failed so far. We see Fies orientation to this misalignment in how she responds
to Torstens commitment. Rather than accepting that her request has been granted, she
produces an account for why the request was made in the first place (lines 56): her
son is missing the hard disc (it was supposed to be a birthday present for him). Just as
noticings can serve as vehicles for complaints by pointing out that something is missing
(Schegloff 1988), Fies account here implies that something that should have happened,
or should be present, has not happened or is not present. In other words, Fie thereby
insists on her own understanding of the request as one she ought not to have had to
make if the shop had behaved according to its own promises. She thus also takes issue
with Torstens commitment to carrying out the requested action because she asked him
to, rather than as a natural consequence of his or his shops earlier failure. Torsten also
subsequently orients to this by producing another request response in the form of I do
that (line 9), which here serves to recalibrate his earlier response to show now that the
requested action was in fact recognizably appropriate to him, as being a next logical step
within the larger activity that he and Fie are jointly engaged in.
The following case illustrates in a similar way how participants use and orient to
the det ska(l) jeg nok format as a response that, while committing to carry out the
requested action, at the same time indicates that this will be done out of obligation,
i.e. because the requester asked. Here, the response is delivered after the requester has
persisted in getting a committed response from the requestee. Det ska(l) jeg nok
responds to this pestering by giving in. The example comes from the end of a call to
a radio phone-in programme. This follows Anitas promise to call back later (Example
3 line 7). As we see in the following, however, Anitas full clause modal response is not
treated as sufficient by Lars, who persists in seeking Anitas commitment to call back.
Lars first produces a full, emphasized pursuit, formulated here as a statement (You
really have to promise me that, line 8). When Anita merely affirms this (line 9), he
adds an eliciting tag (a post-response pursuit of response, Jefferson 1981; Aachmann
2010), right in line 11. It is only after this that Anita in line 12 produces a response,
det ska ja nok I shall certainly do that, which is accepted as sufficient (line 13).
(8) Natteravn, Anita: 580595 You really have to promise

07 Anita: Det *ve je*godt,hh
I will do that,hh
08 Lars: >Det m du virkelig love mig<.
that have_to youSG really promise me
>You really have to promise me that<.
09 Anita: Jaer.
Yes.
10 ?: kh
11 Lars: e:j=
Right=
12 Anita: =Det ska ja nok,=
that shall I ADV
=I shall certainly do that,=
13 Lars: =pt hh Alle ti[ders. ]
=pt hh Thats great.
14 Anita:
[J:aer.]

Y:eah.
15 Lars: hhhh Held o lykke
hhhh Good luck
16 Anita: Jo tak,hh
Thank you,hh
Throughout this sequence, Lars can thus be heard to pursue Anitas commitment to
comply with his request. In a situation where he has already received an apparently
committed response (I will do that) in line 7, this pursuit can be heard as pestering
and in orientation to this, Anita produces yet another committed response, now in the
form of a det ska(l) jeg nok response, which at this point indicates that her commit-
ment to calling back in is due to her obligation to Lars, rather than, for instance, her
being personally interested in doing so.
As extracts (7) and (8) illustrate, det ska(l) jeg nok responses to remote requests
are used to indicate that the requested action will be carried out specifically because the
requester asked for it to happen, i.e. out of obligation. Such responses thereby highlight
the deontic authority and entitlement of the requester as someone who has the right to
ask the requestee to carry out certain actions (Stevanovic & Perkyl 2012). In orienting
to obligation as the pre-requisite for carrying out the requested actions and highlighting
aspects of deonticity and entitlement, request recipients can, moreover, be heard to treat
the requested action as unilateral, rather than as being an integral part of a larger, jointly
established activity. Extract (8) illustrates that the det ska(l) jeg nok format and the
orientations invoked by it can be aligning with, or fitted to, the interactional relevan-
cies oriented to in the remote request. Anitas use of det ska(l) jeg nok in extract (8)
is thus fitted to the persistence with which Lars has pursued her commitment to com-
ply with his request for her to call back and in particular his insistence that she must
promise him to do so. The deontic authority that Lars thus assigns himself is reflected
and accepted by Anita, when in line 12 she finally agrees to comply with his request
out of obligation to him. By contrast, extract (7) illustrates how det ska(l) jeg nok
formats can be employed to resist the implication that the requested action is recog-
nizably relevant for both participants. When Torsten here accepts to comply with Fies
request out of obligation, he can be heard to invoke and orient to her deontic author-
ity and entitlement, as a customer who has the right to request certain actions from a
service provider. While Torstens response thus adequately mirrors the institutionally
pre-determined relationship between the two participants, at the same time it fails to
mirror the bilateral orientation of Fies request, namely that her requested action is in
fact simply a reminder for Torsten to carry out the next relevant action within the larger
activity of securing Fies receipt of the hard disc. Orienting to obligation as the relevant
underlying contingency for committing to carry out a requested action by using the full
clause modal response format det ska(l) jeg nok, can thus in some contexts be heard
to align fully with the relevancies addressed in the request, but in other contexts can be
heard to do subtle moral, social and interactional work to resist such relevancies, while
still constituting a fully committed response to carrying out a remote request. In the
following, we shall see how similar moral, social and interactional work can be done
through another modal response format, ka(n) jeg godt.
4.2 Ka(n) godt Committing to a requested action as a concession

In full clause responses to remote requests the verb of ability/possibility ka(n) can/
is able to combines with the modal adverb godt to form the response format: det
ka(n) jeg godt.
Like nok, the adverb godt can be translated into English differently, depending
on its use and placement. In non-modal contexts, it means good/well, as in Det smager
godt (it tastes good/well). When used in requests, it can be translated as please (e.g.
Vil du godt tage servietten, Will you please take the napkin, Heinemann 2006:1085).
When occurring together with the verb ka(n), its job can be glossed as strengthening
the meaning of the verb: used together with kunne (be able to) in expressions of abil-
ity or possibility, in order to make the utterance less ambiguous (DDO, italicization in
original).7 Seeing that ka(n) godt is a package, and that ka(n) is not used in request
responses without a modal adverb, where godt seems to be the default option, we
have decided to translate det ka(n) jeg godt as I can do that, which seems to be the
nearest English equivalent to a format that agrees to perform the requested action
while focusing on the contingency of ability or possibility.8
Det ka(n) jeg godt responses frequently occur in contexts where ability has
been addressed in the request itself and are thus format-fitted to the contingencies
raised in that request; the respondent hearably accepting that the only relevant factor
in carrying out the requested action is whether or not the respondent is able to do so.
Embedded within any complying Det ka(n) jeg godt response thus lies the implica-
tion that the requested action will be carried out not because this action is recognizably
appropriate to the respondent, but simply because the requester asked for it to happen.
Det ka(n) jeg godt responses, like the Det ska(l) jeg nok format, commit to car-
rying out the requested action, but because respondents are here orienting to ability/
possibility, rather than obligation, they can at the same time be heard to indicate that
any relevance for carrying out the requested action is noticeably absent from the per-
spective of the respondent, who may in fact find the requested action unnecessary or
even counter-productive.
Extract (9) occurs in an audiological consultation. An audiologist uses the ka(n)
godt format to indicate that though he will readily agree to carry out the action
requested by his patient, this is not, in his medical opinion, the best solution to the
patients problem. The patient has been prescribed hearing aids from another clinic
some years back, but being dissatisfied with them he has come to this particular clinic
to inquire whether anything can be done. Specifically, the patient has recently read
about the possibility of programming hearing aids differently, so that sounds that
are normally produced in a frequency he cannot hear can be moved into a different,
. Translated by the authors from Danish: bruges sammen med kunne i udtryk for evne
eller mulighed, for at gre udsagnet mere utvetydigt (DDO)
. A translation with strengthening English adverbs (like e.g. surely) would be misleading,
as there are adverbials in Danish that would be thus translatable (e.g. helt sikkert, surely) and
they function differently.
lower frequency range, where they would be hearable. In lines 13, the patient inquires
whether the audiologist can determine whether this new programming can be done on
these current aids. In so far as this inquiry is about what the audiologist can do for the
patient in the future, it serves as a remote request, i.e. the next step would be to make
arrangements for the testing to be done. The patients inquiry, however, addresses two
potential actions to be carried out in the future: (a) testing/measuring his aids and
hearing and (b) determining whether his current aids can be re-programmed. When
the audiologist responds to this inquiry in line 4, he does so with what appears, at least
initially, to be confirmation and hence commitment, through the production of the
full clause modal response det ka(n) jeg godt, prefaced by the affirming jo yes. The
patients immediate uptake of this response, i.e. his yes in line 4 and the continuation
in lines 78, also suggests that he understands this response as a commitment from the
audiologist to carry out the requested action.
(9) H-EXP-11-06-08-3 can you measure

01 Cl: Men ka du mle KR HMM *eller* se om de her
But can yousg measure KR HMM *or* see if they here
But can you measure KR HMM *or*see if these
02 (0.2) ka laves te det der >p etlandet
(0.2) can be_made to that there on one_or_other
(0.2) can be made into that one >at some
03 Cl: tidspunkt[ ( )
time_point ( )
point in time ( )
[Johm det ka jeg godt, >ass< [hhhh
04 Au:

Yes_bt
that can I ADV, PRT hhhh
Sure I can do that, >yknow< hhhh
05 Cl:
[Jeah,
Yes,
06 Au: ehm[:
07 Cl: [se om det a noet der kan laves p de her.=
see if its something that can be made on these.
08 Cl: =for ellers ska jeg s ve[nte et halvt r-
cause if not I have to wait half a year-
09 Au:
[als jeg ka ikk lave om:
well I cant change:
10 (.)
11 Au: jeg ka ikk flytte lydene. >det ka jeg ikk,<
I cant move the sounds. >that I cant do,<
12 (0.1)
13 Cl: Hm.[ (n okay)

Hm. (well okay)
14 Au: [men als jeg ka: jeg ka gre det atehm
but yknow I can: I can do it that uhm
15 >jeg ka tilpasse apparatet bedre. Det ka jeg godt.<
>I can adjust the device better. I can do that.<
16 (0.4)
17 Cl: *Jerh.*
*Yeahh.*
Looking in more detail at the negotiations over treatment in the audiology clinic,
Heinemann & Matthews (forth) note that audiologists frequently concede to treat-
ment suggestions from their patients and that one recurrent format for doing this is
through the use of the ka(n) godt format. They suggest that in this way audiologists
orient to a restriction on explicitly rejecting patients treatment bids, conceding in
a manner that communicates a subdued willingness to go along with the patients
proposal for treatment, yet implying that they do not necessarily find the proposal
the best audiological solution (Heinemann & Matthews forth). These relevancies are
also apparent in the extract above. Though the audiologists modal remote-request
response complies with the request, audiologist and patient simultaneously orient
to the response as indicating a problem with the appropiateness of carrying out the
requested action (testing the aids to see if they can be re-programmed). The audiolo-
gist does so by following his remote-request response with the particle alts (line4),
which is frequently used to preface turns in which specifications and modifications
are made (Heinemann & Steensig, in prep.). Alts in (9) indicates that though he is
able (and willing) to do as requested, there may be reasons why this is not the most
(medically) relevant action to do in the future and that the reason for that will be
subsequently presented (see lines 915, in which the audiologist responds that he
cannot re-programme the patients current aid, but that he can adjust it to be better
than it currently is). The patient, in turn, also orients to the audiologists commitment
to do as requested as a concession to him, in that he in his continuation now pursues
a more committing response by accounting for his underlying reasons for making the
request, namely that otherwise hed have to wait half a year (until he can get entirely
new aids).
The following example further illustrates how participants use and orient to the
det ka(n) jeg godt format as a response that, while committing to carrying out what
has been requested, also indicates that this will be done purely in order to accommo-
date the requester. Sanne has been visiting Ester in her holiday house and is leaving to
go back to her own home later the same day. Her trip involves a number of changes
from a ferry to a bus, then to a train and finally another train; prior to this excerpt
Sanne, who is not used to travelling, has been concerned about the details of her trip.
At this point Ester inquires whether Sanne will call her when she has arrived home.
(10) TH)S6)FF)5A Call me
01 Ester: Ringer du te mig i aften nr du
Call youSG to me in evening when yousg-are
kommet hjem,
come home,
Do you call me tonight when you get home,
02 (0.6)
03 Sanne: Jerh,
Yes.
04 (1.1)
05 Sanne: Det ka jeg godt.
It can I ADV
I can do that
06 (0.6)
07 Ester: pt Det ve jeg gerne du gr.
pt I would like you to do that.
08 (1.0)
09 Sanne: >S du ka hre jeg er kommet [hjem.<
>So that you can hear I have come home.<
10 Ester:
[Jah,
Yes,
Esters inquiry in line 1 concerns an action that Sanne may or may not perform in the
future, i.e. calling Ester to let her know that she has arrived home safely. It is formu-
lated as a question, and is as such ambiguous as to whether Ester is requesting Sanne
to make the call or inquiring whether this is Sannes intention. Sannes initial response
likewise does not disambiguate the function and implications of Esters question, in
so far as she merely confirms that the action of her calling will happen (line 3). After
a lengthy pause, however, Sanne goes on to commit further to making the call, by
producing the det ka(n) jeg godt format, with which she orients to her own ability
to carry out the action. In so doing, she treats Esters initiating action as a request,
rather than an inquiry, thereby orienting to the action to be carried out as one insti-
gated by Ester, rather than one she herself intended to carry out independently. Esters
response to Sannes commitment aligns with this potential new interpretation of what
her question was doing and thus accepts that she was the instigator of a request to
which Sanne has now complied. In line 7, Ester thus produces the turn det ve jeg gerne
du gr Iwould like you to do that, explicitly recalibrating her inquiry as a wish or
need she had. Subsequent to this, Sanne produces a candidate formulation of why her
calling Ester upon arrival might be relevant for (and hence requested by) Ester (line 9).
As extracts (9) and (10) illustrate, det ka(n) jeg godt responses to remote requests
are used to confirm that the requested action is one that is well within the recipients
ability to carry out.
In orienting to ability as the pre-requisite for carrying out the requested action,
recipients implicitly accept that the requester has the right to ask them to carry out
certain actions; at the same time they can be heard to indicate that the appropriateness
of the requested action is not immediately evident to them. Extract (9) illustrates that
the det ka(n) jeg godt format and the orientations invoked by this response format
can be aligning with, or fitted to, the interactional relevancies oriented to in the remote
request. The audiologists use of det kan jeg godt is fitted to the patients inquiry about
his ability to carry out a test and adjustment of the hearing aid. With this inquiry, the
patient indicates that what he is requesting may not in fact be audiologically sound,
but rather is based on the patients own limited expertise and knowledge within this
area. This lack of expertise and audiological authority that the patient assigns himself
is nicely reflected and accepted by the audiologist, who first indicates his ability to
comply with parts of the patients request (adjusting the aid), then specifies what he
cannot practically do. The audiologist thus aligns with the patient by recognizing that
the requested action is of potential relevance to the patient, even if it is not, in audio-
logical terms, something that would be a next step in the larger joint activity of finding
solutions to the patients problems.
By contrast, extract (10) illustrates how det ka(n) jeg godt formats can be
employed to subtly indicate that the request recipient has to do special work to recog-
nize, even on behalf of the requester, the relevance of carrying out the requested action.
When Sanne first recalibrates Esters inquiry as a request that addresses Sannes ability
to call, then specifies subsequently why she would need to do that (to ensure Ester of her
safe arrival), she treats the action fairly explicitly as one that will be carried out because
Ester asked her to do so, because Sanne is able and because she now, retrospectively,
recognizes that Ester may have (good) reasons for making this request. While Esters
initial inquiry could be heard as being merely a friendly reminder that Sanne should
call Ester when arriving home, as being a next relevant action within the larger activ-
ity of Sanne travelling from Esters house and home, Sannes choice of response format
here entirely fails to recognize this, instead recalibrating Esters action as a request to
which Sanne commits as a concession to Ester. Thus, orienting to ability as the relevant
underlying contingency for committing to carry out a requested action by using the
full clause modal response format det ka(n) jeg godt can in some contexts be heard to
fully align with the relevancies addressed in the request. In other contexts, however, it is
heard to do subtle moral, social and interactional work to resist such relevancies, while
still constituting a fully committed response to carrying out a remote request.
5. Conclusion
Houtkoop-Steenstra (1987) and Lindstrm (forth) established that participants

demonstrably orient to a preference or norm for granting remote requests with full
clause constructions, rather than mere affirmation. In this paper, we have sought to
investigate such full clause remote request responses at an even finer level of granular-
ity, by determining a range of possible ways in which participants in (Danish) interac-
tion can construct such responses. Our analysis has focussed on full clause formats
with which participants in interaction can commit to carrying out a future action
requested by a co-participant: (a) responses without modal adverbs, such as det gr
jeg I do that and det skal jeg gre I shall do that; (b) modal obligation responses
such as det ska(l) jeg nok I shall certainly (do) that; and (c) modal concession
responses such as det ka(n) jeg godt I can well (do) that. While all three types of
constructions are employed to grant remote requests, and while in employing any of
these forms the requestee can be heard to commit to carrying out the requested action,
the different constructions nevertheless allow participants to orient to the underlying
relevance of the requested action in different ways. With the responses without modal
adverbs (det gr jeg/ det skal jeg gre), requestees orient to the requested action
as bilateral (Rossi 2012), i.e. as one that constitutes a next logical step within a larger,
jointly established activity. As such, these request responses do not invoke issues of
contingency, authority or entitlement with respect to the request, but simply treat the
requested action as a given, i.e. as something that under the circumstances will be car-
ried out independently of who the participants are to each other.
By contrast, responses with modal adverbs treat the requested action as unilateral,
i.e. as asking for an action that the requestee does not necessarily herself see the imme-
diate relevance of, but which she will nevertheless and for various reasons comply
with, either out of obligation to the requester or as a concession to the requester. In
orienting to such other relevancies, modal full clause request responses thus invoke
social and moral issues such as who has the right to make the request and who has
the obligation to carry out the requested action. In producing an obligation response
such as ska(l) jeg nok, the requestee thus puts him- or herself in the position of being
someone who is obliged to do as requested by the co-participant, and thus, vice versa,
portrays the co-participant as someone who is entitled to make (certain) requests.
With ability responses such as det ka(n) jeg godt, on the other hand, the requestee
confirms his or her ability to do as the requester asks, thus portraying him- or her-
self as someone who is able to help when requested and the co-participant as some-
one for whom it is necessary (and relevant) to ask for help. Our analysis has shown
that invoking or orientating to social and moral issues can be done in alignment with
the co-participant, who may, in formulating the request, have oriented to matters of
entitlement or authority matters that are mirrored in the form and function of full
clause modal responses. However, full clause modal responses can also, as shown, be
employed in contexts where the relevancies oriented to and the social and moral issues
invoked are not present in the request. In such cases, requestees can be heard to do
delicate social and moral work to, for instance, avoid aligning with or accepting the
requesters orientation to the requested action as bilateral, while at the same time still
granting the request and committing to carry out the requested action.
References
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Steger, 5388. Dsseldorf: Pdagogischer Verlag Schwann.
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441458. DOI: 10.1017/S0047404500016572
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Appendix. Glossing abbreviations
ADV Adverb
PRT Particle
SG Singular
JO Untranslated particle
Two request forms of four year olds
Anthony J. Wootton*
The occurrence of declarative I want and interrogative Can I request forms is

examined in the natural language use of four year old children with their parents
in the home. The analysis focuses on the use of these forms after an initial request
has been turned down and after the use of imperatives by parents. The analysis
suggests that in these sequential positions these forms are used in non-equivalent
ways. Further evidence relating to the use of these forms in sequence initial
positions suggests certain parallels with the earlier findings.
By age four most children employ a variety of turn types for accomplishing requests
(cf. Garvey 1975; Bates 1976: Chapter 8; Ervin-Tripp 1977). Two that will have been
within the childs competence for some time are the declarative I want x and the inter-
rogative Can I have/do x. The declarative form may show a decline in use after age
four. Bock and Hornsby (1977) found that when children asked someone for puzzle
pieces their frequency of use declined between ages three and six. At age four how-
ever both declarative and interrogative forms are still prominent, and this raises the
question of whether they are used interchangeably or whether their users respect con-
straints on their use. One could investigate this matter by looking for sociolinguistic
correlates of use age of recipient, topic, situation and the like. But a preliminary
analysis of my data revealed that both declarative and interrogative request forms
could be found within the same situation, on the same topic and to the same recipi-
ent, as in extract (1):1
(1) Ha/3;11
Ch: Cn I lie in Daddys bosy
(0.6)
M: No::

Ch: hhh( )(bt) I want to go in Daddys bosy
* ajwoott@ajwoott.plus.com
. For transcript conventions, see the appendix.
Anthony J. Wootton
This suggests that if children do respect constraints on the use of these request forms
they may be sensitive to interaction and discourse features of a subtler kind than those
located within conventional sociolinguistic analysis.
Here it is argued that in certain sequential positions within discourse children aged
four use these two types of request in non-equivalent ways. This, together with other
evidence, suggests a non-equivalence in the use of these forms in certain sequence
initial request turns. The argument begins with the evidence relating to I want and
Can I in the sequential position of re-requesting after the non-granting of an initial
request. Then two cases of Can I will be discussed which potentially fault the argument
being developed. After examining the use of these request forms after imperatives the
bearing of these arguments on the occurrence of Can I and I want in sequence initial
position will be considered.
Transcripts are derived from audio recordings made in the homes of four year old
children in Aberdeen, Scotland. In this study the recordings of fifteen children have
been used. Three recordings, each about three hours long, were available for each child.
Both working-class and middle-class children are represented within the sample, and
all children are first borns.
1. I want x
After an initial request is not granted2 children sometimes pursue that which recipient
(the parent)3 has said they are not prepared to concede. An instance is given below (2):
(2) Ha/3;11
Ch: Mummy Im wantin my be::ll offa the Christmas tree:
M: Et bell is staying on the Christmas tree
Ch: No
M: Yes
Ch: I want it off[a ((incomplete))
M:
Youll get it to play with after Christmas
(0.7)
. The phrase not granted rather than rejected is used throughout because there are a
variety of turn types through which a recipient may avoid granting a request, not all of which
merit the term rejection. For example, compare the response Very soon in Extract (11) with
No in (12).
. In the extracts cited recipient is always a childs mother or father. The term recipient is
used throughout, however, partly to propose that the patterns revealed are not specific to some
particular class of recipient, such as a parent.
Ch: No::
(1.8)
Ch: No mummy::: hh No:::
(0.7)
Ch: I want i::t
(1.2)
Ch: I WANT I:T
In such sequences childrens turns can be constructed with a number of turn types: for
example, rejections of recipient rejection (e.g. the childs Nos in (2)), pleads (e.g. Please)
and words which diminish the scale of that which is asked for (e.g. Just a bit). Children
may also formally re-request that which recipient is unwilling to grant. In Extract(2) the
childs interrupted I want it offa is doing that, as are the last two turns in the sequence,
which state I want it. Through the I want design the child is asking for precisely that
which recipient is not prepared to concede, which in this case is also that which the child
was asking for with the initial request Im wanting my bell off the Christmas tree.
Further instances of I want used as a re-request are given in extracts (3)(5). Here
again, they are constructed to request that which recipient is not prepared to grant:
(3) De/4;1
Ch: Mummy could you turn the cold water (on)
(0.7)
M: () that water 1 would use tha:t ((suggesting child
use existing water))
(.)
Ch: No::: want co:ld water
(0.8)
Ch: I want co::ld
(4) Ga/3;10 ((Ch wants another story at bedtime))
Ch: Cn Iave (Robbie and Richard )
[
M: You can have a little look yourself
for a se[cond
Ch: All of it
M: We:ll but until mummy comes through from the kitchen

Ch: But I want (.) tsee it hha:::ll the story mummy
M: Well you just wont have time Jonathan
(5) Jo/3;10 ((referent unclear))
Ch: I want s:o:me
(0.7)
{ in }
M: Well well put them on after
(0.8)
Anthony J. Wootton
M: ()
(1.5)
Ch: Ma:m I want te do o:ne
(.)
M: () were not doing any more just no:w
(0.7)
Ch: I want te do o:ne
(3) and (4) illustrate that this is not a simple function of the child repeating the same
request form as was used with the initial request. In (3) the child switches from Could
you turn the cold water on to No want cold water, I want cold; in (4) the child initially
asks for the Robbie and Richard story with Can I but switches to But I want to see all
the story mummy in re-request position. (5) illustrates how the re-request constructed
with I want may seek less than the initial request; in (5) the child initially asks for
some, which is altered to one in both the re-request turns. But in asking for one now
the child is going beyond that which recipient is proposing (We ll put them {onin } after).
Re-requests constructed as I want therefore ask again for what recipient has just
demonstrated an unwillingness to allow. For this reason these turns are not simply re-
requesting, they express an objection to, and seek an alteration of, recipients position
on the issue.4
2. Can I have/do x
After initial requests Can I constructions are used most frequently by children to
solicit replies after recipient has not responded to the initial request or has responded
in a prevaricating manner. Extract (6) illustrates their use after no reply by recipient:
(6) To/3;10
Ch: Can I go an see e:r
(1.0)
Ch: Can I
The delay in response to the initial requests, here the one second gap after the childs
Can I go and see her, may support an inference on the childs part of indecision on the
. The argument about I want excludes one important use of these forms after non-grantings
of initial requests, namely request shifts:-
Ch: Can I .hh can I have a pear

M: Theres no pears (.) we havent (.) theres no more pears =
Ch: = I want aapple hh two p hh apples each
After the child learns that pears are not available he shifts to a request for apples.
part of recipient, but more explicit evidence of recipient indecision can be identified
in sequences like (7):
(7) Ga/3;10
Ch: Mummy in the afternoon please hh please can Iave Shonas
(ball)
M: We::ll
(.)
M: Well see what were doing ( )
[
Ch: Can I:
Here recipients response to the initial request avoids any clear commitment as to
whether or not the child can have Shonas ball, and the childs subsequent Can I treats
that response as not amounting to a clearcut answer.
Can I constructions are used much less frequently than I want to re-request
that which recipient has displayed an unwillingness to allow. Within my transcript
collections there are over 50 such instances of I want re-requests, only 6 of Can I.
Furthermore in those few cases where Can Is are used to re-request they are not con-
structed in equivalent ways to I wants in corresponding sequential position. Instead of
requesting precisely that which recipient has demonstrated an unwillingness to allow,
Can Is incorporate additional elements which alter the construction of the request.
Extracts(8)(10) contain examples of this:
(8) Ta/3;11 ((transcript simplified: gan awa = going away; ging = go))
Ch: I wanna go ou::(hh)
F: After your dinner = youre stayin till your
suppers ready = your nae gan awa (.)(right now )

Ch: Cana ging ou e:fter my dinner
(9) Ca/3;9 ((the jacket = the recording jacket: Ch is calling
through to M in another room))
Ch: Cna take o:ff the ja:cket no::w
(0.8)
M: Very soon
(0.6)
Ch: Cna take it off no:w if a wa::nt
(10) To/3;10
Ch: I wanta put my fee:t i::n ((into the bath))
M: () first ((i.e. delaying the action))
((Ch makes half
[crying/laughing noises))
M: ALEC ((M calls Chs younger brother))
(0.7)
Ch: Can I goin no::w
Anthony J. Wootton
In (8) the child incorporates in the re-request the circumstance in which, according to
recipients non-granting of the initial request, recipient would find the request grant-
able ; recipient says the child can go out after your dinner, and this condition is built
into the childs re-request, Can I go out after my dinner. In (9) the child introduces a
contingency into the re-request (if I want) which alters the form of the initial request
and seeks out some new condition (if I want) which may recommend the request to
recipient. In (10) the childs re-request, Can I go in now, is delayed in line with the
delay that seems to be suggested by recipients use of the word first. Furthermore in the
re-request itself the child includes a word, now, that recognizes the issue of temporal
appropriateness raised in recipients non-granting turn. When used as re-requests after
the non-granting of an initial request therefore Can Is are constructed such as not to
tempt the fate that befell the initial. They are constructed in an altered form which
recognizes, or attempts to circumvent, recipients position on the issue. They are not so
much constructed to change recipients mind as to find a version of the request which
might be acceptable to recipient.
3. Potential deviant cases
From the argument so far it follows that two kinds of occurrence would constitute
deviant cases. Firstly re-requests constructed as I wants which continue to ask for that
which recipients are unwilling to grant, but in an altered form which takes account of
recipients unwillingness to grant them in their initial form. Secondly re-requests con-
structed as Can Is which ask again for precisely that which recipients have indicated
an unwillingness to grant. Within our corpus there are no clear instances of the former
but there are some instances which look like candidates of the latter. In this section two
such instances will be discussed.
(11) To/3;10
(1) Ch: Can I go up t[ Yvonnes no:w (1.2)
(2) M: (sings)
(3) Ch: Cana
(4) (1.0)
(5) M: Very soon ((very lightly))
(6) (.)
(7) Ch: Cana ((ditto))
(8) (.)
(9) M: I wish that fishman would hurry
In line (7) of extract (11) the child appears to re-request with a Can I exactly that
which recipient is currently unwilling to allow, namely permission for the child to go
to Yvonnes. A perfectly fitted response to Can I could have been some form of grant-
ing by recipient (e.g. Oh alright, off you go then). What Can I hopes for is a change of
mind by recipient. In practice Can I appears to be ignored,5 which makes line (7) itself
into an ignorable. Its character as an ignorable is proposed not just by recipients non-
reply to it, but also by the topic initial turn in line (9), which proposes that at just this
point in the talk there is a warrant for doing a new beginning, for the prior sequence
being treatable as terminated. The warrant for the non-reply to (7), and the proposed
termination of the request sequence, is that the child can be treated as already hav-
ing available to her what the answer to Can I in line (7) would have been. This is to
say that the information which recipient has already given on the subject can stand
as an answer to Can I in line (7): and for recipient to propose this is to propose that
Can I in line (7) is a redundant question, one which is soliciting information which
has already been solicited. The design of line (7) allows for just such an interpreta-
tion of itself. There is no hint of disjunction with recipients position as expressed in
line (5) compare, for example, the initial nos and buts preceding I want requests in
Extracts (1), (2), (3) and (4) the intonations are high, clipped and light rather than
whining, and the words used duplicate the pursuit of response turn found earlier in the
sequence in line (3). Line (7) is constructed as an enquiry rather than a plead to recipi-
ent to change their mind. Because it enquires for information which can be treated as
already given (because it occurs in position/line 7, rather than line 3) the design and
positioning make it treatable as a check. By virtue of being a check Can I also offers
recipient an opportunity to re-consider the position they have taken, but it simply
offers this opportunity rather than insist on being treated as a re-request. Recipient
can choose to take this opportunity, or to repeat the information already provided or,
as occurs here, to ignore it.6 Therefore Can I in line (7) is not a re-request but a check
which offers recipient the opportunity of changing their mind about the initial request.
. While there are several instances within the corpus of requests being granted by recipient
without a verbal granting turn, with the exception of this instance in Extract (11), and the
next instance in Extract (12), there are no examples of non-grantings being accomplished
without some form of verbal non-granting turn. This, together with the fact that there is a
systematic basis for the turn being ignored, makes it most feasible to suppose that the turn is
not answered directly.
. As mentioned earlier recipient not only ignores Can I but actually initiates a topic depar-
ture, and that may well attend to the fact that a simple ignoring might be construed by the
child as evidence of uncertainty on the part of recipient. In dealing with the initial request
recipient has attempted various forms of evasion and delay. Note especially the point at which
singing is initiated in line (2), and the childs analysis of this, in line (3), as not having pre-
cluded recipients monitoring of line (1) correctly, as it turns out, given that recipient is
able to respond with Very soon in line (5). In fact this sequence is the third time this issue
has been raised by this child during the recording (see the discussion of Extract (17) later in
Anthony J. Wootton
(12) Fr/3;10 ((F has said that he is going out))

(1) Ch: Could I go with ye
(2) (.)
(3) F: No:
(4) (1.3)
(5) Ch: Could I come with ye
(6) (3.0)
(7) Ch: Fa:rs ye ga:n oo::t ((Where are you going out))
Our second potential deviant case is line (5) in Extract (12), Could I come with ye.
In the previous section it was argued that re-requests constructed as Can Is showed
evidence of re-design as compared with the initial requests. Could I come with ye also
shows obvious features of re-design compared with the initial request in line (1), Could
I go with ye. Furthermore here again there is no disjunctive no or but in initial position
within the turn in line (5) (compare again the use of such words in combination with
I want re-requests in Extracts (1), (2), (3) and (4)). So Could I come with ye is con-
structed as independent of the recipient rejection in line (3), and as something more
than just a repeat of the initial request in line (1).
Even so we are left with the intuition here that lines (1) and (5) have an equiva-
lent meaning, that the requests amount to asking for the same thing. A view which is
consolidated when research findings suggest that children of this age do not differenti-
ate the distinctive deictic meanings of come and go available within conventional
English (Tanz 1980: Chapter 6). Furthermore recipients non-response in line (6)7
could be treating the answer to line (5) as already available to the child, which is to
treat the request in line (5) as equivalent for practical purposes to that in (1). And the
absence of a pursuit by the child (such as Could I) of the response which should have
been forthcoming after line (5) may recognize that recipients response to Could I go
with ye, No, can stand not just as the response to line (1), but also as the response to
Could I come with ye. It can be argued then that recipient treats the two requests as
equivalent in meaning, and that this is recognized by the child by virtue of the absence
of a pursuit turn such as Could I? after the non-response to line (5).
this paper). Simple non-response to line (7) therefore could leave the issue open for further
discussion, and recipients line (9) is an integral part of the termination of this sequence. For
a preliminary discussion of childrens interpretations of delays in responding to their requests
see Wootton (1981).
. Line (13) is treated here as a non-response on the part of recipient for the same reasons
outlined earlier in Footnote5. If there was a non-verbal response in line (13) this makes this
case even less problematic for our arguments in the previous section of the article.
These points, even if true, do not require us to revise our original claims about
re-requests constructed as Can Is. Because the two requests in Extract (12) may be
treated by recipient as equivalent does not imply that they are constructed as equiva-
lent by the child. The fact that in line (5) a child, for whom come may be similar in
meaning to go, nevertheless alters the re-request to come is a nice instance of how
the constraints incurred in employing certain request forms (Can Is) in a particu-
lar sequential position may require a speaker to explore alternative semantic ways of
constructing the same request. In doing this it may happen that the alternative is not
accorded interactional significance. Here, for example, it seems probable that recipient
treats the re-request as equivalent to the initial; from an adult point of view there-
fore the re-request can be treated as an incompetent production. The sequence then
becomes one in which the child is given a basis for finding a proposed discrimination
of the meanings of come and go to be inadequate, and the provision of such informa-
tion may encourage the child to employ the notions of come and go in ways adults
consider consistent with their usage.
4. Requests after imperatives
Our argument about the use of I want and Can I as request forms has so far been
restricted to a particular sequential position within discourse, namely after non-
granting of initial requests. Where, in such a position, we find Can I requests being
used to ask again for that which has not been granted they are constructed in a
modified form which makes the request more than a duplication of the prior non-
granted request. In contrast I wants constructed as re-requests seek again something
which is incompatible with the position being adopted by recipient. This pattern also
holds when we examine childrens use of these request forms subsequent to impera-
tive statements.
Extracts (13)(16) all contain instances in which a child is initially told to do some
action, though in (13) there is the additional complication of recipient also proposing
an action which will involve the child:
(13) De/4;1
M: Close your eyes anIll ta [ke this (black stuff)
Ch: No: no: I want te
do it (hh)
(14) Wa/4;2
M: Get insi:de
Ch: Im wantin out te pla::y
((door slams shut as he comes back into house))
Anthony J. Wootton
(15) Ga/3;10 ((Ch approaches some hot food that he has been
told he has to wait to eat))
M: Now just you wait till Daddy comes down just
(9.0)
Ch: Can I just try one bi:t mummy
(16) Ga/3;10
F: Please goan get your slippers
(1.2)
Ch: (I ca ) can I put this (off) first
In (13) and (14) the use of the I want design is associated with the child proposing an
action which is in contradiction with that proposed by recipient. In (13) recipient ini-
tially proposes that she will cleanse the childs eyes, but in her turn the child rejects that
proposal (with No no) and proposes that she, the child, will cleanse the eyes. In (14)
the child is told to Get inside, whereupon the child says Im wanting out to play, that
is he expresses his concern to do the opposite of what recipient desires. Where Can I
is used to make a request which proposes an action which is potentially at odds with
the prior imperative we find features of the request turn which display a recognition of
this, and which minimize the potential discrepancy. In (15) the request is delayed for
nine seconds after the imperative, and when it is made it asks for the least amount of
that which recipient has said that the child must wait for. In (16) Can I put this off first
displays that the child is not asking not to do what recipient wants, simply to delay that
action until the completion of another action. In effect the child is gaining recipients
permission to delay carrying out the action recipient wants him to do.
In this sequential position I wants appear to be complaints against recipient while
Can Is function as more straightforward requests. Nevertheless their use here parallels
their use as re-requests. I wants propose a division of interest between speaker and
recipient whereas Can Is are constructed such as to minimize that division.
5. Sequence initial requests
Within the corpus both I want and Can I occur most frequently as sequence initial
requests, requests which initiate the discussion concerning the request. This raises the
question of what implications the analysis presented so far has for requests occurring
in this position. The analysis suggests that I want may be used as a way of making
an initial request where the child has some basis for supposing that recipient will be
unwilling to do precisely that which the request seeks. Evidence supporting such a
position can be found in sequences where the request in question is one which has
been discussed at some earlier point in time. In Extract (2), for example, the childs
initial request was Im wanting my bell offa the Christmas tree: here we also know that
about an hour earlier, when the bell was last mentioned, the child asked if she could
put the bell further down the tree, and was told to Just leave that bell on that Christmas
tree, with prosodic features suggesting firmness. There seems little doubt that when
making the initial request in Extract (2) the child knew recipient would be unlikely to
grant it.8 Can I constructions are used very rarely within the corpus to re-initiate such
requests after earlier non-grantings, a frequency pattern which is consistent with our
previous arguments. Earlier we found that Can I re-requests could be used to ask for
the same thing again, but that in these circumstances they were constructed such as
to recognize or circumvent recipients position rather than confront it. A similar pat-
tern seems to hold in those very few cases in which Can I constructions are used to
re-initiate previously non-granted requests at a later time. In Extract (17), for example,
the child is initially told that she cannot go up to Yvonnes until the recording ends, the
man comes back for his jacket. The child re-initiates the request with a Can I construc-
tion on two later occasions that same morning, and each time she includes the word
now which recognizes the temporal considerations which recipient has introduced in
dealing with the request.
(17) To/3;10
(i) Ch: Cana go uptYvo::nnes

M: Wait until the:: (.) man comes back for his jacket

(ii) Ch: Can I go up tYvo:nnes no:w ((about 1 hours later))

M: When the hand of the clock goes round

(iii) Ch: Can I go up tYvonnes no:w ((about 20 minutes later))

M: Very soon
. Negative declaratives, when constructed as sequence initial turns, generally project a dis-
crepancy between what the child wants and what recipient might want. For example:
Ch: I dont want maanorak o:n no:w

(.)
Ch: ()
M: Ah Paul you mustnt take it o:ff
They occurred in this position infrequently in the corpus, but their use seems strongly
consistent with our observations about the use of positive declaratives in non-sequence initial
position.
Anthony J. Wootton
Not all sequence initial I wants are used in ways analogous to their use in re-request
position however. They are not just used to ask for those things to which recipient will
be opposed, they are also used to initiate matters which recipients seem eager to pro-
mote. Going to the toilet is the best example, as in Extract (18).
(18) Ca/3;9
Ch: I want a ( )
M: Oh Dan away you go then
(.)
M: Ill be up behind you
At this stage therefore the evidence suggests that I want request forms are not used in
equivalent ways by children in all sequential positions within discourse.
6. Conclusions
The evidence reviewed suggests that children aged four use and construct declarative
Iwant and interrogative Can I requests in different ways in similar sequential posi-
tions. In doing this they make use of the differing syntactic constraints which these
constructions place on recipients next turn. Can Is formally propose that an answer
of yes or no is possible, and where they are used as re-requests it has been shown that
they are not used in such a way that the answer of no is predictable. Rather they are
formed so as to be more acceptable to recipient, to create the possibility of yes as well
as no. Declarative I wants do not formally solicit a yes or no, and thus do not formally
propose each of these as a possibility. As re-requests their power lies not in the poten-
tial acceptability to recipient of what they are asking their users know, at the time of
constructing them, that they are potentially unacceptable but in their unwillingness
to concur with recipients position. It has been argued (Ervin-Tripp 1974:190) that as
children grow older they cultivate those speech forms which give options to recipient.
In the context of requests we would expect therefore to find a decrease in the use of
Iwant after this age and an increase in interrogative requests together with pre-request
forms, such as Its cold in here, which make possible offers from recipient as an alterna-
tive to requests by speaker.
Appendix: Transcript conventions
Sound production of prior word cut off

[ Marks the point at which one speaker interrupts the prior speaker
= No gap between speakers or between components of a single speakers turn
:: Extensions of the prior sound
Pitch changes
(.) Gaps of under second
hh/hh Audible inbreaths/outbreaths
(word) Words in brackets are uncertainly transcribed
() Empty brackets mark words not transcribed
: Utterances omitted for the sake of brevity
(()) Transcriber comment
Following word(s) softly spoken
Each extract is introduced by two code letters which identify a particular child together with
that childs chronological age in years and months.
Acknowledgement
This article first appeared in the Journal of Pragmatics 5 (1981), pp. 51123, and is
reprinted here with permission from Elsevier.
References
Bates, Elizabeth. 1976. Language and Context. New York: Academic Press.
Bock, J.K. and M.E. Hornsby. 1977. How children ask and tell. Papers and Reports in Child
Language Development 13: 7282.
Ervin-Tripp, Susan. 1974. The comprehension and production of requests by children. Papers
and Reports in Child Language Development 10: 188196.
Ervin-Tripp, Susan. 1977. Wait for me, roller skate. In: S. Ervin-Tripp and C. Mitchell-Kernan,
eds. pp. 165188.
Ervin-Tripp, Susan. and C. Mitchell-Kernan, eds. 1977. Child Discourse. New York: Academic
Press.
Garvey, Catherine. 1975. Requests and responses in childrens speech. Journal of Child Language
2: 4164.
Tanz, Christine. 1980. Studies in the Acquisition of Deictic Terms. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Wootton, Anthony J. 1981. The management of grantings and rejections by parents in request
sequences. Semiotica 37: 5989.
Orchestrating directive trajectories
in communicative projects
in family interaction*

University of California / Linkoping University
Exploring the entanglement of resources (facial expressions, gesture, gaze, and

intonation) that mutually elaborate each other in the production of social action,
across the life of a particular communicative project in family interactions
(getting children to bed), we investigate the ways in which participants calibrate
actions with reference to each others actions. Our specific concern is the
choreographing of directive response sequences. While directives are commonly
thought of as doing things with words, in face-to-face interaction they frequently
entail doing things with bodies as well. Thus, along with a consideration of
action formation, syntactic formats, and prosody used to construct directives
and build responses, we examine the haptic forms that overlay verbal directive
forms, as well as configurations of bodies in lived social space. Compliance may
take the shape of nonverbal responses such as willing movement towards the
target space indexed by the directive, minimal verbal agreement plaintive,
reluctant, or joyful with a parents directive, or response cries, e.g. exasperation
or disgruntled disbelief. As agents with projects of their own, children can
respond to directives with considerable resistance. Very different types of affective
landscapes are created in the midst of interaction. People in interaction form
environments for each other, either ones displaying deference and accountability
for ones actions or alternatively displaying outright antagonism and disdain.
Examples in this study are drawn from video recordings of naturally occurring
interaction in middle class families who were part of the project of UCLAs Center
on Everyday Lives of Families and Swedens sister project.
* This study is part of an interdisciplinary, collaborative research endeavor conducted by

members of the UCLA Center on Everyday Lives of Families (CELF), under the direction of
Elino Ochs, and the Swedish counterpart (SCELF), under the direction of Karin Aronsson.
CELF was generously supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation program on the Work-
place, Workforce, and Working Families, headed by Kathleen Christensen. We are indebted
to the working families who participated in this study for opening their homes and sharing
their lives. Diana Hill provided invaluable assistance and expertise in making the pitch tracks.
Michael Smith and Ian Dickson provided their artistic talents in the rendering of images for
this paper, and we are very appreciative of their work. Charles Goodwin and Jan Anward pro-
vided invaluable assistance during various phases of the preparation of this paper.
1. Introduction
Pioneering work by Ervin-Tripp (1976) on directives and structures of control (Ervin-

