VERBAL BACKCHANNELS IN THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER FULL OSCAR ACTRESS ROUNDTABLE INTERVIEW

Transcription

1 VERBAL BACKCHANNELS IN THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER FULL OSCAR ACTRESS ROUNDTABLE INTERVIEW An Undergraduate Thesis Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty In Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Strata One RISYA MAYA HESTIANI NIM ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH JAKARTA 2017

2 ABSTRACT Risya Maya Hestiani, Verbal Backchannels in The Hollywood Reporter Full Oscar Actress Roundtable Interview. An undergraduate thesis: English Letters Department. Letters and Humanities Faculty, State Islamic University Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta, This research discusses about the occurrence of backchannels in a group conversation between Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji Henson, Amy Adams, Annette Bening, Isabelle Huppert, and Stephen Galloway. The main focus of this research is to identify backchannel forms used by each participant in this interview, and analyse how each backchannel functions depending to its context. The study uses descriptive qualitative method in order to fulfil the objective of the research. The researcher collects and limits the data to fourteen data to achieve deep and detailed analysis. Analysing the data is done by explaining the conversation mechanism, then determine in which forms backchannel utterances are uttered, and then analyse their functions using Maynard s theory. The research discovers 24 backchannel items from the 14 data being analysed, and they are in the forms of simple, double, and complex backchannel. Moreover, there are six functions that they serve, which are Continuer (CON), Understanding (UND), Agreement (AGR), Strong Emotional Response (EMO), Support or Empathy (SUP), and Request for Additional Information (ADD). Key words: Backchannels. Conversation Analysis. Group Talk. Listener Response. Backchannel Functions. i

3 APPROVAL SHEET VERBAL BACKCHANNELS IN THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER FULL OSCAR ACTRESS ROUNDTABLE INTERVIEW An Undergraduate Thesis Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty In Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Strata One RISYA MAYA HESTIANI NIM Approved by: Advisor Sholikatus Sa diyah, M.Pd. NIP Day/Date: / ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH JAKARTA 2017 ii

4 LEGALIZATION Name : Risya Maya Hestiani NIM : Title : Verbal Backchannels in The Hollywood Reporter Full Oscar Actress Roundtable Interview The thesis entitled above has been defended before the Letters and Humanities Faculty s Examination Committee on September 27 th, The thesis has already been accepted as a partial fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of strata one. Jakarta, September 27 th, 2017 The Examination Committee Signature Date 1. Drs. Saefudin, M.Pd. NIP Elve Oktafiyani, M.Hum. NIP Sholikatus Sa diyah, M.Pd. NIP Dr. Muhammad Farkhan, M.Pd. NIP (Chair Person) (Secretary) (Advisor) (Examiner I) 5. Moh. Iqbal Firdaus, M.Hum. (Examiner II) iii

5 DECLARATION I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, it contains no material previously published or written by another person nor material which to a substantial extent has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma of the university or other institute of higher education, except where due acknowledgement has been made in the thesis. South Tangerang, July 2017 Risya Maya Hestiani iv

6 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT In the Name of Allah, The Most Gracious, The Most Merciful. All praises be to Allah SWT, the Lord of the Universe, who has given the researcher indescribable power, knowledge, spirit, and strength without which this thesis would never be completed. Peace and blessing be upon the Prophet Muhammad SAW for guiding and getting us out from the darkness into the world full of light. This thesis is dedicated to the researcher s beloved family; her great Dad, Wahirin, her wonderful Mom, Suratmi, and her helpful sister, Ria Rahma Septiani, for giving infinite support and love, so she was able to find strength in amidst of tiredness and mental breakdown she suffered during her time working on this thesis. Furthermore, the researcher wants to thank several people for their great contribution and help for the completion of this thesis, and they are: 1. Prof. Dr. Sukron Kamil, M.A., the Dean of Adab and Humanities Faculty 2. Drs. Saefudin, M.Pd. the Head of English Letters Department 3. Elve Oktafiyani, M.Hum, the Secretary of English Letters Department 4. Mrs. Sholikatus Sa diyah, M.Pd, as the researcher s advisor, who had guided her with patience, and given a lot of valuable insights and advices. 5. All of the lecturers in English Letters Department, for contributing in the knowledge she gained, moral ethic she abides by, as well as the way of thinking she currently lives with. v

7 6. All of the librarian and staffs of Adab and Humanities Faculty and UIN Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta 7. Efrida Yanti, for being the researcher s greatest friend and supporter during her time in the university, as well as Farah Fawziah, whose clone she still wants to take home. 8. The researcher s classmates in both C, and Linguistics class Student Executive Board of English Letters Department. 10. KKN Genesa; Elok, Dewi, Faiz, Eneng, Amjad, Kamal, Fadel, Dayat, Rahayu 11. Forum Pemuda Kosong Satu; Mega, Veny, Vina, Apri, Eka, Andin, Fadhil, Heri, Agus, Wahyu, Aji, etc. 12. Tolalatuniyah; Ayu, Fika, Dian, Tata, Hasna, Fariz, Kimi, Tifany. 13. Enung. 14. Beloved friends and relatives that cannot be mentioned one by one. May Allah SWT always bless every single step that they take. Aamiin. The researcher acknowledges that this research is still far from perfect, therefore, criticisms and suggestions are always welcomed for the improvement of this thesis and also the researcher s further study. Tangerang Selatan, 23 July 2017 Risya Maya Hestiani. vi

