Irony in political television debates

Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Pragmatics journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/pragma

Irony in political television debates Pirkko Nuolija¨rvi a,*, Liisa Tiittula b a b

Research Institute for the Languages of Finland, Vuorikatu 24, FIN-00100 Helsinki, Finland School of Modern Languages and Translation Studies, FIN-33014 University of Tampere, Finland

A R T I C L E I N F O

A B S T R A C T

Article history: Received 19 September 2008 Accepted 25 January 2010

This article deals with the sequences of irony in TV debates during the Finnish presidential election in 2006. The aim of the article is, within the framework of Conversation Analysis, to analyse how irony is accomplished in the interaction: how it is constructed, used and dealt with in the sequential context. We analyse instances which ridicule the opponent and shift the serious modality of the setting. Although the target or the victim of irony is the opponent, in public discussion, the talk is always designed for an overhearing audience. In the analysed debates, irony is used as a defence in response to criticism and as an attack; in both cases it provides a resource for the participants to improve their own position against their opponents. In most cases, irony is easily recognisable, but owing to its ambiguity, it is sometimes difficult to assign a specific function to it. In a staged debate, this ambiguity is a resource which can be exploited for positive self-display. The recipient typically treats irony-implicative utterances literally, which is a means to ironise the original ironist who in his/her turn shifts back to the serious mode as if not having been ironic at all. ß 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Irony Conversation analysis Rhetoric TV debate Political discourse Finnish language

1. Introduction In recent years, several theories have been proposed to define irony and to explain its use and understanding by offering different perspectives on the phenomenon (Colston and Gibbs, 2007:4). However, the data examined have typically been context-free sentences and/or artificial examples. In contrast, we consider irony as a contextual and interactional phenomenon and examine its use in authentic discourse: on Finnish television, in a public setting where two candidates for presidential election are interviewed by two moderators and where these candidates engage in a debate. Election debates are staged discussions in front of an audience (television viewers and, in some cases, a studio audience as well), that is, the candidates not only address their arguments to the audience but also ‘perform’ the discussion for them; they take the audience into account all the time (Nuolija¨rvi and Tiittula, 2003; Clayman and Heritage, 2002; Hess-Lu¨ttich, 2007). Another important aspect of these debates is that the candidates attempt to present themselves in a positive light and to attempt to portray the opponent in a less positive or a negative light. In order to improve their own positions, they use various rhetorical strategies, especially ‘enforcement’ strategies which aim to enhance the speaker’s communicative rights and the opponent’s obligations (Kallmeyer and Schmitt, 1996; see also Gotsbachner, 2008). This enforcement can be exploited at the different levels of interaction: speaking opportunities, utterance meanings, factual representations, discoursive actions and social relationships. Typical enforcing activities which are linked to irony are making provocative comments, calling for legitimation, assigning unintended meanings to the interlocutor’s utterances and discrediting the opponent. Through irony,

* Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (P. Nuolija¨rvi). 0378-2166/$ – see front matter ß 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2010.01.019

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

573

speakers can position themselves, and at the same time position their interlocutors in a social sphere and/or at an interactional level (Weizman, 2008:76). In this article, we analyse the use of irony as a strategic device in political argumentation. This includes not only ways of arguing with the opponent and being ironic, but also ways of responding to criticism and ironic turns. Specifically, we focus on the sequential emergence and management of irony. Before analysing the data we shall first discuss features which are claimed to be typical of irony and their relevance for our subject, and second, we shall review prior research connected to this study. Irony is often defined as ‘‘the use of words to express something other than and especially the opposite of the literal meaning’’ (Attardo, 2000:794).1 Leech (1983:142) gives the following example: That’s all I wanted!; used ironically, the utterance is taken to mean ‘That’s exactly what I did not want’. Irony is thus typically ambiguous, indirect and implicit. Many scholars argue that the implicit meaning neglects the literal one, whereas others claim that the said and the unsaid coexist: the ironic meaning is not simply the unsaid meaning, and the unsaid is not always a simple inversion or the opposite of the said (Hutcheon, 1994:12–13). So a good example of an utterance which is both literal and ironic at the same time is a negated overstatement such as He is not exceptionally bright to refer to an idiot (Giora et al., 2005). The allusive nature of irony is essential in the mention theory proposed by Sperber and Wilson (1981). The recent version of this theory, the echoic interpretation theory (Sperber and Wilson, 1995, 1998; Wilson and Sperber, 1992), argues that verbal irony is a variety of indirect quotations, which are echoic mentions of something previously experienced or said and of the speaker’s negative attitude toward it. Another influencial approach to irony, the pretense theory proposed by Clark and Gerrig (1984), views an ironist as ‘‘pretending to be an injudicious person speaking to an uninitiated audience’’ (Clark and Gerrig, 1984:121). Due to the ambiguity and implicitness, a common ground has been assumed to be a necessary condition, or at least important, for the understanding of irony (e.g. Barbe, 1995; Pexman and Zvaigzne, 2004; cf. the concept of shared cognitive environment by Sperber and Wilson, 1995). The participants in our data, the presidential candidates, know each other well and may thus share mutual knowledge which is not accessible to outsiders. However, as mentioned earlier, their talk is addressed above all to a third party, the audience.2 As a consequence, in order to be successful, their irony needs to be constructed in such a way that their audience is able to recognise it on the basis of their common cultural knowledge, i.e. without the special background knowledge shared only by the candidates themselves.3 As Wilson and Sperber (1992:67) observe, speakers aim at maximal relevance, that is, at a maximal contextual effect4 for minimal processing effort (see also Sperber and Wilson, 1995). Consequently, the recognition of verbal irony depends on an interaction between the linguistic form, the shared cognitive environment, and the criterion of consistency with the principle of relevance (Wilson and Sperber, 1992:76). Irony is always supposed to have a critical edge, and many linguists argue that the core of irony is negative (e.g. Barbe, 1995; Hartung, 1998; Colston and Lee, 2004; Rahtu, 2006). Furthermore, the echoic mention theory claims that verbal irony involves an attitude of disapproval towards the echoed thought (Wilson and Sperber, 1992:60). Brown and Levinson (1987:265) suggest that the reason for associating ironies with critical content is that the expression of such content tends to be a serious face-threatening act, calling for an off-record strategy.5 This feature of negative evaluation also applies to our data: in political debates, irony seems to function above all as criticism. How critical and aggressive one may be in a public debate varies from culture to culture; the style in Finnish television discussions is rather moderate, and in general, criticism is shown in subtler ways than, for example, in discussions on German television (Nuolija¨rvi and Tiittula, 2000). The critical edge implies a target or a victim. Rahtu (2006) distinguishes these two notions, a victim meaning a person and a target referring to objects, features, phenomena, etc. In political debates, the most obvious victim is the opponent (or the opposing party with whom the speaker is arguing), whereas the target is the opinion or the action of the opponent. The victim can be the addressee of irony, but the talk can also be addressed to a third party, independent of the victim being present or absent. In TV debates, the addressees of irony are the participants in the discussion as well as those watching the programme. The issues related to irony are sarcasm, mocking and humour. The first of these, sarcasm, is assumed to be the most typical form of irony and considered to be more negative and aggressive than the other two types (Barbe, 1995:28; Gibbs, 2000). For example, Norrick (1993:135) states that sarcasm (and mocking) ‘‘display a high degree of aggression toward the 1 According to the traditional pragmatic view of irony (Grice, 1975; Leech, 1983; Searle, 1979; Haverkate, 1990), people detect ironic meanings by becoming aware of an apparent violation of the maxim of quality or quantity (Grice, 1975; Leech, 1983) or felicity conditions for surface speech acts (Searle, 1979; Haverkate, 1990); as a result, they substitute the surface-literal meaning with its opposite meaning (Utsumi, 2000:1779). Recent pragmatic theories pay more attention to the complexity of irony in real-life interaction (e.g., Non-Cooperative Principle by Eisterhold et al., 2006; the reversal evaluation theory by Partington, 2007). 2 Cf. Clark’s (1996:14 15) distinction between participants, side participants and bystanders (see also Goffman, 1976): Side participants take part in the conversation but are not currently being addressed. Moreover, bystanders are openly present but not part of the conversation. The audience of a public debate can be seen as bystanders but also as side participants. 3 See Hartung (1998:184). 4 By contextual effect, Sperber and Wilson refer to the interaction between new and old information, for example, the cancellation or strengthening of existing assumptions (Sperber and Wilson, 1995:109; Wilson and Sperber, 1992:67). 5 For example, Schu¨tte (1991) found that in the interaction between orchestra musicians, irony was used as a means for presenting indirect criticism to avoid conflict and for securing cooperation despite divergent interests. Furthermore, Piirainen-Marsh’s (forthcoming) analysis of classroom interaction revealed that both teachers and students exploited irony for critical stance-taking in a face-saving way.