Tripp etal. 1984) defined directives as including offers, requests, orders, prohibitions,
and other verbal moves that solicit goods or attempt to effect changes in the activi-
ties of others (1984:116).1 Directives (Bybee 1985), attempts to move an addressee
to action, constitute a very basic way in which tasks and activities of everyday life
get organized whether in the peer group (Goodwin 1990; Goodwin 2006b), family
(Aronsson & Cekaite 2011; Aronsson & Thorell 1999; de Len Pasquel 2011; Fasulo
etal. 2007; Kent 2012), among friends (Couper-Kuhlen etal. 2011), or in institutional
settings (Kuroshima 2010; Lee 2011; Merritt 1977). Studies of directives have focused
on the grammatical shape of directive utterances (Ervin-Tripp 1976), next moves
(Thompson etal. forthcoming) and stances responding to directives (Goodwin etal.
2012), relations of relative power constructed between speaker and hearer (Ervin-
Tripp 1982; Ervin-Tripp et al. 1984), forms of politeness (Brown & Levinson 1978;
Culpeper 1996; Ervin-Tripp etal. 1990; Labov & Fanshel 1977), as well as orientations
to notions of entitlement affecting syntactic shape (Curl & Drew 2008; Heinemann
2006; Lindstrom 2005).
Researchers concerned with requests have examined the position of the request
(and pre-request) in the sequence of talk (Aronsson 2011; Lee 2011; Schegloff 2007;
Wootton 1981), forms of accounts (Sterponi 2009), and the evolving sequential pro-
duction of a request (Goodwin 2000b; Lee 2011). Requests are treated as dispreferred
actions (Levinson 1983; Schegloff 2007) in most institutional talk as well as in talk
between friends; they are often delayed (preceded by pre-requests) and are accom-
panied by forms of mitigations, as they are viewed as potentially imposing upon the
recipient. By way of contrast, in service encounters (Kuroshima 2010; Merritt 1977;
Sorjonen and Raevaara, this volume), and during childrens outdoor street and play-
ground games (Goodwin 2006b) as well as in video games (Mondada 2013; Newon
2011) directives constitute the basic resource through which transactions take place.
In family interaction as well directives provide the principal means for accom-
plishing the activities that constitute the very life of the social group and are neither
delayed nor considered burdensome actions to be avoided (Goodwin 2006a). As
Blum-Kulka (1997:150) states, The politeness system of family discourse is highly
. Keisanen and Rauniomaa (2012:325) argue that the borderline between requests and di-
rectives is not clear-cut. See also Antaki and Kent (2012:878). Antaki and Kent (ibid.: 887)
contrast work in Conversation Analysis on requests for abstract or future events (permission
to do something, a commitment to a future action) with directives considered very con-
crete actions in the here and now.
Orchestrating directive trajectories in communicative projects in family interaction
domain-specific and within it unmodified directness is neutral or unmarked in regard

to politeness. Asymmetrical power relations between parents and children legitimates
a high level of directness that is not seen as offensive (Blum-Kulka 1990:259). Parents
entitled use of directness indexes both power and solidarity. Blum-Kulka (1997:151)
argues that the coerciveness of a directive is softened through linguistic mitigating
devices that can act to color the request affectively or express respect for the childs
reasoning capacities. The use of nicknames and endearments, inclusive pronouns
(we), and giving reasons and justifications that assume cooperation and lead the
hearer to the reasonableness of the act (Blum-Kulka 1997:151) provide face-saving
moves in light of the imposition of the control act.
While directives are commonly thought of as doing things with words (Austin
1962), in face-to-face interaction they frequently entail doing things with bodies as
well (Cekaite 2010; Goodwin 2006b; Rauniomaa & Keisanen 2012; Sicoli 2013). The
actual carrying out of the action requested might be preceded by an agreement to
do so (making use of agreement particles such as Okay or minimal clauses such as
Iwill). However, focusing only on the initial directive and its response or second
action does not adequately capture the actual anatomy of the course of action in prog-
ress, which can involve other stages as well. The agreement constitutes an interstitial
mediated step in the actual trajectory of the directive, often entailing the movement of
participants bodies through space and time (Goodwin & Cekaite 2013).
At the heart of our inquiry is the lamination of action in the production of action
in directive trajectories. Along with a consideration of action formation, turn design,
and prosody used to construct directives, we examine the haptic forms that overlay
verbal directive forms, as well as configurations of bodies in lived social space (Kendon
1985) that frame them. The successful execution of a directive in face-to-face interac-
tion demands the joint attention of a co-participant. Facing formations make visible
participants attunement or commonality of readiness (Kendon 1985:237) to one
another. A focus on participation (actions demonstrating forms of involvement per-
formed by parties within evolving structures of talk (Goodwin & Goodwin 2004:222)
highlights the importance of the simultaneous embodied stance displays (Goodwin
etal. 2012) through which directives and their responses are choreographed (Cekaite
2010; Tulbert & Goodwin 2011).
By exploring the entanglement of resources (facial expressions, gesture, gaze, and
intonation) with different properties brought into configurations that mutually elabo-
rate each other (Goodwin 2013), we investigate the ways in which speakers and hearers
calibrate or adjust their actions with reference to the other (Goodwin & Cekaite 2013)
across the life of a communicative project (Linell 1998). As Linell (1998:218) states,
communicative projects aim at solving a communicative problem of some kind
of having something done through language. Linell (ibid.) explains that a problem
is simply a task to do or work out in transaction. In the directives we examine (here
related to the routine of getting children ready for bed), there is an implicit orientation
towards the accomplishment of a variety of activities in a specific temporal order and
within particular time allotments.
As Linell (1998:217) argues, projects can be nested (Tulbert & Goodwin 2011),
and are successively carried out and advanced step-by-step. A parents proposal for
something to be accomplished can entail multiple interweaving actions. Many projects
are characterized by complementary rather than symmetrical participant roles; and
actors sometimes pursue competing goals.2 While compliance (the embodied carry-
ing out of the requested action as well as verbal acknowledgement or ratification) is
the goal of directives, non-compliance through refusals, displays of indifference, exas-
peration, crying, bargaining/counter-requests, and repair moves provide possible next
moves as well each with its distinctive prosodic contour as well as embodied display.
In discussing directive trajectories we will consider alternative syntactic formats
or modal clause types for directives interrogatives (including directive actions pro-
duced with question intonation), imperatives, and declaratives and the resources
used to produce subsequent actions to them, actions (both verbal and non-verbal)
through which participants take up an alignment or stance towards the action in
progress (Goodwin & Cekaite 2013; Rauniomaa & Keisanen 2012; Thompson etal.
forthcoming), in developing trajectories of action. We find that very different types
of affective landscapes or ethos (Bateson 1972) are created in the midst of interaction.
The routine ways in which activities are choreographed have broad implications for
human development (Weisner 2013), as people in interaction form environments for
each other (McDermott 1977), ones displaying deference and accountability for ones
actions (Aronsson & Cekaite 2011) or alternatively displaying outright antagonism
and disdain (Cekaite 2012).
2. Data and methodology
The examples in this study are drawn from video recordings of naturally occurring
interaction in families who were part of UCLAs Center on Everyday Lives of Families
(CELF) and Swedens sister project. Our methods combine ethnographic research
including questionnaires providing basic income, concerning social networks, health
and well being, educational practices and goals, childrens perspectives on work and
family with ethno-archeological timed observations (tracking) of family members,
locations, and activities, photographs of space and material objects, floor plans. In
. With respect to the concept of project in interaction see also Schegloff (2007: 8182, 144,
244) and Levinson (2013:2627).
the US, video home tours were made by family members, and included psychologi-
cal studies of hormones indicating stress. Approximately 50 hours of interaction were
collected in each family over a weeks time in the US and approximately 37 hours in
Sweden. Video-ethnographic methodology makes it possible to record mundane talk
(Goodwin & Kyratzis 2011), physical gestures and action (Goodwin 2000a), and rou-
tine activities, all within the household settings where people actually carry out their
daily lives (Ochs et al. 2006). The age range of children recorded was one through
eighteen, although in this paper we deal primarily with children ages 410.
3. Launching directives at activity junctures
In the first set of Examples (19) participants are closely positioned in facing forma-
tions that permit easy access to the actions of the other, enabling the establishment of
a framework for joint orientation toward the project at hand. The directives occur at
activity junctures where no competing activities are in play. Sequences are launched
with an interrogative or question form that, at least in its surface form, permits optional
types of response. First, we will explore a distinctive format found in US data, i.e. noun
phrases produced with rising intonation. Next we will turn to directives of a particular
lexico-grammatical design: a modal interrogative format in Swedish family data, ska
du xx? (e.g.) Ska du p dig pyjamasen nu? (translated into English as Are you going
to put on the pajamas now?), which is a recurrent syntactic format used to initiate/
launch a directive sequence at the juncture of activities.3
3.1 D
irectives with question format in English within a haptic framework
and compliant responses
In the US at clear junctures in activities, when there is an expected movement towards
next phases in the larger trajectory of getting ready for bed, question formats4 can
be used to launch directive sequences. Boundary marker terms such as alright or
okay are used in the format [Boundary Marker + Shall we?] or [Boundary Marker
+Noun phrase5 produced with rising intonation] to launch a trajectory of action.
. See Cekaite (2012) for the use of ska du in a classroom institutional context.
. The term question format rather than interrogative is used here, as we concern ourselves
with terms overlaid with question intonation, rather than interrogative function words such
as what, when, where, who, why and how.
. Mondada, this volume, describes how a noun X (coag) delivered by a surgeon, rather
than simply being a description of an individual action, serves as a directive initiating collec-
tive action. The noun is part of a paired action involving the surgeon and his assistant.
Thus, for example, in Example 1 below Okay (line 8) is followed by Shall we? and
Bedtime? (lines 13,15). Haptic frameworks functioning as nested seating arrange-
ments (Example 1), shepherding (Cekaite 2010) (Example 2), and taps on the back
(Example3) are used in conjunction with directives with noun phrases produced with
question format.
In Example 1, six-year-old Becky has been sitting on Moms lap while her father
has been reading a book to her, seated on the couch immediately adjacent. Bedtime
stories constitute one of the sub-projects in the trajectory of getting ready for bed in
US families.
Example 16
On completion of Dads reading the story, marked by his slamming the book shut
and leaving, Mom (lines 13, 15) states, Shall we? Bedtime? Beckys response shows
that Moms utterance is treated as a directive. She shakes her head in disagreement
and bargains for delaying the actual bedtime with her utterance Will you read me
(line 16). Mom agrees to read Becky another story and the two go upstairs to Beckys
bedroom. Despite the small protest Moms directive is successful. A haptic frame-
work for the exchange of signs across several modalities is made possible by the
positioning of Becky on Moms lap; such an arrangement provides both tactile and
. In this and all following transcripts in this chapter, bolded italics is equivalent to under-
lining for stress or emphasis.
visual access to precisely how one is oriented towards the trajectory of actions in
progress and facilitates compliance. In addition the close proximity of bodies in a
nested formation allows for Mom to control next moves of her daughter towards the
target activity.
A similar type of control is exhibited by a mom in Example 2, which also occurs
at an activity junction, right after dessert has been eaten at the evening meal. Prior to
Example 2 Mike (age 7) has initiated multiple points of loving contact with his mother
during dinner, whispering a secret to her, hugging her after she promises him dessert,
and letting her examine the little air vent on his pajama top. As Mom gets up from
her chair while holding Mikes waist, she states, Come on. She next puts her hands on
Mikes shoulders and states, Alright. Brushing? The noun phrase brushing (brush-
ing teeth), overlaid with question intonation, indexes a next sub-activity in the larger
trajectory of going to bed that is willingly complied with. Mike (who smiles) moves
with Mom as she shepherds (Cekaite 2010) him in the direction towards the bath-
room. His movement towards the target activity, rather than verbal uptake, constitutes
the relevant next move in the sequence to moms directive.
Example 2
The format [Boundary Marker + Noun phrase with rising intonation] occurs at
a boundary of activities in a third example. In Example 3 Dad and his 10-year-old
daughter Amy return one evening after having escorted a friend home. Upon reach-
ing the front door Dad says, Okay. Pajamas? (1.8) Maybe a shower in the morning?
When no answer is received, Dad reinstates the request but transforms it by proposing
a different time: Or do you want a shower tonight. After Amy chooses morning over
the evening he delivers an imperative (line 11): Then go get into your pajamas.
Example 3
Following Dads imperative, Amy stops briefly to play the piano, rather than going
straight to her bedroom to put on pajamas. As Dad proceeds upstairs, he provides
a slight tap on her back. This tap functions as a sort of recycling of the action. She
responds to the tap with an agreement particle Okay, (line 14) and begins immedi-
ately moving to comply with what she was told to do. For younger children (ages67)
seated on a parents lap (Example 1) or standing near a parent (Example 2), haptic
action served as a form of control move. Here the gentle tap functions as a re-completer
in interaction with a ten-year-old. We will now consider transitioning from one activ-
ity to another with an eighteen-month-old child involved in quite close physical con-
tact with her mom, affording close monitoring of each others actions.
3.2 F
acing formations, haptic action, and transitioning in directive
sequences
Discussing what he terms the F Formation Kendon (1990:239) states that close prox-
imity of bodies allows an easy, direct, and equal access to every other participants
transactional segment. Examining a range of directive trajectories we not only can
locate alternative types of facing formations that parents and children establish, but
also differing forms of attunement to the task at hand; these stances include various
forms of compliance and non-compliance (often achieved through refuting or ignor-
ing). As is visible in Examples 1 and 3, when parent and child are in close alignment,
haptic action can assist in transitioning smoothly from one activity to another.
This is evident in the following, in which Mom and 18-month-old Roxanne move
from a vis--vis facing formation entailing play with the mothers face (in a game
called bus driver) to an orientation involving joint attention to the activity of read-
ing a book, an important subproject in the overarching activity of getting a child ready
for bed among Los Angeles families. The following transcript illustrates the bodily
activity that accompanies the mothers attempts at realigning the operative framework
of mutual orientation.
Example 4
As Mom attempts to close down the bus driver game, which has entailed Roxannes
play with Mothers face, she signals the completion of the activity with a narration
of the activities surrounding the figure of the bus driver in the story-like game: All
done. The bus drivers off work. Hes all gone. (lines 1, 34) Narration of the bus
drivers moves provides a way of closing down the game activity and transitioning to a
new activity without having to tell the co-participant directly what to do next. Through
a narration of a fictional characters activities, such a move has affinities with framings
such as Okay or Alright, that occur in interaction with older children, bounding off
prior activity from a new line of endeavor. (See Examples 13.) Concurrently as Mom
(line 7) produces her second All done (line 7) she sits up while laughing as she faces
Roxanne briefly and then picks up a book to read. Roxanne responds by readjusting
her body position from facing mom to positioning herself towards the new object of
joint attention, the book, as seen in the last two frame grabs of Example 4. The entire
sequence is overlaid with affective warmth through smiles, laughter and loving touch.
As Mom indicates that one activity is closing with her A:ll do:ne. (line 12),
Roxanne responds with a reciprocal All done? (line 13), repeating Moms utterance,
though with rising intonation that requests affirmation. As Mom responds with yet
another repetition of All done, Roxanne readjusts her body position so that she is
more closely positioned towards the new object of orientation, the book (as seen in
the frame grab above). Having closed off the bus driver game in this indirect narrative
form, Mom next initiates the upcoming activity with a directive that with its inclu-
sive pronouns proposes joint activity involving both speaker and hearer (Goodwin
1990:11011): Lets finish the book so we can go nigh-night. Mom successfully
executes an important subproject of the going to bed trajectory using the mitigated
directive form. Roxanne ratifies this proposal by repeating book and agreeing with
okay while simultaneously moving closer to her mom to cuddle, and gazing at the
book.
The movement from one activity to the next is accomplished through both verbal
and haptic action. Routinely parents bound and close off competing prior activities
with terms such as okay and all right with children older than 1.8 months (Good-
win 2006b). Next, after working to achieve the attention of their interlocutor, they
work to achieve the repositioning of the body of the child towards the new activity
focus (i.e. the sink where tooth brushing is to be done (Tulbert & Goodwin 2011:81));
such movement into a new activity of course depends on the willing cooperation of
the child (Cekaite 2012). In Example 4 a form of activity contract (Aronsson & Cekaite
2011) is achieved; a small 18-month child moves her body in the position Mom guided
her and ratifies the new directive proposing to read a book with okay (line 18), as
well as a close physical cuddling realignment of her body. All of this was achieved
through mitigated (Labov & Fanshel 1977) forms (narration of a character in a story
game) and first person plural inclusive directive that proposed rather than demanded
a next course of action involving speaker as well as recipient.
3.3 L
aunching a directive and opening a negotiation space with a Swedish
modal interrogative ska du/are you going to
In Swedish family interactions, the interrogative with modal verb ska (shall) format
is recurrently deployed at the juncture of activities to introduce a new action trajec-
tory. Ska du/shall you or are you going to constitutes a standard pre-sequence move,
compared to other directivesequence initial grammatical formats in the Swedish
corpus. Its significant feature is its location within the flow of family routine activi-
ties, for instance, when the TV show is over, when the child recipient finishes another
activity, such as playing the piano, brushing ones teeth, bathing. Not unlike the US
formats discussed above (e.g. Example 13), the ska du x?/are you going to inter-
rogative is preceded by an activity closure (e.g. parent switching off the TV etc.), and
by a summons for the childs attention. Parents attune to the spatial dimensions of
executing the directive by turning towards a child, coming closer, and by establishing
a facing-formation.
The ska du x? format constitutes a sequence-initial move that targets the childs
next activity in the temporal unfolding of routine activities and is used to introduce
action which has not been brought up in interaction before, constituting a new topic
in the interactional flow of the family. In Example 8, Dad bounds off prior activity by
switching off the TV after an evening TV show, summons Ingella (5-year-old daugh-
ter) and, upon establishing an F-formation, uses an interrogative to introduce a new
line of endeavor.
Example 8
Having closed off the activity in this manner, establishing an F-Formation and locat-
ing the pre-request at the activity boundary, Dad initiates the next activity with an
interrogative modal construction ska du ta p dig pyjamasen nu? (are you going
to put on your pajamas now?) that requests his daughters affirmation. Upon locating
the pajamas, Dad next issues several moves that require the daughter to engage in a
relevant course of action (lines 3, 5), using resources that invoke the relevant activity
by stating, and also physically (through touch in line 5) enforcing this action. He uses
1st person plural and present tense, line 3, and an imperative, line 5, to close down the
potential negotiation space that is opened by the initial interrogative in line 1. Across
the episode, Dads interactional moves are produced with his usual non-prominent
pitch, and relative pitch height (ranging from 100 to 200 Hz).
Other modal forms, described in studies on requests, such as kan du x?/can you
do x? that at least, formally, display concern with the recipients ability to comply with
the directive or modal forms vill (Eng. will) that orient to the recipients desires to
comply (Craven & Potter 2010) are rarely used in the initial launching of task-oriented
directives. The ska du x?/ are you going to x? interrogative format is multilayered in
that the modal form used outlines (among other functions) a potential/future horizon
of action, asking, rather than demanding the recipient about this action trajectory.
Sequentially it makes relevant the recipients production of the next step in the com-
municative project, i.e. acknowledgement or refusal to comply, and opens interac-
tional opportunities for negotiations and non-compliant responses.
3.4 H
aptic directives and embodied compliance
in the ska du?/are you going to? trajectory
The initial interrogative outlines a possible course of action for the child but it does not
receive an embodied compliant response. Rather, it opens a negotiation space. Chil-
drens responses include: (i) negative verbal responses/refusals; (ii) non-forthcoming
responses/ignoring; (iii) minimal verbal acceptance; (iv) verbal responses that promise
compliance but under different conditions. The haptic aspects are recurrently actual-
ized in the progressive development of such directive sequences and are closely related
to the reinstatements of the directive.
Upon the childs non-forthcoming compliance, parents next moves involve
imperatives as well as pragmatically similar grammatical forms, i.e. declaratives that
work to close down the negotiation space, as well as particles (d) that indicate that
the requested action is already on the agenda. Reinstatements of directives are over-
laid with haptic actions that constrain the childs bodily opportunities for alternative
involvement (Examples 8, 9, 10). Haptic formats such as poking, touching the child, or
deploying shepherding moves initiate the incipient embodied compliant action.
In the following Example (Example 9), Mom establishes an arbitrary activity junc-
ture by asking a 9-year-old boy, who, after finishing dinner, sits down to watch TV, if he
is going to prepare himself for going to bed before the TV show. Some contextualization
of evening routines in Swedish families is appropriate here in order to recognize the
structuring role of the TV shows in Swedish family data. For younger children, chil-
drens TV shows constitute temporal activity boundaries for going to bed. For older
children, who are allowed to watch some TV programs later in the evening, bed prepa-
rations putting on pajamas, brushing teeth, etc. are essential before the particular
TV show.
Example 9
In lines 12 Mom summons the boys attention (but listen) with a non-adversative
conjunction and a second person vocative du, framing her interrogative are you
going to prepare yourself (for bed) before the TV program? as a topically new act, and
also framing the boys current act (watching TV) as a counter to her expectations.
When no response is forthcoming, Mom upgrades the initial form and uses a special
type of imperative an imperative with an overt subject to signal that the action is
already on the agenda (line 4). The imperative is also overlaid with a haptic format:
Mom pokes the boy and he complies with the request (line 5).
The pragmatic force of the are you going to x? question format (a directive, and
not an information question) is demonstrated in the parents persistent attempts to
achieve the childs compliance. While the sequence-initial question format opens up
the possibility of taking into account the childs perspective, the parents initial display
of concern for the child recipients contingencies, whether or not s/he plans/intends
to comply with the request, is terminated shortly after the childs non-response/non-
compliance. The opening of negotiation by means of ska du/are you going to is
followed by a number of formats that, in declarative or imperative form, and with a
reference to an action as something that is already known to be on the agenda, close
down the negotiation space (Example 810).
In Examples 10 and 11 below, Mom and her eight-year-old daughter have finished
joint violin practice. After some conversation about favorite musical pieces, Mom
shifts topic and launches an interrogative directive.
Example 10
While Hanna in line 2 acknowledges her reluctant compliance (using weary voice
quality and elongated vowel), she does not engage in the requested action. Later on
(Example 11 below), after some conversation between Mom and her daughter, Mom
uses haptic means to turn the girl to face her, and establishes an intercorporeal facing-
formation (Mom holds Hanna by her hand). She then reinstates the directive with the
turn-initial a men nu well but now calling attention to a topical shift from a current
conversation between the girl and Mom.
Example 11
The directive, re-instantiated in an imperative form with an overt subject (lines 13)
and final particle d, indicates that this action is already on the agenda and encodes
in the language the reference to the activity contract, a mutual agreement about the
childs compliance (e.g. Example 10, lines 13).
Here, we can see how haptic action is deployed in the upgrading of the directive.
Mom playfully turns the girl around (line 4). This movement results in joint reposi-
tioning of the girls body from facing an alternative activity space (window) towards
facing, and being bodily positioned, towards the space/direction for the next activity,
going upstairs to tidy the room. Mom next initiates the requested activity with an
embodied directive, which is designed as a haptic control act produced subsequent to
the girls ratification of the request (lines 56). In addition to close proximity of bod-
ies, the haptic actions of shepherding allow Mom to control her daughters next moves
towards the target activity. Such an arrangement provides both tactile and visual access
to how the other is oriented towards the trajectory of actions in progress and facilitates
compliance: it is these intercorporeally arranged directives that initiate and enforce the
recipients compliant embodied action (lines 67).
Particular grammatical formats and the progressivity of the directive sequence
are related to the alignments participants have taken up in preceding talk and action
(cf. Wootton 1997). When directives are accepted by the recipient, they provide war-
rants for a subsequent reinstatement of the directive, as they form activity contracts
(Aronsson & Cekaite 2011) in the family, constituting a form of intergenerational
promise to complete the requested action (Example 11, lines 14). When parent and
child are in close alignment, haptic action can assist in transitioning from non-compli-
ant bodily action to (at times, gently enforced) embodied compliance.
4. L
aunching directives amidst childrens ongoing activities: Imperatives
and defiant non-compliant responses
In the prior sets of Examples (111) participants were positioned in close proxim-
ity to each other, allowing for the establishment of a framework of joint attention;
no competing activities were in play. On other occasions directive trajectories may
be launched in the midst of a childs ongoing activities, during play with a toy, while
watching television or being engaged with a sibling, and without clear closure of the
ongoing activity. Often parents fail to establish a close huddle for the orchestration of
the directive. In order to launch the directive into the space where the child is located
and to propel it over the din of noise of a television set or raucous play, they must yell
the directive (often taking the form of an imperative) from one room to another, or
even from one floor of the house to another (which results in repeated summonses
and directives).
In Example 12, which follows, the escalated volume and pitch of the impera-
tive is designed to dislodge Jonah from roughhousing play with his younger brother
Dylan. Moms bald imperative rises to almost 500 Hz. In Example 12 first a summons
is used (Jonah! line 1). Receiving no response, Mom persists with bald imperatives
(lines23, 5), which must be recycled three times; rather than securing compliance
from Dylan, the directive is ignored.
Example 12a

In initiating the directive Mom fails to establish a framework for joint orientation.
Having yelled the imperative from a bedroom into the living room, where Jonah was
playing with his two-year-old brother Dylan (line 1), his mother receives no verbal
response from Jonah, who runs upstairs (line 4). By escaping her he positions himself
as unaccountable for the action she has proposed. In what follows Mom attempts in
vain to disengage Jonah from play with Dylan (lines 617). She seeks to recruit Dad (to
no avail) (lines 810) and recycles her imperative several times (lines 1213, 2122),
until finally receiving a laughing Oka(hh)y in lines 18, 2324.
Example 12b
It is only through grabbing Jonahs wrists to separate him from his younger brother
(line 17) and dragging Jonah to the couch where he slides to the floor that mom is able
to elicit a verbal agreement (line 18) to her directive. Considerable effort is exerted
to establish a framework of joint attention; even as Mom tackles Jonah, he challenges
her directive with a laughing non-compliant Wh(hhhhhh)y question (Bolden &

Robinson 2010) and a writhing body. Jonahs verbal moves of acquiescence (lines 18,
2324) are produced in the midst of embodied frames of non-compliance. His okay
moves (lines 2324) are produced laughingly rather than plaintively (as in Example13).
In fact moms directive asking Jonah to read to Dylan is never successfully executed
during the course of the evenings activities. Nine minutes later it is Dad who asks,
Jonah, why dont you get a real story to read to Dylan?, which Mom seconds with
Yeah. Thatd be great. Jonah, however, has a different plan. He jumps on Dylan on
the couch. At this point Dad issues a high-pitched bald imperative to Jonah: JONAH!
STOP! ITS OVER! followed shortly afterwards by Go get a book Underwear Man!
An extended negotiation ensues, escalating with threats to have Jonahs gameboy taken
away (though this never pans out). Dad gives up the fight and later tackles Jonah in his
bed to get him to read a book to his brother.

Figure 1.
We see from this sequence of failed attempts to get a child to do something that
bald imperatives, delivered without the establishment of a framework of mutual orien-
tation in the midst of childrens own competing activities (Goodwin 2006a), or without
the formulation of an activity contract (Aronsson & Cekaite 2011), prove unsuccessful
in executing parental directives. The directives examined here involve considerable
tactile communication, though in the service of dismantling competing configura-
tions and attempting to gain some joint focus, rather than playfully guiding the child
towards a next activity (as in Examples 2, 4, and 11b).
5. Declarative directives about time and embodied affective responses
In contrast to bald imperatives, produced with escalated volume and high pitch, as in
Example 12, declarative directives that include a time reference index implicit obliga-
tions without dramatic pitch excursions. Three different forms of time are referenced
in declarative directives: explicit clock time, units of time (twenty minutes) and
time in a sequence of activities (such as completion of a television show, reading of a
book, etc. that is related to the larger activity in progress.) The responses to declarative
directives in a deontic modality, however, can take a variety of shapes and signal a range
of affective responses. In that children do not habitually treat directives to go to bed as
desirable, they often respond with considerable resistance, through displaying reluc-
tant agreement (compliant unhappiness) and disappointment (Examples13, 14,16),
disgruntled disbelief and exasperation (Example 13), whiny and pleading objections
(Examples 17, 18), defiant refusals (Example 15, 17), corrections (Example16), righ-
teous indignation (Example 17), etc.
5.1 Reluctant agreement (Okay) and embodied exasperation (Uh::)

In the US data, declarative deontic statements frequently entail reference to units of
time. The directive You guys are goin to bed in twelve minutes. receives two different
responses from children. While eleven-year-old Michele responds with an agreement
particle, Okay., with plaintive intonation expressing reluctant agreement, seven-year-
old Cynthia drops to her knees in an embodied response cry (Goffman 1978) of dis-
gruntled disbelief and exasperation (with a vowel 934 ms seconds long). The image
below captures Cynthias stance:
Example 13
In the Swedish data, declaratives with explicit references to chronological time invoke
particular expectations concerning the childrens actions and evening routines. In
the next example, Mom initiates a sequence by making an announcement about time
when talking to the girls (8 and 10 years old), who are playing the game of Solitaire at
the computer:
Example 14
Moms announcement starts with a turn-initial you know what that frames the
upcoming announcement as a new topical contribution to the ongoing interaction.
Almas response is an acknowledgement, produced with an audible sigh, indexing
her disappointment (line 3). Upon the daughters negative affective stance, Mom
formulates what the girls are expected to do and establishes boundaries for their
current activity that do not interrupt it right away (allowing Alma to play the game
of Solitaire until it ends), and formulates mutual agreement (activity contract)
about the transition to the requested activity (lines 69). Despite that, the daugh-
ters ratification with minimal particles is produced with an intonation of reluctant
agreement (line 8).
5.2 Defiant refusal (No)

In Example 15 an alternative response to a declarative directive about time occurs:
a loud defiant refusal, produced with an extremely high pitch. Though the declara-
tive directive is similar in shape to that of Example 13 (Listen. You need to be in
bed in twenty minutes.), in response Jonah screams NO! The vowel of NO lasts
860ms, an extremely long vowel showing heightened affective response. In contrast
to the relatively low-pitched responses in Example 13 (200 and 300 Hz), the pitch
in Jonahs response rises to 600 Hz. This defiant response is answered with a threat:
If you are not in bed in twenty minutes I will hunt wherever your gameboy is
and get it. And it will be gone for the week. (lines 58), though the threat is never
actualized.
Example 15
5.3 Correction, reluctant agreement, and compliant unhappiness

Statements about time can be responded to with corrections rather than moves in a
trajectory of action; they formulate indirect rather than explicit directives. In Example
15 in response to Dads time declarative, Its five minutes after eight. Tim provides a
correction, arguing about the accuracy of Dads statement; Tim treats it as an inform-
ing rather than dealing with its implication in a trajectory of action.
Example 16 ((Father talks to Tim, whose bedroom door is closed))
When Dad recycles his statement about the time with Whatever it is its after eight.
(line 3), Tim provides an update on the progress of his getting-ready-for-bed activities.
Im comi::::ng (line 4) indexes the temporal trajectory of his current activities: his com-
pliance is under way. The talk is produced with a plaintive tone of voice (Gunthner
1997:253), a prosodic contour characterized by high pitch, rising-falling elongated glides
on lengthened vowels, and hearable as displaying compliant unhappiness. Dad, however,
treats Tims response as unsatisfactory, stating, You need to be done. When Dad men-
tions yet another task he wants completed by bedtime: Iwant all your clothes in the
hamper please. Tim responds with promise (I wi::::ll. in line9) using prosody that
displays reluctant affiliation. However, in that he does not initiate movement to carry out
the requested action, Tims response is again treated as wanting. Dads Hurry up. rein-
states that accomplishing the tasks at hand is not being completed at an appropriate pace.
5.4 Whiny pleading objections in English and Swedish

Whiny pleading objections as well as displays of righteous indignation occur in
response to a declarative statement about time in the next example (Example 17).
Dad initiates the sequence with a declarative directive to his son, who has been in
the bathroom for over a half hour: Alright dude. Time to come out. Youve got some
homework according to Mommy. Lets go. In response Dad gets a groaning no nega-
tive response and a crying I do(h)nt wa(h)nt to(h). Daniel protests having to do his
homework not because of the work it will entail, but because having completed the
homework, hell have nothing more that he needs to do and will have to go to bed
(line1012). When Dad explains that he will then be given five minutes to watch TV,
Daniel complains in an indignant response No. Five minutes. That stinks. with an
exaggerated singsong intonation displaying incredulity. At this point Dad no longer
bargains but threatens with treatment equivalent to what happened the day before.
Example 17 ((Father talks to child who has locked himself in the bathroom.))

In the next example of Swedish directives to go to bed (Example 18), after a number
of Moms directives attempting to get the child to bed, a five-year-old boy produces a
multimodal, pleading objection to Moms announcement that hell sleep in his parents
bed tomorrow. In that young children in Sweden are frequently allowed (if they so
wish) to sleep together with their parents, Emil tries to define his terms with regard to
the requested action.
Example 18
Mothers turn in line 1 occasions Emils emotional outburst. The turn-initial response
cries E::h and AJ have extended vowel length (937 msec on the vowel of aj). A::J
is produced with a rising-falling intonation contour, a high global pitch, character-
istic of pleading intonation contours. While the interjection AJ is associated with
responses when being physically hurt, here it is immediately accompanied with an

account that unpacks the reason for Emils affective stance, namely, the violation of
the boys personal preferences. In addition, the account carries a contour, similar to
that of pleading objections; rising-falling intonation on the emphatically accentuated
word (dag today) highlights the boys alternative terms for the requested action.
Markedly high amplitude, rising-falling intonation and vowel elongation index the
directive as an adversarial action, a violation that occasions the childs emotional out-
burst of frustration or unhappiness. The pleading turn is coordinated as an intri-
cate embodied stance, in that Emil makes his body immobile and unavailable for the
requested action. After following Mother from the living room, he collapses and sits
on the floor.
Moms low-key response to this powerful emotion display is multilayered: she
does not change the course of action (she carries him to the bathroom). However, by
using a question format, she verbally displays orientation to the childs perspective on
actions (line 4). Simultaneously, the moms scooping the child and carrying him pro-
duces a powerful non-verbal control move (Cekaite 2010), leaving the child with no
opportunities for non-compliance.
5.5 Discussion of stance-taking responses

In our data we found that an array of embodied verbal responses to declarative
directives about time are possible. The verbal forms of compliance take the shape
of agreement tokens (okay), response cries (Uh:, Eh AJ::: ), promises (such as
I will) and acknowledgements (I know), while non-compliance occurs in refus-
als with disagreement tokens (such as No), repairs (that attempt to sidetrack the
implicit action requested and treat the action as an informing), in minimal and in
full clauses (I dont want to and But I want to sleep with you tonight). Overlaying
these verbal responses are forms of prosody displaying heightened emotive involve-
ment (Selting 1994). Responses can make use of dramatic rising-falling elongated
glides, high global pitch, increased amplitude, and extended vowels to produce a
plaintive tone of voice in pleading objections or high pitch excursions as well as
extended vowels on negatives to register an emphatic refusal. When we examine the
prosody and embodied actions that laminate the responsive actions produced, we
find that recipients have available a rich palate of alternative registers with which
to articulate compliance or non-compliance. In the face of defiant refusals parents
escalate with threats (Examples 15 and 17), negotiations (Example 16) or tactile con-
trol through scooping up the child (Example 18) and transporting him to the desired
location.
6. Conclusion
Directives, as actions in the world, are designed to mobilize participants to take forms
of embodied action. While verbal responses of agreement may constitute a first stage
in a directive sequence, as examples in this paper illustrate, the givers of directives seek
something more than verbal responses to their first actions. In the midst of directive/
response sequences a speaker closely monitors the body of her addressee to assess
whether her talk is receiving the forms of alignment and co-participation that she
proposes to be relevant. Within interaction in the household, as in the workplace and
scientific settings (Goodwin 1994; Goodwin 2000a), participants, rather than being
stationary (as at a dining room table), are quite mobile and are often engaged in mul-
tiple activities simultaneously (Good 2009). A joint focus of attention, unproblematic
in phone calls, cannot be assumed.
Speakers who issue directives engage in considerable work to line up recipi-
ents in operative participation frameworks and facing formations, at points even
tackling the child or physically dislodging him from an alternative framework of
engagement (Example 12). Parents must often bound off prior activities and initi-
ate new ones, to bring focus to the directive. Slotting a directive at a clear juncture
in the evenings activities (Examples 14; 511) can provide for smooth transitions
to a new activity frame with (eventual) compliance. A noun phrase produced with
rising intonation can efficiently launch the directive sequence (Examples 13).
Although question formats allow for the introduction of negotiations (childrens
perspective and refusals), this interactionally constructed orientation to the childs
perspective (requesting affirmation) is generally short lived and usually confined to
the initial question format (Examples 811). When parents take into account the
ongoing activities of children in building their directives, less opposition occurs
than when initiating an imperative disrupting childrens play. In Example 12,
although an Okay agreement with moms directive eventually occurs, Jonah pro-
duces it with laughter and only after considerable recycling of the directive and
bodily tackling, amidst a series of responses of defiant non-compliance and chal-
lenges. And despite Jonahs verbal agreement to read to his brother, over the course
of the evening, he never does so.
Directives in face-to-face interaction are multimodal; in our corpus of family inter-
action they are realized through both prosody and touch in addition to syntax. Their
successful execution is facilitated by close proximity to the body of the person one wishes
to engage in a course of interaction (Examples 14), as haptic action can be employed to
reconfigure the alignment of bodies vis--vis one another. Speakers can re-position the
body of their recipient towards the target activity, steering or even carrying her to the
target destination (Example 18). Haptic action provides for considerable control with
younger children (at least to age 7 in the US and 9 in Sweden). Babies bodies in close
proximity can be deftly shifted from place to place, while making commentary closing
down a prior activity and launching a new one (Example4).
In examining responsive actions, we find a calibration of affective stances taken
in both compliant and non-compliant next moves. In addition to their talk, chil-
drens intonation contours and body alignment display how they position themselves
vis--vis their interlocutors directives. Compliance may take the shape of non-verbal
responses such as willing movement towards the target space indexed by the direc-
tive, minimal verbal agreement plaintive, reluctant, or joyful with a parents direc-
tive, or response cries, e.g. exasperation or disgruntled disbelief. Non-compliant next
moves involve embodied actions such as running away from a parent, remaining
immobile, as well as using language to design defiant/confrontational or pleading
refusals. Despite childrens minimal verbal agreements, using particles such as okay
or yes to comply with the directive, embodied compliant action is produced only
after an extended directive sequence i.e. numerous (and especially with younger
children) haptic directives. As agents with purposes of their own (Pontecorvo etal.
2001), children can respond to directives with considerable resistance (Aronsson &
Cekaite 2011:139).
Participants orient to the ever-changing ways in which human action is built
by entangling resources with different properties into configurations where they
can mutually elaborate each other (Goodwin 2013) across the life of a communi-
cative project. Parents can assemble or dismantle platforms for childrens learning
forms of accountability in routine activities through the way they structure direc-
tive trajectories (Examples 4, 11). By making proposals for action and displaying
their engagement in pursuing them, participants assist in nurturing children to pur-
sue fundamentally co-operative ways of being in the world forms of engagement
which are important for both pedagogy and creativity (Aronsson & Cekaite 2011;
Goodwin & Goodwin 2013).
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Appendix. Glossing abbreviations
def definite
imp imperative
inf infinitive
pres present
prt particle
How to do things with requests
Request sequences at the family dinner table*
Jenny Mandelbaum
Rutgers University
Requests for food and other things at the family dinner table generally run
off smoothly, without breaking the surface of interaction. That is, in an
environment of multiple concurrent involvements (Lerner and Raymond,
2014), requesting and fulfilling requests for food or other things usually only
momentarily suspends or delays the progressivity of other concurrent activities.
This conversation analytic study examines requests in which interactants do
more than just requesting. Drawing on videotaped holiday dinners of nine
families in the Northeastern United States, 91 requests (principally for food)
were collected. I show how at each position in the unfolding of a request
sequence, opportunities may be taken to implement some other action. That
is, requests may be formulated in such a way as to do more than requesting
(e.g. they may enact impatience, implement a complaint about the requested
item, or treat an interlocutor as noncompliant). Responses to requests may be
produced in such a way as to do more than fulfilling the request (e.g. they may
enact attentiveness, critique being asked for the item, teach proper norms of
conduct, or even perform a tit for tat). In third position also, appreciations
or acknowledgements of fulfilled requests may do more than appreciating or
acknowledging (e.g. they may be designed to acknowledge an impropriety in the
fulfilling of the request). Findings indicate how the formulation, fulfillment and
acknowledgement of requests may provide a structure through which norms of
food consumption and distribution, family relationships and personhood may
be enacted and negotiated.
*The author is grateful to Galina Bolden, Gene Lerner, Jeff Robinson and Steven
DiDomenico for very helpful suggestions during the development of this study, and Steven
DiDomenico, Danielle Danisenko, Lisa Dolan, Lauryn Siu and Lori Pesnell for assistance
with data collection.
Jenny Mandelbaum
1. Introduction
This study examines how interactants initiate and implement the transfer of objects,
mainly food and other food-service-related items, at the family holiday dinner table.
Iaddress this process principally in terms of how requests are made, responded to,
and fulfilled. However I use the term request tentatively, as it is freighted with sev-
eral generations and domains of intellectual legacy. In this report I hope to separate
the interactional processes involved in object transfer from the speech act theory
heritage of requests.
This chapter shows that the implementation and fulfillment of requests are not
always innocent. Rather, they may provide opportunities for speakers to implement
other actions. While some of these actions are related to the activity of requesting and
fulfilling requests, others use requests and their fulfillment as an opportunity to imple-
ment other, non-request-related actions.
Prior research has addressed different aspects of how requests are composed. For
instance, Blum-Kulka (2008), Blum-Kulka, House, and Kasper (2008), Brown and
Levinson (1987), Ervin-Tripp (1976, 1981, 1982), Ervin-Tripp, Strage, Lampert, and
Bell (1987), and others have examined comprehensively how different compositional
features of requests may embody norms of politeness. Craven and Potter (2010), Curl
and Drew (2008), Heinemann (2006), Lindstrm (2005), Wootton (1981), Zinken and
Ogiermann (2013) and others have shown how different constructions (e.g. Could/
Can you modal verb formulations vs. I wonder if , or could you vs. couldnt you)
may enact entitlement to having the request granted, and may be attentive to the con-
tingencies involved in fulfilling the request. In my collection, almost a third of the
requests (29 out of 91) were formulated with modal verbs. Of these, 17 were Can
Ihave formulations, and 2 were Can I get. 6 were Could you pass, or pour or
give, and 2 were can you pass. 17 requests were formulated as imperatives, such
as Nathaniel pass me the dressing, 8 interactants formulated requests using just an
object name such as Salt and 13 used pre-requests. There were 24 requests that were
composed using other formats, including Ill have, I want, or Ill take X. (See
Table 1.)
The composition of requests at these family dinners suggests that interactants
enact high entitlement to have their request granted, and that they do not regard
their interlocutors as facing contingencies that would prevent them from fulfilling the
request by delivering the requested item (Curl & Drew, 2008).
As Jefferson has pointed out, the people to whom we are rudest are frequently
the people to whom we are closest. Blum-Kulka (1997), Goodwin (2006) and oth-
ers have noted that this may be one way in which we enact this closeness. Simple
Can I have or object name constructions, sometimes with a please (although this
occurs in only 17 of 91 cases, and appears to upgrade the insistence of the request) and
Table 1. Request formats

Total: 91 Can I have Can Could you Can you Other
(the) X I get pass/pour/give pass
Modal verb 29 17 2 6 2 2
Imperative 17
Object name 8
(e.g. salt, dressing)
Pre-request 13
Other (e.g. Ill have, 24
I want, Ill take X)
Please 17
Addressee name 18
sometimes with the name of the addressed interactant (18 times in this corpus) are
most commonly simply granted by the passing to the requester of the requested item.
If the item is close by, usually the person next to the requester will fulfill the request. If
it is remote, the item may be passed from hand to hand. Others may help themselves
to the food or gravy along the way. This is not treated as accountable in this collection.
Participants were extremely alert to producing their part in the fulfillment of a request
in a timely fashion. However in my corpus of requests for food, and other food-service
related items, there is a significant number of requests through which other actions are
implemented.
It is important to note that the family dinner table is a particular kind of environ-
ment for interaction. It is, in Raymond and Lerners (2014) terminology, minimally, a
context of dual involvements, since participants are involved in both eating and talk-
ing. Some requests occur during a food service round when everyone is engaged in
filling their plate. Others are produced in response to an offer. Sometimes requests
occur during a lapse in talking during what Schegloff and Sacks (1973) have called a
continuing state of incipient talk and these requests may serve to reengage talk; other
requests launch a second activity during some already ongoing activity.
In this chapter I show how at each position in the unfolding of a request
sequence (Schegloff, 2007), interactants may implement some other action along
with requesting. That is, requests may be formulated in such a way as to do more
than requesting (e.g. they may enact impatience, implement a complaint about the
requested item, or treat an interlocutor as noncompliant). Responses to requests may
be produced in such a way as to do more than fulfilling the request (e.g. they may
enact attentiveness, or treat the requester as impatient). In third position also, appre-
ciations or acknowledgements of fulfilled requests may do more than appreciating or
Jenny Mandelbaum

acknowledging (e.g. they may be designed to address an impropriety in the fulfilling
of the request). Further, at each next position in a request sequence, interactants may
use the structure of requesting to introduce some other activity, such as, in this cor-
pus, implementing a supportive action, performing a tit for tat, or teaching norms
of proper conduct.
2. Data and methodology
The corpus of requests examined here is drawn from a collection of 43 Thanksgiving,

Easter and Passover dinners, videotaped over the last fifteen years on the East coast
of the United States. Drawing on a subset of 9 of the videotapes from the larger col-
lection of 43, 91 requests for food and other food-service related items were collected
and analyzed using Conversation Analysis (cf. Atkinson & Heritage, 1984; Sidnell &
Stivers, 2013).
In these dinners, food is principally distributed through distribution rounds at the
beginning of a course. Some food items (for example, cutlets) may be served plate by
plate, but this is very rare. Some families have a buffet. Most commonly though, the
food is brought to the table and attendees serve themselves or are served by those sit-
ting near them, or by a host or cook. Much of the food distribution occurs at the begin-
ning of a course, with serving plates and bowls being circulated, and hosts or cooks
and sometimes others checking that everyone has everything. Some of the food may
be shunted to a secondary table or credenza if the main table becomes too congested.
So apart from requests for seconds, the requests examined in this study are principally
made for somewhat more sundry items such as salt, pepper, rolls, bread or matza,
butter, drinks, ice, gravy, cranberries, stuffing, vegetables, salad, salad dressing and
olives. Before requesting food items, interactants may be seen looking for them, pre-
sumably at least in part assessing whether or not they can reach them themselves, or
to whom to direct a request.
While some requests barely break the interactional surface, and only momen-
tarily become the primary focus of interaction, interactants may launch other activi-
ties through many requests and responses to them. It is these requests that implement
more than just requesting that are the focus of this chapter.
3. Actions implemented via requests and their fulfillment
A description of a simple request and its fulfillment provides a contrast with requests
and fulfillments that implement some other action also.
3.1 A simple request