8 LIST OF TABLES TABLE 1 Transcription symbol TABLE 2 Selected Backchannel Utterances vii

9 TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT... i APPROVAL SHEET... LEGALIZATION... DECLARATION... ACKNOWLEDGEMENT... LIST OF TABLES... TABLE OF CONTENTS... ii iii iv v vii viii CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION... 1 A. Background of Study... 1 B. Focus of the Study... 6 C. Research Questions... 6 D. Significance of the Study... 6 E. Research Methodology The Objective of the Research Method of the Research Research Instrument Unit of Data Analysis Technique of Data Analysis CHAPTER II THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK A. Previous Research B. Conversation Analysis C. Conversation and Interview viii

10 D. Turn-Taking and Overlap E. Backchannels F. Forms of Backchannels G. Functions of Backchannels H. Transcribing Conversation CHAPTER III RESEARCH FINDINGS A. Data Description B. Data Analysis CHAPTER IV CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS A. Conclusion B. Suggestions BIBLIOGRAPHY APPENDIXES ix

11 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION A. Background of Study One of the realisation of Aristoteles concept claiming humans are zoo politicon or social being that cannot live without being related to other human beings is the fact that people are communicating with each other in various ways. Communication in between humans is done in several kinds; it can be interpersonal, verbal, and non-verbal. Moreover, the most common form of human communications is conversation. Yule (71) stated that conversation is like a dance in which people and their partners smoothly coordinate their movements. Correspondingly to dancers, each participant in a conversation needs to synergise and cooperate well in order to achieve smooth conversation flow. This means that when conversing, people have to simultaneously exchange roles in saying something, and listening to the other s speaking. However, oftentimes people do not necessarily utter a sequence of lexical and complete utterances in the conversation happening, instead, they rather voice short utterances, be it a word or short phrase such as great, wow, and I see, or non-word utterances like hmm, umhum, or uh-um, which, in fact, such short utterance conveys various kinds of meanings depending to its spoken context. On the other hand, non-verbal factors can also play a role in generating. 1

12 2 conversation meaning, for example, body language, head movements, and facial expressions. Normally, a conversation mechanism is worked where there is a simultaneous exchange of information between people involved, but in some cases caused by one and other reasons, when the main speaker speaks, the listener feels the need to say something with no intention taking the speakership. Therefore, short utterances such as hm and hu-uh, which actually play a great role in formulating conversation meaning are often found. In some cases, short utterances as mentioned above can also happen because a listener simply does not want to cooperate well with the speaker in a conversation, for example is a conversation between a mother and her son in which the mother lectured him about his habit spending too much time playing computer and her son refused to cooperate with her by speaking short utterances instead (Pridham, 60). Hence, short utterance can also reflect one s cooperativeness and/or uncooperativeness when conversing. These short utterances that function merely as a response from a listener rather than a turn-taking is first coined in a term by Yngve as backchannels, which is defined as the listener s response given to the main speaker when the main speaker is talking (Yngve, 567). Therefore, backchannels imply that in a conversation, there are two channels working concurrently. First is predominant channel, the utterance of the main speaker leading the flow of the conversation, and second is secondary channel or backchannel, which is the listener s responses signalling the listener s attention, understanding or interest of the ongoing conversation (Li).

13 3 In Islamic perspective, it is urged to listen attentively to someone s talking simply to show interest and also to make another person feels respected. As what is shown by Prophet Muhammad reported by 'Amr ibnul 'Aas Radiyallahu 'Anhu, ح د ث ن ا إ س ح اق ب ن موس ى ق ا ل: ح د ث ن ا يونس ب ن بك ي ر ع ن مح م د ب ن إ س ح اق ع ن ز ي ا د ب ن أ ب ي ز ي اد ع ن مح م د ب ن ك ع ب ال ق ر ظ ي ع ن ع م ر و ب ن ال ع اص ق ا ل: ك ان ر سول للا صلى للا عليه وسلم يق ب ل ب و ج ه ه و ح د يث ه ع ل ى أ ش ر ال ق و م ي ت أ ل ف ه م ب ذ ل ك ف ك ا ن ي قب ل ب و ج ه ه و ح د يث ه ع ل ي ح ت ى ظ ن ن ت أ ن ي خ ي ر ال ق و م ف قل ت: ي ا ر سو ل للا أ ن ا خ ي ر أ و أ بو ب ك ر ف ق ا ل: أ بو ب ك ر ف قل ت: ي ا ر سو ل للا أ ن ا خ ي ر أ و عم ر ف ق ا ل: عم ر ف قل ت: ي ا ر سو ل للا أ ن ا خ ي ر أ و عث م ان ف ق ا ل: عث م ان ف ل م ا س أ ل ت ر سو ل للا.صلى للا عليه وسلم ف ص د ق ن ي ف ل و د د ت أ ن ي ل م أ ك ن س أ ل ته (Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alayhi Wasallam gave attention, spoke and showed love to the worst person of a nation. So that, the person may feel he is being given special attention). He used to give attention, and spoke to me also in a manner, that I began to feel that I was the best among the community. (Therefore, one day) I asked: 'O Messenger of Allah, am I better or is Abubakr better?' He replied: 'Abubakr'. I then asked: 'Am I better, or 'Umar?' He replied. "Umar'. I asked: 'Am I better or 'Uthmaan?' He replied: 'Uthmaan'. When I asked him these questions, Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alayhi Wasallam told me the truth. (He did not tell me I was better to keep me happy. Afterwards I felt ashamed of myself on this deed). I felt I should not have asked such a question". (Shamaail Tirmidhi, 361) From the hadith above, it is seen that Prophet Muhammad actually managed to show his beautiful and noble character even just by being a good listener. He listened carefully even to the worst person s talk, so that person would feel like he was being appreciated. Therefore, to maintain good social relationship with other human being, it is genuinely important to be a smart and good listener when being involved in a conversation with anyone since a great person is more likely to be an attentive listener. However, being a good and attentive listener does not mean to be silent and not to make a sound at all, instead, a response from the listener is needed

