Foreign language acquisition through interaction — A critical review of research on conversational adjustments

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Journal of Pragmatics 26 (1996) 215-235

Foreign language acquisition through interaction - A critical review of research on conversational adjustments Johannes Wagner* Department of Language and Communication, Odense University, Campusvej 55, DK-5230 Odense M, Denmark

Abstract The observation has been made that speech in contacts between native and non-native speakers may be modified and simplified to the point of ungrammaticality (the me Tarzan, you Jane phenomenon). Since the early 1980s, a number of studies in Second Language Acquisition have carried the notion of modification into the analysis of the interaction itself. The goal was to learn about interactional modifications and about how they relate to processes of language acquisition. In these analyses, a number of concepts from Conversation Analysis (CA) have been applied. This paper discusses a number of methodological problems in this research, of which especially the model of communication assumed and the type of data analyzed are the most prominent. Finally the paper discusses problems related to the introduction of core CA concepts into research on native-nonnative speaker communication.

I. Introduction In this paper, foreign l a n g u a g e interaction ( F L I ) is d e f i n e d as s p o k e n interaction in w h i c h at least one participant uses a l a n g u a g e other than his or her native language. A t least one participant in F L I being a nonnative speaker (NNS), the other(s) m a y either be native speakers (NS) or NNS. In the latter case, w e have what is referred to as lingua franca interaction. Since the early 1980s, a large n u m b e r o f studies in the f r a m e w o r k o f S e c o n d L a n g u a g e A c q u i s i t i o n R e s e a r c h ( S L A ) , 1 have a n a l y z e d F L I in o r d e r to shed light on

I am grateful to a number of people for their comments and hints which have improved this text and my argument. Remaining flaws and weaknesses are my own responsibility. Special thanks goes to Eric Kellerman, Alan Firth, Gabriele Kasper, and Michael Moerman. * E-mail: [email protected] This paper is not intended as a survey. Its goal is to question certain methodological choices which seem to be made in studies on modifications and I will only refer to a small number of studies to illustrate my points. This may make the field appear more homogeneous than it is. 0378-2166/96/$15.00 Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved PII 0378-2166(96)00013-6

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p r o c e s s e s o f s e c o n d / f o r e i g n l a n g u a g e a c q u i s i t i o n in t h e s e e n c o u n t e r s . T h e r e s e a r c h has b e e n i n t e r e s t e d w h e t h e r salient m o d i f i c a t i o n s o f the d i s c o u r s e , as o b s e r v e d in F L I , i n f l u e n c e the c o u r s e or rate o f a c q u i s i t i o n . T h e v a n i s h i n g p o i n t o f this r e s e a r c h is w h e t h e r l a n g u a g e a c q u i s i t i o n can best be e x p l a i n e d w i t h r e f e r e n c e to i n t e r a c t i o n or w h e t h e r it has to be b a s e d on the d y n a m i c s o f innate l a n g u a g e s y s t e m s a n d / o r universal grammar. 2 T h e p h e n o m e n a r e f e r r e d to as m o d i f i c a t i o n s can be o b s e r v e d in the f o l l o w i n g e x c e r p t f r o m a c o n v e r s a t i o n b e t w e e n t w o N N S . T h e e x c h a n g e is t a k e n f r o m V a r o n i s and G a s s (1985a: 7 8 - 7 9 ) . T h e s p e a k e r s are f e m a l e E n g l i s h l a n g u a g e students at M i c h i g a n U n i v e r s i t y . S has S p a n i s h as h e r m o t h e r t o n g u e . J is J a p a n e s e . (1) 1 J 2S 3J 4S 5J 5S 7J 8S 9J lO S ll J 12 S 13 J 14 S 15 J 15 S

And your what is your mm father's j o b ? My father now is retire. retire ? yes oh yeah But he work with uh uh institution institution Do you know that? The name is ... some thin like eh control of the state aaaaaaaaah Do you understand more or less? State is uh ... what what kind of state? It is uhm Michigan State? No, the all nation No (back channel) government? all the nation, all the nation, Do you know for example is a the the institution m m m of the state mm of Venezuela 17 J ah ah 18 S had to declare declare? her ingress.

2 For my argument, 1 have to neglect a large number of studies which do refer to interaction, but do not have their focus on acquisition. This applies among others to studies on bilingual interaction, e.g. investigation of code switching. Bilingual speakers have more than one native language at their disposal. Hence, as a consequence of my initial definition, bilingual interaction is viewed as a special instance of native speaker communication. Furthermore, studies which are not oriented towards the micro-level of interaction are not referred to in this paper. This excludes a number of studies on speech act realization and cross-cultural pragmatics (for an overview cf. Kasper and Blum-Kulka, 1993), which refer to patterns of speech but do not analyze interactions in real time. Furthermore, studies which investigate miscommunications in FLI - most notably the work influenced by Gumperz (1982; Gumperz and Roberts, 1991), and Thomas (1983, 1984; Blum-Kulka and Olshtain, 1986) - are omitted, since they do not aim at a theory of language acquisition. Interestingly, the same argument goes for most work on foreign language classrooms (Chaudron, 1988). There is a small body of analyses of FLI which typically does not look at acquisition and therefore is not included here either. The work of Aston (1993), Anderson (1988), Day (1994), Hinnenkamp (1991) is based on the micro-analyses of data from FLIs. This work investigates aspects of foreign language use which are considerably different from those analyzed by modification studies.