Frequently, requests for food and food-service related items at the dinner table do
not break the surface of ongoing interaction. Rather, they are produced and man-
aged as a kind of concurrent but subordinate activity. This occurs in extract (1),
taken from a Thanksgiving Dinner. In line 12 Mom produces a simple request for
the cider, and it is granted right away by Kayley, the daughter sitting next to her on
her left.
Extract 1. Cider
01 (2.5)
02 DAD: Where is the co:ncert
03 tak[ing place at]
04 GRA: [you- the do:c]tors will be so::[so:: ]
05 KAY: [Caroly]ns
06 (0.4)
07 GRA: ta:lented=
08 DAD: =Im not sure where that is. Youn- you know where
09 (1.5)/((KAY takes a mouthful))
10 (0.5)/((MOM looks up across table))
11 (0.5)/((MOM points then[reaches with left hand))
12 MOM:
[C ha:ve the- (.) ci:der please
13 MOM: [((looks to her right, reaches for glass))
14 KAY: [((reaches for[cider and passes to Mom))
15 KAY: [(I don know how t get there)
16 but- I know where it i:s,
17 (1.3)/((MOM takes cider))
18 MOM: [((Holds up cider jug;[starts to pour cider))
19 MAR: [What movie[(a- ave-) ]
20 GRA: [((GRA looks up))
21 GRA: [In which ho:]spital is she.
22 MOM: [Shes in Cle:veland.= I dont=
23 MOM: [((pouring cider))
24 MOM: =remem[ber the na:me of [it.
25 MOM: [((pouring ends)) [((holds glass suspended))
26 (0.4)/((Mom puts jug down))
27 GRA: He:re?
28 MOM: In Cle:veland.
29 GRA: O[h
30 MAR: [mm
In the talk immediately preceding this extract, Mom has been talking with Grandma
about someone they know who is having a heart transplant that day, while Dad (who is
not quite visible at the opposite end of the table from Mom) has been talking with Kay-
ley about a concert she will be attending. Note that Moms request in line 12, C have
the- cider please, is produced after Grandma in lines 04 and 07 has addressed to Mom
an assessment of the heart transplant doctors: the do:c]tors will be so:: so:: ta:lented,
to which an agreement or disagreement or second assessment from Mom might be
relevant, and in line 8 Dad has addressed an inquiry to Kayley, Im not sure where
that is. Youn- you know where. So at the point where Mom produces her request,
there are two sequences open at line 9, where Kayley takes a mouthful, and then Mom
looks across the table, possibly locating the cider, points at it, and reaches towards it
Jenny Mandelbaum
Figure 1. Extract 1
and simultaneously with the reach in line 12, asks, C ha:ve the- (.) ci:der please In
line 13 we see Mom looking to her right and reaching for her glass, apparently assum-
ing that the cider will be delivered. Simultaneously, Kayley reaches for the cider, and
as she picks it up in lines 1516 she responds to Dad, (I don know how tget there)
but- I know where it i:s, Kayley delivers the cider to Mom just as she completes her
utterance. The fulfillment of the request coincides with the completion of her second
pair part to Dad.
We can make several observations about this extract that will provide us with
a baseline organization for simple requests as we later consider others that imple-
ment actions in addition to requesting. First, the request barely emerges from con-
current ongoing activities; rather Mom produces her request during a gap, but there
are two open first pair parts, Grandmas to Mom in lines 47, and Dads to Kayley in
line 8. Mom is chewing, and Kayley has also just taken a mouthful in line 9, although
Mom does not appear to see this. There are therefore several concurrent involvements
(Raymond & Lerner, 2014) at the point where Mom produces her request. Second,
Mom composes her request with the modal formulation, C have, can I have, a
common formulation for requests in this collection, indicating high entitlement to
have the request fulfilled. Third, the request is not addressed to a designated request
recipient. Goodwin (1980) has noted that cut-offs, sound stretches, etc. are often asso-
ciated with seeking recipient eye gaze. Here we cannot see Kayleys gaze, and Mom is
oriented to the cider rather than an addressed recipient, but it may be that her cut-off
and micro-pause are designed to attract the attention of a recipient, while her point
and then reach towards the cider indicate the item she is seeking.
This also raises the issue of the projectability (Sacks, Schegloff & Jefferson, 1974)
of a request, as this has an impact on when a request can be fulfilled. While Chave
strongly projects a request, in English, the noun (that refers to the requested object) is
placed at the end of the turn-constructional unit, and here the cut-off and gap occur
before the noun. So exactly what it is Mom will ask for is not available until late in the
utterance, although her point and reach (towards the cider) provide a strong indi-
cation. Her please extends the turn constructional unit beyond the name of the
requested item, and thus facilitates the request being fulfilled immediately upon the
turns completion.
Fourth, Kayley moves to fulfill the request immediately upon its completion,
and Mom appears to assume immediate compliance, as she turns and reaches for her
glass. Fifth, it is the person next to the requester who fulfills the request. This seems
logical, since both the cider and Kayley are closest to Mom. However it is nonethe-
less notable that since they continue their current involvements without showing
any orientation to Moms request, others at the table do not appear to take it that
the request might have been addressed to them. Finally, we can note that there is no
thank you here. We find thank yous in 8 out of 91 requests, further indicating the
high entitlement embodied in the way requests are composed and responded to. In
this extract, then, a request is produced and fulfilled without disrupting other ongo-
ing action, and without implementing anything more than merely requesting and
fulfilling a request.
3.2 Doing more than just requesting

While there is much to be said about how interactants organize their talk and bodily
conduct so as to accomplish a smooth arrangement of concurrent actions, the focus
of this paper is on requests in which interactants do more than just requesting, using
the structure of the request to implement or occasion other actions. Next I show how
more than just requesting can be implemented at each position in a request sequence
(Schegloff, 2007).
3.2.1 Implementing more than a request in first position

In first position, a request can implement more than just requesting. There are two
ways in which this may occur. First, this may occur when the request is formulated in
such a way as to convey something additional, such as impatience. Second, the imple-
mentation of the request may provide a vehicle that carries another action, such
as implementing a supportive action. I discuss each in turn. In Extract (2), through
the way in which he implements his request for salad dressing, Dad at the head of the
table treats his son Nathaniel as non-compliant. (See Figure 2 for the arrangement of
participants). Shortly before this segment, Nathaniel has taken salad and, in line 01, he
picks up the salad dressing. In lines 34 Dad begins to serve himself salad. After Deb
has inquired in lines 89 why there is no turkey at this Thanksgiving Dinner, and Mom
has responded at line 11, there is a one-second gap during which Dad looks around
Jenny Mandelbaum
across the table. In overlap with Debs third position response to Moms response about
the turkey, in lines 1516 Dad points across the table and simultaneously quietly asks
for the dressing from Nathaniel: Nathaniel pass me the: dressing.. He then keeps
his hand outstretched for the dressing, and prompts Nathaniel for the dressing again
in line 25, The dressing please. Just before he asks again in line 25, he raises his eye-
brows, points, and lurches his head towards the dressing, a motion that appears to
combine impatience and prompting, treating Nathaniel, who apparently has not heard
Dads request (as his repair initiator, What? in line 23 indicates), as noncompliant.
Figure 2. Extract 2
Extract 2. The Dressing

OR16_TheDressingPlease_Fam34_2-58_jr
(Participants (Clockwise from left side head of the table): DAD, DEBBIE, (MICHELLE, not
(
at the table), ANN, TODD, NATHANIEL, and MOM))
01 NAT: ((picks up salad dressing))
02 (2.0)
03 DAD: ((picks up salad tongs
04 [and takes salad))
05 MOM: [((Picks up pepper,[grinds,shakes onto plate,replaces))
06 NAT:
[((pours salad dressing))
07 (4.0)
08 DEB: This is supposed to be a- (0.3) Thanksgiving
09 Dinner then why is there no turkey
10 (1.0)
11 MOM: [Turkey well be doing a lot of wee:ks
12 NAT: [((begins to put cap on dressing; licks finger))
13 (1.0)/((DAD looks around across table))
14 DEB: [Well I ( )]
15 DAD: [((points across the table towards NAT))] Nathaniel pass
16 DAD: me the: [dressing. ][((keepsarm&handextended))
17 TOD: [But I didnt ha:ve][to do it.
18 (0.3)/((DADs finger retracts; arm remains extended))
19 DEB: [Oh you ha:ve it?
20 DAD: [((arm remains extended))
21 NAT: [((NAT looks to his right))
22 (0.3)/((DADs arm remains extended; NAT looks at Dad))
23 NAT: What?
24 (0.5)/((DAD raises his eyebrows, points & lurches head forward))
25 DAD: The dre[ssing please.
26 NAT: [((Picks up dressing and passes to DAD))]
27 DEB: Cause I [ thought you ha:d it
28 DAD: [((DAD takes dressing bottle and shakes))
In reissuing his request with The dressing please., naming the item, with a please,
Dad can be heard to implement a request, but the raised eyebrows, prompting nod,
and point that precede it seem designed to indicate impatience, seeking Nathaniels
compliance before reissuing the request. In implementing his request in this way, Dad
conveys that he takes it that Nathaniel should already know what it is Dad wants, and
that he is being noncompliant in not fulfilling the request. Indicating impatience, and
treating Nathaniel as noncompliant here are implemented as part of the execution of
the request.
Requests may also be used to implement other kinds of actions that are not
directly related to the activity of requesting. Rather, making a request can be used
opportunistically as, in Schegloff s (2007) terms, a vehicle for implementing some
other activity. In Extract (3), Mangita uses a request as a way of disassociating her-
self from the collectivity that was poking fun at Moms jello. At this Easter Din-
ner Mangita, a guest of the family, and Tims girlfriend, apparently in response to
a compliment on the jello from Bobshi, Moms mother, to Mom, asks for jello first
from Mom, who is sitting across from Mangita, and then from her boyfriend Tim,
sitting next to her. Mom does not move to fulfill Mangitas request, and Tim refuses
to fulfill it. Ultimately, she is served jello by Tims brother Jon, in a kind of stealth
dessert delivery to be examined later. Note Mangitas requests for jello in lines 17
and 19. They seem to implement more than just a request for jello: they also imple-
ment a demonstration that Mangita should not be taken to be a member of the
jello-disparaging party.
Extract 3. Jello
OR36_Jello_Fam7b_14-51_LD_ra
((Mangita has just put sugar in Tims tea))

01 MAN: hm hm hm
02 (1.3)
03 MOM: tch Ca:nt do a:nything right ca:n you
04 {(0.4)
05 MOM: {((squirts whipped cream))
06 MAN: ((shakes her head))
07 MAN: No:.
08 [(0.9)
09 MOM: [((replaces lid on whipped cream))
10 BOB: [That je[llo tas[tes refreshing Silvia.]
11 MOM: [((turns[head towards BOB))
12 MAN: [Im ve:ry bad girlfri]:end.
13 MOM: [iYeh
14 MOM: [((nods))
15 MOM: [=SEE my mo:ther li:kes the [ jello
16 MOM: [((turns to Tim))
[((looks down at her dessert))
17 MAN: I:ll have some jello.
18 (0.5)/((Mom picks up spoon & resumes eating dessert))
19 MAN: [((turns head to TIM))
20 MAN: [Ca:n I ave [some jello::]
21 JON:
[Go:d shes n]ice,=
22 TIM: =NO. Do:n ask
23 it [ from this person ]
24 MAN: [>Alright,<[whats the other] thing over ] there
Jenny Mandelbaum
25 MAN:
[((Points across table to her right))]
26 (0.3)
27 MOM: ((points at pie))/(0.7)
28 MOM: Rigo:tta chee:se pi::e
29 JON: [((moves whipped cream))
30 MAN: [okay
31 (1.3)
Earlier in this Easter Dinner, when dessert is first brought out, Tim, Jon, and Dad,
(who is not currently at the table), have played with the jello, turned the bowl with jello
in it upside down, and generally made fun of it. Before this segment also, Bobshi has
taken Mom to task for the jello (asking What was the jello for) and then reminisc-
ing about a time that she, Bobshi, made jello with bananas, Mom said Tim would not
like it, but he ate it at Bobshis place. So not only has Bobshi earlier disparaged todays
jello, she has used this story about jello as a way of indicating Mom does not know her
own childrens taste in food. In Extract (3) then, when Bobshi produces a compliment
of the jello in line 10, it can be heard as a remedial compliment, possibly designed
to repair some of the earlier interpersonal damage. That it may be tied back to earlier
talk is hearable in the use of that in line 10 in referring to That jello. refreshing
is hearable as a positive assessment, well-fitted to jello. Mom somehow understands
that Bobshis turn is addressed to her after the je of jello, turning her head to Bobshi,
behind Jon. She acknowledges the compliment with a quiet yeh before turning to
Tim, sitting directly across from her, and in line 15 announcing quite loudly, SEE my
mo:ther likes the jello.
In describing evidential vindication, Kendrick (ms, p. 7) notes that See?
launches a retro-sequence (Schegloff, 2007). That is, it occupies a responsive position
to something prior, while also beginning an adjacency pair in which it serves as a first
pair part. Here See links back to Bobshis compliment, a positive assessment of the
jello that had been so negatively assessed earlier in the interaction. The stress on my
mother can be heard as contrastive. It is not clear whom Mom is including in the
jello-dislike party, but it might be hearable that anyone at the table is included, except
for Bobshi, who, on the basis of the positive assessment at line 10, Mom now infers
likes the jello. Mom here uses Bobshis positive assessment of the jello as evidence
that at least someone likes the jello. Immediately next, in line 17 Mangita, Tims girl-
friend, and a guest in the house, asks for some jello: I:ll ave some jello. The contras-
tive stress on Ill may serve to make it hearable that here Mangita is separating herself
from others who did not want jello. It seems that asking for a food item embodies or
claims a liking for that food at least enough of a liking to want to eat some. Built
into, and hearable in, a request for food, apparently, is an intention to eat that food. So
when Mangita volunteers to have some jello, she may be attempting to prove that she
is not a member of the jello-disparaging party against whom Mom was launching her
vindication. Rather than disparaging the jello, she would like to eat some. This makes
available the inference that she too likes the jello, and in this way she also produces a
supportive action (Pomerantz, 1978) towards Mom. Mom apparently does not take up
Figure 3. Extract 3
this request;1 in line 18 during the 0.5-second gap, she picks up her spoon and resumes
eating her dessert.
Next in line 20 Mangita produces a request for jello that she addresses to Tim, her
boyfriend Ca:n I ave some jello. Redoing the request here may demonstrate Mangitas
seriousness about wanting some jello, indicating that Ill have some jello was not just
a pro forma request. She produces it in a somewhat wheedling voice, perhaps orienting
to the fact that Tim was one of the jello antagonists earlier. In overlap with this, Jon in
line 21 produces an appreciation of Mangita: Go:d shes nice. This may indicate that
he hears the supportive action toward Mom that Mangita has implemented by request-
ing jello in the wake of Bobshis complimenting it.
Here then in addition to the request providing for Mangita to prove that she is
not a member of the jello-disparaging party, the request also provides a venue for an
assessment of Mangitas civility. This is not part of the ongoing course of the request-
ing action, but is fitted to it, and is hearably directly responsive to Mangitas request,
targeting the supportive action towards Mom that this request implements. Note that
in lines 2223 when Tim refuses to grant Mangitas request for the jello, saying NO.
Dont ask it from this person he may in this way resist the revised assessment of the
jello embodied in the request, and perhaps thereby also Mangitas supportive action
towards Mom. As a guest of the family, and Tims girlfriend, Mangita is in a somewhat
delicate position in terms of the concurrent relationships she must manage. In affiliat-
ing with Mom by requesting jello, she risks disaffiliating with Tim, a primary jello-
antagonist earlier in the meal. Her rapid relinquishing of her request for jello, turning
. Or as Stivers (personal communication) notes, perhaps it is an offer Mangita may be

heard to be offering to have some jello. This observation opens further consideration of differ-
ences and similarities between directives, offers, and requests (see also Clayman and Heritage,
this volume).
Jenny Mandelbaum
to other possible desserts, may be sensitive to this. Requesting jello, it turns out, may
not be an innocent activity.
With regard to the first position of a request sequence, then, we saw that the way
in which the request is implemented may serve to do more than merely requesting in
extract (2) Dad enacted his impatience towards Nathaniel through the way in which
he asked for the dressing. In extract (3), Mangitas request (or possible offer) imple-
mented or carried a new action: extracting herself from the jello-disparaging party,
and thereby producing a supportive action towards Mom.
3.2.2 More than fulfilling a request in second position

We find that in second position also, the way in which the request is fulfilled can
do more than just fulfilling a request, and this can also occasion other actions. For
instance, in second position, the specific way in which the request is fulfilled can
implement not just fulfilling the request, but fulfilling it in a way that prioritizes
other-attentiveness over self-attentiveness, or prioritizes self-attentiveness over other-
attentiveness. In addition to implementing other actions through the way in which
requests are fulfilled, we see that the process of fulfilling a request can provide a vehicle
for implementing other actions, such as a tit-for-tat.
Second position request fulfillments may be done in such a way as to prioritize
other-attentiveness over self-attentiveness. In Extract (4), Mom offers stuffing to Jamie,
her daughter-in-law. Jamie turns her down, but Tess and her sister Lynn ask for stuff-
ing in lines 09 & 10. However Dad, who is a little hard to see to Moms right, takes the
stuffing and serves himself. In lines 2426 Mom asks Tess for the butter. In the way in
which she fulfills Moms request, Tess enacts attentiveness towards Mom, temporarily
suspending a self-attentive matter, monitoring Dads progress with the stuffing, pre-
sumably so as to get stuffing for herself when he is done, to respond to Moms request
for the butter immediately. Tess suspends her incipient move to her left to take stuffing
for herself, and swings laterally to the right to get the butter and pass it to Mom.
Extract 4. Butter
OR23_CanIhaveTheButter_Fam32a_19-36-1_JP_jm
01 TES: >I think its okay< weve got ple:nty
02 of room over here
03 (.)
04 TES: [((places glass pan to her right))
03 TOM: [((moves fork of food towards Tommys mouth]
04 MOM: [You want stu:ffing- Ja:me
05 MOM: [((moves bowl of stuffing nearer to Jamie))
06 TES: I-
07 JAM: Ill have some la:ter ()
08 DAD: [((moves stuffing to his side of the table))
09 TES: [=I:: would like some=
10 LYN: =I: would too.
11 TES: (hh) $were like- we wa:nnit
12 MOM: huh huh huh huh hh
13 (0.2)/((TES looks to her left where DAD has the stuffing))
14 LYN: Ho:n, you wa:nt some of this?

15 (1.3)/((TES picks up her fork; MOM looks along table))
16 TOM: ((looking at Tommy)) Like tha:t
17 ( ): (In the oven)
18 LYN: [What does e a:ve.
19 TES: [((takes a mouthful, head directed towards MOM))
20 TOM: [S[wee:t (pota[toes)
21 DAD: [(([moves stuff[ing bowl over to TES))
22 JAM: [((Leans for[ward & looks over at Rs plate))
23 TES: [((removes f[ork from her mouth))
[Tess can I ave the
24 MOM:
25 TES:
[((brings fork to plate))
26 MOM: [bu:tter,
27 TES: [((wipes side of nose; about to reach left))
28 LYN: (t d[oesnt matt]er)
29 TES: [((Reorients body ]to right; reaches right hand towards butter))
30 TES: [Yeah Mom ]
31 TES: [((reaches for butter plate in the shape of a duck))
32 TOM: ()
33 JAM: He li:kes my sweet pot[ato.
34 TES: [((picks up butter plate by beak))
35 TES: [By the bea]:k!
36 LYN: [(He does.) ]
37 MOM: [((reaches left hand for butter dish))} (0.5)
38 TES: [((hands DAD the butter dish))}
39 DAD: [((Reaches up for butter dish))}
40 JAM: [I made it just for [him:]
41 DAD:
[((Takes butter dish from TES))
42 (0.7)
43 DAD: [((Puts butter on table between him and MOM))
44 TOM: [heh heh
45 TES: [((takes stuffing from the bowl on her left))
Figure 4. Extract 4
Here Tess apparently abandons the incipient action of picking up the stuffing bowl
(the fulfillment of her own request for the stuffing) in favor of fulfilling Moms request
immediately. By both suspending her prior action of extending her right hand across
Jenny Mandelbaum
her body as part of an incipient two-handed reach to take the stuffing (which would
complete the fulfillment of her own request for stuffing), and by pivoting her right
hand quickly to her right and extending it toward the butter dish (that is to say, she
moves economically, Raymond & Lerner 2014, into the new action of fulfilling Moms
request), Tess enacts attentiveness to Mom. In this way she literally embodies her stance
towards fulfilling Moms request, treating it as a priority, enacting a strong obligation
towards the other. We might think of this as a kind of family values in action, where
through these tiny shifts a daughter is maximally attentive to her mothers request.
Of course, attentiveness of this sort need not be reserved for family members, and we
often see family members insisting on their own priority rights.
Sometimes the addressed recipient of a request may delay fulfilling the request.
This may be done for practical reasons, such as needing to free up a hand for passing.
Alternatively, an interactant can insist on their primary rights to the requested item,
implying that the requester has over-assumed their entitlement to the object, or is not
paying proper attention to the needs or rights of others. In my corpus during a Passover
dinner in Extract (5) (not transcribed, as most of the key action is embodied rather than
verbal) we see a mother temporarily suspending the activity of spreading something
(possibly cream cheese) on her matza when her son Jake requests the butter, which is
close to Mom. However she does not immediately abandon her spreading to do this.
Figure 5. Extract 5
Mom temporarily suspends spreading while observing her grand-daughter on the

floor, but after her son Jake requests the butter, asking Ma can you pass the bu:tter she
resumes spreading briefly. As Figure 5 shows, Jake is looking over at Mom when he asks
her for the butter, and can therefore presumably see that she is holding matza in her left
hand, and in her right hand a knife loaded with spread, poised above the matza, spread-
ing temporarily suspended while looking at her granddaughter on the floor to her left.
Although Jake can presumably see Mom is still engaged in spreading her matza, he
makes a request for the butter that would implicate her suspending her own spreading
to pass it to him. Resuming her spreading immediately after his request but before
fulfilling it does not seem to embody resistance to fulfilling Jakes request though.
The resumption of spreading is brief and economical, and seems to be being done for
instrumental reasons. She resumes spreading just enough to remove from her knife
and deposit on the matza the new chunk of spread she had taken just previously with
the knife. The wipe of her knife on the matza is visible, followed by brief, economical
spreading moves, apparently designed to show that she is just freeing her knife of the
spread so that she can put it down in order to pick up the butter dish.
These constrained spreading moves contrast with the spreading of the full expanse
of her matza that she engaged in previously. The knife is in her right hand, and the
matza is in her left hand. She needs to put down the knife in order to be able to use
her right hand to pass the butter, since the butter dish is on her right. She puts down
the knife she has just relieved of its spread, and by still holding her matza poised in
buttering position, she preserves her commitment to spreading her matza, indicating
that she has only temporarily suspended spreading while passing Jake the butter. Once
the butter has been conveyed to her son, she resumes spreading. Here we see Mom
fulfilling her sons request, delaying its fulfillment for practical reasons, but through
the way in which she implements the delay, indicating maximum attentiveness to ful-
filling the request, within the constraints of managing the physical logistics of her own
spreading.
This contrasts with another occasion of butter-passing from the same family that
occurs shortly after Extract (5). Here Jake enacts peremptory rights to the butter when
his sister Kelly asks for it, and attempts to refuse to give it to her, claiming that he is not
done with the butter as the reason for restraining his father, sitting in between them,
from fulfilling the request. Refusing to fulfill a request appears to be extremely rare,
occurring just three times in my corpus of 91 requests.
Extract 6. Butter por favor
OR45_butter por favor_fam35a_17-31_jm
01 KEL: [((Takes [a piece of matza))
02 BAB: [ah ah]
03 BAB: mm
04 (0.5)
05 DAD: Just startin
06 (0.3)
07 JAK: ((putting [butter on his matza)) ]
08 JAK:
[([) ]
09 KEL: [Could you pass de bu:tter por favo:r.=]
10 KEL: [((Looking down))
11 JAK: =>Im not [do:ne wit[h it yet<
12 DAD: [((LiftsplateofbutterandmovesittowardsKEL))
13 JAK: Hey!
14 DAD: ((Stops progress of butter and returns towards JAK))
15 KEL: [>Thank you<
16 KEL: [((Reaches for butter as DAD retracts it))
17 JAK: [I still have the butter knife.
18 DAD: [((Returns butter towards JAK))
19 JAK: [Im not even done with it.
20 DAD: [((Swings butter back towards KEL))
Jenny Mandelbaum
21 DAD: Take: [take: take a chunk

22 KEL: [Im taking my: knife]
23 (0.2)
24 BAB: ehh hhh
25 BAB: uh HE:H E:H E:H e:[:h ] heh
26 KEL: [thank you]
27 (1.8)
28 JAK: You impatient little [we:nch
29 MOM:
[Oh thats a good idea!
30 KEL: Oh oh oh [oh ahhhh
31 MOM: [Get that out of the way
32 KEL: Blasphemy
33 (0.7)
34 JAK: Hows that blasphemy?
35 (0.3)
36 JAK: Youre not Go:d.
37 (0.5)
38 KEL: Yes: I am::
39 [((JIL bends over to pick up baby))]
40 MOM: [I::: got chu!
]
While Jake in line 11 protests that he is not done with it yet, Dad picks up the butter
to pass it over to Kelly. Jake attempts to stop Dad in line 13 with Hey. Dad halts the
progress of the butter towards Kelly, and begins to return it to Jake. In line 15 Kelly
says thank you, reaching for the butter as Dad retracts it. In line 17 Jakes I still have
the butter knife is hearable as protesting, by providing further evidence that he is
not yet done with the butter. As Dad continues to swing the butter back towards Jake,
Jake reiterates that he is not done with it: Im not even done with it (line 19). Dad
offers a solution, inviting Jake to Take a chunk in line 21, and in line 22 Kelly offers a
solution to the butter knife not having traveled with the butter: Im taking my knife.
She thus seems to be persisting in taking the butter, despite Jakes resistance. In line 26
Kelly thanks Dad for the butter with a quiet thank you, and in line 28 Jake censures
Kelly, calling her You impatient little wench. Here Jakes insistence on keeping the
butter despite Kellys request for it contrasts quite strongly with the tendency in this
corpus for unproblematic, swift fulfillment of requests, even where doing so may not
be convenient, as we saw in Extract (4), where Tess abandoned her move to take the
stuffing in favor of passing the butter to her Mom, and in Extract (5), where Mom
rapidly stabilized the spread on her matza, and put down her knife, before fulfill-
ing Jakes request, doing so in a way that indicated that she was fulfilling the request
as fast as was logistically possible. Jakes insistence on his priority with the butter
treats Kellys request as ill-timed, and prioritizes his needs over hers. It is tempting
to say that this instantiates sibling competition over scarce resources, indicating that
in some cases it does not end with adulthood. Perhaps insisting on ones own needs
and rights over those of another is a way of enacting intimacy. Here this is enacted
through delaying fulfilling a request.
Delaying fulfilling a request may not always mean resisting fulfilling it, however.
This is apparent in the jello segment discussed as Extract (3). Here we saw Mangita
request jello, and Tim refuse to fulfill the request. While Mangitas request could be
designed to disassociate herself from the jello-disparaging party, she requests jello
twice, suggesting this is not just a pro forma request: she may be serious about having
some jello. However, as we noted earlier, there is no uptake from Mom in response to
the first request, and Tim refuses to fulfill her second request addressed to him, say-
ing No, dont ask it from this person. Mangita then turns to other possible dessert
options. Next though we see Jon launch a kind of stealth jello delivery, quite some
time after Mangitas initial request for jello, but apparently motivated by it. In line 32,
while Mom is listing for Mangita the other dessert options, Jon picks up the bowl of
jello and puts it down next to his place at the table. In lines 3839, Mangita requests a
piece of the Easter bread that Mom has indicated. In line 41 she adds, And Im ha:ving
some je:llo. Note that her volume drops on je:llo. Immediately next Jon puts a
spoon into the jello (line 43), and in line 48 he asks Mangita for her plate, and puts jello
on it before she passes the plate to Mom for the Easter bread.
Extract 7. Jello
OR36_Jello_Fam7b_14-51_LD_ra
10 BOB: [That je[llo tas[tes refreshing Silvia.]
11 MOM:
[((turns[head towards BOB))
12 MAN: [Im ve:ry bad girlfri]:end.
13 MOM: [iYeh
14 MOM: [((nods))
15 MOM: [=SEE my mo:ther li:kes the[ jello
16 MOM: [((turns to Tim)) [((looks down at her dessert))
17 MAN: I:ll have some jello.
18 (0.5)/((Mom picks up spoon & resumes eating dessert))
19 MAN: [Ca:n I ave [ some jello::]
20 MAN: [((turns head [to TIM))
21 JON: [Go:d shes n]ice,=
22 TIM: =NO. Do:n ask
23 it [ from this person ]
24 MAN: [>Alright,<[whats the other] thing over ] there
25 MAN: [((Points across table to her right))]
26 (0.3)
27 MOM: ((points at pie))/(0.7)
28 MOM: Rigo:tta chee:se pi::e
29 JON: [((moves whipped cream))
30 MAN: [okay
31 (1.3)
32 ((JON picks up bowl of jello))/(0.3)
33 MOM: This is a very: (0.4)
34 MOM: plai:n [ Easter bread,]
35 MAN [think Ive ha:d that] before.
36 (.)
37 MOM: Goo:d.
38 MAN: hhh Ill ha:ve a
39 MAN: little [pie:ce (of that please) ]
40 MAN: [((points & retracts right hand))]
41 MAN: And Im ha:ving some je:llo.
42 MOM: {[((pulls dessert towards her with knife in hand))
43 JON: {[((puts spoon into jello))
44 {(1.3)
45 MOM: [You ave a dess[ert [plate? ]
46 MOM: [((knife suspend[ed a[bove cake plat]e))
47 JON: [((JON ra[ises right hand in point] toward MAN and retracts)))
[CA ha:ve your] pl[ate]
48 JON:
Jenny Mandelbaum
49 MAN: [ Yu:]p
50 MAN: [Ha:ve a pla:te. Just- [no:t too much] [for me[(please)
51 MAN: [((picks up plate with left hand;[retracts plate)) ][((plate[ to JON))
52 MOM: [((brings knife down to [ cut cake)) ] [
53 JON: [((Extends hand for plate; [retracts))
54 MOM: [Bt you said [a piece] a thi:s=ri:gh[t]
55 MAN: [Thank[you][]
56 MAN: [((hands plate to JON}} [ ]
57 MAN: [Yeah=
58 DAD: ((from kitchen))=Silvia
59 ([)
]again]
60 MOM: [A:ctually it tastes be:tter with bu:tter]]
61 JON: [((Puts jello on MANs plate & hands back))]
62 (0.3)
63 DAD: I had one of [your regular chrome ones I figured=
64 MAN: [((holds plate suspended))
65 DAD: =safe and I wa- opened a new
66 can a [co:ffee=
67 JON: [((replaces [jello))
68 MAN: [((extends plate))
Had Jon served jello to Mangita when Mom showed no move to fulfill Mangitas
request, or after Tim refused to fulfill it, it might have come off as pointing out Moms
negligence or defying Tim. Here it is woven into the provision of an alternative dessert
to Mangita. In delaying fulfilling Mangitas initial request for jello, and instead fulfill-
ing it in parallel with Mom serving Mangitas dessert, Jon enacts a kind of stealth jello
delivery that fulfills her request but avoids foregrounding the fulfillment in a way that
might be disaffiliative with Mom or Tim.
These extracts indicate that the specific details of the manner in which the request
is fulfilled, whether manually or verbally, or both, can do more than merely fulfill-
ing the request, showing attentiveness to the other, or prioritizing ones own current
involvement at the expense of immediate compliance.
Responses to requests may also implement other actions that are not directly
request-related, but that can be carried on the particular way in which the request
fulfillment is implemented. In Extract (8), Tim responds to Jons request for salt at
lines2224 by offering and retracting the salt several times (lines 30 and 33) before
giving it to Jon.
Extract 8. Salt
OR28_salt_Fam7a_4-42_ss
01 TIM: Iyeah Aunt Ma:rilyn nee::ds to be here.
02 (0.5)
03 MAN: uh(huh)
04 (0.7)
05 TIM: She hasta- put e:verything on everyones pla:te.
06 MOM: Mm. The potato cheese a:re better.
07 (1.0)
08 MOM: but the o:nes? I go:t at Chri:st:mas::(.) were di:fferent.
09 (0.5)
10 DAD: Well they cha:nge manufa:cturers who ma:ke them you know.
11 (1.5)
12 DAD: [they do that. ]
13 MOM: [Cause remember] they were real fla:t.=and they got-
14 (1.0)
15 TIM: (om.)
16 (0.3)
17 MOM: Brow:n on both [sides
18 JON:
[((straightens up))]
19 (.)
20 JON: [((looking up,left then right across the table, reaching hand ))]
21 DAD: [lot:ta these places changes distributors like the weather.]=
22 JON: =Salt.
23 (.)
24 JON: [Tim please.
25 JON: [((pointing at salt))]
26 (0.5)
27 TIM: ((picks[ up salt))
28 JON: [((reaches across table for salt))
29 JON: [Thank you]
30 TIM: [((retracts salt then moves it forward))]
31 TIM: [((reaches for salt))]
32 [(1.5)]
33 TIM: [((offers then withdraws salt, twice))]
34 JON: [((reaches back and forth for the salt))]
35 DAD: Boy the:se are nice and cru:nchy?
36 JON: ((Retrieves salt from Tim with slight smile))
37 (2.5)
38 MOM: You like them?=
39 DAD: =I: like crunchy.
40 MOM: Okay.
While this could be a way of simply implementing a tease, it is better understood as a

tit for tat. Four minutes earlier, at the beginning of this Easter Dinner, the family has
performed an Easter ritual. A bowl of eggs is passed from person to person, starting
with Dad at the top of the table. Upon passing the bowl to the next person, the passer
says, May you live one hundred years. In passing the bowl to Tim, Jon produces a
teasing offer and retraction. He extends the ritual phrase by adding my dea::r, swee::t
bro:ther as he offers and retracts the bowl of eggs. After Jon has passed the eggs to
Tim, Dad laughs heartily.
Four minutes later, in Extract (8), Jon looks for the salt, apparently locates it visu-
ally, near to his brother Tim across the table, and points across the table at it while
simultaneously saying Salt (.) Tim please (lines 2224). Tim moves to fulfill Jons
request by picking up the salt and passing it to him, but he does not pass it directly.
Just before the salt reaches Jons hand, Tim retracts it just slightly, so that it is just out
of Jons reach, and offers and retracts it 4 times, with Jons outstretched hand advanc-
ing just slightly towards Tim each time. No words accompany this brief engagement,
and no one else at the table appears to see it, but it is clearly reminiscent of Jons ear-
lier offer and retraction of the bowl of eggs. Here then, the sequential organization
of requesting a request followed by the fulfillment of the request affords Tim an
occasion to pass something to Jon, and he exploits this opportunistically to turn the
tables on Jon, passing the salt to him with a teasing series of offers and retractions, as
Jon did to Tim when Jon passed Tim the eggs. It is interesting to note that Tim does
nothing to call attention to this. It is not camped up with a smile or any accompany-
Jenny Mandelbaum
ing words, and the offers and retractions are done quite economically. It is possible
that this conveys a kind of pro-forma tit for tat the opportunity for retribution is
taken, but it is done without fanfare, and apparently without drawing the attention of
anyone else at the table. (cf. Lerner & Zimmerman, 2003 for teases of this kind among
young children.)
In both first and second position, then, requesting and fulfilling requests can be
used to implement more than just requesting, both in terms of how the request or ful-
fillment is produced, and in terms of what may be occasioned by reference to request-
ing and fulfilling requests. After the request has been fulfilled, in third position also,
interactants may produce a third positioned item as part of the request sequence that
implements more than simply, for instance, acknowledgment or appreciation. Inter-
actants may also implement other actions by reference to this position in the request
sequence.
3.2.3 More than appreciating a requests fulfillment in third position

In third position, where the fulfillment of the request may be appreciated by the
requester, interactants may exploit this opportunity to implement other actions, either
related to the request, or parasitic upon it.
In Extract (10), Dad asks for the string beans in line 16, You wanna pass down
the string beans, and Tim in line 19, apparently exploiting the You wanna format,
says No. In line 28 Dad responds to Moms delivery of the string beans with a rather
overdone Thank you very much.
Extract 10. String beans
OR84_WantToPassDownStringBeans_Fam7a_16-19_PL
((Participants are discussing when Tims fraternity was started))

01 MAN: Yea:r before you.
02 (1.0)
03 TIM: No it was- they were colonized
04 MAN: Oh
05 (0.5)
06 TIM: years ago.
07 (0.3)
08 MOM: Co:lonized?
09 (0.4)
10 DAD: Thats when th[e du:tch came over ]
11 MOM:
[sounds like (na:tives)]
12 TIM: Thats when the- du:tch come over
13 (0.5)
14 DAD: ghhm ((throat clear))
15 (1.8)
16 DAD: You wanna pa:ss [dow:n the: stri:ng bea:ns
17
[((Tim looks over))
18 (.)
19 TIM: [No.
20 [((Mom looks at string beans))
21 (0.3)
22 DAD: [Well do it anyway=
23 MOM: [((Mom unfolds arms and reaches for string beans))
24 DAD: =[please
25
[((Moms hand reaches string beans))
26 TIM: No:,
27 ((MOM picks up string beans and passes to DAD))/(2.0)
28 DAD: Tha:nk you.=very much.
29 (1.3)
30 MAN: Did you ma:ke them
In formulating the request in line 16 with pass down, Dad makes it clear that he
cannot reach it himself. He does not address anyone specific in the format of the
request, nor with his eye gaze, which appears to be directed to his plate as he contin-
ues eating while producing the request. Tim, who has just taken a bite of a roll, looks
over towards Dad in the middle of Dads utterance. After a brief gap, Tim says No.
His refusal seems to be parasitic on the format of Dads request asking whether
an unspecified someone wants to pass down the string beans. (This appears to be a
comparatively unusual format for a request there are only three in my corpus of 91
requests). At the same time that Tim produces this response, Mom looks over at the
string beans. In line 22, Dad reasserts the request with, Well do it anyway please
and Mom simultaneously reaches for the string beans. Tim says No again in line26,
and Mom picks up the string beans and passes them to Dad, fulfilling his request.
Her reach indicates that the string beans are closer to Tim, and through her reach
she displays that it is somewhat effortful for her to retrieve them. In line 28, as Dad
extends his hand to receive the string beans from Mom, he says, Thank you.=very
much. Thank yous are also quite rare in this corpus, occurring in just 8 of the 91
extracts, perhaps further indicating the high entitlement and low concern about con-
tingencies (Curl & Drew, 2008) that these requests at the family dinner table embody.
Here, however, Dad produces what we might call, after Schegloff s (2002) work on
overwrought utterances, an overwrought thank you; a Thank you. very much
addressed to Mom. The addition of very much after Dads turn has come to a point
of possible completion in line 28 can be heard to augment the appreciation Dad is
enacting towards Mom for passing him the string beans. The overdone display of
gratitude here may call attention to itself, thus converting Moms passing of the string
beans to Dad into a kind of object lesson, where doing something for someone results
in a strong gratitude display. In this way, Mom and Dad may make doing the right
thing by readily fulfilling the request into an object lesson on proper conduct for
Tim, who has refused to fulfill Dads request.
Interactants may also use third position to the request to implement actions
beyond requesting and fulfilling requests that are not part of the request sequence, but
are occasioned by it, as we saw in first and second position. For instance, in Extract(11)
Jon asks Dad for a roll (lines 26 and 30), and rather than passing a roll, or the basket
of rolls, Dad throws the roll to Jon (line 40). In third position, in lines 4950 Mom
censures them: is this the way we act. The fulfillment of the request thus apparently
occasions a rebuke from Mom. She takes the opportunity to reinforce a norm of pro-
priety at the dinner table.
Jenny Mandelbaum
Figure 6. Extract 8
Extract 11. Roll

OR_26_Fam7a_3-09_ls/jm
(Participants (clockwise from head of the table): Dad (DAD), Bobshi (BOB), Mom (MOM), Jon
(
(Jon), Tim (TIM), Mangita (MAN)))
01 (3.5)
02 DAD: (Ohh)
03 (0.3)
04 MOM: You can cover [ the as::- ]
05 DAD: [Bit got qui]et.
06 (.)
07 MOM: [((reaches to cover something))
08 [You can cover the asparagus.=so it
09 doesnt get co[ld.=
10 MAN: [Okay.
11 MOM: And: (and we dont have enough =)
12 might as well
13 TIM: (But)/(W) Mom-Moms not here.
14 (0.3)
15 MAN: ooh ooh ooh
16 MOM: What s at mean?=
17 MAN: =i(h) i wz[ ho(h):t ]
18 TIM: [Thas why its] not noisy.
19 MAN: (hhh) heh heh
20 MOM: ([ ) one of t]he parts.
21 DAD [Thank you:]((spoons serving onto plate))
22 MAN: I hope you dont
23 mind[ my [hands.
24 DAD: [((puts serving utensil down))
25 JON: [((raises h[ands]to reception position))
26 JON: [DAD CAN [I A]VE A ROLL?
27 DAD: [ No ]
28 (0.3)
29 DAD: Huh? ((looks to [his right))
30 JON: [A roll.
31 (0.5)
32 DAD: [((Picks up basket of rolls & holds suspended))
33 TIM: [She tries to coordinate the
34 whole[meal.=
35 JON: [((raises his hands as though to catch something))
36 MAN: =[Just throw it at im:.
37 DAD: =[((moves bread basket to his left))
]
38 MOM: =[((extends-retracts then puts hand out to receive bread
basket))]
39 MAN: eh huh[huh
40 DAD: [((throws roll))]
41 JON: [((Jon catches roll))

42 MAN: [Just kidding][(hhh) I WAS JUS]T
43 [((turns to Dad))]
44 k(h)idd(h)ing (h[h)
45 JON: [(Lint)
46 JON: [((laughing silently))
47 DAD: [ihuh hih hih [hih hih
48 MAN: [[e::h huh (hhh)
49 MOM: [((nodding)) [Is this- ]this is the
50 MOM: way we a:ct
51 MAN: e::h huh
52 JON: huh huh (hh) [(HA:H)]
53 MOM: [ U::h ]Jon, hand me the rye:
54 bread please.
Dad and the rolls are at the other end of the table from Jon, presenting Dad with
the practical problem of conveying a roll or the basket of rolls to Jon. As Jon pro-
duces his request for a roll in line 26 he raises his hands into a catch reception posi-
tion. In lines2227 Dad responds No to Mangitas turn in lines 2223, I hope you
dont mind my hands, and then in line 29 responds to Jons request for a roll with a
Huh? Jon redoes his request in line 30, with A roll. As Dad picks up the basket of
rolls, Jon lowers his hands, possibly to avoid appearing to be impatient by holding
his hands in reception position for something that Dad is not yet prepared to trans-
mit. As Tim continues a separate conversation with Mom in lines 334, Dad holds
the basket of rolls suspended, and Jon again raises his hands into catch position. In
line 37, Mangitas Just throw it at im may be responsive to Dads holding the basket
suspended, apparently hesitant about how to implement roll-delivery, but it is pos-
sible that she is inspired by Jons hands held in catch-reception position. As Mangita
is saying this, Mom beckons towards Dad, and extends her hand towards the basket,
presumably prepared to take the basket and pass it on to Jon. Just prior to docking the
basket in Moms outstretched hand, Dad takes a roll out of the basket with his left hand
and tosses it to Jon, who catches it. As Dad throws the roll, Mangita says, Just kidding
I was just kidding. Jon and Dad laugh, apparently in response to the throw through
which Dad has fulfilled Jons request. Mom maintains a serious expression, and in
overlap with the laughter produces a reprimand: Is this- this is the way we act? This
is met with laughter from Mangita and Jon, and almost immediately next Mom asks
Jon for rye bread for Bobshi.
Here an unorthodox food delivery is responded to with a reprimand in third posi-
tion, after the request has been fulfilled. The fulfillment of the request occasions a
rebuke from Mom, but the reprimand relies heavily on recipients to infer what the
problem is, since Mom formulates the violation with the indexical this, and the way
we act. Recipients must also infer to whom the reprimand is addressed, since she
formulates the culpable agent as we. While Dad and Jon treat the unorthodox food
transmission as funny, Mom reinforces what apparently she takes to be norms of pro-
priety. Whether they are family norms, or societal norms is available for inference, but
also not specified in the format of her reprimand.
Jenny Mandelbaum
The family dinner table may provide a particularly ripe environment for such
third position object lessons as we see in Dads overdone Thank you. Very much
to Mom in Extract 10 after Tim refused to pass the string beans, and as is occasioned
by the way in which the request for the roll is fulfilled in Extract (11). This suggests
that perhaps object lessons may be best conveyed on the coattails of other actions. In
Extracts (10) and (11) we see how the management of object transfers through request
sequences provides two different sorts of pretexts for socializing the family.
4. Conclusions
Our examination of the other things that requests and their fulfillment may be used to
implement along with object transfers food transfers in these extracts at the dinner
table suggests that different ways of requesting, fulfilling requests, and responding to
the fulfillment of requests may provide some insight into how family members pro-
pose, violate and manage proper norms of conduct at the dinner table. In Ochs and
Kremer-Sadliks (2007) terms, this is a particular domain in which morality is taught
and learned.
These requests are an interesting and fruitful domain for examining interaction,
and especially for thinking about sequence organization, particularly because first pair
part request initiating actions so often entail a responding action that is physical. In
examining how multiple physical involvements are managed to hasten or retard the
fulfillment of a request we have the opportunity to further extend our understand-
ing of sequential implicativeness and preference organization in the domain of body
conduct.
These requests for object transfer provide an opportunity to further explore
action formation also, since they are another domain in which to think about how
multiple simultaneous actions are implemented and managed, and how we think
about what is, in Schegloff s (2007) terms, the vehicle of these actions, and what is
carried by them. Extract (1) indicated that some requests can implement merely
requesting, but the other extracts showed that other requests may implement more
than just requesting.
The composition of the turns through which requests are implemented also war-
rants further consideration in this particular domain. The high entitlement and low
concern for contingency embodied in how these requests are composed provides fur-
ther grist for the study of how family members take up stances vis vis one another.
The fulfillment of a request also may embody alignments between interactants, as we
saw in Extract (3), Mangitas request for jello. In refusing to fulfill the request, Tim
sustained his anti-jello, and possibly anti-Mom, stance.
This work provides an opportunity for further consideration of politeness and how
it operates in this domain, since Brown and Levinsons (1987) and Searles (1969) early
work on requests raises this issue. As we discussed above, this corpus indicates that
please does not necessarily increase the politeness of a request. In both Extract(2),
The dressing please, and Extract (10) Dads well do it anyway please, the please
adds to the imperative character of the request, rather than making it more polite.
This corpus also provides an opportunity to think more about what we might call
the moral economy of food. Different ways of distributing food seem to embody or
reveal different moral stances. What is the relative moral value of being offered food, in
contrast to requesting it? Does asking for something you havent yet been served imply
that the host is negligent? We see some orientation to this in pre-requests (Schegloff,
2007), not discussed here, deployed to ask for food that appears not have made it to
the table. Modes of request fulfillment, as we saw, also have normative significance.
Who should pass the requested food? The person nearest to the food, or the person
nearest to the requester? If the person nearest the food is to deliver it, can they use their
hands? How do they implement passing the food? We saw these challenges embodied
in Extract (11) where Dad chose to throw the food to the other end of the table, and
the consequences of unorthodox food delivery (which is to say manual delivery, rather
than utensil-borne delivery).
Food itself seems to bear moral significance also. While some food seems to be
morally neutral in these dinners bread and butter, for instance condiments seem to
be more dangerous territory. Does asking for salt mean that the food is tasteless? Does
asking for ketchup mean that it is dry? Asking for seconds and asking for dessert, and
especially asking for seconds of dessert, all appear to be morally laden. If you have too
much dessert, you are greedy. If you do not have enough you are not properly appre-
ciative of the cooks efforts. All of this morality is embodied in the particular ways in
which requests are produced, responded to, and fulfilled.
In this corpus of requests we see simple, instrumental actions that implement
or carry other, more relationally freighted actions. It seems that the nuances of our
relationships with others may be embodied, reinforced and managed in the specifics
of how we implement and manage requests for food and other things at the dinner
table.
References
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On the grammatical form of requests
at the convenience store
Requesting as embodied action*

