Cover not available
Article published In:
Chinese Language and Discourse
Vol. 7:1 (2016) ► pp.105–135

Modified resayings of reported speech in Mandarin conversation

| California State University, Long Beach

This article examines how and why participants in conversation modify the reported speech made by another speaker, and proffer a second saying in subsequent talk. Two types of modified reportings are identified: (1) explicit modifications, and (2) implicit modifications. Both types are shown to treat the first reported speech as inadequate, and lay claim to speaker’s epistemic authority or priority over the reported talk vis-a-vis other interlocutors. Further, explicit modifications of a prior report generally display a stronger epistemic stance than implicit modifications.

Keywords: reported speech, sequential organization, epistemic territories, epistemic stance, Conversation Analysis
Published online: 4 October 2016
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/cld.7.1.04wu
References
Aikhenvald, A.Y., and R.M.W. Dixon
(eds) 2003 Studies in Evidentiality. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Atkinson, J.M., and J. Heritage
(eds) 1984 Structures of Social Action: Studies in Conversation Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Auer, P
1992 “Introduction: John Gumperz’ Approach to Contextualization.” In The Contextualization of Language, ed. by P. Auer and A. Di Luzio, 1–38. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bakhtin, M.M
1981 The Dialogic Imagination, ed. by M. Holquist, trans. by C. Emerson and M. Holquist. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Banfield, A
1973 “Narrative Style and the Grammar of Direct and Indirect Speech.” Foundations of Language 101: 1–39.Google Scholar
Blom, J.P., and J.J. Gumperz
1972 “Social Meaning in Linguistic Structure: Code-Switching in Norway.” In Directions in Sociolinguistics, ed. by J. Gumperz and D. Hymes, 407–434. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar
Bolden, G
2004 “The Quote and Beyond: Defining Boundaries of Reported Speech in Conversational Russian.” Journal of Pragmatics 361: 1071–1118. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Buttny, R
1998 “Putting Prior Talk into Context: Reported Speech and the Reporting Context.” Research on Language and Social Interaction 31 (1): 45–58. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chafe, W.L
1982 “Integration and Involvement in Speaking, Writing and Oral Literature.” In Spoken and Written Language: Exploring Orality and Literacy, ed. by D. Tannen, 35–53. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.Google Scholar
Chafe,W.L., and J. Nichols
(eds) 1986 Evidentiality: The Linguistic Coding of Epistemology. Norwood, New Jersey: Ablex Publishing Corporation.Google Scholar
Chen, H
2010 “Studies on Reported Speech.” Journal of Nanjing University of Science and Technology 23 (6): 71–76.Google Scholar
Clark, H.H., and R.J. Gerrig
1990 “Quotations as Demonstrations.” Language 661: 764–805. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Clayman, S.E
2013 “Agency in Response: The Role of Prefatory Address Terms.” Journal of Pragmatics 571: 290–302. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Clift, R
2006 “Indexing Stance: Reported Speech as an Interactional Evidential.” Journal of Sociolinguistics 10(5): 569–595. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2007 “Getting There First: Non-Narrative Reported Speech in Interaction.” In Reporting Talk: Reported Speech in Interaction, ed. by E. Holt and R. Clift, 120–149. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dong, X
2008 “Blending of Direct Discourse and Indirect Discourse in Actual Texts.” Language Science 7 (4): 367–376.Google Scholar
Coulmas, F
1985 “Direct and Indirect Speech: General Problems and Problems of Japanese.” Journal of Pragmatics 91: 41–63. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(ed.) 1986 Direct and Indirect Speech. Berlin, New York, Amsterdam: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Couper-Kuhlen, E
1999 Coherent Voicing: On Prosody in Conversational Reported Speech.” In Coherence in Spoken and Written Discourse: How to Create it and How to Describe it, ed. by W. Bublitz and U. Lenk, 11–32. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Drew, P., and J. Heritage
1992 “Analyzing Talk at Work: An Introduction.” In Talk at Work: Interaction in Institutional Settings, ed. by P. Drew and J. Heritage, 3–65. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Drew, P., and M. Sorjonen