574

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

listener, since they make this listener the butt of the joke’’. In contrast, irony includes a mocking aspect which, however, is not equally present in the various types of irony. Furthermore, irony is often regarded as being humorous, but as many scholars state, irony need not be amusing. Hartung (1998:167–168) argues that if irony is a way of expression, and one of its effects can be amusement, this amusing effect depends on the comical potential of the utterance and on the contextual realisation (p. 187). In other words, making a fool of the opponent may elicit laughter but it is hardly amusing from the opponent’s point of view. Although the sarcastic, mocking and humorous aspects of irony are also present in our data, we do not analyse them separately. As mentioned earlier, prior research on irony is mostly based on single utterances or on artificial examples. Traditionally, naturally occurring data have often been collected on the basis of memory or field notes, without recording the interaction. Data of this kind run the risk of not capturing the variation of irony as well as its diversity in the usage, because the interaction and the discourse as a whole are not taken into account. As Gibbs and Colston (2007:588) note, irony probably does not come forth only in single expressions, and interlocutors often engage in ironic repartee so that ironic utterances are chained together. When entire discourses have been explored, the data have mostly consisted of written texts (e.g. Kohvakka, 1997; Prestin, 2000; Rahtu, 2006). Irony in authentic conversations has been studied less frequently. A few instances to mention are the qualitative analyses conducted by Hartung (1998), Clift (1999), Kotthoff (2002, 2003), and Weizman (2008), as well as Gibbs’ (2000) quantitative study. One important feature which has been overlooked in most research is multimodality (cf. Attardo et al., 2003)6: in talk-in-interaction, irony is accomplished not only by verbal means, but also through different modalities of expression. Since our data is video taped, we are able to take into account gestures, facial expressions and other non-verbal elements. Highly relevant aspects of speech are also vocal tone and prosodic features. A deeper analysis of prosody would, however, go beyond this study. Linguistic research on irony has focused on its semantic or pragmatic nature: on the one hand, on the meaning of the ironic sentence or utterance, and on the other, on its function. Another central issue has been the comprehension of irony and how it can be explained (e.g. Giora and Fein, 1999; Utsumi, 2000; Colston, 2002). Moreover, the reception of irony has been studied from various perspectives. From a psycholinguistic perspective, a central issue has been the cognitive processing of irony; these are mostly experimental studies (e.g., Gibbs and O’Brien, 1991; Schwoebel et al., 2000; Giora, 2003; Ivanko and Pexman, 2003). From the interactional point of view, it is relevant to investigate the use of irony and the reactions to it. According to many studies, a common response to irony is laughter or smiling (Clift, 1999; Kotthoff, 2003; Eisterhold et al., 2006). Other reactions are non-verbal reactions, including gestures such as dirty looks, rolled eyes, head shakes, squinting, reddening of the face, sticking out the tongue, mumbling, and other means, such as topic changes and metalinguistic comments (Eisterhold et al., 2006). The addressee can react to irony in a play frame, but also with a ‘serious’ verbal response, which was found to be a frequent response type in the study by Eisterhold et al. (2006; see also Drew, 1987). Responses of this type were also found in Kotthoff’s (2003) study. She examined responses in two different contexts: in private conversations among close acquaintances, and in pro and con discussions on Austrian television. Kotthoff’s findings show that in the conversations between friends, responses to what was literally said (to the dictum) were more common, whereas in the TV debates, responses to what was meant (to the implicatum) were more frequent. The setting seems to be crucial for the use of irony. For example, the relationship between the participants may affect their use of it. For instance, Eisterhold et al. (2006) determined that ironic utterances were more frequent among acquaintances or intimates than among strangers. Furthermore, in Kotthoff’s (2003) data irony emerged more in private conversations than in public debates. In contrast, Weizman’s (2008:105) analysis of the news interviews on Israeli national television showed that irony was rather rare. Our data consist of election debates, in which appealing to the audience is most important. Accordingly, it is not surprising to find irony in a context of this kind, for irony is traditionally considered to be a rhetorical means of persuasion, especially in political speech (Partington, 2007), and also a means of showing the speaker’s intelligence (Hartung, 1998:20–21). Moreover, the functions of irony can differ according to the relationship between the participants and the setting: as essentially negative, it can serve as criticism, but depending on who the addressee and the victim are, and what the target is, it can also be seen as jocular as well as serving to enhance solidarity. Koffhoff’s (2003) study reported that the affective keying of ironic actions was different in the two different contexts: in the private conversations, the irony was friendly, while in the discussions on controversial issues, irony was used for presenting a critical action. Since Kotthoff’s televised data is quite similar to ours, we will return to her findings after we present our analysis. In what follows we will first describe our data, beginning with the larger context, the Finnish presidential election, and then the specific type of the setting, the television debates during the campaign in 2006. Second, we will provide a sequential analysis of the typical cases of irony: irony as a defence and irony as an attack. We will also show how the ambiguity of ironyimplicative utterances7 is treated in the unfolding interaction. After the analysis, we will summarise the results and discuss the further relevance of the conversation analytical method for the study of irony.

6 There is, however, research on the role of prosodic cues which are assumed to be essential for the recognition of verbal irony (e.g. Bryant and Fox Tree, 2002, 2005; Gibbs, 2000). 7 We speak in terms of ‘irony-implicative utterances’ rather than ironic utterances.

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

575

2. Finnish presidential election and TV debates during the campaign The President of Finland is elected directly by the people for a term of six years. The same person may be elected as president for two consecutive terms only. Presidential candidates may be nominated by registered parties that have won at least one seat in the preceding parliamentary election. A candidate may also be nominated by a minimum of 20,000 citizens who have established a constituency association. The presidential election involves one to two rounds of voting; if none of the candidates receives more than 50% of the votes in the first vote, a second round is held between the two highest placed candidates two weeks after the first one. The candidate who then receives the most votes is elected. Earlier, the President had more power than today (e.g. appointment of the prime minister who formed the government). In 2000, the presidential powers were reduced, but the President still has important tasks and rights, especially concerning foreign policy. The new role of the President after the constitution reform of 2000 is still being formulated. The current president, Tarja Halonen, was elected for the first time in 2000 and re-elected in 2006. She is the 11th President of Finland and the first woman to hold the office. She has earlier served as a Member of Parliament (Social Democratic Party), Minister of Justice and Foreign Minister. In the 2006 election, there were eight candidates from various parties. The campaign mainly took place at the end of 2005 and included, among other things, many TV debates on different channels. The two candidates who qualified for the second round were the incumbent Tarja Halonen and Sauli Niinisto¨, former Chairman of the National Coalition Party and former Finance Minister. During the election campaign, he held a directorship at the European Investment Bank. In the second round, held on 29 January 2006, Halonen received 51.8 per cent of the votes against 48.2 per cent for Niinisto¨. Television debates are an important part of election campaigns today, and they play a significant role in the voting decisions of the citizens. Important criteria for the voters include the candidates’ way of arguing and expressing themselves in the discussion, as well as their interaction with their opponent. As usual, this time the election was also a central topic in the media. The TV channels broadcast a great number of programmes on the election. For instance, during the two weeks before the second round, five debates were conducted. The newspapers reported and discussed these television debates and they also commented on the conduct of the candidates. Our data consist of four debates between the two candidates qualified for the second round of the Finnish presidential election in 2006. Each debate lasted 1–2 h and was hosted by two moderators. One debate (MTV3, 25 January 2006) was followed by a studio audience consisting of supporters of both candidates; there were also some special guests who briefly participated in the discussion. The studio audience gave applause or showed disapproval, and also asked some questions. The overall structure in all the discussions analysed was a question–answer format: the candidates answered questions posed by the moderators, but also commented each other’s turns and argued with one another. 3. Analysis of ironic sequences In the following analysis, we present instances of irony which seem to be typical of election debates. These can be divided into two groups: irony as a defence and irony as an attack. In addition, we discuss two ambiguous cases in which irony can be interpreted as a kind of friendly humour. This analysis focuses on the interactional use of irony: how irony is invoked and what is the source of the ironic turn, how the speaker exploits the context to produce irony, how the irony is constructed, how it is dealt with by the recipient, and how the sequence is closed. We will show how irony is exploited as a strategic means in political television discussions reflecting permanent struggles for dominance with losses and gains. In the end, only one person can win, and finally the audience (voters) decide who the winner is. 3.1. Irony as a defence Irony as a defence typically occurs after a critical comment or question. In the following extract, the topic is security policy. Prior to this extract, Niinisto¨ has touched on the issue of security guarantees. He then states: ‘This of course leaves open the question of what threats you are actually painting. I am not painting any threats but I am a realist.’ Niinisto¨ projects Halonen’s counter-argument and aims to prevent it. He does not, however, specify what kind of threats he means but goes on with ‘painting’, which he denies: he is not imagining, he is a realist. When Halonen gets the turn, she picks out the ‘threats’ in the preceding turn and asks where they come from (lines 1–3). (1) [YLE, 18 January 2006] 1

TH:

.hh no mista¨ se te.hh well where do you -

2

mista¨ se nyt sitten Sauli Niinisto¨ se uhka (.) where do you Sauli Niinisto¨ then think that the threat (.)