14 4 as a signal that what is being talked is understood, and also as an encouragement for the main speaker to continue what s/he is currently saying. These signals from the listener when the main speaker is talking are what is known as backchannels. According to Yule (75-76), backchannels might also be interpreted by the speakers that the listener carefully listens, and the message they are trying to deliver is understood. Caller : If you use a long distance a lot then you ll Mary : uh-uh Caller : be interested in the discount I m talking about because Mary : yeah Caller : it can only switch you to a cheaper service Mary : mmm (Yule, 76) Above is the excerpt from a phone call between a telemarketer and a customer in which the speaker is the telemarketer explaining a promo and the listener is the customer. It can be seen from above that being a listener in a conversation does not mean one should not make a sound at all. These short utterances such as uh-huh, yeah, and mmm are actually important to signal that the message has been received by the listener and the speaker is encouraged to resume the talking. In most cases, the absence of listener response can lead to the notion of rejection because in a conversation, pause and silence are meaningful and can be meaningfully interpreted (Yule, 76). An in-depth interview itself is the type of personal conversation since it is often done seriously, and talking about serious matter. Even though several points of questions directing the flow of conversation are provided, where the stream of conversation flowing is purely natural. Before the 89 th Academy Awards took place on Sunday, February 26, 2017, The Hollywood Reporter

15 5 gathered six actresses of the Oscar nominees, Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji Henson, Amy Adams, Annette Bening, and Isabelle Huppert, in a roundtable, and they were talking about their biggest fears, bucket-list goals, and equal pay issues. Each one of them was saying their deep thoughts about each question asked by the host, Stephen Galloway. Even though what they were discussing about are not light issues, they were able to maintain the conversation atmosphere smooth. It can be noticed that one particular factor supporting the conversation to run smoothly is that each participant pays good attention to everyone speaking at the moment, and gave response to appropriately. What is seen as problematic in this research corpus is how these conversation participants deliver each other s response as a listener to show their attentiveness, interest, and understanding when one is being the main speaker, what linguistic forms are the most, and the least often used as a response by them. As important as in what form backchannels are said, it is also important to analyse how these backchannels are understood and functioned as meaning generator in the conversation. Therefore, this study will talk in detail about the forms and functions of backchannels used by the participants in the interview of THR Full Oscar Actress Roundtable: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson & more.

16 6 B. Focus of the Study Considering there are several kinds of backchannels known verbal and non-verbal, this research will focus only on the verbal backchannels obtained from the THR Full Oscar Actress Roundtable: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson & More interview, and does not include non-verbal backchannels found in the corpus data as a unit of data analysis. It means that this research will only limit to verbal backchannels utterances, and will not analyse non-verbal ones such as head nodding, and facial expressions. C. Research Questions As having been described above, through this research, the researcher will answer the following questions: 1. What kinds of verbal backchannel forms are used by participants in THR Full Oscar Actress Roundtable: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson & More? 2. How do verbal backchannels function in the interview between the participants in THR Full Oscar Actress Roundtable: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson & More? D. Significance of the Study This research will benefit mainly in two fields, which are:

17 7 1. Theoretical For the growth of linguistic field, this research is hoped to be beneficial as a reference, and may as well contribute for the advanced research on backchannels as an expansion of Conversation Analysis study. This research is expected to be able to introduce basic theories, and concepts of Pragmatics and its correlation with backchannels utterances, and to contribute to the study about language use in verbal communication. This research will also be advantageous to fellow linguistic scholars, and academics who want to extend and develop CA research based on short utterances as simple as yeah and hmm which, in fact, play a great role in conversation mechanism. 2. Practical The researcher hopes that this study can possibly take an important part in the expansion of linguistic knowledge in general and Conversation Analysis in particular, also be applicable in formal education and daily environment, especially to those who are interested to learn and focus on English conversation and Linguistics field. For society in general, this research will contribute to strengthen the understanding of how important it is to also be a good listener besides being a good talker, and how one s way of listening to others can much less reflect their true character.