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19J 20 S 21 J 22 S 23 J 24 S 25 J 26 S 27 J 28 S 29 30 31 32

J S J S

33 J 34 S

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English? No, English no (laugh) ... ingress, her ingress Ingress? Ingress, yes, INGRESS more or less Ingless Yes, if for example, if you, when you work you had an ingress, you know? uh huh an ingless? Yes uh huh OK yes, if for example, your homna, husband works, when finish, when end the month his job, his boss pay -mm-him something aaaah and your family have some ingress yes ah, OK OK more or less OK? and in this in this institution take care of all ingress of the company and review the accounts OK I got, I see OK my father work there, but now he is old

In the example, the two NNS try to clarify S's father's occupation. We cannot tell what mental image J finally creates, but, for an observer, the two women reach a vague understanding that S's father has retired from a state agency for (some kind of financial) affairs. In terms of current SLA research, both speakers use a number of modifications on the local level. They request clarification (J in 3, 7, 19), check their own comprehension/ask for confirmation (J in 11, 13, 15, 25) and check the other's comprehension (S in 10, 32). Moreover, S exemplifies several times (16, 24, 28). These procedures have been described as modifications on the local or tactical level (Long, 1983a). More global modifications which deploy certain procedures in the conversational structure, e.g., topic preparation, contextualization, have been described in the literature, but are not found in this example. Modifications are either due to the speaker's (S) inability to find the English word or triggered by her partner's demonstrated non-comprehension. The first type of modification, i.e. interactional compensation for a speaker's linguistic deficits, have been described as communication strategies (cf. F~erch and Kasper, 1983; Kasper and Kellerman, in press). The second type, interactional compensation for the listener's linguistic deficits, are referred to by a number of terms: speech modification (Gass and Varonis, 1985), conversational adjustments (Larsen-Freeman and Long, 1991), interlanguage adjustments (Pica, 1988), interactional modifications (Pica et al., 1986) or modified input (Kelch, 1985). Other studies focus more on the level of discourse itself and talk about interaction of comprehension (Pica et al., 1987), negotiation of comprehensible input (Ehrlich et al., 1989) or discourse of accommodation (Ross and Berwick, 1992). In this paper I will use the term (conversational) modi-

fications. Studies of modifications aim at the description of the linguistic and interactional procedures by which (native) speakers make elements of the foreign language accessible for their (non-native) partners, which otherwise would be above their compre-

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hension threshold. Studies of modifications form a very influential body of research. The results are extensively referred to in almost any introduction to language acquisition as being the established core of knowledge in the field. 3 In section 2 of this paper, I will sketch the theoretical approach of the SLA studies of modifications. From the perspective of studies of talk-in-interaction (as many conversation analysts prefer to call their field), I will in the third section offer a critical view of the methodology of these studies. In section 4 of this paper, I will draw attention to other types of FLI than those described by current SLA studies.

2. SLA studies on acquisition through interaction During the 1980s, a large number of studies in SLA engaged the question of how communication and language acquisition are related. The research interest grew out of the development of foreign language teaching which SLA caters for: since the 1970s, foreign language teaching has been dominated by several types of communicative approach (cf. Wagner, 1983; Savignon, 1991). All presuppose that communicative use of the foreign language is a prerequisite for acquisition. Consequently, the value and function of language use for language acquisition becomes a relevant topic for SLA research. In search of a better understanding of the relation between communication and acquisition, SLA has developed and investigated several concepts. One of them is input. When Corder (1967) distinguished between input and intake, he intended input to refer to the language NNS meet in their contact with NS. Intake, on the other hand, referred to what NNS are cognitively able to process in order to develop a command of the foreign language. Taking Corder's distinction seriously created interest in the ways in which NNS encounter input and may use it for acquisition. Ferguson (1971, 1975) had already demonstrated the phenomenon of linguistic modifications, i.e. the pidginized language (foreigner talk.) NS may use in interactions with NNS. The seminal work which had triggered subsequent research on interactional modifications had been undertaken by Hatch as early as 1978. Hatch looked at the interaction between NS and NNS and demonstrated how topics are developed by topic preparation, repairs and by other types of discourse modifications. Her interest in the study of interaction had been inspired by research on first language acquisition according to which syntactic structures develop out of interaction. Through a process of 'scaffolding', syntactic structures are distributed over several turns and between several speakers. In this way, NNS may begin structures which the native partner takes over and finishes, thereby creating models for acquisition. A specific model for the role of input was provided by Krashen (1982, 1985). He argued that slightly advanced input (i+ 1) is the key element for language acquisition: 3 For recent introductions, compare Ellis (1986: 133ff.; 1990: 107ft.; 1994: 243ff.; Larsen-Freeman and Long, 1991: 120ff.; Lightbownand Spada, 1993: 29ff.) Compare likewise the state of the art papers by Pica (1994a,b).