This article discusses the interplay between verbal and embodied resources when
requesting a product at the convenience store. We concentrate on requests for
tobacco products, which are not directly accessible to the customers but have to
be requested from the seller. We will explore a choice between a phrasal (NP) and
clausal format for presenting a request, and show how the choice between these
two formats is intrinsically tied to the arrangements of the physical space at the
kiosk, the location of and the bodily movements by the participants, as well as to
the sequential trajectory of the activity. More specifically, the key element in the
verbal request is the description and identification of the product, presented with
an NP, and this element is produced to coincide with reaching the counter and
achieving a stationary position. There is a practical basis for the choice between
an NP and a clause in formatting the request: the extended verbal format is
chosen to manage the time it takes for the customer to reach the counter. Thus,
the length of the verbal format stands in an iconic relationship to the relative
distance and to the time needed for the customer to reach the counter. The verbal
format is a flexible resource that is adjustable structurally and temporally to the
embodied and sequential trajectory of the on-going activity. The data of the study
consist of 101 encounters in which the customer asks for a tobacco product,
collected in different parts of Finland.
*We are grateful to the editors of this volume, Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen and Paul Drew,
and Kristian Mortensen for their apt and thoughtful comments on this paper. We are espe-
cially grateful to Lorenza Mondada for her insightful, detailed comments. All the remaining
shortcomings are of course ours. We would also like to thank the participants in the FRIAS
colloquim, as well as the members of the Finnish Centre of Excellence in Research on Inter-
subjectivity, especially its request group, for useful comments. Liisa Raevaaras research was
funded by the Academy of Finland (Project no. 250099, the Finnish Centre of Excellence in
Research on Intersubjectivity). Marja-Leena Sorjonen is grateful to the Freiburg Institute for
the Advanced Studies (FRIAS) for a Senior Fellowship (June 2013) during which much of the
final shape of the paper was developed.
1. Introduction
This chapter discusses the interplay between verbal and embodied resources when
requesting a concrete product in encounters at the convenience store requesting as
an embodied action. An impetus to this study was our earlier finding on the verbal
design of requests in these encounters: Customers design their requests verbally either
as a noun phrase (NP) or as a clause, with the former turn design being much more
frequent. This variation in verbal design did not, however, have any impact on the
end result, that is, on the customer getting the product, nor did it turn out to relate
to language-external variables (age, sex etc.) or factors such as politeness (Sorjonen,
Raevaara & Lappalainen 2009). We were left especially puzzled about requests that are
formatted as clauses. Subsequently we started to explore these requests from a multi-
modal perspective. In this chapter we will argue that the choice of the verbal format
of the request NP vs. clause and the timing of its parts are related to the physical
arrangements at the kiosk, the spatial location of and the bodily movements by the
customer and the seller, as well as the sequential trajectory of the activity. We will
concentrate on requests for a particular type of product, tobacco products. They are
products that are not directly accessible to the customers but have to be requested
from the seller. Furthermore, they are located in a particular place, on the shelves
behind the seller, visible to the customer, whereas products such as stamps or travel
cards, which also have to be requested from the seller, are in a drawer on the sellers
side of the counter.
The data for this study were collected in 19992002 in a research project on ser-
vice encounters, run by the Institute for the Languages of Finland. Altogether some
800 convenience store encounters were videotaped at seven stores in four municipali-
ties in different parts of Finland, both in the countryside and in the cities, including
Helsinki.1 In these data, there are 101 encounters in which the customer asks for a
tobacco product, and these encounters form the database of our study. The general
Finnish word for these stores is kioski, and for the sake of brevity, we will henceforth
use the English term kiosk to refer to them. These kiosks belong to a nationwide chain
called R-kioski. They have a uniform product range and a uniform layout of the prod-
ucts in the shop. The central products of these kiosks include, for example, lottery and
betting products, newspapers and magazines, candies, cigarettes, soft drinks and beer.
. The videotaping was done with one camera that was directed to the counter. Therefore,
we do not have visual access to the entire kiosk before, during or after the encounters we
videotaped, nor, for example, to the entry of the customer into the kiosk and her/his possible
wandering around the kiosk before coming to the counter to make a purchase.
On the grammatical form of requests at the convenience store
In recent conversation analytic research, an increased effort has been made to

reconsider the ways in which social actions are constructed and interpreted, and
requests for action have been a central object of this research. This research has
begun to unravel new types of issues that the participants in interaction orient to
when choosing one or another verbal format for making a request. These include, for
example, an orientation to entitlement to make a request and contingencies in ful-
filling it (e.g. Lindstrm 2005; Heinemann 2006; Curl & Drew 2008), gradations of
trust (Kuroshima 2010a), or the unilateral vs. bilateral character of the request itself
(Rossi 2012). Quite a number of studies have also investigated the use of multimodal
resources for making a request, providing more comprehensive information on the
role of language with respect to other kinds of resources in a given face-to-face situ-
ation and activity (e.g. Downing 2008; Kuroshima 2010b; Mondada 2009, 2011a;
Krkkinen & Keisanen 2012; Keisanen & Rauniomaa 2012; Rauniomaa & Keisanen
2012; Mortensen & Hazel 2014). Studies on differences between the verbal formatting
of requests and their responses as compared to other types of directives situate the ver-
bal resources used for requesting in a wider context of families of actions within and
across languages (Couper-Kuhlen 2014; Thompson, Fox & Couper-Kuhlen In press;
Zinken & Ogiermann 2011, 2013).
Our study relates to the aforementioned lines of research. By focusing on requests
for immediate action in the on-going institutional encounter, and by concentrating on
requests for a certain type of concrete object, we will offer new information at a level of
detail that has been researched less so far. In the following, to set our empirical focus
within the larger frame of requesting at the kiosk, we will first provide a brief over-
view of ways of formatting the request. We will then discuss noun phrase vs. clausal
requests for tobacco products as embodied actions. We will show how the temporal
trajectory of the participants (the sellers and the customers) verbal moves is finely
coordinated and iconic with the customers embodied approach to, and arrival at, the
point at the counter where the transaction takes place. After that we will discuss from
a more general point of view the ways in which the participants bodily movements in
the space are used as a meaning-making resource. Finally we will return to the ques-
tion of different issues related to the choice between one or another verbal format for
making a request.
2. Requesting a product at the kiosk the verbal design of the turn
The encounters at the kiosk examined in this study are routine occasions not just for
the seller but often for the customer, too. Many customers visit the kiosk weekly or
even daily in order to buy, for example, cigarettes, lottery or other game tickets, sweets,
soft drinks, or coffee. The customers are well aware of the assortment of goods and
services that are available at the kiosk, and usually they come to the kiosk to get some
specific product. This is seen in the fact that the customers only very rarely inquire
about the availability of the product, request the seller to present a selection of some
product type, or consider at the counter which brand, size etc. of the product to buy.2
However, as most products are located on shelves from which customers may choose
and pick the product by themselves, the customer may spend some time looking at
sweets or magazines and pondering their choice. Or s/he may stay at a separate desk to
fill out game tickets before approaching the counter. The encounter itself, the transac-
tion between the customer and the seller, is usually very short. Most of the encounters
in our data take less than a minute, the shortest ones being just about ten seconds and
the longest ones only a few minutes.
The routine character and quick tempo of the transaction is reflected in the design
of the customers requests. The requests are verbally minimal, or the customer may
only deploy embodied resources for displaying that s/he wants to buy a certain prod-
uct. Through the design of their requests, the customers treat the request as easily
grantable and display that they are entitled to make it (cf. Lindstrm 2005; Heinemann
2006; Curl & Drew 2008). Furthermore, the customers treat the core of the activity
buying a product as self-evident, as belonging to the common ground (cf. Enfield
2006).
The basic options for the design of the request are related to the availability of the
product for the customer. Some products are concrete objects that the customers select
and pick out themselves and take to the counter (e.g. soft drinks, candies, magazines);
or the customer may come to the counter with a lottery or other game ticket s/he has
filled in beforehand and wants to get registered. When buying these kinds of prod-
ucts more than half of the customers in our data employed embodied resources only,
handing over the product to the counter; more rarely, the handing over was accom-
panied by a minimal verbal turn, a noun phrase (NP) referring to the product (e.g.
tm, this), and only seldom by a clause-formatted turn (e.g. m otan tn, Ill have
this) (Sorjonen, Raevaara & Lappalainen 2009, 96). (On requests at kiosks see also
Haakana& Sorjonen 2011; Raevaara 2011.)
In this this chapter, however, we focus on requests for such products that are
located in the spatial territory of the seller. Tobacco products are situated on the shelves
behind the counter and, for example, stamps and some game tickets are kept in draw-
ers on the sellers side of the counter. These products the customer has to request from
. In our data (800 encounters), there are only 17 encounters in which the customer starts by
inquiring about the availability of the product at the kiosk. In addition, there are 11 encoun-
ters in which the customer presents another type of an inquiry concerning the product (e.g.
asks the price) before deciding what s/he wants to buy.
the seller. In such cases, the customers use verbal resources for presenting the request,
but also these requests are typically minimal. The request is usually presented through
a noun phrase that names the product wanted, and more seldom through a clause, as
can be seen in Table1 (Sorjonen, Raevaara & Lappalainen 2009, 93).
Table 1. Different types of turn design when the product

has to be requested from the seller
NP-formatted requests 199 (71 %)
Clause-formatted requests 82 (29 %)
Total 281 (100 %)
We now turn to explore requests for tobacco products and the choice of verbal
format for presenting the request. We will show that when requesting, the customers
not only talk but instead they talk and walk they also move in the physical space of
the kiosk. We will discuss requesting as an embodied action by exploring the coordi-
nation of bodily moves with respect to the two types of verbal moves, NPs and clauses,
in launching and presenting the request.
3. Requesting a tobacco product with a noun phrase
The encounter between the seller and the customer at the kiosk, and requesting a prod-
uct as part of it, requires that the customer and the seller establish a mutual focus of
attention and a joint interactional space (see Mondada 2009; Haddington, Mondada &
Nevile 2013; F-formation, see Kendon 1990, 249250). The customers and the sellers
reciprocal sighting, as well as the customers gait towards the counter, work as ways of
creating an interactional space. The following picture shows the counter and the area
where the transaction takes place.
Figure 1. The transaction point, marked with a downward pointing arrow. The seller gazes at
the tobacco shelves
Requesting a product at a shop requires that the customer specify the product
in enough detail for the seller to identify and give the customer the correct prod-
uct. When buying cigarettes this includes naming the brand of the product such as
Marlboro. Furthermore, each brand has sub-types (e.g. menthol vs. non-menthol,
strong vs. milder ones, hard vs. soft package). A reference to the distinct features of the
product, including its quantity, is needed by the seller in order to serve the customer.
The minimal verbal form that lends itself for doing that is a noun phrase (NP). The
following example shows an instance. The examples indicate the customers movement
and the position of her or his feet. Right and left in small capitals (line 5) show from the
customers perspective a step that s/he takes and the foot in question. The placement of
these words indicates the moment when the foot reaches the floor.
(1) [Kotus T870, Helsinki]3
01 S: standing at the counter, turning her head to right,
gazing at the approaching customer
02 .mt Hei. [nod
.tch Hello.
03 C: [Hei. cs left arm in the frame
04 => [Pie:ni [punanen l[m[(m).
[Small red LM.
05 => [left[right
[left, aligning the feet
06 S:
[starting to turn to the shelf
07 S: Joo?
Yes
08 S: takes the cigarettes, turns to the cash register, reads the barcode
The elements in the NP (line 4) are ordered, and the same order of the descriptors of
the product is present in most of the cases in our data. The product is specified in the
course of the progression of the NP. When more than one of the product is needed
by the customer, the quantity is mentioned as the first element of the NP, that is, in
Example 1 it would be located before pieni small. If the size of the package departs
from what the customer treats as normal, this is mentioned next (pieni small). The
size is then followed by an indication of the sub-type of the product within the brand,
expressed in all cases with an adjective describing the color (punanen red). The final
element of the utterance, the noun (llm(m) (LM) above), singles out the brand and
functions as the head of the noun phrase. The temporal progression of the NP projects
. For the verbal utterances, first the original Finnish is presented, and below that a transla-
tion into English in italics. In between these two lines, there can be a gloss line that provides
grammatical information; for the glossing symbols, see the appendix. The description of non-
verbal actions is presented in small caps.
and specifies step-by-step the product needed by the customer. The indication of the
quantity does not yet specify the product (e.g. whether the customer wants stamps or
cigarettes) but the mentioning of the color expresses in the kiosk context that the prod-
uct is cigarettes. This can be seen in the conduct of the sellers: they often start to turn
around to the cigarette shelf behind them after the customer has produced the color
term (compare lines 4 and 6 above) or even during its production (cf. recognitional
overlap onset, Jefferson 1984; Mondada 2011b).4
Example 1 above and the following example represent typical instances of request-
ing the product with an NP.
(2) [Kotus T817, Helsinki]
01 S: [gazing to her left side at the approaching customer
02 [Moi.
[Hi
03 C: => [M:oi. [.nff [yks [punane [ smart[ti..hh
[Hi .nff [one [red [Smart
04 => [right[left[right [left[right
[left
05 S: [head straight, gaze down [begins to turn to the shelf,
takes the cigarettes
In Examples 1 and 2, the customers coordinate the initiation and the presentation of
the request temporally with their movement towards the counter. When starting the
request, they are just approaching the counter, and when reaching it and achieving
a stationary position, they utter the final word of the request, the brand name of the
cigarettes (llmm in Example 1, smartti in Example 2; cf. Mondada 2009).
In many cases, the step taken by the customer is in synchrony with the lexical
stress and the syllable structure of the language. Finnish has fixed stress in the sense
that lexical stress is placed almost always on the first syllable of the word. The cus-
tomers synchronize the first syllable of the word (or in some cases the beginning of a
subsequent syllable) and the step they take. In Example 1, the customer synchronizes
the production of the modifier pieni small with a step on his left foot, the produc-
tion of the next modifier punanen red with a step on his right foot, and he utters
the final element llm(m) LM so that he pronounces its last syllable when tak-
ing his last step, bringing his feet into an aligning stable position. The customer in
. The order of the elements in the NP requests, the modifiers preceding the head noun,
follows the canonical structure of NPs in the Finnish language. It is, however, possible for
the customer to depart from this tight structure for interactional purposes (e.g. mention the
brand first and then specify the product within the brand; see Example 13 (lines 4, 10) where
this happens but where the specification of the product is presented as a separate prosodic
unit).
Example 2 coordinates her movements and the verbal request in a way similar to that
in Example1, the only difference being that the final element of the request, the brand
name of the cigarette, is produced in synchrony with the last pair of steps.
Thus, the customers in Examples 1 and 2 are still approaching the counter when
they initiate their verbal request, and they time their requests so that the final ele-
ment that completes the request is produced to coincide with reaching the counter
and achieving a stationary position. What do the customers achieve by initiating their
requests before reaching the counter? We argue, in line with Mondada (2009; see also
Haddington, Mondada & Nevile 2013; Mortensen & Hazel 2014), that they coordinate
and time the initiation of the request with an orientation to the prior reciprocal sight-
ing and to the verbal ratification of the beginning of the encounter.
In Example 1, the seller and customer establish mutual gaze while the customer
is walking to the counter (line 1). The sellers greeting is reciprocated by the customer,
who then moves to initiate the request (line 4). In Example 2, the seller is gazing at the
approaching customer and greets her (line 1). Again the customer responds with a
greeting and proceeds then to the request (line 3). An interactional space for the initia-
tion of the verbal request, and the core of the transaction, is thus arrived at temporally
step-by-step. The initiation of a request presented with an NP occupies a specific place
in the spatial and sequential development of the activity, so that a greeting by the seller
is treated by the customer as an action that makes a relevant next the presentation of
the request, the customers reason for the visit.5
Evidence for an orientation by the customers to the sellers greeting as an action
that offers a sequential place for initiating the request can be seen from the following
cases. First, the customers quite often initiate the request without providing a return
greeting (in 54 cases of 446; Lappalainen 2009, 37), as in Example 3 below (see also
Example 7).
01 S: turning to the counter from aside

02 C: [walking towards the counter
03 S: [at the counter
04 => [M:o[:[i;
[Hi::[[
05 C: => [taking out the wallet from the inside breast pocket
. The timing of the sellers greeting requires a study of its own. Our initial observation is
that sellers time their greetings on the basis of inferences they have made from the customers
bodily conduct (starting a trajectory to the counter), their spatial location (close enough to
the counter) and their availability (facial orientation to the seller and not e.g. searching for
something in their bag).
06 => [ [Sinine [llm[m..h

[er [Blue [LM
07 => [right [left [right
08 S:
[turning to the shelf
09 (0.4)
10 S: Mm?
11 S: takes cigarettes, turns to the cash machine
Second, the sellers do not greet the customer if they are not available for service, for
example, when they are organizing the shelves (see Section 5 below). Thirdly, the cus-
tomers respond to the sellers greeting but may, for example, lengthen the vowels of the
greeting term to get closer to the counter before the initiation of the request.
There is something further that should be mentioned about the initiation of the
request with an NP: the relationship between the initiation of the request and reaching
the counter is a matter of distance in relation to the speed of gait by the approaching
customer when the interactional space is established. In the following example, the
customer, who is close to the outside door of the kiosk and at a distance from the coun-
ter, has signed a form that permits the video recording and circled around another
customers dog. She then withdraws her gaze from the dog, lifts her head up and starts
her trajectory to the counter. At that point she and the seller sight each other, and the
seller greets her (line 3). Thus, the reciprocal sighting establishes an interactional space
and makes a greeting sequence relevant, which in turn makes relevant the next action,
the request.
01 S: [looking at the approaching customer
02 C: [looking at the seller
03 S: [>Hei<;
[Hello
04 C: >Hei;<
05 C: => step with the right leg
06 C: => [Kaks vihreet [Sma[rt:[tia,h
=> [Two green [Smarts
07 => [left [right [left
08 [looks at her purse
09 S: [begins to turn to the shelf
Similar to Example 2, the customer initiates her request after she has returned the sell-
ers greeting, synchronizing the parts of the emerging request with her forward move-
ment to the counter. Her steps are long but there is no impression of hurrying in her
gait. Sustaining the pace of her gait and adjusting the production of the verbal request
to it, she first takes a step with her right foot, and then initiates the verbal request when
taking a step with her left foot. She takes the last pair of steps that lead to a stationary
position when uttering the brand name of the cigarettes.
We now turn to discuss requests that are presented by using a clause. These cases
bear similarities to requests presented with an NP but at the same time differ from
them. We will show that the customers synchronize the presentation of the core of the
request, the identification of the product with the NP, with their embodied actions in
the same way as when using an NP only. However, the more extended verbal format, a
clause, allows the customer more time to approach the counter when the relevance of
the request has been established by the sellers greeting.
4. Requesting a tobacco product with a clause
Among the fourteen clause-formatted requests for a tobacco product in our data there
is a variety of clause types, including the ones presented below as isolated turns.
(5) [Clause types for requesting]
a. 1st person singular interrogative (T751)
C: Saa-k-s m kaks punas-t nortti-i.
get.1sg-q-cli I two red-par North State-par
Can I have two red North States.
b. 1st person singular declarative (T21)
C: >Mu-lle tul-is<, (0.3) p:una-valkonen p:elmontti.
I-all come-con.3sg red-white Belmont
Id like (0.3) a red-white Belmont.
c. 2nd person singular imperative (T402)
C: Anna pieni punane llmm.
give.imp.2sg small red LM
Give(SG) ((me)) a small red LM.
Given the focus of this chapter the embodied character of NP vs. clause formatted
requests differences between these various clause types are not central. For example,
downgrading the customers entitlement to make the request or orienting to possi-
ble contingencies in granting the request does not explain the different turn designs
above.6 What is relevant, however, and what unites these clause types is that the identi-
fication of the product requested occurs as the final phrase of the clause (NP).
. The possible differences between interrogatives, imperatives and declaratives as a way of

requesting await further research. Our initial observations suggest that the clause type may
have an impact on the extent to which the request receives a verbal claim of compliance by the
seller before the fulfillment of the request. On another level it might well be that the choice of
the clause type may reflect practices that the customer and the sub-culture s/he is a member of
have conventionalized as a way of conducting oneself adequately in a social encounter like this.
The following example contains a request by the customer made with a 1st person
interrogative clause (line 5).
(6) [Kotus T751 Helsinki]
01 S: gazing at the approaching customer
02 S: .mt Hei [hei;
.tch Hello hello
03 C: [Hei;
04 C: walking towards the counter
(.)-
05 C: => [Saaks m kaks puna[st nortti[a.
get.1sg.q I two red North State.par
=> [Can I have two red North States.[
06 => [left[right
[left
07 S: [Joo.
[Yes/Okay
[turning to the shelf
Here the customer is approaching the counter while the previous customer is leav-
ing it. When he begins his verbal request, after his return greeting to the seller, he is
still walking. He takes a long step with his left foot when he starts the clause (line 6)
and then a pair of shorter steps (right and left), when he utters the brand name of the
product (norttia). In contrast to requests with an NP, this customer thus initiates the
request while he is more clearly in a walking mode. By using a clause, he orients to
managing the temporal presentation of his request so that he will arrive close enough
to the counter before he initiates the description of the product, the NP. The clause
format thus functions as a flexible resource that allows the customer to start the action,
the request, when the sellers greeting and the customers response to it have made it
sequentially relevant. Beginning with a clause enables both the initiation of the request
and provides enough time for getting to the counter. What is similar here to requests
with an NP is that the customer works to produce the last element of the request (the
brand name) simultaneously with achieving a stationary position at the counter.
The customer may also suspend temporarily the progression of the on-going
clause-formatted request at a point at which the next projected element in the clause
would be the description of the product. This happens in the following example. The
recording begins at a point at which the seller is sighting the approaching customer;
after a short while, he greets the customer.
(7) [Kotus T21, Midwest Finland]
01 S: Piv.
Hello
02 (.)
03 C: => >Mulle tulis<, (0.3) [p:una-[valkonen [p:elmont[ti.

I.all come.con.3sg [red-white [Belmont
=> Id like (0.3) [red-white [Belmont
04 => [left [right [left [right
05 [in the frame, [looking at the shelf
06 S: bends his head slightly forward
(0.2)-
07 S: turning to the shelf7
This customer does not respond to the greeting but, instead, proceeds to the request
after a micro-pause (line 3). He initiates the request but stops its production at a point
after which the naming of the product would be relevant. He fits the initiation of the
request temporally to the greeting by the seller, and brings it to completion during the
last two pairs of steps, after which he reaches a stationary position.
A clause format also allows the customer to do an early initiation of the request at
a distance and in that way to display, for example, that s/he is in a hurry and to imply a
wish for a quick encounter. In the following example the customer initiates his request
when walking to the counter, and he takes his last steps right after he has finished his
request (line 1).
(8) [Kotus T402, Northern Finland]
01 C: => [Anna pieni [punane l[lmm.
[give.imp.2sg small [red lm
[Give ((me)) a small [red LM
02=> [walking to the counter, taking the last steps after the request
03 S: [coming from right to the transaction point
04 S: [Hei. [
[Hello [
05 [at the transaction point
06 [pivots to the shelf
However, even though a mutual gaze between the customer and the seller may have
been established, and the seller has recognized the customers trajectory to the counter,
she is not available: she is away from her place and moving to the transaction point.
She produces her greeting (line 4) in overlap with the customers identification of the
sub-type of cigarettes (punane red, line 1). This sequential placement of the greeting
displays that the request was initiated before an interactional space had been jointly
. The seller in this case is a schoolboy who is working as a trainee. His status as a trainee is
seen in the way he responds to the request. Unlike experienced sellers he waits until the end
of the request before he turns to the cigarette shelf.
established. This suggests that establishing a mutual gaze is not sufficient for initiating
the encounter what is more important is that the seller is at the transaction point,
displaying readiness to engage in interaction.
As in the case of NP formatted requests, using a clause is a matter of distance in
relation to the speed of the gait by the customer towards the counter when the interac-
tional space has been established. In the following case, the trajectory of the customers
movement is towards the counter. However, he stops, folds a paper and puts it in his
bag. At the same time the seller is doing something else, a little away from the transac-
tion point. They achieve mutual gaze simultaneously (line 4). The seller begins to move
to the transaction point and the customer does the same, simultaneously initiating his
request with a clause.

01 C: walking slowly to the counter
02 S: at the cash register doing something
03 C: stops at some distance from the counter, looks down, folds a paper.
04 S & C: sighting each other, mutual gaze
05 S: starting to move to the transaction point:
left [right [left
06 C: => [An[nat[sie pienem punase[m Mal[poro.
[give.2sg you.sg small.gen red.gen Marlboro
=> [Would you give ((me)) a small red Marlboro
07 => [left [right [left [right
08 S: [starts to turn to the shelf
09 S: Se:lv;
Okay
Being a more extended linguistic structure than an NP, a clause thus provides the
mobile customer more time as compared to an NP, and allows the customer to reach
the counter when the production of the key element of the request, the naming of the
product, is due. The length of a clause, its temporal production, is a flexible resource
that can be used in a way that is iconic with the temporal progression and the duration
of the customers movements.
The mobility of the customer, however, is not always a relevant factor in using a
clause for making the request. In some cases a clause is used in a context where the cus-
tomer has already arrived at the counter but is occupied with an activity other than the
transaction. When orienting to the seller and the transaction, s/he then uses a clause to
make the request. In the following example, the customer is standing at the counter, his
upper body turned to the right to a friend he is talking with (F), his hand holding a note.
The seller stands behind the counter, looking at the customer and his friend.

01 S: [gazing at c
02 C: [Se riippuu [siit.
It depends on that.
03 [points at F with his finger
04 S: [smiles, gazing at c ]
05 F: [J(h)oo jo[o.
06 C: => [begins to turn his upper body to the seller]
07 C: [gaze to the seller
08 S: => [H[ei.
=> Hello
09 C: => [Anna kolome<][(0.4) pu[nasta nort:[tia.
give.imp.2sg three red North.States
[Give((me))three][(0.4) red North States
10 [hand with the bill] [ [ [
11 [to the counter][tilts head right, looks at the shelf
12 S: [tilts head left[begins
to turn to the shelf
In line 6, the customer begins to turn his upper body to the seller and gazes at her,
finding the seller gazing at him. At that point (line 8) the seller initiates a greeting, and
right after the initiation, the customer begins his imperative-formatted request, put-
ting his right hand, in which he holds a note, down on the counter.
In this case, there is thus a disruption in the customers conduct and a postpone-
ment of the action that his arrival to the counter had projected. The clause format
works in this case as a way of managing and enforcing the transition from one activ-
ity to another. As compared to an NP-formatted request, a clause format allows and
requires a longer temporal step-by-step progression to the core of the request (NP).
It thus prepares the seller verbally for the core of the action in a way that an NP-
formatted request does not. With the clause, the customer manages the transition and
indexes his awareness of a delay in moving to the activity, which his arrival at the
counter projected. Examples such as the one above also show that arriving at or being
at the counter is not sufficient for the encounter to start. In addition, the participants
need to build up an interactional space and a common focus of attention, facing each
other, within which the transaction is achieved.
Thus, as a verbal resource a clause lends itself to deployment for managing several
interactional dimensions. Its elaborateness, its length, makes it usable as a resource
that stands in an iconic relation to the embodied action in two ways: (1) It allows
the customer to initiate the next action (the request) in the trajectory of the encoun-
ter, which the greeting of the seller and the customers reciprocal greeting have made
relevant, while at the same time to manage a move to the counter for producing and
completing the core of the action, the specification of the product. (2) In the case of
disruptions, it allows the customers to manage a transition from another activity to the
activity that their spatial position has projected (the initiation of the transaction and
the request), and to display their awareness to the seller that there has indeed been a
disruption.
5. Moving in space as a meaning-making resource in action formation
We have shown so far how the customer and the seller coordinate the timing of
their verbal turns and their bodily movements and positions in space while they
are managing the beginning of the encounter, constructing the common interac-
tional space (Kendon 1990; Mondada 2009), and while the customer is moving to
the presentation of the request. The customers reaching the counter constitutes a
pre-condition for the transaction. However, it does more than that. The coordi-
nated movements and engagement of the participants bodies are deployed also as a
meaning-making resource in action formation and in organizing the participation
framework (see e.g. Goodwin 2000; Mondada 2009; Streeck, Goodwin & LeBaron
2011; Haddington, Mondada & Nevile 2013). Together with the establishment of
mutual engagement the customers arrival at the counter projects and launches her/
his next action, requesting a product. It also confirms the customers participation
role as the sellers co-participant, as a customer to be served (cf. Mondada 2009;
Mortensen & Hazel 2014).
Next, we will show how customers display orientation to the indexical meaning
of their bodily movements when they do not approach the counter from a distance.
These are cases in which the customer is waiting for her/his turn just a few steps away
from the transaction point, while the seller is occupied with the previous customer or
with some other job (see also Mortensen & Hazel 2014).
The following example shows an encounter in which the request for a product is
presented while the previous customer is still standing at the counter and collecting
his affairs. The next customer is standing and waiting for his turn a few steps away,
being so near the seller and the transaction point that there is no practical reason for
stepping closer before presenting the request. Furthermore, there really is no room for
such movement, as the previous customer still occupies the transaction point. Never-
theless, the customer deploys the same kind of bodily movement as those customers
who approach the counter from a distance. He uses body movements as a meaning-
making resource for reorganizing for his part the interactional space and the participa-
tion framework, for establishing his role as the current customer and for launching his
request (cf. Mondada 2009).
(11) [Kotus T688, Helsinki; PC = previous customer]

pc is collecting his affairs at transaction point, c is waiting a few steps away
01 S: [turns her gaze to c, makes slight movement towards him

02 C: [turns his gaze to s
03 S: [Moi;
[Hi;
04 C: [nods by lifting his chin upwards
05 C: [Moi moi;
06
=> [steps towards transaction point with the left foot,
shifts his weight onto it without moving the right foot
07 S: [moves slightly towards c
08 C: => [Vihree llm[m; [tumma.

[Green LM; [dark.
09=> [weight on the left foot, leaning forward
10 S: [stands still in stationary position
11 S: [turns to the shelf
12 C: [moves weight onto both feet,
achieves balanced position
While the previous customer is collecting his affairs at the counter, the seller opens up
the next transaction by turning her gaze from the previous customer to the customer
who is waiting. She also starts a slight movement towards that customer, leaning for-
ward and taking a few short steps almost in place (lines 1, 7), and in so doing ratifying
him as next (see Mortensen & Hazel 2014). Simultaneously, the customer turns his
gaze from the previous customer to the seller (line 2). Immediately after the establish-
ment of mutual gaze, the seller greets the new customer (line 3), who in overlap makes
a greeting gesture by lifting his chin upwards (line 4).
Next, the new customer presents a responsive verbal greeting and simultane-
ously moves his left foot towards the transaction point and shifts his weight onto
it without moving his right foot (lines 56). While uttering the key element of his
request (vihree llmm green LM, line 8), he keeps this unbalanced bodily posture,
his weight on the left foot, standing still but leaning forward as if moving towards
the seller (line 9). At the end of his turn, while specifying the type of the product
further (tumma dark), he shifts his weight onto both feet, achieving a balanced posi-
tion again (line 12). Only after the seller has picked up the cigarette pack from the
shelf and begun to read its price with the bar code reader does the previous customer
leave the counter and make room for the current customer, who then takes a few
steps towards the transaction point, picks up the cigarette pack and pays for his pur-
chase. Thus, even when the customer is already standing near the counter before the
transaction is initiated, a movement towards the counter is systematically deployed

as a meaning-making resource.
The kiosks in which the data were collected belong to a kiosk chain. Sellers in
these kiosks usually wear working clothes in the colours of the chain, blue and yellow.
This clothing serves as one basis for customers to categorize them as sellers through
their appearance. Simultaneously, sellers are recognized through their category-bound
embodiment (cf. Sacks 1972): their position in the space behind the counter, and their
bodily orientation towards the approaching customer. (Cf. Kidwell 2000.) Accordingly, a
potential customer entering the kiosk is categorized as a customer to be served, through
her/his category-bound embodied action, that is, her/his trajectory to the counter and
arrival at the transaction point (Mortensen & Hazel 2014). As we have shown above,
this category-bound action may be deployed as an interpretative resource even if the
transaction point is occupied and there is not much space for moving.
Besides queuing situations, participants orientation to the indexical meaning of
reaching the counter can be seen in situations in which the seller is occupied with some
other job when the customer is approaching the counter. If it is not apparent that the
seller notices the approach, if s/he is, for example, doing something in the backroom,
the customers may walk directly to the counter, thus showing their presence and invit-
ing the sellers attention. Instead, if it is clear that the seller notices the approach, when
occupied with some job, for example, with the cash register a few steps away from the
transaction point, the customers in our data recurrently stop to wait near the counter,
also a few steps away from the transaction point. They delay their reaching the counter
until the seller has finished whatever else s/he may have been doing and is directing
her/his attention to the customer, thereby initiating the temporally organized chain of
actions of the encounter.
In Example 12 the seller is working at the cash register and looking down at it.
The customer is standing near the counter and gazing at the seller. The seller initi-
ates establishment of mutual engagement by turning her gaze to the customer and by
simultaneously starting to move towards the transaction point (line 2). The customer
immediately follows by starting her movement to the transaction point (line 3). Dur-
ing the greetings (lines 4, 5) the customer reaches the counter; the presentation of her
phrase-formatted request (line 7) is temporally adjusted with her last steps (lines 8, 9)
in the same way as in those cases in which the customer approaches the counter from
a distance (see Examples 18).
s is working at the cash register, c is waiting a few steps away from the counter
01 C: [standing, looking at s
02 S: [turns her gaze to c, starts to move towards
transaction point
03 C: [starts to move towards transaction point
04 S: [nods=>Moi<.=
>Hi<.=
05 C: [=Mo:i:;=
06 [left foot down
07 C: => =[Pieni [sinine [llm.
=[Small blue [LM.
08 => [right foot down
09 => [left foot down, reaching stationary position
10 S: [in stationary position
11 S: [turns to the shelf
12 S: Se:lv;
Okay;
In situations like in Example 12, the customers recurrently stop to wait near the coun-
ter. They display orientation to the indexical meaning of reaching the counter by
postponing the last steps that would take them to the transaction point. In so doing
the customers maintain the possibility for a joint embodied establishment of mutual
engagement both through gaze and through bodily movements and for an embodied
launching of their request.
Movement in space is one of the meaning-making resources that are deployed by
customers for launching their request for the product (cf. Enfield 2011). In addition,
by finely tuning the timing of their embodied arrival at the transaction point with
the timing of presenting the verbal request, the customers adjust their request as an
embodied action to the quick tempo of routinized transactions at kiosks. In this way
they embody the institution, this particular characteristic of kiosk encounters, into
being (Mortensen & Hazel 2014).
Customers orientation to this institutional fingerprint (Drew & Heritage
1992,26) is displayed also in cases in which the beginning of the encounter is con-
structed as a non-routinized one. There are cases in our data in which a departure
from the routine is indicated through an extended verbal formulation of the request,
and in addition to that, through the embodiment of the action, through slowing down
its tempo. This can be seen in Example 13. In her request the customer uses a verbal
formulation that departs from the common ones (lines 4, 10). She starts by present-
ing a general description of her reason for the visit (line 4). Only after this preface (cf.
Schegloff 2007, 3747, 234) does she name the brand of the tobacco (line 4) and the
quantity and type of packs she wants (line 10) through noun phrases. In both of them
she uses the demonstrative pronoun se as a modifier (in the partitive case sit; sit
Poonusta; kaks sit vaaleaa). In spoken language, the modifier se indicates that the
speaker treats the referent as known to the recipient based on the knowledge the recip-
ient already has (Laury 1997, 218250). Here the modifier implies that the customers
purchase is not news to the seller, that it is the one she recurrently comes to buy at the
kiosk, and accordingly, that she is a familiar customer to the seller.

s is standing at the counter, looking at approaching customer
01 S: He:i;
Hello
02 C: Hei.
Hello
03 C: walks towards the counter gazing at s
- (2.4) -
04 C: => [Tupa:[kkia [tulin ostaas [sit Poonusta; (.)
[tobacco.par came.1sg buy.inf.ill dem3.par Bonus.par
[Its tobacco I came to buy the Bonus; (.)
05 => [left foot down reaching transaction point
06 => [right foot down reaching stationary position
07 S: [turns to the shelf, raising her hand towards it
08 C: [places her bag on the shelf in front of the counter
09 C: [straightens her back
10 C: => kaks sit:; (0.3) vaalea[a.
two dem3.par light.par
two of the:; (0.3) light ones.
11 S: [Jaha,
[I see,
12 [takes the packs
13 C: .Joo, (.) sitten:, (.) l m laittia yks.
prt then LM light.par one
.Yeh, (.) then:, (.) LM light one.
((17 seconds omitted))
14 S: [Yks <kolmekkymment. [noi,
[One <thirty. so, [
15 [gives change to c [
16 C: [Kiitti;
[ Thanks
17 (1.2) c puts the coins into her wallet
18 S: => >Ooks ollu< ulkomailla ku oot nii ruskee.
>Have you been< abroad cause you are so brown.
19 C: Oon <maaliskuussa>. (.) vielk sit o(h)o(h)n
r(h)usk(h)ee.
Yes I have <in March>. (.) am I still br(h)ow(h)n
The way in which the customer coordinates the timing of the request and her bodily
movements is iconic with the slow progression of her verbal turn. The greetings are
exchanged (lines 1, 2) when the customer is not yet in the video frame, and thus, quite
far from the counter. In spite of this, the customer does not begin her request until
the moment she has reached the transaction point and a stationary bodily position
(lines46). While presenting the preface to her request, she places her bag on the shelf
in front of the counter, bending down a bit but gazing at the tobacco shelf (line 8). Only
after that, while straightening her back (line 9), does she present the key information
the seller needs in order to serve her (lines 4, 10; see also lines 11, 12). In so doing she
builds the embodied launching of her request differently than most of the customers.
Through this departure from the verbal and embodied routines in expressing the
request, the customer in Example 13 took her timing and position as a non-routine
case (Drew & Heritage 1992, 50). In her compliant action, by contrast, the seller dis-
plays an orientation to the quick tempo of routine encounters: she turns towards the
tobacco shelf right after the customer has started to utter the word tupakkia (tobacco)
(line 7) and raises her hand towards the shelf to be ready to select the product as soon
as the customer has offered enough information (lines 7, 12). But a bit later the seller
confirms for her part the familiar relationship between the participants implied by
the customer. When the customer has paid for her purchase and put the change into
her wallet, the seller asks if she has been abroad because she is so suntanned (line 18).
The seller and the customer then shortly continue the discussion by commenting on
the time it usually takes before their tan fades (not shown in the extract). By initiating
this departure from business the seller brings out her and her recipients relation as
acquaintances, and this relationship is further reasserted through the joint elaboration
of the non-task talk.
As compared to verbally minimal requests formatted with an NP, a clause format
allows and requires a longer temporal progression to the core of the request, to the
NP that specifies the product wanted. This longer temporal progression of the verbal
request may be coordinated in different ways with the customers bodily movements
and positions in the space and, therefore, used for different interactional tasks. It may
be used for managing the time it takes to get to the counter: if mutual gaze is achieved
and the greetings presented when the customer is still at distance from the counter, for-
matting the request with a clause enables the customer to initiate the request without a
break in the temporally organized chain of actions and still reach the counter in time,
before completing her/his turn (Examples 69). By formatting her/his request with a
clause, instead of an NP, the customer may also indicate a transition from one activity
to another. Clauses are used for this task in situations in which the customer arrives
at the counter but gets occupied with some other activity before presenting her/his
request (Example 10). When already standing at the transaction point, the customer
is not able to use embodied resources for launching the request, but instead, s/he may
deploy verbal resources and use extended verbal formats for indicating transition to
business and for launching the request. By using an extended verbal format for pre-
senting the request the customers may also slow down the tempo of the concatenated
actions of the encounter and in this way build the encounter as a non-routine one
(Example 13). In these cases customers coordinate their verbal and embodied actions
differently than in the typical, routine encounters: they do not begin their request until
they have already reached the transaction point and a stationary position.
6. Conclusion
In this chapter we have explored the choice of verbal format for presenting a request
for a product in a highly routinized institutional situation, at a kiosk. We have focused
on requests for tobacco products and on the choice between a noun phrase (NP) and
a clause in formatting them. We have argued that the choice between these two verbal
formats is intrinsically related to the physical arrangements of space at the kiosk, the
location of and the bodily movements by the customer and the seller, as well as to the
sequential trajectory of the activity. The verbal presentation of the request is adjusted
to the customers embodied approach to, and arrival at the counter. The key element in
the verbal request is the description and identification of the product, presented with
an NP. This element is produced to coincide with reaching the counter and achieving a
stationary position. There is a practical basis for the choice between an NP and a clause
in formatting the request: the extended verbal format is chosen to manage the time it
takes for the customer to reach the transaction point.
We have shown that the initiation of the request is part of a temporally progress-
ing trajectory of a larger activity, during which the participants establish an interac-
tional space and prepare with embodied and verbal resources a sequential slot for the
request. The seller monitors the kiosk space and the customers movements, treating a
walking customer with a trajectory towards the counter as a potential next customer.
A pre-condition for moving into a focused encounter is then the establishment of
mutual orientation, achieved through mutual gaze. This sighting is followed by the
verbal launching of the beginning of the encounter through greetings, initiated usu-
ally by the seller. We have shown that the sellers greeting, after a possible reciprocal
greeting by the customer, makes relevant in turn a presentation of the reason for the
visit by the customer, her/his request for a product. It is this sequential slot in the
temporally organized chain of actions that makes the initiation of the request rel-
evant. The customers choice of a verbal format, at the moment this slot is opened up,
displays her/his understanding of the distance between her/him and the counter
the length of the verbal format standing in an iconic relationship to this distance
and to the time needed for the customer to reach the counter. We have also shown
that clause-formatted requests, allowing a longer temporal progression of the verbal
action, may be used, for example, to index a transition from non-task talk to business,
to the transaction projected by the customers earlier arrival at the counter; they may
also be used for slowing down the tempo of the transaction and for indicating a non-
routine character of the encounter.
The verbal format of the request is thus a flexible resource that is adjustable struc-
turally and temporally to the embodied and sequential trajectory of the on-going activ-
ity and the tasks at hand. The verbal format emerges step-by-step in time and space
and enables the coordination of the clausal, phrasal and syllable structures of language
with embodied actions, the pairwise steps by the customer to the transaction point.
We have also shown how the participants in the kiosk encounter, the seller and the
customer, orient to the counter as a space that needs to be cooperatively constituted
as a space for a focused joint activity. The sellers availability to serve the customer
and the customers availability to be served is established through mutual bodily and
gaze orientation. Furthermore, the interactional space is constituted and the counter is
confirmed as a point of joint activity, or transaction, through the participants arriving
at the counter and achieving a stationary position. The deeply intertwined relation-
ship between the presentation of the verbal request and the embodied conduct by the
customer the last steps during which the stationary position at the transaction point
is achieved is shown by cases in which a customer is standing in line, and when
launching the request enacts the last steps without, however, moving forward.
In our earlier study on these kiosk data (Sorjonen, Raevaara & Lappalainen 2009)
we came to the conclusion that various variables used commonly in sociolinguistic
research (age, gender, regional background) do not explain the choice between NP
and clause as the format of the request. In this study we have shown that the choice of
the verbal format can be a practical here-and-now issue, and that exploring this choice
requires stepping outside the boundaries of verbal resources and taking into account
the multiplicity of semiotic resources that are in play and made use of in kiosk interac-
tion (cf. Streeck, Goodwin & LeBaron 2011; Deppermann 2013; Goodwin 2013;). At
the same time we have shown that verbal structures are flexible tools for action, a set
of ethnomethods used by the participants in interaction.
On several occasions when talking about our prior study, we received the com-
ment that the verbally minimal character of the requests the frequency of mere
embodied resources when handing over a product, or NPs when requesting a product,
as well as the formats of the clauses (e.g. no modal verbs) might reflect the reti-
cence and impoliteness of Finnish speakers as compared to, for example, speakers in
southern Europe. However, several studies on generally comparable types of service
encounters in other cultures and languages mention similar kinds of minimal deploy-
ment of verbal resources (e.g. Antonopoulou 2001; Danblom et al. 2005; Kerbrat-
Orecchioni 2005). Of course, comparing our results with these studies is complicated
by the fact that the empirical analyses in them remain at general level and the use of
different verbal formats has not been compared. Furthermore, some studies are based
on an assumption of the clause as the core unit of language use. For example, within
the framework of politeness theory, Kerbart-Orecchioni (2005:36) describes phrasal
requests for bread at French bakery stores (une baguette sil vous plait) as elliptical with
a variety of potential missing parts (Donnez-moi; Je veux; Je voudrais); she leaves it
open, however, whether a phrasal request is rude or polite.
Our study does not give support to politeness, nor to language external variables
(age, sex etc.) as relevant factors when choosing between an NP and a clause for for-
matting requests at kiosks. In this particular institutional situation, the participants
orientation to their entitlement to make the request does not explain the choice and
the variety of the verbal format of the requests either. We have shown that what mat-
ters, instead, is the management of the multiple relevancies and possible contingencies
of the occasion, having to do with the coordination of verbal conduct and the physical
arrangements of space, as well as the location of and the embodied conduct of the par-
ticipants, all deployed in managing the tasks at hand. The routine character of a kiosk
encounter, and consequently the knowledge of and reliance on shared understandings
of the indexical meaning of resources other than language, is manifested in the verbal
formats used and in their intricate coordination with the embodied resources. Kiosk
encounters form a prime institutional context where intersubjectivity is based on, and
supported by, mutual familiarity and the mundane character of the situation, facilitat-
ing great economy in the management of activities and social relations.
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Appendix. Symbols for glossing
Case endings (the items in parentheses are often dropped in colloquial Finnish)
Case Ending Abbreviation Approximate meaning

adessive -ll(A) ade at, on
genitive -n gen possession
inessive -ss(A) ine in
illative -Vn ill into
partitive -A, -tA, -ttA par partitiveness
Other abbreviations
con conditional
imp imperative
inf infinitive
pas passive
pc present participle
cli clitic
sg singular
pl plural
prt particle
q question clitic
dem demonstrative pronoun (1 this; 2 that; 3 it, that, the)
1 first person ending
2 second person ending
Requesting immediate action in the surgical
operating room
Time, embodied resources and praxeological
embeddedness*
Lorenza Mondada
University of Basel
Research on requests has focused mainly on requests in ordinary social

interactions, often over the telephone, including remote requests for
something to be done in the future. However, less is known about requests
in face-to-face interactions, concerning immediate not-postponable or time
critical actions to be done here and now, about their embodied production,
and their embeddedness in the current activity. In this Chapter I examine
requests for something to be done immediately which are formatted through
multimodal resources through grammar, gestures and the embodied
engagement in the ongoing activity and which orient to the local timing of
the activity and the situated environment making the request accountable.
I focus on video recordings of surgical procedures: the operating room is a
perspicuous setting for investigating immediate requests, since much of the
teamwork supporting a surgical operation is conducted through requests
addressed by the chief surgeon to his collaborators. I describe the possible
multimodal formats of these requests that can be accomplished verbally,
with or without gesture, or with gesture alone and the way they are silently
responded to. Furthermore I show how they are built into expanded complex
sequences, in which the preparation of the request, projecting its relevance and
recognizability, is crucial. By describing in detail the contingency, temporality,
embodiment of these requests in the operating room, the paper offers more
generally a systematic account of the organization of requests to be done right
now and their embodiment and embeddedness in the current activity.
1. Introduction
Research on requests has focused mainly on requests in ordinary social interactions,

often over the telephone, including remote requests for something to be done in the
* Many thanks to Paul Drew for his careful reading and discussion of the paper.
Lorenza Mondada
future (Couper-Kuhlen 2014; Steensig & Heinemann this volume). These studies have
revealed the systematic organization of two important social dimensions, entitlement
and contingency (Curl & Drew 2008), and their impact on the formulation of requests.
However, less is known about requests in face-to-face interactions, concerning imme-
diate not-postponable or time critical actions to be done here and now, about their
embodied production, and their embeddedness in the current activity.
In this Chapter I examine requests for something to be done immediately, requests
that are formatted through multimodal resources through grammar, gestures and the
embodied engagement in the ongoing activity and which orient to the local timing
of the activity and the situated environment making the request accountable. I shall
focus on video recordings of surgical procedures: the operating room is a perspicuous
setting for investigating immediate requests, since much of the teamwork supporting
a surgical operation is conducted through requests addressed by the chief surgeon to
his collaborators. Moreover, these requests concern something to be done right now,
in a timely way that is precisely fitted with the progressivity of the ongoing operation.
Hence, this setting constitutes an observatory for studying the importance of multi-
modality, of embodied actions (Goodwin 2000), and of the temporal constraints on
the organization of requests for an immediate action, as well as their embeddedness in
the actual praxeological context (see also Goodwin & Cekaite this volume).
Most of these immediate requests are produced in directive forms privileging
brevity, such as imperative verbs, but also with minimal linguistic materials (such
as locative deictics) and possibly without a word. They are always complied with in
a silent embodied way. Their intelligibility relies on the way they are prepared and
embedded in the current activity, which makes them accountable and expectable.
The analysis shows that although these requests can be described in terms of adja-
cency pairs, sometimes completed with a closing third, their sequential organization
is more complex relying on a preparatory phase that makes the first pair part rec-
ognizable, and expanding into a continuation/repair of the request accompanying the
directed action as it is performed. By describing in detail the contingency, temporality,
embodiment of these requests in the operating room, the paper offers more generally
an account of the organization of requests to be done right now and their embodiment
and embeddedness in the current activity.
2. Requesting in the operating room
2.1 Surgery as a situated accomplisment

