5.2.1 The teacher identity and linguistic choices ...
Advice-givers are expected to construct the expert identity, but they are also teachers from the same or different universities or institutions. This is evidenced by the term used to address them, namely “老师” (‘teacher’) in this institutional context. This identity is considered as a deviational one in this type of interaction in question because it is less expected than the default expert identity in this community of practice, which is different from the classroom teaching. In the community of practice of the classroom teaching,only one teacher is expected and her/ his main activity (or speech event) is to give lectures to students (i.e., other participants). Moreover, the discourse styles used by a teacher when giving lectures are distinctive from the ones employed by the members of the committee in a PhD dissertation proposal presentation meeting. These differences in participants, major goals to achieve and other properties between classroom teaching and PhD dissertation proposal presentation meetings mean that the teacher identity is less expected than the expert identity in the latter context.
Despite the fact that the teacher identity is less expected, some advice-givers explicitly construct the teacher identity in their advising sequences. Two major ways are found to be used for this purpose and one of them is the use of heuristic discourse style, which is often used in classroom teaching. For example,
(5-9) PhD DPPM-4:
1 T3：另外，你看你后边，
‘Now, let’s look at the second part of your proposal.’
2 S： 嗯。
‘Mm.’
3 T3：第五章。
‘The fifth chapter’
4 S： 哎，第五=
‘Hm, the fifth’
5 T3：=就是你最后两页的那个那那，最后后边两页，大家都有呵？
‘That is, the last two pages, the last two pages, everyone has them, right?’
6 T2：对。
‘Right.’
7 T1：嗯。
‘Mm.’
8 T4：都有。
‘Yes, all of us have (these two pages).’
9 T3：你那个第五章学术互动中交际者建构和展现的身份类型、互动关系及其语用功能，我给你说，这个第五章跟你第八页的问题实际上是，又是一个版本，
‘In Chapter Five, you mentioned the communicators’construction and display of identities, the interactional relationship between different types of identities and their pragmatic functions. I’m telling you what you’ve discussed in Chapter Five and the questions on page eight are another version.’
10 S： 哦。
‘Mm.’
11 T3：就是，是一致的。
‘That is, (what you discussed in Chapter Five and the questions on page eight) are consistent.’
12 S： 嗯嗯嗯。
‘Mm Mm Mm.’
13 T3：等于是5.1也就是你前面对应这个1，然后学术互动中，交际者建构和展现的身份类型，你已经有三个类型了，
‘That is, what you’ve mentioned in the previous part corresponds to 5.1. The identities constructed and displayed by the communicators already have three types.’
14 S： 对对对。
‘Right, right, right.’
15 T3：话语身份、情景身份[和转换性身份]。
‘Discourse identity, situated identity and transportable identity.’
16 S： [对，转换性身份]。
‘Yes, transportable identity’
→ 17 T3：那你的研究问题显然就不是研究问题啦。因为你已经有身份啦，你已经确定这三个身份啦。
‘Then it’s very clear that what you raised as your research question are actually not research questions because you have already had identities, and you have determined these three types of identities.’
18 S： 噢。
‘Oh (I see).’
19 T3：所以你的第一个问题不需要回答了。
‘So you don’t need to answer the first question.’
20 S： 哦。
‘Mm.’
21 T3：因为你这已经有定论啦。
‘Because you have already arrived at the final conclusion.’
22 T1：对，对。
‘Right, right.’
23 T3：你更不需要回答，因为你有定论啦。那下一个问题就是，你为什么选择三个身份啊？
‘You don’t need to answer the question because you have arrived at the final conclusion. And then the next question is why you choose three types of identities?’
24 S： 对。
‘Right.’
25 T3：你知道你这个逻辑了吧，你现在要回答还得有什么身份，你本来是要找身份的，
‘Do you understand your logic now? Now you need to answer what identities there will still be. Originally you are going to look for identities.’
26 S： 哦。
‘Mm.’
27 T3：可是现在到你这地方你已经有身份了，
‘But by now you’ve already found some identities here.’
28 S： 哦已经确定
‘Hm, (identities have) already been determined.’
29 T3：所以你刚才的问题就不需要回答啦，你现在需要回答问题是，
‘So the questions you’ve raised don’t need to be answered.What you need to answer is… ’
30 S： 哦。
‘Mm.’
31 T3：你为什么要选这三个身份？
‘Why do you choose these three identities?’
32 S： 对(1.0)
‘Right.’
33 T3：还是说，你要找这三个身份？(1.0)你怎么知道要找这三个身份呢？
‘Or you will look for these three identities? How do you know you will look for these three identities?’
34 S： 对，[就是]
‘Yes, that’s right.’
35 T3： [你前]面讲的是要去找身份，可是你这个地方有了三个身份。
‘In the previous part, you have said that you are going to look for identities, but you have already had three identities here.’
36 S： 哦。
‘Mm.’
37 T3：那下面问题就来了，你这三个身份从哪来的呀？你还要去找啊？
‘Then you’ll face some questions to answer. Where do these three identities come from? Or are you still going to look for these identities?’
38 S： 对。
‘Right.’