3

teida¨ n ta¨ s arviossa ni sitten tulee. in this estimation of yours where does it come from.

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

576

4

SN:

ta¨ ma¨ on va¨ ha¨ n samanlainen kysymys jonka olisi

vo:i.

oh dear. this is a bit like a question that one could voinut esitta¨ a¨ .hh o¨ o¨ Rooman valtakunnan ikuisen rauhan

5

have put

.hh er to the creators of the permanent peace

luoj [ille etta¨ ,

6

of the Roman Empire that 7

[ei puhutaan nyt ta¨ sta¨ meida¨ n (va¨ ha¨ st-).

TH:

no let’s talk now about our (small). 8

SN:

niin. mutta kun ihmiskunta nyt on vaan yes.

but since humans just have

[ka¨ ytta¨ ytynyt na¨ in. .hhh < (0.5) o¨ o¨ minusta,

9

behaved like this.

.hhh < (0.5) er I feel

10

TH:

[ei no,

11

SN:

o¨ o¨ o¨ m on aika lailla poissuljettu ajatus

no well, er erm it is a pretty much excluded thought 12

etta¨ joku pa¨ a¨ tta¨ isi nyt

.hhh vain noinpa¨ in, (1.7)

that someone would decide now .hhh just out of the blue, (1.7) 13

hyo¨ ka¨ ta¨ Suomeen. ei. vaan maailmanlaajuinen to attack Finland.

no. instead it is a global

14

kriisi on se. johon varmasti (.) varmasti

15

sittenkin (.) kaikki kansakunnat varautuvat.

crisis.

that surely

(.) surely

nevertheless (.) all nations are preparing themselves for. Halonen’s utterance in lines 1–3 contains several particles that modify her question (no, ‘well’, nyt sitten, ‘now then’, ni sitten, ‘so then’), with which she challenges, in a way, Niinisto¨’s argumentation (‘do any threats exist?’). The particles sitten, ‘then’ and nyt, ‘now’, are often used in questions: sitten shows that the question is based on a conclusion, because the previous turn lacks relevant information (Halonen, 2002:47); nyt is used when the questioner is not actually seeking information, but already has an opinion about the issue and expresses it (Hakulinen and Saari, 1995:493). By using a cluster of these particles, Halonen indicates that she is missing out on the threat Niinisto¨ has spoken about before. In other words, she poses a question which is an effort to determine the course of the discourse. Niinisto¨ treats Halonen’s turn metacommunicatively by naming the utterance as a question and by evaluating it. In this way, he avoids answering it. He begins his turn by sighing vo:i ‘oh [dear]’ (line 4). The particle and the way it is produced – the emphatic stress and prolongation of the first vowel – indicate his not answering the questions and his disagreement (cf. Hutchby’s (2001) analysis of ‘Oh’ followed by an ironic proposition in argumentative talk). Niinisto¨ categorises Halonen’s question by offering an exaggerated comparison (‘a bit like a question that one could have put to the creators of the permanent peace of the Roman Empire’), thus characterising it as being impossible to answer, as absurd. The prosodically marked particle and the evaluation of the question demonstrate the impossibility of the question – and that of the questioner. According to previous studies, both prosody (Bryant and Fox Tree, 2002; Couper-Kuhlen, 1996; Hartung, 1998:174) and exaggeration (Hutcheon, 1994:156) are important signals for irony. The preferred action in mundane conversations is answering a question, whereas in adversatial discourses and political interviews not answering is usual (Clayman, 1993; Arminen, 2005:145). One of the enforcement strategies is ignoring the action line set by the co-participant (Kallmeyer and Schmitt, 1996:22). This gives Niinisto¨ an opportunity to steer the discussion in his own direction. By the evaluation of Halonen’s question, he challenges her competence as a political debater, as someone who does not know what kind of questions one can ask. In this sequential context, Niinisto¨’s irony can be interpreted as mocking. Halonen takes a turn in overlap with Niinisto¨’s talk (line 7). She does not respond to the evaluation but refutes the topic, insisting on her line and continues the conversation at a metacommunicative level (‘no let’s talk now. . .’). She portrays her co-participant in an odd light: why is he speaking about remote states and times (‘Roman empire’) and not about the here and now (‘no let’s talk about our small’, line 7)? Literalisation is also found to be a usual means of producing irony (Hutcheon, 1994:156). Halonen explicates the inappropriateness of Niinisto¨’s turn: the inappropriateness of an utterance in a certain context is claimed to be a crucial aspect of irony and to lead to a search for the relevance and implicit meaning of that utterance (Attardo, 2000; Eisterhold et al., 2006:1242). By addressing the literal meaning, Halonen overtly bypasses the irony by ironising his irony-implicative utterance. Niinisto¨ then continues, but by adopting the literal mode, too: he converts

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

577

his own previously ironic comment into a serious one, and insists on (niin. mutta kun, ‘yes. but since’, line 8) the meaningfulness of his own response by reformulating the ironic meaning (‘you can’t ask a question like this’). In this extract, the first irony-implicative utterance (lines 4–6) is invoked by a challenging question from the opponent, and it functions as a negative evaluation of the question and thus as a defence. The recipient treats the irony-implicative utterance literally and, in this way ironises it and demonstrates its absurdity. In both cases, the target of the irony is the utterance, but at the same time, the producer of the utterance is ironised indirectly. Both ironic turns also make clear that the discussion is addressed primarily to the audience. It is thus important to make the audience laugh – at the expense of the opponent. After the second speaker’s turn, the original ironist responds literally, so that the conversation shifts back to a serious, non-mocking mode. As in the previous example, the following extract contains irony as a means of defending oneself against criticism. In this excerpt, the candidates discuss Niinisto¨’s experience as a politician. As background to this, Niinisto¨ had recently been criticised by the Social Democratic Speaker of the Parliament of Finland, Paavo Lipponen, a prominent supporter of Halonen. The moderator (M2) refers to Lipponen’s comments, implying that he has denigrated Niinisto¨’s experience, and asks Niinisto¨ his opinion on this. (2) [MTV 3, 25 January 2006] 1

M2:

mita¨ mielta¨ te olette Lipposen what is your opinion of Lipponen’s viime pa¨ ivien esiintymisesta¨ .

2

statements during the past few days. 3

SN:

ha¨ n oli puhunut jotain kokemattomuudestani ja, he had said something about my inexperience and (0.8) heh mina¨ muistelen etta¨ ha¨ n o ainakin

4

(0.8) 5

heh I recall that he has at least

kerran ja (.) Tarja Halosen todistuksen mukaa, once and

(.) according to evidence by Tarja Halonen,

toisenkin kerran pyyta¨ nyt minua ulkoministeriksi.

6

another time too asked me to be the Foreign Minister. (0.4) ((laughter and applause))

7 8

TH:

sita¨ kokemusta ei sitte tullu. that was an experience that never came to be.

9

(.)

10

SN:

e ei.

11

TH:

nii.

12

SN:

siihen ei ollut mahdollisuuksia koska: (.) piti

no:o. quite. it was not possible because

(.) one had to

hoitaa (.)ta¨ ta¨ [valtiontaloutta myo¨ skin,

13

manage (.) the state finances as well, 14

TH:

[mm.

An expected response to the moderator’s question concerning Lipponen’s criticism is a defence as well as an evaluation. Niinisto¨ begins his turn by citing Lipponen: ‘he had said something about my inexperience’ (line 3). The echoic quotation and the word jotain ‘something’ implicating ‘I don’t know what’ (further implicating ‘I doubt if there is anything’) project a negative evaluation of Lipponen and his comments. Niinisto¨ then pauses and gives a short laugh. At this point, he starts with an utterance which projects a recollection to come (‘I recall vaguely’), puts his forefinger on his chin, turns his gaze upwards and wrinkles his forehead, displaying a mental search. He then continues that his experience has been acceptable before, when Lipponen served as Prime Minister and had asked Niinisto¨ to serve as Foreign Minister in his Government (lines 4–6). Niinisto¨’s supporters in the audience laugh and applaud the performance, as it expresses irony. The irony here relies on the fact that two contradictory statements by Lipponen are produced (cf. Hutcheon, 1994:157; Partington, 2007) without framing them as contradictory but pretending that the second statement is merely a coordinated continuation (ja ‘and’, line 3) and not an adversative fact. The utterance ‘I recall vaguely’ is also irony-implicative because it feigns uncertainty (cf. the pretense theory by Clark and Gerrig, 1984).

