Edwards2005a
| Edwards2005a | |
|---|---|
| BibType | ARTICLE |
| Key | Edwards2005a |
| Author(s) | Derek Edwards |
| Title | Moaning, whinging and laughing: the subjective side of complaints |
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| Tag(s) | Discursive Psychology, announcements, complaints, conversation analysis, discursive psychology, displacement, laughter, subjectivity |
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| Year | 2005 |
| Language | English |
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| Month | |
| Journal | Discourse Studies |
| Volume | 7 |
| Number | 1 |
| Pages | 5–29 |
| URL | Link |
| DOI | 10.1177/1461445605048765 |
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Abstract
Indirect complaint sequences are examined in a corpus of everyday domestic telephone conversations. The analysis focuses on how a speaker/complainer displays and manages their subjective investment in the complaint. Four features are picked out: (1) announcements, in which an upcoming complaint is projected in ways that signal the complainer’s stance or attitude; (2) laughter accompanying the complaint announcement, and its delivery and receipt; (3) displacement, where the speaker complains about something incidental to what would be expected to be the main offence; and (4) uses of lexical descriptions such as ‘moan’ and ‘whinge’ that formulate subjectivity, investment, and a disposition to complain, and are generally used to counter a complaint’s evidential basis or objectivity. Laughter and irony provide complaint recipients with response cues, and are used in ways that can strengthen as well as undermine a complaint’s factual basis and seriousness.
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