Multimodal Analysis of Low-Stakes Conflicts: A Proposal for a Dynamic Model - Conflict and Multimodal Communication: Social Research and Machine Intelligence - page 282

The third group of gestures are proxemic gestures. They serve to allocate
communicative space, often to the disadvantage of one of the communicative
partners. This can be clearly seen when the woman, on being attacked by the
man, feels forced to back down, because the man's gestures have a significant
amplitude. Thus the man's proxemic gestures have the function of attacking,
whereas the woman uses proxemic gestures to defend herself. In the presented
scene, backchannel signals are mainly nonverbal and are, for example, the man's
shaking of his head as a sign of disagreement, and the woman's movement of the
head as a sign of resignation and disapproval (see Kendon 2002 ).

14.4 Final Considerations

In this chapter we have tried to show how low-stakes conflict processes caused by
verbal aggression can be the object of linguistic analysis. In this kind of conflict
process, the primary element is the struggle for interactional power, which is
pursued through the strategic use of voice, lexical choice, gestures, facial expression,
and proxemics. Through a combined method of conversational and multimodal
analysis it is possible to describe the conflict dynamics (escalation) and the cues
of every conflict stage in a multidimensional way. In the presented conflict situation
we see how accommodation processes influence the lexical choices made, loudness,
and movements of the head and body.
In the interaction analyzed above, the claim for interactional power can be
retraced through the participants' attempts to gain control of the informative
structure and the topics. Several verbal strategies (introduction of topics, change
of topics, rhetorical questions, insinuations, hidden and open attacks, the focus on
affective states) are used to establish the dominance of one or other interlocutor. The
offset phase of the conflict coincides in the analyzed scene with a retraction: one
interlocutor waives a further exchange and leaves the place of interaction. In this
renunciation of communication we can see an example of the so-called avoidance
strategy, which is proof of giving up any attempt to mediate.

References

Austin J (1962) How to do things with words. OUP, Oxford
Bonacchi S (2013) (Un)Höflichkeit. Eine kulturologische Analyse Deutsch-Italienisch-Polnisch.
Peter Lang, Frankfurt
Bousfield D (2008) Impoliteness interaction. Benjamins, Amsterdam
Brown P, Levinson SC (1987) Politeness. Some universals in language usage. CUP, Cambridge
Culpeper J (1996) Towards an anatomy of impoliteness. J Pragmatics 25(3):349-367
Culpeper J (2008) Reflections on impoliteness, relational work and power. In: Bousfield D, Locher
MA (eds) Impoliteness in language. de Gruyter, Berlin, pp 17-44
Culpeper J (2011) Impoliteness. Using language to cause offence. CUP, Cambridge