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"We acquire by understanding language that contains structure a bit beyond our current level of competence (i+l). This is done with the help of context or extra-linguistic information" (1982: 21). Confronted with advanced input, NNS are just able to make sense of what they are exposed to and are at the same time supplied with advanced structures which they can acquire. While Krashen focused on the aspect of input in FLI, Long (1981, 1983a,b) set the agenda for further research on this topic by explicitly distinguishing between linguistic and interactional adaptation. He argued in favour of the central role of interaction, such that conversational modifications are a product of a joint effort of NS and NNS. The negotiation of meaning between the conversationalists makes language input comprehensible for NNS. To put it in Corder's terms: intake is not simply taken as being a part of input, but input is made intake by certain conversational procedures. In 'successful' communication ( 1 9 8 2 : 2 1 ) NS formally and interactionally adapt to the linguistic level of the NNS, hereby creating intake in Corder's terms. Long actually goes further and claims that interactive modifications are the crucial condition for language acquisition to take place. According to Ellis (1990: 99), he claims that "greater quantities of comprehensible input result in better (or at least faster) acquisition" and "lack of access to comprehensible input [...] results in little or no acquisition". Ellis (1990) christens Long's approach the interaction hypothesis in contrast to Krashen's input hypothesis. All in all, a specific research paradigm was put forward in the early 1980s. The research hypothesis was that language acquisition depends on input and that input is made available and processible for NNS by linguistic and conversational assistance on the part of the NS. During the next 10 years, the number of publications on FLI mushroomed. Three different, but related questions were investigated: (1) What is the form and structure of modifications and the discourse they are part of? (2) Do modifications actually help comprehension? (3) Do modifications, by helping comprehension, help acquisition? The first question has been investigated by a large number of studies. The state of the art has been summarized by a recent paper by Yano et al. (1994: 192-193): "Conversational adjustments affect both the content and interactional structure of foreigner talk discourse. Where content is concerned,conversationwith NNSs tends to have more of a here-and-noworientation and to treat a more predictable, narrower range of topics more briefly, for example, by dealing with fewer information bits and by maintaining a lower ratio of topic-initiating to topic-continuing moves. The interactional structure of NS-NNS conversation is marked by abrupt topic-shifts, more use of questions for topic-initiating moves, more repetition of various kinds (including semantic repetition, or paraphrase), and more comprehensionchecks, confirmationchecks, clarification requests, expansion, question-and-answer strings, and decomposition." Researchers agreed on the category of foreigner talk discourse as being specifically suited to the acquisitional needs of the NNS. But, as Larsen-Freeman and Long argue, "it is not the use of devices like those illustrated which distinguishes FTD [foreigner talk discourse] from NS-NS conversation, but rather their statistically significant higher frequency of use" ( 1991 : 125f.). A number of studies have elaborated on the second question, i.e. the role of modification for comprehension. In several studies Pica and her associates looked at dif-

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ferent types of modification and their role in understanding. Pica et al. (1987) demonstrated that interactionally-modified input leads to higher levels of comprehension. Pica (1992) compared comprehension in three different interactional environments: (a) the learner was involved in the negotiation, (b) the input negotiations were observed by the learner, and (c) learners listened to modified input. Pica's results show no clear differences between the three settings, but she points out that learners with a low level of comprehension need more interactive modification than learners with a higher comprehension ability. The third question, whether modification leads to language acquisition, had already been criticized at an early date (cf. F~erch and Kasper, 1986). Long's claim, which has been supported by indirect evidence, was investigated in a recent study by Ellis et al. (1994). The study shows that input modification helps comprehension but demonstrates no effects on the acquisition of new words. Generally speaking, studies on modification have established the claim that input modification helps comprehension, while the claim that it ultimately leads to acquisition still needs empirical support.

3. A critical review of some basic notions in research on modifications

The studies of modification have put forward a number of claims about the nature of FLI, as the earlier quotation from Yano et al. (1994) nicely summarizes. Looking at the methodology of these studies from a different angle, though, raises methodological challenges and problems, namely the model of communication and the data used in the studies. 3.1. The model of communication and the concept of 'negotiation of meaning' Studies on input modification operate in the framework of the information transfer model of communication. This is very obvious in some early studies and is still a hidden presupposition in more recent ones. The well-known model operates as described by Shannon and Weaver and is referred to in any introduction to communication (e.g. Burgoon et al., 1994; Fiske, 1991). According to this model, communication is an exchange process where information is coded by the sender and transferred to the receiver where it is decoded. The goal of communication is complete exchange of information. If the receiver is in a position to decode all the meanings encoded by the sender, the exchange is complete, and communication has succeeded. Incomplete exchange may be due to several reasons. It may result from faulty encoding by the sender, channel noise or flawed decoding. To compensate, the sender may anticipate possible flaws, modify the message sent and make it more robust, or receiver conditions may be changed. If they cannot be changed in the short term - as in the case of NNS - the success of the communication depends solely on the sender. Senders may (p)restructure information on the global, strategic, level, locally adjust the coding procedure, and repair flawed exchanges post hoc.

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The implications of the model for a theory of conversational modifications can be illustrated by two papers of Varonis and Gass (1985a,b). In 1985a, Varonis and Gass distinguish between nonunderstandings and misunderstandings. Nonunderstandings are defined as "those exchanges in which there is some overt indication that understanding between participants has not been complete" (p. 73). In misunderstandings, the participants themselves have not detected that understanding is incomplete. In 1985b, however, Varonis and Gass only use one term: misunderstandings "may or may not be recognized, and if they are recognized, may or may not be commented on" (p. 327). There is a crucial methodological difference between the two versions. In the former version, participant's and analyst's perspectives are kept apart. The analyst is able to clarify which techniques the conversationalists deploy in the case of nonunderstandings to obtain complete understanding. In the case of misunderstanding, the analyst might possibly detect their reasons, even though the participants may not be aware of them at all. In the latter version, this essential distinction is neutralized. Here, no distinction is made between, on the one hand, the information the participants have access to at the time of the encounter and which they demonstrably use in the interaction and, on the other hand, the information which the analyst happens to come across and which may or may not have been accessible by the participants. Understanding is measured by the correct transfer of information. This is illustrated by a piece of data which is used twice by Varonis and Gass. In Varonis and Gass (1985a: 74) the exchange is quoted as

(2) Julie: Martha:

I'm sorry to have called you so early, but I'm just on my way out of the house for (indiscernible) no response

In (1985b: 328f.) a different version is quoted:

(3) Melissa: I'm sorry to have called you so early, but I'm just on my way out of the house for.. (unintelligible) Beverly: That's OK. I was up. According to Varonis and Gass, the second speaker does not understand that the first speaker says she was going to Toronto and the example illustrates communication going wrong. Martha is not responding because there is no 'complete' understanding. The data, though, do not tell the reader whether the interactants at this time in the conversation detect that something is wrong. Neither do they indicate any kind of faulty understanding. Actually, in example (3), it is difficult to see the interactional relevance of the unintelligible part of the utterance. Melissa accounts for her early call by referring to her leaving the house early. By accepting the account as an apology, Beverly goes along with it. In producing the second part of the pair apology-accept, she does what Melissa prefers: Melissa's account is treated as an apology for her early call. Even though Beverly does not understand a part of Melissa's turn, she accepts the turn as a mundane apology. As far as the reader is allowed to