As I have said, surgery is a perspicuous setting for observing requests, directives, orders
in real time since these actions are crucial for the coordination of team activities
in the operating room. Video recordings of naturally occurring surgical operations,
Requesting immediate action in the surgical operating room
which permit us to analyze in detail the practise of surgeons as it unfolds in real time
and in actual work environments (Heath, Hindmarsh, Luff 2010; Mondada 2003,
2007). Although video studies of surgery remain scarce, there is a small ethnometh-
odological and conversation analytic literature that describes both the ordinary work
of surgeons and the work of training surgeons in the operating room, showing how
they notice, gaze, scrutinize, categorize and discover the details of the anatomy while
they operate (Koschmann etal. 2007, 2011; Mondada 2003, in press a), how surgeons
engage in collaborative teamwork (Hindmarsh and Pilnick, 2002; Mondada 2007),
how training and demonstration are embedded in the work of operating (Koschmann
etal. ii, 2011; Mondada 2011a; Sanchez Svensson, Heath, Luff 2007). These studies of
surgical work demonstrate the importance of coordination in the operating room and
thus the crucial role of instructions, requests, directives, orders in the conduct of the
surgical procedure. Although the chapter focuses on how requests exploit the context
of the operation for their efficient achievement, the results are relevant more gener-
ally to those requests pursuing an immediate embodied response showing that they
are generally characterized by their timely embeddedness in the current action and
cannot be reduced to isolated sequences of actions without taking into consideration
actual circumstances and contingencies and how embodied actions are sequentially
organized in complex ecologies.
2.2 Data
Between 1996 and 1998, I conducted fieldwork in the surgical department of a large
university hospital in France, collecting 25 hours of video recorded surgeries. Here I
will use particularly data from two types of operations, the first of which is open sur-
gery involving an inguinal hernia. The surgeon operates with one assistant. He uses
a coagulating forceps and scissors with his right hand; while his left hand and the
hands of the assistant are busy with pliers, retractors and graspers, holding the tissues
and making the anatomical theatre visible and accessible for dissecting. Most of the
instructions produced by the surgeon to the assistant direct the position of his hands
and of the instruments for the progression of the ongoing procedure. The second type
of operation constitutes the larger part of the corpus and concerns laparoscopies. Lap-
aroscopic surgery (also called key-hole surgery) is a minimally invasive technique
that consists in placing the instruments and an optic system within the patients body
through small incisions and by means of trocars in which the instruments are inserted.
The camera is generally handled by an assistant; the surgeon operates while looking
at a TV monitor where the endoscopic image is made available. This image (Figure 1)
can be transmitted to other participants: remote expert on-line advice is made possible
by the accessibility of the surgical theatre through videoconference; remote learning
is also made possible thanks to the transmission of the image to trainees (Mondada
2003). Another image is produced by a traditional camera mounted on the light above
Lorenza Mondada
the operating theater, making visible the movements of the surgeons hands and the
surface of the body being operated on (Figure 2). This camera is mobilized only for
teaching purposes; the chief surgeon can request the control room to transmit it to
the amphitheatre, alone or in an inset image together with the endoscopic view. Thus,
video is the major link between the various participants and is the key technologi-
cal tool for accomplishing multiple activities. This allows the researcher to use video
recordings produced by the participants themselves although I have also produced
my own recordings in the operating room, capturing a more global view (Figure 3).

Figure 1 Figure 2
Figure 3
I will focus on the way in which the surgeon instructs and directs his team within
various surgical procedures, asking the assistant to activate the cautery (cf. Mondada
2011a), to pass an instrument, to put the tissues under tension (cf. Mondada, in pressb),
and to visualize the operating theatre with the endoscopic camera (cf. Mondada 2003,
in press a).
The analysis first centres on the basic sequence organization of these actions
(3), demonstrating that the surgeons instructions, in the form of directives, project
the normative expectation of a complying action. Second, I discuss the multimodal
resources through which these actions are formatted (4). Third, the complex ver-
bal and embodied format of the actions composing the sequence invites us to con-
sider their expansions (5) and their embeddedness in the current ongoing activity.
More precisely the preparation of the sequence (6) displays interesting praxeological
features essential for the intelligibility of the directives. Finally, the analysis shows how
directives merge within subsequent actions, accompanying them, both guiding and
repairing them (7).
3. Sequence organization
Instructions are organized in the form of adjacency pairs, where a directive constitut-
ing a first pair part projects a second pair part (3.1), sometimes followed by sequence-
closing thirds (3.2). Participants are sensitive to absences of responses (3.3) and may
take the opportunity of repairing the first as well as the second action (3.4). Once
established, the complexity of the interrelationships between these basic features will
be explored in the remaining part of the study (57).
3.1 Adjacency pairs

In its simplest sequence organization, requesting in the operating room takes the form
of a verbal directive followed by the requested action. Here are some excerpts concern-
ing the passing of instruments to be inserted in the body through the trocars:
(1) (TC27028V/STR/K2-dv1-23.40)
1 SUR scissors
2 (1)
3 ASS ((gives scissors))
(2) (TC27028V/STR/K2-dv1-1.00.35)
1 SUR ok, les ciseaux
okay, scissors
2 (2)
3 ASS ((scissors are inserted in the trocar))
(3) (TC27028V/STR/K2-dv2-10.17)
1 SUR peanut
2 (4)
3 ASS ((a grasper called peanut is inserted in the trocar))
In these excerpts, the surgeon asks an assistant to do something with an instrument

simply by naming that instrument; the team complies by holding the tool and insert-
ing it in the trocar. Similar requests can also be formulated through directives and
imperatives, as in the following cases:
(4) (coag)
1 SUR coag
2 (2.0)
3 ASS ((activates coagulation))
Lorenza Mondada
(5) (TC27028V/STR/K2-dv1_1.00.27)
1 SUR okay. hold this,
2 ASS ((holds the tissue with the grasper passed by SUR))
(6) (PEL_5.10)
1 SUR prends l
grasp there
2 ASS ((changes position of his pliers))
In the first case, the surgeon asks the assistant to activate the coagulating power of his
hook by dint of a pedal; the assistant complies immediately afterwards. In the second,
the surgeon has finished absorbing blood with a grasper rolled with a mesh of cotton,
then asks the assistant to maintain the instruments position, thus freeing one of his
hands to manuvre another tool. In the third, the surgeon asks the assistant to grasp
another point of the tissue in order to increase the tension for the pursuit of the dissec-
tion; the assistant promptly changes the position of his grasping pliers.
Likewise, directives can also concern the manipulation of the endoscopic camera
in laparoscopy, as in the following cases:
(7) (TC11068_K2_D1-26.50)
1 SUR #zoom avant
zoom in
fig #fig.4
2 (0.3)
3 ASS ((zooms in)) #
fig #fig.5

Figure 4 Figure 5
(8) (1106k1d2-11.31)
1 SUR #zoom arrire.
zoom back
fig #fig.6
2 (0.2)
3 ASS ((zooms back))#
fig #fig.7

Figure 6 Figure 7
(9) (2702k1d1-8.17)
1 SUR au: milieu sil vous pla[t,
in the middle please
2 ASS
[((recenters))
(10) (2702_k1d2-50.23)
1 SUR get close to the spleen now
2 ASS ((zooms in))
In all cases, an instruction in the form of a directive or imperative is produced, fol-

lowed by an action of the assistant or a movement of the camera operated by him or
her. The first directive projects an expectable second action, which is done immediately
afterwards, zooming in (Excerpt 7, Figures 45; Excerpt 10), zooming out (Excerpt 8,
Figures 67), or recentering the image (Excerpt 9).
These paired actions raise several questions.
How is the first pair part formatted and how does it make intelligible and recog-
nizable the action to be done?
How is the assistant able to do the requested action in a way that successfully
complies with the directive given that the latter is produced in a very elliptical
and indexical way?
What is the timing of the responsive action? The (simplified) transcripts given for
the previous excerpts do not allow us to say much about that, hence the necessity
of having more elaborate transcriptions of the ongoing action.
3.2 Sequence-closing thirds

The sequence described above is often closed by a third turn uttered by the first speaker.
This turn is minimal in the sense that it is not designed to initiate another project but
closes the actual sequence (Schegloff, 2007:118). Often the sequence-closing third is
in the form of okay (Schegloff 2007:120):
Lorenza Mondada
(11) (28028_K1_d1_2.46)
1 SUR #tourne la ca[mra.
turn the camera
2 ASS
[((turns))
fig #fig.8
3 (0.3)
4 SUR #ok:
fig #fig.9

Figure 8 Figure 9
(12) (2702k1d1-27.16)
1 SUR okay. get close
2 ASS ((zooms in))
3 SUR okay.
Schegloff describes the okay particle as manifesting an acceptance of the second pair
part (2007:120). A careful multimodal transcription (see conventions at the end of
the chapter), allows us to consider the exact timing of the directed action, particularly
when it begins and when it ends as do the screen shots too (see Figures 89). In this
context, okay appears to be related not only to the completion of the requested action
but also to its temporal unfolding as shown in the following cases (Excerpt 13 being
a temporally more detailed multimodal transcript of Excerpt 11):
(13) (= 11) (28028_K1_d1_2.46)
1 SUR tourne la ca+mra.
turn the camera
ass +turns->
2 (0.3)+
->+
3 SUR ok:
okay:
(14) (TC_27028K1D1_41_30)
1 SUR (please) repo+sition the liver,+
ass
+reposit liver retractor+
2 SUR ye::s
(15) (= 12) (2702k1d1-27.16)

1 SUR okay. get close
2 (0.7)+(0.2)
cam +zoom in>
3 SUR okay.+

->+
In the first case, ok is uttered as soon as the movement of the camera is completed
by the assistant. In this sense, it manifests the acceptance of the new visual field pro-
duced by him. In the second case, the requested action is done by the assistant in
overlap with the directive, in such a way that it is completed at the end of the directive
itself. Here the ye::s acknowledges both the action and its promptness. By contrast,
in the third case okay is uttered as the camera is still moving closer. The particle
serves to stop this movement, signaling when it is possibly complete, as the surgeon
makes explicit in the following excerpt:
(16) (2005/pdcoag)
1 SUR coag
2 (0.5) +(1+5)
ass
+coagulates-->
3 SUR sto+p eh,
->+
Here, the third position is clearly devoted to the management of the length of the
requested action: as soon as the surgeon begins to say stop and the surgeons request
is recognizable, the assistant stops coagulating. In this sense, stop works like another
directive, managing the end, rather than the beginning, of the action. This in turn
shows the importance of a very precise timing of the requested action. So, sequence-
closing thirds function to calibrating the timing of the requested action orienting to
the crucial importance of the second action being produced now, to its finely tuned
duration, as well as to its timely completion.
3.3 Orientation to the absence of response

Directives constitute a sequence in the strongest sense; the first action sets up the
conditional relevance of the second. The second (responsive) action is conditionally
relevant, and if it is not produced, it is seen as noticeably, officially, consequentially,
absent (Schegloff 2007:20). The observable absence of a response is manifested in
repeating the initial action and thereby re-issuing the directive.
(17) (2702k1d1-20.25)
1 SUR get close.
2 (1.3)
comm ((no visible action from the assistant))
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3 SUR get clo:s+e,

cam
+zoom->
(18) (4coag_14.39=14.09)
1 SUR
coag
2 (1.4)
comm ((no visible action from the assistant))
3 SUR COag.
4 (0.5) +(1.7)
ass +activates coagulation
In both cases, the repeated first pair part is produced with upgraded prosody; it is fol-
lowed by the requested action. This intensification of the first pair part is visible also in
other formats, such as the following one:
(19) (TC11068_K2_D1_53.55)
1 SUR
zoom avant# directive
zoom forward
fig
#fig.10
2 (0.8) absence of response
3 SUR #>vas-y,< +zoom avant. 2d directive
>go on< zoom forward
ass +zooms in fast-> response
fig #fig.11
4 (2.1)
5 SUR #merci:+ closing third; end of zoom
thanks
->+
fig #fig.12

Figure 10 Figure 11 Figure 12
As the directive is produced for the first time, the camera does not move (see

Figures1011); as it is re-issued for the second time, the camera assistant produces
a very fast zoom in, approaching very close to the operative field (Figure 12). Thus
merci: orients both backwards, acknowledging the complying action, and also for-
wards, contributing to its completion/stopping.
In the following excerpts, the intensification of the second production of the first
pair part is achieved by code-switching into the L1 of the assistant.
(20) (TC27028V/STR/K2-dv1-23.59)
1 SUR
come close directive
2 (2.8) no response
3 SUR >approche,< 2d directive, CS
>come close<
4 (0.2) + (2.6)+
ass +zoom in+ response
(21) (TC27028V/STR/K2-dv1-25.33)
1 SUR
get close directive
2 (1.6) no response
3 SUR approche, (.) ici 2d directive, CS
come closer, (.) here
4 (0.3) +(3.5)+ (0.2)
+zoom in+ response
5 SUR m hh. closing third
Code-switching is used as a way of intensifying the initial directive, which can also be
stressed, produced in a faster tempo, or expanded with more details. In all cases, the
requested action is then done promptly. When produced, the closing third monitors
the trajectory of the granting action, either for confirming it or for regulating it.
The treatment of the absence of responses shows that directives make directed
action sequentially relevant, and normatively expected. Moreover, the insistence, the
accelerated rhythm of second directives, as well as the placement of the closing thirds,
all show an orientation to the timing of the action which, for the practical purposes of
the surgical operation, has to be done immediately and cannot be postponed, and has
to be precisely calibrated in its length.
3.4 Repair
Assistants responses to surgeons directives are generally tacitly accepted, as displayed
by the continuation of the dissection, although they can also more rarely be ver-
bally acknowledged and accepted by him. But assistants responses can also be treated
by the surgeon as inadequate, evident in his initiating repair.
(22) (TC27028V/STR/K2-dv1-57.18)
1 SUR okay.*(.) back just a b+it
>>intro hook*
ass +back->
2 (1.0)+ (0.5)
ass ->+
3 SUR back
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4 +(1.2)+
+back+
5 SUR okay
The surgeon asks to go back just a bit (1), indicating about how far the assistant has
to zoom backwards. Nonetheless, as the assistant has actually zoomed back (2) and
stopped at some point, the surgeon re-does his directive, in the simple form back (3).
This second directive both repairs the first formulation and corrects the granting action
by the assistant, who complies (4) in a way that is then accepted by the surgeon (5).
This kind of repair shows the difficulties related to an indexical formulation of the
instruction (see below), as is observable in the next case:
(23) (par l/over there) (4.50)
1 *(0.3)
sur *points with his pliers->
2 SUR par l*
over there
->*
3 (0.4) + (0.7) *(0.9) + (0.6)+
*
ass +tends w pliers+reorients+
sur
*points in the air w pliers*
The surgeon instructs the assistant to manipulate in a certain direction the tissue he is
holding with his pliers, using a locative expression and also pointing in that direction
too (12). The assistant complies with the directive (3). Then after a while, silently,
the surgeon points with his scissors, indicating again the direction towards which the
assistant has to manipulate the tissue. Promptly, the assistant reorients his tension. In
this case, the surgeon self-repairs his spatial indication in a purely gestural way. The
assistant adjusts his action to the latter indication, revising his first understanding and
complying with the directive.
3.5 Summary
The excerpts analyzed in this section show how directives constitute an adjacency
pair, consisting of a minimal sequence sometimes completed by a closing third. Its
sequential and normative features are displayed by the participants orienting to the
absence of response and initiating a repair if the directive has not been interpreted in
the expected way. This sequence organization shows some peculiarities, which will be
further investigated:
The directive refers to an action to be accomplished immediately, and which is

sensitive to various temporal dimensions: the timing of the response and the tem-
poral extension of the response are monitored and calibrated by the first speaker.
This is a central feature of immediate requests, which shows the crucial impor-
tance of the temporality of the action.
Directives appear to be highly indexical, raising the question of their intelligi-
bilty and interpretability. Although following instructions is always indexical
(Garfinkel 1967; Amerine & Bilmes 1988), the formulations used by the surgeon
are particularly economic and brief, raising the question of what makes them
understandable by the recipient;
Compliance by assistants is often silent. Moreover although surgeons requests or
directives are done vocally they may also be realized through embodied conduct
during the ongoing surgical activity.
Thus, a detailed analysis of these directives needs to take into consideration the tempo-
rality of the ongoing actions, their embodied character and their embededness within
the larger activity. I show in the next section that this complicates the description of
the sequence and raises interesting issues about the conditions of its intelligibility.
4. Multimodal formats of directives: Resources mobilized
Directives are often expressed verbally, but linguistic resources represent only one part
of their format. Other resources, mainly gestural and related to the manipulation of
the instruments, are also used. Granting or compliance is always silently produced; the
request or directive can also be done in this way, although more rarely. Consideration
of the complex order of multimodal resources used in making and responding to a
surgeons request necessitates other forms of transcription, in which the precise tim-
ing of each verbal and embodied conduct is precisely annotated. Therefore, in what
follows, I mainly use ELAN transcripts, which make possible a careful annotation of
various temporal lines and the timely coordination of action.
4.1 Linguistic resources

The verbal forms used to format these directives are frequently free standing nouns,
when directives concern the passing of instruments (scalpel/bistouri, scissors/cis-
eaux, grasper/pliers/pince etc.); and frequently also imperatives (hold, zoom,
tends, (re)prends, get close coag) for other actions. The use of imperatives
suggests that directing the other is an entitled action for the speaker, the chief sur-
geon, who is responsible for the operation and orients towards an immediate (ver-
sus deferred) compliance by his assistant. Often imperatives are followed by a deictic,
either a demonstrative referring to the tissue (a while the verb argument in the
form of a noun phrase, like that little vein, is much less frequent) or a locative refer-
ring to its position (here, au: milieu, plus loin). These verbal directives are short,
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have a compact form, and thereby orient to brevity or economy (see Rossi, this
volume) another way of orienting to the immediateness of the expected response.
In this multilingual environment, verbal materials can be produced in French and in
English, depending on the surgeon and on his orientation towards the local team or
the cosmopolite audience.
It is clear however that a mere linguistic analysis is insufficient for accounting for
the way in which directives are achieved. These actions are done by mobilizing a range
of multimodal resources, locally embedded in their material environment, closely
related to the moment and contingencies of their production and to the embodied
actions of the other participants.
4.2 Gestural resources

Most of the surgeons directives are formatted by linguistic and gestural resources.
For instance, in the following case the current action (dissection) is suspended and a
communicative gesture is done (pointing, see Figure 13) so that the hook is used to
point and not to dissect.
(24) (TC11068_K2_D1_22.52)
1 SUR une deu*xime pi*nce# ici.h*
a second pliers here.h
*........*points---*
fig #fig.13
2 (6) + (1) + (1) #
ass +..+inserts pliers in the trocar->>
fig #fig.14

Figure 13 Figure 14
(25) (TC27028V/STR/K2-dv2-14.00)
sur >>dissects with scissors>
1 SUR ge*t
clo*se*
->*small pointings w sciss*,,*dissects>
2 (0.2) + (4)
ass
+camera gets close->
(26) (PEL2.15)
1 SUR *reprends plus +prs*
take it closer again
*points-------*
ass
+...->
2 (0.2) + (4)
->+grasps>
At each stage, the directive co-occurs with a communicative gesture, often a pointing
gesture, which indicates the location or the target to be addressed. These gestures make
deictic reference immediately visible. The repeated way in which these gestures are
made both highlights the visibility of the target, securing the identification of the rel-
evant object/point to be grasped, and possibly expresses some insistence the gesture
being repeated until the action of following it is achieved or at least initiated (Figure14).
As we have seen, both responses to directives and the directives themselves can
be performed through non-vocal, silent conduct. Silent instructions clearly indicate
what is being requested/required. For instance, the same visible gestural resources
described above in the minimal verbal format for instructions can be observed also in
tacit instructions limited to waving or pointing gestures, as in this next fragment in
which the surgeon is operating silently; his instruction is implemented by a gesture,
unaccompanied by any words:
(27) (PEL0.54)
The surgeon holds a piece of tissue towards the assistant, then waves it, and the assistant
takes it. A waving gesture mobilizes silent directives that can occur in environments in
which the surgeon is engaged in another action, such as explaining and demonstrating
a procedure. In this case, silent instructions provide for the possibility of simultane-
ously managing multiple activities (Mondada, 2011a), as in the next excerpt:
(28) (PEL1.38)
Lorenza Mondada
The surgeon is explaining the procedure for the audience of trainees watching the opera-
tion from a distance, during which he continues with his dissection. Thus, he is engaged
simultaneously in multiple activities, dissecting and talking, operating and demonstrat-
ing the operation. In this action configuration, the directive achieved through grasping
the anatomical piece and waving it, allows for coordination between them, without dis-
rupting the other course of action the explanation. This reveals the surgeons orienta-
tion towards the double management of demonstrating and to the operation, as well as
talking to the audience and communicating with the team (see also Mondada 2011a).
5. Extended sequences
We should now consider the practical actions in which the surgeons requests are
embedded. The surgeons pointing gesture suspends the dissection but the previous
dissecting moves situate it and make relevant a certain location and target. A closer
inspection reveals that requests/directives and grantings/compliance are embedded in
a more complex sequence, in which the preparation of the sequence is crucial. In the
following sections, I study instances of two different directives, one concerning coagu-
lation and the other the position of the assistants hand.
5.1 coagulation
Beyond the apparent simplicity of the directive-compliance pair, coag/coagulation,
a closer look at the ongoing surgical activity shows the complexity of these paired
actions.
(29) (coag)
Fig. 15 Fig. 16 Fig. 17 Fig. 18

Figure 15 Figure 16

Figure 17 Figure 18
The sequence unfolds in the following way:
The surgeon approches with his hook the point that has to be dissected (Figure15);
he positions it in an adequate way, beneath the fat tissue to be dissected (Figure16).
This constitutes the preparation of what follows.
He utters the directive (coagulation).
In response, the assistant activates the cautery (Figure 17): coagulation is per-
formed by using a current that produces a rapid rise in temperature in the cell,
which makes it explode. This process is visible since it produces some vaporiza-
tion. In our transcripts, the multimodal description of the assistants action is
timely placed as soon as this vaporization is visible.
The hook is further tensed and operates the dissection (Figure 18); once the point
has been dissected, the hook moves away and the dissection continues.
A similar form of organization is visible in the next excerpt, concerning a very differ-
ent action.
5.2 Take it closer

If we look closer at what happens in the open surgery when the surgeon utters a direc-
tive, we find the following complex praxeological configuration:
(30) reprends plus prs/take it closer again (2.15)
Fig.19 Fig. 20 Fig.21

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SURs plier ASSs plier

SURs scissor
Figure 19 Figure 20 Figure 21
The surgeon is holding a piece of flesh with his plier, while he dissects with the
scissors at the bottom of that piece (Figure 19). As he proceeds, the space he dissects is
transformed and the tension given to the tissue is no longer sufficient; hence, the point
of tension held by the assistant is no longer useful. Consequently, the surgeon asks the
assistant to change the position of his plier. In response to this directive (reprends
plus prs/take it closer again), accompanied by waving a piece of tissue, the assis-
tant drops the one he was holding with his pliers (Figure 20) and grasps the indicated
piece, closer to the surgeons pliers. As soon as the assistant has taken this new position
(Figure21), the surgeon continues his dissection.
Here is another example:
(31) reprends plus prs/take it closer again (3.19)
Here the surgeon pushes forward a piece of tissue and waves it when uttering the direc-
tive (reprends plus prs/take it closer again). In response the assistant drops the
piece he was holding and repositions his pliers, grasping the point indicated by the sur-
geon who then continues his work. The surgeons gestures suspend the current dissec-
tion in order to communicate with the assistant, relying on waving the hook to indicate
what is needed the waving thereby serving as a pointing gesture. The way he holds the
tissue is functional to the dissection; it also prepares and projects further steps by indi-
cating the trajectory of the ongoing operation, and enabling the assistant to anticipate
the next step. Thus, the instruction is precisely positioned and embedded in the surgical
procedure and made relevant and meaningful thanks to its position in this temporally
and sequentially organized course of action. The instruction is formatted by a verbal

directive and a gesture (waving). In this case, they occur together, simultaneously. How-
ever, such gestures can be variously coordinated in time, as we shall see below.
5.3 Summary
In sum, the sequence organization of directives in the operating room is constituted
through a complex multimodal gestalt temporally arranged in a finely tuned way.
Sequential format:
Preparation
For example: repositioning of the instruments, changes in the visual disposition of the
anatomic field, visible arrangement of a surgical move projecting a continuation.
1st action:
verbal directive or request + pointing gesture
2nd action:
the ASSistant silently responds, complying with the requested action
Post-sequence expansion:
repair, pursuit of a response, closing third
The following sections focus on the preparation of the sequence and the post-sequence
expansion.
6. P
reparation of the sequence: The importance
of the praxeological context
A general problem associated with requests, directives, commands and instructions is

the matter of how participants manage to deal with the inescapable indexicality of these
first actions and generally disambiguate or interpret them in the expected or intended
way (Garfinkel 1967). Instructions and instructed actions mutually shape one another,
since complying actions anticipate the outcome of the sequences and prefigure them,
and outcomes retrospectively confirm what the expected and adequate actions were.
Both the intelligibility of the first actions and the understanding exhibited by the sec-
ond shape the variable temporality of the sequence, and the way in which multimodal
resources are distributed within it. So, the question is: how does the preparation phase
project the first pair part the request or directive and the intellibility of its indexical
formatting? I will show that this projectability depends on the embededdness of direc-
tives in the ongoing course of action. In order to demonstrate this, I focus on particu-
lar problems encountered in directing the camera (6.1), where the camera is sensitive
to the actual movements of the dissecting hook; in directing the assistants hand (6.2),
where the directive is embedded in the trajetory of the dissection; and in requesting
Lorenza Mondada
coagulation (6.3), where the directive is often part of a series. It will become clear that
through certain preparatory conduct that projects something will be needed (i.e. an
upcoming request), the assistant is able to respond early or even on occasion without
a request/directive having been made.
6.1 Camera assistant orients to the ongoing trajectory of dissection

We have seen that the surgeon can ask the assistant to move the endoscopic camera
verbally and with a pointing gesture. But it is often unnecessary for this gesture to be
performed. When the operating surgeon is fully engaged in the surgical procedure, the
sequential organization of the surgical activity enables the next step to be projected by
the camera operator.
(32) (= 12 = 15) (2702k1d1-27.16)
Fig. 22 Fig. 23 Fig. 24 Fig. 25

Figure 22 Figure 23

Figure 24 Figure 25
Figure 22 shows the surgeon dissecting along a line, under the liver. Before the directive
get close is uttered, there is a substantial change in the visual field; the hook is moved
away from the point of dissection. Interestingly, at that moment, the camera moves too,
although not in a particular direction. When the directive is issued, the reorganization
of the operative field is still ongoing (Figure 23): the hook is still moving around and the
grasper is moving too, towards a new position. In this context, it is difficult for the cam-
era to identify where the next relevant area will be. But as soon as the grasper has moved
to a new position (Figure 24) and the hook is approaching once again the line of dissec-
tion (Figure 25), the camera assistant zooms in. This shows that he is not just responding
to the directive, but he is responding to the repositioning of the instruments and thus a
reconfiguration of the visual operative field. Hence the context of the surgical actions in
fieri and more particularly the projection-stabilization of an intelligible operative field,
makes it possible for the assistant to anticipate what will be relevant or required next.
This intelligibility of the praxeological context can make it possible for the assis-
tant to respond in advance of the completion of the request/directive. In the following
case, the instruction is formulated first with a deictic (here 2); the camera moves as
soon as the verb is uttered:
(33) (= 5) (2702_k1d1- 43.24)
1 *(1.5)*(0.5)*
sur *approches a bleeding spot w hook*cauterizes it*
2 SUR center +here, that little+ vein
cam
+goes below and centres+
3 *(2)
sur *continues cauterization->
Just prior to the production of the directive, the surgeon is approaching a visibly bleed-
ing spot, and begins to cauterize it. The camera assistant complies with the directive
as soon as the verb (centre) is uttered and before the demonstrative description is
completed (that little vein 2). He orients to the ongoing course of actions by the
surgeon, rather than to the reference contained in the directive. A similar case is the
following excerpt:
(34) (2702k1d1-28.18)
1 SUR *okay..hh +show me this+ ligament
*moves the scissors tow the ligamt+dissects->
cam +moves in dir of the scissor->
The surgeon moves his scissors towards the ligament before naming it; and the camera
operator orients immediately to his action, following the movement of the scissors
before the verbal instruction. Moreover, the surgeon begins immediately to dissect an
action that relies on the relevant visualization of the operative field before the ana-
tomical landmark has been uttered. So, although the instruction is particularly explicit,
the action that will be directed is achieved before the surgeon (verbally) requests it. In
both examples, the explicit description of the target seems to be addressed less to the
assistant than to the audience watching the operation.
Lorenza Mondada
In sum, these early movements show that although instructions are always indexi-
cal, their indexicality generally does not cause a problem, since they are accountably
formulated within a praxeological context that reflexively achieves their intelligibility
and makes them projectable. This context is configured by trajectories of the surgical
action that highlight and project the relevant landmarks for the next surgical step. In
these early camera movements, the assistant controlling the camera and the surgeon
directing it display their common orientation to the ongoing surgical action. The assis-
tant exhibits, through these anticipating moves, her skilled participation in the opera-
tion (see also Sanchez Svensson etal. 2007 and Bezemer etal. ii, 2011 about the team
anticipating the next move while passing instruments).
6.2 A
ssistant holding pliers and graspers orients to the evolving tension
of the tissues
In open surgery, the work of the surgeon and his assistant is organized in a comple-
mentary way: the assistants hands and the left hand of the surgeon hold the tissue in
a way that produces a tension, making dissection or cauterization possible. The right
hand of the surgeon operates, dissects or coagulates, by means of scissors or a cau-
terizing forceps. Maintaining the relevant tension along with the progression of the
dissection is the condition for the operating surgeons action. In this way holding and
dissecting represent the core actions constituting their joint activity, and enable the
assistant to anticipate an upcoming request at a given point.
The preparatory phase of the request can be roughly organized in two ways:
either the surgeon reorganizes the operative field, suspending the dissection so
far to reconfigure the tensions. In this case he drops/grasps a piece of tissue and
gesturally/verbally engages in a request.
or the surgeon continues along a line of dissection, maximally integrating his
request in the course of action. In this case he typically pushes/dissects/cauter-
izes along the same trajectory, within repeated progressive similar surgical moves,
projecting the next one.
We can observe that in the latter case, the request is strongly projected and made
expectable by the progressivity of the activity. The gesture of pointing/waving (cf.
supra) is constructed as a continuation out of pushing some tissue, rather than as a
new gesture after suspending the dissection: repeatedly pushing at tissue is equivalent
to making a waving gesture. Because of the projection and continuity of the surgical
action, responses tend to be produced earlier. Moreover, the verbal request tends to be
produced later and in a reduced format.
The next excerpt involves a directive made during in a change in the operative
field. The surgeon suspends the dissection done with his right hand visible in the
scissors going away from the operative field. At the same time, he also stops holding
tissue with the grasper held in his left hand, and he grasps another part of the tissue.
The directive is uttered as he is grasping it (prends); as he waves it, he produces the
deictic (a). Hence, the directive is gesturally organized in two units.
(35) prends a/take this (1.53)
The assistants response comes here after the waving addressed to him has been initi-
ated. He drops the tissue he was holding, repositions his pliers and grasps the indicated
position. As soon as he holds it, the surgeon begins again to dissect. The directive is
organized in subsequent steps: dissection is stopped, the field is rearranged by the sur-
geon, the directive and the visible gesture are produced, and consequently the assistant
performs the requested action. In such cases, directives tend to take the form of an
[imperative + deictic] (see excerpt 35 above).
In other cases, directives can be anticipated on the basis of the ongoing dissection.
In this environment, the praxeological context permits the assistants early response;
moreover, the form of the directive tends to be shorter and even minimal. The follow-
ing collection of excerpts shows a similar phenomenon: the surgeon is operating by
pushing and holding the tissue. At some point, he ends the pulling gesture in a waving
gesture, showing the precise point to be grasped by the assistant. This gesture is done
before he utters the request. The request takes a minimal form (mhm, ici) and the
response is immediate.
(36) mhm (2.39)
(37) mhm (5.02)

Lorenza Mondada
(38) ici/here (1.46)
Minimal verbal directives embedded within the dissecting action and with early gestures
characterize an environment in which the dissection follows a structure within cyclic
and repeated surgical gesture. Dissection is an action organized in progressive units of
movement projecting more to come: the repeated occurrence of these dissecting gestures
along a visible structure under tension has a strong projective force, so that the assistant
can anticpate the required next move even when the request has been made silently.
In all of these three cases, the surgeon is engaged in repeatedly pulling the tissue
with his pliers, dissecting along the line of tension created by him and the assistant. At
some point, his pushing ends in a waving or pointing gesture (see the circled annota-
tions) to the relevant area to be grasped by the assistant. The verbal production of his
directive comes only after, followed by the assistants response. Here, the directive is
(a)projected by the ongoing dissection, (b) firstly and visibly achieved with the waving
or pointing gesture, (c) finally made explicit by the verbal component. Interestingly,
we can notice that when the embodied directive is done much earlier than the verbal
directive, the latter takes a reduced form: no verb is present, and mostly resources such
as isolated deictic elements are used, or even more minimal resources like mhm. So,
the temporal positioning of various multimodal resources (the verbal vs the visible)
accounts for a systematic distribution of the format of the verbal directive: imperative
verbs occur when the waving or pointing gesture is produced simultaneously or late,
whereas directives in a shorter form, reduced to deictics or mhm, occur when the
gesture is produced early.
In some cases, the preparation is so evident that the requested action can be antic-
ipated and done even before the verbal request, like in the following case:
(39) (2.55) fais voir, on va (0.3) paratre un sac ici/let see, we will (0.3)
see a sac here
In this fragment, the surgeon is holding on to a piece of tissue with his left hand, and
has already done various operating moves on it. He waves it, and only then utters a
request, which seems to orient less towards the actual action to be done and more
towards some general next step (concerning what will be seen/shown in a moment).
So the verbal part of the request comes late relative to the gesture, and does not explic-
itly address the next action to be done.
Interestingly, the assistants response begins very early, and before the verbal com-
ponent of the request is projectable (just after the initial verb fais, which is not very
informative at this point and cannot yet project the verbal request). This means that
the assistant orients towards the waving gesture rather than towards the verbal part of
the request; moreover, the gist of the waving is made recognizable by the previous dis-
secting actions progressing along the tissue.
Thus, the projective power of the preparatory phase is demonstrated by cases in
which the preparation itself can work as a request, or, better said, projects the pos-
sible request and the expected requested action. In this case, there is no request, and
no pointing gesture; the dissection is not suspended in order to do the request. The
trajectory of the dissection itself works as a projective hint, where the next action to be
undertaken is clearly visible within the emergent ongoing course of action.
Dissection can be done using different techniques by coagulating tissue, by cut-
ting tissue, and also by bluntly pulling and pushing tissue. When these movements
are done in a repeated way along a line of dissection, following the anatomical struc-
ture, this makes them recognizable and anticipated. The repeated and extended pull-
ing gesture ends in a movement that presents the ending point of this structure to the
assistant: this movement can be transformed into a pointing or waving gesture, but
can also be recognized as projecting some relevant action on the part of the assistant,
without any instruction.
In this case, instead of an instruction, another action is realized, something like
giving, offering, tending something towards the co-participant, who might respond by
grasping it. This can lead to a change of hand position on the part of the assistant, in
a smooth way, without suspending the continuity of the dissection, as happens in the
following case, in which the surgeon pushes the dissected piece of tissue towards the
assistant, tending it to him:
(40) (6.44)
With his scissors the surgeon pushes a piece of dissected tissue towards the assistant,
who drops what he was holding and moves towards the point indicated, as the surgeon
pushes the piece even more explicitly towards him. The assistant then grasps and holds
the tissue piece.
Lorenza Mondada
Thus, instead of a tacit instruction taking the form of an embodied pointing or wav-
ing, coordination is sometimes done in a variety of other forms, such as pushing, pulling,
and tending. In these latter cases, directives merge with the ongoing dissection. A sur-
geons first action is formatted in a way that comes closer to a form of paired collaborative
actions, such as giving and taking, offering and grasping. These boundary cases show
how embodied actions raise issues of description and categorization of resources and
actions, as well as issues of continuity (vs clear cut differences) between types of actions.
In sum, when the preparation is particularly embedded in the operation, a prepa-
ratory move can be recognized as implying a change in the assistants hands to secure
the continuity of the action: this accounts for reduced request/directive forms and
for responses (compliance) that are produced early. By contrast, when the dissection
reaches the end of the tended structure, this makes a reorganization of the tension nec-
essary. In this case, instructions take a more elaborated form and rely less on the pos-
sible anticipation of the assistant. The distribution of sequential formats is sensitive,
then, both to the temporality of the ongoing surgery and to its detailed organization in
progressive steps and recognizable phases.
6.3 coag (.) coag (.) coag: Action-type sequence series

and their projective potential
Projectability of the next action and therefore of a possible requested action relies
heavily on the continuity of the surgical action, on the repetitive character of the dis-
section following a given anatomical landmark (6.1) or a line of tension (6.2). This
previsible character is enhanced in environments in which the surgeon organizes the
collaborative action in form of series of directives. Action-type sequence series have
been characterized by Schegloff as composed of a number of sequences of the same
type, by the same initiating party to the same recipient party with a change in item or
target (2007:212). However, a point that has not yet been explored is that a series of
sequences, and their associated embodied actions, may enhance the projectability and
intelligibility of the next action within the series and thus have an effect both on the
action format and on the timing of the responses.
The directive coag or coagulation is often serially organized: several coags are
uttered one after the other, especially where a dissection plane is followed along several
adjacent points arranged on the same line (Figure 26). Here is an example of a series:
(41) (LEL1.49)
Figure 26
fig #fig.26
1 #*(0.6)
sur *approaches->
2 SUR coa*g,
->*tends>
3 (1.0)+* (2.6)*
ass +activ. coag
sur ->*dissects*
4 *(1.1)
*approaches->
5 SUR co*ag
->*dissects->
6 (1.0)+ (0.1)*(0.8)
ass +activ. coag
-->*repositions->
7 SUR coag*
->*repositions again->
8 *+(2.0)+*
->*repositions & burns tissue*repositions->
ass +coag+
9 SUR c*o+ag
->*advances & burns->
ass +activ. coag
10 (2.4)*
11 SUR *co+ag
*advances & burns->
ass +activ. coag
12 (0.7)*
sur ->*#
fig #fig.27
Figure 27
Lorenza Mondada
During this series of coag, the dissection follows the parietal ligament (see
Figure27, showing the result of the series along this line) and is organised in a series
of repeated moves: the surgeon approaches and positions the hook under the tissue to
be dissected, utters the directive, and as the coagulation is activated, holds the tissue,
dissecting and burning it. Each next move along the ligament is projectable by the
assistant.
Some observations about this series: first, the temporal relation between the prep-
aration and the directive is variable; at the beginning, the surgeon tends clearly to dis-
tinguish the approach and positioning of the hook, the directive and the consecutive
tension that allows him to burn the tissue. Then the directive tends progressively to be
uttered earlier, as the preparation is not yet finished. This shows that the assistant is
left with more or less latitude in the work of determining the right moment at which
it is relevant to coagulate. Second, the response of the assistant can also be earlier or
later. Initially his response is rather late, but progressively he activates the coagulation
almost at the same time as the directive is uttered. Thus, the directive is anticipable on
the basis of the position of the hook.
So, the choice of the right moment at which the action is to be done is truly col-
laborative and presupposes mutual coordination and mutual trust between the team
members. The very possiblity of projecting the next step, enhanced by the series, is
visible (a) in the early responses of the assistant, (b) in the fact that in some cases the
assistant does not even need the directive.
In the following, the surgeon is requesting coagulation with a positive token
oui as visible at lines 3, 11 (simple arrow). At other moments, however, the assis-
tant coagulates without an explicit request having been made (double arrow, 6, 8, 13).
(42) (2005/Vous_y_allez_sans_qujvous_ldise)
1 SUR okay so:, (.) we c- we can use the scissors or the hook,
2 (.)
3 SUR oui:
yes:
4 (+3.1)
ass +activ. coag
5 SUR and you see that the retractor, (0.3) of the first
assistant,
6 (0.6) +follows+ the: hoo:k,
ass
+activ. coag+
7 (0.3)
8 SUR and so we have a very good +traction,+ (0.6)
ass +activ. coag+
9 during all the dissection.
10 (1.3)
11 SUR oui h,
yes h,
12 (+2.4)
ass +activ. coag
13 SUR very important to go on the right +si:de,+ (0.5) even if
ass
+activ. coag+
14 we know that the gland is:, on thee (.) internal part
15 of the (0.5) of the monitor,
The surgeon is explaining the procedure to the audience (1). When he says oui (3),
the assistant complies by coagulating (4). Hence the subsequent move, compliance,
is undertaken without any request or directive having been made: the assistant acti-
vates the coagulating hook in line 6, while the surgeon is talking to the audience, as
he does in line 8 (see the double arrows). Then having arrived at a completion point
in his explanatory talk, the surgeon gives the instruction again (oui h, 11), and the
assistants response is conducted in the middle of the surgeons explanation to the
audience (13).
Thus we can observe a mixed mode of coordination, alternating between tacit
and explicit instructions. This mixed regime is adjusted to the embeddedness of the
operation and the demonstration that constitutes multiple activities: the instruction
oui is uttered between one completed TCU and another (3, 11), i.e. when the tem-
porality of the operation fits with the temporality of the demonstrative talk; by con-
trast, when the relevant moment for coagulating is situated in the middle of the talk,
the instruction is omitted and activation of the coagulation is achieved tacitly by the
assistant following the series of actions conducted by the chief surgeon. The fact that
particles like oui or mhm can work as directives shows that the request is so highly
projectable that instead of a directive, a confirmation of the relevance of the requested
action can be enough.
7. Series, post-expansions, and repairs
Schegloff observes that in the case of a series of sequences it can be sometimes

straightforward and sometimes not to distinguish between post-expansion of a
single sequence (e.g. via redoing or reworking of its first pair part) and a sequence of
sequences of the action-type series sort. (2007:212). In some cases, the next sequence
in the series can be treated as a further post-expansion of the prior sequence a
reworking of its first pair part (2007:212). In the data analyzed here, this possibility
is visible in the way in which one first pair part can be repeated even before the target
action has been done in a form of repair but also during the responsive action.
As a consequence of which we have first pair part and second pair part occurring
Lorenza Mondada

simultenously, with a repetition of the first at the same time or an expansion of the
first, a repair, and an accompaniment/monitoring/calibration of the ongoing respon-
sive action, so that it is difficult to separate the request and the repair, the first pair part
and the second pair part.
Here are some occurrences of the phenomenon. In the first case, the response is
repaired, orienting to a possible problem with shared understanding as well as inter-
pretation of the indexicality of the instruction.
(43) (2702_k1d1_1.00.10)
1 SUR allez vas-y l-bas,
go go over there
2 (0.3) +(1)+ (2)
cam
+zooms up+
3 SUR non, la camra en bas, douce+ment doucement+
no the camera below slowly slowly
cam
+moves right/below+
4 doucement,
slowly
When the camera assistant responds (2) to the initial directive (1), he first zooms in on
an anatomical area in the upper part of the visual field; the surgeon then repairs this
move with a non (3) followed by a new formulation of the directive, more explicitly
about the location. The expansion of the directive with an adverb progressively accom-
panies the complying movement (3). While in the former case the repair is clearly
identifiable, in the following ones the first pair part takes the form of repeated direc-
tives, orienting first to a non-response but then guiding the responsive action as it
unfolds:
(44) (1106k2d2-4.29)
1 SUR ouais, zoom, ici,
yeah zoom here
2 (0.5)
3 SUR >zoom zoom, zo+om, zoom, zoom<
cam
+zoom in>
4 (1. 0) + (4.0)
cam ->+
(45) (1106-k2d2-0.59)
1 SUR < droite image, droite image,> >droi+te, droi+te,<
<to the right image, right image> >right, right<
cam
+moves R-+
(46) (1106k2d1-32.40)
1 SUR SO, *(0.3) now we try to (.) have a better exposure,*

