1.1 Identities in Acadmic Interaction: A Preview
In institutional interactions, participants tend to speak to each other with some expected identities or “default identities” as Richards (2006)suggests, for instance, interviewer and interviewee, questioner and answerer,advice-seeker and advice-giver; teacher and student, expert and novice,doctor and patient, etc. Participants’ default identities are usually considered as one of the major characteristics of institutional interaction (Thornborrow,2002) and they are expected to be constructed in certain institutional communities of practice, in which people come together for “mutual engagement in some common endeavor” (Eckert, 1992, p. 8). In many studies,the participants’ default identities are used as pre-existing variables to interpret their discourse production (e.g. Bardovi-Harlig & Hartford, 1990,1993, 1996; Deng, 2011; Don & Izadi, 2011; Heritage & Sefi, 1992; Mao, 2009;Yu, 2009a). The examination of identity in these studies is mainly about “how members use certain identity labels in their interactions (e.g. grandparent,doctor, interviewer)” (Djordjilovic, 2012, p. 112).
It is observed that participants in spoken academic interaction do not always communicate with each other through the expected/default identities characteristic of institutional interaction. Rather, they sometimes deviate from the identities that they are expected to construct in line with a particular academic community of practice. For instance,
(1-1) PhD DPPM-3 (PhD dissertation proposal presentation meetings, Data set No. 3):
(Context: PhD dissertation proposal presentation meeting in a Chinese context; one of the members of the committee, T4, as an expert, is offering the PhD student, S, some advice[1].)
→ 1 T4：刚才这个哦：：X老师((T3))也讲了，就是你这个整个这个论
文啊，你这个：：理论框架好像也不是很明确。就是因为你这个说是社会心理语用研究，它有没有一个integrated一个theoretical framework，
‘Just now, about this, Teacher X ((T3)) also mentioned that the theoretical framework of your dissertation is not very clear.Since you have mentioned that you have taken a socio-psychological pragmatic approach, is there an integrated theoretical framework (for this approach)?’
2 T2：嗯。
‘Mm.’
→ 3 T4：如果没有你能不能构建一个，
‘If there is not such an (established) framework, could you construct one (for your study)?’
4 S： 嗯嗯。
‘Mm Mm.’
5 T4：呵呵，对吧？
‘(laughs softly) right?’
6 S： 嗯。
‘Mm.’
→ 7 T4：这个也是，(…就是)把语用研究放在一个大的环境下，而且能够operated，就是能够很好操作。(1.0)反正我这方面看的也少，然后反正，据我所知，这个语用学当中，反正这：：完全涉及到这种社会心理的，这个：：除了这个顺应论它它可能会包括一点，其它的它也没有完全，把这个社会心理的东西包括进来，因为他引用者他完全是，他不，他是研究了好多，他研究一些个案的，研究这种individual interaction，它不是group那种，少一些。我这方面看的不多，我只是一个建议。有没有这方面的，就是它现成的一个社会心理语用研究的一个框架，除了，除了这个顺应论以外？
‘This is just to put pragmatic study into a wider context. And this framework could work well. Actually, I haven’t read much about this. As far as I know, in the field of pragmatics, the Adaptation Theory may include a little of social-psychological factors and other theories don’t include the social-psychological factors because the quoters pay more attention to the studies on individual interaction but not group interaction. I haven’t read a lot about this. This is only my suggestion. Besides the Adaptation Theory, is there an existing theoretical framework related to the social-psychological pragmatics?’
8 S： 嗯：好像没有，[我们现在]
‘Hmm, it seems that there is no such an existing theoretical framework. We are now (still looking for).’
9 T1： [呵呵呵]
‘(laughs softly)’
10 S： 都是在找，然后自己去整合呵呵，觉得这个难度构建也挺大的，呵呵。
‘(I’m still) looking for a theoretical framework. And if possible,I’ll construct a theoretical framework by integrating (different theories). However, it is very difficult to construct (such a theoretical framework) (laughs softly).’
11 T4：这也是你这个，如果做好了也是你一个亮点。
‘If you (can construct) a theoretical framework, that would also be a very good point for your dissertation.’
In this institutional context, T4’s default identity is an expert or T4 is expected to construct an identity of an expert. That is, T4, who is authoritative and has rich knowledge, is expected to offer the PhD student (S)some advice and instruction. As expected, T4 does, initially, construct this identity for himself through his discourse in this institutional interaction. For example, in this advising sequence, T4 points out in line 1, that there are some problems with the theoretical framework of the proposal, and gives advice in line 3 and in the first part of line 7 and then offers accounts/reasons in the second part of line 7. These pragmatic features serve to construct his default identity of an expert.
However, T4 does not maintain this identity in the whole process of the interaction. Rather, he also constructs some other identities through his discourse, which deviate from his default identity of an expert. For example,T4 admits that he knows little of studies on the “socio-psychological pragmatics” by explicitly uttering “反正我这方面看的也少” (Actually, I haven’t read much about this.), “我这方面看的不多” (I haven’t read a lot about this.)and “有没有这方面的，就是它现成的一个社会心理语用研究的一个框架，除了，除了这个顺应论以外?” (Besides the Adaptation Theory, is there an existing theoretical framework related to the social-psychological pragmatics?). All of these utterances indicate his lack of knowledge in certain research fields.Through these utterances or more technically, making linguistic choices, T4 constructs himself an identity which deviates from his default identity in this dynamic institutional interaction, which is that of an expert. In the present study, this additional identity is called the “deviational identity” (or“variational identity”). In this excerpt, the deviational identity that T4 constructs is the identity of a layperson.
Tracy (2002, p. 7) points out that doing “identity-work” is a “process through which talk makes available to participants and observers who the people doing the talk must be.” This means that some identities are expected to be constructed by interlocutors during verbal interaction. The pictures of who people must be are actually their default identities in the above example.Furthermore, the above example shows that talk also makes available to participants and observers who the people doing the talk can be and might be in an institutional interaction. The pictures of who people can be and might be in an institutional interaction are often related to their deviational identities. It is argued here that only when both types of identities are considered, can identity construction be fully depicted in institutional interactions.
Starting from this observation, the study will focus on the advice-givers’identity construction in their advising sequences, based on the data collected from five PhD dissertation proposal presentation meetings in a Chinese context. The investigation will be conducted by adopting a discourse-analytic method and drawing on the Linguistic Adaptation Theory or Adaptation Theory(Verschueren, 1999).