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follow, there is no problem here and no misunderstanding. Certainly, though, the 'missing' information may be relevant for a different part of the conversation. If this turns out to be the case, the point may have to be made again, possibly some time later. But then it would be in the conversation. But from the glimpse Varonis and Gass allow us, there is nothing unusual here and the speakers do not refer to the lack of understanding as a problem. Now, if the speakers do not seem to have a problem, how and why should the analyst? The concept of non-understanding does not make very much sense here. The problem emerges only if the analyst operates in a framework of "faulty message transmission and/or reception" (Varonis and Gass, 1985b: 331). Consequently, the problem of non-understanding arises as an artefact of an analysis which models communication as information transfer and which takes the propositional value of an utterance as its sole and supreme value. Other studies on modifications focus less on the propositions and more on the dynamics of conversations, i.e. the modifications of the message. Here, the presupposition of the information transfer model is less obvious but still in place. These studies operate with a concept of 'normal' interaction which is understood to be the unproblematic exchange of information. The 'real', 'pure', 'intended', 'undisturbed', 'unmodified' information is presupposed to be best transferred between native speakers. This is the baseline towards which studies of modifications orient. Sometimes, though, even in baseline interactions, 'normality' is interrupted. When speakers expect or become aware that there is a mis- or nonunderstanding, they may leave the main topic and initiate side sequences to clarify their point. Varonis and Gass refer to this distinction as horizontal versus vertical development in the interaction. Each time the horizontal flow is disturbed, vertical 'trouble shooting' (Aston, 1986) may surface. When the trouble is resolved, the speakers merge back into the horizontal flow. Any conversation follows this shift between horizontal and vertical movement and involves trouble shooting from time to time, but FLI is characterized by a very large number of these interruptions. In a number of studies, these vertical modifications and strategic behaviour of speakers have been referred to as negotiation of meaning. "'When participating in face-to-face interaction, conversationalists cooperate to sustain the conversation and establish understanding (Goffman 1974). As Garfinkel (1976) points out, this is an ongoing negotiation process. Here we describe it in terms of the 'work' involved in helping one another communicatively, for example by jointly expressing messages, filling in lapses in the conversation, indicating gaps in understanding, and repairing communication breakdowns." (Scarcella and Higa, 1981: 410) Negotiation of meaning is a metaphor for the sensemaking activity of both partners. It is not reducible to a repair process. Studies of talk-in-interaction have demonstrated that all communication is constructional - even though this may be more explicit in some conversations than in others. Negotiation, then, is the prime ongoing activity of the conversationalists, as becomes clear in the following quotation from Heritage (1989: 32): "A basic reference point in this field ]the relationship between speech, gaze and body movements] is C. Goodwin's (...) demonstration that the production of a turn at talk is itself the object of active management in which the interactants engage in fine-grained 'negotiations' over speaking and hearing roles."

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It should be mentioned that this is one of the few passages of recent work on talkin-interaction which uses the term negotiation at all - clearly marked as a metaphor. In contrast, the metaphor of negotiation is strikingly popular in modification studies (cf. the overview by Pica, 1994a). It allows to rewrite interaction as information transfer, to isolate meaning transfer from meaning construction activities which are restricted to trouble solving, to code and quantify these episodes in the flow of interaction, and to calculate them against the baseline. The information transfer model surfaces again from below the negotiation metaphor. Actually, the negotiation metaphor fits nicely into the information transfer model, which is an exchange model - as is the 'market'. When exchange processes are interrupted, negotiation and bargaining can begin! A large number of studies on talk-in-interaction have shown a very different perception of interaction. To put it plainly, neither the concept of pure information transfer, of a baseline or of modification is useful for the analysis of naturally occurring data. Meaning is not a 'fixed' concept, but is shaped locally by participants who draw on all available resources. Being a non-native speaker may be used as a local resource, a condition towards which the speakers orient (cf. Aston, 1993; Wagner and Firth, 1996; Firth, 1996 (this issue)). All conversational turns are designed for specific recipients. There is no 'optimal' 'recipient-free' baseline as presupposed by modification studies. Any 'baseline' will be projected unto data, since any act of communication is locally accomplished, i.e. draws on all available resources which may vary from case to case. Being the essential activity in interaction, negotiation of meaning cannot reasonably be isolated from 'normal' interaction. One central feature of meaning creation is the positioning of speakers' turns. Broadly speaking, the meaning of a speaker's turn is what the next speaker makes of it. In this sense, any turn has a potential for meaning which is narrowed down in subsequent interaction. In this framework, all communication involves negotiation of meaning: "... one central feature in conversation is that participants constantly and conjointly stretch their meaning creating potentials; often, it seems, to the limits. Many studies spanning a wide range of approaches to talk and social interaction have shown that speakers attempt to use all available information in conversation as a resource to create and continually (re)negotiate interpersonal meaning. Therefore speakers use formats such as pauses and other markers, and listeners deploy mechanisms such as repair, formulations, and control checks to clarify whether they have inferred the meaning acceptable to the speaker." (Wagner and Firth, 1996) In contrast to an information transfer model, the negotiation process itself is for an interactive approach the main object of analysis. Such an approach is fundamentally different from the view held by modification studies, according to which the use of certain elements (modifications) matters. In this way, the interaction process is projected onto the use of linguistic elements.

