2007 Frame Conflict

Discourse & Society
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Frame conflict and social inequality in the workplace: professional and local
discourse struggles in employee/customer interactions
Gabriela Prego-Vazquez
Discourse Society 2007 18: 295
DOI: 10.1177/0957926507075478
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ARTICLE Prego-Vázquez: Frame conflict and social inequality in the workplace 295
Frame conflict and social inequality in the

workplace: professional and local discourse
struggles in employee/customer interactions
Discourse & Society
Copyright © 2007
SAGE Publications
(Los Angeles, London, New Delhi
and Singapore)
GABRIELA PREGO-VÁZQUEZ www.sagepublications.com
Vol 18(3): 295–335
UNIVERSITY OF SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, SPAIN
10.1177/0957926507075478
ABSTRACT This article focuses on frame conflicts in workplace interactions

and their role in the sociodiscursive reproduction of social inequality. Specif-
ically, I analyse the frame conflicts that arise when customers mobilize local
discursive patterns, code-switching and conversational topics. I observe how
these local communicative means, which are considered to be of lesser value
on the linguistic market, struggle when matched against the institutional and
depersonalized discursive style of the professionals. The research is based on
employee/customer interviews recorded at a partly state-owned enterprise
that supplies water, sewage treatment and waste collection in a borough in
Galicia (Spain). The data have been subjected to sociodiscursive, sequential
and critical analyses. This multimethod aproach has enabled us to observe
the way in which social order is built up from interactional order, revealing
the role played by frames, linguistic resources and interactional asymmetry in
reproducing the power differences that separate institutions and citizens.
KEY WORDS: frame conflict, local and institutional discursive resources, power,
social inequality, workplace interactions
Introduction
Employee/customer interactions represent relevant social practices to study
the way in which local and institutional discursive resources enter into situ-
ations of conflict. Whereas employee strategies allow them to control and
regulate interactions, the majority of their customers do not have access to
institutional knowledge, discursive control or verbal resources. This lack of
knowledge would appear to explain the low level of expertise of many ordinary
citizens in mobilizing tactics that would enable them to counteract the control
exerted over them by professionals. In this sense, the unequal distribution
of linguistic resources (Bourdieu, 1991) is linked to the situations of inter-
actional asymmetry that arise in encounters between professionals and cus-
tomers (Agar, 1985). Indeed, as Sarangi and Roberts (1999b: 1) claim:
296 Discourse & Society 18(3)
[. . .] workplaces are also sites of social struggle, as certain ways of talking, recording
and acting are produced and ordered over a period of time. This regulation of
communicative resources, in turn, controls access to the workplace and opportunities
within it. So our understanding of the workplaces as a social institution where re-
sources are produced and regulated, problems are solved and identities are played
out and professional knowledge is constituted must include, amongst other things, a
thick description (Geertz, 1973) of talk, text and interaction.
The purpose of this article is to determine the way in which frame conflicts arise
in workplace interactions and their role in the sociodiscursive reproduction of
social inequality. I have opted to use the ‘frame conflict’ concept described by
Todd (1983) to refer to the struggle between professional and local frames
presented in the data analysed. According to Todd, frame conflicts occur as a
result of the differences between the systems of values and knowledge of the insti-
tutional and lay worlds. Specifically, I analyse the frame conflicts that arise when
customers mobilize the following: (i) local discursive patterns, (ii) code-switching,
and (iii) conversational topics. I observe how these communicative means, which
are considered to be of lesser value on the linguistic market (Bourdieu, 1991),
struggle when matched against the depersonalized discursive style of the pro-
fessionals (Morales López et al., 2005), including standard varieties, technical
lexis and strategies associated with the institutional world in general (Drew and
Heritage, 1992b).
The research is based on a corpus of data made up of 80 employee/customer
interviews recorded at a partly state-owned enterprise that supplies water,
sewage treatment and waste collection and treatment services in a borough in
Galicia (Spain).1 The data have been subjected to sociodiscursive, sequential
and critical analyses, taking as a basis a multimethod aproach that includes
ethnography of communication, conversation analysis (CA), interactional socio-
linguistics, critical discourse analysis (CDA) and critical sociolinguistics
(Heller, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003) or critical ethnography (Blommaert et al., 2001,
2003). 2 This analytical focus has enabled us to observe the way in which
social order is built up from interactional order (Goffman, 1974), revealing the
role played by frames, linguistic resources and interactional asymmetry in re-
producing the power differences that separate institutions and citizens.
Methodological preliminaries: towards a

sociointeractional and critical discourse analysis
In methodological terms, the frame concept constitutes the basic tool for the
analysis used in this research. Frames – interactive and cognitive mechanisms –
act as structures of expectation (Tannen, 1993) that enable social actors to
define or redefine the situation, to relate their structures of experience to what
is actually taking place in the interaction, or to participate coherently in the
communicative exchange (Telles Ribeiro and Hoyle, 2000). Specifically, we have
taken as our starting point the frame conflict concept described by Todd (1983),
Prego-Vázquez: Frame conflict and social inequality in the workplace 297
and the distinction established by Tannen and Wallat (1993) between inter-
active frames and knowledge schemas.
Interactive frames are the mechanisms whereby those taking part in an
interaction evoke and interpret the activity they are co-constructing. They
correspond essentially to the concept of frame put forward by Goffman (1974),
who sees them as principles for social interaction and organization. According
to Goffman (1974), social activities are perceived by speakers in terms of their
‘participation frameworks’, which not only serve to provide their actions with
meaning, but also involve and commit them to the communicative exchange. In
the author’s opinion, participation frameworks are negotiated during the inter-
personal relationship. They are the result of actions and alignments that the
individuals adopt towards themselves and others under certain circumstances.
In other words, they are the result of the various footings used by the participants
(Goffman, 1981).
In contrast, knowledge schemas represent the cognitive dimension of the
frames (Chafe, 1977; Fillmore, 1975; Lakoff, 2003; Van Dijk, 1998). They refer
to participants’ expectations about people, objects, events and settings in the
world, in contrast to the alignments being negotiated in a particular interaction
(Tannen and Wallat, 1993). At all events, and as Tannen and Wallat point out
(1993), knowledge schemas and interactive frames must not be seen as separate
mechanisms. To a certain extent, they represent two sides of the same coin,3 as
they act together during interaction. Indeed, a mismatch between knowledge
schemas would lead to changes in interactive frames (Tannen and Wallat, 1993).
The sequential and interpretative analysis of the frame conflict (Todd, 1983)
included in this article is also based on conversation analysis and interactional
sociolinguistics. CA has developed a methodological strategy for the in-depth
analysis of the sequential organization of interaction, thereby enabling us to
specify the discursive resources mobilized in the renegotiation of frames turn by
turn. By contrast, interactional sociolinguistics, which includes ethnography
of communication (Gumperz and Hymes, 1972), has contributed a series of tools
that can be used both in ethnographic observation and data collection and the
interpretative and inferential analysis of the aforementioned data (Gumperz,
1982a, 1982b). Consequently, the study of contextualization cues (Duranti and
Goodwin, 1992; Gumperz, 1982a, 1992) is essential in order to explain how
frame conflicts arise in the interactions studied.
Finally, we subjected our analysis to critical reflection. We applied a range
of tools in order to explain the link between discursive resources and the power
differences between institutions and citizens. The contributions from CDA
(Van Dijk, 1998, 2003; Wodak and Meyer, 2001), conversationalization (Fairclough,
1997) and disorder in discourse (Wodak, 1996) revealed the discursive masks of
power. New trends in anthropological linguistics (Silverstein and Urban, 1996),
namely the notion of text trajectories (Briggs, 1997), explained the way in which
power is intertextually reproduced. Furthermore, Blommaert’s study (2001),
based on critical ethnography, proposes an analysis of discursive resources as
‘resources as context’, associating their unequal distribution with social in-
equality (Bourdieu, 1991).
Communicative conflicts and social inequality in

sociodiscursive studies
The need to resolve communicative problems between individuals and insti-
tutions has not gone unheeded in the field of sociolinguistic and discursive study
(Jacquemet, 2001). Early studies in this field include the well-known socio-
linguistic studies of Bernstein (1972) and Labov (1966) who focused on the
educational context. Bernstein’s controversial notion of ‘speech barriers’ (1972)
and Labov’s ‘difference’ concept (1966) highlight the consequences on children
from the lowest social classes of communicative conflicts in the classroom.
During the 1980s and 1990s, interactional sociolinguistics, CA and CDA
played a crucial role in the development of research into the connection between
communicative conflict and social inequality and power in the workplace. Of
particular relevance within this area of research is the in-depth study of talk in
professional contexts (Bargiela-Chiappini and Harris, 1997; Iedema and Wodak,
1999; Mumby and Clair, 2000) due to its ability to reveal how power relations,
identities and problems between institutions and the individual constitute
interactional phenomena (Thornborrow, 2002).
From its beginnings in the 1980s, interactional sociolinguistics has been
concerned with the analysis of the link between communicative misunderstand-
ings and social inequality. Cross-talk (Gumperz et al., 1979), misunderstandings
caused by a problem of contextualization and misinterpretation, not only hinder
effective cooperation in communication, but also constitute active resources for
the reproduction of social inequality within verbal micropractice. The study
carried out by Gumperz et al. (1979), focusing on job interviews held by Britons
with Hindus, shows how contextualization cues work differently depending on
the variety of English employed. In each dialect, the linguistic and discursive
resources imply different communicative intentions and sociocultural values.
This leads the Britons to wrongly interpret the communicative behaviour of the
Hindus, as they consider it to represent low levels of cooperation. The result of
this negative assessment is that Hindus experience greater difficulties in obtain-
ing a job or accessing vocational training courses. As Tusón (1997: 88) affirms
. . . se produce un efecto de minorización . . . de las personas que ocupan la posición

inferior, a través de una evaluación peyorativa de su comportamiento comunicativo
que trasciende este ámbito para convertirse en una valoración negativa de sus
capacidades o habilidades para acceder al puesto que solicita.4
Communicative problems associated with the socioeconomic and political struc-

ture were analysed by Auer (1998) in a study that has much in common with
that carried out by Gumperz within the area of interactional sociolinguistics,
and which also focused on job interviews. The objective was to study the com-
municative difficulties between East and West Germans following the polit-
ical reunification process. This author shows how the inhabitants of the two
Germanies use rather unsimilar patterns of interaction as a result of years of non-
communication between the two communities. The inhabitants of the former
communist Germany had no training or experience in the use of the competitive

discursive style of western companies. The data collected by Auer (1998) show
how the circulation of contextualization practices is linked to differing socio-
economic and political forces in these two communities who therefore display dif-
ferent types of behaviour. As Gumperz (1996) observes, ‘Contextualization prac-
tices diffuse in accordance with institutionalized networks of relationship
and their acquisition is constrained by the economic, political and ideological
forces that serve to minorize large sectors of the population’ (p. 402).
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, conversation analysts, who had trad-
itionally focused on the study of spontaneous conversation, began to apply
their methodology to the study of interactions in the workplace. They consider
the discursive mechanisms of institutional talk to be the same as those used
in everyday conversation. Indeed, the only differences lie in: (i) frequent usage
and the specific sociocommunicative values adopted by discursive resources
in institutional language (Heritage and Greatbatch, 1991); and (ii) the recur-
ring constraints experienced by certain conversational patterns and principles
(Drew and Heritage, 1992a).
Consequently, both the specific aspects and the constraints of institutional
discourse resources are linked to specific frames that are not always shared by
ordinary citizens (Clayman, 1992 and Drew and Heritage, 1992a, among others)
and therefore constitute potential interactional sources of communicative prob-
lems. In turn, this situation serves to intensify the asymmetries that exist be-
tween the institutional and lay worlds, based on differences of power and status
(Fisher and Todd, 1986).
For instance, and as indicated above, Todd (1983) takes the ‘frame conflict’
concept as the basis to explain how differences between the value systems and
the knowledge schemas of institutions and the lay world represent a cause for
misunderstandings. Along these same lines, Telles Ribeiro (1996) analyses
frames in order to detect problems in doctor/patient interaction, focusing
particularly on the differing expectations held by doctor and patient regarding
the institutional activity that they are co-constructing. Her study reveals that, on
many occasions, patients activate a change of footing in which the institutional
context is abandoned, thereby creating a conflict between institutional and
personal frames. This form of frame incompatibility is not restricted to the scope
of doctors and patients and can be found in other professional contexts, as our
analysis will show. Indeed, as Roberts and Sarangi (1999) state, the roles evoked
by professionals and customers respond to a complex hybridity of frames and
modes of talk – institutional, professional and personal (Roberts and Sarangi,
1999) – which may act as an interactive origin for conflict.
From the perspective of CDA, Wodak (1996, 2000) analyses the disorders in
discourse that arise when ‘institution insiders’ – namely the social elite – come
into contact with ‘outsiders’ – in other words normal citizens. She adopts a
sociolinguistic perspective of critical discourse to study the conflicts and social
inequalities associated with these disorders in several areas (medicine, edu-
cation, journalism and politics).
Naturally, the combination of communicative conflict and social inequality

is a constant in research that combines the ethnographic tradition and CA with
CDA. Indeed, and as discussed above, Blommaert (2001) considers that one of
the contexts that has been overlooked in discourse analysis studies is the un-
equal distribution of discursive resources. Blommaert explains that there are
speakers who know how to use certain linguistic varieties and resort to linguistic
resources, whereas other speakers are unable to do so because they have no
access to them. This is what Bourdieu (1991) terms the unequal distribution of
symbolic capital imposed by economic and social differences. Blommaert (2001)
believes that such inequalities are transformed into ‘conditions for discourse pro-
duction’ that influence communicative behaviour. Blommaert therefore defends
the view that one of the contexts that has been overlooked by discourse analysts
is that of ‘resources as context’. He considers them to be discursive elements of
pretextuality that explain the communicative problems associated with social
differences.
Consequently, as already shown in the various studies mentioned, the impact
of the unequal distribution of discursive resources is greater in relations between
individuals and institutions. In these cases, the professionals act as gatekeepers,
employing a number of institutional discursive tools that are not accessible to
everyone. Thus, many citizens may fail to receive the standard of service to which
they are entitled by law.
Frame conflict analysis in our data corpus

