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Time in Embodied Interaction: Synchronicity and sequentiality of multimodal resources
Edited by Arnulf Deppermann and Jürgen Streeck
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 293] 2018
► pp. 325–350

Chapter 10
Times of rest

Temporalities of some communicative postures

This chapter discusses how multiple time-scales intersect in a particular unit of embodied communicative action, body postures that are held for a moment (beyond the single sequence of talk). These time-scales are the immediate moment and its position within the unfolding interaction sequence (its duration); the personal (‘historical’) relationship among the specific persons adopting it; the workday over whose course the body tires; and the life-course over which a bodily ‘habitus’ is formed. The specific shape of a socially meaningful posture is not only responsive to interactional circumstances and tasks, as well as the relational history of the parties, but also a result of the body’s ongoing adaptations to its own organic needs, a factor taken into account in everyday perceptions and descriptions of postures, but yet to be addressed in interaction research. The posture samples in this chapter are taken from interactions in an auto-shop and a high-school classroom.

Keywords: posture, time-scale, living body, coordination
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2. Posture as a medium of interactional organization
  • 3.The situation scale: Postures, stances, and courses of action
  • 4.The relationship scale
  • 5.Life-scales: Bodies and their days
  • 6.The biographical scale: Habitualization, self-making, aging
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 13 September 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.293.10str
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