3.2. Data in input modification studies Almost any data in input modification studies are elicited in laboratory settings. Typically test subjects operate in dyads. A number of different tasks have been used:

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interview type interactions, games, narratives, instructions (Long, 1983a), picture drawing tasks (Ehrlich et al., 1991) and discussions (Zuengler and Bent, 1991). Sometimes there are "no instructions other than to talk in English with each other" (Varonis and Gass, 1985a: 72). 'Baseline' data are elicited by asking NS dyads to perform the same activity. Very often subjects do not know each other beforehand, so the data are actually drawn from their very first meeting. Transcripts are rarely provided, though one interaction is quoted in Larsen-Freeman and Long (1991: 146-147). Larsen-Freeman and Long provide some ethnographic information about the data: NS "is female, Caucasian American, in her late twenties, and a speaker of 'educated West Coast (Los Angeles) English'." NNS "is a male Japanese office worker in his mid twenties (...) He is a 'beginner'. This is their first meeting, which has been arranged by the researcher". The transcription has been rearranged according to the standard used in this paper. (4) 1 NS

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22

are you a student in Japan? no I am not (..) I am worker you're a worker what kind of work do you do? uh I'm a/o~er/(3/o~er/ official! [official [Official of (.) (pu-) public ah you work for the government uhm (pref-?) (..) no? (I don't understand) no. [pre? [/prifek prif ker/ s- Japan has uh (....) many/prifkers/ factory (.) [factory? [no what is it? can you tell me? what is that? uhm city city [city have/afsr/? aha [right ah you work for the city what do you do? what do you do? ((pause of seven 'beats')) NS do you talk (.) to people? do you write (.) letters? NNS (write write) NS you write good uh how ~ (.) have you been working NNS NS NNS NS NNS NS NNS NS NNS NNS NS NNS NS NNS NS NS

No information about the interactants' task is provided, but it may be supposed that the example is covered by what Long (1983 a) calls 'informal conversation'. Apparently the subjects are trying to get to know each other. In doing so, they enact a conversation which partly reminds one of an unstructured interview, partly of classroom talk: The NS asks questions about the NNS. The NNS answers and talks about himself. New topics are introduced by the NS, who elicits information and behaves as if she is ticking off questions on a questionnaire. But the agenda seems to be developed on the spot, for otherwise an answer such as 'write ' (line 20) would hardly count as the description of a civil servant's work (line 21).

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In line 1, NS asks for NNS's occupation, using a yes-no question format. NNS is showing cooperation since he not only answers 'no', but goes on and provides more information: he is a worker. When NS asks for further specification in line 3, both interactants cooperate in clarifying that NNS is a civil servant in a Japanese city. In line 17, NS summarizes what NNS is doing. Between line 3 and line 17 an exchange unfolds which resembles a guessing game with NS in the role of the friendly, openminded, creative guesser. In line 4, NS starts a self repair. There is a short pause after the first 'o~er' where NS might have signalled nonverbally that she did not understand, but the data only show that NNS repairs his utterance. This repair is taken as an invitation for a NS repair (line 5). NS guesses the lexical item 'official', which is rephrased and thereby accepted by NNS, who is trying to specify what kind of an official he is. In line 7, NS again rephrases NNS utterance. A chain of mutual repairs and rephrasings follows, until NS is able to conclude in line 17. Here, NS is back in the eliciting role, leading on to the next question about the job activities NNS performs. NS and NNS chat in friendlyfashion - not surprisingly given the situation the two speakers are placed in. NS is collecting information which stays at a superficial level: 'You write. Good' (line 21). This is their first meeting, taking place in a lab conversation with no background knowledge about the other participant. Long and Larsen Freeman conclude that the speakers talk about here-and-now topics, use interactional modification, repeat, paraphrase and check for confirmation. What else could they do? But - if this is a modified interaction - what would be the baseline conversation? The problem is not that the speakers are doing what they do, the problem is that data of this kind are taken to represent FLI and that results are generalizations about the NNS's role in conversation (compare the earlier quote from Yano et al.). My argument concerns the validity of these claims. If it can be shown that naturally occurring FLI - even in initial encounters - can take very different forms, generalization on the basis of the earlier mentioned data alone have to be handled cautiously. In example (5), a female Greek immigrant to Germany converses with a German shop worker who is delivering soft drinks to her house. The example is quoted from Jakovidou (1994: 304-305). Due to the frequent use of simplified forms (foreigner talk), I have chosen to provide an interlinear translation only. (5) 1 NNS Heute bible sp~it kommen Du. Today a little late come yot; 2 NS Gril3gott. Hello 3 NNS DriBgott. Hello (15 lines removed) 4 NNS A so n~ichste Woche daene Vaataar, ah? And then next week your father, TAG4

4 TAG refers to tags as in English isn't it, wouldn't you.

226 5 NS 6 NNS 7 NS 8 NNS 9 NS 10 NNS 11 NS 12 NNS 13 NS 14 NNS 15 NS 16 NNS 17 NS 18 NNS 19 NS

20 NNS 21 NS

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Letzte Woche Vater waar, Last week father was Vater, father Ja ja. Warum Du nix kommen? why you no come Doch. Yes, I did Ja. Ha hm. Daene Vater kommen, oda? your father come, or what? Achsoo, Vater kommen, ja. oh well, father come, yes Nja. Achsoo, ha ii oh yeah, well I Eeh eh daene Vata kom (..) er er your father come Jaa egaal, oder? well, who cares, TAG? (Di). Jaa egal i sagen warum. Du krank? well who cares I say why. you ill? Ja, ich haabe dann andre. Ich waar aao dabei. Ich aoch dabei, aber ich waar bae Schmitt drtitiben, gal. yes, I have others. I was there too. 1 was there, but I was at Schmitt's over there, TAG Hoaah, Vaater halt hierher. father happened to (came) here