*with pliers tries to control the fat----*
cam moves slightly
2 >zoom avant. zoom avant. zoom avant.< (.)
>zoom forward. zoom forward. zoom forward< (.)
3 zoom avant.
zoom forward
cam zooms-
4 *(5.0)
sur *arranges fat->>
In Excerpt 44, repetitions orient to the absence of response and offer another slot for
a responsive action. Futhermore, Excerpts 45 and 46 show that the directive can be
repeatedly uttered, accompanying the movement, eventually directing it step by step
and repairing its possible inadequate trajectory. In the latter case, directive and pro-
gressive guidance merge, as the emergent action proceeds.
The directive can be repeated once or several times. The temporal dimension of
these repetitions is crucial, since directives can guide the action until it is correctly
granted. A similar trajectory has been observed by Lindwall and Ekstrm in crochet
lessons: both parties are reciprocally and continually calibrating their actions so as
to respond to each other and to the developing situation (2012:36). They adjust to
the temporality of the action, for instance by accelerating the delivery of the directive,
both in its prosody and its form (in extract 46, the directive is produced in a form
that is shorter and shorter) (cf. Mondada, 2011b). Generally, the repetition stops as
soon as the instructed camera begins to move since this clearly projects a new view,
the initiation of the camera movement is here relevant, whereas its completion is not
addressed. This shows again the crucial importance of time in the management of
these sequences.
8. Conclusion
Through the detailed study of a particular activity the surgeon directing the assis-
tants action in the operating room through requests to do something next this
chapter provides a systematic analysis of praxeologically embedded, timely produced,
multimodally formatted requests. I have focused on the specificity of immediate
requests: they are produced within an ongoing activity and in service of it; they ask
the co-participant to do an action immediately, and not in a future or post-ponable
moment. These two features the embeddedness in the current activity and the
Lorenza Mondada
importance of the immediate temporality of action produce a specific sequence for-

mat, in which the timing of both the first and the second pair part is crucially oriented
to and monitored by the participants.
Responses to the surgeons requests/directives may be performed silently, without
verbalisation. Although directives are generally produced with some verbal resource,
they are not reducible to talk. So, both actions are formatted within complex multi-
modal gestalts, which are shaped by different linguistic and embodied resources that
can display different temporal orders, but are deeply intertwined within the ongoing
activity. Time is central for the understanding of these complex sequences of action:
the first action is characterized by its brevity, the second action by its temporal fit-
tedness with the ongoing activity; moreover, the latter is constantly scrutinized for
early vs. late achievement. Early responses rely on the projections made possible by
the preparation of the first action; late responses are repaired and monitored, guided
online by repeated directives.
The embeddedness of immediate requested actions within the larger praxeo-
logical context shows their intricate relation not only with the requesting action but
also with its preparation which makes possible early projections. In some cases,
the second participant can fully anticipate the requested action: the first participant
engages in the preparation of the action, which is part of the ongoing larger activity,
and this is often enough to occasion the next action, without any request having to
be made. In this sense, immediate requests merge within the ongoing activity; they
structure it, they exhibit responsibilities and entitlements to request, but they also
rely on it, they exploit its trajectory, they are occasioned by it, and they can merge
with it. In this way, the paper demonstrates the importance of embodiment, time
and praxeological context for the understanding of complex sequences of directed
actions.
Transcription conventions
Talk has been transcribed according to conventions developed by Gail Jefferson (see Jefferson
2004).
A rough translation is provided line per line, in italics.
Multimodal details have been transcribed according to the following conventions (see
Mondada: 2007):
* * each participants actions are delimited by the use of the same symbol
*-> action described continues across subsequent lines
*->> action described continues until and after excerpts end
>* action described continues until the same symbol is reached
>> action described begins before the excerpts beginning
. action preparation
,,,,, action retraction
sur participant doing the action is identified in small characters

when s/he is not the current speaker or when the gesture is done during a pause
cam refers to the camera movements
fig screen shot
# indicates the exact moment at which the screen shot has been recorded
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When do people not use language to make
requests?*
Giovanni Rossi
Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics
In everyday joint activities (e.g. playing cards, preparing potatoes, collecting

empty plates), participants often request others to pass, move or otherwise
deploy objects. In order to get these objects to or from the requestee, requesters
need to manipulate them, for example by holding them out, reaching for them,
or placing them somewhere. As they perform these manual actions, requesters
may or may not accompany them with language (e.g. Take this potato and cut it
or Pass me your plate). This study shows that adding or omitting language in the
design of a request is influenced in the first place by a criterion of recognition.
When the requested action is projectable from the advancement of an activity,
presenting a relevant object to the requestee is enough for them to understand
what to do; when, on the other hand, the requested action is occasioned by a
contingent development of the activity, requesters use language to specify what
the requestee should do. This criterion operates alongside a perceptual criterion,
to do with the affordances of the visual and auditory modalities. When the
requested action is projectable but the requestee is not visually attending to
the requesters manual behaviour, the requester can use just enough language
to attract the requestees attention and secure immediate recipiency. This study
contributes to a line of research concerned with the organisation of verbal and
nonverbal resources for requesting. Focussing on situations in which language
is not or only minimally used, it demonstrates the role played by visible
bodily behaviour and by the structure of everyday activities in the formation and
understanding of requests.
* I am most grateful to Nick Enfield and Kobin Kendrick for their significant input throughout
the preparation of this chapter and for their careful and constructive reading of earlier drafts.
I also wish to thank Jef Robinson for helping me firm up the main argument of the study,
Ruth Parry for fruitful discussion, and the editors of this volume for their valuable comments.
Finally, special thanks go to Herb Clark for his insightful comments as well as for his guidance
on matters of style and clarity. Any remaining errors and infelicities are my own. This work
was supported by the European Research Council and was carried out in the Interactional
Foundations of Language Project, within the Language and Cognition Department, at the
Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics.
Giovanni Rossi
1. Introduction
A wealth of research has examined how different forms of language are used for
requesting. But language is not always necessary to make a request. Interaction rests
for a good part on resources other than language. One of them is visible bodily con-
duct, with which language is constantly combined (de Jorio 1832; Goffman 1963;
Clark 1996; C. Goodwin 2000; McNeill 2000; Kendon 2004; Enfield 2009, among
many others). If we take a corpus of face-to-face interaction among speakers of Italian,
the majority of requests (about 85%) are made using language.1 Yet there are many that
dont involve language at all. This is what this study is about.
My focus is on requests for immediate, practical actions, that is, requests that
deal with the concrete business of everyday activities in co-present interaction, includ-
ing the circulation and deployment of tools and other manipulations of the material
environment. Many of these request sequences involve passing an object, either from
requestee to requester or from requester to requestee (for the requestee to do some-
thing with it). This means that making the request often requires the requester to
manoeuvre an object. For example, if I have just peeled a potato and want you to cut
it, I need to get the potato to you by, say, holding it out towards you, or by placing it on
a cutting board next to you. Also, if Im sitting at the dining table and want to collect
other peoples empty plates, I will have to reach out to have them handed over to me.
The question then is: when do people accompany these movements with an utterance
(e.g. Take this potato and cut it or Pass me your plate) and when do they not? What is it
that allows or invites requesters to rely exclusively on their visible bodily action? And
what is it that instead motivates them to add speech to it?
To answer these questions, I concentrate on requests made as part of joint activi-
ties, that is, on requests that are functional to the accomplishment of a shared under-
taking, such as playing a game or managing the progress of a family meal. Here, the
selection between a nonverbal and a verbal form of requesting seems to be influenced
by two kinds of criteria.
The first has to do with the relative projectability of action in the activity of which
the request is part. There are cases in which a requested action (e.g. passing a plate) is
projectable from the ordinary development of an activity (e.g. collecting empty plates
between two courses of a meal, in cultures where this is customary) and can therefore
be anticipated. Here, all that is needed to get the requestee to act is to configure the
body in such a way as to make the requested action possible (e.g. reach out to receive
the plate). On the other hand, there are cases in which a requested action (e.g. laying
. This is based on a sample consisting of 15-minute segments from 20 recordings (5 hours),

yielding a total of 339 requests. The criteria used to identify requests are explained in Section3.
When do people not use language to make requests?
a new combination of cards in a game) is occasioned by a contingent, non-projectable

development in the activity (e.g. the combination just played turns out to be illegal),
which makes it less possible for the requestee to anticipate. Here, the indexical mean-
ing of the requesters nonverbal behaviour (e.g. pointing to the cards) may not be suf-
ficient for the requestee to understand. For this reason, it needs to be accompanied
by a verbal utterance (e.g. Put down another combination), which has the ability of
specifying the action propositionally, that is through semantic description.
The second criterion relates to the perceptual affordances of the auditory and visual
modalities, and to the consequences that they have for recipiency. These become most
evident when requests are made in the absence of visual attention by the requestee.
Here, no matter how projectable the action requested is, a nonverbal form will fail to
be immediately perceived, unless attention is obtained by nonvisual means. Adding
language can therefore be a way of securing immediate recipiency.
In what follows, I first situate this study in the context of the existing literature
on requesting and introduce the main analytic concepts that underlie my argument,
including form selection, projectability, anticipation, and activity ( 2). Then, after a
brief illustration of the data and method used ( 3), I begin by describing the main
nonverbal forms of requesting found in my corpus ( 4). In the two central sections,
I analyse the environments in which nonverbal requests occur, focussing on how the
action requested integrates into the larger activity ( 5), and then make a comparison
with verbal requests occurring in similar contexts, focussing on a contrast between
projectable and contingent actions ( 6). I add to this analysis by examining a group
of verbal cases that only apparently depart from the pattern observed, motivated by
the management of recipiency ( 7). Finally, I interpret the findings in light of broader
interactional principles that shape communicative behaviour ( 8).
2. Background
2.1 Requests
It has long been noticed that people use a range of different forms to make requests
depending on context. This has been the topic of a large body of research within vari-
ous disciplines and methodological traditions, from cross-cultural pragmatics, based
on written elicitation (Blum-Kulka, House, and Kasper 1989; Mrquez-Reiter 2000;
Rue & Zhang 2008; Ogiermann 2009; Flores Salgado 2011; among others), to conver-
sation analysis, based on recordings of naturally-occurring interaction. In this latter
field, research has focused for the most part on either verbal request forms used on
the phone (Taleghani-Nikazm 2006; Lee 2006; Curl & Drew 2008; among others) or,
when video recordings of face-to-face interaction are used, on the verbal component
of multimodal forms (Wootton 1981; Wootton 1997; Vinkhuyzen & Szymanski 2005;
Giovanni Rossi
Heinemann 2006; Galeano & Fasulo 2009; Craven & Potter 2010; Kent 2011; Rossi
2012; Zinken & Ogiermann 2013; Parry 2013; Couper-Kuhlen and Etelmki, this vol-
ume; among others).
A mounting interest in multimodality has recently produced studies on the vis-
ible bodily aspects of requesting, and in particular on their interplay with talk (M.
H. Goodwin 2006; Cekaite 2010; Tulbert & Goodwin 2011; Keisanen & Rauniomaa
2012; Mondada 2014; Sorjonen and Raevaara, this volume). However, no research has
explicitly focused on fully nonverbal forms of requesting as an alternative to verbal or
composite forms (but see Mondada 2014).2
In the present study, the choice of a nonverbal form is situated in a wider reper-
toire of strategies, which I refer to as request system. A system is a set of alternative
practices for carrying out a function or action. It can also be defined as a paradigm
of functionally overlapping but not equivalent forms (cf. Enfield 2009, 35; Sidnell
2009,19).3 Forms of requesting have different interactional properties. For instance,
a verbal imperative like Pass me the salt carries an expectation that the requestee will
comply. An interrogative like Will you pass me the salt?, on the other hand, gives the
requestee the opportunity to accept or refuse (Craven & Potter 2010; Rossi 2012). A
nonverbal form differs from both imperatives and interrogatives in that it neither tells
nor asks the recipient to do something, but leaves it largely to the recipient to infer
what is requested of them. Also, a nonverbal form differs from a verbal one in that,
in order to be perceived and responded to promptly, it requires the recipients visual
attention. These affordances make nonverbals appropriate in some situations and not
in others.
2.2 Projectability and anticipation in activities

In this chapter, the selection between alternative forms of requesting is tied to the
projectability and anticipation of a requested action in the development of an activity.
I now unpack these analytic notions by reference to some of the relevant literature.
The central idea is that the structural organisation of action makes subsequent units
projectable from the occurrence of certain priors. This allows people to anticipate the
advancement of action at different levels, from the components of a turn-at-talk, to the
actions within a sequence, to those within an activity (Streeck & Jordan 2009).
. Fully nonverbal forms of requesting have been studied in other primate species that lack
language (Rossano 2013; Rossano and Liebal, this volume).
. Systems of formal alternatives have been described, among other things, for other-
initiation of repair (e.g. Schegloff, Jefferson, & Sacks 1977; Hayashi, Raymond, & Sidnell
2013; Benjamin 2013), overlap management (Schegloff 2000), responses to polar questions
(Raymond 2003), and person reference (Enfield & Stivers 2007).
Social action unfolds temporally and progressively. A turn-at-talk, for example,

is inspected by recipients for how it progresses towards points of possible completion
(Sacks, Schegloff, and Jefferson 1974). The projectability of turn-constructional units
is one of the cornerstones of the turn-taking system. Among other things, it allows
recipients to anticipate the end of a current speakers contribution and time the start of
their own contribution relative to it.
Another projectable form of behaviour is manual action. A grasping movement,
for example, comprises a preparatory stage of reaching out, a contact period in which
the grip is adjusted to the object, and a retraction stage (Streeck 2009, 47; cf. Kita, Gijn,
and Hulst 1998). The ordinary progressive realisation of hand movements is, among
other things, a resource for the coordination of object transfers and of other everyday
manual tasks (Lerner & Raymond 2008).
Projectability operates also at a higher structural level, where units of behaviour
by different individuals are organised into sequences. An adjacency pair is a struc-
ture of two actions, the first of which normatively obliges the production of the sec-
ond (Schegloff 2007a). So the occurrence of a question allows people to expect the
subsequent production of an answer. Moreover, particular kinds of adjacency pair
are regularly reciprocated with another pair of the same type by the same people
with reversed roles. When a how-are-you sequence is initiated by A at the beginning
of a conversation, one can expect it to be followed by a how-are-you sequence initi-
ated by B. In this case, we can talk about a sequence of sequences (Schegloff 2007a,
Chapter 10).4 This is a form of supra-sequential coherence (Robinson 2013, 258)
that holds across the boundaries of a single adjacency pair and its possible expansions.
But in this chapter we are interested in a still higher level of structural organisa-
tion, which has been referred to as activity (Levinson 1979; Heritage & Sorjonen
1994; Robinson 2013, among others). An activity is a structure that involves multiple
sequences of action above and beyond a series of same-action pairs. The notion of
activity is broader than that of sequence of sequences in that it encompasses a wider
range of internal organisations, participation frameworks, goals, etc.
Activities differ in the extent to which the actions that compose them and the
order in which they are taken is normatively specified (Levinson 1979; Atkinson&
Drew 1979; Dausendschn & Krafft 2009; Heritage & Clayman 2010). But most
activities have recurrent and identifiable components. An informal telephone con-
versation, for example, normally comprises an opening section (summons-answer,
identification/recognition, greetings, how-are-yous), a topical structure (first topic,
followed by others), and a closing section (pre-closing, possible unmentioned top-
ics, terminal exchange) (Schegloff 1968; Schegloff & Sacks 1973). This has also been
. Other kinds of sequences of sequences are discussed in Schegloff (2007a, 207ff).

Giovanni Rossi
called the overall structural organisation of a telephone conversation (Sacks 1992,

2:157; Schegloff & Sacks 1973; Robinson 2013).
Activities are relevant to this study in so far as their structure is a source of projec-
tion and anticipation. The structure of an activity constrains what contributions can
be made to it at any given time, and sets up expectations about the function of peoples
behaviour within it (Levinson 1979; Atkinson & Drew 1979; Heritage & Clayman
2010; Robinson 2013). The structure is sometimes provided by a material source. A
written questionnaire, for example, dictates the development of a series of questions
and answers (Heritage & Sorjonen 1994). Other activities are less predetermined and
organised mainly by reference to an outcome (e.g. solving a mathematical problem).
In this case, we can talk about completable projects (Lerner 1995), where the recog-
nisability of completion informs peoples understanding of what it takes to bring off
the task, and allows them to assess the progress made towards it. Finally, the structure
of activities is also provided by cultural and practical routines that define procedures
for recurrent events, such as distributing food at the start of a meal, collecting empty
plates, doing the washing-up, or buying goods at a butchers stall (Dausendschn-
Gay & Krafft 2009; cf. psychological literature on scripts: Schank & Abelson 1977;
Suchman 1987; Kellermann etal. 1989). People draw on these procedures to antici-
pate upcoming events and coordinate action with others. As an example, consider the
anticipation demonstrated by scrub nurses in assembling and handling objects during
surgical operations (Svensson, Heath, and Luff 2007). Scrub nurses normally arrange
and rearrange surgical instruments according to their temporal relevance, placing the
one anticipated to be used next nearest to the surgeon and removing others that are
no longer needed (p. 50). Besides making the instrument immediately available for the
surgeon to take, this allows the scrub nurse to pass an instrument in a timely way if
requested to do so (see also Mondada 2011; Mondada 2014; Mondada, this volume).
Social action is organised at various levels, from single actions such as a turn-
at-talk or a hand movement, to sequences of actions, to sequences of sequences, to
activities. The structural projectability of action at all these levels allows people to
anticipate aspects of its development. In this chapter, I appeal to anticipation at the
activity level as both a resource for interpreting others actions and a criterion for
designing ones own.
3. Data and method
The research reported in this chapter is based on a video corpus of naturally-

occurring interaction among speakers of Italian living in Northern regions of Italy.
The data come from informal encounters and activities among family members and
friends.
The range of interactional objects I call requests is partly broader and partly nar-
rower than is usually understood in the literature. It is broader because it includes any
communicative behaviour that causes or recruits (Enfield, this volume) someone to
do something, from the most direct utterance (Open the window!), to the most indirect
one (Its hot in here), to no utterance at all (pointing to the window). At the same time,
it is narrower because I only consider cases in which what is requested is a physical,
practical action to be performed here-and-now, such as fetching an object, performing
other kinds of manual tasks (e.g. opening a window), stopping or changing an ongoing
bodily movement. Using these criteria, I identified a total of 131 nonverbal requests
across 45 recordings (25 hours) featuring about 140 different participants.5
I draw on methods from conversation analysis (Schegloff & Sacks 1973; Heritage
1984, Chapter 8; Drew 2005; Schegloff 2007a; Sidnell 2010; Sidnell & Stivers 2013) and
linguistics to examine the sequences of interaction in which requests occur and the
language used within them. This analysis is accompanied by a close consideration of
peoples nonverbal conduct, such as object manipulations, other hand gestures, body
posture and gaze. The classification of nonverbal request forms given in the following
section focusses on the requesters manual action, as this is the focal and most promi-
nent component of the request in the majority of cases.
4. Nonverbal forms of requesting
Nearly all nonverbal forms of requesting involve some kind of manual action, many
of them involving an object being manipulated or reached for. We can identify four
main types. The first consists in holding out an object (e.g. a card) for someone to take
and carry out a specific task with (e.g. join it to a combination of cards). The second
consists in reaching out towards an object controlled by someone (e.g. an empty plate)
for them to hand over. Another form consists in placing an object (e.g. a potato) in a
specific location controlled by someone (e.g. a cutting board) for them to carry out a
task with the object (e.g. cut the potato). Finally, a last major form is pointing, whereby
requesters indicate an object to be transferred to them or the location for a task to be
performed.
The four types of manual action just described establish indexical relations
between objects and participants in different ways. In holding and placing, for instance,
an object is physically brought into someones field of attention, whereas in reaching
and pointing it is the directionality of arm and hand that creates a deictic link with
. This sample is larger than the one used to calculate the relative frequency of nonverbal
requests compared to verbal ones (see Footnote 1).
Giovanni Rossi
the object. Also, placing differs from all the other types because it presupposes a pre-
existing connection between the placed object and the location of placement (Clark
2003). But besides these differences, in order to function as request forms, all four
types require the ability of the recipient to interpret the relevance of a target object at
that particular point of the interaction.
Taken together, forms of holding, reaching, placing and pointing make up 87.8%
(n = 115/131) of the nonverbal requests collected (see Table 1). The remaining cases
include a few iconic gestures depicting the shape of the requested object or action
(2.3%, n = 3/131), such as waggling the conjoined thumb and index fingers to rep-
resent writing (to get someone to sign a form), and other behaviours that are too
heterogeneous to be classified (9.9%, n = 16/131); these miscellaneous forms include
behaviours as diverse as tapping on somebodys back in order to be let through a nar-
row passage, shaking somebodys arm and making a face.
Table 1. Nonverbal request forms in 45 everyday

interactions (25 hrs)
Type Frequency
holding out 33.6% (n = 44)

placing 32.8% (n = 43)
reaching out 14.5% (n = 19)
pointing 6.9% (n = 9)
iconic gesture 2.3% (n = 3)
other 9.9% (n = 13)
TOTAL n = 131
5. N
onverbal requests rely on the projectability of action
within a joint activity
When is a request made nonverbally? What are the conditions that allow or invite
someone not to add speech to their request? The answer I propose hinges on two
empirical findings. The first is that in 87.0% of the cases collected (n = 114/131) non-
verbal requests serve the accomplishment of a joint activity or a shared goal. That is,
the requested action contributes to a larger undertaking to which both requester and
requestee have committed. One consequence of this is that the requester can assume
the requestee to be compliant with the request (Wootton 1997; Rossi 2012). The sec-
ond finding is that actions requested nonverbally constitute a projectable step in the
activity in progress, which makes them easy to anticipate for the requestee. All the
requester needs to do to solicit these actions is make known or available the necessary
objects by holding them out, reaching for them, placing them, or pointing to them. In
what follows, I substantiate this argument with examples, which are representative of
the four main forms of nonverbal requesting described in the previous section.
In Example (1), four friends are playing a card game, a type of joint activity. The
request is about a card that is passed from Clara to Silvia, who are in the same team,
opposing Bianca and Flavia.
(1)
Circolo01_1314331
1 Bianca gi un quattro ((discards a card))
down one four
Ill discard a four
2 (1.0)
3 Flavia gi l re dai ((lays down a card))
down the king pcl
lets use this as king
4 (1.0)
5 Clara ((draws a card from the drawing deck))
6 ((rests just-drawn card on table))
7 ((picks another card from her hand))
8 ((holds out the card across the table towards
Silvia, for her to take it and join it to a card
combination))
9 Silvia ((takes card from Claras hand))

10 ((joins the card to one of their teams
c
ombinations))
11 Bianca varda ((to Flavia))

look-imp.2s
look
After Bianca discards a card (line 1), it is Claras turn. She first draws a card (line 5),
and then picks another card from her hand to play it (line 7). In this game, cards are
played by joining them to existing combinations of cards on the table. The combina-
tions built up by Claras team are located next to her teammate Silvia, slightly out of
Claras reach. This gives Clara two alternatives for playing a card: to stretch her arm
out all the way over the table and place the card herself, or to pass the card to Silvia
Giovanni Rossi
and have her place it for her. In this case, Clara opts for the second: by holding out the
card across the table towards Silvia (Figure 1), she produces a request for her to take
the card and lay it down in one of their teams combinations.
Figure 1. (Example 1, line 8)
Clara presents Silvia with a card during her turn, when she is expected to play one.
Her holding the card out signals that she has selected the card to play, but also that she
is not going to deliver it to the appropriate location herself. The structure of the game
allows Silvia to anticipate the relevant next action, and therefore aids her in recognis-
ing Claras gesture as a request for help in playing the card.
In Example (2), participants are having lunch. The extract begins when everybody
has finished their first course and the soup plates need to be gathered.
(2)
PranzoAlbertoni01_972625
1 Mum ((takes Rosas empty plate and spoon))
2
Rosa allora quando abbiamo ristrutturato in parrocchia
((to Giulio))
so when have-1p renovate-pstp in parish
so when we renovated the parish centre
3 perch veniva don [Mario io e la Lidia
because come-ipf-3s Father name 1s.n and the name
because Father Mario was coming, Lidia and I
4 Mum
[((stretches out arm
with hand palm-up
towards Giulio, for
him to pass his plate))
5 (1.0)/((Rosa swallows))
6 Rosa abbiamo [prima raccolto i soldi=
have-1p before collect-pstp the moneys
collected the money first
7 Giulio
[((passes plate to Mum))
8 Rosa =ma soprattutto ci siamo occupate n[oi

but above.all 1p.rfl be.1p occupy-pstp 1p.n
but more importantly we took care of
9 Luca [vuoi- vuoi ((to Mum))
want-2s want-2s
do you wan- do you want
10 anche il mio
also the mine
mine too?
In line 1, Mum begins gathering the soup plates by taking Rosas plate. By the begin-
ning of line 3, Mum has laid Rosas plate on top of her own. At this point, it is time for
Giulios plate to be collected, which is out of Mums reach. She therefore produces the
target request by reaching out across the table towards Giulio (Figure 2). He then picks
up his plate and hands it over to Mum.
Collecting used plates is a joint activity that allows diners to move on to the
next course of their meal. The activity unfolds in a predictable way, plate by plate,
until all have been collected. The action requested by Mum is an integral part of
this activity that can be projected from its outset in line 1. When Mum takes Rosas
plate and places it on top of her own, she recognisably starts the gathering. Since
Giovanni Rossi
Giulio is sitting beside Rosa, he can anticipate that his plate is the next in line to be
collected.6
In Example (3), a group of friends is chatting around a table while simultaneously
peeling and cutting potatoes in preparation for lunch. Sofia is among the participants
responsible for peeling the potatoes, whereas Paolo is among those responsible for
cutting them.
(3)
CampUniPictionary01_2210552
1 Lidia potremmo mandarla a Focus Uno l [cos che era
can-cnd-1p send-inf=3s.a to name there what=3s rel be-ipf-3s
we could send her to that Focus One, what was it?
2 Viola
[perch
why?
3 (0.9)/((Sofia finishes peeling potato))
4 Sofia [((places potato on Paolos cutting board,
for him to take it and cut it))
5 Lidia [quello dellatl- cosera [latleta che puzzava di pi

that of-the athlete what=be-ipf-3s the=athlete
rel stink-ipf-3s of more
the one with the ath- what was it, the one with the
athlete that stinks the most?
6 Paolo
[((begins cutting potato))
Throughout lines 13, Paolo stands next to the table, momentarily idle, holding the
knife on his cutting board. As Sofia finishes peeling a potato (line 3), she places it on
Paolos cutting board (line 4, Figure 3), and then he begins cutting it.
Preparing potatoes is a joint activity made of ordered moves, much like a game.
The potatoes are to be peeled first, then cut, and finally gathered in a container. The
participants understand this procedure and their respective roles within it. When the
peeling of a potato is complete, the projectable next action is cutting, which is to be
performed by one of the participants assigned to it, as displayed by the cutting boards
in front of them. In placing a peeled potato on Paolos cutting board, Sofia relies on
Paolos understanding of the relation between the placed object and the location of
. The progression of the activity is inspected also by Luca, whose plate is the next in line
after Giulios. While Giulio hands over his plate, Luca anticipates his turn by making an offer
to Mum (do you want mine too?, lines 910).
placement, as well as of his role as cutter. This understanding allows him to interpret
Sofias nonverbal action as a request for him to cut the potato.
In a last example, the card players we have already seen in Example (1) have just
finished a game. In line 1, Flavia announces the points that have to be paid by her
team, that is subtracted from the teams previous score. Biancas request is about the
notepad on which the scores are kept.
(4)
Circolo01_402024
1 Flavia e ades te pago zinquantazin[que
and now 2s.d pay-1s fifty-five
and now Ill pay you fifty-five
2 Bianca [s
yes
3 (0.6)
4 Flavia [cinquantacinque ((sets cards on the table))
fifty-five
5 Bianca [((puts last cards on top of drawing deck))
6 ((turns, extends arm towards notepad and points to it))
7 Silvia ((takes notepad and passes it to Bianca))
Shortly after approving Flavias count (line 2), Bianca turns to the other side of the
table, where Silvia is sitting, and gazes in the direction of the notepad, which is visibly
out of Biancas reach. She extends her arm towards the notepad and points to it. Silvia
then picks up the notepad and passes it to Bianca.
Giovanni Rossi
The action requested is embedded in the ordinary development of the activity. At

the end of each game, the points for each team are counted and the scores updated in
the games record. The last of these steps has been carried out for all previous games by
Bianca, who knows the games rules best. So when in line 6 Flavia marks the end of the
points count by setting her cards on the table, the projectable next action is Biancas
writing down the scores. This is an environment in which Biancas pointing to the note-
pad is all that is needed for Silvia to understand that she is being requested to pass it.
6. Th
e verbal component of requests serves the recognition
of non-projectable actions
I now complement the analysis made in the previous section by comparing the use
of nonverbal forms of requesting with that of verbal forms, or better, of compos-
ite ones (Clark 1996; Engle 1998; Enfield 2009), that is forms in which nonverbal
conduct (akin to the ones seen above) is accompanied by an utterance. I show that
requests are verbalised when the activity structure does not afford the projection
required to recognise the request only from its nonverbal component. Another way
to view this is that utterances provide more information about the target action
when nonverbal behaviour alone may not be enough for the requestee to under-
stand what to do.
The exact form a request utterance takes is influenced by a number of factors that
need not concern us here. For purposes of comparison, I concentrate mostly on cases
in which the utterance is formatted as an imperative (hereafter, for brevity, imperative
requests). Imperative requests have been shown to be functional to the advancement of
larger undertakings to which both requester and requestee have committed (Wootton
1997; Rossi 2012). This means that nonverbal and imperative forms of requesting have
a certain degree of functional overlap. As we have seen, nonverbal forms too are used
to request actions that serve the furthering of a joint activity, or that otherwise feed
into sequences of actions with a shared goal. However, the interactional conditions for
using the two forms are not the same. The argument developed so far is that nonverbal
requests are about a predictable step in the activity in progress, an action that is usu-
ally projectable from the outset of the activity and that can be anticipated at the point
at which the request is made. In what follows, I argue that imperative requests, on the
other hand, advance an activity by dealing with a contingency that arises in its course.
Actions requested through imperatives are normally not projectable from the develop-
ment of the activity, and are therefore harder to anticipate for the recipient. This is why
they need to be specified verbally.
A first example of such an action comes from the same family lunch as Example(2).
The extract features both an imperative and a nonverbal request. Mum and Rosa are
now distributing the second course, consisting in a main dish of meat to be accompa-
nied by mashed potatoes. In line 1, Mum indicates a piece of meat she has selected for
Grandma, who is the first in line to be served. While Mum makes a jovial comment
on the meat, Rosa begins scooping up a ladleful of mashed potatoes from the mash
pot (line 4).
(5)
PranzoAlbertoni01_1040172
1 Mum questo ((indicating piece of meat for Grandma))
this
this one
2 (1.0)
3 Mum [questo qui la:::
this here be.3s the
this one is the:::
4 Rosa [((begins scooping up a ladleful of mashed potatoes))
5 (.)
6 Mum [mucca pazza
cow mad
mad cow
7 Rosa [ah come piacerebbe a mio marito
oh how please-cnd-3s to my husband
oh my husband would so much love this
8 (0.5)
9 Mum [vero ((cuts out Grandmas portion of meat))
true
10 Rosa [((finishes scooping up ladleful of mashed potatoes
and holds it up))
11 Mum ((leans ladle on pans rim))
12 ((stretches out arm with palm-up hand towards Grandma))
13 Rosa passami il [piatto della vecia ((to Mum))

pass-imp.2s=1s.d the plate of-the old-f
pass me the old ladys plate
14 Grandma
[((passes plate to Mum))
15 Mum vecia ((to Grandma, while bringing Grandmas plate

old-f
over pot and holding it up for Rosa))
old lady
Giovanni Rossi
16 (0.4)
17 Mum [vuoi pur
want-2s mashed.potatoes
do you want mashed potatoes?
18 Rosa [((puts mashed potatoes on Grandmas plate))
In line 9, Mum finishes cutting out the piece of meat selected for Grandma. At this
point, she leans the ladle on the pans rim (line 11), turns to Grandma, and produces
a nonverbal request by reaching out towards her plate. Grandma then picks up the
plate and hands it to Mum. The transfer of the plate from Grandma to Mum is a
predictable step of the ongoing activity, the expectation for which is confirmed by
Mum in line 1.
Consider now the way in which the target imperative request emerges in the same
sequence. From the beginning of the extract, Mums actions project the upcoming
transfer of meat onto Grandmas plate, a process which culminates with Mums lean-
ing the ladle full of meat on the pans rim (line 11). Up to line 13, nothing seems to
project that some other action may be interpolated into this sequence. Although Rosa
can be seen to be scooping together mashed potatoes (lines 48), she does not signal
that their transfer onto Grandmas plate should be given precedence over the meats.
The relevance of Grandmas plate being passed first to Rosa arises contingently in the
course of participants actions. By the time Mum requests the plate from Grandma,
Rosa is already holding up the ladleful of mashed potatoes, while the ladleful of meat is
still in the pan (see Figure 4). Since Rosa is sitting next to Mum, it becomes convenient
for her to get Grandmas plate from Mum and drop the mashed potatoes on it before
Mum adds the meat. Rosas request, however, has to be slotted into the projected
trajectory of Mums actions. So it needs to be verbally specified.
Example (6) shows another imperative case, from the same card game as
Examples(1) and (4). Flavia has just drawn a card that allows her to lay down a first
combination (lines 12). Upon inspecting the cards played by Flavia, Bianca indicates
a problem (line 4). She leans across the table and counts the cards while pointing at
them (line 6) and then, after a brief pause, requests that Flavia put down another
double, which is needed to complete the combination. Moments later, Flavia fulfils the
request by laying down two sevens (line 11).
(6)
Circolo01_677062
1 Flavia [una due tre quatro (che) te lho pescada (.) to
one two three four (CN) 2s.d 3s.a=have-1s draw-pstp itj
one two three four, I finally drew it here we go
2 [((lays down cards in a new combination))
3 Clara ah [per-
oh because
oh bec-
4 Bianca [no: ((leans forward across the table))
no:
5 Silvia por[ca miseria
piggy misery
holy cow!
6 Bianca
[due quarto::((points to and counts cards))
two, four::
7 (1.2)
8 Bianca meti zo n altro ambo ((keeps pointing
put-npst-2s down one other double to cards))
put down another double
9 (2.5)/((Flavia looks at cards in her hand))

10 Flavia de sete l gho
of seven 3s.a EX=have-1s
I have one of sevens
((10 seconds omitted))
11 Flavia ((lays down a double of sevens))
Bianca makes her imperative request after Flavia has laid down an illegal combina-
tion of cards. The request is aimed at solving a problem that has arisen during the
game, but that was not projected by its structure. After Bianca first raises the prob-
lem (no:, line4), Flavias silence indicates her uncertainty as to how to proceed. Also,
Giovanni Rossi
the fact that Bianca needs to count the cards before she can instruct Flavia (line 6)
shows that the next relevant action is hard to anticipate. Here Biancas pointing to the
incriminated cards would not be enough for Flavia to understand what to do next. The
requested action needs to be fully articulated.
In a last imperative example, Greta, Sergio and Dino are chatting, while Sergio is
dyeing Gretas hair. As the dyeing proceeds, Dino notices that Sergio has a runny nose
(line 1). Since Sergios hands are busy with Gretas hair, Dino then volunteers to do this
terrible thing (line 4) that is, to help Sergio wipe his nose.
(7)
Tinta 469934
1 Dino ti sta pende(hh)ndo una goccia di-
2s.d stay-3s hang.down-ger one drop of
youve got a drop hanging do(hh)wn from-
2 Sergio ((sniffs))
lo so adesso me la tolgo
3s.a know-1s now 1s.d 3s.a remove-1s
I know now Ill to take it off
3 Dino ((gets some kitchen paper from the table))
4 mad mi tocca fare questa cosa tremenda
Madonna 1s.d touch-3s do-inf this thing tremendous
my god the fate fell to me to do this terrible thing
5 ((raises paper to Sergios nose))
6 Sergio ((turns head to meet Dinos hand))
7 Dino ((begins to rub Sergios nose))
8 Sergio [((brings free hand to nose))
9 [((positions dye bottle in a way suitable for Dino
to grab it))
10 tieni questo ((holds out the dye bottle))
hold-npst-2s this
hold this
11 Dino ((grabs the bottle))
12 Sergio ((wipes nose))
Dino offers Sergio his help by getting some kitchen paper (line 3) and raising it to
his nose (line 5). His comment on the course of action he is launching (the fate
fell to me to do this terrible thing, line 6) projects his wiping Sergios nose, which
is facilitated by Sergios reorienting his head to him (line 6). In line 8, however,
Sergio brings a hand to his nose and takes hold of the napkin. This move steers
the course of action in another direction than initially projected in that Sergio is
thereby effectively taking over the wiping of his own nose. As he initiates this tran-
sition, other actions become relevant that will make it easier for Sergio to clean
his nose himself, most importantly freeing his second hand. Transferring the dye
bottle to Dino for him to hold is therefore contingent upon this transition. This
makes Sergios request harder to anticipate, and motivates adding an utterance
(hold this) that makes explicit what Dino should do with the bottle being held
out to him.
The last example in this section is one in which the interaction runs into difficul-
ties. I show that the source of trouble is the use of a nonverbal form of requesting in a
context that does not afford projection of the action requested.
Flora and her friends are hanging out in the living room. Most people have filled
out the consent forms for being video recorded, but two are still left to do this: Flora
and her young brother Lucio, who has only just joined the gathering. In line 1, Giulia
tells Flora that the signed forms have been stacked on the table. A few moments later,
after having signed her own form, Flora adds it to the pile (line 6). The target sequence
begins right after this, when Flora places a blank form on the table next to Lucio, for
him to fill out.
(8)
StubePrep_889779
1 Giulia qua ci sono gli altri tre ((referring to pile
here ex be.3p the other three
of signed forms))
the other three are here
2 Flora ah
itj
oh
3 (1.3)
4 Silvio non cho neanche tanta fame
not ex=have-1s neither much hunger
Im not even that hungry
5 (4.7)
6 Flora ((adds her signed form to the pile))
7 ((places blank form and pen on table next to Lucio))
8 (1.0)
9 Lucio cosa devo fare
what must-1s do-inf
what should I do?
Giovanni Rossi
10 Flora eh anche tu devi scrivere il tuo nome

pcl also 2s.n must-2s write-inf the your name
firmare e la data
sign-inf and the date
well you too must write your name, sign, and {put}
the date
11 ((pushes form closer to Lucio))
12 Lucio ((grabs form and pen))
13 Flora questo cos ((picks up bottle of wine))

this what=be.3s
whats this?
The nonverbal form used here is another instance of placing (cf. Example 3). Flora puts
a blank consent form in a specific location on the table, i.e. next to Lucio, for him to
do something with, i.e. fill it out. This request form presupposes that the recipient is
able to infer the target action from the relation of the focal object to the location where
it has been placed, and from the recipients own relation to both object and location.
However, Lucios repair initiation (what should I do?) shows that this is not enough
for him to proceed. A plausible explanation for this lack of understanding is that Lucio
has joined the interaction much later than the other participants, when the researcher
has already left the scene. He has been told about the recording and has seen oth-
ers signing the forms. But nobody has yet explained the consent procedure to him.
So he doesnt have access to the activity structure that would allow him to recognise
the actions made relevant by the form being presented to him. To put it another way,
Lucio doesnt have sufficient information to understand what is required of him. This
is reflected in the way Flora responds to Lucios repair initiation: she fills him in on
the consent procedure by spelling out the components of the action requested (well
you too must write your name, sign, and {put} the date), thereby making up for her
under-telling (Schegloff 2007b, 140; Enfield 2009, 103105). This example demon-
strates the importance of projectability as a condition for the recognition of a nonver-
bal request. The requestees access to the underlying activity structure is a criterion for
the requesters informational calibration in producing the request. A nonverbal form
in the wrong environment can cause the requestee to seek clarification, which in turn
obliges the requester to supply it, resulting in a disruption of progressivity (Stivers &
Robinson 2006; Heritage 2007).
In sum, I have argued that different contributions to a joint activity can have dif-
ferent statuses within its structure that make them easier or harder to anticipate, and
that this impacts the way in which they are requested. I propose a distinction between
actions that are projected by the development of an activity and actions that are contin-
gently occasioned by it. Actions of the former kind are easy to anticipate on the basis
of a common understanding of the activity structure. For this reason, presenting the
requestee with the objects necessary for these actions is enough for getting them to act.
On the other hand, actions that become relevant contingently to deal with a halt in
the activity or to steer its course in an unanticipated direction are harder to antici-
pate. Soliciting these actions therefore requires specifying them verbally. Not doing so
can result in a failure to achieve understanding.
7. A
competing motivation for verbalising projectable requests: Securing
immediate recipiency
In my corpus, I have encountered a few cases in which requesters add a verbal compo-
nent to their request even though the target action is a projectable step of the activity in
progress that can be easily anticipated by the requestee. These cases require an account
because they depart from the pattern proposed in the previous sections. In what fol-
lows, I show that such a deviation is not inconsistent with what has been shown so far,
but motivated by a concurrent functional pressure: securing immediate recipiency.
This pressure interacts with the criteria seen above in shaping the multimodal design
of requests.
The two examples below are part of a larger group of cases in which the requestee
does not have visual access to the requesters behaviour at the time at which the request
is made, as displayed by their body posture and gaze direction. Visual attention is
fundamental to human perception (Gibson 1979; Marr 1982; Liversedge, Gilchrist,
and Everling 2011) and a key element in establishing joint attention with others
(Butterworth & Cochran 1980; Tomasello et al. 2005). In request sequences, visual
attention is important for coordinating each others physical actions, particularly when
the transfer of an object is involved. For this reason, requesters monitor other peoples
movements in the environment and use various practices to establish joint attention
before producing a request (Keisanen & Rauniomaa 2012). But there are also situations
in which requesters produce a request when the requestees attention is not yet secured.
In these situations, one way to carry out the request is to actively get the requestees
attention by nonvisual means.7 This is another function of the verbal component of
requests. Securing immediate recipiency can motivate using speech even though the
action requested is fully projectable.
. Another way to overcome a momentary lack of visual attention is to hold the nonverbal
behaviour in position until the requestees attention eventually falls on it.
Giovanni Rossi
Consider Example (9), taken from the same card game we have already consulted
multiple times. When the extract begins, Flavia is shuffling the cards for the next
match.
(9)
Circolo_508664
1 Silvia adeso vinzem Clara e dopo ghe dago l

now win-1p name and after 3s.d give-1s the
cambio al Danilo
change to-the name
now we win Clara and then Ill take over for Danilo
2 (1.0)/((Silvia turns on her chair to see where