18 8 E. Research Methodology 1. The Objective of the Research This study is directed to identify and analyse forms of backchannels used by each participant in THR Full Oscar Actress Roundtable: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson & More, and how those backchannels function to generate meaning in the given conversational context. 2. Method of the Research The method used in this research is descriptive qualitative method which focuses on utterances in the conversation as the research object. The research will focus on the utterances of all participants in the interview of The Hollywood Reporter Full Oscar Actress Roundtable. The writer aims to answer the research questions by analysing backchannels forms, be it minimal or non-minimal backchannels, and the functions of backchannels regarding the conversation context using related theories. According to Sudaryanto (62), descriptive method is where the research is conducted according to empirical experience, facts, and phenomenon one has undergone, so it can be said that descriptive research is the study of what it actually is.

19 9 On the other hand, qualitative method is chosen considering five main characteristics of qualitative method (Bodgan and Biklen, 29) which are: (a) Qualitative has the natural setting as direct source of data and researcher is the key instrument; (b) Qualitative research is descriptive. The data collected are in the form of word or picture, rather than numbers; (c) Qualitative researches are concerned with process rather than simply with outcomes or products; (d) Qualitative researchers tend to analyse their data inductively; and (e) Meaning is an essential concern to qualitative approach. 3. Research Instrument The main instrument of this research is the researcher herself (human instrument) by watching the interview video entitled THR Full Oscar Actress Roundtable: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson & More backed up by full transcript. The writer, then, will focus to determine which utterances are considered as backchannels, transcribe the chosen utterances using the transcription symbols to represent the mechanism of the conversation, before finally analysing the data using relevant theories. 4. Unit of Data Analysis The unit of data analysis of this research is selected utterances from all of the participants Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji Henson, Amy Adams, Annette Bening, Isabelle Huppert, and Stephen Galloway containing verbal backchannels taken from the THR Full Oscar Actress Roundtable: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson & More interview. The interview video, which was uploaded on January 30, 2017,

20 10 was retrieved offline from The Hollywood Reporter YouTube channel on March 14 th, Technique of Data Analysis The researcher will use descriptive data analysis by watching interview video in several steps. First, the researcher will watch the video and at the same time, also review the transcript provided in The Hollywood Reporter website. Second, the writer will identify which utterances fit backchannels criteria, then proceed the data obtained using Gail Jefferson transcription convention in Conversation Analysis theory (Bloomer, Griffths, dan Merrison, 43-46). At last, the researcher will analyse the data collected using relevant theories about backchannel forms and functions. Data will be limited to 14 data by random sampling method. They are chosen by consideration that the number of backchannels in this corpus data is too many, and some cannot be comprehended well enough as they often overlap with the main talk, and thus makes it hard to turn them into words. Therefore, these 14 data are verbal backchannel utterances clear enough to be transcribed, and they are thought to be able to represent all of the backchannel items in this corpus data, as certain types of backchannels are often used similarly for several times in different points of the talk.

21 CHAPTER II THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK A. Previous Research Since backchannels term first appeared, there have been several studies by previous researchers conducted on this issue. One of them is the study done by Shigeo Uematsu in 2001 entitled The Use of Back Channels between Native Speakers in English and Japanese in Setsunan University, Japan. The ethnographic research discusses about the use of backchannels by the native and non-native English speakers in Japan. This study discovered and concluded that it was mostly Japanese women having high-level fluency in English who were able to use various kinds of both English and Japanese backchannels. Next research is Kathrin Lambertz Backchannelling: The Use of Yeah and Mm to Portray Engaged Listenership in This research limits its analysis on the use of only two forms of backchannels, which are yeah and mm and drew conclusion that from only two backchannels said above, they had three functions; continuers, alignment tokens, and agreement tokens. Another previous research is also done by Han Z. Li, Yanping Cui, and Zizhang Wang in 2010, titled Backchannel Responses and Enjoyment of the Conversation: The More Does Not Necessarily Mean the Better published in the International Journal of Psychological Studies. This research focused on 11

22 12 the comparison of backchannels occurrence in a multicultural conversation between Mandarin-speaking Chinese and English-speaking Canadian, and aimed to find out whether or not the usage of backchannels increased enjoyment of the conversation. The researchers tested both Chinese and Canadian in a patient-doctor conversational situation, and counted how often each participant used backchannels response. The study then resulted in conclusion that in term of cultural difference, Chinese patients made significantly more backchannel responses than Canadian patients, by giving non-verbal gesture which was nodding, and uttering short utterance which were okay, repeat, and oh as the most often forms of backchannels used. Regarding whether backchannels affect the enjoyment of conversation, the study concluded that the higher the frequency of backchannel responses, the lower the enjoyment of the conversation (Li, Cui, Wang, 31). The last one is a thesis by Rahmat Edi Sutanto in 2015 entitled Verbal Backchannels in English Conversation Between Daniel Radcliffe and J.K. Rowling in State Islamic University of Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta. This study mainly discussed about the mechanism of backchannels usage in the interview between J.K. Rowling and Daniel Radcliffe, and limited the data to only fourteen data. This study discovered that from the data having been analysed, some backchannels were uttered in TRP, and some others as overlap. The writer also gave clear border that backchannels mentioned were not turn. Different to the four studies mentioned above in term of research problems, unit of analysis, and method of the research, through this study, the