Jakovidou's transcript does not carry any intonational and nonverbal information. It is taken from a paper on foreigner talk and illustrates a number o f linguistic modifications in German, but there are no interactional modifications. This can be explained by the reversed roles of NS and N N S : contrary to example (4) and to other data from modification studies. In (5), the initiative is taken by the NNS. In most modification studies, topics are described as generally carefully prepared and contextualized by the NS before a question is launched. In example (5) things are different. In line 4, NNS introduces a new topic: 'and then next week your father, T A G ' . This could be interpreted as initiating an agreement about next w e e k ' s delivery. NS could react by saying something like 'Sure! M a y b e ' , or 'I d o n ' t k n o w ' , but he does not. He repairs N N S ' s time reference and makes it a statement about the week before. We do not know if that actually was what N N S had in mind, but she accepts implicitly the repair by asking why NS did not come himself. Which he did, so he informs her. N N S ' s turn in line 12 seems to indicate that she is puzzled ' y o u r father come, or w h a t ? ' Apparently, there is a contradiction between NS line 5 and line 9.

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NS makes no move to enlighten NNS, but tries to abandon the topic in line 17 'well, who cares, TAG? '. NNS cooperates in giving up the topic, but goes on by making it metacommunicatively explicit 'I say' (cf. Schiffrin, 1980) that she is trying to be nice, that she is doing social talk by asking if NS had been ill. Based on this explicit announcement of the social, i.e. phatic, intention NNS's turns in 1 and 4 might now be heard retrospectively as initiations of phatic talk. There is a development from line 1 over 5, 9, 13, 15, and 17 where NS initially is a bit unsure about what kind of conversation they are having - to put it in speech act terms, he is not sure about the illocutionary force of NNS's utterances. When NNS becomes explicit in line 18, NS in a longer turn explains the possible contradiction between 5 and 9. We cannot answer the question whether the NS and NNS are moving in the fashion they do as a result of NNS's restricted command of German. It is difficult to say if lines 4, 8, 16 and 18 in a baseline conversation between two NS would have been replaced by something like 'Did your father deliver soft drinks last week because you were ill?' The only thing we know is, how these conversationalists in this particular situation proceeded. In general, NS and NNS speech in example (5) shows heavy linguistic modification but no interactional ones. Questions are asked by the NNS. The topic is clearly not primarily referential but social. And there is very close cooperation between the two. By frequent use of tags confirming statements of the other part are invited and given: 4-5, 12-13, 13-14, 17-18 and 19-20. Close cooperation of the interactants is shown by a second feature: the use of parallel constructions (compare line 4 and 5, line 12 and 13 and line 17 and 18) where the speakers mirror each others formulations. It could be said that the interactants in example (5) show the same style of close cooperation and attention to each other as the speakers show in examples (1) and (4), though not by using conversational modifications. In connection with another example, I will argue that the difference between example (5) and data from current modification studies is by no means accidental but systematic. Example (6) is taken from a project on international business communication between commercial companies (Wagner, 1995; Wagner and Firth, 1996). Today, FLI is a routine phenomenon in Europe. People communicate in languages other than their mother tongue in the workplace and in daily life. This happens not only between employees in one company site (native-immigrant interaction), but in the close cooperation of companies across borders. The conversations recorded in the business project are part of the interactants' daily work using foreign languages. Obviously, the participants do not restrict themselves to here-and-now topics but follow their professional agenda. Example (6) is a telephone conversation between a Danish employee of a small Danish company which delivers steel constructions and a German who is employed by a very large industrial conglomerate. The Danish company is currently producing constructions for the German company, which has asked the Danes if they could produce tanks for tanker trucks. The Danes think they can do it, but need further information about the very tight German security regulations for this type of truck. One relevant regulation is the GGVS, the regulation for road transportation of dangerous

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goods. The Danes have r e c e i v e d a telefax with a blueprint o f the tank to built. It has to be p r o d u c e d according to the G G V S . Here, the Danish engineer in charge calls his G e r m a n colleague, w h o is not in at the m o m e n t . His call is transferred to another engineer in the G e r m a n c o m p a n y . (6) 1 NNS .h ich habe ein anfrage g gekricht numma fianfhundertunzw61f (0.5) von herr KOrten. I received an inquiry number 512 (0.5) from Mr. K/Srten ja? 2 NS 3 NNS un e: es ist ein ehm (0.3) behalta (0.3) *behalta* (1). and it is a (0.3) container (0.3) container ja: 4 NS 5 NNS tt kenn sie das do you know it 6NS xxxx xxxx xxxx das jetz konkret=is. (it depends) what it is about 7 NNS tt.h. [das is (0.3) 8 NS [(denn bei dem) [that is [because in the 9 NNS das (.) e es heifSt=eh: (.) ein kessel=ja? es heil3t ge ge (.) vau es it (.) it says=er (.) a tank=yes? it says GGVS ja:a? 10 NS 11 NNS schlammkamma sptilwassa un ktihlwassa mud compartment used water and cooling water jaa? 12 NS 13 NNS .h eh 14 NS is mit drei kammern is der oder was with three compartments isn't it 15 NNS ja? ja 16 NS 17 NNS (.) genau. (.) genau..h un ich will sehr gem wissen (0.3) was ist=e:: ge ge vau es (1.5) (.) exactly. (.) exactly, and I would really like to know (0.3) what is GGVS (1.5) 18 NS das is die gefahrgutverordnung straBe. (2.5) it's is the regulation for transport of dangerous goods 19 NNS blttE??hh hhe hh (0.3) excuse me? 20 NS die gefahr gut verordnung straBe. the regulation for transport of dangerous goods 21 NNS (0.8) ge fffffahr (0.3) gut (2) und 22 NS verordnung 23 NNS ver (.) ord (.) nung= 24 NS straBe. (2.5) 25 NNS stral3e. (2) und un was is das. road (2) and an what is it 26 NS das is hier in Deutschland (.) das is n (.) druckbeh~ilta ja? it's here in Germany (.) it is a pressure tank, isn't it