Analysis of our data revealed three possible types of frame conflicts caused by
customers:5
1. The customer introduces interactional patterns that fail to correspond to the

sequential rules of organization that are in keeping with the institutional
context. As Telles Ribeiro (1996: 183) points out: ‘Each context has different
sequential rules, different constraints on what talk should be about, and dif-
ferent underlying assumptions as to who controls ongoing activity’. The case
analysed in Section 4.1 illustrates how customer interactional patterns do
not correspond to the expectations of the institutional context.
2. The customer uses code-switching and code-mixing, resources that are
traditionally associated with spontaneous conversation (Gumperz, 1982a),
as a contextualization cue for the negotiation of professional and personal
frames. Section 4.2 provides several examples of this.
3. The customer introduces personal and conversational topics that contrast
sharply with the professional topics traditionally associated with the insti-
tutional context. The resulting conflict is the result of the differences in the
knowledge schemas used by the participants and restricted access to bur-
eaucratic and professional discursive skills. An example of this is given in
Section 4.3.
TRADITIONAL BUYING AND SELLING IN A PROFESSIONAL CONTEXT:

THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN TRADITIONAL AND PROFESSIONAL FRAMES
The interaction analysed below is an example of the first type of conflict. The
customer introduces interactive patterns that are typical of a traditional buying
and selling situation,6 yet incompatible with the institutional frame mobilized by
the employee. The interview, which is transcribed in its entirety in the Appendix,
is divided into four sections. The first section (lines 1–33) reproduces a discur-
sive practice that is prototypical of employee/customer encounters; the second
(lines 34–121) and the third (lines 122–196) include negotiations regarding both
the price of a meter and its installation, which take place within a situation of
conflict between traditional and institutional frames; the final section (line 197
onwards) once again reproduces the employee/customer institutional frame.
The first section (lines 1–33) constitutes standard professional discursive
practice (Drew and Sorjonen, 2000). A standard interview frame is created,
in which the employee resorts to the use of a series of standard practices that
enable her to maintain control over the interaction and to administer the insti-
tutional frame: question/answer sequences in which the employee controls the
progress of the interview (lines 13, 24–30) or expressions of politeness (the use
of the Spanish ‘Usted’ and the third person) in order to preserve the necessary
distance in the face of the customer’s use of the Spanish familiar second person
‘tú’: ‘Mira’ (Look) (line 1).
However, on line 34, the customer changes the professional frame that she
was co-constructing with the employee, activating a traditional buying and
selling frame that is typical of contexts such as markets, local fairs and street
stalls and does not correspond to the discursive expectations of an institutional
encounter. She introduces a series of strategies that reject the fee charged for
installing the meter which are similar to those used when haggling over prices in
a market and initiates a discursive task that is typical of this type: a cut-and-thrust
strategy (Prego-Vázquez, 1998).7 This marks the start of the second part of the
interview (lines 34–109), in which a conflict arises between the traditional local
frame, mobilized by the customers, and the institutional frame that the employee
maintains throughout the conversation.
34. C: Y por qué tengo que pagar tres 34. C: And why have I got to pay three
mil quinientas thousand five hundred
35. y a los demás no les cobran tres 35. and nobody else has been charged three
mil quinientas? thousand five hundred?
36. E2: A todo el mundo que le ha- 36. E2: Everyone who has
37. se le ha colocado el contador 37. -has had a meter installed
38. se le han cobrado tres mil 38. has been charged three thousand five
quinientas cincuenta pesetas hundred
39. por la colocación del contador. 39. for the meter installation.
40. (1) 40. (1)
41. Porque nos obliga la ordenanza 41. Because the order from Watertown
del ayuntamiento de Vilauga. Council requires us to.
42. C: xx xx xx les cobraron mil y pico. 42. C: xx were charged one thousand and
something.
43. E2: No. 43. E2: No.

44. C: Mm. (asiente) 44. C: Mm. (nods head)
45. E2: Tres mil quinientas cincuenta. 45. E2: Three thousand five hundred.
46. Si quiere le enseño facturas, eh. 46. If you want I can show you some
bills, eh.
47. Mire. 47. Look.
48. (2) 48. (2)
49. Aquí tiene la de otra persona... 49. Here’s someone else’s bill...
50. Ay, este es el contador... 50. Ah, this is the meter...
51. (4) 51. (4)
52. Ahora mismo no tengo ninguna 52. I don’t have an invoice here right
factura, now,
53. pero a todo el mundo se le ha 53. but everyone has been charged
cobrado
54. tres mil quinientas cincuenta 54. three thousand five hundred
pesetas, eh. pesetas, eh.
55. (2) 55. (2)
56. C: ¿Seguro? 56. C: Are you sure?
57. E2: Mari, (a una compañera) 57. E2: Mari, (addresses a fellow worker)
58. ¿me das una factura 58. Can you give me a bill
59. de colocación de contador? (La 59. for a meter installation? (Her
compañera no le entiende.) fellow worker doesn’t understand.)
60. Una factura 60. An installation
61. de colocación de [contador.] 61. bill [for a meter.]
62. C: [Es que] a mí 62. C: [The thing is
me dijeron that] I was told
63. que cobrabais mil y pico. 63. that they charge a thousand and
something.
64. E2: Que dice que cobraron mil y 64. E2: She says they charged a thousand
pico, (a la compañera) and something, (to her fellow worker)
65. ¿Me la dejas para enseñársela? 65. Can you pass it over here so I can show
her?
66. C: Es que a mí me dijeron que 66. C: The thing is that I was told they
cobraban mil y pico. charged a thousand and something.
67. E2: Sí. 67. E2: Yes.
68. C: Que cobraban, 68. C: That they charged,
69. aquí, 69. here,
70. vamos. 70. let’s see.
71. E2: Derechos de enganche 71. E2: Connection charges
(mostrando la factura) (shows the bill)
72. y colocación del contador. 72. and meter installation.
73. (2) 73. (2)
74. Tres mil 74. Three thousand
75. quinientas 75. Five hundred
76. cincuenta 76. and fifty
77. pesetas. (Recalcando las palabras) 77. pesetas. (Emphasizes the words)
78. (2) 78. (2)
79. A otra persona, 79. Charged to someone else,
80. como ve o... 80. as you can see or...
81. Una factura legal de 81. A legal bill from Watercompany,

Augaempresa,
82. cuñada, 82. stamped,
83. con sello... 83. and sealed...
84. C: Yo no digo que no esté legal, 84. C: I’m not saying it’s not legal,
85. pero al principio cobrabais menos, 85. but you didn’t use to charge so
much,
86. [entonces...] 86. [so...]
87. E2: [No.] 87. E2: [No.]
88. (2) 88. (2)
89. Siempre se cobró eso. 89. It’s always been the same price.
90. (2) 90. (2)
91. C: Si era una persona 91. C: If it were a person
92. que no tenía ni contador, 92. who didn’t have a meter,
93. nunca pagara, 93. who’d never paid,
94. nunca estaba dado de alta. 94. never been registered.
95. E2: Siempre se cobró tres mil 95. E2: The price of installing the meter,
quinientas cincuenta,
96. por la colocación del contador. 96. has always been three
thousand five hundred.
97. (3) 97. (3)
98. C: Aún te he de traer la factura. 98. C: I’ll have to bring the bill in.
99. (1) 99. (1)
100. E2: Bueno, 100. E2: OK,
101. [xx xx] 101. [xx xx]
102. C: [Como la] encuentre, 102. C: [If I] find it,
103. ya verás. 103. you’ll see.
104. (2) 104. (2)
105. E4: xx xx 105. E4: xx xx
106. tráigala, tráigala. 106. You bring it in, bring it in.
107. E2: [Tráigala, eh.] 107. E2: [Bring it in, eh.]
108. C: [Es que a mí] me dijeron que 108. C: [The thing is that] I was told that’s
cobraban eso. how much it costs.
109. E4: Bueno. 109. E4: OK.
The cut-and-thrust strategy here is the discursive task whereby the price of the
product is negotiated (Prego-Vázquez, 1998). The initial phase begins when the
buyer fails to accept or questions the price with an interactive response. This is
precisely what occurs on line 34. C introduces a question/response that queries
the price of installing the meter: ‘Why have I got to pay three thousand five
hundred pesetas?’ This strategy is common in the corpus of buying and selling
interactions at countryside fairs analysed in Prego-Vázquez (1998). An example
is given in the following fragment of haggling collected at a countryside fair that
also reproduces a question/response that rejects the price offered:
C: ¿A como son? C: How much?

V: A dez pesos. V: Fifty pesetas.
C: ¿A dez pesos? (Prego-Vázquez, 1998:13). C: Fifty pesetas? (Prego-Vázquez, 1998: 13)
Following this initial intervention on line 34, C continues to produce inter-

active movements designed to query the fee charged for installing the meter. The
tactics employed by the customer in order to prolong this situation of cut-and-
thrust, which are summarized below, are also essentially those used in traditional
haggling (Prego-Vázquez, 1998):
1. References to real or fictitious situations in which the product is cheaper.

The details provided are vague and the source of the information is not given
in order to raise doubts about the credibility of the price. For example: ‘Nobody
else has been charged three thousand five hundred’.
2. Counter-offers in which an inexact price is put forward, for example: ‘a
thousand and something’ (line 42).
3. Responding with a question. These tend to be shorter interventions designed to
destabilize the institutional frame and break down the employee’s arguments.
An example of this can be found on line 56: ‘Are you sure?’
4. Use of the familiar second person form that challenges the polite third person
form used by the employee throughout the conversation (lines 102–03).
5. Repetition as a rhetorical strategy to emphasise the ideas expressed
(lines 62, 66).
The interactional patterns of ‘cut-and-thrust’ challenge and delegitimize the

interactional control that the employee has attempted to maintain right from
the start of the interview. In the face of this situation, the employee’s reaction
is to maintain the institutional frame and reinforce her professional role. Her
resources correspond essentially to the depersonalization style analysed in
Morales López et al. (2005):
1. Passive reflexive constructions in which the agent is omitted and all personal
references are avoided. For example: ‘Everyone who has had a meter installed’
(lines 37–8; 53–4; 89, 95–6).
2. Specialized lexis that is specific to the discursive domain of a bureaucratic or
institutional scope. Examples include ‘order’ (line 41), ‘Connection charges’
(lines 71–2), ‘a legal bill from . . .’ (lines 81–3).
3. Arguments based on objective and contrastable date. For examples, see
lines 41, 46–7, 79–83.
4. Assertive speech acts that commit the speaker to the truth of the claim
(lines 36–41, 52–4, 71–83, etc.).
5. Directive speech acts designed to force the customer to check the facts related
(line 47).
The result is a conflict between traditional and institutional frames. Between

lines 34 and 104 the interaction fails to progress and the tension between the
employee and the customer heightens. In this instance, the clash between
traditional and institutional discourse becomes a communicative problem that
hinders a positive outcome to the interaction. Faced with this situation, the inter-
vention of E4 is essential in order for the interview to take a small step forward:
105. E4: xx xx 105. E4: xx xx

