interaction discourse news
Interaction discourse news | Raymond Sheehan | May 20th, 2002
From the Drew and Hedges article in IIC (p. 47):
"In his study of news interviews, Clayman...identifies elements of question design which enable news interviewers to incorporate controversial or hostile opinions within the framework of their questions while avoiding any endorsement of these opinions."
As you listen to BBC Hard Talk, or Jeremy Paxman or Meet the Press, do you notice any framework for these questions, such as "But aren't you worried that..." or "But couldn't it be the case that..." What other framework devices have you noticed?
What about Spanish? Japanese? German? Newsreaders (like teachers in a multicultural classroom I believe) have devised frameworking ways and linguistic means of coding their standpoints without necessarily compromising themselves to the extent that they are inalienably and immutably linked with a given point of view. Despite their interrogatory role-play, they (we) are essentially receptors (or stimulators) of linguistic, emotional or totally rational considered responses. (Of course, this is when it comes to areas that are potentially divisive. In other more personal areas that are non-controversial, it is probable that the teacher will be generously forthcoming and self-revealing.)
We can be engaged and detached at the same time??? Of course we should be more humanly and personally engaged too, expressing sincerity, truth and principles we believe in... but how? Directly? And what are the boundaries?
Question design, according to Drew and Hedges, 'permits interviewers to ask challenging questions while nonetheless maintaining a "neutralistic" position...remaining personally disengaged from the substance of the opinion being put to the interviewee.'
I'm just still wondering if teacher talk (while conducting a debate, fuelling controversy and communication) and newstalk have any 'frameworking' and/or coding devices in common? Are there linguistically realised avoidance strategies? What lexical phrases could we help our learners to recognise, extrapolate, and use from interviews which maintain (the fiction of ) objectivity when posing questions?
Raymond Sheehan
UAE
with 
and 