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27 NNS ja:a? 28 NS un=der wird nach dieser verordnung mul3 de:r (.) gepriift un ausgelecht sein. (1).h u::nd (1)jetz von ihm schweiBverfahrn da mii6tn sie glaub ich auch ne zulassung habn. ne tiivzulassung. and according to this regulation it has to be (.) testetd and designed (1) and (1) well, regarding your welding technique you have to be certified, a Tf2V certification 29 NNS jaa? un=das ist auch notwendich= yes? and it is necessary 30 NS das is notwendig weil der (.) vom ttiv wird er abgenommn? (0.5) dann wit nomalerweise auch schon in dem (.) werk=getz wo der hergestellt wird (.) ttivgeprtift. it is necessary because it (.) it will be tested by the Tf,.)V (0.5) then normally it is already tested in the company where it is produced 31 NNS jaa? 32 NS .h und da sind dann die schwei ei=einmal mul3 der betrieb (.) ne zulassung habn. diese schweil3arbeitn durchzufiihrn und die schweil3er mtissen auch (.) ein=e entsprechende (.) qualifikation ham and then there are the wel first the company needs a certification to do these weldings and the welders must have the right qualification 33 NNS ja:a? (1) oke:: The two speakers do not know each other, so it is their first encounter. But - contrary to expectations based on the modification studies mentioned above - there are few interactional modifications. There is, though, a very interesting 'requests for clarification' sequence (line 17 onwards), which will be given closer scrutiny. After having tried to elicit more information by means of a global request (line 5, 'do you know it'), NNS reads from the inquiry he has received (line 9, 'it says'). His main problem, the meaning of the acronym G G V S is already announced here, but by mentioning it in a list ('it says=er (.) a tank=yes? it says G G V S [...] mud compartment used water and cooling water'). In this way, G G V S appears to be a description of the tank itself. In line 17, NNS asks what GGVS stands for. A pause of 1.5 second follows, NS replies and his turn is, again, followed by a very noticeable pause of 2.5 seconds. So, the turns in line 18 and in line 19 are considerably delayed - compared to turnshifts in the rest of the example. If NS should be surprised by the question in line 17, he does not show this in his own turn. He does not mark his utterance in line 18 in any way, e.g. by intonation, reduced speech, hesitation signals or other elements. So, the pause could simply be the access time he needs for the translation of the acronym. NNS in his delayed turn in line 19, however, exclaims 'excuse m e ' , accompanied by a laugh. By pause, exclamation and laughter NNS indicates surprise and non-understanding. Now, NS has the option of reacting to this as a linguistic problem and kickstarting the input modification machine which would generate contextualizing, checks for understanding and other means. But he does not. He repeats himself slightly more accentuated and NNS notes down the term (lines 21 to 25). The notetaking activity again demonstrates that NNS is lost: he cannot even remember the whole word but asks for assistance (line 21). NS does not volunteer any explanation.

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Neither does he modify his speech or slow down his speech rate during the following explanation sequence. Hereby he treats NNS's difficulties as conceptual, not linguistic. Even though NS in line 26 contextualizes the concept GGVS with 'here in Germany', his contextualization is oriented towards conceptual problems. Apparently, indications of nonunderstanding alone do not trigger input modification. In this aspect, example (5) is prototypical of the data collected in the business project. Why, then, is there an abundance of input modifications in SLA studies but not in these naturally occurring data? Gaies (1982) speculates "NS discourse modifications are made in accordance with the perceived proficiency of the NNS participant". So the answer to the question may be that the NNS in (5) is perceived to be more proficient than the NNS in the modification studies. It is difficult to decide if he really is. He seems to be fluent in German and English business calls, while his fluency is noticeably less in typical classroom tasks like picture description. Based on all the data recorded in the business project, it seems fair to say that proficiency seems not to be a major factor for input modifications deployed by native partners. This fits very nicely with what was observed in the case of the Greek speaker in example (4). My guess is that the lack of modifications in (5) and (6) has to do with the NNS having the initiative in the conversation 5 and with their social roles in the encounter. In (5), NNS is initiating the conversation. In (6), NNS is the caller. Furthermore, especially in the case of the business project, professional expectations towards the business partners' competence may play a role. Even with non-fluent partners, NS and NNS in the business data do not deploy heavy linguistic or interactional modification which would resemble examples (1) and (4). In not doing so, they do not orient their contribution towards their partners' linguistic competence but towards their professional competence. By doing so, they may ascribe a competence to their partners which might be unjustified. On the other hand, the lack of modification in the business data might indicate that modifications are interpretable as social intrusions which might be acceptable in teacher talk but not in professional settings. In general, all these explanations have to do with the recipient design of a conversationalist's turn. Recipient design means that speakers orient their turns towards the conditions valid for the listener at the point of the conversation. Recipient design, therefore, is always a local matter. In the case of FLI, recipient design may work in a number of ways. Certainly, NS has expectations about the NNS' linguistic and conceptual competence and will assess it conversationally. Recipient design will be oriented towards the partner's nonnativeness, towards his/her signalled non-understanding. But it is necessarily also oriented towards the partner's professional competence, which is also expected to include language competence. Whatever explanation may be valid in each instance, it seems clear that broad generalisations cannot be made. There is no general rule about how NS and NNS converse, and the investigation of conversational techniques related to modification is in its infancy. Not only do modification studies operate on an empirical basis that is far too narrow, but they neglect the local accom-

5 Cf. Zuengler(1993).

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plishment of recipient design and put the focus on the speaker while it should be just as much on the listener. Generalisation from these studies into environments outside language teaching seems to be unjustified. The heavy load of input modification seems at least partly to be a problem created by the elicitation procedure itself. Long (1983a: 131) is aware of this problem and tries to minimize it "Results from a controlled laboratory study like this one must obviously also be treated cautiously. (...) however, some loss in external validity might be considered a small price for the more fundamentally important internal validity". As a matter of fact, the validity problem seems to be much greater than Long concedes. Elicited data of FLI are only partly valid.