106. tráigala, tráigala. 106. You bring it in, bring it in.
107. E2: [Tráigala, eh.] 107. E2: [Bring it in, eh.]
108. C: [Es que a mí] me dijeron que 108. C: [The thing is that] I was told
cobraban eso. that’s how much it cost.
109. E4: Bueno. 109. E4: OK.
110. (5) 110. (5)
111. C: ¿Y me ponéis vosotros el 111. C: And you’ll install the meter for
contador? me?
112. E2: Claro. 112. E2: Of course.
113. El contador lo tiene que 113. You’ll have to buy the meter...
comprar....
114. Lo va comprar fuera, ¿no? 114. You’re going to buy it
somewhere else, aren’t you?
115. C: No, lo compro aquí entonces. 115. C: No, in that case I’ll buy it here.
116. E2: Ah, ya lo va a comprar aquí. 116. E2: Ah, so you’re going to buy it
here.
117. (2) 117. (2)
118. C: ¿Cuánto vale? 118. C: How much does it cost?
119. (1) 119. (1)
E4 (lines 105–6) does not use the same institutional discursive resources as
E2, which, as we have seen in this case and with this customer, constitute an
interactive source of conflict. E4’s intervention therefore represents a change
of frame. She reuses the customer’s conversational strategies to ask her to
prove her claims, situating her discourse within C’s interactional frame in
order to put an end to the situation of cut-and-thrust generated by the custom-
er. E4 introduces a directive speech act that threatens C’s face (Brown and
Levinson, 1987). She uses a verb in the imperative form (‘bring it in, bring it in’,
line 106) and adopts the same challenging tone as C. Notice too her use of repeti-
tion as a rhetorical strategy in order to emphasize the communicative inten-
tion of the statement. The customer is robbed of her arguments and ceases to
quibble about the price; instead she moves on to other questions related to the
installation of the meter (lines 111–19). In short, E4’s intervention momentar-
ily neutralizes the situation of ‘cut-and-thrust’, while at the same time helping
the interaction to move forward.
Following this brief interval, the customer initiates a new phase of nego-
tiation regarding the price of the meter (line 122). This is the third part of the
interview (line 122 onwards):
110. (5) 110. (5)

111. C: ¿Y me ponéis vosotros el 111. C: And you’ll install the meter for
contador? me?
113. El contador lo tiene que comprar... 113. You’ll have to buy the meter...
114. Lo va comprar fuera, ¿no? 114. You’re going to buy it somewhere
else, aren’t you?
115. C: No, lo compro aquí entonces. 115. C: No, in that case I’ll buy it here.
116. E2: Ah, ya lo va a comprar aquí. 116. E2: Ah, so you’re going to buy it here.
117. (2) 117. (2)
118. C: ¿Cuánto vale? 118. C: How much does it cost?
119. (1) 119. (1)
120. E2: Seis mil trescientas ochenta. 120. E2: Six thousand three hundred and
eighty.
121. (2) 121. (2)
122. C: Entonces subieron. 122. C: So they’ve gone up.
123. (3) 123. (3)
124. E2: Le estoy diciendo que no, 124. E2: I’ve told you they haven’t,
125. que es el mismo precio que 125. that they’re the same price as
tuvimos siempre. always.
126. (3) 126. (3)
127. C: Entonces [bien que me 127. C: So [they’ve tricked] me, eh.
engañaron] a mí, eh.
128. E2: [Le habrán dicho...] 128. E2: [You’ll have been told...]
129. Habrán comprado el contador 129. They’ll have bought the meter,
otro... from another...
130. C: [No, no, no, no, no, no.] 130. C: [No, no, no, no, no, no.]
131. E2: [En otro sitio.] 131. E2: [somewhere else.]
132. El contador en otro si[tio] 132. The meter somewhere [else]
133. C: [No.] 133. C: [No.]
134. E2: sí que puede ser [más barato.] 134. E2: it might have been [cheaper.]
135. C: [Lo compraron 135. C: [They bought
aquí,] it here,]
136. y les valieron quinien- 136. and it cost them five hund-
137. cinco mil y pico. 137. five thousand and something.
138. (2) 138. (2)
139. E2: Señora, 139. E2: Madam,
140. usted lo que vio es el precio de 140. what you saw is the price at the
arriba top
141. [desglosado.] 141. [broken down.]
142. C: [¡No vi nada!] 142. C: [I didn’t see anything!]
143. ¡No vi nada! 143. I didn’t see anything!
144. A mí me lo dijeron. 144. Someone told me.
145. (3) 145. (3)
146. E2: Bueno. 146. E2: OK.
147. C: A mí me lo dijeron, 147. C: Someone told me,
148. yo no vi nada. 148. I didn’t see anything.
149. E2: xx xx 149. E2: xx xx
150. C: Para qué te voy a decir que vi, 150. C: Why would I tell you that I saw it,
151. si no vi. 151. If I didn’t.
152. E2: xx xx 152. E2: xx xx
153. C: Ahora, 153. C: Now,
154. me dijeron que que sí. 154. I was told that, that.
The strategies are the same as those used in the previous cut-and-thrust.
The customer introduces: (i) vague imprecise data and fictitious references to
raise doubts about the credibility of the price: ‘So they’ve gone up’ or ‘So they’ve
tricked me’ (lines 122–7); (ii) indirect counter-offers (lines 136–7); (iii) responses
(lines 130, 133); and (iv) use of the familiar second person (lines 111) and
repetition (lines 142–3, 148). Once again, the intervention of E4 will play a vital
role in taking the interaction forward towards a satisfactory conclusion. E4
introduces the responses/counter-responses that are typical of this ‘cut-and-
thrust’ strategy. This leads to a further shift from an institutional frame to a
traditional conversational frame:
159. E4: [Ah, ah,] 159. E4: [Ah, ah,]

160. pues ya le digo que es imposible, 160. well I’m telling you that’s just not
possible,
161. porque además, 161. because in addition,
162. mire, 162. look,
163. ese papel lo ha escrito un 163. that paper was written by a
ordenador computer
164. que xx las demás tarifas. 164. that xx the other tariffs.
165. C: No lo vi, 165. C: I didn’t see it,
166. me dijeron que cobraban por el 166. I was told that the meter cost five
contador cinco mil y algo. thousand and something.
167. (2) 167. (2)
168. Por el contador. 168. The meter.
169. E4: El contador son cinco mil 169. E4: The meter costs five thousand five
quinientas, hundred,
170. (1) 170. (1)
171. sin IVA. 171. excluding VAT.
172. C: No sé, 172. C: I don’t know,
173. me dijeron 173. I was told
174. por el contador 174. the meter costs
175. E4: [ xx xx ] xx 175. E4: [xx xx] xx
176. C: cinco mil [y algo.] 176. C: five thousand [and something.]
177. No sé si me dijeron... 177. I can’t remember if they told me...
178. No sé si:: echaban el IVA en- ahí. 178. I don’t know whether:: that was
with VAT.
179. Y después que pagaban, 179. And then they had to pay,
180. por no sé qué 180. for something or other
181. (1) 181. (1)
182. mil y algo, 182. a thousand and something,
183. nada más. 183. nothing else.
184. E4: No hay ningún concepto que 184. E4: There’s nothing that costs a
sea mil y algo. thousand and something.
185. C: Mil y algo. 185. C: A thousand and something.
186. E4: No xx xx xx xx. 186. E4: No xx xx xx xx.
187. C: Es una persona que nunca 187. C: It’s someone who’d never had a
contador tuvo, meter,
188. no estaba dada de alta 188. they weren’t registered
189. y ya me dirás. 189. so you tell me.
190. E4: Ya sabe que la gente compra 190. E4: You know people are always
siempre más barato que los demás, saying they get things cheaper than
anyone else,
191. C: [No sé.] 191. C: [I don’t know.]
192. E4: [gana] más dinero que los 192. E4: [earn] more than anyone
demás... else...
193. (1) 193. (1)
194. C: No sé, 194. C: I don’t know,
195. yo ya te digo que no lo vi 195. Like I said, I didn’t see it
pero... but...
196. (3) 196. (3)
197. ¿Y esto cuándo me lo vais a 197. And when will you install it?
poner?
198. (2) 198. (2)
As in lines 105–6, E4’s change of footing represents the conversationalization

(Fairclough, 1997) of the institutional discourse. This interactional shift enables
the employee to reuse the customer’s conversational discourse, introducing re-
sponses to reject C’s claims and delegitimize her sources of information. From
line 190 onwards, E4 strategically activates an ‘agreement framework’ designed
to neutralize C’s cut-and-thrust strategy. In this specific instance, the expression
‘you know’ presents E4 as having knowledge that is shared by both participants
and expresses an irrefutable fact. She appeals to common sense, thereby leaving
little room for disagreement. This strategy responds to the agreement maxim of
the politeness principle put forward by Leech (1983), which guides the speakers
to choose discursive tactics designed to mitigate any possible discrepancies.
This case shows that conversational resources may be a powerful means of
controlling our interlocutor’s interventions. Indeed, on certain occasions, con-
versationalization is more effective than other institutional resources (Álvarez–
Cáccamo and Prego-Vázquez, 2003). As can be seen in this interview, E4 man-
ages to get the customer to abandon her haggling tactics, and from line 197
and until the end of the interview, both participants once again set about co-
constructing the professional frame in a cooperative manner (see Appendix).
In short, this case illustrates sequentially how the conflict between profes-
sional and traditional frames arises, is negotiated and resolved. We have analysed
the way in which the grammatical, lexical, pragmatic and sociodiscursive re-
sources of C and E2 activate two apparently irreconcilable interactive frames:
the institutional and the traditional. This situation results in different conver-
sational inferences and expectations. The participants do not share the same
knowledge schema for the activity of buying and selling. For this reason, nego-
tiation of the participants’ frames and footings results in conflict. The customer’s
use of haggling strategies enables her to negotiate changes of footing and chal-
lenge the interactional asymmetry that characterises the institutional context.
However, the analysis also shows that E4’s interventions lead to a conclusion.
E4 uses conversationalization as a means of obtaining power. She adapts to
the haggling activity knowledge schema used by C and activates a new partici-
pation frame in order to resolve the conflict frame that arose between E2 and C
during the course of the interview.
CODE-SWITCHING AND PERSONAL FRAMING IN PROFESSIONAL CONTEXTS

The interaction analysed in this section illustrates the second type of frame
conflict. The customer introduces linguistic alternation with code-switching
(Álvarez-Cáccamo, 1998, 2000) in order to negotiate personal and professional

frames. The interview – reproduced in the Appendix – is divided into five sections.
In the first section (lines 1–46), the principal object of the query is introduced:
the installation of the meter and queries about the bills received.8 The next
three sections make up the central issue. Three subtopics are dealt with which
have arisen as a result of the main issue: lines 47–147 represent a discussion
about the price of each of the bills; the sequence running from lines 148 to 168
clears up the confusion surrounding the date of the bill and finally, the fourth
section (lines 169–254) focuses on the procedures involved in installing the
meter. Once all these problems have been solved, we enter the final section
(lines 255–489) in which an agreement is reached regarding the date and
time and other issues related to the installation of the meter. In each of the
five sections, the same interactional routine takes place:
1. Customer query. The start of a new query is marked by the use of Spanish
(see lines 8, 47, 148, 169–71). Spanish is also used at other times during
the interview in order to introduce institutional routines (lines 32, 80, 173–4,
181, 186, 227–30, 237).
2. Negotiation of responses. The customer and the employee co-construct the
solution to the queries raised. The customer initiates various conversational
tasks including questions, repetitions, responses, narrative and continuation
sequences. However, the most significant discursive resource used is that
of code-switching. C initiates linguistic alternations into colloquial or
dialectal Galician (lines 50, 54–8, 129, 154–70, 211–26, 286–90) or into
colloquial Spanish (lines 242–8) in order to interrupt the institutional rou-
tines and introduce personal frames. Faced with the inclusion of this
personal frame, the employee, searching for an affiliative alliance (Álvarez-
Cáccamo, 1996), also makes pragmatic use of the systematic juxtaposing
of Spanish and Galician in her discourse. Yet this is not just an example of
situational code-switching brought about by the linguistic uses of her
interlocutor. In this instance, linguistic alternation is linked to the mobil-
ization of didactic and conversational footings which are converted into a
means of maintaining power and a situation of inequality, as will be seen
from our analysis.
3. Closing sequence. Once the negotiation is completed, one of the two par-
ticipants – most frequently the customer – introduces a closing sequence
in order to bring the negotiation to an end. The discursive procedures used
are closure markers (as in line 46) which indicate the end of the sequence or
interventions (Gallardo Paúls, 1996). These are utterances in which the par-
ticipant brings the topic under discussion to an end. These turns have a clear
marking function, as they separate the various sequences of the interview.
4. Microanalysis reveals, as stated earlier, that the negotiation of professional
and personal frames associated with linguistic alternation is recurrent
throughout the interview. It is an example of the conversational function of
code-switching that Gumperz (1982a: 82–3) terms ‘personalization versus
objectivization’. Consequently, the results of the analyses of the various
language pairs show how, on certain occasions, code-switching serves to