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

578

The victim of Niinisto¨’s irony (Lipponen) is not co-present, but the irony can be understood as targeting Halonen as well. This is indicated by Halonen’s interjection (line 8). She does not, however, defend Lipponen or his speech, but challenges Niinisto¨’s experience by stating ‘that experience never came to be’. She uses a derivative of the same word as Niinisto¨ used: (SN:) kokemattomuus ‘inexperience’, (TH:) kokemus ‘experience’ (line 8). She states as a fact that Niinisto¨ has no experience in foreign affairs and thus treats Niinisto¨’s hint literally. In fact, Halonen’s turn can be seen as a kind of teasing. As Drew (1987) has demonstrated, it is typical of teasing that the speaker exploits the prior turn to construct a tease, and that the person who is teased is overdoing something, such as extolling the virtues of someone. In extract (2), Niinisto¨ is boasting of his expertise, and Halonen reacts ironically to his boast; this irony brings him down again. Reusing the lexical items of previous turns (kokemattomuus ‘inexperience’ kokemus ‘experience’) constructs a semantic parallelism, in other words, a resonance. Resonance can be realised at various linguistic levels (syntactic, semantic, prosodic) and be used for marking a stance toward the previous speaker’s utterance (cf. for example Du Bois, 2001; Ka¨rkka¨inen, 2006; Sakita, 2006). As Zima et al. (2008) have demonstrated, the resonance in political discourse conveys dissociative pragmatic purposes, such as expressing disagreement, irony, teasing and expressing intellectual superiority by uncovering and exploiting potential weak spots in a previous speaker’s utterance. If we return now to the interaction in (2), Niinisto¨ agrees but explains his lack of experience in foreign affairs in his following turn: ‘one had to manage the state finances as well’ (lines 12–13). This utterance form stresses that he had other important tasks at that time; this implies that he is an experienced politician, because he has served as Finance Minister. Niinisto¨ does not mention that he had no chance to serve as Foreign Minister because he was Finance Minister. Instead, he is indirectly using the generic non-personal form (‘one had’), an unspecific formulation (‘manage the state finances’), and the adverb ‘as well’ hinting at the importance of this duty. The first ironic statement in extract 2 (lines 3–6) is invoked by a criticism and is a defence. At the same time, the irony functions as a negative evaluation (cf. echoic mention theory by Wilson and Sperber, 1992). The development of this sequence is similar to the one in extract (1). The opponent reacts with irony (line 8) to the defensive turn that emphasises the defender’s achievements. After that, the original ironist reacts in a serious mode. Irony is used in both extracts as an ‘enforcing’ move at several levels. At the level of speaking opportunities, ironic comments can be used to interrupt the co-disputant, thereby blocking his/her argumentative line. At the level of action structure, ironic turns are a means to steer the co-disputant’s actions, for example, by forcing him/her to a defence. At the level of identities, ironic-implicative utterances challenge the political credibility of the opponents and highlight their own competence. 3.2. Irony as an attack In the extracts above, the critical utterance was invoked by the previous turn by the opponent. Irony does not, however, always arise directly from the preceding context, as the following examples illustrate. In these extracts, the speaker uses irony to attack the opponent. Extract (3) is from the very beginning of a debate, part of Niinisto¨’s first turn. The moderator has challenged the candidates to a duel: to debate about Finland’s role in the EU. This comment by Niinisto¨ is addressed to Halonen: (3) [MTV 3, 25 January 2006] 1

SN:

silloin lupasitte etta¨ saan siita¨ siita¨ kin materiaalia. you promised then that I’ll receive material on that as well. ((smiles, hand gesture)) se on nyt ja¨ a¨ nyt (.)kylla¨ kin sitten postiin.

2

it certainly seems to be stuck (.) in the mail. ((laughter)) ta¨ lla¨ kertaa. mut[ta

3

this time. 4

TH:

but [selva¨ . ta¨ a¨ lta¨ tulee. okay. here it comes.

In his turn, Niinisto¨ refers to a promise made by Halonen. He repairs his utterance by repeating the pronoun siita¨ (‘on that’) using stress and to this he adds the clitic -kin (‘as well’), which is also stressed. However, Niinisto¨ does not specify what else she has promised him – the utterance only hints at something more. Niinisto¨’s claim of not having received any material is constructed so as not to blame Halonen directly: the material is stuck in the mail (‘I neither suspect nor accuse you of not having fulfilled your promise’). The expression ‘to be stuck in the mail’ is close to conventional irony (cf. Rahtu, 2006). This is used when describing something which the speaker is not actually expecting to receive (e.g. ‘the invitation to the Independence Day reception at the Presidential Palace is stuck in the mail’). The ironic expression is underlined by the particles kylla¨kin sitten (‘certainly seems’, line 2). The utterance elicits laughter from the audience, who thus treat it as

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

579

humorous. Niinisto¨ adds the hedge, ta¨lla¨ kertaa (‘this time’), which mitigates his ironic stance (cf. Giora et al., 2005). Halonen then reacts quickly: she treats Niinisto¨’s utterance as a request and bypasses the irony. Extract (4) is another example where irony does not arise from the immediately preceding context and is used as an attack. Earlier, the moderator initiated a new topic, economic policy, and asked, using an expression by Halonen, how to maintain and promote the welfare society. Halonen answered with a long turn. In the course of her turn, Niinisto¨ tries to start his own response, but Halonen goes on. This causes a lengthy fight for the floor. Niinisto¨ is manifestly irritated. When Niinisto¨ gains the floor, he makes a statement about the issue; his turn (starting at line 1) is not directly connected to Halonen’s turn. (4) [MTV 3, 25 January 2006] 1

SN:

minusta, kaikkein ta¨ rkeinta¨ mita¨ politiikassa I mean,

the most important what the politics

voidaan tehda¨ . poliittiset toimijat. on (.)

2

can do. 3

political actors.

is (.)

luoda tulevaisuuden uskoa. to create the trust in the future.

4

TH:

mm. mm.

5

SN:

me emme voi tehda¨ niin kuin deedeea¨ rra¨ ssa¨ we cannot do as in the GDR sa¨ a¨ ta¨ a¨ perustuslaki etta¨ @ta¨ :sta¨ eteenpa¨ in

6

to draft a constitution that @henceforward ((hand movement)) 7

kaikkie ihmiste@

ela¨ ma¨ o oleva onnellista.

the life of all people@ shall be happy. 8

(0.4) [koska se ei ole lainvaraista. (0.4)

because that cannot be regulated by law.

((shake of the head)) 9

TH:

10

TH:

[eiku, no but eiku ihan [ta¨ a¨ Suomen [perustuslaki riitta¨ a¨ . no but just the Finnish constitution is enough here. ((nodding))

11

SN:

[MUTta [jat- jatkan, BUT

13

I will continue

((noise from audience))

12 TH:

kun deedeea¨ r[ra¨ a¨ ei ena¨ a¨ ole. since the GDR no longer exists. ((head shaking))

14

SN:

15

SN:

[kun since kun mina¨ en menisi sita¨ sa¨ a¨ ta¨ ma¨ a¨ n sen vuoksi since I wouldn’t go and enact something like that

16

etta¨ .

h

because .h Niinisto¨ makes a comparison to the former GDR (line 5) when he speaks about a happy life for all people: we (the politicians in Finland) cannot do as they did in the GDR. When talking about the unrealistic constitution, he uses a lyrical, almost biblical style, kaikkie ihmiste ela¨ma¨ o oleva onnellista, ‘the life of all people shall be happy’ (line 7). The verb form in this utterance is o oleva, an archaic future form. Niinisto¨ utters this expression in a mocking tone and he lengthens the first syllable of the first word ta¨:sta¨, ‘hence’ (line 6). At the same time, he moves his hand, waving it from side to side. In other words, Niinisto¨ uses several means to underline the absurdity of a political action of this kind. There is no obvious reason to mention the GDR here, because thus far nobody has talked about it or even about issues related to it. If the interlocutor