23 13 researcher will analyse the forms of backchannels and their functions in conversation context between all participants in THR Full Oscar Actress Roundtable: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson & More. Unlike previous researches which mainly talk about backchannels occurrence in a twoparty conversation, this corpus data is a multiparty conversation with 7 participants in total. This research will also focus to all kinds of verbal backchannels utterances, and will not be limited to yeah and mm only. Also, rather than ethnographic like Uematsu and Lambertz, this research is a corpusbased research using descriptive qualitative method. Likewise, this study is not conducted on a notion of cultural differences even though participants in the chosen interview might have various cultural background. B. Conversation Analysis General definition of Conversation Analysis is that CA is an approach to the study of social interaction that focuses on practices of speaking that recur across a range of contexts and settings (Sidnell, Introduction). Conversation analysis is characterized by the view that how talk is produced and how the meanings of that talk are determined as practical, social and interactional accomplishments of members of a culture. Talk is not seen simply as the product of two 'speaker-hearers' who attempt to exchange information or convey messages to each other. Rather, participants in conversation are seen as mutually orienting to, and collaborating in order to achieve orderly and meaningful communication (Hutchby dan Wooffitt, 1).

24 14 The approach, which is inherited from ethnomethodology, focuses on how people produce utterances, assuming that hearers can make sense of them by using special methods and procedures (Aijmer and Stenström, 1744). CA is thought to fit this research since the utterances in the corpus data is seen as a part of social interaction mechanism rather than merely the exchange of talks only. C. Conversation and Interview There are fairly a lot of types of conversation. Mortimer J. Adler (ch. 10, part 2) proposed several varieties of conversation. First, conversation is classified according to how playful and serious the talks are. What is meant by playful includes all forms of talk having no set purpose, no objection to achieve, and no controlling direction. Another name for playful is social conversation, and a good social conversation can never be planned in advance, he said. It simply gives pleasure, and by doing so, it brings persons together in friendship or helps to make them better acquainted with one another. Different to playful, human conversation is often personal, therefore, it is called as heart-to-heart talk (Adler, ch. 10, part 2). Personal conversation is the kind of conversation where the persons use their mind to express what affects their heart emotion and feeling, affection and disaffection. Mostly it is deeply serious since the participants are concerned about their emotional problems. This kind of conversation also requires one another to be an attentive

25 15 listener. According to its characteristics, personal conversation can be planned or not planned in advance. Different to variety of conversation defined by Adler, Jucker (85) gives another basis to classify conversation, which is according to its orientation, amount of constraints on allowable contribution, freeness of turn order, dependency of contribution to the previous ones, etc. Conversations naturally tend to be process-oriented, have few constrains of allowable contribution and free turn order, and depend largely on previous contribution (talk), while in courtroom situation, conversation has entirely different characteristics. In a courtroom, all participants are assigned well-defined roles with well-defined speaking rights (Jucker, 84). Looking at the distribution of speaking right in the courtroom, interview fairly has similar mechanism. Interviewer and interviewee ask questions and give responses, respectively. In this way, a fixed turn order goes together with the many constraints on the allowable contributions, whereas discourse types with few such constraints will have a fairly free turn order. Interviewers, who are nominally in charge of the direction an interview takes, can prepare all their questions in advance and ask one after the other whatever the responses of the interviewee turn out to be (Jucker, 87). D. Turn-Taking and Overlap In a conversation mechanism, there is an unwritten convention for participants involved to take turns at speaking. If Yule associates conversation

26 16 with dance, taking it a little further, then, any form of coordinated, joint activity, from conversation to ballroom dancing, requires some way of organizing and managing the contributions of the various persons who are engaged in it. In conversation, opportunities to participate are distributed through a turn-taking system (Sidnell, 36). Normal conversation occurrence requires its participants to switch roles and exchange the floor of speakership simultaneously. In a conversation, turn of the talk is distributed through turn-taking mechanism (Sidnell, 36). Yule (72) stated that in any situation where control was not fixed in advance, anyone can make an attempt to get control, and such condition is called turn taking. However, it should be underlined that even though someone is uttering something while making backchannels response, it is not considered as a turn, and vice versa. An interesting aspect regarding turn taking mechanism is overlap. Oftentimes participants who play the role as listeners, in some points, start talking even when the current speakers have not completed their turn of talk, and this is when the talk is said as overlapped. Overlap, in fact, does not indicate competitiveness in a conversation (Givon, 64), but still, having two people talking at the same time can be problematic. Despite there have been close relations between turn, overlap, and backchannels, these three terms are conceptually different from one another. Stenstorm (321) explained that backchannels can be inserted in any points of

27 17 the conversation, and often said at the same time of the ongoing talk as an overlap. This means that not every overlap is considered as turn-taking. When the overlap serves merely as a signal of what the main speaker is currently saying, it is called as backchannels, otherwise, it functions as turn. E. Backchannels As language users, humans suffer two fundamental cognitive limitations. First, a person generally cannot produce coherent utterances while listening to someone else (Jaffe 1978). Second, symmetrically, in general, a person cannot really listen (process speech input) while talking (Ward, 34). Backchannels, which have some other nicknames such as response token, listener response, hearer signal, or minimal response, somehow escape both of the limitations. (For present purposes backchannels are optional responses to something said by the other which do not require acknowledgement). First, backchannels are produced while the other person has the turn, and often while the other is talking (Ward and Tsukahara, in Ward, 34). Second, backchannels can be heard and understood at least well enough to get a sense of whether the other person is confused, bored, excited, knowledgeable, supportive, and so on by a person who is himself talking. Thus, people, both as speakers and as listeners, can process back-channels simultaneously with processing the content of the conversation on the main channel (Yngve, 569). Even though earlier study conducted on backchannels are done in English context, backchannels are somehow universal. The universality of