distinguish between ‘talk about action’ and ‘talk as action’. In this sense,
linguistic alternation indicates the speaker’s degree of involvement with
what is being said; in other words, it distinguishes the personal from that
which is kept at a certain distance: ‘the degree of speaker involvement in,
or distance from, a message, whether a statement reflects personal opinion
or knowledge, whether it refers to specific instances or has the authority of
generally known fact’. According to Gumperz (1982a), this discursive
function is a metaphoric extension of the we code and the they code.
A similar process can be observed in the doctor/patient interactions studied

by Telles Ribeiro (1996). Telles Ribeiro analyses the way in which
personal stances on the part of the patient represent a necessary contextual transfor-
mation in bringing about a sense of self, of who the woman is, of the person behind the
patient. The doctor, however, does not seem to be attuned to this situation. (1996: 181)
Telles Ribeiro’s analysis shows how each patient reframing
changes her communicative strategies from providing less information to providing

more information; her communicative style changes from less involvement to more
involvement (signalled by paralinguistic and linguistic cues); and a topic change or a
change in a focus on the ongoing topic occurs. (1996: 189)
The following fragment illustrates the connection between the code-switching

function of ‘personalization versus objectivization’ and the negotiation of frames
in the professional context. It includes the end of the second part of the interview
and the beginning of the third:
151. E3: Pero este é un ejemplo. (riéndose) 151. E3: But this is an example. (laughs)
152. C: No, no, no. (riéndose) 152. C: No, no, no. (laughs)
153. E3: É o recibo en- 153. E3: It’s the bill-
154. C: Entonces estou ben. 154. C: So I’m all right.
155. E3: Si, [muller, si, si.] 155. E3: Yes, [love, yes, yes.]
156. C: [Bueno, vale vale.] 156. C: [All right, all right then.]
157. E3: Si non o reci-, 157. E3: But I didn’t recei-,
158. non [se líe,] 158. don’t [get confused,]
159. C: [Pois,] ese é o [xx xx ] 159. C: [Well,] that’s what [xx xx ]
160. E3: [si non o 160. E3: [if you
quere,] don’t want it, ]
161. [tírao e 161 [then
punto.] just throw it away.]
162. C: No, no, eu quéroo, pero... 162. C: No, no, I do want it but...
163. (1) 163. (1)
164. Pero... 164. But...
165. E3: Usted non se líe, 165. E3: Don’t get confused,
166 eso solo é un eghem[plo,] 166. it’s just an exam[ple,]
167. C: [Eso.] 167. C: [Oh.]
168. E3: é unha explica[ción.] 168. E3: it’s an explana[tion.]
169. C: [Pero,] por eso 169. C: [But,] that’s why

vengo aquí. I’m here
170. (1) 170. (1)
171. ¿Y ahora con esto qué tengo 171. And what do I have to do with
que hacer? this?
172. E3: Pagar la colocación... 172. E3: Pay the installation...
173. C: ¿Y cuánto vale, 173. C: And how much does it cost,
174. la colocación? 174. the installation?
175. E3: Tres mil quinientas cincuenta. 175. E3: Three thousand five hundred
and fifty.
176. (2) 176. (2)
177. Quedamos un día, 177. We arrange a date,
178. a una hora, 178. and a time,
179. y se lo vamos a colocar. 179. and we’ll install it for you.
180. (2) 180. (2)
181. C: ¿Y lo tiene... Lo dejo aquí o [lo 181. C: And do you have... Shall I leave it
cojo?] here or [shall I take it?]
182. E3: [No, lo] 182. E3: [No, lo]
lleva, lo lleva, take it with you, take it with you,
183. y se lo da al fontanero el día, 183. and give it to the plumber the day,
184. C: [Pero...] 184. C: [But...]
185. E3: [ese] mismo día. 185. E3: [that] same day.
186. C: Pero..., ¿no le ponen el número 186. C: But..., don’t I need a number or
ni nada? something?
187. E3: Claro, 187. E3: Of course,
188. aquí tomamos nota de la marca, 188. we take note of the make,
189. (1) 189. (1)
190. su contador, 190. your meter,
191. (1) 191. (1)
192. un iberconta, 192. an iberconta,
193. (1) 193. (1)
194. y el número de su contador, 194. and your meter number,
195. que es este que trae aquí arriba. 195. which is here at the top.
196. (1) 196. (1)
197. Después, 197. Then,
198. aquí, 198. here,
199. en estos números negros, 199. these black numbers,
200. irá marcando 200. show
201. los metros cúbicos de agua, 201. the cubic metres of water,
202. (1) 202. (1)
203. y esto rojo significa litros, 203. and the red means the litres,
204. estos no los tenemos en cuenta. 204. we don’t take those into
consideration.
205.C: Que es lo que pagamos de agua. 205. C: So that’s how much we pay for
our water.
206. E3: Pero usted sabrá 206. E3: But you must know
207. los metros cúbicos de agua 207. how many cubic metres of water
208. que consu[me,] 208. you consu[me,]
209. C: [Ya.] 209. C: [Yes.]
210. E3: [mirando aquí.] 210. E3: [just look here.]
211. C: [Somos dúas] personas, 211. C: [There are two ] of us,
212. somos dúas personas [nada 212. just two of us [that’s all.]
máis.]
213. E3: [Sí,pero 213. E3: [Yes, but two]
dúas] personas poden gastar máis people can spend more money ...
cartos que... ,
214. que cinco 214. than five
215. eso xa é [o que mira]mos. 215. that’s [what we look] at.
216. C: [Esa é.] 216. C: [That’s right. ]
217. E3: Non sempre é igual, 217. E3: It’s not always the same,
218. ao mellor dúas personas 218. maybe two people
219. (1) 219. (1)
220. gastan a tira, 220. use a lot,
221. outros somos [cinco e..., e 221. others, there are five [of us...,
acomodámonos co que temos.] and we make do with what we’ve got.]
222. C: [Non, pero non 222. C: [No, no, but
somos] destraghadoras,eh. we’re not] wasteful, eh.
223. E3: Bue:no, eso xa o dirá o 223. E3: We:ll, the meter will soon tell.
contador.
224. C: Eso xa o dirá o contador. 224. C: The meter will soon tell.
225. E3: Eso mismo, 225. E3: That’s right,
226. ahí. 226. there you are.
227. C: Bueno, ¿y cuánto...? 227. C: All right, so how much...?
228. (1) 228. (1)
229. ¿Cuánto tenemos de mínimo? 229. How much is the minimum?
230. ¿Cuántos metros [cúbicos?] 230. ¡How many cubic [metres?]
231. E3: [Treinta] 231. E3: [Thirty]
metros cúbicos, cubic metres,
232. dos meses. 232. two months.
233. (2) 233. (2)
234. (...) 234. (...)
Lines 151–68 coincide with the end of the second part of the interview.
They include the final phase of the negotiations and the closing of the sequence.
Both participants use a variety of colloquial Galician: ‘entonces estou ben’
(So I’m all right) (line 154) ‘sí, muller’ (Yes love) (line 155), ‘non se líe’ (don’t get
confused) (line 158). The general tone of this fragment is conversational and
there is a high degree of implication with what is being said from both
participants. Instead of adopting a distant tone, the employee personalizes the
problems and takes her side. Indeed, she mobilized a conversational footing.
In turn, C does not speak of the problems caused by the bills, but instead ‘acts
out’ (Gumperz, 1982a) her problem by using a colloquial variety of Galician
and conversational strategies. The fragment is very similar to a colloquial
conversation; it seems as though interactional symmetry exists between the
two participants as both C and E3 overlap their utterances (lines 155–69)
and produce responses (lines 152, 162). This fragment does not respond to a
prototypical question/answer routine but instead, to a certain degree, reflects
a certain cut-and-thrust strategy between the employee and the customer.
In other words, at this stage the discourse is conversationalized and personal-
ized. These linguistic and discursive resources are used to situate the problem
of the bill within a personal frame.
In lines 169–72, C then goes on to produce a linguistic alternation from

Galician to Spanish which is a contextualization cue for a change of frame. C
initiates a sequence of questions and then inserts a new institutional routine:
‘¿y ahora con esto qué tengo que hacer’ (And what do I have to do with this?)
(line 171). Notice how from lines 169 to 210 a professional frame is activated
in which a type of asymmetric interaction takes place: sequential organization
is typical of an institutional ritual organized into adjacent question/answer
pairs. This represents a discursive practice designed for institutional activities
and identities (Telles Ribeiro and Hoyle, 2000).
As a result, in this new sequence the participation framework is modified.
The participants adopt institutional footings that portray them as ‘customer’ and
‘employee’. C introduces questions (lines 169–71, 173–4, 181, 186) about the
price of the meter and how it works. E3 uses the first person plural to position
herself as the ‘principal’ in her replies (Goffman, 1981). She portrays herself as
a social actor representing an organization or group, and whose position is
determined by the words she utters. This is a typical professional footing where-
by ‘the power to respond’ symbolizes the difference in interactional status be-
tween the employee, the organizational ‘gatekeeper’ and the customer.
Moreover, when the professional frame is mobilized, C no longer questions
the replies given by the employee. No negotiation takes place using ‘cut-and-
thrust’ discursive tasks. Nor is there a high degree of participant implication
in what is being said, and the problem is no longer personalized. In this in-
stance, the employee and the customer simply ‘talk about the action’ (Gumperz,
1982a: 80).
On line 211 there is a further change of frame. Linguistic alternation into
Galician acts as a contextualization cue for the personal frame and a change
in the participation framework. C switches to colloquial and dialectal Galician,
interrupting the question routine and introducing a story sequence in which
she presents a personal dimension. She relates her family circumstances in
order to explain the consumption of water in her family. Both participants
personalize the issue under discussion. The linguistic and discursive resources
of this new frame are as follows: dialectal and colloquial linguistic varieties,
code-switching, intonation and a conversational approach to the problem. In
other words, narrative sequences (lines 212–22), colloquial lexis and expressions
(lines 220, 222), conversational practices such as responses/counter-responses
(lines 213–24) and constant overlapping are all introduced, thereby enabling
both C and E3 to mobilize conversational and personal footings.
Finally, on line 227, the customer switches from Galician to Spanish, and
introduces a new sequence of questions: ‘Bueno, ¿y cuánto. . . .?/ ¿Cuánto tenemos
de mínimo? ¿Cuántos metros cúbicos?’ (All right, so how much. . .? /How much is
the minimum? How many cubic metres?), marking a return to the institutional
routine and professional frame.
However, in this instance, the conflict between personal and professional
frames does not lead to a communicative problem. The employee correctly inter-
prets the inferences and contextual assumptions activated by the linguistic
alternations, and adapts to the changes of frames initiated by the customer. E3

is perfectly capable of adapting to the linguistic and discursive choices of her
interlocutor. Both participants share the values assigned to code-switching as a
personalization and objectivization resource, and gradually co-construct a fluid
hybrid macro-frame that is both personal/professional and conversational/
institutional, ideal for resolving the problems posed by the customer.
Nevertheless, the fact that in most instances it is the customer who interrupts
the professional frame, leaving it up to the employee to adapt to these changes,
does not mean that it is C who is interactionally manipulating and controlling
the discourse. Indeed, the employee puts code-switching and other conversational
elements to strategic use in order to achieve her interactional goal: namely to
resolve the customer’s queries and problems. She adopts a conversational foot-
ing; in other words, ‘she speaks like a citizen who shares the problems of her
interlocutor’. This is a clear case of the conversationalization of professional
discourse, similar to that of the interview analysed in the previous section. In
other words, control of the interaction is concealed. This is in fact a more effect-
ive method, as the customer’s problems are gradually resolved and at no time
does the frame conflict turn into a communicative problem.
We also observed that the employee does not only limit the use of code-
switching to conversationalization strategies. It also appears with other re-
sources such as a slow rhythm, examples and repetition aimed at emphasizing
or simplifying the information. In these cases, Galician acts as a contextual-
ization cue for the didactic frame in which the employee positions her inter-
ventions (lines 39–40, 44–5, 61, 82–9, 91–3, 95–6, 99–100, 102–5, 121–3,
132–3, 136–40, 166–8) and activates a didactic footing which consists of
‘talking like a person who is trying to teach someone who does not have access
to specific knowledge by repeating, simplifying information and using conver-
sational strategies such as code-switching’. The didactic footing can also be
used to create the ‘hidden interactive asymmetry’. These strategies have much
in common with the ‘motherese’ style detected by Wodak (1996) among certain
doctors treating inexpert patients. In the opinion of this author, this com-
municative behaviour is also a means of exerting power given that by adopting
this style of condescending communication, the doctor places the patient at a
disadvantage.
To sum up, the detailed microanalysis of the code-switching reveals: (i) how
footings and frames can be manipulated, and (ii) how potential conflicts be-
tween lay and institutional discourse may be tackled and resolved.
PROFESSIONAL AND PERSONAL TOPICS AND MISMATCHED SCHEMAS OF KNOWLEDGE