Danilo is))
3 Silvia [va bem che me par che l::
go.3s well cmp 1s.d seem-3s cmp scl=be.3s
well, it looks like hes::
4 [((all participants look down the hall))
5 Clara ma l l via che l [che l( )] che zuga
but scl=be.3s there away rel
scl
rel scl rel play-3s
hes over there p- p- ( ) playing
6 Flavia [che l zuga]
rel scl play-3s
playing

7 (.)
8 Clara vara che gh [tra- ((still looking
look-imp.2s cmp EX=3s tranquillity down the hall))
you can see its all very q-
9 Flavia [alza ((sets cards in front
lift-imp.2s of Clara))
cut

10 Clara .hh[hhh= ((looks down at cards))

11 Silvia [l za n a zugar
scl=be.3s already go-pstp to play-inf
hes already there playing
12 Clara =[gh tranquilit
ex=be3s tranquillity
its all very quiet
13 [((cuts cards))
As required by the rules, at the beginning of each game the cards have to be shuffled
by the dealer (here, Flavia) and cut by the player on the dealers right (here, Clara). The
action requested of Clara (cut) is part of this procedure and can be easily recognised
from the placing of the shuffled cards in front of her. Verbally specifying the action
requested is therefore unnecessary in this context. Why then does Flavia design her
request with an utterance? In line 4, while Flavia is still shuffling the cards, all partici-
pants turn their attention to Danilo. In lines 58, Clara describes what Danilo is doing
while looking down the hall. And when Flavia finishes shuffling and turns to Clara,
Clara is still looking away from the table, making an assessment about what shes see-
ing (line 8, see Figure 5). So by the time the request is produced, the requestee is not
visually oriented to the requesters nonverbal behaviour. Flavias imperative utterance
(cut) works to get Claras attention back to the table and to the cards that are being set
in front of her (line 10).
A similar case is taken from the same interaction as Example (3), where a group
of friends is chatting around a table while at the same time peeling and cutting pota-
toes in preparation for lunch. The target request is produced by Lidia by holding out
a peeled potato towards Paolo (for him to take and cut) while uttering the imperative
interjection to take/here you are.
(10)
CampUniPictionary01_1525517
1 Sofia ((places potato1 on Paolos cutting board))
2 (0.5)
3 Sofia (dai) fal- fa nar quele mam ((to Paolo))
(pcl) make-imp.2s- make-imp.2s go-inf those hands
(come on) us- use those hands
Giovanni Rossi
4 Paolo [no guarda l ((leans across table and places potato1

no look-imp.2s there on Stellas cutting board))
no look there
5 Lidia [((holds out potato2 towards Paolo)) to
itj
take/here you are
6 Paolo ((leans back, takes potato2 from Lidias hand))
7 [vedi qua dai andiamo se mi fai perdere tempo ( )

((to Sofia))
see-2s here pcl go-1p if 1s.d make-2s lose-inf time
see here? come on lets get a move on, {but} if you
waste my time ( )
8 [((sets potato2 down near his cutting board))
Before the extract begins, Paolo has teased Sofia for working too slowly. In line1, Sofia
retaliates on Paolos tease by placing a peeled potato1 on his cutting board, in spite of
the fact he is already busy cutting one. In response to this, Paolo points out that Stella,
a momentarily idle cutter, is in a better position than him to cut the potato1 (no
look there, line 4). So he leans across the table to place the potato1 on Stellas cutting
board. It is at this point that Lidia launches the target request by extending a hand with
another potato2 towards Paolo. As she begins extending her hand, Paolo continues
leaning across the table towards Stella, thereby reducing his visual access to Lidias
gesture (Figure 6). Lidia utters the verbal component of her request at the same time
Paolo drops the first potato1 on Stellas cutting board. The verbal form to is a truncated
version of an old imperative form togli take and can be described as an imperative
interjection. In cases like (10), its use implies that the passing of an object is underway,
and its meaning can be glossed as take or here you are. As Lidia produces this mini-
mal imperative, Paolo (still leaning across the table) turns his head and gazes at the
potato2. He then leans back and takes the potato2 from Lidias hand (line 6).
The action requested in this example is akin to the one seen in Example (3). Cut-
ting is the next relevant action that Paolo can expect to undertake whenever a peeled
potato is presented to him (be it through a placement or a holding-out gesture). What
is different between the two examples is the requestees visual orientation relative to the
requester at the point at which the request is produced, which has consequences for
the design of the request. To be acted upon immediately, a nonverbal gesture needs to
be seen. An utterance, on the other hand, can be perceived by the requestee even with-
out visual attention. A requests verbal component therefore helps the requester secure
immediate recipiency from the requestee (cf. Krkkinen & Keisanen 2012, 602).
To summarise, in the cases analysed here and in the prior section, the verbal com-
ponent of requests has two independent functions. The first is to specify the requested
action. This is necessary when the action is not projected by the ongoing activity but
contingently occasioned by it, which makes it harder to anticipate for the requestee.
The second function is to secure immediate recipiency when the requestee does not
have visual access to the nonverbal component of the request. In cases where a verbal
specification of the requested action is not required to achieve understanding, a mini-
mal utterance may still be produced to get the requestees attention.
8. Discussion
In everyday joint activities, participants often request others to pass, move or other-
wise deploy objects. In order to get these objects to or from the requestee, requesters
need to manipulate them, for example by holding them out, reaching for them, or
placing them somewhere. As they perform these manual actions, requesters may or
may not accompany them with a spoken utterance. This study shows that the choice
between these two alternatives adding or omitting language is influenced in the
first place by a criterion of recognition. When the action requested is projectable
from the advancement of an activity, presenting a relevant object to the requestee
is enough for them to understand what to do; when, on the other hand, the action
requested is occasioned by a contingent development of the activity, requesters use
language to specify what the requestee should do. This study also shows that this
criterion operates alongside a perceptual criterion, to do with the affordances of
the visual and auditory modality. When the action requested is projectable but the
requestee is not visually attending to the requesters manual behaviour, the requester
Giovanni Rossi
can use just enough language to attract the requestees attention and secure immedi-
ate recipiency.8
The projectability of a requested action is grounded in the activity of which it is
part. Activities like playing cards, distributing food at the start of a meal, collecting
empty plates, preparing potatoes, are forms of social organisation in which the actions
of different individuals are sequentially structured to achieve a set of outcomes. Their
ordinary progressive realisation (Lerner & Raymond 2008) allows participants to
project upcoming steps, and thereby to anticipate the relevance of contributions that
may be requested of them (see also Mondada 2014; Mondada, this volume). The struc-
ture of an activity is in other words a form of common ground (Clark 1996, 93), a
resource for interpreting others actions as well as a criterion for designing ones own
(Levinson 1979; Robinson 2013).
An assessment of the relative projectability of a requested action is an estimation
of how easy or hard the action is to anticipate for the requestee. This has consequences
for how much information the requestee needs to understand the request. By simply
holding out an object, reaching for one, placing, or pointing, requesters provide the
requestee with only a minimal amount of information. None of these behaviours has
a propositional content of its own; none of them represents the action requested sym-
bolically (as language does) or depicts it iconically (as a drawing or an iconic gesture
would). They are instead all indexical signs that draw attention to an object on the
basis of spatial contiguity and/or through a directional vector (Clark 2003; Kendon
2004; Enfield 2009), without specifying what should be done with the object.9 They
are therefore minimal forms of requesting that heavily rely on participants common
ground that is, in our case, on the projectability of the requested action in the ongo-
ing activity.
The question now is: why should requesters minimise the form of a request?
Why not always provide the same amount of information? I want to suggest three
reasons for this that apply more generally to human communicative behaviour. The
first is a principle of least effort (Zipf 1949). If a nonverbal form is enough to achieve
. These findings do not exhaust the functional properties of requests produced with no or
little language. One aspect that hasnt been discussed, for instance, is the potential of a non-
verbal request to be made without interrupting simultaneous talk. Not using language can
allow requesters to launch a request sequence while at the same deferring to a parallel con-
current course of action (Raymond and Lerner ms; cf. Goffman 1963; Ekman 1976; Kendon
1985; Toerien & Kitzinger 2007; Mondada 2011; Mondada 2014, among others). This or other
additional functions of nonverbal forms, however, will still be subjected to the recognitional,
informational and perceptual principles presented here.
. Reaching out is more meaningful in this respect, as the configuration of the hand in a
grasping shape signals ones readiness to get hold of an object (Streeck 2009, 47).
understanding, the requester should not add extra cost by accompanying it with
unnecessary language. Adding another semiotic layer implies more effort both for the
requester to produce and for the requestee to process. Minimising a request form is
therefore in keeping with minimising joint effort (Clark and Wilkes-Gibbs 1986). But
minimisation has social reasons as well. The less I specify what Im requesting you to
do, the more I rely on you to make the correct inference. This is possible, as we have
seen, in contexts of close collaboration where immediacy of interpretation feeds on
mutual access to the progressive development of a joint activity, which is a form of
shared knowledge. Trusting in anothers ability to understand is therefore a signal of
closeness that fosters interpersonal affiliation (Enfield 2008; cf. also Ford, Thompson,
and Drake 2012, 209). Finally, a third reason for not adding unnecessary informa-
tion is to prevent ones request from doing more than requesting (cf. Schegloff 1996;
Stivers 2007). One default assumption in communication is that people will make their
contribution as informative as required, no more, no less (Grice 1975; Levinson 2000).
This doesnt mean that a speaker cannot add more, but that adding more is a special
thing to do. If requesting by simply holding out an object is already enough for you
to understand what to do, then supplying extra information verbally (e.g. Take this
and put it over there) will attract special attention (see also Enfield 2013, 444445).
Over-specifying a requested action potentially elicits an enriched interpretation of
the request and compromises its status of business as usual. This general pragmatic
principle has already been shown to be operative in other functional domains such as
person reference (Schegloff 1996; Stivers 2007).
But we have also seen that the selection between a nonverbal and a verbal form of
requesting is sometimes concurrently influenced by a perceptual criterion. There are
cases in which specifying the target action verbally is unnecessary from an informa-
tional point of view, yet in which the requester uses language to attract the request-
ees attention and secure immediate recipiency. How then, in these cases, does the
attention-getting function of language interact with the principles of minimisation
discussed above? I argue that these principles continue to be oriented to by produc-
ing only a minimal utterance. We can find support for this by comparing the verbal
forms used in Examples (9) and (10), whose function is to get the requestees atten-
tion, with the ones examined in Section 5, whose function is (also) to articulate the
target action. Whereas in cases such as (5), (6) and (7) the utterance includes both a
predicate and an object argument (pass me the old ladys plate, put down another
double, hold this), often encoded as a full noun phrase, in Examples (9) and (10)
the utterance only consists of either a predicate without arguments (alza cut) or an
imperative interjection (to take/here you are). The informational load in the latter
cases is therefore much reduced. Using just enough language to attract attention pre-
serves the assumption that the requestee can already know what to do. So it allows the
requester to satisfy multiple interactional pressures.
Giovanni Rossi
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Key to interlinear glosses
1 = first person, 2 = second person, 3 = third person, a = accusative, cmp = comple-

mentiser, cn = connective, cnd = Conditional, d = dative, ex = existential, f = femi-
nine, ger = Gerund, imp = Imperative, inf = Infinitive, ipf = Past Imperfect, itj =
interjection, m = masculine, n = nominative, name = proper name, npst = Non-Past,
p = plural, pcl = particle, prt = partitive, pstp = Past Participle, rel = relativiser, rfl
= reflexive, s = singular, scl = subject clitic.
In absence of other tense/aspect/mood glosses (ger, imp, inf, ipf, npst, pstp), the
unmarked verb inflection is present indicative (i.e. simple present).
Requests and offers in orangutans and
human infants*

Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig /
Freie Universitt, Berlin
This paper presents two pilot studies of sharing situations in orangutans and
human infants. We report on the communicative behaviors that elicit food
transfers, the contingencies associated with gesture selection and the (relative)
success in obtaining food. We focus on the sequential unfolding of these
interactional projects, on the timing between an initial action and the responsive
move, and on the semiotic features that allow a participant to recognize (a) when
a request has been produced, (b) when it has been unsuccessful and, (c) in the
absence of success, when to pursue it further.
We claim that the infrastructure for sequentially organized, cooperative
social interaction and the capacity to selectively produce communicative actions
predates language evolution and is, at least to some degree, shared with other
primates.
1. Introduction
What can language do for you? According to Davidson a creature cannot have a
thought unless it has a language (1982, 322). Proponents of the Sapir-Whorf hypothe-
sis (or linguistic relativity) suggest that it is possible to have thought without language,
but language fundamentally affects the way we think and the way we categorize the
world (see, e.g. Sapir 1921; Whorf 1956; Gumperz & Levinson 1996; Casasanto 2008).
Speech act theorists emphasize how certain speech acts, such as promising, could not
exist without language (Austin 1962; Searle 1969). Conversation Analysts emphasize
how language is deeply implicated in our ability to produce certain social actions,
*We thank the Wolfgang Khler Primate Research Center for generously allowing us to
collect data for this project, Elena Rossi and Marta Halina for helping collect the data and
Maren Schumann for drawing the images presented in this paper. A special thank you to
Tanya Romaniuk, Paul Drew and Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen for their incisive feedback on
earlier drafts of this manuscript.
such as, for example, conveying agreement, telling stories and providing accounts for
our behavior (Sacks 1992 [196472]). Plainly, human social life would be different in
important ways if language had never evolved.
Given the central role that language plays in human social life, a great deal of
research has been conducted on its evolutionary roots, although much of it remains
speculative. In recent years, a comparative approach has been increasingly adopted in
investigating potential precursors of human language in nonhuman primates. Anum-
ber of scholars have argued that we can use ape gestures to model the evolutionary
origins of human language because of a hypothesized similarity between ape gestures
and those of our early hominid ancestors (e.g. Corballis 2002; Tomasello 2008). Others
have focused principally on the relationship between language and primate vocaliza-
tions and the extent to which the latter can be characterized in terms of semantic
content and syntactic structures (e.g. Cheney & Seyfarth 2005; Zuberbhler 2005;
Fedurek& Slocombe 2011). More recently, an increasing number of studies of primate
communication has adopted a multimodal perspective (see, e.g. Partan & Marler 1999;
Leavens, Russell etal. 2010; Taglialatela, Russell etal. 2011; Liebal, Waller etal. 2013).
Extending work on the evolution of language to include primate gestures and vocaliza-
tions not only broadens the scope of scientific inquiry, it also puts the role language
plays in communication and social interaction at the center. Besides helping us to cat-
egorize and retrieve information, language facilitates our ability to exchange informa-
tion and to accomplish coordinated and cooperative social actions. Understanding the
relationship between language and social action allows us to shift the focus from how
language evolved to what language contributes to human social life. Something we
can begin to see by comparing our communicative behavior to that of our closest rela-
tivesthe great apes and those who cannot yet produce language, i.e. human infants.
Focusing specifically on the evolution of human social interaction, Levinson
(2006) has claimed that, in the animal kingdom, humans are unique in their predispo-
sition and motivation for social interaction by virtue of what he calls the interaction
engine. From a psychological perspective, Tomasello (2008) has similarly claimed
that human cooperative communication that he defines as intentionally inform-
ing others of things for cooperative motives is species unique. He contends that
such cooperative communication rests crucially on a psychological infrastructure
of shared intentionality which comprises most importantly: (a) socio-cognitive
skills for creating with others joint intentions and joint attention and (b) pro-social
motivations (and even norms) for helping and sharing with others (pp. 1213).
According to Tomasello and Warneken (2008), the human ways of sharing are unique
and distinguishable from those of other primates in their other-regarding prefer-
ences (see also Fehr, Bernhard etal. 2008). For example, it has been claimed that
nonhuman primates do not point for conspecifics, do not hold objects up to show
them to others, do not actively offer objects to other individuals by holding them
Requests and offers in orangutans and humans
out (Tomasello 2000, 170) and that, more generally, do not have the motives to help
and to share (Tomasello 2006, 516).
Recent work on food sharing in primates has shown that about half of all pri-
mate species share food from adult individuals to immature ones (Jaeggi and Van
Schaik 2011). Thus, food sharing is an ideal domain to investigate primates motiva-
tion to share. In great apes, food sharing peaks well before weaning and is unrelated
to the nutritional quality of the food (Silk 1978; Nishida & Turner 1996; Jaeggi, Van
Noordwijk etal. 2008). Sharing between adults exclusively occurs in species that also
share with offspring (the claim being that the latter is a precondition for the former,
see Jaeggi and Van Schaik 2011). For the most part, sharing occurs between males and
females with males usually in control of the food. The direction of transfer, then, is
usually from male to female rather than vice-versa (except in female-dominant species
like bonobos, see Fruth & Hohmann 2002).
In multi-male multi-female groups, food sharing seems to arise as a sort of recip-
rocal exchange (what has been called meat for sex see, e.g. Hockings, Humle etal.
2007; Gomes & Boesch 2009; Gomes & Boesch 2011), but it is not clear yet whether
food sharing consistently leads to higher mating and therefore greater paternity (see,
e.g. Gilby, Emery Thompson etal. 2010). Trading food for mating purposes appears to
work in situations where females control future opportunities to mate. This is the case,
for example, with orangutans. They live a semi-solitary life, which means that males
and females spend a limited amount of time together, and females move on if they find
males unsuitable (Rijksen 1978). Van Noordwijk and van Schaik (2009) have claimed
that female orangutans even test males in their willingness to let them take their food
and their tolerance in such situations. If a male responds aggressively or resists sharing
food, then the female is more likely to move on.
In general, previous research has claimed that the majority of food sharing in non-
human primates occurs in the form of tolerated theft (Blurton Jones 1984; Blurton
Jones 1987) or relaxed claims (de Waal 1989). In these kinds of situations, an indi-
vidual takes the food either from the vicinity or directly from the hands or mouth of
the one in control of it, without any opposition. Sequences of more active sharing are
rare, mostly arising to end or limit harassment from begging individuals (Stevens&
Gilby 2004). Harassment is defined as extending a hand towards an owner, vocal-
izing, slapping the ground, grabbing at food, or attacking the owner (Stevens & Gilby
2004:606). The claim is that such harassing behavior may lead to fights or injuries for
the possessor.
Most of the research on food sharing has focused on the amount of sharing and
whether it was active or passive; very rarely have studies offered details of the food
transferring sequence in terms of how it unfolds, what precedes it, and the timing of
the responsive behavior. In addition, while different gestures for requesting or offering
food have been observed in orangutans, for example, these gestures have never been
systematically investigated in food sharing situations (Liebal, Pika etal. 2006). This
paper addresses this gap by providing a more in-depth description of food sharing
sequences and the communicative signals used to elicit sharing.
In exploring how orangutans transfer food through request-like or offer-like acts,
we engage with Tomasellos (2008) claim that of three basic motives of human cooper-
ative communication (requesting, informing and sharing emotions and attitudes), the
only one we share with great apes is requesting. In outlining the semiotically recogniz-
able ways in which requests and offers get done including some of the contingen-
cies that affect their deployment and success we show how offering, while rare, is
another social action that human and great apes share.
Ultimately, the aim is to outline the evolutionary primacy of the interactive
machinery (from action formation and recognition to its sequential unfolding) over
language evolution and language development. We do so by using a combination of
ethology and conversation analysis to show how the behavioral repertoire displayed
in orangutan interactions that lead to food transfer is remarkably similar to what is
observable in human infants.
2. Data and method
We collected video recordings of orangutans (Pongo abelii) at the Wolfgang Khler

Research Centre, Leipzig Zoo (Leipzig, Germany) in 2010. To create a situation in
which food sharing could take place, we used a procedure similar to what de Waal
(1989) had previously done with chimpanzees. We dropped into the orangutans
enclosure a large paper bag containing fresh bamboo or willow branches with leaves
drizzled with honey. The orangutans were therefore placed in a situation of food abun-
dance, where the main bag was easy to monopolize by one individual. On the other
hand, the food to which they had access was easy to share and to steal, and the occur-
rence of sharing or stealing was easy to observe from an analytic point of view because
of the size of the branches.
We repeated this procedure on ten different days to observe whether specific shar-
ing patterns or other dynamics might develop within the group. The group consisted
of one adult male (Bimbo), three adult females (Pini, Dokana and Padana) and their
respective offspring (Batak, Tanah and Suaq, all less than 12 months old), a juvenile
female (Raja) and two sisters, Kila and Maia (see Table 1 for more information about
the subjects). After analyzing the data it became apparent that the adult male Bimbo
was always the one monopolizing the bag; therefore the majority of food exchanges
revolved around him. For this reason, two years later we collected ten additional video
recordings of identical situations, with the critical difference that Bimbo was not in
the enclosure while the bag was provided to the orangutans (nor were Kila and Maia
who had been moved to a different zoo). Since the dominant male was excluded, we
observed that the dominant female Pini now monopolized the food. The ten record-
ings collected in 2010 amounted to a total of 5 hours and 32 minutes, while the ten
recordings collected in 2012 amounted to 4 hours and 7 minutes.
Table 1. Subjects information

Orangutans Sex Father-Mother Recordings Approx. Recordings Approx.
2010 Age 2012 Age
Bimbo M Major-Nony X 29.5 y

Pini F Coco-Dunja X 22 y X 24y
Dokana F Djeruk-Djudi X 21 y X 23y
Padana F Walter-Pini X 12.5 y X 14.5y
Kila F Tujoh-Dunja X 10 y
Raja F Walter-Pini X 6.5 y X 8.5y
Maia F Bimbo-Dunja X 2.5 y
Tanah F Bimbo-Dokana X 12 m X 3y
Suaq M Bimbo-Padana X 12 m X 3y
Batak M Bimbo-Pini X 8m X 3y
To identify the behavioral means through which food transfers were solicited or
elicited, we adopted a participants perspective and relied on the following procedure:
we first observed when an individual that was not in control of the bag obtained food,
then identified the behaviors that preceded obtaining the food. Once those behaviors
had been identified, we could then track also when an attempt to solicit or elicit a food
transfer had occurred but had been unsuccessful.
We identified three main ways of transferring food: (a) taking/stealing (which
could be tolerated thefts or relaxed claims), (b) requesting, and (c) offering (see
Table 2 for an overview of the specific distributions). The average number of food
transferring attempts (including those that failed) was basically identical between
groups of recordings (3 per minute), notwithstanding the absence of the adult male
in the recordings of 2012. The difference among the three ways of transferring food
concerned whether (a) the beneficiary obtained the food independently and without
the help of another participant as a benefactor (taking/stealing), (b) the beneficiary
obtained the food thanks to a benefactor who had been asked for it (request), or (c)the
beneficiary obtained the food thanks to a benefactor who had not been asked for it
(offer) (on beneficiaries, see Clayman & Heritage, this volume).
While taking/stealing was by far the predominant way of obtaining access to
food, in the remainder of this chapter we focus on the social actions of requesting and
Table 2. Food transfer attempts by group of recordings

Action types Recordings 2010 Recordings 2012
(with adult male) (without adult male)
Taking/Stealing 91% (902) 98% (752)

Requesting 7% (64) 2% (17)
Offering 2% (23) 0
Total 100% (989) 100% (769)

offering, as they were the ones that were truly interactional and cooperative. Indeed,
taking/stealing usually meant that an orangutan would either take some food from the
ground near another individual, or directly from the bag or from the hands of another
individual. Often this would be done hastily while the individual with the food was
distracted. While the individual controlling the food might attempt to prevent the
other participants from taking the food, for the successful transfer of food to take
place via taking/stealing it was necessary that there was no responsive behavior from
the one controlling it (in fact, lack of response is what facilitates taking/stealing). On
the other hand, for requests and offers to succeed, one participant had to produce an
initiating action and the other had to grant it (for requests) or accept it (for offers). For
these two social actions, without the recipients appropriate responsive behavior, no
transfer of food could take place. As Table 2 shows, the actions that were most affected
by the presence vs. absence of the adult male in the group were requesting and offering
(reduced to less than a third and not occurring at all, respectively), rather than taking/
stealing (from 91% to 98%). This is what makes an in-depth investigation of these two
social actions particularly desirable.
It should also be noted here that while the number of hours recorded is very small
compared to the thousands of hours of focal observation described in prior studies of
food sharing in wild orangutans, the number of instances of food transfers observed
goes far beyond what has been previously described. Jaeggi etal. (2008) report on 458
food interactions over 1145 hours of focal observation, i.e. one every 2.5 hours, while
van Nordwijk and van Schaik (2009) report 76 instances of intersexual food transfers
recorded over 2426 hours of focal observation, i.e. one every 31.9 hours. In our data we
observed 3 attempted food transfers per minute. Both the setting (the animals that we
observed live in captivity as a group) and the procedure we used appear to have been
particularly conducive in eliciting food transfers.
3. Requests
Within the interactional situations that we identified as requests, we further distinguished

three ways in which an orangutan attempted to elicit a food transfer from another:
1. MOUTH-TO-MOUTH: by placing their face and mouth close to the face and
mouth of the individual who has the food;
2. BEGGING: by turning their hand palm up, while facing the individual with food;
3. REACH: by extending their arm and hand toward the food, in an apparent attempt
to grab it.
Example 1 shows a request sequence in which Raja moves her head and mouth very
close to Bimbos until Bimbo transfers food from his mouth to her mouth.
(1) Request Mouth-to-mouth
Raja first positions herself in front of Bimbo, in his line of sight, while Bimbo is
eating the leaves off a branch (1a). He starts chewing the leaves and turns his head
away from Raja (1b). Raja moves slightly to the left, so that she can face Bimbo again
and moves her mouth closer to Bimbos mouth (1c). At this point, with a delay of only
0.1 seconds, Bimbo rolls a ball of chewed leaves on the tip of his tongue, in front of
Rajas face. Raja moves closer and takes the ball off his tongue (1d). As soon as the food
transfer has taken place, Bimbo turns his head and looks towards his left (i.e. towards
the bag containing other branches and leaves) and Raja looks away as well, breaking
the F-formation (face-to-face looking at each other, see Kendon 1977) that has made
the request sequence possible. In this example, the sequence initiating action (the
request) is implemented by Raja moving her face and mouth close to Bimbos mouth
while he is eating. The responsive action (the granting of the request) is Bimbos rolling
the food on the tip of his tongue and holding it while looking at Raja. Yet notice that
to obtain the food, Raja has to make another step, i.e. move even closer to Bimbo and
put the food into her mouth by taking it directly from Bimbos tongue (on division-of-
labor in requests and offer sequences, see Couper-Kuhlen & Etelmki, this volume).
Example 2 shows an instance of the begging gesture. In this sequence, Pini pro-
duces a begging gesture while looking at Bimbo, who takes a ball of food out of his
mouth and hands it to her.
(2) Request Begging
Bimbo is chewing some leaves while holding the bag with food to his right. Pini
is sitting in front of him at about 1 meter distance, holding Batak (her son). Initially,
Pini is not looking at Bimbo but rather towards her left (2a). Pini then turns her head
towards Bimbo and with a wide arm movement she raises her hand up in front of
both her face and Bimbos face (2b) and then reaches the stroke of a begging ges-
ture: holding the hand palm up at some distance from Bimbo, while looking towards
him(2c). Within 0.2 seconds Bimbo begins to move his left arm towards his mouth
and takes a ball of leaves out (2d). He then hands it to Pini (2e). Pini takes the ball from
Bimbos hand (2f) and eats it herself. In this case, Pinis request (the first pair part) is
implemented through the begging gesture produced while looking towards Bimbo.
Bimbos granting of the request (the second pair part) consists in taking the ball of
leaves out of his mouth and handing it to Pini.
Example 3 shows an adjacency pair sequence in which Bimbo stretches his arm
towards a piece of paper held by Pini and Pini hands it to him.
(3) Request Reach
Bimbo is eating some leaves from a branch when Pini stops licking part of the
paper bag (probably because of the honey) and puts it on the ground (3a). Bimbo then
interrupts eating the leaves, drops the branch and stretches his hand and arm towards
the paper under Pinis left hand, while looking towards the piece of paper (3b). Pini
picks it up and hands it to him (3c) and Bimbo begins licking the piece of paper. In this
example, the request is implemented by Bimbo stretching his hand and arm towards
the paper while looking towards it. Pini grants the request by picking the paper up and
handing it to Bimbo. It is ambiguous to what extent Bimbos reach for the paper was
intended as a request rather than as a real attempt to pick the paper up by himself. The
fact that he is not leaning forward while reaching for the paper suggests that it was
probably meant to elicit a response from Pini. Independently of what Bimbos inten-
tions were, however, Pini responds to Bimbos gesture by quickly handing the paper to
him. In this way Pini has been recruited by Bimbos gesture (see the editors introduc-
tion on recruitment).
Table 3 shows the distribution of requesting attempts by gesture type in the two
groups of recordings. In the recordings with Bimbo, requests implemented through
mouth-to-mouth gestures were produced only by Raja and Dokana; begging ges-
tures were produced only by Pini and Dokana; and out of the reaching gestures, two
instances were produced by Bimbo towards Dokana and Pini, one by Raja (the juve-
nile female) towards Bimbo and two by Tanah (the female infant) towards Bimbo.
In the recordings without Bimbo, mouth-to-mouth requests were produced by Batak
towards his mother Pini and by infant Suaq to Raja); begging gestures were produced
by Dokana to Padana, by Batak to Pini and by Tanah to Padana; and finally, the reach-
ing gestures were all produced by infants towards adult females. Overall, it is likely that
the reaching gestures here are under-represented, because not all reaching gestures
were counted as requests. We considered them requests if the individual producing it

could not reach the food by herself/himself. In other words, we consider a reach to be a
request if the one producing the gesture would need a responsive action from another
individual to obtain the food.
Table 3. Request attempts by group of recordings

Gesture type Recordings 2010 Recordings 2012
Mouth-to-Mouth 22% (14) 17.5% (3)

Begging 70% (45) 17.5% (3)
Reach 8% (5) 65% (11)
Total 100% (64) 100% (17)
A few points to note concerning request types and who produces them:
Bimbo (the alpha male) only produced the reaching gesture and never produced
begging gestures nor mouth-to-mouth gestures;
Nobody requested food from the infants (rather the adults would take food from
them);
The two infants who used a begging gesture once during the recordings of 2012
(Batak and Tanah) are the offspring of the only two females who used the begging
gesture towards Bimbo during the recordings of 2010;
Padana, Kila and Maia never requested food from anybody across all the
recordings.
It might be premature to rank the three ways of requesting in terms of how they dis-
play entitlement to the food and to which degree they acknowledge the contingencies
associated with the granting of the request (see Curl & Drew 2008). Nonetheless, the
fact that the adult male only produces reaching gestures suggests that this might be
a gesture displaying high entitlement. On the other hand, the begging gesture might
display an orientation to the contingencies associated with the granting of the request
and similarly produce less pressure in terms of soliciting a response, because it does
not amount to physical insistence (as mouth-to-mouth requesting does). Begging
gestures are always implemented at a certain distance from the recipient when it is
impossible for the requester to obtain the food without the help of the recipient. It is
not clear, however, what degree of entitlement a begging gesture displays, given that
the individuals implementing it are either adult high-ranking females towards the
dominant male or infants towards their own mothers. To understand the contingen-
cies affecting success, we have to consider not just the requests that successfully lead to
an active food transfer, but also the ones that fail to do so.
The three examples above show successful request sequences. However, it often
happens that a request is not granted. Having identified the behaviors that successfully
elicit food transfers, we were also able to identify cases when a request was made but
failed to elicit food. Table 4 shows the likelihood of a successful food transfer following
a request in relation to gesture types.
Table 4. Successful food transfers following requests by gesture

type and set of recordings
Gesture type Recordings 2010 Recordings 2012
Mouth-to-Mouth 36% (5/14) 67% (2/3)

Begging 44% (20/45) 67% (2/3)
Reach 60% (3/5) 0% (0/11)
Total 44% (28/64) 24% (4/17)
While it might appear that begging and mouth-to-mouth gestures are generally
more likely to succeed if the adult male is not present, caution is necessary given the
very limited number of requests in the recordings of 2012. Similarly, it would appear
that reach gestures are more likely to succeed if the dominant male is in the group.
This is almost certainly caused by the fact that in 2012 all the reaches are produced
by infants towards adult females. This already suggests that rather than seeing gesture
types as more or less effective or having a normative force, what seems to matter is
rather who is requesting and who is expected to grant the request. For example, while
requests delivered via begging gestures are granted by Bimbo in 44% of the attempts, he
clearly differentiates between who is asking. Dokana got food in 25% of her begging-
gesture attempts (4/16), whilst Pini got food in 55% of her begging-gesture attempts
(16/29). Pini, the alpha female in the group, was therefore twice as likely than Dokana
to get food from the alpha male using the same gesture. It is also clear that hierarchy in
this group plays an important role in terms of accountability of behavior and entitle-
ment to food. In one instance, for example, after Bimbo has offered food to Dokana,
Pini the more dominant female literally takes it out of Dokanas mouth and eats it
herself; Dokana does not fight back or protest in any way. Moreover, a possible sense
of entitlement in relation to Bimbos reaction to attempts to take food appeared to
affect the very deployment of specific gesture types. For example, in one recording
Dokana first attempts to elicit a food transfer from a distant position using a begging
gesture, but when Bimbo does not react, Dokana attempts to take the food directly
from the bag close to Bimbo. Bimbo then prevents her from taking the food. She next
tries again with a begging gesture, but again Bimbo does not react and when she tries
to get the food herself, he again prevents her from accessing it. On the other hand, a
few minutes later Pini is now close to Bimbo and takes food directly from the bag or
near the bag. The first begging gesture occurs when Bimbo moves the bag away from
her and there is no food available on the ground close to her. She could move closer to
him and to the bag, but rather she switches to begging. And in the first two instances
(separated by 5 minutes) she fails. She then succeeds in eliciting a food transfer in the
following 7instances of begging. Bimbo even offers her food twice, until he rejects
the 8th request by pushing her hand away. Two minutes later she resumes begging
and although she has to pursue a response a couple of times, she returns to elicit food
from Bimbo another 3 times, after which he stops giving. In this session, Pini produces
a total of 21 begging gestures, successfully eliciting food in 11 of them. Yet it is not
the case that Bimbo alternates between giving and not giving, or that he gives in the
beginning and then stops. Rather, having shared food for a while (by allowing Pini to
take it or by sharing), he actively prevents further sharing from happening. Consider-
ing when begging occurs in relation to taking, the former occurs when Bimbo either
prevents Pini from taking or when he moves the food away from her (making taking
problematic). So on the same day we see how Dokana starts with begging and then
switches to taking (unsuccessfully), while Pini usually takes but then switches to beg-
ging when Bimbo prevents taking.
4. Requests as courses of action
Requests and offers can be considered interactional projects whose successful comple-
tion requires a responsive action from the recipient. If an initial request for food is not
granted, the individual who made the request can either retract the request (i.e. by
interrupting the holding of the gesture stroke and retracting the hand or by moving
the mouth away from the other individual) or further pursue it by making another
attempt (see, e.g. Example (1)). Hence the occurrence of a sequence-initiating action
(e.g. a request) starts a course of action involving a series of actions produced by more
than one participant (e.g. Sacks 1992 [196472], Schegloff 2007). For the interactional
project to be complete, more has to happen. For example, a request can be considered
accomplished only if the other participant provides the thing requested. An offer is
completed only if it is accepted and the thing offered is provided to the individual to
whom it had been offered. This means that the occurrence of a communicative behav-
ior and the action(s) that this implements opens up the possibility of (and in humans,
at times it normatively expects) the occurrence of another set of responsive actions
that would allow the interactional project to reach completion. This can be achieved in
two moves or may require larger structures, in that an initial move may be repeated if
the interactional project remains incomplete. It is useful to consider requests as inter-
actional projects that develop through courses of action rather than as isolated speech
acts with felicity conditions (e.g. Austin 1962; Searle 1969), because we thereby take
into account the likelihood of orangutans further pressuring the recipient to share
food (possibly through harassment) and on the other hand it shows the contingencies
under which a request may be retracted.
The 64 requests recorded in 2010 cluster into 50 courses of action, of which
11 contain at least one pursuit (i.e. a failed attempt that is immediately followed by
another attempt). In all cases, the pursuing request consists of the repetition of the
same gesture type: a failed begging gesture is followed by another begging gesture to
the same individual, a mouth-to-mouth is followed by another mouth-to-mouth. Of
the 11 courses of action in which the request was repeated at least once, in 3 cases the
request had been initially implemented using a mouth-to-mouth gesture, while in 8
cases the request had been implemented by a begging gesture.
Similarly, the 17 requests from 2012 cluster into 12 courses of action, of which
4 contain at least one pursuit. In all but one of these 4, the gesture used is the same
type used in the sequence-initiating action. There is, however, one exception, in which
an initial failed reach by Batak towards Pini (his mother) is pursued through a beg-
ging gesture. The begging gesture then succeeds in eliciting a food transfer. Out of the
remaining courses of action that get pursued, in one an infant uses mouth-to-mouth
gestures and in the other two an infant uses reach gestures. Table 5 shows that if an
initial request has failed, repeating the request (i.e. pursuing a food transfer from the
same individual) pays off, as those courses of action are twice as likely to successfully
elicit a food transfer. And in this case who is asking seems to be less relevant in terms
of likelihood of success (for the 2010 recordings, Dokana had 2 successful pursuits out
of 3 attempts, Pini 4 out of 5, Raja 3 out of 3).
Table 5. Successful food transfer by type of course of action and recordings

Course of action Recordings 2010 Recordings 2012
Only 1 request 48% (19/40) 25% (2/8)

At least 1 pursuing request 82% (9/11) 50% (2/4)
However, most of the requests are not pursued, even if the initial request has
failed. To understand why this might be the case, it is useful to consider when pursu-
ing a response might actually be effective. Repeating a request can work only when
both of the following conditions apply:
a. The recipient has not explicitly denied granting the request; and
b. The recipient is still capable of granting the request.
Explicit denials occur very rarely (only 3 instances in the recordings of 2010).
Example(4) illustrates how Bimbo can display that he is not going to grant Dokanas
request.
(4) Request and rejection
Bimbo is looking at the bag with food and is eating from it while Dokana and
her baby are sitting to his left, Pini and her baby are sitting in front of him and Raja
is standing on his right. All the females are looking at the bag (4a). Pini then turns
towards her left, away from Bimbo, while Dokana produces a begging gesture while
looking at him (4b). As soon as the begging gesture reaches its stroke, Bimbo quickly
pushes Dokanas hand away (4c). Then Bimbo resumes licking the paper bag and
Dokana looks away from him, towards her right.
In this example we can see how Bimbo can reject a request by pushing away the
begging hand, leading to the request being abandoned. Dokana does not pursue it any
further; by deploying a begging gesture rather than a reach, Dokana is recognizably
not attempting to take/steal the food from Bimbo. Pushing Dokanas hand away could
imply that he is not willing to share more food with her (Dokana had already requested
food from him 5 times before this sequence); indeed she does not request food from
him for the rest of this recording. In other words, by pushing the hand away Bimbo is
treating the begging hand as a social action with specific implications for him (pres-
suring for a food transfer).
In most cases, however, after the production of the first pair part, the individual
in control of the food (the recipient of the FPP) does not push the begging or reach-
ing hand away or the other individual away. If the recipient is attentive and continues
looking towards the individual who produced the request, then it is very likely that
the request will be repeated. Sometimes the recipient (e.g. Bimbo) is not looking at
the individual issuing the request. Repeating the request with the recipient distracted
would be useless and indeed there are no pursuits unless the recipient looks towards
the requester. On other occasions, an attentive recipient looks away following the
requesting gesture and resumes eating. If the individual was requesting the ball of
leaves that the other had in her/his mouth, resuming eating and chewing suggests that
that food is gone (it has been swallowed) and therefore the likelihood of obtaining it is
gone. Example (5) shows a case in point.
(5) Failed Request and hand retraction
Pini is sitting in front of Bimbo exactly like in Example (3). Pini looks at Bimbo
(5a) and ostensibly raises her right arm in front of her face (5b) to produce a begging
gesture (5c). By the time the begging gesture reaches its stroke, Bimbo moves the ball
of food outside his mouth on the tip of his tongue, exactly as he does in Example3
(see 3d) and as he always does before passing the ball from his mouth to the individual
requesting it. However, he then moves it back into his mouth (5d) and resumes chew-
ing the paper bag while looking at it (5e). As soon as he resumes licking and chewing
the paper bag, Pini retracts her hand (5e) and then turns her head towards her left,
away from Bimbo (5f). In other words, she disengages from the focused interaction
that she had established by looking at Bimbo before producing the begging gesture.
Note here that Pini does not retract her hand as soon as Bimbo takes the ball of food
back into his mouth. Rather, she does so only when he looks away from her and most
importantly, when he re-engages chewing the paper bag. By the time he re-engages in
a competing course of action (eating), the successful accomplishment of the previous
course of action (obtaining the food from him) becomes unattainable and the gesture
can be retracted.
Example (5) then illustrates how an orangutan can recognize whether or not the
successful completion of the interactional project is still possible. Example (3) is a sort
of template of a basic request sequence: when in response to the first pair part (the beg-
ging gesture) nothing happens, after waiting for a bit the request can be repeated and
therefore the granting of the request can be pursued. If, on the other hand, an alternative
competing behavior occurs (e.g. looking away and resuming eating), then the course of
action cannot be completed and the sequence-initiating gesture can be retracted. This
is true even if part of the usual responsive behavior is produced (e.g. Bimbos moving
the ball of food outside the mouth and placing it on the tip of his tongue). Indeed, while
this might constitute the beginning of the responsive behavior that leads to the granting
of the food request, the non-occurrence of the successive step (in this case not taking
the ball of food out of his mouth and not handing it to the requester) is problematic.
Another element to consider is the combination of the timing of a delayed
response and the possible cause for it. In the 2010 recordings, for example, 89% (17/19)
of requests that were granted without any pursuit were granted in less than a second,
usually within a few tenths of a second. Similarly, 89% (8/9) of the pursuing requests
are granted in less than a second. The 3 deviant cases can be accounted for as follows:
in one case Bimbo is simultaneously dealing with a request from Raja and a
request from Dokana and so the delivery of a branch to Dokana is slightly delayed;
in the remaining two cases, Bimbo continues to look at Pini and keeps rolling the
ball of food in and out of his mouth, before taking it out and handing it to her.
Therefore, in one case the delay is due to dealing with a competing request and in
the other two it is clear that Bimbo has not swallowed the food nor disengaged from
the F-formation that Pini has established. By not disengaging, he shows that he could
potentially still grant the request (which indeed he does after 4 seconds).
In general, it appears that the basic heuristic that the members of this group seem
to follow is:
if following a request nothing happens, wait;

if the wait is longer than 1 second, and it is unclear why the recipient might be
delaying dealing with the request, repeat the request (i.e. pursue it);
if what the recipient does is in line with the expected course of action (i.e. the food
is still available and the recipient has not disengaged from the focused interac-
tion), wait and possibly pursue it further;
if what happens derails the course of action (i.e. the recipient has rejected the request
and/or is engaged in a competing activity unrelated to the request and/or the food is
unattainable), retract the requesting gesture and give up for the time being.
5. Offers
We noted previously Tomasellos (2000) claim that great apes do not offer food and
do not show food to others (though he later acknowledged the existence of anecdotal
evidence suggesting that offers might occur, see Tomasello 2008). A closer look at
Bimbos behavior during the recordings of 2010, however, shows that he often does
offer food to three females (Pini, Dokana and Raja), but never to his own infants or to
other females in the group. It is likely that the food offering is generated by the food
abundance and by the fact that Bimbo can easily monopolize a large part of it. Not sur-
prisingly, food offering occurs only between the male and adult females. Nonetheless,
if the question concerns not what an orangutan regularly does in the wild, but at the
very least whether an orangutan might be able/inclined to offer food, our data show a
remarkably cooperative and generous adult male.
From the events that we regard as offers, we excluded all those cases in which an
individual possessing food dropped food in the space between herself/himself and
another individual. This would often lead to the other individual picking up the food
and eating it (what we have previously called taking/stealing); yet it was not possible
to differentiate whether the droppings were intended acts of food offers or if they were
accidental and not directed towards the recipient. Among the cases in which behavior
is clearly addressed to the recipient (the offerer looks at the addressee), we can identify
two main ways of offering food:
HAND: while looking at the addressee, Bimbo moves the food in his hand closer
to the addressee and holds it;
MOUTH: while looking at the addressee, Bimbo rolls the food on the tip of his
tongue outside his mouth and holds it.
Example (6) illustrates an offer implemented using the hand.
(6) Offer Hand