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

580

asserts some fact that he or she supposes to be known to the listener, he or she points out its relevance rather than stating the fact (cf. Sacks, 1995:369). Everybody knows that happiness cannot be prescribed by law in Finland. The relevance of the statement is, however, unclear and leads the listener to search for an implicit meaning behind what he says (cf. relevance theory by Sperber and Wilson, 1995). It is clear that Niinisto¨ ironises the GDR, but by using this keyword, he hints at certain political values linked to Halonen’s left-wing background. One explanation for his critical move is the irritation caused by the previous fight for the floor which prevented him from presenting his own views on political issues. His ironic-implicative turn can therefore be interpreted as an attempt to downgrade Halonen’s previous lengthy talk or to establish another intepretative frame for it (cf. Gotsbachner, 2008). Halonen does not take the argument any further. She could, for example, deny Niinisto¨’s claim that the GDR has prescribed happiness by law. With the particle chain eiku, ‘no but’ (lines 9 and 10), she turns down the appropriateness of the subject: the Finnish constitution is enough here since the GDR no longer exists. By stating the obvious, she is hinting that the opponent does not know what everybody knows. Hence, the second speaker deploys the same type of irony as the first one. Halonen bypasses this insinuation and a certain kind of political activity (making decisions on the happiness of citizens) and instead takes up the country mentioned in the comparison. In so doing, she turns the direction of irony from herself back to the ironist. Extract (4) is very similar to extract (1). In both, the irony is constructed through an unrealistic comparison, and it is marked prosodically and also non-verbally. In addition, the irony in (4) it is marked by a change in register, a typical signal of irony (Hutcheon, 1994:156). In both extracts the recipient reacts at a metacommunicative level, reflecting the inappropriateness of the utterance. She treats the turn literally and in so doing, ironises it. The original ironist in turn continues as if he had not been ironic at all. The difference between these two extracts is that the first irony in (4) does not seem to be invoked directly by the previous context. Nevertheless, in all extracts above, the speakers display adversative positions through their use of irony. Adversative positioning is predictable in disputatious settings such as election debates. Extracts (3) and (4) show that in some cases, especially in the cases of conventionalised irony, that irony is recognisable without a larger context, but one turn is still insufficient to explain its function and use. All the examples analysed demonstrate the use of irony to improve the speaker’s position against the opponent who is negatively evaluated.8 The ironic reaction in turn serves to redress the balance. The examples make clear how irony is chained and occurs in a sequence of several turns. Irony is a rhetorical means of presenting oneself as a competent speaker and politician. It depends on the context as to whether irony is used as a defence or as an attack. In addition, the larger political context can affect the choice of the means. In our data, the debating participants are the President in office and the alternative candidate. Even though we have not analysed our data quantitatively, according to our observations, the challenger uses more irony and especially more attacking irony, whereas the President’s strategies are more friendly in nature. She uses irony which is more subtle but she also jokes without using irony. We now turn to the ambiguity of the irony and, through the analysis below, we will show how the participants exploit it for their self-display. 3.3. The ambiguity of irony as a resource of strengthening the positive face As the analysis above show, the ambiguity of irony allows the recipients to pick up the meaning that supports their position. In some cases, irony is very subtle, and its target and function can also be ambiguous. In this section our analysis focuses on detecting how the participants handle the ambiguity in the unfolding interaction. Extract (5) comes from the end of a discussion. Prior to this extract, the moderator has marked the subsequent turns as being different from the preceding debate. In other words, the candidates can ask each other a question, but no real answers should be given. Thus the moderator allows the candidates to deviate from the normal mode. This, however, also gives them the opportunity to challenge or to criticise the rival who cannot now defend him-/herself. Niinisto¨ is prepared to ask something – he opens his mouth – but the moderators give the turn to Halonen. (5) [MTV 3, 25 January 2006] 1

TH:

no: me tavataan muutenkin Saulin kanssa me we:ll we Sauli and I are going to meet anyway we ollaan sovittu [jo et vaalien ja¨ lkeen.

2

have agreed already that after the election. 3

SN:

4

M1:

[eiks saa kysya¨ . is it not allowed to ask. no: [kylla¨ tottakai. we:ll yes of course.

8 A project led by Norbert Groeben found that speakers who think they are superior, but cannot control the situation as they would like to, use irony more than in other contexts (see Hartung, 1998:52).

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

5

M2:

[saa kysya¨ totta[kai meha¨ n pyydettiin

6

SN:

[ai saa.

581

of course it is allowed we actually asked for aha it is allowed. 7

M2:

kysymysta¨ (0.4) kummaltakin. (.) a question

8

TH:

(0.4) from both. (.)

no, ole hyva¨ .

(0.9)

all right, go ahead. (0.9) ((nods hand gesture)) 9

SN:

luuletko etta¨ saat

(.) hyvin nukutuksi ensi yo¨ na¨

do you think you’ll be able (.) to sleep well tonight [mina¨ toivon.

10

I hope so. [((laughter))

11 12

TH:

mina¨ myo¨ s toivon samaa sinulle ja toivon I also wish the same for you and I hope

13

etta¨ olet huomenna pirtea¨ na¨ tentissa¨

14

koska sinun kanssasi on ihan hyva¨ va¨ itella¨ .

that you’ll be energetic tomorrow at the debate because it is quite nice to debate with you. 15

M2:

Merja.

16

SN:

ta¨ a¨ on kivaa.

Merja. this is fun. ((final thanks and concluding words)) Halonen withholds from asking Niinisto¨ a question but does something else (lines 1–2): she postpones the act of asking questions to a future (private?) meeting. She marks the relationship between herself and Niinisto¨ as being intimate by addressing him by his first name, Sauli,9 and by saying that they will meet anyway after the election. Her smile also signals a friendly modality. Niinisto¨ disagrees with Halonen: eiks saa kysya¨ ‘is it not allowed to ask’ (line 3). When he receives permission, he states in a slightly irritated fashion ai saa ‘aha it is allowed’ (line 6). This may refer to a prior sequence in which Niinisto¨ was vehemently criticised by some special guests, especially by the chairman of a trade union. At this point, Niinisto¨ complained that it was not fair for a rival to attack him, together with other guests, and that he was not allowed to defend himself. Halonen, in her turn, gives him permission both verbally and non-verbally with a hand movement (line 8), and now she seems to be a bit irritated. After getting the turn (line 9), Niinisto¨ asks: ‘Do you think you’ll be able to sleep well tonight?’ This utterance contains a framing question luuletko, ‘do you think’, which is a marker of scepticism. In the subsequent talk, the words ‘well’ and ‘sleep’ are stressed. Niinisto¨’s turn is a shift from political issues to the private well-being of his opponent. This is incongruent in this context and violates the topical relevance. Why does he ask this question now and what does it implicate? Why should Halonen not sleep well? Does the possible hint refer backwards or forwards? There are several possibilities to interpret it. First, Halonen cannot sleep because she is so nervous about the debate the next day (cf. line 23) and about the coming election. In that case, Niinisto¨’s question can be a threat (‘you are nervous because I am such an excellent candidate and a tough opponent’), while pretending to express care (cf. the pretense theory). A further possibility is to interpret the utterance as blaming on the basis of the prior talk in this debate, hinting that Halonen has not been a fair opponent. The phrase ‘sleep well’ can be associated with a good or bad conscience. One cannot sleep well if one’s conscience is troubled (cf. the former political slogan ‘‘porvari nukkuu huonosti’’ ‘the bourgeoisie sleeps badly’). Niinisto¨ adds a wish ‘I hope’, stressing the word ‘hope’ (line 10). It sounds as if Niinisto¨ were indicating just the opposite. His unexpected turn elicits laughter from the audience (as it does from Halonen’s supporters), they interpret the turn as humorous. If the question is a tease, Halonen bypasses it (line 12). She does not respond to the question and its possible implications, but instead focuses on the wish, which she treats as sincere and to which she responds. In so doing, she takes the sting out of the tease. Niinisto¨ now continues in the same way (‘this is fun’), thus denying that the irony implies a severe attack. The 9 In Finnish public debates, politicians usually address each other by their surnames and not by their first names, which would be an informal term of address.

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

582

ambiguity of irony allows the participants to choose the non-ironic positive meaning and in this way to display themselves as being a friendly candidate who cares for the opponent’s well-being. The ironic turn in this extract (lines 9–10) produces a topical inconsistency with the prior turns, which makes the recipients look for its motives and implicit meaning. The implicit meaning can be found in the previous context, or in the larger context of the election debates. This utterance is ambiguous, enabling several interpretations, but what is mostly present is the negative evaluation of the opponent. The recipient responds again to the literal meaning, and the ironist continues along the same line, thereby pretending his good will and unwillingness to ridicule the opponent. Hence, we can again find the same sequential structure as in the previous extracts as well as the role of the audience in the ironic strategy. Extract (5) demonstrated how difficult it is to assign one unambiguous meaning to an irony-implicative utterance. Extract (6) shows that it can also be difficult to define the target of irony. Here the moderator asks these urban candidates how familiar they are with country life. This topic refers to previous debates on television and in the newspapers which have doubted the candidates’ knowledge about the countryside; in formulating the question, the moderator exploits words that Halonen uses in her prior turn. (6) [YLE, 18 January 2006] 1

[.mt >onko < Niinisto¨ lo¨ yta¨ nyt

M1:

.mt >has < Niinisto¨ found 2

[maaseu(8tu8). the countryside.

3

TH:

4

SN:

[£.nff£ 4 ee #mmm# >nim < minu: ei oo tarvinnu sita¨ hakea kum, er #mmm# >well < I have not had to look for it because

5

(0.4) oli, (0.4) tapana, (0.4) it was

(0.4)

(0.4) .mh etta¨ :, (0.4)

the custom, (0.4)

.mh that (0.4)

>mut< la¨ hetettiin kesa¨ :ksi aina, (0.6) .mthhh

6

>I<

was sent for the summer always (0.6)

.mthhh

7

serkku:, (0.6) pojan luokse maataloon
8

sitten>, (1.2) sitten, (0.4) parhaamme mukaa:, (0.4)

to my male (0.6) cousin to a farm

(1.2) then

(0.4) to the best of our ability (0.4)

kiusasimme lehmia¨ ainakin. .mff .thh oo € €yy

9

annoyed the cows at least 10

.mff .thh erm

h:eina¨ to¨ ita¨ ja muita. (0.4) #mm# kylla¨ mina¨ :, (0.2) haymaking and other.