In this section, we look at the third type of frame conflict identified at the start
of section 4: that caused by the various topics introduced by the professional
and the citizen.
Both the topics developed in a communicative exchange and the ability to
introduce them at the right time and place in the interaction form part of the ‘sche-
mas of knowledge’ (Tannen and Wallat, 1993; Telles Ribeiro and Hoyle, 2000).
Each speech activity – in the sense of the term used by Gumperz (1982a) –
creates certain expectations regarding the topics that may arise and their pro-
gress. In the case of institutional encounters, strong thematic constraints arise
(Drew and Heritage, 1992a) given that they deal with specific issues that, on
many occasions, follow a pre-established ‘agenda’. In addition, the way in
which they are introduced and mobilized is designed to display discretion,
objectivity or neutrality, formality and, in general terms, institutional ‘stances’.
Bergman (1992) for instance, analyses the question of discretion in psychiatrist/
patient encounters, whereas Clayman (1992) studies the issue of neutrality in
the news.
Specific discursive topics and the ability to mobilize them are associated with
certain specific conversational inferences that take place during institutional
encounters (Drew and Heritage, 1992a).9 However, not all citizens have access to
institutional knowledge, nor are they skilled at using discursive tactics correctly in
a professional context. Citizens fail to comply with the expectations of the institu-
tional agenda and introduce personal or conversational topics. This situation
leads to mismatched schemas of knowledge.
This situation is recurrent in our corpus of data; in other words, customers
constantly introduce topics of a personal or everyday nature. These movements
do not correspond to the discursive expectations and are a source of misunder-
standing (Telles Ribeiro and Hoyle, 2000). The interview analysed in this
section – reproduced in its entirety in the Appendix – clearly illustrates this type
of conflict.
The customer goes to the company offices because she receives two bills
in the same month. One of them is the bill for the water she has consumed and
the other is a sample bill sent out by the company for explanatory purposes
only. As we will see, the situation is similar to that of the previous interview.
The first sequence (lines 1–19) consists of the standard institutional routine
observed in other cases where the query is first posed: the employee initiates an
interactive pair (lines 1–2), thereby enabling C to pose her query. C explains her
problem (lines 3–4, 14–15, 19): she has received two bills and in this first sec-
tion E2 tries to understand the nature of the complaint while at the same time
offering some form of explanation (lines 6–13, 16–8).
The second sequence (lines 20–96) is concerned with resolving the problem.
However, it is clear that this interactional task is carried out unsatisfactorily,
resulting in a frame conflict caused by the disparity in the topics mobilized by the
employee and customer. E2 refers to the characteristics of the explanatory bill,
whereas C talks about the amount of water her family consumes.
Throughout the interaction (lines 20–4, 26, 30–41, 90–6), E2 explains
that the second bill is not a real demand for payment, but merely a sample bill
showing the various items included. According to E2’s discursive expectations,
it would appear that this explanation is sufficient to bring the interaction to a
close. Indeed, in all her interventions she insists on maintaining the institutional
frame and makes no effort to employ other strategies in order to ‘make herself
understood’.
However, this explanation is insufficient for C, who breaks away from

the expectations of the institutional context by introducing personal topics
(lines 58–74, 76–80, 87–9), thereby prolonging what should have been a
rapid employee/customer intervention. She speaks of her family’s habits
in order to explain that the amount indicated on the bill does not correspond
to their water consumption. These interventions indicate that C has failed to
fully understand E2’s explanations. She still has not grasped the fact that this
bill is merely a sample explanatory document that has nothing to do with her
family’s water bill.
The excerpt of the interaction given below illustrates how the conflict between
frames arises:
37. E2: (...)Esta hoja 37. E2: (...) This sheet

38. explica 38. explains
39. su recibo, (Recalca las palabras) 39. your bill, (Speaks slowly to
emphasize her words)
40. el recibo que le llegó a su 40. the bill that was sent to your
vivienda. home.
41. (1) 41. (1)
42. ¿Entiende? 42. Do you understand?
43. C: Ya, bien sé, 43. C: Yes I know,
44. que el recibo ya sé lo que vale, 44. I know how much the bill is,
45. pero [los-] 45. but [the-]
46. E2: [Est]o nada, (señala el recibo 46. E2: [Th]is is nothing, (holds up
explicativo) the explanatory bill)
47. esto no significa nada, 47. this doesn’t mean anything,
48. esto simplemente es una 48. it’s just information
información
49. que la puede leer. 49. for you to read.
50. C: Bueno, 50. C: All right,
51. vamos a ver, 51. let’s see,
52. bueno xx xx xx 52. All right xx xx xx
53. xx xx xx 53. xx xx xx
54. yo tengo la xx xx 54. I’ve got the xx xx
55. xx xx 55. xx xx
56. yo no puedo cambiarla. 56. I can’t change it.
57. (1) 57. (1)
58. Nosotros somos dos personas 58. We are two elderly people
mayores
61. en el otro, 61. on the other,
62. en el C, 62. on the C,
63. mi hijo no está xx xx, 63. my son doesn’t live with us xx xx,
64. sólo los fines de semana 64. only at the weekends
65. así que tampoco... 65. so he doesn’t...
66. (1) 66. (1)
67. Puede ver el- 67. He can see the-
68. dijo que iba ver el contador 68. He said he was going to look at
the meter
69. pero... 69. but...
70 (1) 70. (1)
71. Si..., si no llama al- 71. If..., if you don’t call -
72. al de dónde estoy yo 72. where I am
73. (1) 73. (1)
74. allí no hay nadie. 74. there’s nobody there.
75. E2: Vale. 75. E2: OK.
76. C: Así que no sé cómo... 76. C: So I just don’t know...
77. (1) 77. (1)
78. Ninguno gasta agua. 78. No-one uses any water.
79. (1) 79. (1)
80. Yo no sé cómo hace... 80. I don’t know ...
82. C: Entonces tengo seis mil 82. C: So I’ve got to pay six
y pico (es el importe señalado en thousand and something (this
el recibo explicativo) is the amount given on the
explanatory bill)
83. [xx xx- ] 83. [xx xx- ]
84. E2: [Es la in]formación, 84. E2: [That’s the in]formation,
85. no- 85. It doesn’t-
86. no significa nada. 86. it doesn’t mean anything.
87. C: La información es que 87. C: The information is that
88. nosotros no gastamos eso de 88. we don’t use that much water,
agua,
89. si nos van a cobrar después eso... 89.
if you’re going to charge us that
much then...
90. E2: No, 90. E2: No,
91. no van a cobrar seis mil pesetas, 91. no, you’re not going to be
charged that much,
92. es un recibo tipo que sacamos 92. this is a standard type bill we’ve
issued
93. (2) 93. (2)
94. pero no es 94. but it’s not
95. (1) 95. (1)
96. No es que vayan a cobrar eso, eh. 96. That’s not the amount you’re
going to be charged, eh.
(Llega otra clienta, y la empleada la (Another customer comes in, and the
atiende. Finaliza este intercambio de forma employee turns to serve her. The exchange
brusca). comes to an abrupt end).
In this fragment the employee and the customer are observed to be talking at
odds with each other. Each has a different schema of knowledge and therefore
the discursive expectations regarding the development of this speech activity
and thematic progression are not the same. E2 keeps strictly to her institutional
activity and her explanations remain firmly within this frame: it’s an explanatory
bill (lines 37–41, 46–9, 84–6, 90–5). E2’s strategy consists of repeating the same
idea. E2 considers that the customer’s query is resolved and given the discursive
brevity that normally accompanies this type of institutional encounter, it is to

