Takagi’s CCI Plan

Empirical Study on the Development of Intersubjectivity:
Utterance of Children Made at Third Position in Talk-in-Interaction

Tomoyo Takagi
(Modern Cultures and Public Policies, University of Tsukuba)

Abstract

I am always amazed at the complexity of verbal and non-verbal behavior of my two-year-old interacting with her care-givers and peers. Even though she is far from a fluent speaker of Japanese, what she does with words she have learned so far and with her body in communicating with people around her is surprisingly intricate. (Not that my daughter is particularly precocious; other children of her age in my neighborhood are no different!) However, the complexity and intricacy that small children show in interacting with others are often overlooked because we are obsessed by their cute, child-like mistakes in speech, whether out of feelings of parental affection or scholarly interest in the development of linguistic competence. What I am interested in is to reveal small children’s interactional competence that seems to develop prior to their acquisition of their first language.

In my dissertation research, I videotaped adult-child interaction in Japanese, capturing the locus of language socialization through social interaction. Using the conversation analytic approach, I discussed the issue of mutual relationship between language and interaction. In particular, I analyzed the ways in which children utilize limited linguistic and other available resources to accomplish interactions with adults. Close observation showed that what might be simply seen as child-like grammatical mistakes or fragmental speech in fact reflect various social-interactional skills, complementing the limited linguistic skill.

Through this CCI project, I would like to deepen my understanding of language socialization by carefully observing how small children verbally and bodily interact with their care-givers and peers. In particular, I would like to explore how they learn to negotiate intersubjectivity (i.e. sharing the understanding or the definition of the situation with the other person interacting with you). For example, if you correct the other who has misunderstood your prior utterance by saying “No, I mean…,” this is one way to negotiate intersubjectivity of what is happening in the on-going interaction. When and how do small children come to be able to do this? I believe this topic will lead to addressing the profound and far-reaching theme: social foundation of language and human existence.