conversation analysis – Language Culture and Society in Hong Kong (and beyond)

By Hung Ling Kwan

Power struggle exists between employers and employees in the business life. It is important to know the establishment of power relation in business because it is relevant to all of us. Everyone is a potential ‘employer’ or ‘employee’ after graduating from schools. Understanding the langauge and power relation in workplace will promote better communication among superiors and subordinates. With better communication means, it is easier for employers to establish an authortative image in office and be a persuasive leader at work. Indeed, the power relation among employers and employees is asymmetrical in essence. ‘Power’ is the ‘ability to influence decisions which are and are not taken by others’ (Hyman, 1975). It is well known that employer has the right to make business decisions and employees are the ones to enact the company plans. Hence, power is in hands of employers instinctively. However, without effective language use, we cannot say that power is manipulated by the business leaders successfully. It is easy for employeees to disregard employers if they consider them a mate instead of a superior, and they might try to negotiate and disobey the instructed orders. That’s why we should use the conventional mean of communication－language to build up and reinforce our authority in workplace. The use of language is particularly important in terms of handling employee discplinary and it would be shown below.

As proposed by Heritage (1988), every detail in a conversation contributes to social construction. It is further supported by Mehrabian (1981) that 55% of body language, 38% of speaker tone and 7% of the actual content interwine with one another and constitute to be a meaningful speech. Hence, we should not neglect the very detail of a conversation and take them seriously into the account for speech analysis. The analytic approach of Conversation analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis are effective in considering these elements into the examination of speech. While Conversation Analysis examines the talk-in-interactions of speakers and Critical Discourse Analysis deepens speakers’ linguistic strategies (Numa 2007; Simpson, Mayr & Statham, 2019), the features of a conversation could be fully captured and interpreted throughly using this comprehensive analytical methodology.

There’s a video clip featuring a employee discplinary issue and I would like to share my analysis with regard to Conversation analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tk2z_eUGlDA)

A few linguistic strategies are adopted throughout the conversation:

Interruption

Interruption is a common linguistic device to gain control and dominance in speaking (Yang, 1996). When dominant speakers consider the contributions of a less powerful person are irrelevant, they disrupt and force others to stop speaking in showing his/her authority.

Topic Control

Powerful speaker would use questions to guide less powerful speaker to certain directions of the topic. By guiding questions, the dominate speaker could directly retrieve information they need and also avoid irrelevant information.

Adjacency pair & Imperative

The adjacency pair is used to illustrate the use of ‘summon and answer’ and there is no choice for the employee to reply a ‘no’to the statement. The employer also uses the imperative language of ‘need’ to indicate the necessity of the command.

Body language (Finger Pointing)

As stated above, body language aids us in emphasising the phrases and convincing the authority (Nicolas Fradet, 2020). This finger pointing gesture is to stress out the importance of message and reinforce the authority of speech.

All in all, language and power are interrelated in workplace communication. We have to manipulate the language effectively to build up power. On the other hand, power also make an impact on speaker’s language use. We could make good use of verbal language and non-verbal behaviors to reinforce power establishment.

by Janice Hon

Journalism and politics have great influence in society. They are mutually connected to and dependent on each other. Due to the recent political situation in Hong Kong, the relationship between politicians, including the police force, and journalists has changed. A lot of press conferences were also held these days for reporting and presenting details of political incidents. Clayman and Heritage (2002) mentioned that the linguistic styles in political interviews have changed and “conversationalized” ,and the social distance between politicians and journalists has been reduced. In order to investigate the situation in Hong Kong, we are going to look into the conversation between the police representatives and some journalists during the Q&A session of the police press conference with regard to the “721 Yuen Long Attack” (See the video below). Several interactional patterns that shape their power relations are found by close conversation analysis of the data.

YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwr-1vfRgNY

1. Journalists as “questioners” set the agenda

Journalists took the role of “questioners” and restricted what the police could answer in the next turn at the beginning of the Q&A session. They frame the topics and set the agenda of the following interaction by asking questions based on what the general public would like to know.

2. Police resisted by “asking for permission”The police made use of a strategy of “asking for permission” so as to sustain their turn and power. They are aware of the powerful position of journalists within the interaction. However, the police do not do that to simply admit their less powerful position. Instead, this strategy could smartly turn the police from the less powerful position to a position with advantage.

Picture source 1: Sing Tao Daily 2: RTHK Live video 20190723

3. Adjacency pairs allowed journalists to re-negotiate the agenda

Adjacency pairs were seen from the interaction when the police requested permission and journalists granted or rejected the approval. Journalists have a chance to re-negotiate the agenda and the power relationships, especially by rejecting the request.

4. Inserted sequences were used by both sides to sustain themselves as “questioners”

Inserted sequences were found throughout the interaction. Both the police and journalists tried to make use of inserted sequences with an attempt to interrupt the turns and sequences, hoping to turn themselves into the questioner.

5. Police made use of “no details in hand” strategy and silence to avoid answering questions

The police made use of strategies like “no details in hand” and silence to avoid answering questions they refused to talk about. When the police said they could not provide answers since they did not have related details or information in hand, it became challenging for journalists to ask follow-up questions and seek further responses. They seemed to have answered the questions but in fact journalists could not get useful information from their answers. Sometimes, they also kept silent when being asked questions that they might not be able to answer.

6. Presence of MC maintains the overall power of the police

The assistance and presence of the emcee, who was in charge of leading the press conference and spoke on behalf of the police force, were crucial for maintaining the power of the police force during the press conference. When the emcee said that they should move on to the closing sequence and end the press conference, the police could successfully avoid answering questions since journalists did not have the opportunity to ask questions or enforce explicitness anymore.

To conclude, the communicative style between the police and journalists is indeed “conversationalized”. However, the power relations between politicians and journalists are inevitably still asymmetrical. Despite the fact that journalists could ask questions and set agenda freely at the beginning of the Q&A session, the press conference was held by the police and they had control over the overall agenda. Therefore, they could interrupt and prevent journalists from asking for more details. Their power could be further reinforced by the strategy of “no details in hand” through which they seemed to have answered the questions but journalists could not get any useful information from their answers.

Tag: conversation analysis

Power Relations among Employers and Employees

Power Negotiations Between the Police and Journalists in Hong Kong