Séminaire du GREMLIN - Simona Pekarek Doehler

The fact that face-to-face communication is fundamentally multimodal in nature has for long been established in a variety of research paradigms within the larger fields of language and communication sciences (Clark 1996, Goodwin 1986, 2000, Kendon 1972, McNeill 1992): We humans use verbal-vocal means in concert with bodily-visual resources (gaze, posture, facial expressions, gestures, manipulation of objects) for both social and cognitive purposes, such as constructing and interpreting meaning, accomplishing and coordinating actions, and enhancing memorization and learning. Surprisingly, however, the complex ways in which language and the body interface in second language (L2) development have largely remained unexplored. Although many studies show that L2 learning is also a bodily process, these typically focus on observable gesture-language constellations ‘in the moment’; a longitudinal, developmental perspective is missing.
 
Bringing together insights from multimodal conversation analysis and usage-based linguistics, this presentation addresses the following question: What can multimodal analysis tell us about how people use and develop their L2 interactional competence? To address this question, I present two longitudinal studies, the first focusing on speakers’ multimodal enactment of word-searches over time and proficiency level; the second on speakers’ development concrete grammar-body packages, i.e., recurrent constellations of precise bodily conduct combined with a precise lexico-syntactic form. The results invite research on language, language development and social interaction to more centrally attend to the fact, as Goodwin (2000 : 1490) put it, that “[t]he construction of action through talk within situated interaction is accomplished through the temporally unfolding juxtaposition of quite different kinds of semiotic resources”