1997 “Institutional Discourse.” In Discourse as Social Interaction, ed. by T.A. van Dijk, 92–118. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Drew, P., and A. Wootton
(eds) 1988 Erving Goffman: Exploring the Interaction Order. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Du Bois, J.W., S. Schuetze-Coburn, S. Cumming, and D. Paolino
1993 “Outline of Discourse Transcription.” In Talking Data: Transcription and Coding in Discourse Research, ed. by J.A. Edwards and M.D. Lampert, 45–87. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Goffman, E
1971 Relations in Public. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
1974/1986 Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience. York, Pennsylvania: Northeastern University Press.Google Scholar
1981 Forms of Talk. Oxford, England: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Golato, A
2000 “An Innovative German Quotative for Reporting on Embodied Actions: Und ich so/und er so ‘And I’m Like/and He’s Like’.” Journal of Pragmatics 32 (1): 29–54. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Goodwin, C
2007 “Interactive Footing.” In Reporting Talk: Reported Speech in Interaction, ed. by E. Holt and R. Clift, 16–46. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Goodwin, M.H
1990 He-Said-She-Said: Talk as Social Organization among Black Children. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Grice, H. Paul
1975 “Logic and Conversation.” In Syntax and Semantics, vol. 3, Speech Acts, ed. by P. Cole and J.L. Morgan, 41–58. New York: Academic.Google Scholar
Gumperz, J.J
1982 Discourse Strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1992 “Contextualization and Understanding.” In Rethinking Context: Language as an Interactive Phenomenon (Studies in the Social and Cultural Foundations of Language 11), ed. by A. Duranti and C. Goodwin, 229–252. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gumperz, J.J., and J. Cook-Gumperz
1982 “Introduction: Language and the Communication of Social Identity.” In Language and Social Identity, ed. by J.J. Gumperz, 1–22. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Günthner, S
1997 “The Contextualization of Affect in Reported Dialogues.” In The Language of Emotions: Conceptualization, Expression and Theoretical Foundation, ed. by S. Niemeier and R. Dirven, 247–275. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Guo, J., and H. Shen
2004 “Analysis of the Meaning of Renjia based on a Cognitive Model Unfamiliar.” Chinese Teaching in the World 11: 28–40.Google Scholar
Hayashi, M
1997 “An Exploration of Sentence-Final Uses of the Quotative Particle in Japanese Spoken Discourse.” In Japanese/Korean Linguistics, vol. VI1, ed. by H. Sohn and J. Haig, 565–581. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Heritage, J
1984a Garfinkel and Ethnomethodology. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
1984b “A Change-of-State Token and Aspects of Its Sequential Placement.” In Structures of Social Action: Studies in Conversation Analysis, ed. by J.M. Atkinson and J. Heritage, 299–345. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
2012a “The Epistemic Engine: Sequence Organization and Territories of Knowledge.” Research on Language and Social Interaction 45 (1): 30–52. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2012b “Epistemics in Action: Action Formation and Territories of Knowledge.” Research on Language and Social Interaction 45 (1): 1–29. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heritage, J., and G. Raymond
2005 “The Terms of Agreement: Indexing Epistemic Authority and Subordination in Talk-in-Interaction.” Social Psychology Quarterly 68 (1): 15–38. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Holt, E
1996 “Reporting on Talk: The Use of Direct Reported Speech in Conversation.” Research on Language and Social Interaction 29 (3): 219–245. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2000 “Reporting and Reacting: Concurrent Responses to Reported Speech.” Research on Language and Social Interaction 331: 425–454. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Holt, E., and R. Clift
(eds) 2007 Reporting Talk: Reported Speech in Interaction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jefferson, G
1978 “Sequential Aspects of Storytelling in Conversation.” In Studies in the Organization of Conversational Interaction, ed. by J. Schenkein, 219–248. New York, San Francisco, London: Academic Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1983 “Caveat Speaker: Preliminary Notes on Recipient Topic-Shift Implicature.” Tilburg Papers in Language and Literature 301.Google Scholar