28 18 backchannels is shown by the fact that minimal vocalization such as mm, and umhum portraying the engagement of the listeners in a conversation are used widely by people across cultures, such as Japanese and Korean (Hayashi and Yoon, 250), or Mandarin-speaking Chinese and English-speaking Canadians (Li, Cui and Wang, 25-26). Hayashi and Yoon also explain sequential context pattern in which backchannels are uttered, as stated below: A : turn s talk Position 1 B : minimal yeah/mhm-like acknowledgement token Position 2 A : minimal yeah/mhm-like acknowledgement token Position 3 The pattern can be seen more clearly in the verbal corpora below: A : I don t go there at all anymore, I guess. Position 1 B : Mhm. Position 2 A : Mhm. Position 3 B : Oh, I see. Well, it s good that you went to Hattori (Hayashi and Yoon, 255) Many researches before neglected the fact that primary speakers might also respond to a listener s backchannels, and it does not automatically make a responded backchannel a turn. When the primary speakers backchannelling a backchannel response, it can be seen as a decline to take the opportunity in that slot to say anything more about the previous topic/activity (Hayashi and Yoon, 258), and as a sign to take the conversation to a whole new topic. However, since the occurrence of yeah, hmm, or mm is often found in various kinds of conversation, it should be underlined that not every short utterance is considered as backchannels, and not all backchannels are in the form of short utterance. Many refer to backchannels as short utterances, even

29 19 though Maynard and Yngve, the inventor of the term itself, included longer questions and statements as backchannels also. Tottie, then, came to a conclusion that to decide if an utterance is a backchannel will depend on what follows it. If the utterance invokes a response from the speaker, then it should be termed a turn and not a backchannel (Fujimoto, 43). F. Forms of Backchannels In her work entitled Conversational Style in British and American English: The case of backchannels, Gunnel Tottie (quoted in Pipek, 47), proposed some characterization of backchannels falling in three categories which are simple, double, and complex backchannels. Simple backchannels are backchannels uttered as a single entity, for example is yeah or yes only. Double backchannels are represented by multiple repetition of the same backchannel item, such as yeah yeah, or hmm hmm. Another type is complex, meaning that the listener is giving response by combining different forms of backchannel items, or mixing backchannels consisting of items from different backchannel categories and/or one or several open-class lexical items, for example oh yeah, yeah, I see, or yeah, I know. This notion is also supported by McCarthy (in O Keeffe and Adolphs, 8), claiming that both forms of backchannels might be combined in a single conversation. A: you know it reminds me of am the play and ah. B: Mm. A: And the character in the play is not+ B: I don t know. A: +someone I d kind of identify with+ B: Yeah that s true that s true but I wonder if that s a cultural sort of+

30 20 A: Yeah mm B: +I don t know I had the same question for Rosemary (O Keeffe dan Adolphs, 8) Duncan and Fiske (in Fujimoto, 39) broadened the term backchannel to include sentence completions, requests for clarification, brief restatements and non-verbal responses such as head nods and shakes. However, according to most previous researches (Fellegy, Zimmerman & West, Fishman, Schegloff, Maynard, Gardner, Tottie, McCarthy & Carter, McCarthy in O Keffe and Adolphs, 6), backchannels are commonly classified into two main forms, which are minimal, and non-minimal backchannels. 1. Minimal backchannels Minimal backchannels are divided into two, which are in the form of short utterance such as yeah or yep, and non-words vocalisation such as mm and umhum (O Keeffe and Adolphs, 7). Essentially, minimal category of backchannels covers every listener response shorter than a word. Example : A: Tis a lovely day but tis cold isn t it? B: Ah the days are grand shure well yesterday was a bad bad evening. A: Mm. B: It turned black (O Keeffe and Adolphs, 7). From the example above, Mm falls under the category of minimal backchannels since it is considered as a non-words vocalization, and

31 21 looking at humans natural conversation, backchannels are generally often used in this form. 2. Non-minimal backchannels Non-minimal backchannels can be in the form of adjectives or adverbs functioning as pragmatic markers, like good, great, absolutely, short phrases, for instance you re not serious, is that so? and not at all, and full sentence or question. Example : A: I wouldn t have minded giving an apprenticeship to that lad here on the site cos he was a good strong worker so he was. he was a polite young fella too. B: Is that right? A: She had a tough job with them she brought up those two kids herself. Her marriage broke down there a long time ago (O Keeffe and Adolphs, 7). Even though it is not rare to find backchannels in the form of complete sentence, it should be noted that what makes it different to turn is that the listener does not intend to take the floor of speakership. From the example above, it can be seen that A was explaining something in detail and then B as a listener gave his response by saying is that right? merely as an expression of requesting additional information about what the other was currently talking about. A distinction needs to be given in deciding that a full question utterance serves as a backchannel and not a turn. When it is posed as a question, it is often judged as a backchannel response if its tone is falling,