be expected that the intervention should come to a close.
However, on line 58, C introduces a personal theme. This clearly shows that
her discursive expectations differ from E2’s. The fragment shows that C positions
her explanations within an everyday discursive domain. She considers that
the issue has still not been resolved and provides full details of her personal
circumstances regarding the amount of water she uses. It is therefore clear that
the employee and the customer are talking about completely different things.
The misunderstanding that takes place prior to the interaction is heightened
during the actual interaction itself. It seems as if they are simply not listening
to each other.
In short, C fails to interpret the topic developed by E2 and therefore introduces
a personal topic at an inappropriate moment. This changes the course of the
thematic progression of the interview. In the light of the interaction prior to
line 58, it was to be expected that the intervention would come to a close. However,
this is not the case. This misunderstanding conceals C’s difficulties in access-
ing institutional discursive domains. Indeed, as stated by Goodwin (1986), the
participants’ access to the discursive domains expressed in the conversation and
knowledge of the topic under discussion are directly related to the participation
frameworks. In this sense, the topics developed by the customer and the employee
suggest two different interpretations of the interactive frame, whereby the em-
ployee’s professional footing clashes with the personal footing of the customer.
This is seen very dramatically at the end of the sequence (line 96), which
coincides with the closure of the interaction. Following the arrival of another
customer, the exchange comes to an abrupt end and the misunderstanding is
left unresolved.
The end of the sequence (line 96) coincides with the closure of the interaction,
which is interrupted and comes to an abrupt end following the arrival of another
customer, leaving the misunderstanding unresolved.
Conclusions
This article has focused on the conflict between professional and local frames
as an interactive source of communicative problems in the workplace and a
sociodiscursive resource for the reproduction of social inequality. Specifically,
I have analysed the frame conflicts that arise when customers mobilize: (i) trad-
itional conversational patterns; (ii) code-switching; and (iii) topics of a personal
or everyday nature within an institutional context.
Each of the interviews analysed reveals a specific type of frame conflict and
the way it is dealt with in sociodiscursive terms. The sequential and critical
microanalysis of the data has managed to explain the role and sociodiscursive
impact of linguistic resources on the negotiation of interactive frames and
interactional asymmetries. In addition, it has enabled us to link frame conflicts
and interactional asymmetries with the reproduction of inequality and the power
differences that separate institutions and citizens. A qualitative and detailed
analysis of the data shows how frame conflicts are connected, on the one hand,
with citizens’ limited access to the professional discursive domains of the water
company, and, on the other hand, with institutional interactive routines.
The company rules and all relevant information have been generated in the
various discourses that have taken place throughout the organization’s history.
Text trajectories10 occur thanks to entextualization (Urban, 1996), or rather
the fact that the different discourses circulate within the diverse company con-
texts. This intertextual information is transformed into institutional power, as
only those who are familiar with the trajectory of the discourses have all the
information at their disposal (Blommaert, 2001; Briggs, 1997). Consequently,
the explanations provided by the employees are neither autonomous nor
spontaneous. Instead, they form part of the company’s discursive background
and the various interactional spaces in which operational decisions have been
taken. Customers do not have access to all these contextual spaces for the en-
textualization process and therefore are not skilled in professional discursive
domains or interactional resources. This inequality represents an interactive
source of conflict. Participants in these interviews do not possess the same shared
knowledge and therefore do not share the same schemas of knowledge about
the possible activities that may be carried out. An example of this can be seen in
the first interview, in which the employee activates an institutional buying and
selling frame, whereas the customer’s discursive practices are more in keeping
with a traditional buying and selling situation. A further example can be found
in our analysis of the second interview, which shows how the code-switching
mobilized by the customer activates contextual presuppositions that do not
correspond to those to be expected in a professional frame. Finally, the third inter-
view shows how the employee and the customer do not share the same discursive
expectations regarding the thematic progression of the interaction and the
relevant topics to be discussed.
It can therefore be concluded that professionals and customers do not have
access to the same sources of information and do not share the same schemas
of knowledge for sociointeractional activities or their associated interactive
frames. These discursive resources constitute what Blommaert (2001) terms
‘conditions for discourse production’, which produce interactional asymmetries
that enable the professionals to control the interaction.
In this sense, unequal access to interactive routines and discursive resources
have extremely negative consequences for those social groups that are not
skilled in the most highly valued discursive resources in institutional context
(Bourdieu, 1991). As Blommaert (2001: 21) points out, and in keeping with
the opinions of Hymes (1996): ‘access to some rights and benefits in society is
constrained by access to specific communicative (e.g. narrative) resources (cf.
Hymes 1996)’. The unequal distribution of discursive resources plays an es-
sential role as it both reflects existing social inequalities and contributes to their
reproduction in discursive practices. Indeed, many customers are unable to
resolve their problems due to the communicative barrier that separates them
from the institutions, with the consequent negative impact on their fundamental
rights. An example of this can be found in the third interview. Nevertheless,
the first and second interviews show how the institutional and depersonalized
voice has to tune into the customer’s own repertoire in order to prevail. Detailed
microanalysis of these interviews demostrates how conversational strategies
and code-switching are introduced into professional discourse as discursive
masks of power. Consequently, power does not always reside in the impersonal
rigidity of institutional discourse.
Finally, it must be pointed out that the line of ethnographic, sociointeractional
and critical research followed in this study not only contributes to explaining
the relationship between discursive practices, power and social inequality, but
may also be used to determine measures aimed at improving communication
(Gunnarson, 2000; Morales López et al., 2005, 2006; Pan et al., 2002) and to
democratize institutional and professional practices.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Part of this research corresponds to work financed by a grant received from the
Department of Innovation, Industry and Trade of the Autonomous Government of Galicia,
and carried out at the International Pragmatics Association Research Center (University
of Antwerp) during October 2004; 75 per cent of the grant was co-financed with the EU’s
Integrated Operating Programme of Galicia (FSE). This study corresponds to the initial
phase within the framework of the completed COMTECNO Project ‘Comunicacións e novas
tecnoloxías: empresas, organizacións e institucións’ (Communications and New Technologies:
Companies, Organisations and Institutions’) (PGIDT00PXI10404PR), subsidised by the
Autonomous Government of Galicia. A second phase, which includes work described in
this study, forms part of the ongoing project entitled Medidas de eficacia comunicativa en
las construcciones lingüísticas del habla infantil (Measures for communicative efficiency in the
linguistic constructions of children’s language) carried out by the Koine research group to
which I belong (part of the co-ordinated project entitled Eficacia comunicativa y evolución
del lenguaje en el habla infantil y afásica – Communicative efficiency and language development
in children’s and aphasiac language), financed by the Ministry of Education and Science
(HUM2004-0587-C02-01).
N OTE S
1. The data included in this article were collected during the course of 2001, a few
months after the privatization of the water, sewage treatment, and waste collection
and treatment services of a Galician borough, whose name has been omitted for
reasons of confidentiality. Administration of the services listed above was transferred
to a company in which 51 per cent of its capital remains public, and the remaining
49 per cent is privately owned. Privatization implies certain changes in the way
payments are processed. These changes have generated a general atmosphere of
discontent and tension directed against the company and the town council.
2. Heller (2001) proposes a ‘Critique and Sociolinguistic Discourse Analysis’ and in
a later study, (Heller, 2002), presents the guidelines for critical sociolinguistics.
Essentially, she aims to combine interactional sociolinguistics, ethnography and
critical analysis for the study of linguistic practices within historical and social
contexts. This multipronged analytical framework can be seen in the various studies
included in the book by Sarangi and Roberts (1999a) on talk in the workplace, or in the
research by Gunnarson et al. (1997). The following also respond to this methodology:
the study by Sarangi and Slembrouk (1996); the analysis of talk power carried out by
Thomborrow (2002) within various institutional contexts; the study by Tusón and
Unamuno (1999) within the context of schools; the research by Martín Rojo and
Gómez Esteban (2002) into gender and power in the professional context; Codó
Olsina’s doctoral thesis (2003), which focused on institutional/emigrant encounters;
or the article by Morales López et al. (2005), among others.
3. The interactive frames are the interactional realisation of knowledge schemas.
4. The translation is: ‘ . . . a minorization effect occurs . . . on those persons occupying
the lower status, the result of the negative assessment of their communicative
behaviour which eventually results in an overall negative appraisal of their qualities
or skills with regard to the post they have applied for’.
5. It is my own typology derived from data research.
6. Haggling is a traditional and universal practice employed in buying and selling
situations whereby the price of the product is negotiated. It constitutes a form of
dialogic and persuasive discourse that can be found in various cultures and which can
still be seen in certain specific contexts such as fairs, markets or street stalls (Prego-
Vázquez, 1998). However, it is somewhat surprising that these traditional forms of
fixing a price should appear within an institutional context in which the prices and
tariffs are predetermined.
7. Based on the results of the sociodiscursive and ethnograpic analysis I carried out on
haggling in traditional Galician market fairs (Prego-Vázquez, 1998).
8. It is important to explain here that in addition to the regular bill, the company also sent
its clients a sample bill, designed to explain the new items that would be included in the
company’s bills from then on. This dummy bill led to a series of misunderstandings,
as many citizens thought that they had been billed twice in the same month.
9. As Gumperz (1982a) states, conversational inference is a process of interpretation
situated within and linked to the context that enables participants to assess the
communicative intentions of others and thereby produce their responses. The aim
is to determine the contextual presuppositions, which requires the identification of
the speech activity. Gumperz therefore sees conversational inference as a function
for identifying speech activities. Each speech activity implies a relationship between
the participants, pursues certain goals and uses certain expectations as to what may
occur; they also create certain constraints on the development of the contents and
the turn-taking system.
10. Text trajectories are ‘the shifting of discourse across contexts’ (Blommaert,
2001: 24).
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Sarangi, S. and Roberts, C. (1999b) ‘The Dynamics of Interactional and Institutional
Orders in Work-related Settings’, in S. Sarangi and C. Roberts (eds) Talk, Work and
Institutional Order: Discoure in Medical, Mediation and Managements Settings, pp. 1–57.
Berlin: de Gruyter.
Sarangi, S. and Slembrouck, S. (1996) Language, Bureaucacy and Social Control. London:
Longman.
Silverstein, M. and Urban, G. (1996) Natural Histories of Discourse. Chicago: University
of Chicago Press.
Tannen, D. (1993) ‘Introduction’, in D. Tannen (ed.) Framing in Discourse, pp. 3–13.
New York: Oxford University Press.
Tannen, D. and Wallat, C. (1993) ‘Interactive Frames and Knowledge Schemas in
Interaction: Examples from a Medical Examination/Interview’, in D. Tannen (ed.)
Framing in Discourse, pp. 57–76. New York: Oxford University Press.
Telles Ribeiro, B. (1996) ‘Conflict Talk in a Psychiatric Discharge Inteview. Struggling
Between Personal and Official Footings’, in C.R. Caldas-Coulthard and M. Coulthard
(eds) Texts and Practices. Readings in Critical Discourse Analysis, pp. 179–93. London:
Routledge.
Telles Ribeiro, B. and Hoyle, S. (2000) ‘Frame Analysis’, in J. Verschueren, J. Östman,
J. Blommaert and Ch. Bulcaen (eds) Handbook of Pragmatics. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
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London: Longman.
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traception’, in S. Fisher and A.D. Todd (eds) The Social Organization of Doctor–Patient
Communication, pp. 159–88. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.
Tusón Valls, A. (1997) Análisis de la Conversación. Barcelona: Ariel.
Tusón, A. and Unamuno, V. (1999) ‘¿De qué Estamos Hablando? El Malentendido en el
Discurso Escolar’, Discurso and Sociedad 1(1): 35–53.
Urban, G. (1996) ‘Entextualization, Replication and Power’, in M. Silverstein and G. Urban
(eds) Natural Histories of Discourse, pp. 21–44. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Van Dijk, T.A. (1998) Ideology: A Multidisciplinary Approach. London: SAGE.
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Alegato en Favor de la Diversidad’, in R. Wodak and M. Meyer (eds) Métodos de análisis
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SAGE.
G A B R I E L A P R E G O - V Á Z Q U E Z is Associate Professor of Linguistics (Profesora Contratada

Doctora) at the University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain). She received her PhD from
the University of A Coruña in Discourse and Society Programme (Linguistics Section).
Her areas of interest include Interactional Sociolinguistics, Pragmatics and Critical
Discourse Analysis. Her research has focused on the discursive processes and practices
involved in the negotiation of social identities in face-to-face interaction. Her works
focuses on traditional, conversational and institutional discourse. Other interests include
child discourse. Some of her publications include: ‘Aproximación sociointeraccional al
género discursivo del regateo’ (Lynx, 1998); ‘Entrevistas electorales en las campañas
políticas para la presidencia del Gobierno de 1996 y 2000’ (coauthored with Esperanza
Morales-López, Oralia 2002); ‘¿De onde es?, ¿de quen es?: Local identities, discursive
circulation, and manipulation of traditional Galician naming patterns’ (Estudios de
Sociolingüística, 2002); ‘Political cross-discourse: Conversationalization, imaginary
networks and social fields in Galiza’ (coauthor with Celso álvarez-Cáccamo, Pragmatics,
2003): ‘Interviews between employees and customers during a company restructuring
process’ (coauthor Discourse and Society 2005), and ‘Recursos gramaticales y dinámicas
interaccionales. La protofunción discursiva de la cita en el habla infantil’ (Problemas
de eficacia comunicativa, 2005). For more information see http://www.usc.es/koine.
A D D R E S S : Facultade de Filoloxía, Campus Norte, Universidade de Santiago, 15782
Santiago de Compostela, Spain. [email: gabipv@usc.es]
APPENDIX
ENTREVISTA 1: AU200901III
1. C: Mira, 13. E2: Está..., Cestillo número
2. yo era para cambiar un veinticinco
contador. 14. primero derecha,
3. El de antes no funcionaba. 15. [¿no?]
4. (2) 16. C: [Sí.]
5. E2: Colocar el contador. 17. (2)
6. C: Colocar, 18. E2: Tiene que pagar tres mil
7. que no funcionaba. quinientas cincuenta por la colo-,
8. Bueno, yo ya lo tengo, 19. ponerle un contador.
9. (2) 20. (3)
10. xx xx remedio 21. xx xx la colocación.
11. el xx xx 22. C: ¿Y después aparte el
12. (3) contador?
23. (3) 57. E2: Mari, (a una compañera)

24. E2: ¿El contador no lo tiene ya? 58. ¿me das una factura
25. C: El contador lo tengo, 59. de colocación de contador?
26. pero..., según me dijeron (La compañera no le entiende.)
está estropeado. 60. Una factura
27. E2: ¿Pero ya lo ha comprado, 61. de colocación de [contador.]
28. el contador? 62. C: [Es que]
29. C: No. a mí me dijeron
30. E2: Pues el contador lo puede 63. que cobrabais mil y pico.
comprar 64. E2: Que dice que cobraron mil
31. aquí en la oficina y pico, (a la compañera)
32. o en cualquier ferretería, 65. ¿Me la dejas para
33. donde usted quiera. enseñársela?
34. C: ¿Y por qué tengo que pagar 66. C: Es que a mí me dijeron que
tres mil quinientas cobraban mil y pico.
35. y a los demás no les cobran 67. E2: Sí.
tres mil quinientas? 68. C: Que cobraban,
36. E2: A todo el mundo que le ha- 69. aquí,
37. se le ha colocado el 70. vamos.
contador 71. E2: Derechos de enganche
38. se le han cobrado tres mil (mostrando la factura)
quinientas cincuenta pesetas 72. y colocación del contador.
39. por la colocación del 73. (2)
contador. 74. Tres mil
40. (1) 75. quinientas
41. Porque nos obliga la 76. cincuenta
ordenanza del ayuntamiento de 77. pesetas. (Recalcando las
Vilauga. palabras)
42. C: xx xx xx les cobraron mil y 78. (2)
pico. 79. A otra persona,
43. E2: No. 80. como ve o...
44. C: Mm. (asiente) 81. Una factura legal de
45. E2: Tres mil quinientas Augaempresa,
cincuenta. 82. cuñada,
46. Si quiere le enseño 83. con sello...
facturas, eh. 84. C: Yo no digo que no esté
47. Mire. legal,
48. (2) 85. pero al principio cobrabais
49. Aquí tiene la de otra menos,
persona... 86. [entonces...]
50. Ay, este es el contador... 87. E2: [No.]
51. (4) 88. (2)
52. Ahora mismo no tengo 89. Siempre se cobró eso.
ninguna factura, 90. (2)
53. pero a todo el mundo se le 91. C: Si era una persona
ha cobrado 92. que no tenía ni contador,
54. tres mil quinientas 93. nunca pagara,
cincuenta pesetas, eh. 94. nunca estaba dado de alta.
55. (2) 95. E2: Siempre se cobró tres mil
56. C: ¿Seguro? quinientas cincuenta,
96. por la colocación del 134. E2: sí que puede ser [más
contador. barato.]
97. (3) 135. C: [Lo
98. C: Aún te he de traer la compraron aquí,]
factura. 136. y les valieron quinien-
99. (1) 137. cinco mil y pico.
100. E2: Bueno, 138. (2)
101. [xx xx] 139. E2: Señora,
102. C: [Como la] encuentre, 140. usted lo que vio es el precio de
103. ya verás. arriba
104. (2) 141. [desglosado.]
105. E4: xx xx 142. C: [¡No vi nada!]
106. tráigala, tráigala. 143. ¡No vi nada!
107. E2: [Tráigala, eh.] 144. A mí me lo dijeron.
108. C: [Es que a mí] me dijeron 145. (3)
que cobraban eso. 146. E2: Bueno.
109. E4: Bueno. 147. C: A mí me lo dijeron,
110. (5) 148. yo no vi nada.
111. C: ¿Y me ponéis vosotros el 149. E2: xx xx
contador? 150. C: Para qué te voy a decir que
112. E2: Claro. vi,
113. El contador lo tiene que 151. si no vi.
comprar... 152. E2: xx xx
114. Lo va comprar fuera, ¿no? 153. C: Ahora,
115. C: No, lo compro aquí 154. me dijeron que que sí.
entonces. 155. E4: No, no,
116. E2: Ah, ya lo va a comprar 156. es que es imp- es imposible que lo
aquí. haya visto.
117. (2) 157. C: No lo vi.
118. C: ¿Cuánto vale? 158. Ya te [digo que no] lo vi.
119. (1) 159. E4: [Ah, ah,]
120. E2: Seis mil trescientas 160. pues ya le digo que es imposible,
ochenta. 161. porque además,
121. (2) 162. mire,
122. C: Entonces subieron. 163. ese papel lo ha escrito un
123. (3) ordenador
124. E2: Le estoy diciendo que no, 164. que xx las demás tarifas.
125. que es el mismo precio que 165. C: No lo vi,
tuvimos siempre. 166. me dijeron que cobraban por el
126. (3) contador cinco mil y algo.
127. C: Entonces [bien que me 167. (2)
engañaron] a mí, eh. 168. Por el contador.
128. E2: [Le habrán 169. E4: El contador son cinco mil
dicho...] quinientas,
129. Habrán comprado el contador 170. (1)
otro... 171. sin IVA.
130. C: [No, no, no, no, no, no.] 172. C: No sé,
131. E2: [En otro sitio.] 173. me dijeron
132. El contador en otro si[tio] 174. por el contador
133. C: [No.] 175. E4: [xx xx] xx
176. C: cinco mil [y algo.] 207. cinco mil quinientas