1985 “On the Interactional Unpackaging of a ‘Gloss’.” Language in Society 141: 435–66. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Jespersen, O
1924 The Philosophy of Grammar. London: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Jia, Z
2000 “The Reporting Speech and Its Pragmatic Functions.” Journal of Foreign Languages 21: 35–41.Google Scholar
Kamio, A
1997 Territory of Information. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kim, M
2003 “Reported Speech as an Interactive Resource: An Examination of Korean Quotative Constructions.” In Japanese/Korean Linguistics, vol. 121, ed. by W. McClure, 3–15. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Klewitz, G., and E. Couper-Kuhlen
1999 “Quote-Unquote: The Role of Prosody in the Contextualization of Reported Speech Sequences.” Pragmatics 91: 459–485. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kuo, S
2001 “Reported Speech in Chinese Political Discourse.” Discourse Studies 3 (2): 181–202. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Labov, W
1972 Language in the Inner City. Philadelphia: University of Pennsyvania Press.Google Scholar
Leech, G.N., and M.H. Short
1981 Style in Fiction: A Linguistic Introduction to English Fictional Prose. New York: Longman.Google Scholar
Li, C
1986 “Direct and Indirect Speech: A Functional Study.” In Direct and Indirect Speech, ed. by F. Coulmas, 29–45. Berlin, New York, Amsterdam: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Li, X
2011 Reported Speech in Academic Discourse: Dialogues between Different Voices.” Journal of South China Normal University (Social Science Edition) 61: 141–147.Google Scholar
Lin, H
1999 Reported Speech in Mandarin Conversational Discourse. Unpublished PhD dissertation, National Taiwan Normal University.Google Scholar
Lü, J
2013 “The Discourse Features of Reported Speech in Court Trials.” Rhetoric Learning 61: 74–82.Google Scholar
Lucy, J.A
(ed) 1993 Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and Meta-pragmatics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Luke, K.K. and W. Zhang
2007 “Retrospective Turn Continuations in Mandarin Chinese Conversation.” Pragmatics 17 (4): 605–635. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ma, B., and W. Guan
2012 “Zero Quotatives in Chinese Conversations.” Journal of Foreign Languages 35 (4): 24–34.Google Scholar
Maynard, S.K
1996 “Multivoicedness in Speech and Thought Representation: The Case of Self-Quotation in Japanese.” Journal of Pragmatics 251: 207–226. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2005 “Another Conversation: Expressivity of Mitaina and Inserted Speech in Japanese Discourse.” Journal of pragmatics 371:837–869. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mayes, P
1990 “Quotation in Spoken English.” Studies in Language 141: 325–363. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mushin, I
2001 “Japanese Reportive Evidentiality and the Pragmatics of Retelling.” Journal of Pragmatics 331: 1361–1390. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Myers, G
1999 “Functions of Reported Speech in Group Discussions.” Applied Linguistics 20 (3): 376–401. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Niemelä, M
2010 “The Reporting Space in Conversational Storytelling: Orchestrating All Semiotic Channels for Taking a Stance.” Journal of Pragmatics 421: 3258–3270. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Park, Y
2009 “Interaction between Grammar and Multimodal Resources: Quoting Different Characters in Korean Multiparty Conversation.” Discourse Studies 11 (1): 79–104. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Peng, J
2001 “A Cognitive-Pragmatic Analysis of Language Report in English and Chinese.” Foreign Language Teaching and Research (bimonthly) 33 (5): 359–366.Google Scholar
Romaine, S., and D. Lange
1991 “The Use of Like as a Marker of Reported Speech and Thought: A Case of Grammaticalization in Progress.” American Speech 66 (3): 227–279. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sacks, H
1984 “On Doing ‘Being Ordinary’.” In Structures of Social Action, ed. by J.M. Atkinson and J. Heritage, 413–29. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
1992 Lectures on Conversation, vol. I & II1, ed. by G. Jefferson. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Schegloff, E.A
1996 “Some Practices for Referring to Persons in Talk-in-Interaction: A Partial Sketch of a Systematic.” In Studies in Anaphora, ed. by B. Fox, 437–485. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2000 “On a Turn’s Possible Completion, More or Less: Increments and Trail-Offs.” Paper presented at the Euro-conferences on Interactional Linguistics , Spa, Belgium.