Having eaten a few leaves off a thin branch, Bimbo looks at Pini while holding in
his left hand the branch with a few leaves left. Pini is looking away, towards her left (6a).
Pini then turns her head towards Bimbo, who is already looking at her (6b). He moves
his hand holding the branch closer to Pini and away from his body, while still looking at
her (6c). Pini looks at the hand with the branch and moves her right hand first to touch
the branch tentatively and then take it. (6d). Now Pini starts eating it, while Bimbo
begins to retract his hand away from her (6e). In this example, Bimbo waits to extend
his arm and hand until he has Pinis attention. Once the two of them are looking at each
other, he can produce the offer, which is immediately accepted by Pini.
Example (7) illustrates an offer implemented using the mouth.
(7) Offer Mouth
Bimbo is sitting, surrounded by other members of the group. Dokana and her
baby are on his left, Pini and her baby are in front of him and Padana is further back.
First, Bimbo looks towards Pini, who is looking back at him (7a). Then Bimbo rolls
a ball of leaves on the tip of his tongue and holds it outside his mouth while continu-
ing looking at Pini (7b). At this point, Pini moves closer to Bimbo (7c), whereupon
Bimbo leans forward and passes the food to Pini, mouth-to-mouth (7d). Having com-
pleted the food transfer, the two participants disengage from the mutual visual engage-
ment: Bimbo turns towards his left and Pini looks down at the bag of food in front
of him (7e). In this sequence, then, Bimbo offers food first by selecting his addressee
and securing her attention, then by showing what he is offering. Pinis move towards
Bimbo (7c) shows that she is interested in obtaining the food; he can then provide the
food he has offered.
70% (16/23) of Bimbos offers are hand offers, while 30% (7/23) are mouth offers.
Bimbo offered food 11 times to Pini, 10 times to Dokana and twice to Raja. In general,
offers are accepted 87% of the time (20/23) and the responsive behavior demonstrating
acceptance is initiated very quickly, always in less than a second. The remaining 3 cases
in which the offers are not accepted can be accounted for as follows:
in a first case, Bimbo, producing a mouth offer, turns toward Dokana; but Dokana
is looking away and the ball of food drops from his tongue to the ground after he
held it for a couple of seconds;
in a second case, Bimbo offers Dokana a branch with a few leaves right after
Dokana had managed to take a better branch from beside the bag; Dokana does
not respond to Bimbos offer;
in a third case, Bimbo offers Pini a very thin branch, after he has eaten all the
leaves from it. Pini looks at the branch but does not reach for it (probably because
there is nothing left for her to chew).
21 offers were produced once and either accepted or not responded to (there is no
explicit rejection). Only in one case was the offer repeated. This happened in a situa-
tion in which Bimbo moved a piece of the paper bag close to Pini but for 0.5 seconds
Pini did not move. At that point, Bimbo moved the piece of paper again and placed it
even closer to Pini, who then took it.
6. Request and offers: A sequential relationship
Conversation analysts have long claimed that in humans, offers are preferred over
requests (e.g. Schegloff 1988; Schegloff 2007). This claim has recently been challenged,
at least for conversations between adult humans (Curl & Drew 2008). In reviewing
this claim Kendrick & Drew (this volume) point to the close relationship between
requesting and offering; we can add that a closer look at the behavioral unfolding of
requests and offers suggests a very close relationship between the two that is likely
lost once these actions are produced verbally (see also the editors introduction to
this volume). From an orangutan point of view, an offer is identical to the second
pair part of a request sequence. Lets look, for example, at how Bimbo responds to a
request implemented through a begging gesture (see Example (3)): if he is giving a
ball of food, he rolls the ball out of his mouth, then takes it with his hands and moves
it closer to the requester. If he is offering a branch, he simply moves it closer to the
requester. Rolling the ball of food out of his mouth and showing it to the recipient is
how he produces offers via the mouth, while moving the branch closer to the recipient
is how he implements offers via the hand. From his point of view, the form of an offer
corresponds to what he would do following a request, only this time without having
observed a request.
This is important because once it is established that orangutans can respond coop-
eratively to requests, implementing offers does not require any learning or develop-
ing of conventions from a behavioral point of view. Rather, it requires the pro-social
motivation to give when/although the other has not asked. According to some, this is
uniquely human (e.g. Tomasello 2008). Here, we can show the existence of at least one
orangutan that actively offers food to females, in the context of eating close to each
other in the presence of an abundant and monopolizable food source.
Concerning orangutans actual pro-social attitude in sharing food, one criticism
that can be raised concerns the actual value of the food that they provide in response
to requests. For example, if Bimbo offers only food that has little value left for him (e.g.
food that he has already chewed and sucked the juice off), is he really being pro-social
when he gives it to others?
When an individual is faced with a request, the problem concerns what exactly
the other individual is requesting. Recent work has shown how infant bonobos, for
example, can develop specific gestures to request being picked up and carried around
by their mothers through the process of ontogenetic ritualization (Halina, Rossano
etal. 2013; Rossano 2013). In that situation it is possible that one gesture can be used to
request specifically one thing. However, it is by now quite established that orangutans
and other great apes often use the same gesture in different contexts (see, e.g. Liebal,
Pika etal. 2006; Call & Tomasello 2007). It is likely that some gestures mean something
like give me/can I have/ I want X and then other features of the gestural form or of
the contextual configuration provide helpful information concerning what that X is.
For example, if individual A moves very close to individual B and produces a mouth-
to-mouth request, it seems rather obvious that what individual A is after is not a fresh
branch from the bag but rather the food that individual B has in his mouth. Providing
that food means providing exactly the food that has been requested. Similarly, a reach-
ing gesture usually has an indexical component: it works a little like a pointing finger.
It therefore facilitates identifying the item that the requester is asking for. It is, on the
other hand, much more complicated to infer what the other wants when a begging ges-
ture is produced. The likely heuristic to solve this problem is the following: you want
something that I currently have in my control and the context should tell me what you
need. A begging gesture, indeed, simply works as a request for something, but does
not specify what exactly the requester is asking for. It could be food, it could be a tool.
As such, if both participants are in a feeding context, if the individual requesting has
no food and the recipient of the request has food, then most likely the request will be
about the food. If the recipient has food in his hands (e.g. a branch), then giving that
food should satisfy the request. If the recipient has food in his mouth and nothing in
his hands, then providing that food should satisfy the request.
The interesting part of this puzzle concerns what happens when the recipient has
simultaneously food in his mouth and food in his hands. What does he give? In this
situation, Bimbo gives the branch that he has in his hand in 86% of the cases (12/14).
This shows that even when he has a choice, he tends to provide the food item that
has most likely generated the request (the food that is visible) and not the least valu-
able one (the food in his mouth). Similarly, in the 2 cases recorded in 2012 in which
a begging gesture is responded to by two adult females that have simultaneously food
in their mouth and food in their hands, the food provided is a branch with plenty of
leaves and not the food they have in their mouth.
If we then consider offers, in 70% of the cases Bimbo offers what he has in his
hands, which means almost always a branch. While it might not be the biggest branch
with the largest amount of leaves, it is still a branch with some leaves and not already
chewed food. Last but not least, it never happens that a recipient who obtains a ball of
food from Bimbos mouth throws it away or rejects it. Rather, they always eat it. The
fact that it might appear of little value from a human perspective does not mean that it
has little value from an orangutan perspective.
7. Requests and offers in human infants
To investigate whether the behavioral forms observed in orangutans can be compared

to ones produced by human infants who do not (yet) speak, we collected some addi-
tional human infant data. Middle-class Western human infants are more motivated
and interested in toys than in food and in order to collect a larger sample of infants in
a comparable situation, we created a semi-experimental situation involving toys. We
invited to the child lab 16 infants aged 16 months 2 weeks with their parents. Each
infant then played with an experimenter (E) for about 810 minutes. They played with
some colorful wooden or plastic shapes placed on a table. E produced a series of beg-
ging gestures towards the infant, alternating them with playtime. The begging gestures
were produced at times while looking and at times without looking at the infant. The
logic behind it was to assess:
a. whether young infants recognize a begging gesture as a request;

b. which objects they give to E in response to the begging gesture;
c. how likely they are to provide an object to an adult stranger (i.e. to grant the
request); and
d. to assess whether they pay attention to the direction of Es eyes or simply look at
the begging hand.
The age chosen was related to what has been repeatedly documented about children
between 15 and 18 months of age it is the age when they begin to share more systemati-
cally, by showing and giving objects, including giving them in response to begging ges-
tures (see, e.g. Rheingold, Hay etal. 1976). We wanted to test young infants who would be
unlikely to speak and indeed very few of them produced a single word during the entire
interaction, exceptions being one child who said Bitte (please) and three others who
produced sounds that were interpretable as no and that. The situation was such that
it was possible to observe not just the infants responses to requests, but also instances
of their requests and offers to E. Note that when we use the term offer in this context,
we really mean give. Indeed, if in the case of the orangutans giving comes at a cost (the
recipient eats the food after receiving it), in these interactions with human infants the
objects that were given to E were not lost forever and could be accessed again later in
the interaction. Nonetheless, as our interest is primarily in the bodily means through
which they communicate to E that they are requesting or giving her something, rather
than just showing it, we believe the situations are comparable, at least in terms of the
socio-cognitive and semiotic demands on the infants when compared to the orangutans.
A look at the childrens responses to Es requests shows that all but one child
responded at least once to the begging gesture by placing a wooden shape in Es hand.
This suggests that infants clearly recognized the begging gesture as a request for some-
thing, more specifically one of the shapes almost always (97%) the object that they
had in their hands. It happened only twice that a child had something in her hands but
instead of giving it, looked for another toy and placed that one in Es hand. In other
words, infants interpreted the begging gesture as requesting what they had in their
physical control at that moment in time, just like the orangutans did.
There was a large variability in terms of the likelihood of Es request being granted.
Some children would put the object in Es hand following every begging gesture and
others would do so only once or twice out of 67 requests. Overall, they gave the color-
ful objects to E in 58% of begging requests (see Table 6). Given that putting a shape in Es
hand did not mean losing access to it forever, but just for a few seconds or minutes, it is
remarkable how these pro-social/altruistic human infants (especially when compared
to other great apes) were not willing to give up what they had in their hands about half
of the time. Es looking or not looking at the infant while producing the begging gesture
had no effect on the likelihood of success in obtaining the shapes from the infant (with
gaze 50%, without gaze 62%, Wilcoxon Signed Rank test z=0.912, p=0.362).
Table 6. Action types and their success rate

Action type Successful
E requests 58% (71/123)

E offers 73% (11/15)
Infant requests 75% (21/28)
Infant offers 86% (48/56)
Like the orangutans, in the case of unsuccessful requests, most times the infants
simply ignored Es request (at times probably because they did not perceive it/notice
it). However, there were also instances in which the infant actively rejected the request
by pushing the begging hand away. Example (8) shows how this is done.
(8) Request rejected
The child (C, a girl) is sitting in front of a table on her fathers lap and the experi-
menter (E) is sitting at a 90-degree angle on her left. C is holding an object in her hand
and looking at another object on the table when E produces a begging gesture by plac-
ing her hand, open palm, quite close to the child (8a). C drops the cube in her hand and
pushes Es hand away while looking at other objects on the table (8b). C then reaches
for another object on the table. Here we see how the child refuses to grant the request
by pushing the requesting hand away and then proceeds with another course of action.
If we then consider how infants request objects from E, we can see that they
almost always implemented reaching gestures (one child once points to an object)
and never produced begging gestures. Example (9) shows how infants requests were
usually implemented.
(9) Request Child
C (a boy) and E are sitting in the same positions as in the previous example.
Eis looking at the objects on the table. C begins looking at one of the objects on the
table and he leans forward and stretches his right arm, hand palm down (9a). While
stretching his hand, C is simultaneously producing a very brief high pitch vocalization
and looking attentively toward the object. C then holds the reaching gesture while
Escans the objects on the table, apparently to figure out which object the child might
be requesting (9b). After 1.1 seconds from the initial gestural stroke, E picks up the
fish toy from the table and hands it to the child (9c). The child begins to look atten-
tively at the fish and E returns to look at the other objects on the table (9d). Note that
throughout the whole sequence, the child has never looked at E, while E looks at C
while handing him the fish toy (i.e. while granting the request). In our dataset children
look at E during a request only when E has not promptly responded to it. This might
be due to the childs monitoring what is causing the delay in reacting or it might be
done to mobilize a response (Stivers & Rossano 2010) by making more explicit that
the gesture is not just an attempt to reach the object but rather an action meant to be
taken as communicative and addressed to E. On the other hand, when a young child
wants to give an object to E, she tends to look at E while moving the object closer to
the recipient. Example (10) is a case in point.
(10) Offer Child

C and E are in the same spatial configuration as in Examples (8) and (9). C, who
was looking towards his left while holding a fish toy inside a plastic cup, begins moving
the fish towards E. As soon as C begins to move the fish toy, he turns towards E and
while stretching his arm and the object towards E, they engage in eye contact (10a).
Eimmediately (0.1 seconds) moves to take the fish from C, therefore accepting Cs
offer and says Danke (Thank you) (10b). As soon as the fish offer is completed, C also
offers E the cup (9c). He does so in the exact same manner as he produced the previ-
ous offer: while looking at E he stretches his left arm with the cup toward E. As before,
Eimmediately responds by taking the cup and saying Danke (9d). Then E withdraws
his gaze from the child and looks at the objects on the table, whereupon C withdraws
his gaze from E and looks at the objects on the table. Note here that Es physical and
verbal response to C can be used as evidence that Cs action was interpretable as an
offer. E indeed takes the object in her hands and says thank you to the child. E does not
label the object (e.g. by saying it is a fish) or assess the object (e.g. by saying it is a
beautiful fish), which would be reasonable responses if E had interpreted Cs behavior
as showing, rather than giving. Moreover, if C had not meant it as an offer, then he
would probably resist Es taking the object and most likely C would not immediately
implement a second offer by handing E the other object he has in his hands.
To summarize, requests are produced through reaching gestures while looking at
the object, usually associated with a vocalization. While we have no instances of a child
requesting an object from E using a begging gesture, they do recognize those gestures
as requests as they tend to grant the requests quite reliably. Offers are produced by
moving the object in the childs hands closer to the addressee (by stretching the arm)
while looking at the addressee.
8. Discussion
This paper presented two pilot studies aimed at eliciting sharing situations in orang-
utans and human infants. The goal was to move beyond the general dichotomy of
active/passive food sharing in primates, by presenting one way of investigating the
communicative behaviors that often elicit food transfers, and noting the possible con-
tingencies associated with deploying specific gestures and their likelihood of success
in obtaining food. Most importantly, we focused on the sequential unfolding of these
interactional projects, the timing between an initial action and the responsive move,
and the semiotic features that contributed to the recognition of the actions; that is, what
allowed a participant to recognize when a request versus an offer had been produced,
when such social actions did not result in a food transfer and when to pursue a food
transfer further. In doing so, we have shown the role that body configurations and gaze
play in displaying attention and in contributing to a gestures possible success. Further,
we showed how remarkably fast responsive moves occur when requests are granted
(as in humans, within one second). Similar to adult human interactions, delays in the
production of responsive actions communicate information a problem of some kind
(in the case of orangutans, such delays communicate the unlikelihood of obtaining
food). Given that we found most requests were not rejected but instead ignored, this
raises intriguing questions about the nature of accountability in/for human infants and
orangutans and the degree to which responses to different actions are (conditionally)
relevant (see, e.g. Stivers & Rossano 2010).
In terms of describing some of the semiotic differences between offers and
requests from a behavioral perspective, we have shown how the behavioral design of
an offer corresponds to the format of an answer to a request. Requests especially
those implemented through begging gestures are common in primates. This raises
the possibility that requests may be primordial social actions relative to offers, at
least such that they appeared earlier in the evolutionary process, whereas offers may
have developed once a motivation to pro-actively share and other-regarding prefer-
ences kicked in.
Turning to the human infant data, we showed that 1516-month-old human
infants reliably recognize begging gestures as requests and reliably respond to them
accordingly. However, the infants observed in this study never used begging gestures
to request objects, but instead produced reaching gestures directed toward the object
they sought, alongside brief vocalizations while stretching their arms (multimodal sig-
naling). Further, we found that these children usually produced the reaching gesture
while looking at the object, as opposed to looking at the addressee, whom they only
tended to orient toward in the absence of immediate response. In the case of offers,
we found that children move the objects in their hands in close proximity toward and
while gazing at the addressee. Finally, we saw that children often ignored requests, as
opposed to rejecting them, but when they rejected them, they would push the begging
hand away just as we observed with the orangutans.
Morphological similarities in the behavior of orangutans and human infants and
comparable patterns in terms of the likelihood of a request being granted do not nec-
essarily imply similar understandings of the social situation and of the social actions
implemented through those behaviors. However, we believe that the similarities
observed between orangutans and pre-verbal human infants pose a number of intrigu-
ing empirical questions for future investigations. In his ethological investigation on the
ontogenesis of speech acts, Bruner claimed that language acquisition must be viewed
as a transformation of modes of assuring co-operation that are prior to language, prior
both phylogenetically and ontogenetically (Bruner 1975, 2). In that paper, Bruner
investigated only the ontogenetic part of the hypothesis. In this paper we addressed
simultaneously both the phylogenetic and the ontogenetic parts of the hypothesis. The
similarities observed here seem to confirm Bruners claim concerning the existence
of communicative modes of assuring cooperation that are prior to language. These

modes are very basic and their complexity is minimal. Yet if confirmed, this would
suggest that language does indeed build on a pre-existing infrastructure for social
action, transforming it and making the range of social actions wider and more com-
plex. In sum, the infrastructure for sequentially organized, cooperative social interac-
tion and the capacity to selectively produce recognizable communicative actions may
predate language evolution and be, to some degree, shared with many of our relatives
in the animal kingdom.
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Index terms
A 189, 191, 193197, 199200, 228, 233235, 247, 256, 259,

ability 910, 57, 157, 161162, 202204, 209210, 216219, 303, 305306, 309, 323, 325,
165167, 196, 305, 310, 329, 223, 226, 228, 243246, 250, 327329, 336, 352, 355, 359
335336 255257, 262264, 269270, attribution 57, 20
account, accountability, 272, 281, 284, 288, 290,
accountable 24, 26, 28, 35, 299300, 303308, 310311, B
42, 51, 5960, 6667, 78, 88, 313314, 316, 318, 322323, benefactive, including
92, 9496, 110, 116, 159, 164, 327329, 350 benefactive stance,
185186, 201, 208210, 217, activity contract 195, 199, benefactive status 5583
269270, 282, 290, 292, 336, 202, 204 benefactor 5583, 141, 339
345, 360 adjacency pair, including pair beneficiary 6, 5583, 125, 129,
acknowledgement 63, 188, 197, parts 106, 111, 224, 273, 280, 131, 141, 339
204, 208, 215, 217 307, 343 benefit 6, 58, 59, 6583, 119,
action 1, 317, 2831, 3738, advice 148, 154, 156, 271 125, 151
4243, 4849, 51, 5562, affective 185, 187188, 194, bilateral 13, 152154, 156, 161,
6566, 6870, 7383, 8789, 202204, 208, 210 167168, 245
94, 96100, 103, 105, 107, affirmation 146, 148, 156, 167, bodily movement 1, 199,
110112, 115116, 119, 121126, 194, 196, 209 243245, 250, 257263,
130, 133135, 137, 139142, agent, agency 3651, 6162, 304, 309
145146, 148168, 175, 77, 111, 116, 127, 130133, 139,
179180, 185189, 191193, 142143, 150 C
195201, 203, 205210, agreement 75, 99, 117, 185, calibrate 150, 159, 166, 185, 187,
215218, 221, 223, 224, 228, 187, 192, 199, 201, 203205, 279280
232, 234, 235, 238, 239, 208210, 219, 336 children, infants 23, 89, 11,
243245, 247, 250253, alignment (also misalignment) 30, 48, 87, 171182, 185210,
256257, 259260, 262264, 59, 106, 159, 167, 188, 193, 224, 234, 355360
269273, 275285, 287, 199200, 209210, 238 choreograph 185, 187188
289294, 296301, 303316, anticipation, anticipatory 15, chronological order 115,
318, 320323, 325, 327329, 4243, 66, 76, 82, 88, 91, 121122
335336, 338340, 342, 344, 9899, 101104, 110, 112, closing 70, 90, 134135, 137,
346350, 353, 356361 286287, 289291, 293294, 142, 147, 153154, 156, 194,
action ascription 15, 5659, 300, 304308, 311312, 314, 210, 270, 273, 275, 277280,
75, 8283 316, 320323, 327328 287, 307
action formation 13, 5658, 78, appreciation 6263, 69, 82, 117, commit, committing,
83, 185, 187, 238, 257, 338 215, 225, 234, 235 commitment 30, 45, 47, 111,
action recognition 5, 7, 13, 15, assessment 6365, 153, 219, 115124, 130142, 145168,
5556, 74, 156, 180, 303, 316, 224, 225, 325, 328 175, 186, 229, 310, 316
322, 327328, 338, 359 assistance 12, 14, 17, 19, 28, 31, common ground 246, 328
action trajectory 187, 189, 195, 43, 58, 64, 68, 7172, 87, 94, complaint 2, 17, 47, 56, 107, 159,
197, 199, 205206, 243244, 101, 105, 110112 180, 206, 215, 217
263264, 279, 300, 318 asymmetry, asymmetric compliance, complying,
action, asymmetric action 8, 45, 59, 62, 78, 82, comply 14, 26, 29, 66,
(see asymmetric action) 115, 132133, 141, 187 116, 127, 129, 134, 148, 185,
activity 2, 29, 57, 6162, 64, attention, attentiveness 23, 188189, 191, 193, 197210,
73, 76, 78, 102, 104105, 108, 49, 56, 106, 187, 193195, 215, 217, 221, 223, 232, 252,
125, 155159, 161, 166167, 198, 200201, 209, 220, 262, 281, 284, 294, 297, 310
Index
compliment 223, 225 140142, 149, 157, 162, 178, interrogative 8, 14, 1617, 59,
concession, concede 30, 152, 189, 206, 220, 244, 248, 282 75, 81, 83, 111, 122123, 131,
161, 164, 166167 entitlement 1415, 66, 70, 78, 133134, 141, 144, 146147,
concurrent involvement 194, 80, 149150, 153156, 161, 167, 149, 157, 171, 182, 188189,
215, 219, 220221, 225, 323, 329 186, 216, 220221, 228, 235, 195198, 252253, 306
conditional 57, 122123, 125, 238, 245, 252, 265, 270, 300, intersubjectivity 243, 265
133, 137, 139141, 144, 268, 344345 intonation ixx, 37, 117,
277, 334 119, 124125, 127, 177, 185,
configuration 59, 61, 185, F 187189, 191, 194, 203204,
187, 210, 284285, 289, 328, face-to-face interaction 1, 8, 206210
354, 359 16, 31, 87, 118, 146, 185, 187, invitation 3, 5657, 80
confirmation 57, 153, 163, 297 209, 304305 Italian 1314, 45, 304, 308
construction 8, 11, 14, 3031, family interaction 185186,
3639, 55, 58, 75, 9798, 115, 209 J
123127, 129130, 132133, 135, felicific calculus 65, 7273, 75 joint activity 61, 166, 194, 264,
137, 140142, 146, 152, 154, felicity conditions 67, 12, 290, 310311, 313314, 316,
157158, 167, 174175, 181182, 5556, 346 322, 329
196, 216, 220, 221 F-formation 196, 247, joint attention 187, 193194,
contingency 1415, 149150, 342, 350 200201, 323, 336
154156, 161162, 166167, Finnish 115120, 122125, joint orientation 189, 201
176, 238, 269270, 316 132135, 137, 140142, 144,
counter 73, 76, 80, 101, 188, 198 243244, 248249, 264, 268 K
future action 5, 55, 5759, 61, kiosk 243247, 249, 251,
D 116, 126, 134, 158, 167, 186 259260, 263265
Danish 145151, 155157,
162, 167 G L
declarative 8, 16, 80, 83, 104, gaze 1, 27, 31, 106, 108, 185, 187, lamination 59, 187
122124, 133, 137, 149, 171, 182, 220, 235, 249251, 254256, linguistic form 2, 8, 1213,
198, 202206, 208, 252 258260, 262264, 271, 309, 1516, 3031, 57, 143
deference 10, 59, 185, 188 323, 356, 359 linking element 119, 122125
demonstrative 260, 281, greeting 154156, 250254, 256,
289, 297 258, 263 M
deonticity, deontic 1516, 115, manual action 307, 309
126127, 129, 132133, 137, 141, I meaning-making 245, 257,
154, 161, 203 illocutionary 4, 7, 37, 55 259260
directive 810, 12, 14, 48, 96, imperative 8, 10, 1417, micro-pause 119, 220, 254
125, 148, 185191, 193204, 3738, 4850, 57, 80, 111, 117, minimal 60, 6869, 185, 187,
206, 208210, 225, 270, 122124, 133135, 137, 154155, 197, 204, 208, 210, 246248,
273275, 277281, 283292, 179180, 188, 192, 196202, 262, 264, 270, 275, 280, 283,
294, 296300 209, 216217, 239, 252, 256, 291292, 327329, 361
disagreement 190, 208, 219 270, 273, 275, 291292, 306, minimization 6970, 73
display of a problem 19, 22, 316, 318320, 325327, 329 modal 14, 17, 122124, 145,
105, 107, 111 indexical 106, 237, 257, 149168, 188189, 195196,
distribution of agency 35, 41, 259260, 265, 275, 280281, 216217, 220, 244, 264, 300
131, 139 287, 290, 298, 305, 309, 328, mutual gaze 250, 254255, 258,
division of labor 57, 115, 117, 354 262263
124, 129, 132135, 137, 139142 infant 343, 347, 354356, 360 mutual orientation 193, 202,
inferencing rules 7, 10 259260, 264
E inquiry 12, 22, 163, 165166,
engagement 209210, 233, 257, 187, 219, 246, 336 N
259260, 269270, 352 instruction 42, 153, 275, 280, necessity 2, 16, 31, 129, 149,
English 2, 7, 13, 15, 21, 24, 89, 283, 286287, 289, 293294, 157, 275
115120, 122123, 125, 133135, 297298 negative face 1011
Index
negative interrogative 14, 81, 217218, 221222, 224, 226, 290, 292293, 296300,
122123, 133134, 141, 149 229, 234237, 243, 248251, 346350, 353
negotiation 139140, 164, 253254, 257264, 271, 274, report 105108, 110112, 335
195198, 202, 208209 277, 281, 284, 285289, 291, resistance 43, 80, 82, 185, 203,
non-compliance 188, 193, 293, 296, 323, 326, 341, 345, 210, 229, 230
197198, 200, 202, 357 response 9, 1314, 22, 26, 30,
208210, 223 possibility 72, 78, 88, 101, 36, 38, 48, 5556, 60, 6264,
non-verbal/vocal conduct 8, 110111, 134, 139, 142, 157, 6869, 7275, 77, 7982,
12, 1617, 19, 26, 29, 31, 178, 161162, 182, 198, 260, 283, 88, 91, 94, 9798, 100101,
185, 188, 208, 210, 248, 283, 297, 346, 360 108, 111, 116, 126128, 139,
303306, 309311, 315316, practice 55, 5960, 62, 65, 142, 145154, 156168, 172,
318, 320323, 325, 327, 68, 7071, 75, 105106, 174175, 177178, 185, 187,
328329 115116, 118119, 121, 124, 133, 189190, 197198, 200210,
normative 6, 26, 51, 87, 111, 140142, 188, 252, 306, 323 215, 217218, 222223, 231,
239, 272, 279280, 307, pre-(sequence) 29, 69, 80, 232, 235, 237, 245, 253, 271, 273,
345346 106, 147, 182, 186, 195196, 277280, 282283, 285287,
noun phrase 189191, 209, 216217, 239, 307 290294, 296300, 306,
244248, 260, 263, 281, 329 problem (see also trouble) 17, 326, 340, 343344, 346347,
1920, 22, 25, 2829, 45, 49, 349350, 354356, 358360
O 9596, 98, 100, 103, 105112, responsibility 115117, 126127,
object transfer 13, 107, 216, 238, 130131, 133134, 142, 162, 130133, 139, 142143, 154
307, 309, 323, 359 164, 166, 187, 237, 287, 298, routine 47, 58, 69, 188, 195197,
obligation 2, 5, 910, 30, 67, 73, 308, 319, 354, 360 203, 210, 245246, 260,
94, 99, 111, 131, 149, 152, 157, progressivity 199, 215, 270, 262263, 265, 308
159162, 167, 228 290, 322
Other-attentive promise 45, 7, 64, 68, S
(inc. inattentive) 19, 28, 148149, 158161, 191, 197, Self 13, 36, 41, 57, 60, 74, 8082,
5960, 80, 215217, 226, 228, 199, 206, 208 101, 115, 119, 121128, 131133,
229, 232, 348 proposal 15, 57, 59, 6162, 226, 280
overt subject 117, 122124, 7678, 82, 115, 117, 124, semiotic 12, 29, 35, 37, 264,
198199 127128, 130135, 137, 329, 335, 338, 356, 359360
139142, 145, 164, 180, 188, sequence closing thirds 273,
P 195, 210 275, 277, 280, 287
participation 15, 78, 187, 209, prosocial 35, 45, 51 sequence organization 238,
257, 290, 307 prosody 6, 56, 185, 187, 206, 272273, 280, 287
permission 9, 29, 38, 58, 208209, 278, 299 sequential position 11, 133,
6869, 78, 104, 127, 176, 180, pursuit 3536, 55, 6566, 135, 140, 155, 171172, 175,
183, 186 82, 117, 160, 177178, 274, 179180, 182, 250, 254
pitch 196, 200, 202, 204, 347348, 350 stationary (position) 209,
206208, 357 243, 249251, 253254, 258,
pleading 130, 203, R 260261, 263264
206208, 210 ratifying 151, 153154, suggestion 15, 57, 9899,
point(ing) gesture 23, 28, 37, 159, 258 122124, 134, 137, 142, 148,
231233, 245, 280, 282284, recruitment 1, 17, 1920, 154, 164
286288, 290, 292294, 305, 2224, 2629, 31, 35, 38, 43, summons 106, 195196, 198,
309311, 315316, 319320, 51, 87, 105, 110, 112, 309, 343 200, 307
328, 336, 354, 357 rejection 62, 64, 72, 8182, 130,
position 7, 11, 2223, 27, 31, 172173, 178, 348, 353 T
56, 62, 8992, 94, 96, 101, repair 101, 188, 208, 222, 224, tactile 190, 199, 202, 208
104105, 111, 133, 135, 140, 270, 273, 279280, 287, tease 22, 233, 326
142, 149, 155, 167, 171172, 297300, 306, 322 temporal ix, 10, 57, 8990,
174182, 186, 189, 194195, repeat 25, 116, 174, 177178, 176, 181, 188, 196197, 206,
199201, 209210, 215, 194195, 200, 277278, 283, 243, 245, 248250, 253256,
Index
259, 262264, 269270, 276, transaction 19, 65, 186187, 193, turn design 13, 15, 17, 55, 75, 78,
280281, 286287, 292, 294, 245247, 250, 254264 80, 83, 92, 96, 177178, 180,
296297, 299300, 307308 transition 3031, 193194, 187, 244247, 252, 275
third position 62, 215, 217, 222, 200, 204, 209, 256257,
234, 235, 237, 238, 277 262263, 321 W
topic 11, 68, 9092, 94, 171, 177, trouble 95, 99100, willingness 57, 127, 149, 157,
196, 198, 204, 305, 307 105106, 321 164, 175176, 182, 337
Index of names
A Clayman, Steven E. 68, 75, 88, Etelmki, Marja 137, 142143

Aachmann, Allan 160 307308 Everling, Stefan 323
Abelson, Robert P. 308 Cochran, Erward 323
Ahearn, Laura M. 51 Corballis, Michael C. 336 F
Aitken, Kenneth J. 8 Couper-Kuhlen, Elizabeth Fanshel, David 910, 56, 186,
Amerine, Ronald 281 1516, 5659, 76, 111, 125, 131, 195
Antonopoulou, Eleni 264 137, 142, 148, 151, 186, 245, 270 Fasulo, Alessandra 186, 306
Aronsson, Karin 185186, 188, Craven, Alexandra 14, 16, 134, Fedurek, Pawel 336
195, 199, 202, 210 196, 216, 306 Fehr, Ernst 336
Atkinson, J. Maxwell 218, Croft, William 124 Flores Salgado, Elizabeth 305
307308 Culpeper, Jonathan 186 Ford, Cecilia E. 329
Auer, Peter 147 Curl, Traci S. 2, 14, 16, 29, 47, Fox, Barbara E. 57, 148, 245
Austin, John Langshaw 34, 57, 66, 70, 75, 78, 9597, 105, Francik, Ellen P. 11
67, 55, 187, 335, 346 130, 137, 149, 153154, 186, Fruth, Barbara 337
216, 235, 245246, 270, 305,
B 344, 353 G
Bar-Hillel, Yehoshua 3 Garfinkel, Harold 3, 281, 287
Bates, Elizabeth 171 D Garvey, Catherine 9, 171
Bateson, Gregory 188 Dausendschn-Gay, Gell, Alfred 41, 51
Bentham, Jeremy 65, 72, 75 Ulrich 307308 Gilby, Ian C. 337
Bernhard, Helen 336 Davidson, Donald 51, 335 Gilchrist, Iain 323
Bezemer, Jeff 290 Davidson, Judy 81 Goffman, Erving 2, 6, 10, 88,
Bilmes, Jack 281 De Jorio, Andrea 304 203, 304, 328
Bloomfield, Leonard 36 de Len Pasquel, Lourdes 186 Gomes, Cristina M. 337
Blum-Kulka, Shoshana 10, de Waal, Frans B. M. 337338 Good, Jeffrey 209
186187, 216, 305 Deppermann, Arnulf 264 Goodwin, Charles 16, 27, 41,
Blurton Jones, Nicholas G. 337 Downing, Arthur 245 56, 209210, 220, 257, 264,
Bock, J.K. 171 Drake, Veronica 75, 329 270, 304
Boesch, Christophe 337 Drew, Paul 2, 14, 16, 29, 47, Goodwin, Marjorie
Bolden, Galina B. 88, 116, 202 56, 61, 66, 68, 7071, 75, Harness 56, 155, 189,
Brown, Penelope 1011, 75, 94, 7879, 95, 105, 108, 137, 194195, 202, 210, 216, 306
186, 216, 238 149, 153154, 186, 216, 235, Goody, Jack 41
Bruner, Jerome 8, 360 245246, 260, 262, 270, 305, Gordon, David 56
Butterworth, George 323 307309, 344 Grice, H. Paul 329
Bybee, Joan 186 Duranti, Alessandro 51 Gumperz, John H. 335
C E H
Call, Josep 354 Ekman, Paul 328 Haakana, Markku 246
Casasanto, Daniel 335 Ekstrm, Anna 299 Haddington, Pentti 247, 250,
Cekaite, Asta 155, 191, 195, 199, Enfield, N.J. 17, 37, 41, 45, 47, 257
202, 208, 210, 306 49, 51, 141, 246, 260, 304, Hart, H.L.A. 4
Cheney, Dorothy L. 336 306, 316, 322, 328329 Hay, Dale F. 355
Clark, Andy 36, 41 Engle, Randi 316 Hazel, Spencer 245, 250,
Clark, Herbert H. 11, 45, 51, Ervin-Tripp, Susan 2, 811, 58, 257260
303304, 310, 316, 328329 110, 171, 182, 186, 216 Heath, Christian 271, 308
Index
Heinemann, Trine 14, 81, Laitinen, Lea 123 Ogiermann, Eva 16, 129, 216,
148149, 153154, 157, 162, Lakoff, George 56 245, 305306
164, 186, 216, 245246, 270, Lampert, Martin D. 216
306 Langacker, Ronald W. 124 P
Hepburn, Alexa 116 Lappalainen, Hanna 244, Pagel, Mark 4142
Heritage, John 57, 68, 75, 81, 246247, 250, 264 Parry, Ruth 303, 306
83, 88, 97, 107, 111, 158, 218, Laury, Ritva 125, 260 Partan, Sarah 336
260, 262, 307309, 322 Lave, Jean 36, 41 Perkyl, Anssi 15, 82, 126,
Hindmarsh, Jon 271 Leavens, David A. 336 154, 161
Hockings, Kimberley J. 337 LeBaron, Curtis 16, 257, 264 Pilnick, Alison 271
Hohmann, Gottfried 337 Lee, Seung-Hee 186, 305 Platzack, Christer 149
Hollander, Matthew M. 15 Lerner, Gene H. 88, 9899, Pomerantz, Anita 56, 224
Holmberg, Anders 149 153, 215, 217, 220, 228, 234, Pontecorvo, Clotilde 210
Hornsby, M.E. 171 307308, 328 Potter, Jonathan 14, 16, 134,
House, Juliane 305 Levinson, Stephen C. 1011, 196, 216, 306
Houtkoop-Steenstra, 13, 51, 56, 75, 88, 94, 186, 188,
Hanneke 145, 167 216, 238, 307308, 328329,
R
Humle, Tatyana 337 335336
Raevaara, Liisa 143, 186, 244,
Hutchins, Edwin 41 Liebal, Katja 306, 336, 338, 354
246247, 264, 306
Lindstrm, Anna 2, 1314, 16,
Rauniomaa, Mirka 13, 146,
J 75, 88, 145, 148149, 153155,
186188, 245, 306, 323
Jaeggi, Adrian V. 337, 340 157, 167, 216, 245246
Raymond, Geoffrey 111, 215,
James, William 3536 Lindwall, Oskar 299
217, 220, 228, 306307, 328
Jefferson, Gail 16, 116, 160, 216, Linell, Per 187188
Rheingold, Harriet L. 355
220, 249, 300, 306307 Liversedge, Simon 323
Rijksen, Herman Dirk 337
Jordan, J. Scott 306 Luff, Paul 271, 308
Robinson, Jeffrey D. 88, 202,
215, 303, 307308, 322, 328
K M
Rossano, Federico 306, 354,
Krkkinen, Elise 245, 327 Marler, Peter 336
358, 360
Kasper, Gabriele 216, 305 Mrquez-Reiter, Rosina 305
Rossi, Giovanni 1314, 1617,
Keisanen, Tiina 13, 146, Matthews, Ben 164
45, 51, 75, 146, 153, 155156,
186188, 245, 306, 323, 327 Maynard, Douglas W. 15
167, 245, 282, 306, 310, 316,
Kellermann, Kathy 308 McDermott, R.P. 188
335
Kendon, Adam 37, 187, 193, McNeill, David 37, 304
Rue, Yong-Ju 305
247, 257, 304, 328, 342 Melden, Abraham I. 6
Russell, Jamie L. 336
Kendrick, Kobin 11, 17, 224 Merritt, Marilyn 186
Kent, Alexandra 186, 306 Mondada, Lorenza 186, 243,
Kerbrat-Orecchioni, 245, 247, 249250, 257, S
Catherine 264 271272, 283284, 299300, Sacks, Harvey 8889, 99, 111,
Kidwell, Mardi 259 306, 308, 328 217, 220, 259, 306309, 336,
Kita, Sotaro 307 Mortensen, Kristian 243, 245, 346
Kitzinger, Celia 328 250, 257260 Sapir, Erward 335
Kockelman, Paul 41, 50 Schank, Roger C. 308
Koivisto, Aino 131 N Schegloff, Emanuel A. 13,
Koschmann, Timothy 271 Nevile, Maurice 247, 250, 257 29, 5657, 68, 8792, 96,
Krafft, Ulrich 307308 Newon, Lisa 186 98, 100101, 106, 111, 126,
Kremer-Sadlik, Tamar 238 Nishida, Toshisada 337 159, 186, 188, 217, 220 221,
Kuroshima, Satomi 186, 245 Nolan, Jason A. 15 223, 224, 235, 238, 239, 260,
Kyratzis, Amy 189 Norman, Donald A. 36, 41 275277, 294, 297, 306309,
322, 329, 346, 353
L O Schieffelin, Bambi 910
Labov, William 2, 910, 56, Ochs, Elinor 910, 185, Searle, John R. 47, 910,
186, 195 189, 238 5556, 110, 238, 335, 346
Index
Selting, Margret 56, 208 Svensson, Marcus V

Seyfarth, Robert M. 336 Sanchez 271, 290, 308 Van Noordwijk, Maria A. 337
Sicoli, Mark A. 187 Van Schaik, Carel. P. 337, 340
Sidnell, Jack 45, 47, 51, 141, 218, T Velea, Adina Ioana 155
306, 309 Taglialatela, Jared P. 336 Vilkuna, Maria 125
Silk, Joan B. 337 Taleghani-Nikazm, Vinkhuyzen, Erik 13, 305
Slocombe, Katie E. 336 Carmen 305
Sorjonen, Marja-Leena 139, Tanz, Christine 178 W
143, 158, 186, 244, 246247, Thompson, Melissa Emery 337 Waller, Bridget M. 336
264, 306308 Thompson, Sandra A. 58, 82, Weisner, Thomas 188
Steensig, Jakob 157, 164, 270 117, 148, 186, 188, 245, 329 Whorf, Benjamin 335
Sterponi, Laura 186 Thorell, Mia 186 Wilkes-Gibbs, Deanna 329
Stevanovic, Melisa 1516, 82, Toerien, Merran 328
126, 154, 161 Tomasello, Michael 36, 111, Z
Stevens, Jeffrey R. 337 323, 336338, 350, 354 Zhang, Grace Qiao 305
Stivers, Tanya 218, 225, 306, Trevarthen, Colwyn 8 Zimmerman, Don H. 234
309, 322, 329, 358, 360 Tulbert, Eve 187188, 195, 306 Zinken, Jrg 16, 129, 216, 245,
Streeck, Jrgen 16, 257, 264, Turner, Linda A. 337 306
306307, 328 Zipf, George Kingsley 36, 41,
Suchman, Lucy Alice 36, 41, U 328
308 Upadhyay, Shiv R. 11 Zuberbhler, Klaus 336

Requesting in Social Interaction

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Requesting in Social Interaction

Studies in Language and Social Interaction (SLSI)

John Benjamins Publishing Company

theAmerican National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Requesting in Social Interaction / Edited by Paul Drew and Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen.

2014 John Benjamins B.V.

When do people not use language to make requests? 303

Paul Drew and Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen

Temporal and sequential relationships

Aspects of speech delivery

Encloses talk which is produced quietly

CAPS Words or parts of words spoken loudly marked in capital letters

Les: Dr: Speaker names (pseudonyms) or labels (Dr = doctor)

Paul Drew & Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen

In this introduction we outline some of the background to and evolution of the

being enlivened by more naturalistic, observational studies of language development

2. The evolution of research into requesting speech acts

In a series of lectures given at Harvard in 1955, the ordinary language philosopher

3. Requesting in contexts of interaction

control by trying to exert a measure of control themselves, for instance by requesting

The action requested needs to be done.

4. Contemporary studies the interactional turn

Sequential placement. In a longitudinal study on the development and use of lin-

Distinctive linguistic formats. Couper-Kuhlen (2014) argues that recurrent for-

5. The visual turn: Requests as recruitments

7 Kate: =UH HEH UH HEH

Figure 1. Line 6 of Example (2)

Andy responds by transforming the movement he is currently executing, plac-

(3) Bowl (Risotto, 6:11)

((Wendy opens the cupboard and takes out a bowl

(4) Door (Housemates II, 1:44)

1 Carol: just to let you know

15 Andy: Ive got a phobia: of c(h)ameras

19 Beth: hye(h)ahh uhm:

Figure 2. Line 19 of Example (5)

Figure 3. Line 33 of Example (6)

(7) Moisturizer (Cigarette, 16:50)

15 Alice: in the morning

Figure 4. Line 11 of Example (7)

Figure 5. Line 13 of Example (7)

information and permission to do something cannot be recruited, although they can

6. The organization of this volume

1. Flexibility in the pursuit of goals

2. Language+ as a tool for mobilizing others

may be further creatively combined with accompanying visible bodily behaviour. We

2 B Turns to reach out for the food, grabs it and passes it to A

3. The distribution of agency

3 A daj4 caw4 ka peet5 beng1 tha m4

Then half a minute later:

It is an inviting analogy: asking someone to do something for us is like pressing but-

1. Even though B is being manipulated, B wants to help.

4.1 B wants to do the requested action

Figure 3. INTCN_111203l_03_56, INTCN_111203l_04_08, INTCN_111203l_04_10

4.2 Roles may be reversed

4.3 The goal may be shared

Figure 4. INTCN_030731b_04_31, INTCN_030731b_04_33

4.4 B need not comply

Extract 11. INTCN_030731b_695170_0:11:35

Speaker B is not declining to do the requested behavior. She is declining to do it at the

Extract 12. INTCN_111203l_425170_0:07:05

Extract 14. INTCN_111203l_601081_0:10:01

Extract 15. INTCN_111203l_629110_0:10:29

Appendix. Abbreviations used in glosses of Lao examples

When do people not use language to make requests? 303

2. The evolution of research into requesting speech acts

3. Requesting in contexts of interaction

4. Contemporary studies the interactional turn

5. The visual turn: Requests as recruitments

((Wendy opens the cupboard and takes out a bowl

6. The organization of this volume

1. Flexibility in the pursuit of goals

2. Language+ as a tool for mobilizing others

2 B Turns to reach out for the food, grabs it and passes it to A

3. The distribution of agency

4.1 B wants to do the requested action

4.2 Roles may be reversed

4.3 The goal may be shared

4.4 B need not comply

2.2 Formulating agents and recipients

2.3 Benefactive rendering of the nominated action itself

3.1 Explicit appreciations

3.2 Appreciative assessments

4. In pursuit of acceptance: A felicific calculus

4.1 Maximizing benefits

4.2 Minimizing costs

5. Benefactive status and stance: Congruence and departures

5 Mar: Ye:h I I wa:s, (_) en n:ow Im take- I have taken a leave

2. When do requests and offers occur in conversation?

3. The turn design of requests and offers

4. One action masquerading as another

5. Do offers forestall requests?

6. What is the relationship between offers and requests?