11

(0.4) #mm# indeed I: (0.2)

s:uurinpiirtein, (0.4) siita¨ la¨ htie olen, (0.6) more or less

(0.4) ever since have (0.6)

12

.hhh sukuyhteyksien, (0.2) kin puitteissa kyennyt

13

seuraamaan, (0.4) .hhhh mita¨ : kr krhm

14

maatalou:dessa varsinaisesti

15

ta[pa:htuu

.hhh through my family connections (0.2) also been able to keep up with

(0.4) .hhh what kr krhm

in agriculture actually goes on ... 16

M2:

kuinka uskottavia te nyt, (0.4) .h olette .hh maaseudun, how credible you now

17

(0.2) peoples’ 18

(0.4)

.h are .hh in the rural

(0.2) ihmisien, (0.6) s:il:missa¨ . jo[s nyt ollaan TH:

(0.6) eyes. if we are to be [siis, well,

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

19

M2:

oikeen rehellisia¨ >teki< sano:itte Halonen et >you< Halonen also said that

really honest 20

jouduitte, (0.4) kulkemaan sen pitka¨ n tien ja, (0.2) (0.4) to walk that long road and (0.2)

you had 21

.hh oppimaan et mita¨ se, (0.4) maa[seutu on. .hh learn about what

22

583

TH:

(0.4) the countryside is.

[8(joo)8, (yes)8,

23

TH:

.hh no, ma € luulen etta¨ :, (0.2) et ihmiset hh (0.2) .hh well I think that

24

(0.2) that people hh (0.2)

ma¨ unohdin tietysti kertoa aluks et kyl meia¨ nki:, of course I forgot to say at the beginning that also ((pointing to SN)) (0.2) .hh suvussa ni on ,

25

(0.2) 26

(0.8) yks niinku

.hh in our family there is (0.8) one like

avioliiton kaut:ta saatu sikafarmari et:ta¨ , pig farmer through marriage so

27

M2:

28

TH:

senta¨ a¨ n [yks. one at least. [et se, (0.2) o:n on toki ja iha ha €nen so that (0.2) there is really and just from where

29

seudultaan Salos8ta8. .hhhh ni tuota, (1.4) he comes from Salo.

30

.hhh so I mean,

(1.4)

ng ((nielaisee)) #niij joka# tapauksessa:, ta¨ a¨ ng ((swallows))

#so any#way, this

31

uskottavuus on mun mielesta¨ sita¨ et on koko kansan

32

presidentti. ja:, s- maaseutu kuuluu siihen ihan

33

samalla tavalla kun, .hhhh kun myo¨ skin kaupunkien

34

ihmiset.

credibility is in my opinion that you are the whole nation’s president.

and the countryside is part of it in exactly

the same way as

.hhhh as also urban

people. In lines 4–15, Niinisto¨’s answer first rejects the presupposition that he is not familiar with life in the countryside (you can find only something you are missing). He justifies this by mentioning his childhood experiences and his visits to country relatives, emphasising how he has continuously kept an eye on the situation of farmers. His way of speaking (for example, the lexical choice ‘annoy the cows’, line 9) implies self-irony. Later on, the other moderator is still sceptical and asks how credible and competent the candidates honestly are as regards to rural life (lines 16–17, 19–21). In short, the moderators’ questions are quite critical. As a consequence, the candidates’ responses are defensive. Halonen begins to answer the moderator’s question, but interrupts herself and, as it were, adds metalinguistic irony to the content plane of irony (‘I forgot to tell’ meaning ‘it was my intention to tell’). She then continues in the same humorous tone that Niinisto¨ introduced and ties her utterance to the one by Niinisto¨, first pointing with her hand and then verbally kyl meia¨nki suvussa ‘also in our family’ (lines 24–25). The word yks ‘one’ (line 25) is prolonged and repeated after a pause, which stresses the minimal extent of that experience. The expression ‘pig farmer through marriage’ (line 26) is a key element in making the statement playful: the expertise is not in fact very substantial if one knows only one distant relative in the countryside. The term sikafarmari ‘pig farmer’ likewise expresses playfulness; more common in standard Finnish would be words such as sikalan omistaja ‘piggery owner’ or maaseutuyritta¨ja¨ ‘rural entrepreneur’. Halonen parallels Niinisto¨’s use of irony by reporting irrelevant facts masked as self-praise. Her irony-implicative turn can be understood to display the significance of using irony to demonstrate rhetorical competence. The criticism can be aimed at the speaker herself: ‘I don’t know very much about rural life’. Niinisto¨ smiles kindly, thereby displaying his understanding of the turn as self-irony by Halonen. This turn, however, can also be construed as an ironic comment on the experience Niinisto¨ has reported before: ‘he has no expertise’. Halonen’s statement is embedded as a parenthesis (it is

584

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

hardly worth mentioning) in the turn, and she says it with no hint of a smile. The humorous utterance (lines 24–26) is a reaction to the opponent’s boast. By boasting about oneself in the same way, the speaker ridicules the co-participant, as if she had taken him seriously. During the next turn, the moderator takes up one word in Halonen’s utterance: he reacts swiftly to the word yks ‘one’: senta¨a¨n yks ‘one at least’ (line 27) and thus supports the self-ironical interpretation. Before continuing, Halonen confirms the moderator’s turn and adds an increment that deals with Niinisto¨: ‘just from where he comes from, Salo’ (line 28–29). In this extract, irony introduces a humorous mode into the situation. The moderator’s comment focuses on the humorous meaning of the turn while simultaneously being ironic. If Halonen’s irony was a criticism against Niinisto¨, now the irony turns to affiliating the participants (cf. Partington, 2007). In extracts (5) and (6), the irony is ambiguous as regards to the victim, the meaning and the function. By using ambiguity, speakers can convey critical stances while also pretending to be friendly. This friendliness is based on the humorous mode of the utterances. The meaning is negotiated in the unfolding interaction so that the obvious negative tone can be suppressed in the course of action, and the positive is consequently chosen. In so doing, the disputant is able to strengthen his or her positive face as well as that of the co-participant. 4. Results To summarize briefly, our results indicate that in election debates, the participants are oriented to the staged disputatious setting. One strategic device to position oneself as antagonist and to enhance the own position in relation to the co-disputant is irony. This can be exploited as a powerful ‘enforcing’ strategy at various levels of interaction: talking opportunities, modes of participation, course of action, line of argumentation, constitution of meanings, and identity ascriptions. The power lies in the possible shift which forces the co-participant somehow to respond to it. Our findings show that a typical environment for the irony-implicative statement in the Finnish political election debates is a point where the position of one interactant is threatened: it can be a face-threatening question or some type of boasting in the opponent’s prior turn or an unfavourable distribution of talking rights. Ironising the opponent or his/her talk can thus be a means to improve one’s own position. In many cases, irony responds to a prior turn by evaluating it. Irony does not, however, have to be invoked directly by the prior utterance(s), for it also derives from the actions and the context of the competitive setting. Irony is used in Finnish televised election debates typically as a subtle means of criticising opponents. The ironic turn in this context is a negative evaluation of the opponent and his or her talk or previous action, but at the same time, it functions as a defence or an attack. During the irony sequence, typically the first irony-implicative utterances are inconsistent with the prior turns in some way. This inconsistency with other triggers, such as the prosody, gestures, and a change of register, indicates irony. Our findings suggest that irony in public debate typically is marked through its construction and its placement in the sequence of talk. This means that irony is recognisable in the context even though it may be difficult to assign one specific meaning to it. The sequential analysis revealed that irony is indeed a sequential phenomenon. This means that the irony-implicative utterances do not occur as single occasions but occur instead in the chains. Thus, ironic actions are reciprocated with irony that targets the original ironist. Because irony always at some level challenges the other politician, this opponent must respond to it. Our analysis showed a recurrent structure in dealing with irony. The recipient usually treats the ironyimplicative utterance as literal, which is in line with Drew’s (1987) findings of ‘po-faced’ responses to teasing. Responding to the ironic turn at face value highlights its inappropriateness and absurdity. Thus the recipient overtly bypasses the ironic meaning and ignores the negative evaluation in it, but simultaneously ironises the original ironist or his/her talk. Thereafter, the original ironist in turn responds literally, so that the conversation shifts back to the serious, non-mocking mode. In other words, the original ironist continues as if he or she had not been ironic at all. Hence, the meanings of ironic-implicative utterances are negotiated in the unfolding interaction, and the participants can choose the reading of the equivocal expression which supports their positive face. Irony does not occur freely in a discussion. The ironic turns are not topic-initial utterances; they are reactions to previous actions (our data are, of course, special in this respect, because the topics are initiated by the moderators). This can best be seen in those cases where the irony exploits the prior turn(s) by the person who is ironised. Irony is therefore a type of metacomment. This means that irony sequences are not very long and cannot be endlessly expanded: the participants return to the key issues of the political debate as soon as possible. Through sequential analysis, we have demonstrated how irony is constructed and dealt with in the course of action. This reveals the various possibilities of interpreting it and contributes to the understanding of irony as a resource in interaction. 5. Discussion Comparing our results with Kotthoff’s (2003) findings, we notice essential differences. According to Kotthoff, responses to the implicatum were frequent in the German television debates, whereas in the conversations among friends, the responses to the dictum were more common, with the irony acting friendly. Contrary to her findings, in our Finnish data, responses to what was said were typical, although the irony was not friendly. This may be due to the different type of the televised data: Kotthoff’s data consisted of general political discussions, whereas we have analysed public debates involving two candidates