2007 Sequence Organization in Interaction: A Primer in Conversation Analysis, vol. 11. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Shen, D
1991a “Function of Different Modes of Speech in Narrative Fiction.” Foreign Language Teaching and Research 11: 13–18.Google Scholar
1991b “On the Idiosyncrasies of Modes of Speech Presentation in Chinese Narrative Fiction.” Peking University (Philosophy and Social Science Edition) 41: 76–82.Google Scholar
Sohn, S., and M. Park
2003 “Indirect Quotations in Korean Conversations.” In Korean/Japanese Linguistics 11, ed. by P. Clancy, 105–118. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Stivers, T., and F. Rossano
2010 “Mobilizing Response.” Research on Language and Social Interaction 431: 3–31. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stivers, T
2005 “Modified Repeats: One Method for Asserting Primary Rights From Second Position.” Research on Language and Social Interaction 38 (2): 131–158. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2007 “Alternative Recognitionals in Person Reference.” In Person Reference in Interaction: Linguistic, Cultural, and Social Perspectives, ed. by N.J. Enfield and T. Stivers, 73–96. Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tang, Q
2004 “Reporting in Academic Texts.” Foreign Languages and Their Teaching 21: 3–6.Google Scholar
Tannen, D
1986 “Introducing Constructed Dialogue in Greek and American Conversational and Literary Narrative.” In Direct and Indirect Speech, ed. by F. Coulmas, 311–332. Berlin, New York, Amsterdam: Mouton de Gruyer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1989 Talking Voices: Repetition, Dialogue and Imagery in Conversational Discourse. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Vlatten, A
1997 Quotatives, Reported Speech, and Constructed Dialogue in Everyday German Conversation: A Conversation Analytic Perspective. Unpublished PhD dissertation. The University of Texas at Austin.Google Scholar
Wierzbicka, A
1974 “The Semantics of Direct and Indirect Discourse.” Papers in Linguistics 7(3/4): 267–307. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Willett, T.A
1988 “A Cross-Linguistic Survey of the Grammaticalization of Evidentiality.” Studies in Language 121: 51–97. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Xin, B
1998 “A Critical Analysis of Reported Speech in News Reports.” Foreign Language Teaching and Research 2 (114): 9–14.Google Scholar
2013a “Reported Speech in Chinese News Titles (I).” Rhetoric Learning 5 (179): 48–56.Google Scholar
2013b “Reported Speech in Chinese News Titles (II).” Rhetoric Learning 6 (180): 20–25.Google Scholar
Xu, J
1996 “Direct Reported Speech in Narrative Discourse.” Language Teaching and Research 11: 52–66.Google Scholar
Yang, Y., and Z. Lin
2008 “English Reporting Sentences: Functional and Pragmatic Perspectives.” Journal of Northeast Normal University ( Philosophy and Social Sciences) 1 (231): 151–156.Google Scholar
Yue, Y
2011 Evidentiality and Its Interaction with Other Linguistic Categories in Mandarin Chinese. Unpublished PhD dissertation. Peking University.Google Scholar
Zhang, R
1997 “Forms and Functions of Free Indirect Reported Speech and Free Direct Reported Speech.” English Knowledge 9 (96): 19–20.Google Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Hsieh, Chen-Yu Chester
2018. From turn-taking to stance-taking: Wenti-shi ‘(the) thing is’ as a projector construction and an epistemic marker in Mandarin conversation. Journal of Pragmatics 127 ► pp. 107 ff. DOI logo
Lim, Ni-Eng
2019. Introduction. Chinese Language and Discourse. An International and Interdisciplinary Journal 10:2 ► pp. 127 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 16 may 2023. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.