4. Conversation analysis of foreign language data Studies of interactional modifications make use of core CA concepts such as turn taking, repair, acknowledgment tokens or backchannels, adjacency pairs, openings. While these concepts are used in CA to explain how conversationalists organize talk in interaction, modification studies tend to interpret them as decontextualized coding categories. Thus these concepts may very well lose their meaning. To take an extreme example: in 1982, Varonis and Gass investigated NS variation in responding to natives and nonnatives. They sent a number of speakers (low and high proficient nonnative speakers of English, native speakers "feigning a nonnative speaker mode" (1982:116f.) and native speakers) to ask for directions to the train station. According to Varonis and Gass 'the same question' was asked by all speakers, but they overlook the fact that this 'same' question was asked in a number of different ways. Varonis and Gass themselves quote the following variations: Please, I need information about the station train. Can you tell me where the train station is? I need information about the station train. Do you know? Can you tell me how to get to the train station from here? It is evident that the speakers have not asked the same question. They may have asked for the same referential information but they have oriented themselves differently towards their partner. As a matter of fact, a higher standard of transcription may reveal even more fine-tuned information about these matters. Being the first part of an adjacency pair, a question sets the frame for the answer. If a question is asked in different ways, then no doubt the reactions will be different. A number of studies have demonstrated that talk in interaction is extremely well organized and well tuned. Now, Varonis and Gass code the answers and relate them to their groups of test subjects, revealing that a certain response has been given to NS, NNS or to natives feigning an accent. Since we do not know how the individuals have formulated their question, this categorization does not make any sense at all. If coding answers is the thing to do, it should be related to variables in the first pair part, i.e. the question. Actually Varonis and Gass demonstrate what Schegloff (1993)

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criticizes about quantification of CA concepts: it projects different instances onto the same coding category and loses sight of the object which should be described. Even though Gass and Varonis' procedure is extreme, it is fair to say that modification studies have made use of decontextualized CA concepts, thereby obstructing the analytic view of the techniques NS and NNS use cooperatively in making sense. A conversation analysis of foreign language data has to describe how nonnative talk in interaction is organized, how speakers create orderliness (cf. Aston, 1993; Anderson, 1988; Day, 1994; Hinnenkamp, 1991). This, then, may give way to different perspectives on the acquisition of language. Still, this work needs to be done. CA is - as part of its ethnomethodological heritage - interested in describing how social order is produced in interaction. CA describes social order being instantiated locally and only hereby coming into existence. Social concepts are not constructs of the analyst but of the member who is doing social order. Therefore, the analyst has to reconstruct the perspective and knowledge of the participants in talk. Current CA, though, is not geared towards the analysis of FLI. It takes linguistic competence on the part of the conversationalists for granted. The prototypical conversationalist is a monolingual speaker in a stable first language setting, preferably the analyst's own. In such cases, the analyst has the necessary membership knowledge to understand ongoing interaction. CA's sociocultural bias has been challenged from inside. Moerman's work in particular argued in favour of 'culturally contexted conversation analysis' (Moerman, 1988). The situation is different in the case of FLI, however, where culture and cultural interpretation systems are much more fuzzy. In whose cultural frame does FLI operate? How can members of different cultures make themselves understood? Even though conversationalists may have a very limited command of the language they use, the basic conversational organization seems to work. NNS are able to make sense in FLI. If NNS are able to do this, it must be possible to analyze how they are doing it. This is clearly a challenge to current CA (cf. Firth, 1996 (this issue)). The challenge aims directly at the methodological heart of CA: It is paramount for the analysis that the participants themselves refer to a problem of communication. But at least anecdotal evidence indicates that they very often don't do this. They may walk away from a FLI with the gut feeling that one - or the other, respectively - has not understood what was going on. The German speaker in example (3) seems to be in that situation when he asks, 'who cares?'. Following Garfinkel, Aston (1986) distinguishes b e t w e e n f o r m a l and substantive understanding. In substantive understanding, the participants create meaning jointly. In formal understanding, the interactants act without understanding but as if they had understood. There is no trace in the data that the understanding is not substantive. This kind of formal understanding seems to be quite common in FLI. My guess is that very often the participants are aware of it. CA, being a situated study of interaction, does not handle post hoc reports and is therefore unable to analyze cases of formal understanding. For the time being, it is unclear to me how data of this type might be analyzed. The methodological implications have to be carefully considered. This paper argues that speakers in FLI may orient themselves very differently. The body of studies in a SLA framework criticized above apparently describes inter-

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a c t i o n w h e r e the p a r t i c i p a n t s o r i e n t t o w a r d s l e a r n i n g . B u t p a r t i c i p a n t s in talk m a y o r i e n t t h e m s e l v e s t o w a r d s o t h e r factors u n d e r other c i r c u m s t a n c e s . S L A studies d e s c r i b e a r e l e v a n t social activity: l e a r n i n g . B u t they h a v e to b e c o m p l e m e n t e d b y studies o f n a t u r a l l y o c c u r r i n g n o n - n a t i v e t a l k - i n - i n t e r a c t i o n .

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