177. No sé si me dijeron... 208. más el IVA,
178. No sé si:: echaban el IVA en- ahí. 209. que son seis mil trescientas
179. Y después que pagaban, ochenta.
180. por no sé qué 210. (4)
181. (1) 211. El jueves veintisiete a las dos,
182. mil y algo, 212. ¿pueden ir?
183. nada más. 213. (1)
184. E4: No hay ningún concepto 214. C: Jueves veintisiete.
que sea mil y algo. 215. ¿A las dos?
185. C: Mil y algo. 216. E2: Sí.
186. E4: No xx xx xx xx. 217. C: ¿Seguro?
187. C: Es una persona que nunca 218. (1)
contador tuvo, 219. Es que allí no vive nadie, eh.
188. no estaba dada de alta 220. (4)
189. y ya me dirás. 221. ¿Me llamáis,
222. si no...?
190. E4: Ya sabe que la gente
223. E2: Sí.
compra siempre más barato que
224. C: Si no es,
los demás,
225. ¿me llamáis?
191. C: [No sé.]
226. E2: Sí,
192. E4: [gana] más dinero que los
227. pero...
demás...
228. (2)
193. (1) 229. siempre van,
194. C: No sé, 230. a lo mejor se pueden retrasar o
195. yo ya te digo que no lo vi pero... adelantar cinco o diez minutos.
196. (3) 231. (2)
197. ¿Y esto cuándo me lo vais a 232. Ya está,
poner? 233. puede ir a esa mesa a pagarlo,
198. (2) ¿mm?
199. E2: Se lo digo ahora mismo. 234. (4. La señora mira los
200. (9 segundos. La empleada trabaja documentos.)
con los papeles.) 235. C: ¿Aquí qué pones,
201. Puede sumar, 236. a la una?
202. le- le saqué dos facturas, 237. (2)
203. una..., una para el contador 238. E2: A las catorce horas.
204. y otra para la colocación, 239. (1)
205. mira: 240. A las dos.
206. (1) 241. (La señora se va)
ENTREVISTA 2: AU041001BII
1. E3: Dígame, señora. 8. C: A mí...

2. (5) 9. (2)
3. Ya el mes pasao... 10. Yo fui a comprar este
4. C: xx xx contador, pero xx xx
5. E3: Cómo somos, cómo 11. (2)
so [mos.] 12. colleron un..., un..., un...,
6. C: [Mire,] a- xx, o sea, un...
7. E3: Dígame. 13. (1)
14. xx xx xx 58. Catro mil non sei qué.

15. xx xx el di 59. E3: Cuatro mil cuatrocientas
16. que los- [treinta y dos.]
17. contadores 60. C:
18. están pagados (1.5) [Eso é.]
19. xx xx xx 61. E3: O... su ejemplo pon seis mil
20. xx xx xx quinientas tres.
21. xx xx xx 62. (2)
22. pero están todos, 53. C: xx xx
23. y yo lo fui a comprar, 64. ¿É máis que é o que pon
24. porque también nos llegó aquí?
esta carta 65. E3: Sí, porque nós pagamos
25. (2) máis que usted.
26. con los recibos 66. E este é o recibo noso.
27. (1) 67. (1)
28. ahora 68. Augaempresa.
29. (2) 69. (2)
30. E3: Julio-agosto. 70. C: ¿Y este?
31. (2) 71. (2)
32. C: ¿Y esto qué es? 72. E3: Este é seu.
33. (3) 73. (1)
34. E3: Para que usted entienda 74. Supoño,
cada vez mejor su recibo. 75. porque usted é María
35. (1) Concepción.
36. A explicación do se- 76. C: Claro.
37. Este é o seu recibo. 77. E3: Entonces este é seu.
38. C: Sí. 78. C: Ah...
39. E3: E esta é unha explicación 79. (1)
do seu recibo, 80. ¿Y entonces qué quiere
40. é un eghemplo. decir?
41. C: Ai, é un eghem[plo.] 81. ¿eso xx xx [xx xx]
42. E3: [P’a] que cada 82. E3: [Mire,]
vez entendamos mellor o recibo. 83. vamos a ver,
43. C: Vale. 84. na caixa de galletas María,
44. E3: Que quere decir cada 85. (3)
cousa, 86. na caixa de galletas María,
45. e que significa cada cousa... 87. (2)
46. C: Vale. 88. dentro da- das galletas
47. Pero aquí abajo María,
48. pone outra cousa que... 89. ven un papeliño,
49. ¿qué quiere decir? 90. C: mm (asinte)
50. Seis mil non sei qué. 91. E3: que nos explica
51. E3: Home, 92. (1)
52. pero pon seis mil porque é 93. as galle::tas,
un recibo, 94. C: No, ya.
53. ¿o seu canto pon? 95. E3: os precios das distintas
54. C: O me::u son... caixas,
55. (3. Mira o recibo.) 96. e eso non nolo cobran.
56. Son cuatro mil... 97. C: Ah, bueno,
57. (3) 98. entonces esto...
99. E3: É un eghemplo, 142. E3: P’a que sepa,

100. o sea, 143. o que pasa [é que] as nosas
101. C: Un eghemplo [xx xx ] pesetas son unhas que xx
102. E3: [para 144. C: [Vale.]
entender] 145. E3: que as nos [as pes]etas
103. mellor o recibo. 146. C: [Vale,]
104. C: Sí [xa.] 147. E3: [Son unhas que xx ]
105. E3: [É] un eghemplo. 148. C: [pero ahí no sé que pone]
106. C: Ah, bueno, maio...
107. [xa está.] 149. (2)
108. E3: [Tamén]o total é un 150 Maio a junio i...
ejemplo. 151. E3: Pero este é un ejemplo.
109. C: Vale. (riéndose)
110. E3: O seu recibo é este. 152. C: No, no, no. (riéndose)
111. C: Sí. 153. E3: É o recibo en-
112. E3: Porque pon o seu nombre, 154. C: Entonces estou ben.
113. ten a [dirección] da súa 155. E3: Si, [muller, si, si.]
casa. 156. C: [Bueno, vale vale.]
114. C: [Si, si si, si,] ten o... 157. E3: Si non o reci-,
115. xx non [sei que pon.] 158. non [se líe,]
116. E3: [Este non,] este pon: 159. C: [Pois,] ese é o [xx xx ]
117. “Calle do Río trinta e dous 160. E3: [si non o quere,]
primeiro”, 161. [tírao e punto.]
118. este é noso. 162. C: No, no, eu quéroo, pero...
119. C: Pero..., sí. 163. (1)
120. (3) 164. Pero...
121. E3: Este é un- o noso recibo, 165. E3: Usted non se líe,
122. o que nós pagamos. 166. eso solo é un eghem[plo,]
123. Poñémolo de eghemplo. 167. C: [Eso.]
14. C: Ya. 168. E3: é unha explica[ción.]
125. (1) 169. C: [Pero,] por
126. Ya. eso vengo aquí.
127. E3: ¿sab[e?] 170. (1)
128. C: [xx] bueno, 171. ¿Y ahora con esto qué
129. e ustedes paghan este tengo que hacer? (Se refiere al
recibo no ayuntamiento. contador)
130. (1) 172. E3: Pagar la colocación...
131. ¿Comprendo ahora? 173. C: ¿Y cuánto vale,
132. E3: Pagámolo, 174. la colocación?
133. a nós mismos, 175. E3: Tres mil quinientas
134. si. cincuenta.
135. C: Vale, moi bien. 176. (2)
136. E3: E poñémolo de eghemplo, 177. Quedamos un día,
137. (1) 178. a una hora,
138. explicando todo, 179. y se lo vamos a colocar.
139. p’a que 180. (2)
140. as mismas cousas que 181. C: ¿Y lo tiene... Lo dejo aquí o
pagamos nós tamen as paga [lo cojo?]
usted. 182. E3:
141. C: Ah, ah ah. [No, lo] lleva, lo lleva,
183. y se lo da al fontanero el 223. E3: Bue:no, eso xa o dirá o

día, contador.
184. C: [Pero...] 224. C: Eso xa o dirá o contador.
185. E3: [ese] mismo día. 225. E3: Eso mismo,
186. C: Pero..., ¿no le ponen el 226. ahí.
número ni nada? 227. C: Bueno, ¿y cuánto...?
187. E3: Claro, 228. (1)
188. aquí tomamos nota de 229. ¿Cuánto tenemos de
la marca, mínimo?
189. (1) 230. ¿Cuántos metros [cúbicos?]
190. su contador, 231. E3: [Treinta]
191. (1) metros cúbicos,
192. un iberconta, 232. dos meses.
193. (1) 233. (2)
194. y el número de su contador, 234. C: Ah, bueno,
195. que es este que trae aquí 235. entonces x[x x x ]
arriba. 236. E3: [Quinientos]
196. (1) litros al día.
197. Después, 237. C: ¿Cuántos?
198. aquí, 238. E3: Al día, quinientos
199. en estos números negros, litros.
200. irá marcando 239. C: Bueno,
201. los metros cúbicos de agua, 240. pues teño[ xx xx]
241. E3: [Unha lavadora]
202. (1)
consume a mitá.
203. y esto rojo significa litros,
242. C: Pero la:: lavadora
204. estos no los tenemos en
243. (2)
cuenta.
244. la pongo dos veces a la
205. C: Que es lo que pagamos de
semana.
agua.
245. E3: Ben.
206. E3: Pero usted sabrá
246. (3)
207. los metros cúbicos de agua
247. C: Porque yo,
208. que consu[me,]
248. las cositas pequeñas las
209. C: [Ya.] lavo yo a mano.
210. E3: [mirando aquí.] 249. E3: A mano.
211. C: [Somos dúas] personas, 250. C: No puedo yo...
212. somos dúas personas 251. E3: A::h.
[nada máis.] 252. (2)
213. E3: [Sí,pero dúas] personas 253. Es usted una mamá de
poden gastar máis cartos que..., verdad.
214. que cinco 254. C: Sí (se ríen las dos.)
215. eso xa é [o que mira]mos. 255. E3: Vamos a ver.
216. C: [Esa é.] 256. (1)
217. E3: Non sempre é igual, 257. Eh... Le ponemos el
218. ao mellor dúas personas contador entonces, en esto,
219. (1) 258. ¿verdad?
220. gastan a tira, 259. C: Bueno, claro.
221. outros somos [cinco e..., e 260. (6. La empleada se dispone
acomodámonos co que temos.] a tomar nota de la colocación.)
222. C: [Non, pero 261. E3: Esto es..., en
non somos] destraghadoras,eh. 262. (1)
263. Orazábal, número tres, 307. E3: Vale.