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

585

who were competing against each other in a presidential election. In this type of debate, the opponent could also deny the irony and correct the allegation. This does not, however, happen in our data. If the irony is intended to ridicule the opponent, as is to be expected that in a public political debate, the allegations are not corrected; this would make the prior implicit meaning obvious, which might be more face-threatening. An explicit reaction to the ironic meaning could also lead to an open quarrel, so it is a better strategy just to bypass it without paying attention to it, or to turn the irony against the ironist. We have shown in our analysis that this is exactly what happens in most cases. Another possible explanation for the difference between Kotthoff’s results and ours is that there are cultural differences in the use of irony. It would, however, require extended empirical studies to establish an assumption of this kind. We now turn to the conversation analytical approach in the study of irony. Analysing the interaction, it is possible to describe the ironic turns as actions in their environments and to examine the nature of irony as a resource for the participants and its exploitation in ongoing talk. The conversation analytic framework does not replace the pragmatic or semantic theories of irony, but provides a new perspective on the phenomenon. It is an approach for analysing the interaction – what kinds of actions the utterances and turns perform, how they are occasioned and how they are treated – but it does not seek to determine the conscious intents behind them. As Schegloff and Sacks (1973) have stated, the sequential environment of talk provides the primary context for the participants’ understanding, appreciation and use of what is being said, meant and, most importantly, done in and through the talk. How can we analyse something hidden and not stated in the interaction in the framework of CA? According to the definitions of irony, irony is indirect; its meaning is hidden, implicit. Some researchers consider the presence of signals obligatory and assume that irony can be recognized by ironic cues (see e.g. Utsumi, 2000:1796), whereas others stress that irony can also occur without signals (e.g. Barbe, 1995); according to Hutcheon (1994), ‘‘the fewer the signals, the ‘better’ the irony’’ (154). Explicitness is said to destroy irony: ‘‘irony cancels itself out the moment it adds a word for interpretation’’ (Adorno, 1974:210). This means that it is difficult to find any accounts which help to identify irony. Due to the implicitness, understanding irony requires that the participants have shared background knowledge. In our everyday understanding, we rely on common cultural knowledge constantly. In this sense, the analyst is in the same position as the participants when analysing talk in a society or group to which he or she belongs. As Arminen (2005:9) states, ‘‘CA inquiries suspend knowledge about the external context of interaction, and study the way participants make the context relevant for themselves in the course of ongoing interaction’’. The participants in television discussions, and particularly in election debates, orient to the overhearing audience, and the talk – as well as irony – is ‘‘performed’’ for them. In an adversative interaction, irony is one of the strategic means to position oneself and the opponent. Consequently, irony and its meaning have to be made clear enough in order to be successful. Our analysis has shown that the irony-implicative utterances are, in fact, constructed so as to be recognisable. For example, important signals such as intonation and the tone of voice as well as non-vocal features help the recipient to infer whether the utterance is meant to be ironic or serious. Irony is also understandable through the contextual features and can be explained by a sequential analysis without the help of external knowledge. A further difficulty for CA may arise from the ambiguity of irony. The recipient can react to the literal meaning as well as to the implicit, ironic meaning. In conversation analysis, the reactions of the interlocutors are the most important: how they treat the previous turn and thus display their understanding of it. But how can we analyse the ironic meaning if the recipient does not react to it but instead bypasses it? One of the debates in our data has a studio audience, and in some cases they laugh after the ironic utterance, thus marking it at least as being humorous (extracts 2, 3, 5); the opponent can also laugh or smile (extract 6). The supporting audience can also give applause to indicate that the candidate’s turn was especially apt and sharp. However, these reactions are most often missing in our data. As stated by Drew (1987:226) in his analysis concerning teasing, we have to make a distinction between recognizing and displaying recognition: ‘‘Although the only research methodology for seeing that someone has recognized a tease is through their displaying that recognizing (for example, by laughing) it cannot be inferred from an absence of such a display that they did not recognize the tease’’. The same applies to irony: if the opponents do not respond to the ironic meaning, it does not mean that they did not recognise it. But when they deal with the literal meaning, they simultaneously point out the inappropriateness of that utterance, and this indicates recognition of the irony. To conclude, the sequential analysis brings out the nature of irony as a resource for the participants in a public debate. In this context, it can be seen as an important rhetorical means for self-presentation and for challenging the co-disputant. Compared to dyadic conversation, the public setting and the multiple orientation set essentially different constitutive conditions for the production and function of irony. A useful next step would be to analyse data from both situational types, and to contrast them thoroughly. This would contribute to the understanding of the interactional use of irony and give new insight into this phenomenon as a whole. Irony is a complicated phenomenon. Accordingly, a variety of methods is needed to analyse it. The analysis of interaction reveals how irony is jointly produced by the participants as well as the relationship between explicit and implicit irony. Acknowledgements We are very grateful to the anonymous referees for the insightful and constructive comments on an earlier version of this article. We also want to thank Marja-Leena Sorjonen, Arnulf Deppermann and Reinhold Schmitt for their helpful comments.

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

586

Appendix A. Transcription symbols .

falling intonation

,

level intonation

oh

emphasis is indicated with underlining

:

lengthening of the sound

so-

a dash indicates a cut-off of a word

8

degree signs: a passage of talk quieter than the surrounding talk

#

creaky voice

@

animated voice

£

smile voice

< >

talk inside is done with a pace slower than the surrounding talk

> <

talk inside is done with a faster pace than the surrounding talk

h

the letter h (or several of them) indicates an audible aspiration

.h

a period + the letter h (or several of them) indicates an audible inhalation

(0.5)

silences timed in tenths of a second

(.)

a micro-pause less than two tenths of a second

[

utterances starting simultaneously

]

point where overlapping stop overlapping

(-)

item in doubt

(( ))