32 22 indicating that an answer from the current speaker is not required. If the question is presented in a rising tone, it is an indication that a response from the current speaker is requested. It is then judged as a question in the front channel, not a backchannel response (Li, Cui and Wang, 28). Moreover, even though past researchers would undoubtedly exclude noises such as grunts, laughter, sighs, and audible intakes of breath as a kind of verbal backchannels, more recent researchers apparently have different view on this matter. Including Tsukahara, Gardner, and Ward (in Fujimoto, 42), they suggest that noises such as grunts could be viewed as non-word vocalizations of backchannels. Besides grunts, many also believed that laughs can function as a type of backchannels too (Maynard, Tottie, and Gardner in Fujimoto, 42). G. Functions of Backchannels When conversing, the use of backchannels is often caused by several factors. Some of these factors include the fact that listeners often want to announce that they are listening the conversation, wish the speakers to continue what is currently being talked, or hope to show their interest and/or disinterest. It is quite difficult to wrap all backchannels functions proposed by many previous researches in a precise list, since Fujimoto (40-41) has tried and it turned out to be a very exhausting list. Goodwin (in Fujimoto, 44) explains that the main functions of backchannels encompass in two points, which are continuer and assessment, or what Tottie have suggested; that backchannels can serve a supportive

33 23 function or a regulative function. Supportive functions could be those showing agreement, or understanding, while regulative functions would be continuers, or change of activity tokens. While according to Goodwin, as an assessment, it means that backchannels are functioned to respond the previous talk, while as a continuer, it means that the listeners do not intend to give actual response to what the speakers are talking, however, it acts merely as a signal to the speakers to persist next unit of the talk. As continuers, backchannels are usually uttered at any points in ongoing talk, whereas as assessments, backchannels are often made at TRP, or when the turn of talk is completed. While many researchers have different views on backchannels function, this research will later follow Maynard s more elaborated functions, which are listed in six points, which are continuer, understanding, agreement, support and empathy, strong emotional response, and minor addition (request for information) (in Cutrone, 31). 1. Continuers (abbreviated as CON) As a continuer, backchannels function as an indication from listeners given to primary speakers to continue next unit of talk. Gardner (in Fujimoto, 44-45) stated that backchannels serving as continuers aim to return the speakership to the primary speaker. Yeah and the minimally aligning form Mm have been called backchannels and also seem to serve a continuative function when they carry a fall-rising (or rising) contour (Cutrone, 31-32).

34 24 Example: Joshua : It was raining last night= Vernon Joshua : =hmm= : =when the burglar broke into my house. Vernon s backchannels above, hmm, functions as a continuer, since his utterance signals that he is listening, and Joshua should continue speaking. Many researchers (Schegloff, Maynard, Gardner in O Keeffe and Adolphs, 17) have identified that minimal form of backchannels is often used to convey its function as a continuer. 2. Understanding the content (abbreviated as UND) Besides serving as continuers, backchannels can also function as an understanding of content conveyed in the conversation. This is when the non-primary speaker feels it is necessary to show that he/she understands what exactly the primary speaker is talking about as in the following example: Example: A: You have to go two blocks B: Mm hm A: then turn left at the video store B: Uh huh A: It s a few stores down on the right side B: I see A: You can t miss it (Cutrone, 32) In this example, B sends two continuer type of backchannels in Mm hm and Uh huh to signal to A that he/she should continue giving directions, and once B seems to understand where the place is, B signals

35 25 understanding of content to A with the backchannel I see. The most common backchannel conveying this function is I see, Yeah, Ooo, Ah ah, and Oh yeah (Gardner, Ito, and Uematsu in Cutrone, 32) 3. Agreement (abbreviated as AGR) Backchannel responses may also serve as an expression of agreement to the primary speakers talk. This is when the non-primary speaker reacts to a question or question-like utterance made by the primary speaker. For coding agreement, Maynard also identifies this function when the primary speaker is performing a speech act of questioning (Uematsu, 88). Example: Jackson : You mean you heard the news already. Dave Jackson : Yeah : I was going to tell you. From the example mentioned above, Dave s backchannel yeah represents his agreement to Jackson s utterance, meaning he was agreeing Jackson s supposition that he had heard the news already. However, it might seem hard to distinguish between agreement and understanding function of backchannels. Tao and Thompson (in Kobayashi, 156) provides a distinction between these two;... a cue for their differentiation might be that a speaker gives a claim of understanding when the interlocutor provides something unknown to him,... In contrast, an acknowledgment of agreement doesn't involve unknown information...