264. segun[do] D, 308. C: xx xx na casa.
265. C: [Sí.] 309. E3: Viernes vinteséis, ¿eh?
266. E3: ¿verdad? 310. C: Viernes vinteséis.
267. C: Sí. 311. (3)
268. E3: Bueno. 312. Ya lo voy a llevar aquí
269. C: Y..., y entonces, si yo..., ya anotao [xx xx xx]
le..., pagho ahora y ya... 313. E3:
270. E3: Eso es. [No, ya se lo] pongo yo, eh.
271. (2) 314. (54 segundos. La empleada
272. Y ya le decimos un día, trabaja con la documentación.)
273. y ese día nos espera, 315. C: Y muy poco duran los
274. y punto. contadores,
275. C: Nada más. 316. porque ahí:: no tienen ni
276. C: ¿Por la tarde van? cien...
277. E3: ¿Quién? 317. No tienen ni vinte anos.
278. C: Por la tarde y... xx xx el 318. (2)
primer día, 319. E3: Más de vinte años
279. porque estamos xx dificilmente duran, eh,
280. E3: xx [xx ] 320. a vida media dun contador
281. C: [Única]mente... é sobre vinte anos.
282. (2) 321. (2)
283 yendo a una:: cosa xx xx 322. Pero despois ten que ter en
una señora...
conta
284. E3: Bueno,
323 que a veces a agua ven con
285. de todas [maneras- ]
óxido,
286. C: [de mi cuña]da
324. entonces vanse tupindo e::
enferma,
non enfilan...
287. (1)
325. (1)
288 e ao mellor xa teño que ir
326. Que se estropean,
con ela::
327. como o coche.
289. p’a p’a o hospital.
328. (22. A empregada traballa
290. O martes nós estamos na casa.
291. E3: O sea, coa documentación.)
292. el día veinte, 329. Viernes veintiseis,
293. ¿será xx? 330. diecinueve treinta horas.
294. C: ¿Eh? 331. (7)
295. E3: xx xx xx 332. Que son las siete y media de
296. C: xx xx xx la tarde.
297. E3: xx xx xx 333. C: Moi bien.
298. C: xx xx xx 334. (9)
299. (10 segundos. La empleada 335. ¿Ya llevan ellos el...
cubre el parte de colocación de 336. E3: No, [lo lleva...]
contador) 337. C: [la llave?]
300. E3: A... 338. E3 Lo lleva [usted.]
301. (2) 339. C: [No,] le digo yo,
302. Vamos a ver, 340. la llave, la llave para entrar
303. ¿ás sete e media da tarde?, en el contador?
304. ¿é unha boa hora? 341. (1)
305. C: Bueno, 342. ¿Tienen ellos
306. por min... 343. (1)
344. llave 384. C: Y claro que sí.

345. (2) 385. (1)
346. maestra? 386. Aunque xx que...
347. E3: Pues no lo sé, 387. (1)
348. no lo sé. 388. E3: ¿Y a usted [cómo le
349. C: Porque si no lo tengo que llaman?,] ¿María Concepción?
decir yo en la comunidad. 389. C: [Nos llaman Maru-]
350. (5) 390. C: A mí me chaman Maruxa.
351. E3: No tienen llave. 391. E3: ¡Bueno!, (C ri) bueno, anda
352. C: ¿Y luegho como miran los que no lo cambió.
contadores? 392. C: No::
353. (3) 393. (2)
354. E3: Aquí no dice que lo hay con 394. Yo, mi nombre es María
llave, pero..., Concepción
355. (1) 395. E3: Ya::,
356. a lo mejor la tienen, 396. C: Pero::, [de pequena me
357. no lo sé. dixeron Maruxa],
358. (5) 397. E3: [pero hija,] [¿qué
359. ¿Quiere que le mire? te- qué tiene de malo]
360. C: Pues si me fai o favor si. 398. [María Concepción?]
361. xx[xx] 399. C: [e Maruxa me quedou,]
362. E3: [A ver si] tienen llave. 400. non me gusta nada.
363. (2) 401. Ex: había xx...
364. Pedro, por favor. (A un 402. bloque siete, portal dos,
compañero.) 403. pero...
365. (1) 404. E3: [O sea que...]
366. Pedro, please. 405. C: [¿Tienen llave?]
367. (2) 406. E3: No. No.
368. ¿Me miras si hay llave de xx 407. Ex: [No.]
para el número dos? 408. C: ¿No tienen?
369. (8) 409. E3: Del bloque siete, sí,
370. C: xx xx alí, 410. del suyo no.
371. pero no entraba. 411. (2)
372. (Unos 18 segundos. La 412. Entonces tiene que
empleada trabaja con los datos.) [usted...]
373. E3: Tiene usted un nombre 413. C: Del bloque siete,
muy bonito. 414. que yo estoy en el bloque
374. C: Ah. (se ríe) siete.
375. E3: Porque yo también me 415. Ex: xx xx
llamo 416. Portal dos.
376. María Concepción. 417. C: Portal tres.
377. C: Ah, [¿también?] 418. Ex: No,
378. E3: [No piense] usted. 419. tengo del portal tres
379. C: Pues entonces somos 420. del portal dos no.
tocayas, eh. 421. C: ¿Pero el portal dos no?
380. E3: Sí, sí, sí, sí. 422. Ex: No.
381. C: Bueno, xx (2) 423. C: Vaia cousa máis rara.
382. xx xx 424. Teñen as cousas ben feitas
383. E3: Tenemos un nombre muy 425. E3: usted es bloque dos
bonito. 426. C1: bloque dos (0’75)
427. no... (1) 459. porque aquí está mal (2)

428. bloque cinco (2) 460. entonces aquí
429. bloque cinco 461. teñen mal a dirección (1)
430. portal dos (1) 462. E3: non (0.75)
431. E3: pues aquí tiene 463. témola ben
432. bloque dos 464. pero...
433. C1: ah (1) 465. C1: non
434. ¿y entonces cómo- 466. xx x[x...]
435. cóm[o...] 467. E3: se ten as cartas
436. E3: [ nú ]mero dos (2) 468. chéganlle
437. piso dos (1) 469. C1: ai
438. C1: claro 470. muy bien
439. E3: mire 471. E3: entón
440. C1: pero es[o es] 472. poñemos aquí (0.75)
441. E3: [ dos] 473. bloque cinco (1.5)
442. C1: p[ort]al dos 474. C1: claro (1.5)
443. E3: [dos] 475. el bloque cinco (0.5)
444. C1: portal dos 476. portal dos (0.5)
445. E3: segundo C 477. segundo C (1.5)
446. C1: segundo C (2) 478. y yo no sé si-
447. y es el bloque cinco 479. si no-
448. E3: es que aquí 480. no...
449. no hay nada de bloque 481. E3: ya está (0.5)
450. aquí tiene 482. ya está (0.5)
451. número dos (1) 483. y entonces tiene usted (0.5)
452. segundo C 484. que decirle al portero (0.5)
453. C1: no 485. que ese día (0.5)
454. pero es que es 486. le dé la llave (0.5)
455. el bloque cinco 487. para...
456. portal dos 488. C1: no (0.5)
457. segundo C 489. le voy a decir a-
458. y el otro también (grabación cort
ENTREVISTA 3: AU20090111
1. E2: Dígame, 13. le llegaron dos por...

2. señora. 14. C: No,
3. C: A ver, 15. es uno de cada piso.
4. que uno de estos dos 16. E2: Ah, ¿uno de cada piso?
recibos 17. ah, bueno, lo lo que pasa
5. yo no sé que... (Le da los que los trajo juntos.
recibos.) 18. [Mire,]
6. E2: A ver. 19. C: [Claro,] porque me venía a
7. (3. Observa los recibos.) mí este...
8. Mire. 20. E2: Esto es
9. (1) 21. la explicación de su recibo,
10. Es- esto, 22. ¿no ve?,
11. nada, 23. aquí pone:
12. esto fue una confusión 24. “Explica[ción de su recibo.”]
nuestra, 25. C: [Sí, ya lo veo.]
26. E2: Y:: aquí pone: 61. en el otro,

“Augaempresa, calle del Río 62. en el C,
treinta y dos primero.:” 63. mi hijo no está xx xx,
27. C: Mira, todo eso lo sé, 64. sólo los fines de semana
28. xx xx xx 65. así que tampoco...
29. pagué a xx 66. (1)
30. E2: Sí, 67. Puede ver el-
31. pero este no es su pre- 68. dijo que iba ver el contador
32. no tiene nada que ver con 69. pero...
su recibo, 70. (1)
33. señora, 71. Si..., si no llama al-
34. su recibo ya le llegó, 72. al de dónde estoy yo
35. este es el suyo, 73. (1)
36. este es un recibo 74. allí no hay nadie.
informativo. 75. E2: Vale.
37. Esta hoja 76. C: Así que no sé cómo...
38. explica 77. (1)
39. su recibo, (Recalca las 78. Ninguno gasta agua.
palabras) 79. (1)
40. el recibo que le llegó a su 80. Yo no sé cómo hace...
vivienda. 81. E2: Claro.
41. (1) 82. C: Entonces tengo seis mil y
42. ¿Entiende? pico (es el importe señalado
43. C: Ya, bien sé, en el recibo explicativo)
44. que el recibo ya sé lo que 83. [xx xx- ]
vale, 84. E2: [Es la in]formación,
45. pero [los-] 85. no-
46. E2: [E s t ]o nada, (señala el 86. no significa nada.
recibo explicativo) 87. C: La información es que
47. esto no significa nada, 88. nosotros no gastamos eso
48. esto simplemente es una de agua,
información 89. si nos van a cobrar después
49. que la puede leer. eso...
50. C: Bueno, 90. E2: No,
51. vamos a ver, 91. no van a cobrar seis mil
52. bueno xx xx xx pesetas,
53. xx xx xx 92. es un recibo tipo que
54. yo tengo la xx xx sacamos
55. xx xx 93. (2)
56. yo no puedo cambiarla. 94. pero no es
57. (1) 95. (1)
58. Nosotros somos dos 96. No es que vayan a cobrar
personas mayores eso, eh.
59. xx xx xx 97. (Llega otra clienta, y la
60. xx xx xx empleada se dirige a ell

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Discourse & Society

The online version of this article can be found at:

Email Alerts: http://das.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts

Frame conflict and social inequality in the

ABSTRACT This article focuses on frame conflicts in workplace interactions

Methodological preliminaries: towards a

Communicative conflicts and social inequality in

. . . se produce un efecto de minorización . . . de las personas que ocupan la posición

Communicative problems associated with the socioeconomic and political struc-

communist Germany had no training or experience in the use of the competitive

Naturally, the combination of communicative conflict and social inequality

Frame conflict analysis in our data corpus

1. The customer introduces interactional patterns that fail to correspond to the

TRADITIONAL BUYING AND SELLING IN A PROFESSIONAL CONTEXT:

43. E2: No. 43. E2: No.

81. Una factura legal de 81. A legal bill from Watercompany,

C: ¿A como son? C: How much?

Following this initial intervention on line 34, C continues to produce inter-

1. References to real or fictitious situations in which the product is cheaper.

The interactional patterns of ‘cut-and-thrust’ challenge and delegitimize the

The result is a conflict between traditional and institutional frames. Between

105. E4: xx xx 105. E4: xx xx

110. (5) 110. (5)

159. E4: [Ah, ah,] 159. E4: [Ah, ah,]

As in lines 105–6, E4’s change of footing represents the conversationalization

CODE-SWITCHING AND PERSONAL FRAMING IN PROFESSIONAL CONTEXTS

(Álvarez-Cáccamo, 1998, 2000) in order to negotiate personal and professional

language pairs show how, on certain occasions, code-switching serves to

A similar process can be observed in the doctor/patient interactions studied

Telles Ribeiro’s analysis shows how each patient reframing

changes her communicative strategies from providing less information to providing

The following fragment illustrates the connection between the code-switching

169. C: [Pero,] por eso 169. C: [But,] that’s why

In lines 169–72, C then goes on to produce a linguistic alternation from

alternations, and adapts to the changes of frames initiated by the customer. E3

PROFESSIONAL AND PERSONAL TOPICS AND MISMATCHED SCHEMAS OF KNOWLEDGE

However, this explanation is insufficient for C, who breaks away from

37. E2: (...)Esta hoja 37. E2: (...) This sheet

brevity that normally accompanies this type of institutional encounter, it is to

Agar, M. (1985) ‘Institutional Discourse’, Text 5(3): 147–68.

Álvarez–Cáccamo, C. and Prego-Vázquez, G. (2003) ‘Political Cross-discourse: Conver-

Geertz, C. (1973) The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books.

G A B R I E L A P R E G O - V Á Z Q U E Z is Associate Professor of Linguistics (Profesora Contratada

23. (3) 57. E2: Mari, (a una compañera)

176. C: cinco mil [y algo.] 207. cinco mil quinientas

1. E3: Dígame, señora. 8. C: A mí...

14. xx xx xx 58. Catro mil non sei qué.

99. E3: É un eghemplo, 142. E3: P’a que sepa,

183. y se lo da al fontanero el 223. E3: Bue:no, eso xa o dirá o

263. Orazábal, número tres, 307. E3: Vale.

344. llave 384. C: Y claro que sí.

427. no... (1) 459. porque aquí está mal (2)

1. E2: Dígame, 13. le llegaron dos por...

26. E2: Y:: aquí pone: 61. en el otro,

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