a comment by the transcriber; also non-verbal action

References Adorno, Theodor W., 1974. Minima Moralia. Reflections from Damaged Life. Trans. E.F.N Jephcott. New Left Books, London. Arminen, Ilkka, 2005. Institutional Interaction. Studies of Talk at Work. Ashgate, Aldershot. Attardo, Salvatore, 2000. Irony as relevant inappropriateness. Journal of Pragmatics 32 (6), 793–826. Attardo, Salvatore, Eisterhold, Jodi, Hay, Jennifer, Ploggi, Isabella, 2003. Multimodal markers of irony and sarcasm. Humor 16 (2), 243–260. Barbe, Katharina, 1995. Irony in Context. Benjamins, Amsterdam. Brown, Penelope, Levinson, Stephen C., 1987. Politeness. Some Universals in Language Usage. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Bryant, Gregory A., Fox Tree, Jean E., 2002. Recognizing verbal irony in spontaneous speech. Metaphor and Symbol 17 (2), 99–117. Bryant, Gregory A., Fox Tree, Jean E., 2005. Is there an ironic tone of voice? Language and Speech 48 (3), 257–277. Clark, Herbert H., 1996. Using Language. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Clark, Herbert, Gerrig, Richard, 1984. On the pretense theory on irony. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 113 (1), 121–126. Clayman, Steven E., 1993. Reformulating the question: a device for answering/not answering questions in news interviews and press conferences. Text 13 (2), 159–188. Clayman, Steven, Heritage, John, 2002. The News Interview. Journalist and Public Figures on the Air. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Clift, Rebecca, 1999. Irony in conversation. Language in Society 28 (4), 523–553. Colston, Herbert L., 2002. Contrast and assimilation in verbal irony. Journal of Pragmatics 34 (2), 111–142. Colston, Herbert L., Gibbs Jr., Raymond W., 2007. A brief history of irony. In: Gibbs, Jr., R.W., Colston, H.L. (Eds.), Irony in Language and Thought: A Cognitive Science Reader. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, New York, pp. 3–21. Colston, Herbert L., Lee, Sabrina##Y., 2004. Gender differences in verbal irony use. Metaphor and Symbol 19 (4), 289–306. Couper-Kuhlen, Elizabeth, 1996. The prosody of repetition: on quoting and mimicry. In: Couper-Kuhlen, E., Selting, M. (Eds.), Prosody in Conversation: Interactional Studies. Cambridge University Press, pp. 336–405. Drew, Paul, 1987. Po-faced receipts of teases. Linguistics 25 (1), 219–253. Du Bois, John, 2001. Towards a dialogic syntax. Unpublished manuscript. Department of Linguistics, University of California, Santa Barbara. Eisterhold, Jodi, Attardo, Salvatore, Boxer, Diana, 2006. Reactions to irony in discourse: evidence for the least disruption principle. Journal of Pragmatics 38 (8), 1239–1256. Gibbs Jr., Raymond W., 2000. Irony in talk among friends. Metaphor and Symbol 15 (1/2), 5–27. Gibbs Jr., Raymond W., Colston, Herbert L., 2007. The future of irony studies. In: Gibbs, Jr., R.W., Colston, H.L. (Eds.), Irony in Language and Thought: A Cognitive Science Reader. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, New York, pp. 581–593. Gibbs, Raymond, O’Brien, Jennifer, 1991. Psychological aspects of irony understanding. Journal of Pragmatics 16 (6), 523–530. Giora, Rachel, 2003. On Our Mind. Salience, Context, and Figurative Language. Oxford University Press, Oxford. Giora, Rachel, Fein, Ofer, 1999. Irony: context and salience. Metaphor and Symbol 14 (4), 241–257. Giora, Rachel, Fein, Ofer, Ganzi, Jonathan, Alkeslassy, Levi Natalie, Sabah, Hadas, 2005. On negation as mitigation: the case of negative irony. Discourse Processes 39 (1), 81–100. Goffman, Erving, 1976. Replies and responses. Language in Society 5 (3), 257–313. Gotsbachner, Emo, 2008. Durchsetzung von Deutungsrahmen in politischen Fernsehdiskussionen. Gespra¨chsforschung – Online-Zeitschrift zur verbalen Interaktion 9. http://www.gespraechsforschung-ozs.de/heft2008/ga-gotsbachner.pdf. Grice, H. Paul, 1975. Logic and conversation. In: Cole, P., Morgan, J. (Eds.), Syntax and Semantics, Speech Acts, vol. 3. Academic Press, New York, pp. 41–58. Hakulinen, Auli, Saari, Mirja, 1995. Temporaalisesta adverbista diskurssipartikkeliksi. Viritta¨ja¨ 99 (4), 481–500. Halonen, Mia, 2002. Kertominen terapian va¨lineena¨. Tutkimus vuorovaikutuksesta myllyhoidon terapiassa. SKS, Helsinki. Hartung, Martin, 1998. Ironie in der Alltagssprache. Eine gespra¨chsanalytische Untersuchung. Westdeutscher Verlag, Opladen. Haverkate, Henk, 1990. A speech act analysis of irony. Journal of Pragmatics 14 (1), 77–109. Hess-Lu¨ttich, Ernest W.B., 2007. (Pseudo-)argumentation in TV-debates. Journal of Pragmatics 39 (8), 1360–1370.

P. Nuolija¨rvi, L. Tiittula / Journal of Pragmatics 43 (2011) 572–587

587

Hutchby, Ian, 2001. ‘Oh’, irony and sequential ambiguity in arguments. Discourse & Society 12 (2), 123–141. Hutcheon, Linda, 1994. Irony’s Edge. The Theory and Politics of Irony. Routledge, London. Ivanko, Stacey L., Pexman, Penny M., 2003. Context Incongruity and Irony Processing. Discourse Processes 35 (3), 241–279. Kallmeyer, Werner, Schmitt, Reinhold, 1996. Forcieren oder: Die verscha¨rfte Gangart zur Analyse von Kooperationsformen im Gespra¨ch. In: Kallmeyer, W. (Ed.), Gespra¨chsrhetorik. Rhetorische Verfahren im Gespra¨chsprozeß Narr, Tu¨bingen, pp. 19–118. Ka¨rkka¨inen, Elise, 2006. Stance taking in conversation: from subjectivity to intersubjectivity. Text & Talk 26 (6), 699–731. Kohvakka, Hannele, 1997. Ironie und Text. Zur Ergru¨ndung von Ironie auf der Ebene des sprachlichen Textes. Lang, Frankfurt/M. Kotthoff, Helga, 2002. Irony, quotation, and other forms of staged intertextuality: double or contrastive perspectivation in conversation. In: Grauman, C., Kallmeyer, W. (Eds.), Perspective and Perspectivation in Discourse. Benjamins, Amsterdam, pp. 201–229. Kotthoff, elga, 2003. Responding to irony in different contexts: on cognition in conversation. Journal of Pragmatics 35 (9), 1387–1411. Leech, Geoffrey N., 1983. Principles of Pragmatics. Longman, London. Norrick, Neal##R., 1993. Conversational Joking. Humor in Everyday Talk. Indiana University Press, Bloomington. Nuolija¨rvi, Pirkko, Tiittula, Liisa, 2000. Televisiokeskustelun na¨ytta¨mo¨lla¨. Televisioinstitutionaalisuus suomalaisessa ja saksalaisessa keskustelukulttuurissa. SKS, Helsinki. Nuolija¨rvi, Pirkko, Tiittula, Liisa, 2003. Poliitikot keskustelua esitta¨ma¨ssa¨. Tiedotustutkimus 26 (2), 46–64. Partington, Alan, 2007. Irony and reversal of evaluation. Journal of Pragmatics 39 (9), 1547–1569. Pexman, Penny M., Zvaigzne, Meghan T., 2004. Does irony go better with friends? Metaphor and Symbol 19 (2), 143–163. Piirainen-Marsh, Arja, forthcoming. Irony and the moral order of secondary school classrooms. Prestin, Elke, 2000. Ironie in Printmedien. Deutscher Universita¨ts-Verlag, Wiesbaden. Rahtu, Toini, 2006. Seka¨ etta¨. Ironia koherenssina ja inkoherenssina. SKS, Helsinki. Sacks, Harvey, 1995. In: Gail, Jefferson (Ed.), Lectures on Conversation, vol. II. Blackwell, Oxford. Sakita, Tomoko I., 2006. Parallelism in conversation. Resonance, schematization, and extension from the perspective of dialogic syntax and cognitive linguistics. Pragmatics and Cognition 14 (3), 467–500. Schegloff, E.A., Sacks, Harvey, 1973. Opening up closings. Semiotica 8 (4), 289–327. Schu¨tte, Wilfried, 1991. Scherzkommunikation unter Orchestermusikern. Niemeyer, Tu¨bingen. Schwoebel, John, Dews, Shelly, Winner, Ellen, Srinivas, Kavitha, 2000. Obligatory processing of the literal meaning of ironic utterances: further evidence. Metaphor and Symbol 15 (1/2), 47–61. Searle, John R., 1979. Expression and Meaning. Studies in the Theory of Speech Acts. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Sperber, Dan, Wilson, Deirdre, 1981. Irony and the use-mention distinction. In: Cole, P. (Ed.), Radical Pragmatics. Academic Press, New York, pp. 295–318. Sperber, Dan, Wilson, Deirdre, 1995. Relevance. Communication and Cognition, 2nd ed. Blackwell, Oxford. Sperber, Dan, Wilson, Deirdre, 1998. Irony and relevance: a reply to Seto, Hamamoto and Yamanashi. In: Carston, R., Uchida, S. (Eds.), Relevance Theory: Applications and Implications. Benjamins, Amsterdam, pp. 283–293. Utsumi, Akira, 2000. Verbal irony as implicit display of ironic environment: distinguishing ironic utterances from nonirony. Journal of Pragmatics 32 (12), 1777–1806. Weizman, Elda, 2008. Positioning in Media Dialogue. Negotiating Roles in the News Interview. Benjamins, Amsterdam. Wilson, Deirdre, Sperber, Dan, 1992. On verbal irony. Lingua 87 (1–2), 53–76. Zima, Elisabeth, Broˆne, Geert, Feyaerts, Kurt, Sambre, Paul, 2008. Resonance activation in interactional parliamentary discourse. In: Ramm, W., FabriciusHansen, C. (Eds.), Linearisation and Segmentation in Discourse. Multidisciplinary Approaches to Discourse (MAD 08), February 20–23 2008. Lysebu, Oslo, pp. 137–147. Pirkko Nuolija¨rvi is a professor and the director of the Research Institute for the Languages of Finland, Helsinki. Her research focuses on variation in Finnish, institutional interaction and language policy. She has studied the change of Finnish, the immigrant language situation in Finland as well as language variation in the public sphere in Finnish and Nordic projects. She has published several books and numerous articles in sociolinguistics. Liisa Tiittula is professor of German Language (Translation Studies) at the School of Modern Languages and Translation Studies, University of Tampere, Finland. Her main areas of research are media talk, German–Finnish business communication, conversation analysis, and translation studies. Current research projects focus on multimodal interaction in institutional and professional settings such as international trade fairs and interpreting for hard-of-hearing people as well as on translation of spoken style and dialogicity in fiction.