36 26 Therefore, the difference between backchannels understanding of content and agreement lays mainly on the presence or absence of some new and previously unknown information. Ito (in Cutrone, 33) includes statements such as That s exactly true and I think so too to show agreement, and Uematsu (95) presents non-lexical items such as Hm hm hm, Umm, Umum, and Unhum. 4. Support and empathy (abbreviated as SUP) Another function of backchannels is that they may also serve to show support and empathy toward the speaker s judgement, utterance, or confession. This occurs when the non-primary speaker responds with a show of support or empathy to a statement made by the primary speaker (Cutrone, 33). Backchannels having this function is often located at a TRP when the intonational contour is up (Uematsu, 86). Example: A: He quit his job again B: It s going to be hard to find a new one A: Yeah B: He ll have to apply... (Cutrone, 33) Backchannels having this function often occur in a heartfelt conversation, where its participants are talking about something emotional. 5. Strong emotional response (abbreviated as EMO) Listening to the main talk, sometimes some utterances can cause surprise to the listener. From Jakobson s model of six language functions,

37 27 language is said to have emotive function, which means that language can be used to express one s emotion through expressive words to communicate the addresser s emotions, or attitudes (Fiske, 35). When the listeners want to simply express their emotion made by the current talk, and do not intend to grab the floor is when backchannels behave as strong emotional response, as what is shown below; V : We re going to Brazil next week. Jin : Wow! V : Finally, we re going to meet our Brazilian fans. From the example above, Jin was expressing his emotion and surprise of V s utterance through backchannel Wow, most likely using rising intonation. Afterwards, V continues his unit of talk. Goodwin has suggested utterances such as Wow or Great serve as strong emotive responses, Maynard has proposed laughs, and Uemastu has included the non-lexical item Hehehe (in Cutrone, 33). 6. Minor addition (request for information) (abbreviated as ADD) Functioned as minor addition or as a request for additional information, backchannels are often uttered when the listener requires more information from what has already been said. Example : DK : He broke up with her again.

38 28 Sam : Really. DK : Yeah. She was caught cheating. Maynard and Cutrone (in Cutrone, 34) have pointed out that Really is a common backchannel form to request confirmation. Another strategy that might be helpful to this end is for the non-primary speaker to repeat the last word or two of the primary speaker s utterance with a rising contour. H. Transcribing Conversation The unit of analysis for Conversation Analysis is naturally occurring talk, including interview, or everyday conversation, and the data need to be recorded and then transcribed before being analysed. However, transcribing conversation data is not a compulsory step, instead, it is seen as a tool which can be used to help analyse and understand recording materials for CA (Heritage, Psathas, and Anderson, in Liddicoat, 13). Many linguistic researchers prefer visual data to audio, since data are often easier to be seen rather than to be heard. Almost in all cases, researchers conduct a study using written record from auditory data, which is widely known as transcription. Regarding aforementioned consideration, Gail Jefferson created a transcription convention system, which then broadly used by CA researchers (Bloomer, Griffths, dan Merrison, 41). In conversation analysis, no level of detail is considered a priori to be irrelevant for the understanding of talk in interaction and this means that

39 29 transcription is much more than the recording of the words produced by participants in interaction (Liddicoat, 14). Any symbols might be used to mark events in the transcription. There s no fixed rules for CA researchers to use and not to use which symbols as long as it is accessible to a range of readers provides a way of communicating (partial) information about the talk being studied in a written analysis of the talk. Below is the transcription system and symbols used in this research. These symbols are thought to be relevant for analysing process in the next chapter retrieved from Bloomer, Griffths, and Merrison (43-46). Table 1. Transcription Symbols [utterance] =utterance=. :, Shows overlapped talk; talk uttered concurrently with the talk of primary speaker Latched utterance; An utterance that immediately follows the preceding utterance without a gap is said to be a latched utterance. One at the end of the preceding stretch of talk and one immediately prior to the onset of the latched utterance. Gradual falling intonation. Very often indicates a statement, but it is important to note that it doesn t necessarily mean that. Talk is completed. Elongation of the preceding sound. The more colons, the longer the sound. Fall rise intonation, often signalling an unfinished turn-in-progress. Utterance trails off ; several utterances are cut.! More animated intonation (often rise fall).? Gradual rising intonation ºutteranceº Utterance Text surrounded by degree signs is quieter than the surrounding talk. Other emphasis/stress.

40 30 utterance utterance (0,X) Notably lower shift in pitch from the surrounding talk. Notably higher shift in pitch for the text between the upward pointing arrows. Pauses longer than 0,2 seconds, to the nearest tenth of a second and are put within parentheses.

41 CHAPTER III RESEARCH FINDINGS A. Data Description As having been described in the two previous chapters, this chapter will talk deeply about the occurrence of backchannels in The Hollywood Reporter Full Oscar Actress Roundtable Interview: Emma Stone, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson, & More regarding to their forms and functions. This chapter contains fourteen data collected randomly throughout the interview video. Below is provided tabulated data along with each backchannels utterance. Table 2. Selected Backchannels Utterances between Participants No. Data Backchannel Responses Line Number Henson: B:ecause it speaks to:: what's happening to day = Galloway: =[Huh] (CON) Henson: [in] the world and, you know, including everybo:dy in the health ca:re, and (0,2) Galloway: m (CON) Henson: yes, AIDS is still an epidemic. Galloway: Does a great performer have to speak to a particular problem? Henson: No:, but you said a time capsule, [right?] Galloway: [Mm], yeah (AGR) Henson: =so we re gone. So that s [inaudible] Unknown Audiences: [laughter] Henson: I mean, you know people need to know that there was a problem Harris: I: am obsessed with The Sound of Music Huh and m Mm, yeah Oh, and really