39 T3：还是说你不用找啦？不用找了，你写这个地方干嘛呀？(3.0)
‘Or you don’t need to look for (identities)? If you don’t need to look for (the identities), why do you write them here?’
40 T3：明白我的意思了吧？
‘Do you understand what I mean now?’
41 S： 哦。
‘Mm.’
→ 42 T3：就是你前面的问题问的和你这个后面也要也要一致起来。
‘That is, your previous questions should be consistent with your questions in the latter part.’
43 S： 噢：：
‘Oh (I see).’
In this example, T3 from line 17 points out some problems in S’s proposal by using a battery of heuristic questions, thus constructing himself an identity of a teacher because the way of asking questions is a typical one in classroom teaching. This is just as de Klerk points out, when he calims that “the identities of teachers and students and the relationships between them are at the heart of the educational system and depend on the durability of the discourse patterns used” (de Klerk, 1995, p. 157). Finally, based on this identity, T3 puts forward a solution to the problem in line 42. In this example,discourse style is more salient in constructing T3’s teacher identity.
The advice-givers can also construct the teacher identity through explicitly using “学生” (‘student’) to refer to the advice-receivers. For example,
(5-10) PhD DPPM-4:
→ 1 T3：如果你没有，那你就不是解释。(1.5)其实我觉得你可能，现在就是，我倒有个就说，可操作性对你们学生来讲说始终会有这样一个模式，就是说，你把你的书，你把你的文章，你的书和文章都蛮新的。
‘If you haven’t (kept the consistency), then it will not be an interpretation. Actually, I think there will always be an operable model for all you students. That is to say, since the books and the articles in your references are very new, you(could write an overview).’
2 S： 嗯嗯。
‘Mm Mm.’
3 T3：先写一个文献综述去发表。
‘First write an overview of the relevant literature to publish.’
4 S： 嗯。
‘Mm.’
5 T3：你自己先写一个文献综述，你把它弄懂、弄清楚。
‘You first write an overview of the relevant literature. Make out what you’ve read and make it clear what you’ve read.’
6 S： 嗯。
‘Mm.’
7 T3：就是人家说的什么弄清楚。
‘That is, make out what others have said.’
8 S： 嗯。
‘Mm.’
In this example, T3 constructs the advice-receiver an identity of a student by uttering “对你们学生来讲” (‘for you students’), thus constructing himself an identity of a teacher because identity is reciprocally constructed by participants in interaction (He, 1993; Tracy, 2002; Van De Mieroop, 2008). That is, in verbal communication, one constructs certain identity for herself/himself and at the same time s/he constructs an identity for her/his counterpart. In this example, linguistic forms are more salient in constructing T3’s teacher identity.
The teacher identity can sometimes be more specific because the members of the committee are also supervisors in their own institutions. For example,
(5-11) PhD DPPM-5:
1 T2：对吧？=
‘Right?’
→ 2 T3：=对对。如果说是这样的话呢，哦：：：就回到她框架上面，text,discursive practice跟social practice，那么我们究竟是在研究text还是在研究discursive practice，是吧？就是这里面还是有差别的。如果看文本可能是text，如果看reporting这类行为可能就是discursive practice。所以我们定位就定位在哦：：这是框架的哪一个方面，几方面哎。
‘Yes yes. If so, let’s return to her framework mentioned above,text, discursive practice and social practice. Then are we studying text or studying discursive practice? That is, they are still different. If you look at the text, then your focus may be on text. If you look at the reporting behavior, then your focus may be on discursive practice. So which aspects we will be concerned with decide the position we will take.’
3 S： 嗯。
‘Mm.’
→ 4 T3：嗯因为之前我们，我有一个博士生她做的是，也是做的是转述。(刚才)XXX((T3博士，已毕业))的=
‘Hmm because we had a, I had a PhD student before. She has also studied reporting. XXX’s (dissertation)’
5 T2：=XXX((T3博士，已毕业))=
‘XXX ((the name of the PhD student))’
→ 6 T3：她是从语用学角度来讲的，那她主要是看的是这个act，是吧？=
‘Her discussion is from the perspective of pragmatics. Then she mainly looks at the act, right?’
7 T2：=XXX((T3博士，已毕业))的那个你还有？
‘Do you have XXX’s dissertation?’
8 S： 有。
‘Yes, I have.’
9 T2：你有，是吧？当时你要了一份。
‘You have it, right? You asked for one copy of it then.’
10 S： 我复印了一份。
‘I have made a copy of it.’
11 T2：你没有的话，我那儿有。XXX((T3博士，已毕业))搞的还不错。
‘If you haven’t, I have one. Her dissertation is good.’
12 T3：哎哎，那她是从行为角度来=
‘Mm, her dissertation is conducted from the perspective of(speech) acts.’
13 T2：=她呢，她那个其实也不容易。她是把原话要找到=
‘It wasn’t an easy task to do for her because she needed to find the original utterances.’
14 T3：=她是要找到原话的。
‘She needed to find the original utterances.’
……
In this example, T3 gives advice to S on her analytical framework in line 1 and then offers his explanations from line 4, by mentioning the dissertation completed by one of his PhD students, thus constructing an identity of a supervisor. As in Ex.(5-10), linguistic forms are made salient in constructing T3’s supervisor identity here.